Wednesday, 10 December 1986 The PRESIDENT (Senator the Hon. Douglas McClelland) took the chair at 9.30 a.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 the undersigned citizens of Australia respectfully showeth: 1. that the result of the recent Queensland State Election, when the National Party received a comfortable majority in Parliament with a bare 39% of the votes, violates the rights of a majority of citizens to elect a government of their choice and 2. that consequently there is an urgent need for electoral and constitutional reform at Federal and State level. Your petitioners most humbly pray that the Senate in Parliament assembled, should: Support the Constitution Alteration (Democratic Elections) 1985 Bill and your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray. by Senator Macklin (from 50 citizens). To the Honourable the President and the honourable members of the Senate in the Parliament assembled. The humble petition of the undersigned electors of the Commonwealth of Australia respectfully showeth that: 1. Australians are offended by taxation evasion and welfare fraud which has the effect of increasing the taxation burden of honest Australians. 2. The community has shown its overwhelming support for the Government's decision to proceed with a national identification system known as the Australia Card. Your petitioners therefore pray that your honourable Senate will: continue the fight against taxation evasion and welfare fraud and restore fairness and equity to the tax and welfare systems by supporting the Australia Card Bill. by Senators Maguire (from 41 citizens) and Ryan (from 10 citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled: We, the undersigned are deeply concerned at the impact of the new Fringe Benefits Tax on the following grounds: 1. its severe and damaging effect on business confidence, investment and incentive, especially in the rural, mining and small business sectors. 2. its capacity to seriously worsen unemployment through the additional costs it imposes. 3. its extreme negative impact on the competitiveness of export industries at a time when the nation desperately needs to improve its trading performance. 4. in that it may compel many honest and decent citizens to defy Tax in order to preserve their livelihoods, their businesses and the jobs of their employees, thus causing hardship, the breakdown of respect for the law and discord within the community. We therefore most earnestly petition you to repeal the Fringe Benefits Tax Legislation forthwith. Your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray. by Senator Brownhill (from 100 citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The petition of the undersigned shows: That the Hawke Government should 1. Pass on the full benefit or lower international oil prices; 2. Not increase or extend fuel taxes, and 3. Maintain its tax cut commitments. Your petitioners humbly pray that the Hawke Go-vernment honour its commitment to the Import Parity Pricing Policy. And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray. by Senator Brownhill (from 40 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: The Hawke Labor Government's ID card proposal is the most far reaching and intrusive piece of Australian legislation ever, and that on all the evidence available will not tackle in the most cost-efficient and effective manner tax and social security fraud. Your petitioners therefore humbly pray that the Senate in Parliament assembled should: Reject Labor's ID card proposal to prevent a gross waste of taxpayers' money and a significant infringement of civil liberties. And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray. by Senator Archer (from 31 citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. We the undersigned are deeply concerned at the impact of the proposed Australia Card legislation on the following grounds: 1. We believe that it represents potentially undesir-able interference in the lives of honest Australians and is a grave interference in the civil liberties of Australian citizens; 2. That it will not address the problems of tax evasion and social security fraud; 3. That it will create unnecessary expansion of the bureaucracy; and calls on the Senate to reject the legislation. And your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray. by Senator Brownhill (from 21 citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The humble petition of we, the undersigned requests that: The Parliament express its concern at the disastrous effect abnormally high interest rates are having on far-mers, small business people and families. Your petitioners pray that your House strive to eliminate this unjustified burden that is sending many hard working Australians to the wall. And your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray. by Senator Brownhill (from 38 citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The petition of the undersigned citizens of Australia respectfully showeth that: 1. Australia is one of the few industrial nations which has unlimited access to unemployment benefits without requiring some return to the community; 2. the present method of paying unemployment benefits as ``money for nothing'' is individually destructive, demoralising and socially unjust; 3. schemes requiring community work to be performed in return for unemployment benefits, such as the Workfare system in the United States, are explicitly endorsed by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) Convention No. 44 on Unemployment. 4. `Work for the dole' schemes are supported by the overwhelming majority of the community, especially young people, and has recently been supported by the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU). Your petitioners most humbly pray that the Senate in Parliament assembled should: Legislate to introduce a system which provides community work which must be undertaken in return for unemployment benefits. And your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray. by Senator Reid (from 40 citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled: The petition of the undersigned citizens of Australia respectfully showeth: (i) That we are disgusted at the behaviour of the women protesters who located themselves outside Parliament House during late October, in hindering public access and obstructing Members of both Houses of the Parliament from going about their duties as duly elected representatives of the people of Australia; (ii) That we are gravely concerned at the lack of action by the Federal Government with relation to this incident; (iii) That we are also gravely concerned that the prevention of males from entering public property is a huge backward step for equality of the sexes; (iv) That we understand the women may have their views and are entitled to them, but their methods of expressing them are illegal; (v) Notes with concern that these people have received grants from the Commonwealth. Your petitioners therefore humbly pray that the Senate in Parliament assembled: (1) Refers the actions of the women in hindering Members and Senators in their duty to the Privileges Committee; (2) Will call on the Government to evict, by force if necessary, any protesters that set up camp outside Parliament House; (3) Recommend prosecution of these women for trespass and breaches of the Sex Discrimination Act. And your petitioners, in duty bound, will ever pray. by Senator Reid (from six citizens). To the Honourable the President and members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The petition of the undersigned citizens of Australia respectfully showeth: 1. The Higher Education Administration Charge introduced by the Hawke Government is a breach of Labor Party policy and platform. 2. The $250 compulsory charge is a tertiary tuition fee and means the end of free education in Australia. 3. The $250 charge will severely disadvantage many students from lower incomes, especially women, isolated students and those in need whose parental income disqualifies them from Austudy allowances. 4. The Charge will unfairly impact on part-time and external students and may dramatically reduce enrolments in these areas. Your petitioners most humbly pray that the Senate in Parliament assembled should reject or amend this legislation and recognise that this $250 charge is inconsistent with the promotion of higher levels of participation in higher education in Australia. And your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray. by Senator Reid (from 40 citizens). Petitions received. Senator MACKLIN(Queensland) —I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move: That the Senate- (a) notes with regret the increasing politicisation of the Olympic Games; (b) notes that the last 2 Olympic Games have been boycotted by a large number of nations, and that the capacity of the Olympic Games to improve relations and understanding among citizens of the world has thereby been seriously diminished; (c) acknowledges that the key problem for the Olympics in this regard is the absence of a permanent politically neutral venue to hold the Olympics; and (d) urges the Australian Government to work with the Greek Government to promote Athens, the site of the classic Olympics, as the permanent venue for all future Olympics from 1996-the 100th Anniversary of the revival of the modern Olympics. Senator MICHAEL BAUME(New South Wales) —I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move: That the Senate- (a) notes that the Australian Taxation Office forwarded its letter advising the Treasurer (Mr Keating) of his failure to lodge his taxation returns to 14 Fishburn Street, Red Hill Australian Capital Territory 2603, the address he apparently gave as his principal place of residence and his address for delivery of notices; (b) notes that while the Treasurer has apparently now given his Canberra address as his principal place of residence, for purposes both of the Commonwealth Electoral Act and also the Income Tax Assessment Act, the Federal Government continues to accept that, for purposes of the Remuneration Tribunals Act, the Treasurer's principal place of residence is a Sydney property in which he has never resided and which is presently unoccupied; and (c) calls on the Government to abide by the interpretation of the principal place of residence introduced by the Fraser Government in September 1982, which is that used by Mr Keating in his taxation and electoral affairs, but which he has rejected in claiming $35,000 over 2 years in living away from home allowance for living in what, by his own admission, is his principal place of residence. Senator MICHAEL BAUME(New South Wales) —I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move: That the Senate- (a) notes that the Leader of the Government (Senator Button) was unable on Friday, 5 December 1986, at Question Time, to advise the Senate how many of the 170,999 Australians, whose lodgment of tax returns last year resulted in additional penalty tax of $45.4m, had done no more than the Treasurer (Mr Keating) who failed to lodge his tax 1984-85 return until 16 months after the close of that financial year; (b) further notes that these 170,999 Australians who failed to lodge their tax returns on time are in addition to the 37,000 taxpayers who were prosecuted in 1985 and fined a total of $11m for failing to file a return at all-a totally different breach of the tax laws; and (c) calls on the Minister to ensure that the Federal Government provides a speedy and fully informative response to Senator Michael Baume's Question without Notice on Friday, 5 December 1986, which asked: How many of these 170,999 Australians were guilty of no greater an offence than the Treasurer who, unlike them, has escaped penalty tax altogether? Debate resumed from 9 December, on motion by Senator Walsh: That the Bill be now read a second time. Upon which Senator Peter Baume had moved by way of amendment: Leave out all words after `That', insert `this Bill be withdrawn because: (a) it does not address serious administrative failings and operational deficiencies in the Australian Taxation Office which remain a main cause of failure to collect revenue due to Government; (b) the Card would not solve the problems of tax and welfare fraud, both of which generally involve people whose identity is not in question; (c) the costs have been grossly understated and the benefits grossly exaggerated; and (d) it will constitute an unprecedented and unjustifiable intrusion into the individual privacy of all Australians and will greatly damage our civil liberties'. Senator SHEIL(Queensland)(9.35) —Perhaps I may just recapitulate on what the Australia Card might do and what it might not do. It is supposed to reduce tax avoidance, reduce social security fraud, reduce criminal activity and reduce illegal immigration. It has been adequately shown throughout the whole of this debate that, far from reducing any of those things, it is more likely to increase them, creating new vistas in crime and in tax evasion and avoidance, and a new wave of illegal migration. It is very fitting that we are debating a thing like the Australia Card on the 900th anniversary of the Domesday Book. Of all the things that the card would do, the worst is the greatest invasion of the privacy of the Australian people that we have ever known. I pointed out earlier that the introduction of the Australia Card really means the introduction of a dual system. There is the card system and the number, and the important feature is the number, because the number will represent the individual. With all other plastic card systems that we have, it is the card that carries the number and, indeed, one can have several cards and several numbers all belonging to the individual. As far as the Australia Card is concerned, that number will be the individual. It will be the key that the bureaucracy can use to lock into remote databanks full of information in various departments all round Australia so that it can get on one's trail. There will not be a need for a big central repository of information, because with that number remote databases can be quite easily linked and matched. We heard yesterday just how many departments are going to start off with being accessed by this computer key: Foreign Affairs, Health, Social Security, Medicare, and the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs. Undoubtedly, the use of the card would be extended over the years. In the past, we have been to great pains to protect our privacy. If people want to find out anything about us, they have to get a search warrant. Not only that, but the search warrant has to be specific. Senator Brownhill —This will be looking through the keyhole, won't it? Senator SHEIL —Oh, but the bureaucrat who decides to search out one's files or records does not need a warrant and does not need to be specific about what he is looking for. He can just go on a fishing expedition and unlock all one's personal files and records. He does not have to justify his actions. They do not have to be reasonable, and he does not even have to suspect that one has broken the law. He can decide to go fishing amongst one's records off his own bat. Senator MacGibbon —You will be before the people's court, won't you? Senator SHEIL —Exactly, an inquisitional people's court. Also, there is no redress against the bureaucrat. No legal person will come to one's aid to stop this snoopy-nosed bureaucrat going through one's records. At the flick of a switch, he will be on one's audit trail, as he calls it. Once one's number is locked into any transaction one makes-any travel or contact where one uses one's card-that is flicked to the central computers instantaneously. It would be like booking airline tickets. We have seen the way in which terminals work in that respect. We can look at the airline tables in darkest Africa from any terminal in Australia. Similarly, all our transactions will be instantaneously translated to a central computer and there will be an audit trail. I took out a list of the sorts of things which can be monitored-credit transactions, medical treatments, financial dealings of any sort, even telephone calls and electricity bills. It would be possible to tell how much time people spend at home from looking at their electricity bills. One's tastes, lifestyle, travel patterns, entertaining habits and the clubs and associations one belongs to will be recorded. A person who is the authorised signing officer for the Bunbury branch of the Australian Labor Party or the geranium association will have to put his or her number on the cheques signed. One's private affairs, hobbies, clubs and the political parties one belongs to will be recorded. That just goes too far. It would be possible to tell one's lifestyle, travelling, entertainment, clubs, associations, even what periodicals one buys or what bookshops one attends; maybe, one day, even the way one votes. If we have to front up to the ballot box or the electoral officer with our Australian Card to prove our identification and have our number run through a little machine-- Senator Brownhill —You would have to prove your identification. Senator SHEIL —Maybe we would have to prove our identification with our Australian Card at the ballot box. Senator Brownhill —If you forget to take it with you, you do not get a vote. Senator SHEIL —Yes. The absence of such a data trail could bring one under suspicion straight away. If a bureaucrat wants to know all about a person and that person does not have a data trail so that his or her lifestyle can be checked, that could bring that person under suspicion. Senator Boswell —It is frightening. Senator SHEIL —It is frightening and it is inevitable that the use of the card will be extended. Once the Government's computers start chattering to each other it will be worse than a midwives picnic. The range of agencies having access to the system will be widened. If a person has ever lost a job or been refused a job, consulted a psychiatrist, adopted a child, had a child or had an abortion, all that information will be indelibly printed on one's record and it cannot be rubbed off. The information will be available at the flick of a switch. This will give the Government enormous power to manipulate, control, coerce and humiliate people, even to ruin and destroy people, just from the power of having that information. Senator Elstob —You do not believe what you are saying, do you? Senator SHEIL —I believe that governments are the biggest infringers of human rights in history and there is no reason to suppose that this Government is any different from any other one. The very reason we have the Constitution, fixed terms for governments, an independent judiciary, and all the institutions we have is to limit the powers of government. This would extend the powers of government beyond the bounds of tolerance in this country. One basic principle that would be taken away from us with the Australia Card is the right to confront one's accuser and to test the weight of the evidence against one. A bureaucrat might be looking at a visual display unit with information on it which is corrupted by obsolescence, or it might be just in error or there may have been some impersonation-lots of things could be wrong with the information there. The bureaucrat can make his accusation against a person and that person has no way of testing the strength of the accusation. That is violating one of our most precious rights. The bureaucrat does not have to justify his actions at all, but a person could be compelled to divulge private information for use by remote computers and remote bureaucrats. I have heard it said by some people concerning the Australia Card: `Oh, I have nothing to fear, I am innocent, there should not be any worry to me'. That is a very unthinking proposition because it is the innocent who stand to lose the most from the introduction of the Australia Card. Innocence is a subjective phenomenon. It is a matter of opinion-that is why we have juries-and different people have different interpretations of the information shown on a video display unit. The cryptic information displayed can be misleading, and it can be misinterpreted and misused even in the absence of malice on the part of the bureaucracy. Few families can say they have nothing to hide or do not have things they do not want to be known. Somebody is sure to have made a mistake somewhere, or to have had an embarrassing problem. As I said, people may have experienced some stress or anxiety during examinations and may have had to have a few psychiatric counselling sessions. They may have been refused a licence for something, or lost a job. Senator Zakharov —Do you think that is embarrassing? Senator SHEIL —That can be embarrassing for people, and they might not want it generally known-especially to a snoopy bureaucrat. Remember that we can never rub out this information or cleanse our record. We cannot get at our records even if they are wrong. If a bureaucrat sees that there may be a tiny fault in the record he will not take a risk with his own career, and not take notice of it; he will take notice of it and that will take place to the detriment of the person to whom the information relates. Senator Brownhill —Big brother will be watching him too. Senator SHEIL —Yes. We have been concentrating on the use of the card and on the safeguards against its abuse, but submit that it is the very existence of the card which represents the great infringement of human rights. This debate should be on not whether or not the card will be beneficial but on whether or not we should have a card at all. I am strongly of the view that we should not have a card at all. Some people take comfort in the notion that only the Government will know all these things about us but I say that that is the last bit of comfort they should take. Governments are the greatest infringers of our human rights and if by some chance we let this genie out of the bottle we will certainly not be able to control it. I support the amendment and reject the concept of an Australia Card altogether. Senator POWELL(Victoria)(9.48) —I rise to take part in this somewhat extraordinary debate, which has brought us trekking back to Canberra this week at great expense to the taxpayers, as much as anything to make it clear that the Australian Democrats' position on the first of the Bills in this cognate debate, the Australia Card Bill 1986, is that we should not have an identity card which could become an internal passport in this country as it has in others. We also believe that we need action in the area of tax avoidance, tax cheating, and in the area of social security fraud where that exists. Our position is one which says: Yes, we do need action, but the action the Government is proposing is not the right kind of action. As our proposed amendment shows, we are supporting the decision arrived at by the majority of the all-party Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card which would be a much more rational, reasonable and effective and a less expensive system. We want to make that point particularly clear. We arrived at that conclusion after looking at that Committee's evidence. We do want some action. We are not here blindly to oppose something, to throw it out and not propose something in its place. This contrasts, I think, with the position of the Opposition which, as I understand it, is having trouble mustering the troops to oppose the ID card. It is not prepared to support the amendment embodying the findings of even its own members on the all-party parliamentary committee. This is a great pity because, as I said, we need some action in this country and we certainly want it in the area of people's financial dealings, whether it is in relation to taxation or their collection of welfare benefits. The Government, in its position on the introduction of the Australia Card and in its push for public support, has relied heavily on slamming welfare fraud and tax cheats. I do not think there is any disagreement from any of us that these areas need to be cleared up. But it is a fiction to suggest that the Australia Card, as proposed, would do that, and there has been a great deal of contribution in this debate already on that fact. What concerns me are some of the trends which are showing up in this very strong push in the area of welfare fraud and tax cheating. I think some fairly irrational views are being perpetrated. I would like to begin with the approach to welfare fraud and so-called dole bludging. Recently some figures were released from the Government's special task force investigating suspected fraud in unemployment benefit. We were treated immediately to a headline in the National Times on Sunday which announced that one in five people on the dole is a cheat. That was a clear misrepresentation of the position. A specific target group had been investigated and, of that specific target group-a group suspected of fraud-one in five in fact was found to be engaging in fraud. What was rather disturbing was the speed with which the Opposition pounced upon that misrepresentation and costed it out as though one in five of all unemployment beneficiaries were involved in some kind of fraud. That was not the case and I am quite sure it will not be seen to be the case as the task force moves forward in its work, work which needs doing. It is all good political point scoring perhaps but it does not do anything for the unemployed themselves. I cannot see any particular action or policy from either side which will give genuine opportunities to the young to get into the work force or to family breadwinners who, having lost employment, want to return to the work force. The same sort of passion does not seem to be put into those areas as is put into knocking the people who have to accept unemployment benefit in particular but also other welfare payments. It seems to be the easy thing to do to blame the victims. It appears to be a lot more difficult to get concrete policies which say: `We will give these people an opportunity to move beyond the welfare payments and get into some kind of genuine employment.' The Australian Democrats are often accused of flights of fancy on the basis of the suggestion that we do not have to worry about being in government. However, we sit here with the government and, supposedly the alternative government, but do not see any concrete policies or actions in this area. Perhaps we all thought there was a glimmer of hope when the Parliament decided it would take action to remove some of the disincentives that these people experience in the system. This action was embodied in the poverty traps legislation. But, of course, there was a turnabout on that, too. It seemed that the Parliament had recognised that one of the problems is that people on unemployment benefit and other welfare payments can earn, over and above their payments, only a very small amount of money. The Parliament was saying to them: `We accept that that is a problem. We will raise that amount; we will allow you to earn more before you lose part'-in fact, 50 per cent-`of every dollar of your payment'. But, of course, then we found ourselves in stringent economic circumstances. We had to have a Budget which said to those people as it said to many other people in the community: `You must take a cut.' The Government and the Opposition joined to say to those people: `We are sorry. We know you have a problem. However, until next July we are not prepared to take that small action that we had been prepared to take.' So the poverty traps legislation was delayed. That disincentive still applies. The proposed legislation is inadequate anyway because it will increase the permissible free income level only minimally and it means that people on very low incomes will still have that disincentive. It is in the environment of much talk about working for the dole, for instance, that this sort of thing exists. It seems to us that that free income level must be raised, and it must be raised substantially. When we talk about people working for the dole we have to realise what we should be saying. We should be providing for people who are not able to find employment, genuine opportunities for training or some sort of worthwhile work. I think the Government has recognised that to do so will cost money. We should not be looking upon any of these sorts of proposals as cost-saving measures. They will not be money savers if we are genuine in our attempts to provide worthwhile life experiences and, in particular, work for people who currently are not finding work. One area which was highlighted in today's news is education, which is obviously a way to work. The good news is that in the last three years our retention rate at secondary schools has gone up by 10 per cent. Senator Peter Baume —I raise a point of order. This is a very interesting discourse and the debate has ranged fairly widely, but I wonder whether it has some relevance to the ID card proposal. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT(Senator Coleman) —I do not think there is any point of order at this stage. I simply ask Senator Powell to make sure that her comments are directed to the Bill before the Senate at this stage. Senator POWELL —Certainly, Madam Acting Deputy President. The thrust of the Government's proposal for the ID card has definitely been directed towards people cheating on welfare payments. Many people are on welfare payments because of lack of opportunity. Some people are taking extra opportunities, and among them the opportunity to stay at school. I share the hope of the Minister for Education (Senator Ryan) that this trend will continue. These opportunities will have to be funded, supported and seen as an investment, not as a cost, because that is what it is. There are implications for the whole system. We have to accept the fact that there are those needs. We have to accept vast changes in our attitudes and, I would suggest, in our priorities. The other area to which the Government has been directing its attention in its thrust towards the introduction of an Australia Card is that of tax cheating. Much of the debate already has called into question the ability of the card to have much impact there. I repeat that we agree that action is needed and that we support the recommendation of the all-party Committee of the use of the upgraded tax file number. We must not lose sight of the fact that in the area of taxation generally there are enormous gaps, to the extent that major rip-offs are available without the need to cheat on the system. The Government does not need the Australia Card in order to crack down in those areas. The Opposition does not seem to be particularly concerned about them either. It is the sort of thing about which we have talked consistently. The corporate buccaneers have at their disposal a system on which they do not have to cheat substantially because there is the ability within that system-for instance, through negative gearing on company takeovers-for them to do very nicely, thank you. A comment from Alan Bond, which I read at the weekend, is interesting. He said that he did not see anything at all wrong with profit making for its own sake, that he did not really see that we have to be too concerned about the productivity angle in this question of corporate takeovers. That is a very worrying attitude and one that will not advance our economy. It reflects an all too prevalent attitude in that area. Transfer pricing is another device-there is no need to cheat at all-used by companies to reduce tax liability. Taxation revenue is markedly reduced by companies using this device. The figures show that many major companies do not seem to be called into question by either the Government or the Opposition for using the system. Many major companies are not cheating. They are paying tax at levels below 10 per cent; many of them pay below the 46 per cent level. Ten years ago company taxation comprised about 20 per cent of government tax receipts. It has fallen to 10 per cent. In the last year revenue from company tax fell by $350m; it fell below what the Government's expectation was. We have here a picture which shows an issue, but perhaps it is not an issue of cheating so much as an issue of enforcement. By all means let us move against tax cheats, but also let us do something about the legitimate rorts that are in the system. One of the Government speakers suggested that those opponents of the Australia Card, the Australian Democrats-and I suppose the speaker was also referring to the Opposition-are pandering to a selfish and greedy minority. The Government's own policies in these tax areas, as I have outlined, do just that; they pander to a selfish, greedy and very rich minority. Meanwhile, insufficient action is taken to improve the lot of another minority; the unemployed and those on welfare. It is clear from the Government's argument that no action is being taken. It seems to be that minority which is suffering the slings and arrows in this debate. It is time that action was taken. Of course there is concern about the size of the welfare bill. I am concerned about recent actions which have been taken in the name of tax reform and which have resulted in welfare recipients being the ones in the community who are effectively paying the highest tax rate, way above that which anybody else is expected to pay, because we have delayed the small action we might have taken to make their position better, to give them some incentive and some ability to earn extra income, to display some initiative, to get involved in co-operative work and perhaps to get out of the situation in which they find themselves so often trapped. I take no comfort at all from the position of either the Government or the Opposition. We need genuine and positive action to help the unemployed. We need to collect the taxes from those who are exploiting the system as well as from those who may be cheating the system. While I welcome the Opposition's opposition to the Australia Card Bill it seems to me that there is something illogical about its position on the Privacy Bill. Many of the concerns it has expressed about the Australia Card and its implementation are with us and will continue to be with us whether or not an Australia Card is introduced. The Privacy Bill addresses many of those concerns and my colleague Senator Macklin will talk about those in more detail later. Total opposition to both Bills is somewhat unproductive. It would be better to try to take some positive action such as that which the Australian Democrats are proposing through amendments to both Bills. Senator McKIERNAN(Western Australia)(10.04) —The Senate today is continuing to debate the Australia Card. It has been a lengthy debate so far and promises to be even longer than we had originally envisaged. I believe I am No. 14 out of a list of 33 or 34 speakers now with the addition of Senator Vigor which will please all of us no doubt. It has been an emotional debate, not only in this chamber but also in my Party, the Australian Labor Party. There have been cracks, divisions and dissent since the original proposal was first mooted. The debate has ranged widely. There have been many arguments about the merits of having a national identification system. As many sections of the Party, and even divisions within factions of the Party, are in favour of the proposal as are opposed to it. Debate has ranged within our Caucus rooms, our committees, our conferences and our executive meetings. At the conclusion of the debate, whenever that happens, Australian Labor Party senators will be voting in support of the proposals-- Senator Puplick —Every one of them? Senator McKIERNAN —Every one of them, including me. We have some concerns. Some of us on the left of the Party and in some of the factions have some concerns about the question of civil liberties. We can stand on our laurels on that because since the formation of the Labor Party the Left has been concerned about civil liberties. The interesting thing this debate has brought out is the fact that from the Opposition benches we now hear concerns for civil liberties. We even hear Queensland senators-National Party Queensland senators to boot-expressing some concerns about the erosion of civil liberties in this country. Senator Puplick —That is progress for you. Senator McKIERNAN —It is progress indeed, which we on the Left welcome and support. We will offer any assistance possible as long as the concern is genuine. Senator Robertson —As long as it is dinkum. Senator McKIERNAN —Is it dinkum? Is it genuine? We shall wait and see whether any major reforms are instituted in Queensland in the very near future. We will see whether the concerns for civil liberties are dinkum, as Senator Robertson said, or whether they are not genuine. Believe it or not, a quotation from Sir Robert Menzies-many quotations have been given in this debate-was given. Sir Robert Menzies led this country when it became involved in the awful tragedy of Vietnam, when the youth of this country were conscripted and sent to Vietnam to die, to be wounded, injured and maimed. Where were the concerns for civil liberties from the other side of the chamber on that occasion? This debate has been somewhat boring for those who have been involved in it for quite a period. It has been repetitious in a whole number of areas, particularly in regard to quotations. We have had, ad nauseam-I think it is about six times-from the Opposition benches a quotation from the Minister for Health, Dr Blewett, of a statement made by Dr Blewett at the ALP State Conference in South Australia. We will hear it yet again. When the first person used the quotation we saw other Opposition senators go to get copies of it for themselves. They will, in turn, wave it around. I do not know how many people it will convince to continue quoting. Perhaps it is to catch the drive time audience. I did not have much opportunity of catching the drive time audience this morning because, unfortunately, the poor individuals in Western Australia are being subjected to this debate at 10 past 7 in the morning. I ask you! It is probably okay for those lying in hospitals who have nothing else to do-I hope you are improving, Jackie. We on this side of the chamber, in turn, can use our own quotations. I will use a quotation in a negative sense but will also put some positive aspects to it later. On 13 November this year an editorial appeared in the Australian headed: `Opposition flounders around aimlessly'. The editorial continued: The Federal Opposition is looking like an opportunistic rabble. It is looking less and less like an alternative government. It continued: The decision to oppose the introduction of the Australia Card straight after being so forthright in the fact that a Coalition government would abolish the fringe benefits tax makes the Opposition look like the tax avoiders' party. A tax avoider's party, indeed. Members of the Opposition are floundering around aimlessly, with one or two quotations on the Australia Card from the Federal Minister for Health, and they are feeling good. So they ought to be feeling good. I have paid tribute to them before about the fact that they are now showing some concern for civil liberties. That is positive, that is good, it has to be encouraged, and it has to continue. Hopefully, if they ever reach the Government benches again-it is not looking very much like it at the moment-they will institute some reforms in the area of civil liberties in Australia. I also want to commend members of the Opposition for showing a degree of unity on this occasion. I think in excess of 20 Opposition speakers are all pushing the Opposition line. That is positive, but it is not what the people of Australia want to hear. They want to hear their alternatives. We know what those opposite are not going to do and what they want to stop this Government doing; but they should tell us what they propose as an alternative. They have not done that yet and it is about time they did so. The question of civil liberties and access to information has been a major feature of the debate not only in this chamber but in the other place. The information required by the Australia Card Bill will be simply name, residential or postal address, date of birth, sex, a photograph, a signature and some verification of identity. What other agencies in Australia collect information? I want to quote from an excellent speech made in the other place by one of my more brilliant colleagues in the Australian Labor Party, the honourable member for Charlton (Mr Robert Brown). On 13 November-the day on which the editorial from the Australian which I quoted earlier was published-Mr Brown listed the information that is collected by a certain government instrumentality. He said: Their name and address and a personal identifying number, their age, a full history of addresses where they have lived, the people with whom they have lived, the various occupations they have followed, the names of all who have employed them, how much they paid them, whether they have changed their name, the name of their spouse, whether they are married or divorced or widowed, whether they are living away from their spouse, the names and ages of their children, whether their children live with them, whether their children go to state or private schools, the details of any previous pre-nuptial or ex-nuptial children, whether they are unmarried parents, any periods of unemployment or sickness, what social welfare payments they have received, the names of trusts and partnerships of which they are members, the names of any companies of which they are directors and any remuneration they receive, the details of all institutions in which they hold funds, the identity of companies in which they hold shares, any life assurance policies, a description of all property owned by them, when it was acquired and when it was sold, its purchase price, its sale price, any profit made on its sale, any interest held in any property or business outside Australia, the location of the property, a description of it, the names and addresses of any companies, trusts or partnerships outside Australia in which they have an interest, the names of any trade unions, business or professional associations of which they are members, the annual membership fees, the names of any organisations and institutions which they have supported financially and, if they have had high medical expenses, the details of all illnesses and treatments, including psychiatric treatment. Those details are already collected by the Australian Taxation Office. Concerns have been expressed here about civil liberties and about the fact that, to get an Australia Card, we would have to provide our name, our residential and postal address, our date of birth, what sex we are, and a photograph with a signature and some verification of the information. Where are the real concerns about data protection in this country on the question of the Australia Card? Some mention was also made, in opposition to the card, of the fact that a trade union-again, this example was quoted ad nauseam-the Federated Clerks Union of Australia, had come out in opposition to the Australia Card. The Federated Clerks Union is but one union out of some 300-odd unions. Perhaps the most important fact, when we are talking about trade unions and their attitude to the Australia Card, is that the Executive of the Australian Council of Trade Unions, the governing body of the trade union movement in this country, has come out in support of it, as indeed, according to opinion polls, have the majority of the people of Australia. Although the debate has been long, somewhat boring and certainly repetitious, it has also been worth while. We know what is going to happen when the vote is taken-the proposal before the Senate will be defeated. I think we can all learn from it, as indeed the Government learnt from its original proposal and instituted refinements following the Committee's report. I think that the Government will take into account some of those real concerns that have been raised. I hope that some of the concerns about civil rights and civil liberties that have been raised from the Opposition benches are genuine and will be taken into account when the Australia Card Bill is again put before the Senate for passing next year. Senator MacGIBBON(Queensland)(10.17) —Finally, after years of speculation, debate and expensive investigation, this legislation is upon us. In the dying hours of a dying session of a dying government we have now got the Australia Card Bill 1986 and cognate Bills before us. This legislation is not about an identity card. If it were there would not be any problems. What we are talking about is a unique system of identification, not of an individual but of all that that individual has done, all that he has achieved and all that he has owned, and it is without parallel in any other democracy. The Government tells us that this Australia Card Bill will stop the cash economy and tax rorts, social security fraud, passport fraud, illegal migration and organised crime. Yesterday in here Senator Robert Ray, with all the aplomb of someone who had been selling gold-plated watches around Circular Quay in Sydney for years, was just plucking billions out of the air that he said we are going to save with this legislation. His opening bid was $2 billion; it went up to $3 billion, then it went to $4 billion and then to $4.7 billion, which he said we were going to save with this card. He finished up in the heights of hallucination saying that there would be no deficits when we got this legislation through. Every ill that Australian society suffers from will be cured by the Australia Card because we have the word of someone or other in the Government at some time on this point! Regrettably this card will not do any of those things. This legislation is a characteristic response of a Labor government which has the belief that the ends justify the means. There is no concern at all here for the rights of an individual; there is every concern for the mythical efficiency of the corporate state. This legislation is the incorporation of the socialist ethos. As the Minister for Health, Dr Blewett, the Minister handling this matter, said to the critics of this scheme: Let me say as a socialist that it is the interests of the community that should come before the individual right . . . we shouldn't get too hung up as socialists on privacy because privacy, in many ways, is a bourgeois right that is very much associated with the right of private property. There we have it; the lack of trust of the Australian people, which characterises every piece of legislation that comes from the Labor Party. Not for the Australian Labor Party the Churchillian dictum of `trust the people'. No, it starts from a position of mistrust of everyone; it thinks that everyone is a criminal. It does not recognise that the great majority of human beings are honest, law-abiding and want to work with their fellow citizens. But under this legislation the individual will suffer for the good of the state and, regrettably, in this legislation there is very little good. We are on the track to becoming a corporate state-a state of big government, big unions and big business. Under Hawke we are setting path down a new track towards a feudal society, where a bunch of super rich people will act in concert with an all-powerful government and the rest of us will be mendicants on their charity, if it exists. The Opposition is opposed to this legislation and we will oppose it at all levels. From a personal point of view, I have no problem at all at being able to identify myself. For nearly 30 years now I have carried a passport, which is a document which recognises internationally who I am. I am all in favour of stopping fraud and tax evasion and jumping on social security rackets. The Fraser Government did more than any government in recent history to stamp out those rackets-certainly far more than the Keating-Hawke regime has done. But what is before us this morning simply will not work. With the best intention in the world it will not work. There are some good reasons why it will not work. First of all, the accuracy on which the card will be issued can be beaten. Cards can be forged after they are issued. Nothing in this legislation goes to the heart of the problem, which is the inefficient administration in government departments, principally the Australian Taxation Office and, secondly, the Department of Social Security. The card is being sold to the public on emotion and not on reason. Senator McKiernan, despite his white bow tie at 9.30 in the morning, epitomised the argument of emotion over reason, the argument of fairness and equity, stopping crooks and racketeers but not coming up with any concrete way as to how it will be done. If it were true and if it were possible, it would be an attractive and irresistible argument. What is the truth about tax evasion, the cash economy, the social security and welfare departments, criminal activities and illegal migrants? In respect of tax evasion, what the Australian Taxation Office needs to do is, first of all, to apply the laws that are on the statute book. Under this Government and under the previous Government the Taxation Commissioner showed a marked reluctance to use to the full the legislative powers that he had. The second thing that the Tax Office needs to do is to work efficiently. It is not doing that. The Australian Taxation Office, despite what we all think as taxpayers, is a very inefficient body. The most damning indictment of the Tax Office's incompetence ever brought down in this country is in a slim volume published in September this year by the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Expenditure entitled `A taxing problem'. It is written in simple language, it is a slim volume and anyone who has any interest in taxation at all ought to read this volume. If anyone writes to me requesting a copy, I will be happy to send him one because it is a most damning indictment of the incompetence of the Australian Tax Office. That report makes the claim that $2,000m a year is being lost through the maladministration of the Australian Tax Office. Chapter 3 on computers deals with the problems of the Australian Tax Office and says that it is underspending very heavily on its modernisation through computers. Chapter 4 on dividends and interest payments makes the point that $300m to $500m a year of interest payments is being lost and that only 18 per cent to 20 per cent of all interest is being declared for taxation purposes. The correction of that problem is not to bring in an Australia Card Bill, which by its very nature cannot cope with that, but to get the Tax Office working efficiently. The Government should have the institutions-the biggest one of all is the Reserve Bank of Australia-submit to the Tax Office every year the interest payments they make or should institute a withholding tax on the payment of dividends, as the previous Government did on other matters. There are simple solutions to this problem and the benefits would yield billions of dollars a year. I turn now to the cash economy. The Australian Labor Party says that somehow or other the cash economy will disappear because of the Australia Card. That must be because members of the Labor Party are living in cloud-cuckoo-land. They are a bunch of ex-school teachers and ex-union organisers who do not mix in the real world. The cash economy will go on stronger than ever under this legislation. People will do deals out of their hip pocket on a personal basis, one to one. How many people today employing gardeners and paying them cash in hand will stop doing it because this legislation has come in? Not one of them. I exclude myself from those remarks; I mow my own lawns. I know many people who employ gardeners-students, casual labour-and every bit of this employment is on a cash basis. I turn to social services. We have had the wonderful spectacle of members of the Labor Party talking about dole cheats and dole bludgers during the debate on this legislation! After years and years of beating the Liberal Party for talking about such things, they are now picking up the cry and using it as a bludgeon against us. They are justifying the introduction of the Australia Card on the grounds that it will stop cheating on claims for benefits from the social welfare departments. But all the studies we have show that 0.6 per cent of recipients are cheating through identification means. In other words, only one in 200 recipients of welfare payments is cheating on the basis of identity. So the Australia Card will have no influence on such people. I come to the criminal community, which the Labor Party should be expected to know a little about. One must realise that the criminal community is a professional community; it is a multi-billion dollar industry. It is not at the level of people stealing cars and stealing fruit from fruit stalls. The industry involves $4 billion to $6 billion a year. People in that industry are real professionals and they have the means of beating the system. The people who know about the criminal community, such as Commissioner Costigan, say that the introduction of this legislation will put another barrier of immunity between the criminal world and the detection agencies. Again the Government does not understand what is going on in the community if it thinks that the Australia Card will prevent illegal migration. I have never accepted the figures of there being 50,000 to 60,000 illegal immigrants in Australia. My view is that the figure is probably between 200,000 and 300,000 at least. Those people are largely protected within communities of migrants of their own nationality. There is an impenetrable barrier to the police and immigration officials when they try to find out what is going on. Illegal immigrants live, work and die in those communities and we will not penetrate them with an Australia Card. The fix to these problems is to improve the administration of the departments, not to introduce such horrendous legislation with its many disadvantages. Only the honest will suffer. As Senator Peter Baume said in leading for the Opposition in this debate, most of us are honest so most of us will suffer. We will suffer a loss of privacy with the huge databank. Our legal position will be completely inverted. There will be a huge cost to the taxpayer and to industry. There is a very important ethical or cultural point I want to come to later: The denial of the ability to turn over a fresh leaf and start again in life. These disadvantages far outweigh any possible advantages of this Bill. The loss of privacy is the obvious disadvantage, and it is enormous. We will have a huge interlocking data bank, all on computer with a common file number or index number so that somebody can get into it. Senator Sheil made the point that unlike credit cards where the number on the card is applied to the card and not the individual, the number on the Australia Card will apply to the individual. We will all have a number of 10 to 20 alphanumerical characters and we will be known by that number for the whole of our life. I do not mind so much being attributed a number. I still remember my Army number-1/705497. That goes back over 30 years. I do not find that a disability to carry at all. What I do find a disability is having all my information with a common user index so that some clerk, someone just out of school, in a Public Service department can immediately get a print-out, by the data interlocking between these computers, of all my personal affairs. We have nothing like that at present. Senator McKiernan said that medical records, social security records and tax records are held. That is true, but they are not linked together, and the task of linking among them is quite impossible at present. Identify them all with the same character and link the computers together, as must be done to make this work, and somebody will have access to them. They will have access to tax records, and information on bank loans, mortgages, all financial dealings, medical history, education, employment, social security, military service, veterans' affairs, passport history-you name it, it will all be there on file. And the legislation to control access is absolutely meaningless. Senator Robert Ray and Senator Maguire said: `But we are going to have responsible, authorised people. They are going to have their own ID card or ID number to access this information in the computer file and every time they access it will be recorded so that the individual can go along at the end of the year and find out who looked at his information'. One really would have to be a mental defective to think that that was of any value at all. It is over 15 years since I wrote and debugged my first computer program. I could not write a program today, but I have been mixed up in some way with computers for quite a while. No one understands how computers work if he believes that pap that Senator Ray and Senator Maguire told us. People can get access, and get access quite easily, to data. Another thing that they do not look at is how the information is presented. It does not come up on a visual display unit only. One gets a print-out. Anyone going to a file gets a print-out. Within 100 feet of where I am talking now there must be half a dozen photocopiers. There is no security for the data we have. If we look at the history of the Australian Government and the Australian Public Service we would have nightmares if we thought that everyone's affairs were going to be safe on a computer file. In the recent past we have had two major scandals-the Social Security Department and the Health Department-well publicised in the Press where the most intimate of information was sold or made available to people who should not have had it. There is no security possible in these circumstances. My great concern really is not so much with the financial history of people and their tax returns. Having been involved as a dentist in the health professions for most of my life I know that the sensitivity of the average person as to his medical history is absolutely important to him. To have the confidentiality of case histories, especially psychiatric treatment-and a large number in the community do have treatment at some time in their lives-distributed around the community by irresponsible people is absolutely intolerable in the sort of society we live in. There is nothing in this legislation that gives us any control from those secrets, and that is without getting into the criminal field of hackers and other people like that gaining access to information and, importantly, putting in incorrect information, without our having any control over it. It is inevitable that this is going to go on and that there is going to be an expansion of data put in. There is also going to be an expansion in the number of those people who want to use it. It will not be only the departments we have talked about-the Taxation Office and the Health Department. We will find that the very first cab off the rank wanting this information, and all of it, will be the State police forces. They will want access in the way they want access to phone taps. After that, it will be everyone. The third point I mentioned was the legal position. We are now facing the situation of the traditional system being supplanted by the Napoleonic system: One is going to be presumed guilty until one can prove that one is innocent. The Government has been very dishonest because it has pretended that we really do not have to join the Australia Card, but at the end of the day we will have to. We are going to be invited to apply, but we cannot do any business if we do not have a card. That leads me to the next point-the huge cost to the taxpayers. In June 1985 the Health Insurance Commission's opening bid on the cost of this was $38m a year and $48m a year thereafter to run, for a gain of about $150m in tax, building up to $800m at the end of the program. But the final bid which Dr Blewett took to Cabinet was a cost of $1,059m for the first 10 years to set it up for a possible return of $4 1/2 billion in tax. These are only suppositions that Dr Blewett has made. The certainty is that we will need another 2,000 public servants, plus, to make the scheme work and this from a government which has seen the biggest blow-out of the Public Service in modern history. But it is not only a cost to the taxpayer, it is also a huge cost to industry. We will need a card to do everything and the extra bookwork will cost Australian industry at least $600m a year. We will need a card for everything: To open a bank account, to get a safety deposit box, to sell, to buy or to borrow. This legislation will bring the whole of the commercial world under the eye and the regulation of government and that is an infringement of our freedom that no one on the other side of the Senate talks about but it is absolutely revolutionary. What we will need next is approval for what we buy and sell. This is the ultimate of regulated, socialist markets and it is an inevitable consequence of this system and it is all backed up by the most draconian penalties. People will be in for $20,000 for every breach of it. We are setting up an internal passport. It is one thing when we are overseas and we have to put in our passport at the hotel when we sign in at night so that people know who we are but now Senator Walsh is bringing in an internal passport. It will not be very long before we find that there will be travel requirements as well. When we have to move more than 50 kilometres beyond our State registered domicile we will have to go along to our local branch of the Australian Taxation Office, or to the local police station probably, to get a travel permit to go from Sydney to Melbourne to see our brothers and sisters and things like that because that is the sort of path we are going down. But to me one of the most important points is the very great ethical loss that we will suffer through this legislation. There will be no possibility at all for someone to start a new life. All of us know people who have had wild times in their youth who have sown a few wild oats but who have settled down and become responsible and constructive members of the community. Beyond that, a number of people who, for various reasons, have been involved in criminal activities, have reformed, changed their names, changed their addresses and have gone to live somewhere else and they are living meaningful and responsible lives in the community. That opportunity will be denied them because a high speed printer will now follow them all the days of their lives and any sort of clerk will have a complete print-out of their life history. The basic principle of the Judaeo-Christian society, the possibility of redemption, is now denied the Australian community by these socialists and that is a very great loss. I turn now to the administration of the Australia Card by the Health Insurance Commission. It is really hard to imagine a body less suited to Australia to handle such a vast program. Over 20,000 more Medicare cards are issued than there are people entitled to receive them. We have hundreds or thousands of forgeries around the place. The Department of Health simply has no chance of co-ordinating and issuing the massive identity card system that is proposed and I say that even though one of my very great friends has joined the Health Insurance Commission. I am sure that he will be of enormous benefit to it with his intelligence, his ability and his hard work. But we cannot make a silk purse out of a sow's ear and the Health Insurance Commission cannot do this job. What is the view of the critics on all this? The polls have accepted the Government's position because it has been presented in an emotional and simplistic way. But no group in Australia which has looked at this legislation carefully and in any detail supports it. That view ranges right across the whole of the social and political spectrum of Australia. Above all, the special Parliamentary Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card came down unhesitatingly against it. The Government is not being honest. This is not a simple, plastic ID card; this is a massive intrusion into everyone's private affairs. A huge data bank will be set up which will inevitably be abused as an instrument of oppression of Australian people. It will take away our basic liberties and our basic rights. It will take away our privacy. It will take away the right to independent financial activities. It is unnecessary and it cannot work. The Australian Labor Party does not trust the people it governs. The Labor Party starts with a feeling of inadequacy socially. It does not recognise the rights of people to make and determine their own lives. I come back to the statement of Dr Blewett at the Australian Labor Party conference in South Australia as justification for this action. He said: Let me say as a socialist that it is the interests of the community that should come before the individual right . . . we shouldn't get too hung up as socialists on privacy because privacy, in many ways, is a bourgeois right and that is very much associated with the right to private property. Senator CROWLEY(South Australia)(10.41) —The opportunity I have to support this legislation and to elaborate on what it is about also enables me to oppose, to elaborate on, or to sketch out, counter-arguments to the arguments put by the Opposition but, more importantly, to lay at rest the absolute, blatant misrepresentations-there is only one word for it and that is lies-in this place about the Australia Card. I do not even mind the fanciful nonsense, such as Senator MacGibbon taking his identification card with him once he gets 50 kilometres beyond the place where he lives. That was good, hysterical stuff, and it should get him a hell of a lot of votes from the dentists of Australia, particularly when they have patients with their mouths full of instruments. Senator MacGibbon's speech was sheer, unmitigated nonsense and rhubarb and he would be better off writing scripts for films. His speech had nothing to do with the facts of the matter, but it is some evidence of the fancifulness of his imagination. To that extent, it has added to the gross, very wicked misrepresentations that he and other Opposition senators have been making. For Senator MacGibbon to claim, in particular, that there will be a loss of privacy under the Australia Card in the area of medical history is wicked. It is nothing short of a scandalous, wicked misrepresentation. I say again that the only word for it is lies. People who visit psychiatrists-- Senator Peter Baume —Madam Acting Deputy President, the honourable senator has now linked the word `lie' with Senator MacGibbon's presentation. I believe that she has transgressed standing order 418 and she should withdraw. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT(Senator Bjelke-Petersen) —Order! Senator Crowley, you cannot attribute lies to any honourable senator. I ask you to withdraw that statement. Senator CROWLEY —I withdraw any connection to any particular honourable senator but I simply say-- Senator Peter Baume —Madam Acting Deputy President, I understand that a withdrawal should be unqualified. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —The Opposition has asked for an unqualified withdrawal. I would like you to withdraw. Senator CROWLEY —I am sure that it has. I withdraw those remarks and I hope that everybody understands exactly what I have been asked to withdraw. One by one, members of the Opposition, collectively, have wickedly misrepresented this point of view. Senator Walsh —Big fibs! Senator CROWLEY —The word `fibs' is hardly the word to describe it. The word `fibs' is the word that children use. It is an absolute farce that this chamber has to tolerate that kind of misrepresentation by members opposite who find clever or farcical ways of saying to the people listening to this debate that it is untrue. The example given concerning Medicare is very wicked indeed. Senator Peter Baume knows that and I am a bit shocked that he has not at least told his troops that that is not the way it will go. Under the Medicare card at the moment there is no way in which people's visits to the doctors and the particular treatment they are seeking is known to anybody else except the patient and the doctor. It is not known to Medicare and it is not an invasion of the privacy of citizens at all. It is scandalous for honourable senators opposite to suggest that, under the Australia Card, any of that will be changed. Senator Peter Baume —You simply don't understand. Senator CROWLEY —Under this legislation, information of that sort about individuals will not be available under freedom of information, and that should be understood, too. There is a wicked amount of misrepresentation. If Opposition senators want to dispute the effectiveness of the Australia Card, they may dispute it, but they should stick to the facts. They should not make up these wicked furphies. Senator MacGibbon is marvellous; he is matched only by Senator Sheil for highly creative imagination and flights of fancy. I shall come to some of Senator Sheil's nonsense. He, too, should know this, because he is a medical practitioner. Let us not introduce very grave misrepresentations about this matter. Let us talk about the issues. The issues are about whether or not an Australia Card identification system for citizens in this country will help people in the course of their business and will help government in the course of trying honourably and properly to collect tax revenue, of trying properly and honourably to pay social security recipients what they are entitled to, and of trying to stop people fraudulently claiming under that system, and, as well, its third great arm-of trying to comply with all the provisions that are currently provided under the Medicare card. That is what the Australia Card is about-not nonsense about travelling down roads, getting taxis, internal passports, and the most extraordinary claims by Senator Sheil. Let us not get into the land of fantasy. Let us stick with the facts. If Opposition senators cannot do that, they should sit down and listen to us. We are prepared to look at the argument, as we have with the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card and with any sort of evidence, but let us not have this highly creative rubbish and nonsense that can be confusing and can create fear and anxiety in the community. If Senator Peter Baume wants to ask people to support him against this measure, he should tell them the facts, and not all this rubbish. That is what it is. It is very offensive to me and, I hope, to most Australians who are listening to this debate, that Opposition senators have to resort to that nonsense and wildly mischievous misrepresentation. Senator MacGibbon, for some strange reason, does not mind having his one stroke-or whatever it was-to prove that he was a member of the Army. Under any of those records more was known about Senator MacGibbon in the Army than the Australia Card system will ever want to know about him. He somehow does not mind knowing it in the Army, but he is appalled to think that another section of the Government, the tax system, might want to know about it. For goodness sake, what is the logic of having everything known to the Department of Defence and nothing much known to the Australian Taxation Office? Why worry when one can tell everything to the Army but nothing to the Tax Office? I suggest that it goes to the point about which Minister Blewett was talking, which has been so oft quoted by Opposition senators. The trouble is that members of the Opposition do not want their financial dealings being understood, although they do not mind a few other of their dealings being known about. It is to the point of money that we are talking. I find it offensive that Opposition senators would so misrepresent the issues in this debate. The Opposition has also said that evidence was given before the Joint Select Committee that identification was not a problem in the area of social security fraud. I should have thought that any proper examination of that evidence would make it clear that that is exactly the difficulty. Because people can so easily falsify an identification, identification has not been the problem for the Department of Social Security. In answer to a question asked yesterday, I think, Senator Walsh cited the case of the man in Victoria who has some 50 false identifications, all of which were drawing social security benefits. The identification was not a problem; it has been extraordinarily difficult for the Department to establish that a person is the identity he says he is and not any other identification. The Australia Card goes to establishing with great integrity that a person is that person and not any other person. It will make it very difficult for one to have a false identification, and it will make it, therefore, much easier for the Department of Social Security to be sure that it is paying the right person the right benefit or pension. To say that identification is not a problem except in a very small percentage of cases is to misrepresent the difficulties the Department of Social Security must face. Identification is a considerable problem for people trying to establish their identification. At present they often cannot do so. It is an extraordinarily difficult thing for people to do. It is very difficult for the Department of Social Security to be sure that it has the right person. It has some mechanisms to try to address that difficulty. I should have thought that Opposition senators would know, as senators on this side of the chamber know from constituents who come to see them, that establishing identification is one of the biggest problems for citizens who go to claim social security benefits. I certainly have spoken to people in my office who have come to South Australia from Queensland, for whom the challenge and the terrible difficulty is to prove in South Australia that they are the same people who were the beneficiaries in Queensland. That question of identification is a major one, and it will be in the largest part dealt with by the Australia Card. Because the Australia Card establishes a person's identity at an interview, with the Health Insurance Commission having access to the new data bank of births, marriages and deaths, and because people would have other documentation relating to who they are, all of that data being brought together in the one place will establish their identification at an interview, and therefore the documentation will be of very high integrity. That makes it very difficult to establish false identities. It makes it very difficult for people who wish fraudulently to create an identity. On what? On some fake birth certificate? It will not be easy fraudulently to identify false characters if the Australia Card comes into existence. It seems easy to produce a bit of plastic-there is no trouble with doing that; we have been doing it for quite a few years now-but to establish some method of sourcing that number, that signature and that photograph to a false identity will be very difficult. No longer do people have easy access to birth certificates. Under the changes proposed in relation to information about births, deaths and marriages, that information will be in a very differently secure and differently accessible system. The Australia Card identification goes to the integrity that will be attached to it because of the interview and the high integrity documentation and access to births, marriages and deaths records at the time of interview. Those are the sorts of things the Opposition has not been telling the Australian public. They are the sorts of things that make an absolute mockery of the Opposition's claims as to how easy it will be to buy a false identification or to produce one in some little back street. We were hearing from one member of the Opposition about his wandering around Times Square, I think, buying American social security cards, and a few other things besides; we did not ask what they were. What a lot of nonsense; what a massive furphy. It has nothing to do with the identification system proposed under this legislation. Precisely because of that high integrity identification, much of the Opposition's claims in this area are nonsense. Senator Peter Baume can tell his colleagues who are not now present that some of us have had the experience of living overseas and of having an identity card. I certainly have, living, as I have done, for four years in the United States. The first thing I had to get on arrival there was my United States social security card. I never felt that it was a terrible invasion of privacy. It was never a great problem for me, but it certainly facilitated some of the processes that I had to go through-for example, renewing visas, and so on. It is a piece of paper with a number on it. I should have thought that it would be very easy to reproduce it. That is not the sort of thing about which we are talking when considering the identification system under the Australia Card. So the Opposition does not have much argument at all if all that it can resort to are the misrepresentations and the wicked mischief it has put up instead of a significant debate on this issue. It is interesting to find Opposition senators-Senator MacGibbon, for example-asking how we will stop the cash economy between a householder and a lawnmower man-or woman; which, of course, Senator MacGibbon did not mention. The Government is not making claims of that sort at all. The Government does not claim to be introducing the parousia pairidaeza, nor even an approximation to paradise. What it is introducing is a method of identification for citizens in this country that will massively reduce opportunities for tax evasion, tax avoidance and social security fraud and, at the same time, it will make the Medicare provisions that currently exist, in a very manageable way, part of that. It is not claiming to do away with all fraud. It is claiming that this system will dramatically reduce the largest areas of tax evasion and tax avoidance in this country. It is not saying that it will do it all. Even in the cash economy, the Australia Card will make a very significant impact, not in some of the household exchanges but certainly in the area of building, for example, where very much of the exchange has been in the cash economy. With the Australia Card, continuation of that kind of financial exchange would not be possible without the tax liabilities being picked up in that area, to name just one area of the cash economy that the Government sees as being closed to tax evasion and tax avoidance with the Australia Card. The Government does not expect that it will solve all problems, but it does expect that it will dramatically reduce the difficulties we confront at the moment and will dramatically increase the amount of revenue gained by the Government on behalf of Australian citizens. I have heard people talking about this massive and terrible invasion of privacy. These very same citizens in fact have all this information held about them in a series of different records, but for some strange reason they feel more threatened when the tax man is looking at their tax revenue. I suggest that honourable senators opposite read again what Minister Blewett had to say about privacy; not that the individual citizen does not matter as compared with society, but that there is a balance between both of those. If individual citizens go on taking their money and not contributing responsibly, honestly and honourably to society, therefore putting a burden on all the rest, the honourable citizens, that kind of price has to be paid. If every citizen to this point had been honest, we would not have to worry, but neither Senator Peter Baume's former Government nor this Government can say that all citizens are honest. We know that a small percentage are very dishonest and massively rort the system so that honest citizens have to pay far more than is their due. It is this Government's intention to try to reduce the opportunities and prospects for that percentage who are wicked and dishonest and who rort the system, so that there is a redistribution of revenue regained to honest and honourable citizens. There has never been other than a tension between privacy and society and I do not know why the Opposition thinks that it can persuade Australian citizens that we are the first to invade privacy-never. It has been a tension, it has been a struggle since communities became concerned to become communities, as apart from a group of individuals, probably 4,000 or 5,000 years ago. Over the time we have seen the development of all that, but the things that Opposition senators have been saying in this debate make a mockery and a nonsense of their level of intellectual ability. Why argue about privacy when one's birth certificate, marriage certificate and death certificate-I am not sure that that would describe this side of the chamber, but certainly Opposition honourable senators may have some death certificates amongst them, inasmuch as they are hardly ever animate-- Senator Archer —Ha, ha! Senator CROWLEY —I thank Senator Archer; I thought it was not bad myself. Information that people are born, are married, how old they are, that they are on social security or that they pay tax, seems to me to be a fairly significant amount of information that citizens are already required to give to the Government. I do not understand why people feel that the Australia Card, which will put some of those bits of information side by side-that is all it will do-and under very strict regulations, requirements and limitations, is such a problem. We have to worry about privacy and civil liberties, but Minister Blewett and the Government, in introducing this legislation, have quite clearly paid very large and strict attention to those matters. There is privacy legislation, there is the establishment of the Data Protection Agency and there are the points listed by Senator Maguire and Senator Robert Ray, to name just two, in those areas. It is not as though the Government is thoughtless in this area-it is very thoughtful. I recall the answer Senator Walsh gave to a question yesterday: The difficulty is not about just dealing with social security fraud or tax evasion and avoidance; the difficulty is that sometimes the two are hand in glove. People are not rorting social security only because they are getting two lots of unemployment benefit; they are rorting the system because they are getting unemployment benefit while they are working and paying tax. We need a system to match up the social security information with the tax information about some of our citizens. That is one of the biggest ways in which some of that fraud and tax evasion will be better controlled or managed. That is the true state of affairs and that is what is necessary. It is not possible for each department to go on trying to solve these problems, because the evidence is quite clear that it is the cross-departmental manoeuvrings of some citizens which contributes very much to the massive loss of revenue by people who are rorting the system. Senator Sheil was really carried away when he got into extraordinary language about things such as search warrants. He said that any minute now, with the Australia Card, we will not have search warrants; citizens will be required to do this, that and the other, even without search warrants. There is a certain cynicism in my soul to hear a Queensland senator say that, when certain behaviour, with or without search warrants, in certain medical practitioners places last year leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Certainly Senator Sheil from Queensland ought to be talking about his concern about civil rights, but I wish that he would practise it in his own State. It is also important that he does not leave the Australian community with that sense of what the Australia Card is about. It is exactly not that. It is also true that citizens once a year can request to see the information through the Data Protection Agency and can check it. Senator Sheil and Senator MacGibbon loudly proclaimed that once the information is there it will never be able to be changed; it is stuck there for life. The legislation says exactly the opposite; people can check their information files and if they are inaccurate they can require them to be corrected. We cannot go into this debate with that kind of wild misstatement. We cannot ask people to understand what the issues are if we are so grossly misrepresenting the issues. The Australia Card is not about search warrants or internal passports, nor will it require anything other than that the listed organisations-the Taxation Office, the Department of Social Security and Medicare-- Senator Peter Baume —Yet. Senator CROWLEY —Yet, says Senator Baume. What an extraordinary answer. Senator Peter Baume —Just tattoo it on the inside of our arm. Senator CROWLEY —Now the tattoos. What about the thumbprint on the forehead? Why do we not go the whole way with Senator Baume's creative rubbish? That is a scandalous way of looking at things. Senator Peter Baume —We don't trust you. Senator CROWLEY —That is what the issue is. Senator Baume has said it in a nutshell. Let him tell everyone listening, the few of them who are serious enough to stay here and listen to two days of this: The Liberal Opposition does not trust the Labor Government. That is what this debate is about-it has nothing to do with the issues we are supposed to be talking about. We are debating whether or not the Opposition trusts us. The Opposition does not want to read what is in the Australia Card legislation or what is in the privacy legislation, nor does it want to know the facts about the Data Protection Agency. Senator Peter Baume and his Opposition colleagues have stood up for two days and have grossly misrepresented what is in this proposed legislation because they do not trust us. That is what it is about-not the real issue. The Opposition is not telling the Australian people what the issue is. The issue is that, with the Australia Card, the Government will produce an identification system of very high integrity for every citizen so that those citizens can be sure that under social security they will be able to receive what is properly theirs and those people who want to claim fraudulently will have considerable trouble doing it. The Department of Social Security will be able dramatically to reduce welfare fraud. Under the tax system, with the high integrity identification system, citizens who are honest and honourable will have no difficulty; they will pay their tax as they ever have. The crooks and cheats will find it very difficult and the Taxation Office will be greatly assisted in recouping revenue from the people who to this point have been able fraudulently to avoid and evade their tax responsibilities. We have the Medicare card system at the moment, which is working very efficiently and nobody's medical history is being touted around the country. That information will change not at all under the Australia Card system. The Opposition's claims to the contrary are scandalously misrepresenting the facts. The Opposition cannot face up to those facts; it is not telling the people of Australia those facts. The Opposition, honourably and collectively, is an utter disgrace to intellectual debate. That is what I find most intolerable about the Opposition. It is a disgrace that it should so misrepresent the facts to the people listening. Senator Knowles —You're so clever, aren't you? Senator CROWLEY —No, I am just honest. Other issues have been raised which need to be picked up. One extraordinary piece put in by Senator Powell, an Australian Democrat, seemed to be devoted entirely to whether or not the Government was passionate about creating jobs. It is a very good point and not a bad topic for discussion but it is not exactly what the Australia Card debate is about. The Australia Card debate is not about whether or not we are creating jobs; it is about establishing a high integrity identification system for citizens in this country so as, as I have said before, to make the recoupment of tax manageable, to reduce the possibilities for fraud, evasion and cheating under the tax and social security systems and to provide for the payment and return of moneys under Medicare. It is not about job creation. It is very colourful of Senator Powell to put all of that on the record, but it is really a massive furphy. This Government is passionately committed to creating jobs. Over 600,000 jobs have been created since it came to office in 1983. That is a very good record, although the Government is the first to say that it is insufficient. It is interesting, too, that Senator Powell argued that we could help people out of poverty by creating jobs for them. That is exactly the point I made in debate on the social security amendment legislation not too long ago, only to be harangued almost to death by the Australian Democrats who suggested that that was a sideways attempt to help people out of poverty. I am glad that Senator Powell has finally come to see the force and persuasion of my argument. Creating jobs is not really what the Australia Card issue is about. However, it is at one remove certainly true that if the Government had available to it the revenue forgone under the present system, where people can defraud the social security system and cause increased payouts from government or avoid their tax responsibilities and therefore reduce government revenue, the Government could put that revenue into alternative and preferred programs. Even to pick up on the points Senator Button has often raised in this chamber, it could put such funds into research and development, encouragement for industries and the creation of jobs in the new high technology areas. Certainly those are some of the things that the Government might prefer to divert its tax moneys into. All of those options are important but they are consequential on the Australia Card legislation. That is one of the reasons for looking at the whole business of establishing a high integrity identification system. Too many people have been saying for too long that something must be done. The Government has bitten the bullet. It has done something and it has done it with considerable thought and deliberation following a joint select committee inquiry and the collection of a massive amount of evidence. It has looked at the difficulties, including the possibility of the invasion of privacy. It has chosen a proposal that will provide the highest integrity card so as to minimise as much as possible-rather than guarantee, as anything is possible-false identification. The Government has been absolutely honourable in its figuring and it has been conservative in its costing. It has had to deal with the sort of debate we have heard from the Opposition, so there has not been the contribution in this Senate over the last two days of the type that we might have expected seeing that honourable senators opposite were so keen to get back here to debate this matter. That is said with heavy irony as it is my understanding that they were not keen at all. They are so deeply divided on the issue that they did not want it to come to a vote at all. The Government is unashamed. It wants to pass this legislation and implement the Australia Card over the next couple of years. It will take that time to establish all the necessary prerequisites before the system can be put in place. The Opposition suggests that it does not trust the Government, that it does not believe that what the Government says is what it means and that the legislation really means what it says. The Opposition does not accept any of those things. How can we have a debate with people who argue like that? Let us hear the Opposition's considered views about the issues in question. The civil liberties debate is very important. I believe that the Government has met the concern in its own ranks and in its proposals for the Data Protection Agency and with the Privacy Bill. It was interesting to hear Senator Puplick point out that the Government has adopted a minority report and minority recommendations. I remind him that that is exactly what he said about the report on human embryo experimentation. He wanted it put on record that he supported the minority report. Seeing as I contributed to that report, I was pleased to have his support but I remind him that he cannot go skipping around like that from one to the other. He says that that minority report was good enough because he examined it and found it honourable; I say that is all the Government did when it looked at the joint committee report on the Australia Card. This is a significant piece of legislation. It has far-reaching consequences in terms of the revenue, it will be of benefit to the Government as a result of the difficulties it will provide for tax cheats, tax avoiders and evaders. It will assist honourable people by providing a high integrity identification system which will mean that they do not have to hassle to prove they are who they say they are. It will remove a whole lot of difficulties in social security. It will be helpful to the honest and honourable people as it will make it very hard for the cheats, the crooks, the rorters and the frauds and it will be of great benefit to government down time. I am absolutely sure that if this legislation is passed the Opposition will not remove it should it ever return to the Treasury benches. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT(Senator Elstob) —Order! The honourable senator's time has expired. Senator ARCHER(Tasmania)(11.11) —I invite Senator Crowley to recall the famous words: `There will be no capital gains tax'. She apparently forgot those words when she said that the people of Australia can trust this Government. We should not overlook the degree to which we rely on history to base our judgments. Today I came in ready to debate and discuss the points in Senator Crowley's speech but I regret that I found only one point that requires any discussion. That point was that I and my colleagues have not read the Australia Card Bill. I can assure her that we have read the Bill and that we are going to considerable lengths to ensure that as many people as possible read it. It is on the reading of the Bill that judgment will be made. I recently noticed an article in a Tasmanian newspaper, attributed to a Government spokesman, under the heading `Australia Card-A bid for tax fairness'. I thought this was a silly headline because very clearly there is not now and there never has been any consideration of tax fairness in the proposal. The article has two intentions: Firstly, it raises no question of a fair tax, it just supports the move to get more tax from everyone with no case for fairness; and secondly, it smothers the hopelessly inefficient implementation of the Government's responsibility for the receipt of taxpayers' funds and the enforcement of existing tax laws. The Press item failed to explain that the majority of the members of the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card rejected the proposition to implement an ID card, as has the vast majority-the numbers are growing-of the community together with a considerable list of business, professional, privacy and other organisations. The newspaper item laboured as justification for the ID card the present revenue loss, with emotive phrases such as `massive tax cheating', to the extent that it clearly implied two things: Firstly, that the existing law is not good enough to catch those who defraud the system and, secondly, that a plastic cure all card would fix everything. Of course both of these premises are completely false. A letter in yesterday's Age shows how shallow and superficial this supposedly high integrity card is in reality. I seek leave to incorporate in Hansard a copy of that letter, from Mr Rubens, headed `ID cards will not work if forgers can copy them'. Leave granted. The letter read as follows- As one who has a great deal of experience with ID cards, let me say that the Government's plan to introduce the Australia Card would be excellent, if only it would work. I am not impressed with opposition to the card on the ground of civil liberties. What civil liberties? One of the most fundamental civil rights surely is the right of all citizens (including women) to walk the streets and use public transport in safety at any time of the day or night. I don't know of many women who would be game to travel at night time by themselves in a suburban train. Nobody complains because we have unwittingly become conditioned to this lack of civil liberty. Yet, I am against ID cards, because I know that they are not effective. During the Nazi occupation of Holland (1940-45) the Germans introduced ID cards, not only with photographs but also with fingerprints. The Germans were more efficient and ruthless in enforcing their ``laws'' than Australians could ever be. Yet, I survived the German occupation of the Netherlands thanks to a forged ID card. My wife once even managed to travel on an ``illegal'' errand in a German military train under the protection of a forged ID card. One of my good friends was in the business of procuring false ID cards and survived in spite of a gruesome death penalty for such activities. It is, alas, true that very many ``offenders'' were caught by the Germans and paid with their lives. But the point I want to make is that the introduction of the Australia Card will most probably give rise to a flourishing forgery industry. The Australia Card will only be effective after we have managed to remove all crooks from our society, but then we won't need the card any more. My wife's and my own forged ID cards are still in my possession and Dr Blewett is welcome to inspect them. S. M. RUBENS, Brighton. Senator ARCHER —I thank the Senate. I wish to deal with the issues covered by the responsibility I have in relation to crime and law enforcement and the portfolio of the Special Minister of State (Mr Young). I will leave other areas to other honourable senators involved. I state categorically that whether there is one plastic card or a dozen plastic cards it will make little difference to the way this Government has run and is running its law enforcement operations. There is clearly no will to ensure adequate law enforcement and I feel no constraint in simply asking why. All members of the Senate and all members of the general public clearly understand the law in respect of tax evasion offences, social security offences, immigration offences, medifraud, quarantine offences, smuggling or whatever. There is substantial law in all these areas. So why are we not doing better in stamping out these crimes? The answer, very simply, is that the Government gives law enforcement a very low priority. Let us look at the various inquiries that have been held and the advice that has been given to government. In this respect, I refer to inquiries carried out by Williams, Stewart, Costigan, Moffitt and Woodward. I refer also to the Australian Federal Police resources inquiry, the parliamentary inquiry into the National Crime Authority and so on. Every one of them was involved in seeking out criminal money movement, law breaking and major crimes of all types. Did they urge an identity card system to trap crooks? No, they did not-anything but. Costigan and Meagher in fact said that the ID proposal was of `great potential benefit and use to organised crime.' Is that what this Government is all about and is that what it is prepared to undertake, knowing that? We heard from Senator Peter Baume the long list of eminent people and diverse organisations that have already announced their opposition. I will not repeat them, but I ask honourable senators opposite to give us their list of people and organisations, particularly the law enforcement bodies, that have given support since the time when the report of the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card came down and provided real information to them for the first time. There was significant support for a better system, and there still is, be it a card or whatever, but I have not found one case where those people who initially gave support continue to support the Card once they have had all the details and asked their questions. Had more time been available I would have liked to report on the recommendations that the various reports put forward to government to reduce crime and to apprehend the miscreants involved. I would like to read a portion of a letter which appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald dated 5 November written by Mr Justice Woodward. He noted the following issues to which the Government should give attention if it were really trying to apprehend criminals in these areas. He said that it is necessary to have powers to tap phones; to inspect bank accounts, records of financial institutions and bookmakers' records; to search; to require a reconciliation of assets with known apparent income; and otherwise to follow the trails of criminals engaged in organised crime. Neither law nor intention mean anything without enforcement, and there is quite inadequate enforcement and inadequate will on the part of the Government to mix it with the criminals. Let us start with the crooks, please, before we start harassing ordinary, decent individuals. A variety of these reports that have come out in the last two years give the picture of what the Government is doing, or not doing, in this regard, and I would like to quote excerpts from pieces of them. The Australian Federal Police review of resources dated November 1985 said: The Joint Task Group notes major resource problems in the drugs and intelligence areas of the AFP, the CIB functions, and the organised crime units. The Group was presented with cases of serious criminal activities which are not being investigated because of staff shortages. As for the smaller criminal activities-such as many DSS cheque frauds-most of these are unable to be investigated. The revenue implications of the overall situation are clear. Later in that review it is stated: The Group notes that the Ports Watch role is significantly under-resourced. There are major staff shortages, a critical lack of experience amongst the bulk of staff, and a shortage of logistical support. Further, it states: Unless there is a substantial lift in overall resource levels the AFP will be increasingly unable to discharge its priority functions effectively. Would a card change that situation for the better? The Chairman of the Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence Management Committee reported to the Australian Police Ministers Council in 1984-85. In that report it was stated: . . . the lack of support staff is having an adverse effect upon the efficiency and development of the organisation. Later it states: Budgetary constraints prevented the Bureau from further progress in the establishment of the Australia Drug Data Base . . . and to respond to the increasing workload in information/intelligence processing. It is now quite clear from the operations of the Bureau itself, and from the findings of several Inquiries, that organised crime is now firmly entrenched in the Australian Society. It is also quite clear that some of these organisations are prepared to, and in fact do engage in violent activities. Further on it is stated: . . . In the meantime, it is the view of the Management Committee that the ABCI is already under-resourced. I ask again: Would a plastic card help this situation? The National Crime Authority's annual report for 1984-85 said: The Authority's initial staffing proposal formulated in mid-1984 called for a total establishment of approximately 235 permanent positions. In the event, the Authority's initial establishment was set at 178. How could a plastic card help that situation? The Australian Federal Police annual report for 1985-86 came out recently. Under the heading of `Resources', it is stated: It is just not possible at present and with present resource levels to enhance the capability of those objectives below the first four. On airport security it said: My concern over the AFP counter terrorist capability is that it remains at a bare minimum with little capacity to respond to a sudden increase in the level of threat. On the matter of legislation, the Australian Federal Police set out their urgent requirements and strenuous requests in the following terms: Despite the publicity generated by the Drug Summit, little real progress has been made in the vital area of legislation essential for the effective fight against drug trafficking. The legislation of concern includes: forfeiture and confiscation of assets police access to taxation records police access to records of banks and other financial institutions creation of an offence of sending illicit drugs through the mail amendment of the Customs Act to clarify the powers to detail persons concealing drugs internally model drug legislation. Do honourable senators think that a plastic card would sort out those sorts of problems? The Director of Public Prosecutions annual report for 1985-86 was in a very similar vein. That report states: . . . unfortunately the AFP does not have the resources to cope with more than a few of the large number of cases referred to it . . . concentrating instead on the very serious cases. Meanwhile the DSS investigates the less serious matters . . . as a result of minor cases and very serious cases are investigated by the DSS and AFP respectively, large groups in the middle are not. This unsatisfactory state of affairs can only undermine the deterrent value of prosecution in this area. On Medifraud, the DPP's report referred to inadequacies in this area, in particular, weaknesses in the Medicare Bill. On the matter of health insurance the report said: The legislation is generally in an unsatisfactory state for the purpose of prosecution . . . In many areas the legislation is vague and ambiguous. No amount of plastic cards will overcome those sorts of difficulties. So it goes on. The report of the Senior Inspector of Shipping Control on the security of the Melbourne waterfront said: The criminal element has little to fear from Customs on the waterfront except through his own carelessness. The reasons for this included staff shortages, lack of clearly defined charter for Customs staff and so on. How will a plastic card assist us in tidying up the waterfront mess? The report entitled `Footprints in the Sand: Inquiry into Civil Coastal Surveillance' also raised this problem. It said that, of 82,500 sightings by the Coastal Surveillance Unit in 1984-85, there were 28 responses and 9 prosecutions, eight of which related to foreign fishing. Australia is the safest place in the world for crooks. How could a card help with infringements in this vast range of criminal activities? I quote from the report of the Auditor-General in relation to Customs systems at airports: . . . the findings reflected serious weaknesses in the passenger and crew clearance system . . . We have to deal with all manner of people and all manner of crimes. Again, would a card help here? How would a plastic card stiffen the resolve of this Government to do something of consequence in attacking fraud, corruption and organised crime? I have to ask: Is it frightened whom the net might gather in if it made the service really efficient? The problem lies clearly in law enforcement. It lies with the Government and its willingness or otherwise to provide the resources to its agencies and the joint law enforcement bodies of which it is a member. I again quote Mr Justice Woodward: I believe the Mr Bigs can be caught, given the will to do so, the courage, and the means. If governments lack the means, let us go without something else. That is very good advice. It is also up to the Government to ensure that there is total collaboration and liaison among the various law enforcement bodies and to eliminate any obstacle to optimum performance. It is very clear that there are many difficulties within and among the forces. It is equally clear that we know why. Morale is not at the level that it should be; there is frustration generally through the lack of resources in both equipment and manpower; and resignations are excessive. If the ID card is to be used in criminal apprehension, whether this be for income detection, drugs, social security, Medicare fraud or whatever, it will require much better servicing and greater resources than this Government has chosen to provide to its existing law enforcement agencies during its first 3 1/2 years in office. What would make anyone believe that this Government would provide 2,160 extra staff members to promote this highly questionable enterprise when, as the records show, it cut five people from the Bureau of Criminal Intelligence; it let the Australian Federal Police run at approximately 1,000 below the required strength; and the National Crime Authority was established with a staff of 178 instead of the 235 which was the required number agreed upon? Why then would it provide 2,160 staff members for another policing operation, and why would anybody fall for believing that it would? I suggest that if the Government wishes to make serious inroads into the fields of crime-crime by fraud, crime of tax evaders not filling in their returns, drug business or any other type-the proven method of strengthening the resources of those already engaged in fighting crime would be the sensible way to go about it. To set up a new organisation-with premises, I presume, throughout Australia, with a new Public Service hierarchy, with a long period of establishment, considerable funding for equipment, transferring of staff, requiring vehicles, computers and so on-ahead of the logical thing of making the existing law enforcement agencies more effective is absolutely unthinkable. Why would these 2,160 new staff members be appointed? If appointed, how could they be as effective as those forces already set up and capable of handling any reasonable expansion? We already know that the Department of Social Security does not regard false identity as any more than 10 per cent of its overpayment problem. We know that the Australian Taxation Office, through its hopeless inefficiency in not getting its methods up to date, would not improve with just a plastic card. We know that drug dealing, illegal gambling and race fixing are not done by plastic cards. We know that the cash economy does not require the showing of any plastic card. We know that laws galore are not enforced because they are unenforceable through the inadequacy of the staff and facilities available to the existing responsible bodies. The Director of Public Prosecutions has made it adequately clear that he does not have the resources to do more than he is doing. The Australian Federal Police seldom investigates fraud allegations if they are less than $20,000 because it does not have the manpower to do so. The Bureau of Criminal Intelligence is starved for money and staff even to get the Australian drug database operable and to make its task worth while. It is of no use the Government members denying that. I see it as nothing short of absolute lunacy to set up another organisation which I would suggest the Government would not have any intention of adequately funding or making self-sufficient and effective, judging by its record with those agencies that it already has. As it is, we have cases in the hands of Federal enforcement authorities held up for up to two years because of the inability of existing staff to prepare cases. How would an identity card do anything but make that worse? Australians do not need and do not want to be numbered and registered like cars or tagged like livestock. We do not want a system which at any future time could be extended or which is subject to misuse in the hands of unscrupulous people or governments. We should heed the warning from the Law Society of New South Wales which quoted the Government's submission to the inquiry when it said: The Government in its submission to the Joint Select Committee suggested that the following departments have access to the Australia Card Register: Australian Tax Office Department of Health Department of Social Security Department of Veterans' Affairs Department of Housing and Construction Services Australian Bureau of Statistics Australian Federal Police Australian Institute of Health Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs Department of Foreign Affairs and the Department of Employment and Industrial Relations. There is absolutely nothing to make anyone in Australia believe that anything has changed. This is the list which the Minister for Health, Dr Blewett, produced and which he would expect to get sooner or later. At present, however, according to the Bill access has been limited to the Australian Tax Office, the Department of Health and the Department of Social Security. But for how long? The submission went on to say that the Government cannot rule out categorically the possibility that at some future date additional uses may suggest themselves as being desirable or essential to meet emerging problems in the taxation, welfare and other areas. No evidence has been put forward by the Government or any of its members to indicate that there is any necessity for this or that the existing laws are being adequately prosecuted. Until that time, I will be doing all I can to urge the people of Australia to oppose the implementation of the identification system in every way possible. I will also be calling on the Government to demonstrate its commitment to apprehending criminals by adequately resourcing the existing law enforcement agencies so that they may become fully effective. Only then will we see whether the abominable proposition deserves any consideration. Senator KNOWLES(Western Australia)(11.32) —I rise today to speak on the Australia Card Bill 1986 out of sheer concern that this Bill is yet another attempt by this Hawke socialist Government to strangle Australians with more and unnecessary bureaucratic red tape, more public servants, more information collection of a personal nature, more expenditure for the taxpayers and more expenses for business. To gain what? That is the question. According to government departments and expert witnesses before the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card, the gain is absolutely nothing. Contrary to what the Government and the Minister for Health, Dr non-medical Blewett, would have Australians believe, it is the honest Australians who have most to fear and most to lose. I object to calling this proposal an Australia Card if for no other reason than it gives it an air of respectability that it does not deserve. By using the green and gold sporting colours it tries to do exactly the same. It is an absolute manipulation by this Government of the symbols of freedom and democracy which we in this country value. As I have said before, the next thing that this Government will try to do presumably is to rename all the gaols `Australia camps', to give them the same degree of respectability. The Government gave a much more honest revelation of its true thinking and underlying attitude when, on 9 June, Dr non-medical Blewett said-it has been quoted before in many speeches, but it is worth repeating as it shows the true thinking of this Health Minister: Let me say as a socialist it is the interest of the community that should come before the individual right. He also said: We shouldn't get too hung up as socialists on privacy because privacy, in many ways, is a bourgeois right that is very much associated with the right to private property. That says it all. That says exactly what this Minister means. The Minister whose Department will administer a national identity card has, on his own admission, no respect for either privacy or private property. The Minister says that there will be adequate privacy provisions associated with the card. One cannot but help but wonder whether those provisions will be similar to the ones connected with Medicare. Many people were disgusted last year that personal income details of doctors were leaked from Medicare information during the New South Wales doctors dispute, in an effort to achieve political point scoring. Yet, we heard this morning from Senator Crowley, a medical practitioner, who said that everything is as tight as a drum with Medicare. How absurd. She said that no information was available. Senator Crowley did not even have the decency to stay in here for two seconds after she had finished her speech. I would have liked to ask her why it was necessary for us, as members of parliament, to be notified this year that our Medicare cards were to be tagged or flagged to ensure our privacy. That is absolutely disgusting. Why should we be privileged in the community to have our Medicare files flagged to ensure confidentiality? Why cannot everyone have that confidentiality with his own Medicare records. Senator Peter Baume —Every time we make a claim we identify a broken leg. Senator KNOWLES —That is exactly right. Senator Crowley omitted to say that what Senator Baume is saying is quite correct, that every time one makes a Medicare claim the item number for the problem one has is put on that claim form, so therefore everyone in Medicare knows exactly what the illness or problem is. When some people in the community are given a so-called privilege by having their confidential medical records made different to the records of anyone else in Australia, it is an absurdity. Surely everyone is entitled to total privacy of his medical records, and not just a select few. This Department of Social Security is run by the same self-confessed socialist Minister who will be in control of the ID card. While the Government insists on saying that the Opposition is taking the easy way out in rejecting the proposition of an ID card, I see it as quite the reverse. If we were to take the easy way out we would not have made the decision we did when it was still supposedly a popular proposition. If it were going to work that may be another thing, but every investigation and expert opinion says it will not work. We have not made this decision lightly. We have not just decided to oppose it for the sake of opposing it. Many people on our side of politics have been quoted as having originally supported the concept of an ID card. That is fair enough. Anyone is entitled to change his opinion once he has investigated the matter thoroughly and found that it will not achieve the results that it is designed to achieve. I do not think anyone at all should be criticised for changing his mind on that basis. Why is this Government pursuing it in the light of all the evidence within and outside Australia that says that it is cost ineffective, intrusive, and unworkable. I always worry when I find myself agreeing with anyone on the Left, but fortunately public opinion on this crosses all political beliefs and ideologies. It is highly appropriate that under the legislation we are no longer citizens but card subjects. If this Bill passes we will find that the Government has licensed us for the privilege of functioning as members of the Australian society. Conscientious objection will be an impossible luxury. We heard Government senators yesterday saying that you do not have to carry the card. That may well be so. The simple fact is that a person will not be able to operate without carrying the card. So we do not have to carry the card if we do not want to do anything. Without the ID card and our personal identification number, we will be unable to obtain employment or employ anybody else. We will be unable to invest in shares, trusts or commodities. We will be forbidden to sell primary produce, buy or sell real estate, or even open a safety deposit box or a bank account. We will not even be able to leave the country. It will not be safe to get ill as ID cards and numbers will be a prerequisite for Medicare benefits and hospital administration. This state of affairs is covered in clauses 4 to 54 of this Bill through the levying of $20,000 penalties that will be visited on employers, stock agents, banks, brokers, real estate agents, and any financial institution that fails to cite and record the ID card of employees, customers and clients. Social control is being achieved through the threat of fines against the private sector. So the private sector is in the gun again. Only those prepared to exist as nomads or hermits will be able to avoid the use of an ID card. Let there be no mistake, this all pervasive compulsion will at once result in massive inconvenience to the private sector and to many individual Australians. The cost to business of compliance has been conservatively estimated to be up to $200 billion over the next 10 years. I have already asked the Government to confirm or deny this and it has chosen not to comment at all. Why? Senator Aulich was rather amazing yesterday when talking about the cost of compliance to business. He listed the compliance factor as being as simple as taking four seconds to write down a 12-digit number. That was his only argument about the cost and the inconvenience to the private sector-that it would take four seconds to write down a 12-digit number. That goes to show the depth and intelligence of the argument being put by the Government. The Government has not even bothered to estimate the cost of the ID card to private business. It has not even given business the courtesy of a rubbery estimate. The Minister for Health says that he does not know, or presumably care. No longer will it be possible for any new business to be initiated over the telephone. It is well understood in the community, if not by the Australian Labor Party Government, that the telephone is a prime business tool of stock brokers, real estate agents and financial agents, followed up through the mail without any direct contact whatsoever. Rural dwellers and those doing business with them will find themselves put to enormous inconvenience when they must now present themselves in person to the offices of those who currently do their major business on the telephone and much of it after hours. Senator Boswell —They don't worry about the farmers. They have never cared about the farmers. Senator KNOWLES —I am glad that Senator Boswell has said that because we have all been able to read about the short shrift that the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) and the Treasurer (Mr Keating) gave to the National Farmers Federation last night. This is obviously another extension of `let's strangle the farmers, let's strangle the rural dwellers, and let's give them an ID card and make them travel miles and miles'. The ramifications of this ID card for people in remote areas of my own State of Western Australia-let us face it you cannot get anywhere more remote than the far outposts of the north west-are that they will have to travel thousands of miles to do the business that they now do by telephone. The Hawke Government is apparently not concerned at all at the difficulty and expense that will result from the ID card for these thousands of Australians, nor does it care about the sick and the elderly who will be unable to conduct their investment business from home. It is no accident that employers who fail to sight and record the ID card of even a casual or temporary employee are subject to a fine of $20,000 while a person who deliberately lies to obtain the social security benefits-a practice that an ID card will not prevent-will be fined only $2,000. Obviously, this Government considers the offence committed by a company in not sighting a person's ID card is far more critical and more dangerous than someone trying to defraud the social security system; they happen to be fined 10 times as much. No doubt employers and business people who have accepted forged ID cards will, in practice, be forced to prove their innocence adding further costs. I have mentioned the immense inconvenience to those businesses, particularly in the country, which trade by telephone rather than by direct contact. We now have to consider the cost to every employer, large and small, whose employees must absent themselves from work to register for the Australia Card. The interview and photograph may be scheduled for only a couple of minutes, but travel time and inevitable delays within the Medicare offices will eat into that employee's time. The smaller the staff, the more that will be felt. Businesses will have to alter payroll and accounting systems to accommodate the new ID card and the related changes to taxation reporting procedures. I remind the Senate that it was only yesterday that Senator Aulich said that that will not be so, that it takes only four seconds to write down a 12-digit number and that that is the only thing they will need to do. How absurd. It will be a major cost burden for banks, according to Mr Allen Cullen of the Australian Bankers Association. Yet how much greater a cost burden will it be in relative terms for the thousands of small businesses that are not computerised? The Hawke Government should take heed of the director of its own Business Regulation Review Unit, who admitted that as a general rule we can expect new regulations to cost the private sector twice what they will cost the Government. Yet Senator Aulich said yesterday that this was our figure. It is not. It is the Government's figure. We in Australia should take warning from the experience in Sweden, where a national identification system has allowed the profiling of citizens without their knowledge to the extent that a formal census is no longer needed. Seventeen registers can be centrally linked. Sweden, too, has a data protection agency. It has failed to protect individual privacy. So what chance do we in Australia have with these proposals? As was stated in the Joint Select Committee report, major American studies have specifically rejected the introduction of a national identification system because of the extent to which criminals could benefit from such a move. Yet we heard Senator Ray say yesterday that the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada had national identification systems. That is purely and utterly incorrect. It was only a few months ago that evidence was given to the Joint Select Committee which quite clearly showed that the United States had rejected the system out of hand. The Australian Federal Police, Mr Frank Costigan, QC, and Mr Douglas Meagher, QC, have also warned the Government that organised crime could flourish with ID cards and the Government still will not listen. Senator Ray asserted yesterday that an ID card would catch the drug pushers. That is gorgeous. When a couple of druggies exchange money for drugs will it be a case of show and tell-`You show me your ID card and I will show you mine'? Senator Peter Baume —Or $20,000 if you don't. Senator KNOWLES —That is right. It is absolutely laughable to suggest that it will stop the drug pushers. Let us not forget that no other common law country has a similar compulsory national ID card system. I now turn to the practical question of the costs and benefits of the ID card. The report of the Joint Parliamentary Select Committee, endorsed by representatives of all four parties represented in Parliament, sets out very clearly that the Australian Labor Party Government estimates of revenue savings and administration costs have little reliability. The Committee took 129 submissions, covering 5,000 pages of evidence, examined the issues closely, and is now conveniently being disregarded by the Government, which does not, I suppose, like this brand of consensus. It likes all other sorts of consensus. It has costly tax summits and everything else, but it sets up a parliamentary select committee that comes down with conclusions and that form of consensus is not good enough. Evidence from the Department of Finance revealed that the revenue savings figures, which the Government is so fond of citing, were not calculated by that Department at all, where we assume that the financial expertise is to be found. The figures were calculated by the Department of Health, not the Department of Finance. Alternative calculations based on cumulated discount benefits that were favoured by the Department of Finance give a benefit to revenue of $2.5 billion-very different from the $4.5 billion the Government is now claiming. Some $1,300m of the $4,500m supposed revenue savings is to result from the apprehension of illegal immigrants. Yet, in paragraph 1.56 of the Joint Select Committee report, it is revealed that the Department of Immigration admitted that its estimates were simply based on guesswork. Good substantial stuff, is it not? It appears that many within the bureaucracy see the ID card as the quick fix to achieve revenue savings when other effective and less intrusive methods have been neglected. This certainly appears to be the case with the Australian Taxation Office, which on only 11 November was named by the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Expenditure as being responsible for as much as $500m in lost revenue through administrative inefficiency. Such a report echoes the 1984 Auditor-General's report which pointed to a failure by the Taxation Office to use its existing powers in requiring the reporting of interest payments where the ATO estimates that as much as $500m could be lost each year. It already has the ability to find out that information but chooses not to. We are entitled to ask why the Taxation Office demands the use of ID cards when it has not made use of modern computer technology to cut down on tax avoidance, using only half of a $76m allocation for computer equipment. Real blame, however, lies not with the Taxation Office but with the Government that controls it. This socialist Government has neglected to implement the recommendation of Mr Frank Costigan, QC, that procedures for the opening of bank accounts be tightened. Instead, it now proposes a sledgehammer approach of an ID card, to which Mr Costigan is strongly opposed as a threat to individual liberty. I am getting a little tired of hearing the ALP trot out the excuse that the ID card is needed to fight social security fraud, thereby seeking support from the huge section of the community which is concerned over this issue, and angry that other Australians are getting a free ride on the system. What the public is not being told is that evidence from the Department of Social Security before the Joint Select Committee showed that, of $63m overpaid by the Department in 1984-85, the great bulk was due to people falsifying not their names but their circumstances, and also to clerical error and simple misunderstanding. While 61 per cent of social security overpayment was due to false statements, not even one per cent but 0.6 per cent was attributed to false identity. This is why the whole of the Australian community is going to be burdened with the number. They will be numbered by this Government, supposedly to catch fewer than one per cent of social security recipients who defraud the system by false identification. Again, a government which in the area of social security has failed to enforce the work test for unemployment benefits and which has only recently been insisting that 19b forms for the continuation of the dole be lodged in person has absolutely no right whatsoever to scream for ID cards to cover up its own slackness. If it had had the work test being efficiently implemented and people lodging their 19b forms in person we would not have the great problem we have today. The proposal of the Liberal Party, widely supported in the community, is that those on unemployment benefits present themselves for work or training. This would make multiple registrations for the dole impossible, unless people worked 48 hours every day. The Opposition fully supports a central register of births, marriages and deaths which would be as effective as an ID card in stopping fraudulent identity, without the danger to privacy posed by an identifying number. The absurdities the Minister carried on with in his second reading speech reached their peak when he tried to draw a similarity between the ID card and other cards currently carried by individuals. Absolutely no one in his right mind can say that what the Government is proposing is in any way similar to a driving licence, student card, credit card, membership card or any other card. Apart from all the obvious differences, the major difference is that none of those cards is linked to a central computer with wide access. Senator Sheil —The number belongs to the card. With the Australia Card the number belongs to the person. Senator KNOWLES —That is right. There is a very major distinct difference. Everyone in Australia will be numbered. The Government also says that one will not be able to forge the ID card. We heard Senator Crowley say this morning that it will be impossible to forge the ID card. That is really laughable. Senator Crowley obviously has a very short memory because it was only last year when a prison-I think it was in New South Wales-was a one-stop shop. If one wanted a birth certificate, a death certificate, a marriage certificate, a driver's licence or, in fact, a little bit of cash to go on with, one was told: `Come to us-we will do the lot'. Senator Sheil —A complete service. Senator KNOWLES —It was really a one-stop shop. It was absolutely fantastic. Yet here we have the Government saying: `But that's different. It is not like a passport that can be forged'. Passports are not meant to be forged either. This one prison did the lot-passports and all. People were told: `If you want to get your passport and you want some money to go overseas, come to us'. I am very concerned that the attitude that this Government is taking to the recommendations and findings of the Joint Select Committee is one of absolute ignorance. This ID card and this Bill will not save any money. The ID card will cost taxpayers an arm and a leg. It will place enormous costs on the private sector and, heaven knows, it cannot afford any more costs after all of the taxation imposts that have been placed on it this year. It will invade privacy and it will restrict freedom of operation of individuals. Most importantly, it simply will not work. I am one of the people-and I do not mind admitting it at all-who, when the proposal was first in the wind, said that it seemed like a good idea. I have spent some 17 months going through document after document. I have not taken the decision lightly to oppose this legislation. I am 100 per cent opposed to it because it will simply not do what it is designed to do. I come back to what I said earlier: I do not believe that people should be criticised for changing their minds after having done something like 17 or 18 months research into this matter. I am pleased to oppose this Bill. Senator MACKLIN(Queensland)(11.57) —We are debating cognately three Bills-the Australia Card Bill 1986, the Privacy Bill 1986 and the Privacy (Consequential Amendments) Bill 1986. Earlier in this debate yesterday Senator Haines, on behalf of the Australian Democrats, spoke at length about our opposition to the Australia Card Bill and our support for the detailed recommendations of the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card whose recommendations we have incorporated in a foreshadowed amendment to the second reading motion. I wish, therefore, to restrict my remarks to the Privacy Bill, which has not been debated to any extent so far. The Privacy Bill is in itself a very significant piece of legislation which goes to the very heart of the relationship between the private citizen within our society and the powers that are operated and held by the state. There are very cogent reasons for the protection of privacy and, fairly obviously, attacks are being made on the privacy of individuals at all levels within our society. I refer here not only to the operation of the powers of the state but also to developments with regard to new technology and the changes that are being made within our financial system, such as the move away from a money or cash economy to a card economy. Authoritarian attitudes and intrusive modern technology combine to undermine the freedom and the privacy of individuals. The Australian Law Reform Commission, in its excellent 1983 report on privacy, concluded after seven years of investigation into this issue that privacy in Australia is in danger, both in actuality and in prospect. The Commission pointed out that there was an urgent need for new legal protections in this area. The Australian Democrats regret that the Government has taken so long to act on this excellent report and, even worse, that it has watered down some of the Commission's most significant recommendations. Before turning to the ways in which the legislation before us is deficient, I wish to remind the Senate of the principles that guided the Australian Law Reform Commission in its deliberations. The Commission stated in its report: An understanding of what is encompassed in the concept of privacy can therefore be gained by seeing privacy in the context of human rights. Basic to all the human rights identified in the ICCPR-- that is, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights- and other international human rights instruments is respect for individual autonomy. Claims to privacy are part of the claim that the autonomy of each individual should be protected and his integrity respected. Privacy claims involve a number of aspects: that the person of the individual should be respected, i.e. it should not be interfered with without consent; that the individual should be able to exercise a measure of control over relationships with others; this means that: a person should be able to exert an appropriate measure of control on the extent to which his correspondence, communications and activities are available to others in the community; and he should be able to control the extent to which information about him is available to others in the community. It is under these categories that the Commission's recommendations for reform are made. I think when one looks at those recommendations from the Law Reform Commission's report on privacy one cannot but be concerned that the Bills before us should have been drafted in the way they have and that they should have been put forward as a package. Regrettably, the Government has seen fit to depart from these principles of the Australian Law Reform Commission in significant detail. Its attitude to the protection of privacy is clearly indicated in these Bills. The Bills are clearly a watering down of the Australian Law Reform Commission's proposals. In addition, the Bills have been introduced as an adjunct to the Australia Card Bill rather than as a fulfilment of that excellent report of the Australian Law Reform Commission. I think this has cheapened the debate on privacy. Indeed, it has confused and muddied the waters in an area that ought to be dealt with on its own since it is of vital importance to every Australian. The Privacy Bill and the Privacy (Consequential Amendments) Bill will operate basically as follows: They will establish rules of conduct to be called `information privacy principles' for the collection and the retention of, access to and correction of uses and disclosure of personal information about individuals. The information privacy principles will apply to Commonwealth departments and agencies. A breach of these principles is deemed to be an interference with privacy and Commonwealth agencies will be required to avoid doing things that amount to an interference with privacy, although such interference does not give rise to any civil liability in damages or criminal penalties. Persons alleging an interference with privacy will, under this piece of legislation, be able to complain to the Data Protection Agency which, interestingly enough, will be established by the Australia Card Bill, not this Bill. The Data Protection Agency will be authorised to investigate complaints and, where appropriate, to attempt conciliation. Where requested to do so by the Minister it will be authorised to examine proposed legislation under which interference with privacy might arise; to monitor activities overseas and in Australia; to promote understanding and acceptance of these privacy principles; to prepare and publish guidelines for agencies; to collate from publicly available sources and publish information on personal information databanks covered by these principles; and to provide advice to the Minister and agencies on other matters. On application by an agency, the Data Protection Agency, which is to be established under the Australia Card Bill, will have the power to determine that an act or practice that is inconsistent with these principles is substantially more in the public interest than compliance with them. The Privacy Bill also provides for certain limited extensions of the law of confidentiality. The Privacy (Consequential Amendments) Bill 1986, which is being debated cognately, will make amendments to the Freedom of Information Act 1982 to require that where reasonably practicable a person whose personal affairs are dealt with in a document to which another person has sought access is to be consulted before access is granted. The person will be able to object to that provision of access. The Bill will prevent departments claiming exemption under the Act from disclosure of a document to a person, insofar as it deals with that person's personal affairs, merely on the grounds that the document is covered by a general security provision in the legislation. The Privacy (Consequential Amendments) Bill also makes amendments to the Ombudsman Act 1976, the Merit Protection (Australian Government Employees) Act 1984 and the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission legislation, which was passed recently, and others. A reverse referral power is also provided under the Australia Card Bill. When we go through that piece of legislation and seek to compare it in detail with the recommendations of the Australian Law Reform Commission report on privacy, we are struck by the way that the Government has piecemeal applied and piecemeal left out significant recommendations of the Commission for privacy. It is quite an extraordinary situation where the Government, in defence of the Australia Card, is saying: `We are also bringing in a Privacy Bill and making general arm waving gestures towards the Australian Law Reform Commission', but the Bill that the Government has introduced in many ways makes significant and radical departures from those recommendations, such as making the whole issue of privacy more or less dependent upon the whim of government rather than something which is held personally by an individual within our society. When the Committee stage of the Privacy Bill is reached, which I understand will not take place this year, the Australian Democrats will be supporting it since, as I have already said, this legislation stands on its own and should stand on its own. Of course significant changes will have to be made to it to eliminate references to the Australia Card and it will have to be significantly beefed up to accord with the Australian Law Reform Commission report. We intend moving amendments to do both of those things-to eliminate the Australia Card references and to beef the legislation up-because we believe that Australians are entitled to legislation from this Government dealing with privacy. There have been significant technological changes, significant invasions of privacy and significant denials of the civil liberties of our citizens, as a result of technological developments, that have to be dealt with and that should have been dealt with three years ago, but which should not have been dealt with in the context of the type of debate we are now having. On behalf of the Australian Democrats I will be moving next year, when we get into the Committee stage on the Privacy Bill, a whole series of amendments significantly to strengthen the legislation and bring it into line with those types of recommendations. We will also, at that stage, seek to establish the necessary investigatory body, that is, the Data Protection Agency, the establishment of which will be defeated at the end of the second reading debate of the Australia Card Bill. We believe that will need to be incorporated in this Bill and we will seek to do so. Shortly before George Orwell's death in 1949 he wrote that although Nineteen Eighty-Four had been a parody: . . . this is the direction in which the world is going at present, and the trend lies deep in the political, social and economic foundations of the contemporary world situation. I think that is very true. There is a possibility that information on individual citizens will be more and more leaked into databases, many of which, of course, are established with the voluntary agreement of citizens and that must not be forgotten. But in seeking to avail themselves of a whole range of benefits and services which are available in our community, from the ability to gain cash from an automatic teller on a 24-hour basis, for example, to the ability to travel overseas and to use a card, citizens voluntarily give part of their personal information to various databanks. We have all been made aware that a number of agencies that we do business with, sell our names and addresses to other people. Hence we find ourselves the unwilling recipients of all sorts of soliciting mail and requests. But we have, voluntarily given our names, and if we look at the fine print on those forms we will see that unfortunately, at the same time we have given those people the ability to sell our names and addresses to others. There is a whole range of movements that need to be looked at and that need to be dealt with. This Bill deals with only Commonwealth agencies; it does not seek to deal with State agencies. One of the interesting activities of this Government, in its refusal to use its powers to deal with these significant items, is that it does not deal with private agencies that have the ability to intrude significantly into the affairs of individuals in Australia. It seeks to depart, in a major way, from the principles set down by the Australian Law Reform Commission. I will spell out the principles that have guided us in an attempt to draw up our amendments. The ones which we believe ought to have been in the Government's mind when it was drafting this legislation-they may have been in the Government's mind but it certainly did not pass them along to the bureaucrats who drafted the legislation-are these: Privacy laws should pay due respect to the protection of important human rights and social interests which compete with privacy; they include the general desirability of a free flow of information and the recognition of the rights of government and business to achieve their objectives in an efficient way. Remedies for privacy protection should be clear and specific, not vague and general, some examples of which we find in this legislation. Privacy remedies should build upon, extend and, where necessary, modify the present Australian laws relevant to the protection of privacy. The Government has done that to some degree, but not as far as we would wish. Privacy remedies should be so designed as to permit an aggregation of experience with a view to future extension of privacy protection where that is shown to be needed. The Government has moved in that direction, but again not as significantly far as we would desire. Although necessarily limited to the Commonwealth constitutional areas of responsibility, the remedies proposed for the better protection of privacy should be capable of acceptance, adaptation and extension throughout Australia. The Australian Democrats believe that the Government, following the 1983 report, ought to have made significant attempts to bring the State governments and the Commonwealth Government together on a general acceptable basis whereby the Commonwealth could legislate and there could have been corresponding legislation by the State governments. This Government has made no such attempt after three years of having had probably the most comprehensive, detailed report ever provided to any democratic government in history. Senator Button —I am glad you concede that, anyway. Senator MACKLIN —That is the Commission's report, not the Government's. Next, the remedies should be compatible with international obligations accepted by Australia, including a respect of the international technology of communications. So far as possible, they should also be compatible with developing general international guidelines relevant to the better protection of individual privacy. The Government has accepted basically that principle, though some of its implementation has not been significantly extensive enough to meet the detailed recommendations of the Commission's report. Lastly, the new remedies should be cost-effective, avoiding where possible the creation of expensive bureaucracies and placing due reliance upon self-regulation and initiatives for self-protection. It is very interesting that the Government, in terms of its connection with the Australia Card issue, has significantly departed from that principle. I return to that warning by George Orwell. I think we should be careful of not neglecting that when we are dealing with the issue of privacy and this Privacy Bill which is before us today. We have a responsibility, I believe, to act on this independently of whether the Australia Card goes ahead or not. We believe that it is of such significance that, in giving our support to the second reading, we hope that the Government will be willing to recast the Bill before next February and eliminate those items on the Australia Card that are in the Privacy Bill. Senator Tate —You are talking about the Privacy Bill? Senator MACKLIN —I am talking about only the Privacy Bill, Senator; we should eliminate those items on the Australia Card so that we can have good, operational privacy legislation in Australia at the start of 1987. Senator Peter Baume —That is the main reason we are opposing it-it is so linked in with the Australia Card. Senator MACKLIN —It is linked in, but we are giving support to that because we accept the notion of privacy and we believe that that Bill can be amended in significant ways to allow it to operate. We believe that to pay lip service to the protection of privacy is just as bad or possibly even worse than doing nothing. Our amendments that we propose to move next year, we believe, will prevent that occurring. They will, if accepted, we hope present a significantly strengthened Privacy Bill. As far as we are concerned, this is a move which should be applauded and which should be supported. We hope that out of the atmosphere of the Australia Card debate, this chamber will be able to have a more extensive debate in Committee on privacy matters and that these items can be dealt with at length. I note here that our amendments at the second reading stage to the privacy legislation, which has been foreshadowed by Senator Haines, makes reference to that item. Part of the proposed amendment reads: That the Commonwealth introduce privacy legislation based on the recommendations of the Australian Law Reform Commission Report on Privacy . . . We believe that, whatever this legislation is said to be based on, there are such significant departures that as it now stands it cannot be supported. We hope that the Government will see that it needs to be significantly amended and will agree to those significant amendments next year. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT —I call Senator Tate. Senator Tate —Senator McKiernan is actually next on the speakers list. Senator McKiernan —No, I have made my speech. Senator Tate —Mr Deputy President, I had not intended to intervene in this debate but I got a little tired of the constant iteration by Opposition speakers. I think we have had four or five in a row. That is why I am leaping to my feet. Senator Georges —If an honourable senator wishes to speak, he puts his name on the speakers list and awaits the call. Senator Tate —I am very willing; that is why-- Senator Georges —I have been sitting here for almost two days now. Senator Tate —Senator, that is why I gave way to Senator McKiernan when he leapt to his feet. If you leap to your feet, I will gladly give way. Please rise. Senator Georges —I am not prepared to upset somebody else. I am on the list. Put yourself on the list. Senator BOSWELL(Queensland)(12.21) —Unlike Senator Macklin, who debated the Privacy Bill 1986, I want to return to the Australia Card Bill 1986, which is really the essence of the debate that the Senate is involved in at the moment. The debate is of immense interest to Australia, and the Senate has been brought back for two or three days, or however long it takes, to debate it. The point that I want to bring out in my contribution is that initially the Government sent the Australia Card off to an all-party committee, which had representatives from the Liberal Party of Australia, the National Party of Australia, the Australian Democrats and the Australian Labor Party. The results of that all-party report came down very much against the implementation of an identity card. In four areas the report found that the identity card was lacking. The Department of Social Security gave evidence that the ID card proposal would result in no net savings and that it would be ineffective in tackling the real issues of welfare fraud. The report found that the ID card would be ineffective in tackling illegal immigration-a point that the Government conceded. The Committee also found that the ID card would be ineffective in tackling tax collection, tax evasion and the so-called cash or black economy. On organised crime, two of the most prominent names in the fight against organised crime-Mr Frank Costigan QC and Mr Douglas Meagher QC-opposed the whole card proposal as being of potential benefit to organised crime. One must ask why the Government has brought the Senate back at great cost to the public to debate the identity card. The Opposition and the Democrats were quite happy to leave the debate until we came back in February. That position would have saved the taxpayers of this nation hundreds of thousands of dollars, but no, the Government wanted to bring us back so that we could debate this card. One must ask why. Of course, the obvious answer to that is that the Government is looking for a trigger for a double dissolution. It knows that it is behind in the polls, that the people are rejecting it now as its sins are coming home to roost. Only today in a poll the Government was 6 percentage points behind the Opposition. The Government wants to clear the decks for an election if it sees a political advantage. That is really what this debate is all about. The debate is really about a double dissolution, as the Government believes that it is on a winning track by debating this identity card out in the community. The Government is relying on research that shows that people are giving the Australia Card some sort of support. But I believe that after all the points that my colleagues have raised in this debate have been aired people will become frightened of the identity card. This debate has brought up a lot of issues. My colleagues Senator Sheil and Senator Peter Baume and other Liberal and National Party members, and indeed the Democrats, have raised matters that I was not aware of and as the debate develops I am becoming increasingly alarmed from observing the points that are being brought up in the Senate. For instance, Senator Knowles said that parliamentarians' Medicare cards were being flagged so that parliamentarians will get some type of extended privacy that will not be available to any other citizen. I was not aware of this. I think this attitude of the Government is despicable. We are here to represent the citizens of Australia; we are not here to receive extended benefits that are not available to the average citizen. I am appalled by this suggestion. This Government is going down the track of putting more impositions on a free society. The Government has already hit the productive sector of the community on many fronts. It has imposed a fringe benefits tax-a ridiculous, unjust and costly administrative nightmare to the private and farming sectors. The capital gains tax, which has a death duty element, removes the incentive to start or expand a business. The abolition of negative gearing and the abolition of entertainment expense deductions are both counter-productive, unjustified attacks on the running of businesses. The Government has forced many sub-contractors into a totally inappropriate pay as you earn tax scheme. The Government has increased company taxes. Senator Childs —This has nothing to do with this Bill. Senator BOSWELL —I am quite aware of what the Bill does but what I am saying is that this Bill goes further down the track and makes more impositions on business and the farming community. That is the point I am trying to get across to Senator Childs. He obviously does not understand it because he was a union and Party official and he has no experience in business or making the economy run and getting out in the community producing and increasing the wealth of the nation. Let me expand my argument on the Bill. All those taxes and impositions have meant more form filling and more unproductive time ploughing through paperwork and more people on the payroll for no return. Now, under this Bill, farmers and the business sector will have an Australia Card inflicted upon them. The card will have to be produced for any bank transaction, when dealing with other financial institutions, depositing money with a legal practitioner, purchasing or selling land, purchasing shares, transacting business with a marketing authority, a produce agent or real estate agent, beginning new employment, obtaining medicare benefits, dealing with the Taxation Office, and remitting money overseas. We should examine some of those impositions. Speaking as a representative of the National Party of Australia, which takes into consideration the interests of rural people all over Australia, I put this to the Government: People out at Laura are 300 or 400 miles from the nearest bank or stock agent. I ask Senator Button to respond to this. A person in Laura may ring his stockbroker and say: `Buy me 100 store cattle'. How does he get on? He probably does not have an aeroplane to fly his Australia Card to Dalgety's to purchase some stock. Such a trip would cost $600 or $700 each way. How does that man living 300 or 400 miles away from his broker or his bank or his stock and station agent get on? These are the things I find incomprehensible. Senator Button —Clearly, there are a lot in that category. Senator BOSWELL —Senator Button and the Government are unsympathetic to the farming community. That person in Laura, if he telephones his stock agent, may say: `I am Fred Bloggs. You know me. I have dealt with you for 20 years. I want to buy some cattle'. The broker would have to say to Fred Bloggs: `I know you, Fred. I have done business with you for 20 years. I have been to your daughter's wedding, but if I take your order over the phone I am in breach of this law and I will be fined $20,000'. That is the penalty if the broker takes an order over the phone. That is the sort of example I put to this Government. How can people live with such an imposition? The same applies to small business operators. They have had plenty to do under this Government in the last four years. Apart from trying to survive under the regime this Government has laid down, they have had to fill out stupid fringe benefits forms, to calculate the capital gains tax they may be liable for every time they want to sell or expand a business. Now they will have to take this card with them everywhere-to the bank, when seeing a solicitor, when purchasing goods from overseas and dealing with the Tax Office. Senator Button —That would be the first time for some of them. Senator BOSWELL —What Senator Button's government is suggesting is that every Australian is a cheat. That is the first premise from which it works. It is not worried about the 99 per cent-decent, law abiding citizens. It is throwing a net so vast that it will catch everyone and calling every Australian citizen a cheat. What will the scheme cost? The Government tells us that the Australia Card will cost $750m to implement. It will require 2,100 public servants-and that is the Government's cost. I say to everyone listening to this broadcast that the last thing that Australia needs at this time of financial crisis and peril is another 2,100 public servants. In a choice of things we need from one to 1,000, the very last would be 2,100 extra public servants. The Confederation of Australian Industry has looked not only at the Government's costs but also at what it will cost the private sector. Although Senator Button has shown some sympathy towards the manufacturing sector, he has never displayed any feeling for the rural sector or small business. The Confederation of Australian Industry has claimed that the direct costs, the extra filing and staff, will cost business $377m a year. I believe that is a very conservative figure. The private sector and the farming sector have not realised what a hindrance this card will be to them. They view it in the same way as many other people in business viewed it. I am the first to admit that when the proposition was first expounded the identity card was seen as a panacea for all ills. It is the last thing we should wish on the private sector and the farming communities of Australia. The Government will not come clean. It will not tell us just how much the Australia Card is going to cost. On the best available estimates it will cost the private sector up to $2,000m over the next 10 years. That is a terrible imposition that the Government is placing on the private sector of Australia, the productive sector that is going to provide the people of Australia with jobs, prosperity and wealth. The Government is inflicting upon them another $2,000m cost over the next 10 years by the introduction of this card. The Government's own Business Regulation Review Unit has estimated that there are two costs to business resulting from government regulation-the cost of the paper work involved in obeying government regulation, which is twice the cost incurred by government, and the compliance cost, which can be up to 10 times the cost incurred by government. It is no wonder that the Government will not come clean and tell us what it has estimated the cost to the private sector to be. One would think that the Government would have made some practical approach to find out what the cost will be of the Australia Card to the private and rural sectors. If the Government has done so, the figure must be so frightening and so vast, so immense, that Senator Button is hiding and will not produce it. That is a typically heavy-handed approach which is not helping the private sector. Thankfully the Australian Democrats have had the foresight to stand with the Opposition and block this legislation, because everyone who breached it would have faced the imposition of draconian fines, including a $20,000 fine for a mere oversight or for something that was totally accidental. Of course, the legislation contains a reduced fine of $5,000 for lesser offences. It provides that every individual must present himself personally every time a transaction is made and that one cannot present a card on behalf of anyone else. Again this would be massively inconvenient to business. What about the extra cost to taxpayers which would eventuate as the number of public servants grew-2,150 new public servants and 300 Medicare offices to be upgraded at public expense? State government, local government and statutory authorities will all have to bear extra costs. The Australia Card is a costly exercise dreamed up by people far removed from the reality of producing wealth for this nation. It does not take into account the everyday problems that will be faced by people in business. Apart from the impositions that the Australia Card or identity card would place on business, I think we also have to be aware of the imposition that it would place on the privacy of Australians. Professor Geoffrey Walker, head of the Queensland University Department of Law, summed up the one safe method to protect individual privacy against the Australia Card when he said: The only effective safeguard against proposals of this kind is to prevent them from becoming a reality in the first place. That is the stand that the National and Liberal parties and the Democrats are going to take when this Bill comes on for a vote. Senator Button —You didn't do much about it, Senator. You talked about the private sector. Tax avoidance was the great growth industry under your Government. You know that. Senator BOSWELL —I was in the private sector for probably 18 years. I felt very proud to play my part in employing a number of people and in providing them with jobs, a decent income and a home to live in. I feel that I played my part very significantly in the private sector. Senator Peter Baume —And you put in your tax returns. Senator BOSWELL —I lodged my tax return yearly, unlike the Treasurer (Mr Keating). Senator Walters —And on time. Senator BOSWELL —And on time too. Let us hear what some members of the Labor Party think. Mr Lewis Kent most eloquently said: Nothing can be more un-Australian than the need to provide one's identity on the call of an official, be it a policeman or a bureaucrat. It would be more appropriate for the proposed card be called a Hitlercard or Stalincard . . . Senator Bolkus spoke out against it. He has been exiled to some far off place until after the debate is over. We have not seen Senator Bolkus. He has been shunted off somewhere overseas because of his opposition to the card. Senator Georges is going to make a statement. Senator George's political stand would be poles apart from mine, but I believe that he has strong feelings on the Australia Card also. Senator Georges has displayed courage in this House. He stood up for what he believed in and for his sins he was sent to Coventry for three months. He was sent to the sin bin for three months, but he had the courage to stand up and represent the views of the people who put him into the House, and I hope that Senator Georges continues to have the courage to stand up and represent the people of Queensland. Senator Crichton-Browne —And all he did was vote for party policy. Senator BOSWELL —He voted for party policy and got three months in the sin bin. That is justice for you! I find it frightening to consider the wealth of information that will be accumulated against every Australian and will result in an unprecedented data bank being compiled against every Australian. Confidential Medicare records were publicly released by the Federal Government in a dispute with the New South Wales doctors. The South Australian Government in 1983 released to trade unions details of supposedly confidential records of its own employees who did not have trade union subscriptions deducted from their pay. The Minister responsible for the card, the Minister for Health, Dr Neal Blewett, attempted this year to waive secrecy provisions to allow the Department of Social Security access to previously confidential medical records. With this sort of record it is no wonder that everyone is so concerned that the cross-references of data between the Department of Social Security, the Department of Health, the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs and the Taxation Office initially, and a number of others in the long term, will be able to fall into the hands of the wrong people. There are thousands and thousands of public servants out there. I would be the first to acknowledge that most of those public servants take their responsibilities well and are effective and hard-working people. They are there to serve the public of Australia, but what concerns me is that amongst those thousands of public servants there will be some who will take advantage by leaking those very personal documents. Senator Newman —What about the doctors? Senator BOSWELL —I mentioned the doctors a few moments ago. It has been proved already that in three instances highly sensitive records have been leaked out of government departments. So no one on that side of the Senate can say that it has never happened and will not happen again. It has happened and, under Murphy's law, it will happen again. No one can say that it will not happen. Senator Sheil, who is a doctor and has had experience in these types of things, gave the example of a 16-year-old who has a nervous breakdown because he has been studying so hard. What concerns me is that that private information will be recorded on a Medicare file, will go on the data bank and will then be accessed by any one of the public servants who work in Social Security, Health, Immigration and Ethnic Affairs or Taxation. Senator Archer alluded to a number of other government departments that the Government wanted to give access to this data bank. Debate interrupted. Sitting suspended from 12.45 to 2 p.m. Senator BUTTON(Victoria-Leader of the Government in the Senate) —by leave-I inform the Senate that the Minister for Education, Senator Ryan, is unwell and will be absent from the chamber today. Any questions which would normally be directed to her or to the Minister for Community Services, Senator Grimes, should therefore be directed to me. Senator CHANEY —My question, which is addressed to the Minister representing the Minister for Primary Industry, concerns the submission put to the Government yesterday by the National Farmers Federation. I ask the Minister: Does the Government agree that farmers have been hard hit by the high interest rates which continue to exist in Australia? Is there any real prospect of a significant reduction in interest rates in the near future to relieve some of the burdens of rural industry? Further, does the Minister agree with the National Farmers Federation that a wages freeze and further cuts in Government spending would help reduce pressure on interest rates by removing the need to use interest rates to support the dollar? Will the Government act in these critical areas to relieve the crippling interest rate burden on Australia's farmers? Senator WALSH —In respect of the wages freeze I make the same observation as the Prime Minister made; that is, that the National Farmers Federation, like the Opposition, is pursuing two mutually exclusive policies-a deregulated labour market and a wages freeze. They are two diametrically opposed policies. The National Farmers Federation has displayed the same degree of intellectual sloth on that question as has the Opposition. I am not surprised, therefore, that the Opposition is eager to take up the National Farmers Federation's proposition and endorse it. The Minister for Primary Industry will deal with the National Farmers Federation's submission in the professional way that he normally deals with submissions from anybody. As to the operations of the Reserve Bank of Australia, the Reserve Bank is presently operating in a manner very similar to the manner in which the Australian Wool Corporation operates its reserve price scheme-something of which I understand the National Farmers Federation approves. I think the Australian Broadcasting Corporation described Mr McLachlan's action yesterday as a piece of grandstanding, which I think is a fair enough description. Indeed, I believe that Mr McLachlan has used the people he purports to represent-that is, the farmers-over a very significant period to prop up his own political campaign. Nowhere is that more apparent than in the high profile role the NFF has taken in opposing the fringe benefits and capital gains taxes. I note with considerable satisfaction that a number of the people whom Mr McLachlan purports to represent and whose trust he has misused have realised that they were being taken for a ride by him. I cite the Merredin zone of the Primary Industry Association of Western Australia, which recently carried a motion condemning the PIA and the NFF for running a high profile campaign in opposition to fringe benefits and capital gains taxes, which are of peripheral, if any, relevance to the concerns of the agricultural sector. So some of them have woken up and I am very pleased that that has happened. On the question of government spending, I think one would have to acknowledge that, if government spending were to be slashed drastically, the dollar value would rise, interest rates would fall, or, more likely, a little of both. I note, however, the Oppositions's consistent pattern of obstruction of this Government's attempts to reduce government spending and its promise to overcome the country's economic problems by bringing back the boozy free lunch, the tax deductible Mercedes, and paying pensions to millionaires. All those things would either force the value of the dollar down or interest rates up or, again more likely, a bit of both. I note also, of course, the Opposition's clear intention to sabotage yet again a vital piece of legislation that is before the Senate today which would have the effect of both increasing revenue and reducing government outlays to a quite significant extent. If that were to happen, in other words, if the Australia Card legislation were to be passed instead of being defeated, as these vandals and saboteurs-- The PRESIDENT —Order! The Minister is now clearly debating the matter and is getting well away from the question that was put to him. I ask him to come back to the terms of the question that was asked. Senator WALSH —Very well, Mr President. I just observe that one way of reducing government outlays by a significant amount and bridging the Budget deficit by an even greater amount because of the elimination of tax evasion would be to pass the Australia Card legislation. Senator CHANEY —Mr President, I wish to ask a supplementary question. I am sure that the farmers of Australia will be much cheered by that splendid answer from the Minister. I ask him whether he admits that high interest rates are crippling many farmers. Does he agree that the Government is pursuing a high interest rate policy? Will the Government change that and do something about high interest rates? Senator WALSH —As pointed out in the publication put out by the Livestock and Grain Producers Association of New South Wales from which I quoted a week or two ago in the Senate-this is the LGPA's estimate and I am not able to verify it-30 per cent of farmers have cash credits. They would be the beneficiaries of high interest rates. It is certainly true that a number of farmers are in difficulty because of the size of their debts in the first instance. The present historically high level of interest rates-although they are not as high as they were when John Howard was Treasurer-is a serious problem for a number of farmers. The size of their debt, of course, is almost invariably a function of the fact that they paid too much for land in the early 1980s, partly in the expectation that they would receive untaxed capital gains. Senator McKIERNAN —My question is directed to the Minister for Resources and Energy. Is Woodside Offshore Petroleum Pty Ltd recruiting engineers in the Hague and bringing them to Australia to oversee the Goodwyn platform development phase of the North West Shelf natural gas project? If so, how many engineers will be coming to Australia? Further, will this project, which is costed at $600m and is scheduled to come on stream in the early 1990s, be developed exclusively by Dutch and Japanese interests, or will provision be made for local Australian industry participation? Senator GARETH EVANS —It is early days yet in the development of the Goodwyn platform. No final decision has yet been made about the detailed shape of the project, let alone the question of the appointment of engineers. I understand that Woodside Offshore Petroleum and its partners are currently completing feasibility studies for the development of Goodwyn. Mr Peter Tapper, the Executive General Manager of Woodside, advised me in a letter dated 26 November that no decision had been made about the design or fabrication of the Goodwyn platform. The conclusion of the feasibility studies obviously is a necessary step before development plans can be submitted to government for approval. In any event, fabrication of the Goodwyn platform is not scheduled to begin until 1989 for completion by 1993. As I have said, the engineers for the project have not yet been selected. In relation to the employment of foreign engineers, it is to be noted that Australia's immigration requirements promote the use of local engineering expertise by refusing entry to expatriates where the necessary skills and experience are available in Australia. I should add that the Government has been very keen to maximise both the Australian content in the material going into the liquefied natural gas export project in the North West Shelf and the Australian professional skills and expertise involved in it. Early next year Woodside Offshore Petroleum, on behalf of the joint venture participants, will be briefing me and other Ministers on the performance of Australian industry to date in respect of these local content issues. That briefing will build upon the very detailed series of discussions that have been jointly chaired by myself and David Parker, the Western Australian Minister, in meetings of the national liaison group over the last two years. At that briefing I expect Woodside to discuss its plans for Goodwyn and, in detail, the opportunities for Australian participation. Finally, Woodside has offered to brief industry on opportunities arising from the Goodwyn development. I expect that briefing for industry to be held early in 1987 and to be similar to the session arranged by Woodside before major contracts for the LNG phase of the project were let. It needs to be appreciated that Australian participation in the LNG export phase of that project is currently around 65 per cent and is expected to rise to 70 per cent by its completion, which is a similar level to that achieved in the domestic phase of the project, and really does represent a first rate achievement for Australian industry, given the unique character of this development in Australia-it is the first time there has been this sort of plant built-and extraordinary technical complexity of it. We would be expecting, similarly, a very substantial Australian participation in the Goodwyn development. Senator COLLARD —I refer the Minister representing the Ministers for Defence and for Foreign Affairs to a report in today's Canberra Times about the disappearance of a linguist from the Defence Signals Directorate. Can the Minister confirm that an investigation is under way into the reported six-month absence without leave of a corporal from the DSD? Has this man been engaged in work of a highly sensitive nature which could give rise to a concern for national security? Is there any other information which the Minister can provide to the Senate on this matter? Senator GARETH EVANS —I understand that this report originated in Truth, of Melbourne, so one can, perhaps, make one's own judgment about some of the more lurid aspects of the report, at least in its original form. My defence brief tells me that a corporal has been absent without leave since 20 May 1986, that investigations into the circumstances of his absence are continuing, and that all such cases of unauthorised absence-there are more than one arising from time to time-are investigated. This case is not being treated any differently. Senator DEVLIN —The Minister for Veterans' Affairs will be aware of the lengthy delays in the pensions determining system at the Veterans' Review Board level and of concerns being expressed by the ex-service community in having the backlogs reduced. What action is the Minister taking to reduce the delays? Can he also advise whether the claimants themselves are contributing to the delays, and, if so, what steps he would like them to take to speed up the system? Senator GIETZELT —The Senate will be aware that it is almost two years since the new determining system came into operation. It was designed to reduce the delays in dealing with pension applications. Whilst there has been an appreciable reduction, we have found that, due to a number of circumstances beyond our control, the earlier aims will not be realised. It needs to be recognised that one of the reasons that this problem exists is the large number of applications outstanding before the Veterans' Review Board flowing from the inability of the advocates appearing on behalf of the applicants, the veterans, to be ready to bring their cases before the Board. This is understandable because the applicants rely upon and feel the need for advocate assistance in presenting their case. A very high rate of adjournment has been noted in recent times in relation to these matters that are before the Veterans' Review Board. As a result of this, about 30 per cent of such cases in which a certificate of readiness has been prepared and with which the Board is ready to deal, are then withdrawn because of problems associated with the case and the advocate's not being ready to proceed. That, of course, creates a difficulty from the applicant's point of view as well as for the work output of the Veterans' Review Board. We have had discussions with the principal member of the Veterans' Review Board and he has taken the matter up with the veterans organisations, which generally provide this service on a voluntary basis. We are very appreciative of that, but it breaks down at that point, when they indicate that they are prepared to proceed and then, for some reason, they are not able to proceed-an option that is available to them. This causes considerable delay in dealing with the applicant's case. Senator Dame MARGARET GUILFOYLE —My question is directed to the Minister for Finance. It concerns the Forward Estimates of Commonwealth Government outlays and staffing for 1987-88. Is it a fact, as reported by Michael Stutchbury in today's Australian Financial Review, that the Forward Estimates for 1987-88 are in the Government's hands and that their release is overdue? If so, what is the estimate of total Commonwealth Government outlays for the next financial year? When will the full details be released? Senator WALSH —I have not seen the report, but from that account it is certainly not entirely correct. The Forward Estimates were cleared for publication by me last week as a result of a Cabinet decision. They were also to be cleared by the Prime Minister and the Treasurer. I think that has now been done, and they would have gone to the printers today. If not, I expect them to go to the printers tomorrow, and I understand there is about a week's delay. I will be making them public next week. As to the estimate of expenditure for next year, I am afraid that Senator Dame Margaret Guilfoyle will have to wait until publication to get that information. Senator COATES —I ask the Minister representing the Treasurer and the Minister for Employment and Industrial Relations about an article in the Australian Financial Review last week reporting the withdrawal of the Confederation of Australian Industry from the national priorities project, which I understand was an employer-sponsored research project focusing on taxation reform, public expenditure and industrial relations policy. Is the Government concerned that, consequent on the CAI's withdrawal, the project will be significantly curtailed, therefore limiting the employer contribution to the economic debate as the Government sets policy in the coming year? Senator WALSH —One of the things that this Government has done, probably to an unprecedented degree, is to encourage public debate about major economic issues and to sponsor a wide-ranging consultation process-most notably the National Economic Summit, shortly after the present Government was elected, and the National Taxation Summit last year. The concept of Australia's employer organisations setting up the national priorities project, or a project of that type, to fund research is, in principle, something that the Government welcomes. But I understand that there have been considerable tensions between the relevant organisations associated with that, which in turn are attributable, I think, to the naked political ambitions of a number of the most visible members of that group, in particular the tensions attributable to the political campaigns being conducted continuously by the President of the Australian Federation of Employers, Andrew Hay. The Australian Federation of Employers is itself beginning to disintegrate with the withdrawal of the Confederation of Australian Industry and the Housing Industry Association. It seems that about the only people who are going to be left in the Australian Federation of Employers shortly are Mr Hay and the National Farmers Federation-and perhaps not even the National Farmers Federation but just its President, Mr McLachlan. I think I have probably covered the question. In principle, the Government welcomes the project, but it would appear that it is not going along too well because of the squabbling from the various groups that are involved in it. Indeed, that is something very like the squabbling within the Liberal Party, to which it is also related. Senator KILGARIFF —I direct a question to the Minister representing the Minister for Foreign Affairs. I refer to the recently announced collaboration by a number of so-called peace groups, which have stated that their aim is to remove the Australian-United States joint defence facilities, such as Pine Gap, within 10 years. Would the Minister agree that seeking to obtain world peace by the removal of these bases is not unlike seeking to do away with crime, drugs and prostitution by firing the police force? Senator GARETH EVANS —I do not have Senator Kilgariff's gift for the extravagant metaphor, but certainly the Government takes the view, as is well known, that the presence of these joint facilities on Australian soil is an indispensable component of the Western world's defence effort and that they make a very substantial contribution to international peace and security through the verification and early warning capacity they give the West. Australia has its interests as a nation very well served by the presence on our soil of these facilities, not by reason necessarily of the significance that has for the alliance with the United States of America, but much more so because of the contribution it represents to peace and security in the world. We equally strongly and fervently are committed, unlike our opponents opposite, to ensuring disarmament in the world at large, which hopefully ultimately will make such facilities unnecessary. We see the whole structure of mutual deterrence and the supporting apparatus that goes with it as being essentially only an interim phase, pending what we all hope will be a much more far-reaching system of guarantees for the peace of the world. Looked at against that background and in that context there is nonetheless a very strong commitment on the part of the Labor Government to the maintenance and continuation in existence of those facilities. Senator COOK —My question is addressed to the Minister for Finance representing the Treasurer. It is in the nature of a Christmas box question. What are the benefits of the full tax imputation system announced by the Treasurer at 1 p.m. today? Senator WALSH —The first point to observe about the tax imputation policy is that it will remove the double taxation of company profits which had previously applied; that is, taxation in the first instance in the hands of the company and, in the second instance, in the hands of the shareholders on the dividends distributed. Under the existing system a dividend paid to a shareholder in the top tax bracket is effectively taxed at the rate of 78.4c in the dollar, leaving 21.6c for the shareholder. The changes announced by the Treasurer today, with the tax cuts, will mean that the 21.6c return will become 51 per cent on 1 July next year; an after-tax return which will be nearly 21/2 times greater than was possible under the previous system. Provided that the dividends are qualifying dividends, the actual tax rate may be less than 49c in the dollar if the shareholder to whom the dividend is distributed has a personal marginal tax rate of less than the maximum rate. For taxpayers in the lower and middle income ranges there is that further benefit. In other words, the company tax on distributed income is effectively abolished and at the same time the Government is abolishing the additional tax on undistributed profits. The Division 7 tax will no longer be needed because from 1 July next year the significantly lower top rate of personal tax will be aligned with the company tax rate. Incorporation will no longer be necessary as a means of avoiding the 60 per cent tax rate, so retention rules are not required. From the next financial year companies therefore will be completely free to decide whether to distribute or retain income. There will be no dividend or retention tax penalties from either course. The direct cost of the new full imputation system and the abolition of the Division 7 provisions is estimated at almost $500m in a full year. In the Government's initial consideration of the imputation system a new tax, known as compensatory tax, was to be incorporated into the package. The Government has now decided not to impose that compensatory tax. As a result of major design improvements the new business tax system will proceed as a landmark reform. For all the wailing and caterwauling that used to come from the Opposition over as many years as I can remember about the evil of the double taxation of company profits, the Opposition did not do a thing about it in the seven years it was in government. In the five years that John Howard was Treasurer, what happened? Absolutely nothing happened. The imputation system will do the job that several provisions had previously done. The direct cost of imputation and the abolition of Division 7 will be almost $500m. In addition, the Treasurer announced today that non-residents will not be taxed twice, consistent with the general policy that withholding tax on dividends paid out of taxed income and branch profits tax will be abolished. The estimate of the total gross cost of the package is some $775m. Of course, more than half of that will be offset by the increase in the company tax rate to 49c in the dollar. This is one of the major components of the Government's tax reform package; this is a move to simplicity which will remove a number of the distortions in the pre-existing tax law. It achieves the sort of policy change that many people have sought for a long time but have not been able to have enacted until this Government came to office. Apart from removing the distortion which is undesirable as a macroeconomic policy measure, it also provides very considerable benefits to the business community and it is about time that the business community recognised that. Senator Chaney —I ask the Minister to table the paper from which he has quoted. The PRESIDENT —I take it that the Minister is prepared to table the paper from which he quoted. The Minister has tabled the paper. Senator BROWNHILL —My question is directed to the Minister for Finance. In the light of answers given by the Minister earlier today regarding the recipients of fringe benefits, is the Minister aware of the Australian Bureau of Statistics survey which shows that of people with incomes under $199 per week, 131,500 or 21.1 per cent are in receipt of fringe benefits in the form of goods and services; over 26,000 have a telephone fringe benefit; nearly 15,000 have a housing fringe benefit; 12,000 have a medical fringe benefit; and 11,700 have electricity provided as a fringe benefit? In the light of those examples, is the Minister still prepared to claim that fringe benefits are provided only for the wealthy? Senator WALSH —I do not remember ever saying, or indeed anybody else in the Government ever saying, that fringe benefits are received only by the wealthy. What many of us have said and what is indisputably true is that overwhelmingly fringe benefits have been directed towards higher income earners. I did not have a chance to take down all the figures Senator Brownhill mentioned, but I did take down the first one. Senator Brownhill said that 21.1 per cent of wage earners earning less than $199 per week receive a fringe benefit in the form of goods and services. I have seen similar figures to that, so I am quite willing to accept that as being correct. However, Senator Brownhill's analysis is inadequate. Under the de minimis provisions of the fringe benefits tax, any benefit of a lesser value than $500 over the whole year will not be taxable, so almost all of those 21 per cent of taxpayers who have been getting some fringe benefits through goods and services will not be affected by the tax, because of that. Moreover, the $500 de minimis provision compounds the pre-existing generous treatment of fringe benefits provided as goods and services under which the FBT, even in the absence of de minimis provisions, would not apply unless the goods sold by the employer to the employee were sold at less than wholesale prices. The limit may be even less than that; I will check later. The important thing is that even without the de minimis provisions goods provided to an employee could be provided at significantly less than the retail price, and of course the provision of goods to an employee at the retail price would be part of the Australian Bureau of Statistics definition of a fringe benefit provided to such a worker. In other words, in short, there is absolutely no doubt that overwhelmingly the recipients of fringe benefits of the type which will be subject to tax under the Government's legislation were high income earners. The benefits were disproportionately concentrated among high income earners and, as I mentioned last week, depending on the bargaining power of the employee and employer respectively, very often the benefits were creamed off by the employer as well. Senator TATE —My question is directed to the Leader of the Government in the Senate. The Minister will recall that an article in the Bill of Rights, which was proposed by this Government and frustrated by the Opposition, recognises that the family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society. Will the Government consider building on its considerable record in relation to promoting the family and particularly in relation to the provision of employment, which of course is the greatest help that any family can have provided to it? Will it consider establishing an Office of the Family, possibly within the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, to co-ordinate and monitor the impact of policies on the promotion of the family as the unit within which most Australians find economic and social support? Senator BUTTON —I am able to answer only half the question, because I only heard half of it. If Senator Tate wants to ask a supplementary question because of any inadequacy of mine, I invite him to do so. Senator Chaney —If that is your reason for asking supplementaries, you are in trouble. Senator BUTTON —It is an inadequacy of hearing, Senator. I understand the nub of Senator Tate's question to be whether the Government would give consideration in the light of a number of factors to establishing an Office of the Family within the Prime Minister's Department or some other appropriate department. I do not know whether the Government has considered that question; I will certainly pass it on for further consideration. Whether or not the solution to the problems of Australian families is best arrived at by that route I do not know. However, I draw attention to some of the considerable progress made by this Government in relation to a whole range of policies which assist the family. For example, under the present Government spending on welfare housing and health has increased from 40 per cent of Commonwealth outlays, excluding public debt, to around 44 per cent. Secondly, it is important to remember that employment is the single most important determinant of a family's welfare and that unemployment is the greatest cause of poverty in this country. This Government came to office when the dole queues had swelled by 254,000 in a single year under the Fraser Government and the unemployment rate had hit 10 per cent. Since then, in 3 1/2 years, some 670,000 jobs have been created-twice the number of new jobs in three years that was created in the whole seven years of the previous Government. The opportunity for women to participate in the work force and more fully in the community at large has been enhanced under Labor's child care policies. Similarly, housing commencements averaged 142,000 a year in this Government's first three years in office, more than 10 per cent higher than the average for the previous period of government under Mr Malcolm Fraser. I do not think we have made enough fuss about the fact that in education 46 per cent of children are now staying on to Year 12 compared with 36 per cent during the period of the Fraser Government. That is not a statistic of which this Government can be particularly proud in terms of international comparison but in terms of the previous situation in this country it is an extraordinary improvement. I think we have a long way to go with that. Senator Dame Margaret Guilfoyle —Why is the Government falling in the polls if you have done all that? Senator BUTTON —I do not know, Senator. I suppose it may be because the public is enchanted by this virile Opposition. Senator Chaney —It is because only families have to submit tax returns. Senator BUTTON —I do not think that is the reason at all. I could make similar points about health and welfare payments. Senator Dame Margaret Guilfoyle —You must be on the wrong policies though, don't you think? Senator BUTTON —No, they are not the wrong policies, but I do not wish to make a statement about this. I will certainly see that Senator Tate's suggestion is referred to the Government for further consideration. Senator CHANEY —My question is to the Leader of the Government and it follows the welcome and novel interest in the family being shown by Senator Tate. I congratulate him for trying to put this issue on the Australian Labor Party's agenda. I ask: Is it a fact that families are now paying higher interest rates on their housing since the advent of the Hawke Government? Has the real value of family allowances deteriorated by about 30 per cent since the Hawke Government came to power? Has the dependent spouse rebate lost about 30 per cent of its value since the Hawke Government came into power? Has the relative position of families with dependent children deteriorated under the tax system in the way which was so admirably described by the Catholic Social Welfare Commission and the Anglican health and welfare services? Is it a fact that there are extensive waiting lists in public hospitals which means that many families are unable to get surgical treatment when they need it, quite apart from the shocking strike in Victoria which is preventing anybody from getting assistance, let alone families? Is it a fact that there has been a loss of choice of medical care for families and that a much smaller proportion of families are now able to insure because of the failure of the Government's Medicare system? Is it a fact that, as recorded by the church bodies I have referred to, the relative position of families has declined and is in urgent need of attention? Senator BUTTON —I suppose it might comfort Senator Chaney somewhat to invoke church bodies in support of his flamboyant statistics. In respect of some of the matters which Senator Chaney averted to, I have not checked the facts precisely. Senator Chaney —No one has checked them in the Government? The PRESIDENT —Order! There are far too many interjections. Senator BUTTON —They are not very good either; that is the point. I am fairly confident that the value of the family allowance has deteriorated by some 30 per cent in the last 3 1/2 years, as it did during periods of the Fraser Government. I am not sure about the dependent spouse rebate. There are certainly waiting lists in public hospitals, mainly for elective surgery which by and large does not affect the average family to the extent that-- Senator Lewis —Rubbish. How would you like to wait 12 months to have a hip socket replaced? Senator BUTTON —I said elective surgery, Senator. I was then asked whether there has been a loss of choice in respect of health services. Nearly two million Australians under the Fraser Government had no health cover at all. These people did not have any choice; they just had no insurance whatsoever. The Opposition just comes in here and raises these arguments. So one can go through all these things, but they are matters for debate and not matters for-- Senator Boswell —Not matters for Question Time? Senator BUTTON —Yes, they are matters for Question Time. Senator Boswell —You told us we have to ask questions. Senator BUTTON —If the honourable senator were capable of putting together a question I would invite him to ask one, but I do not believe that is the case. In respect of each of these matters I am quite happy to obtain a factual answer to each of the points made by Senator Chaney and provide him with that answer in due course. Senator COLEMAN —My question without notice is directed to the Minister for Veterans' Affairs. I advise him that I have received representations from the relative of a veteran who claims that the repatriation pharmaceutical benefits schedule discriminates against males, in that it provides for the prescription of spermicidal creams, intra-uterine devices and diaphragms, which are all contraceptive devices used by females, but does not approve of the prescription of condoms for males. I am sure I do not need to remind the Minister of the concern that is being expressed in the community in favour of the use of condoms due to the escalation of such diseases as acquired immune deficiency syndrome. Does the Minister agree that this omission indeed constitutes discrimination against males? If so, what steps will he take to redress the situation? Senator GIETZELT —The question obviously raises a very interesting point. I can assure the Senate that I had no conception that there was such a serious omission from the schedule. The question, of course, of whether this omission constitutes discrimination against males is, I would have thought, rather up in the air, because this situation has existed for a long time. In fact, it could be argued that this omission rather constitutes discrimination against females, in that it suggests that the onus of contraception falls on them and that that, of course, is why contraceptive devices for females are included in the schedule. Senator Coleman did warn me that this issue was likely to be raised at Question Time, so I checked with my Department's Assistant Secretary of pharmaceutical services. He advised me that there had been no previous request for condoms to be put on the schedule. Of course, I recall Senator Coleman's very active participation some years ago over the discrimination existing in the Parliament in respect of the use of the toilets; so, of course, I can appreciate her interest in this particular area. I must point out, of course, that I do not know what this matter says about my Department's client group, because we have something like three-quarters of a million veterans who are overwhelmingly male and who are overwhelming aged. But I can assure Senator Coleman that I will take this request seriously and see what can be done to remedy the shortcoming. Senator TEAGUE —My question is directed to the Minister representing the Prime Minister. I refer to the Prime Minister's failing to keep an appointment with the National Farmers Federation, led by Mr Ian McLachlan, yesterday here in Parliament House by holding the meeting up for several hours and then by kicking the NFF delegation out after a few minutes. Was this a deliberate political decision on the Prime Minister's part, as was the case with Mr Pendarvis recently, or was it a Government decision to insult the rural sector, our primary industries and country people generally? Senator BUTTON —First of all, let me say that the Government has great sympathy and concern for the plight of many farmers in Australia and particularly those who are growing wheat. The question is how the interests of farmers are best represented to the Government and by whom. Having had over some time the pleasure of having discussions with Mr McLachlan about one issue or another, I am not convinced that the best interests of farmers are in any way represented by Mr McLachlan, just as I am not convinced that the best interests of some manufacturers are represented by Besco Batteries, and just as I am not convinced that the interests of a wide range of sections of this community are best represented by people who have ideological commitments over and above their representational role. It is extraordinary for anyone to approach any government, I believe, anywhere, and turn that request for consultation into a stunt before the consultation has taken place. That is what happened yesterday. Mr McLachlan turned that visit into a stunt, and it was not a genuine attempt to consult with the Government about a variety of issues. It is not at all a new experience for the Government, and I believe that that action reflected a quite deliberate decision which was made for reasons which have nothing to do with the interests of the people whom Mr McLachlan purports to represent and about whom every Australian citizen with any concern is correctly concerned. I do not know whether I can take the answer to the question any further than that, but that is what happened yesterday and that is not a good example of the very great attention which this Government has given to consultation with various community groups-attention to consultation which is recognised-in comparison with previous governments. This Government has been prepared to indulge in a very high level of consultation. Senator Lewis —You don't even confer with your own back bench. What are you talking about? You don't consult with anyone. Senator BUTTON —It is all right for Senator Lewis on his tax-free allowance muttering away in the front row waiting around for another bus strike in Canberra so he can say something and contribute something to the Parliament. The honourable senator will be waiting a while, I think. It is all right for him to sit here muttering about these sorts of things, but what I have said happened yesterday is correct, and I do not want to repeat it. Senator JONES —Has the attention of the Minister representing the Treasurer been drawn to a publication released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics last week headed `Private New Capital Expenditure, Australia, September Quarter 1986'? What light do the figures in that publication shed on the outlook for the Australian economy during the remainder of this financial year? Senator WALSH —The short answer to the question of what light these figures shed on the economy is that they shed a rather favourable light on the outlook for the economy for the rest of this financial year. The publication is a survey conducted in October and November of business investment spending and expectations about the level of investment that had actually been undertaken in the September quarter and the anticipated investment for 1986-87 as a whole. The former, that is, the actual investment spending in the September quarter, was very favourable, up by 7 per cent in real seasonally adjusted terms on the preceding quarter, indicating an annual rate of close to 30 per cent if that level were to be sustained. This confirms the figures contained in the September quarter national accounts which were published last week. Probably more important than what actually happened in the September quarter is what firms anticipate doing for the rest of the financial year. Anticipated 1986-87 investment spending has increased by 6 per cent since the ABS survey, which was conducted only two months before. To get a clearer picture of what these figures mean, it is normal to apply what I think the Statistician calls realisation factors; that is, an adjustment which measures the extent to which anticipations regarding investment spending have been realised in the years during which these surveys have been conducted. According to the expectations revealed in the July-August survey, which was published in mid-August, and applying that average realisation factor for the past five years, total business investment was set to rise by about 7 per cent in the 1986-87 financial year. The equivalent figure for the October-November survey is 9 per cent. I think one could say fairly confidently both from what has been recorded to have happened and what has been recorded as an expectation that there should be a significantly higher level of private investment this financial year than has been anticipated and forecast in the Budget. Senator CHANEY —My question, which is directed to the Minister for Finance, follows on from the answer which he has just given on investment. Is he in a position to tell the Senate what the September on September figures are? In other words, what is the investment shown by the figures for the recent September quarter compared with the figures for the September quarter 12 months earlier? I further ask him: Is it not a fact that the increased investment to which he referred is a rise from a very low base following three quarters of decline? I further ask the Minister-- Senator Button —Sure did. It has been a low base since the 1970s. Senator CHANEY —Even on the standards of the Leader of the Government in the Senate, it is a low base. Senator Button —Oh, come on! I said: `It has been a low base since the 1970s'. Why do you always have to refer to other people's standards? The PRESIDENT —Order! Senator Chaney, I ask you to ask your question. Senator CHANEY —Mr President, I am happy to, but the Leader of the Government in the Senate was engaging in discourse. The PRESIDENT —I ask you to ignore the interjections and ask the question. Senator CHANEY —I further ask the Minister: Even if the most optimistic interpretations are made of the expectations data for manufacturing, would investment expenditure for the year still fall in real terms? Senator WALSH —Off the top of my head, I do not know the answer to the last part of the question, and I do not know to which particular investment Senator Chaney was referring. There can be investment in plant and equipment, investment in buildings-public and private-and so on. In relation to the earlier part of his question, however, I do not have with me the September on September figure. Yes, it is true-I made no attempt to hide this-that the record for the September quarter, which was a 7 per cent real seasonally adjusted increase on the June quarter, is from a low base in the June quarter. Seven per cent is an extraordinarily high rate of increase. Senator REYNOLDS —Is the Leader of the Government in the Senate aware of concerned rumours about the future of the Australian Studies Centre which was officially opened by the Queen Mother in London only three years ago? Could it possibly be true that financial considerations could be placing the work of this centre at risk and that it could ironically close in 1988? Will the Minister seek an urgent reassessment of Government priorities in overseas postings to ensure that this and other Australian studies centres are able to continue their important role of promoting Australia? Senator BUTTON —Senator Gareth Evans as Minister representing the Minister for Foreign Affairs has come to my aid in this matter. In answer to the question, it should be pointed out firstly that the Australian Government's level of support for the centre was increased this financial year from $180,000 to $248,000. The centre is also supported by other institutional assistance, including the Sir Robert G. Menzies Memorial Trust and the Institute of Commonwealth Studies. There is some private corporate sector support as well. Officials of the Department of Foreign Affairs are engaged in discussion with a number of Australians associated with the centre to explore ways and means of establishing new forms of future budgetary support. At the same time, the Australian Studies Centre has been advised that the Department of Foreign Affairs will continue to facilitate support for the centre's programs through such means as assisting in providing books and facilitating visits of Australian scholars and writers. I add that the head of the centre, Professor T. B. Millar, was recently advised that the Government will continue its funding support of the centre to the end of the 1987-88 financial year. Senator REID —My question is directed to the Minister representing the Minister for Community Services. I preface my question by reminding the Minister that the Salvation Army has expressed opposition to the Government's direction that wherever possible emergency aid be paid in cash and not by way of food voucher and the further direction that, if it is paid by way of food voucher, no endorsement may be made preventing the value of it being used to buy alcohol, cigarettes, pet food or videos. Has any other organisation expressed similar concerns? What social policy purpose does the Government believe it is meeting by forbidding organisations to limit emergency food vouchers to the issue of food for families in need of food? Senator BUTTON —Mr President, one would have to be an intellectual to handle that sort of question. No ordinary man could be such a fool as to attempt to answer that because it contains a number of suppositions as well as seeking factual information. I will ask the Department of Community Services for an answer on the factual matters as quickly as possible and provide it to Senator Reid. Even if we cannot provide it in a future Question Time, I will get the information. Senator ELSTOB —Can the Minister representing the Minister for Foreign Affairs tell me what is the Government's reaction to the announcement of the extension of the state of siege in Chile? Senator GARETH EVANS —The Government is extremely disappointed and disturbed by the announcement that has just come to hand that the state of siege in Chile is to be extended by 30 days. In a public statement on 9 September, the Foreign Minister, Mr Hayden, described the state of siege as a draconian measure that was more likely to provoke further violence than to ease tensions in Chile. Its extension now, 90 days after the armed attack on President Pinochet, is likely only to engender greater resentment among the Chilean people and lead to a further polarisation of Chile's political situation. The Australian Government has repeatedly called on the Pinochet regime to call an end to its disregard for human rights and to move quickly to institute genuine democratic reforms. Only by a return to Chile's long tradition of democracy can that country regain its political stability and international respectability. Senator BJELKE-PETERSEN —My question, which is directed to the Leader of the Government in the Senate, follows on from a question that I asked him on 18 November. Can the Minister advise why the Queensland Cane Growers Council's efforts to obtain funding of about $750,000 for urgently needed research into mechanical cane harvesting losses has been rejected? Is the Minister aware that such research would save the embattled sugar industry millions of dollars annually? In view of this refusal, can the Minister appreciate the concern of the sugar industry over Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation research which is helping to develop the product aspartame which will be in direct competition with an industry which has served this country well in export earning in the past? Senator BUTTON —First of all, I am not convinced that it is right that the CSIRO research has led to a product which is in direct competition with sugar. Certainly it is in some ways, but not generally. Most of the sugar crop disposed of in Australia goes to manufacturers of various food products and so on. I am not sure that that item is in competition with it. With regard to research funding, the Commonwealth Government does not hand out dollops of money for research funding to any industry. There are various arm's length mechanisms whereby research funding assistance can be obtained. For example, there is the Sugar Research Council which is funded to a fixed extent by the Commonwealth Government each year; there are numerous other mechanisms, such as the Australian Industrial Research and Development Incentives Board, which fund research, but there is no normal method of funding research by direct grant to any industry. Perhaps it is a matter which the Queensland Government ought to take up. Senator MAGUIRE —My question is directed to the Minister representing the Minister for Defence. I refer to numerous representations to the members of the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence on the subject of defence housing during the Committee's northern inspections last year under the leadership of Senator Sibraa. I ask the Minister: What initiatives has the Hawke Government now taken to improve the well-being of Australian Defence Force personnel and their families? Senator GARETH EVANS —This Government has taken a number of very significant decisions to improve the conditions and well-being of Australian Defence Force personnel and their families, not merely confined to the housing area. This is in stark contrast to those opposite, the most noisy being Senator MacGibbon and Senator Newman, who, despite the rhetoric of nearly 30 years of their Party being on the Treasury bench, ignored the needs of Australian Defence Force personnel. Let us look at the record. First, so far as pay is concerned, unlike those opposite and despite the amount of misinformation that is spread by the Leader of the National Party, Mr Sinclair, on these occasions-he was in fact responsible for the pay freeze for the Australian defence forces-not to mention commentators such as Mr Peter Young of the Australian, this Government has passed on all indexation rises and it established an independent Defence Force Remuneration Tribunal last year which gave a 5.9 per cent pay increase. The DFRT is currently examining a claim by the Chief of the Defence Forces for an increase in service allowance and other allowances. Senator Newman —You kept them frozen for three years. Senator GARETH EVANS —Secondly, let us look at spending generally on ADF personnel. Spending on ADF personnel has increased from $2.3 billion in 1981-82 to $3.8 billion in this financial year, an increase of some 33 per cent. Senator Walsh —I thought Ollie was the grub in Senator Newman's family. Senator GARETH EVANS —There is plenty of evidence to the contrary. This Government is spending $66m this financial year on new housing for the ADF. A total of 467 new housing commencements is planned. In the next 10 years this Government plans to spend $750m on new housing for the defence forces. In addition, we have announced the establishment of a defence housing authority to manage this massive Government initiative more efficiently to get maximum benefit from the expenditure. These measures are a vast improvement over our predecessors, who were responsible for, among other things, the Garland freeze which put back the program of improving defence housing by 10 years. Let us look at the situation so far as service families are concerned. Those opposite were singularly derelict in completely ignoring the importance of ensuring the welfare of defence families. We have given very high priority, by contrast, firstly to identifying the major problems being experienced by defence families, and secondly to doing something about rectifying them. Senator MacGibbon —Like what? Senator GARETH EVANS —I am glad to see that Senator MacGibbon has come in to listen to some facts for a change rather than indulging himself in his own rhetoric. The PRESIDENT —Order! Senator Evans, I ask you to ignore the interjections. Senator GARETH EVANS —Honourable senators will recall that the Minister for Defence, Mr Beazley, appointed Sue Hamilton from the Office of the Status of Women to prepare a report in this area. I am pleased to inform the Senate that very substantial progress is being made in implementing the recommendations of the Hamilton report. For example, financial provisions: $1.3m has been made available this financial year and $2m is earmarked for subsequent years to enable implementation of the Hamilton recommendations. The National Consultative Group of Service Spouses, comprising defence spouses from major defence establishments throughout Australia, has been formed and met in Canberra in mid-October and last week to develop and provide a forum for representing defence family matters to the Chief of the Defence Force. That group will meet regularly. Ms Hamilton recommended the provision of community development services for defence families. This will be provided by professionally trained community development officers, who will be appointed early in 1987. Suitably qualified service spouses will be eligible for appointment and this will be actively encouraged. Finally, in the light of the Hamilton report, work is proceeding on improvements to, among other things, reunion travel, child care during removals, and removal for separated spouses. So putting all that together and looking at the area of pay, of personnel spending on the ADF generally, of housing, and the treatment in a variety of ways, of defence force families, the record of the Hawke Labor Government and the present Minister, Mr Beazley, is absolutely second to none and represents a quite gigantic leap forward from the dark ages and years of neglect by people such as Senator MacGibbon and Senator Newman, who are good for nothing but talk. Senator BUTTON —On 4 December Senator Dame Margaret Guilfoyle asked me a question relating to reported remarks by the Secretary to the Treasury, Mr Bernard Fraser. That was based on Press reports of a speech given by Mr Fraser. I advise that I have received a letter from the Secretary to the Treasury, Mr Fraser, in which he refers to the reported remarks about his speech, I quote the relevant comments he made in answer to a question at the forum: I believed the Budget time forecasts of a 6 1/4 per cent increase in earnings in 1986-87 would be adhered to; He said further: . . . such an increase was `broadly' in line with the average of our major trading partners, particularly when seen in the context of the very large depreciation of the $A. The full text of the speech is available to me and if Senator Dame Margaret Guilfoyle wants a copy I will make it available to her. Senator Dame MARGARET GUILFOYLE(Victoria) —by leave-I move: That the Senate take note of the answer. I seek leave to continue my remarks later. Leave granted; debate adjourned. Senator GIETZELT —Yesterday Senator Archer asked me a question, and I promised to get him a response before the Senate adjourned, about a house in Kambah which is due to be auctioned on 13 December. The Minister for Territories advised me that the house was not built or purchased using funds from the Commonwealth housing expansion program, otherwise known as CHEP, and there is no reason why the Government should receive notice of the impending sale. The Minister also advised that legal proceedings to recover the grant of $133,000 to the Wyuna Co-operative have been in progress since June last year. Senator BUTTON(Victoria-Minister for Industry, Technology and Commerce) —by leave-Pursuant to sub-section 63m (3) of the Audit Act 1901, I table the Australian Capital Territory Schools Authority annual report and interim financial statements for 1985-86. Senator REID(Australian Capital Territory) —by leave-I move: That the Senate take note of the paper. I seek leave to continue my remarks later. Leave granted; debate adjourned. Assent to the following Bills reported: States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill (No. 2) 1986 Australian National University Amendment Bill 1986 Canberra College of Advanced Education Amendment Bill 1986 Maritime College Amendment Bill 1986 Overseas Students Charge Amendment Bill 1986 Overseas Students Charge Collection Amendment Bill 1986 South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty Bill 1986 Environment Protection (Sea Dumping) Amendment Bill 1986 Home Deposit Assistance Amendment Bill 1986 International Financial Institutions (Share Increase) Bill 1986 Taxation Administration Amendment (Recovery of Tax Debts) Bill 1986 Bounty (Books) Bill 1986 Bounty (Ship Repair) Bill 1986 Disability Services Bill 1986 Disability Services (Transitional Provisions and Consequential Amendments) Bill 1986 Fertilisers Subsidy Bill 1986 Navigation Amendment Bill 1986 Subsidy (Cultivation Machines and Equipment) Bill 1986 Debate resumed. Senator CRICHTON-BROWNE(Western Australia)(3.08) —We are debating cognately the Australia Card Bill 1986, the Privacy Bill 1986 and the Privacy (Consequential Amendments) Bill 1986. The Australia Card Bill 1986 will introduce the Government's identity card, euphemistically called an Australia Card. Should this Bill pass through the Senate, Australians will be invited by the Minister for Health (Dr Blewett) to apply for an Australia Card. Although there are exceptions, in the normal run of things the applicant will receive a card indicating the bearer's name, the Australia Card number, the expiry date of the card, a photograph of the person and the person's signature. It will be necessary to present the Australia Card to banks, building societies and credit unions so that they may record the number of the card. Until this is done these institutions will be quite unable to accept deposits, open an account, pay interest, or even permit withdrawals of a person's own money. Where a person is opening an account in the name of a partnership or organisation of a political, social, sporting or agricultural nature, the number of the card must be recorded to open the account. The card number will also have to be recorded for any money lent to a State and Territory body and any money lodged with legal practitioners or unit trusts. Primary producers will not be able to receive payment from marketing authorities and real estate agents are not to pay rents to landlords unless an Australia Card number has been recorded. Funds cannot be remitted by banks overseas, interests in land cannot be transferred, and safety deposit boxes cannot be opened unless the person's number is so recorded. Stocks and futures brokers cannot deal for people and public companies cannot register shares unless the number of the transferee is also recorded. All employees will have to provide their employers with their Australia Card numbers before they can be legitimately employed. The Commissioner of Taxation will have access to a person's Australia Card information and number. On the payment side, a person will not be able to claim Medicare or social security benefits unless an Australia card number is provided first. The Government claims to be introducing the system to stop people cheating the taxation system, the social security system and the health insurance system. It is also claimed that the Australia Card will help in the fight against organised crime and against illegal immigrants. Nothing can be further from the truth. It is my belief that many of the claims that are used to support the proposal are exaggerated, that its costs are clearly, starkly and blatantly underestimated, and that not only are the safeguards which are supposed to protect the information gathered by this proposal insufficient but also there can never be a permanent safeguard for an identity card system. I turn first to the claim that the Australia Card will reduce taxation evasion and social security fraud by the elimination of false identities within the system. The system is supposed to overcome these problems because everyone will have only one number-each name will have a number and false identities will be removed. In the tax area there is an obvious form of evasion which the Australia Card, or for that matter the best identification system in the world, cannot stop. It is not where an employee works under a false identity but where there is no official acknowledgment of employment at all. These employees are the cash out of the till employees who work behind bars or on farms, frequently for less than award rates, on the basis that they are paid in cash and that there is no official notification whatsoever of employment. I am obviously well aware that no employment is supposed to take place without the employer recording the number of the Australia Card of the employee but unofficial employment is not supposed to take place now, under any system. This is a major area of tax evasion which the card cannot ever hope to catch. What is more, where people currently work under false names and feel that the Australia Card may in some way cause them some difficulty, the incentive will be not to register a card and to take cash out of the till. The people already being paid cash out of the till will continue to be paid in that way. Many people who are currently employed under false names will transfer to this form of tax evasion. The Australia Card will be totally helpless, inadequate and powerless to do anything about it. This seems to me to be the greatest area of tax evasion at present. This card will not address that problem. It simply cannot. The cash economy has been estimated by the Commissioner of Taxation to be worth $3 billion. In my view that is a gross underestimate. I think it was the National Australia Bank which some little time ago estimated the figure was in the range of $14 billion. Yet this card will do absolutely nothing to overcome the problem. The problem is not addressed by having an identification card. There is a second weakness in the Australia Card as proof of identity-the very source documents which are used to complete the information on the central register. The reason the Government wants to introduce an identity card system is that it considers that birth certificates, drivers licences, marriage certificates and the like-the general recording of one's activities-are of a low integrity. Yet it is those very documents, that information, upon which the register will be compiled. More to the point, the Government has cited examples of people who have 20 or more Medicare cards, or people who claim unemployment benefit from several different Commonwealth Employment Service outlets. This information is now going to be the basis, premise and foundation for providing us with a further card. Senator Robert Ray —Oh, read the Bill. Senator CRICHTON-BROWNE —I have read the Bill. I say to Senator Ray, with the greatest respect, through you, Madam Acting Deputy President, that having heard Senator Robert Ray's contribution to the debate I am none the wiser as to what the Bill says. His speech seemed to be an absolute departure from the Bill. The Government has failed to come to grips with the fact that a person who has shown sufficient resourcefulness to obtain 10 or 20 Medicare cards so that he can systematically go about ripping off the system is not going to lie down and die in his tracks because he has been presented with an ID card. He will use the diligence he has used to rip off the system so far to continue to do so with an ID card. Senator Georges —He cannot do that without the collusion of the doctor. How can he do it? Senator CRICHTON-BROWNE —There is more than one doctor. These people will be able to produce any number of false birth certificates and drivers licences. Ultimately they will be able to obtain more than one Australia Card. As was pointed out in the debate yesterday by an Opposition senator, the passport, which is supposed to have high integrity, has been the cornerstone of much corruption and organised crime. Yet the process is such that the situation will not change. It is not without consequence that, in the Government's submission to the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card, the Department of Social Security very clearly indicates that it intends to require better, more substantial and more material identification than just the Australia Card to minimise the risk of false identities being accepted because of the improper use of lost or stolen cards. The Government department about which we have heard so much in this debate, which needs the card to overcome all these problems, is saying that it will not accept the card on face value. It will not accept it as prima facie evidence that the holder of the card, the person presenting it, is the person represented on the card. Yet this card is being foisted upon us by this intransigent Government, in spite of the fact that the very Department it is intended to assist refuses to accept it. The point becomes even more obvious when the Government asserts that the card will assist the fight against organised crime. Does Dr Blewett really expect the Australian public to believe that crime figures will not be able to get numbers of cards from different sources? Of course they will. They will do so by false applications, theft, alteration, or perhaps straight-out forgery. One thing is absolutely certain: With the millions of dollars available to organised crime, criminal participants will not be stopped by this simple, glorified Bankcard. There is even the very real possibility-I suspect that it weighed upon the mind of Mr Costigan-that the Australia Card will aid organised crime, and welfare and taxation cheats. If the Government sells the identification card system as a system of extremely high integrity-again, upon which much of its argument is mounted-many people will accept it at face value as being of high integrity. They would not do so with any other means of identification. The possession of a card, therefore, guarantees perfect anonymity. The card is the beginning and the end. Senator Peter Baume —That is why Mr Costigan is so much against it. Senator CRICHTON-BROWNE —Absolutely. It guarantees no further checks. It guarantees that if a person carries the card he is who he says he is and the information contained thereon is correct. In many cases the very character of the problems the Government is seeking to address will not be rectified by the Australia Card. Australian citizens, Australian society, will receive no benefit but all the hazards, liabilities and afflictions resulting from this Government's blundering, uncaring insensitivity. The Government will give us a card and it will make us enjoy it. This is a typical socialist attitude to life. Welfare fraud is just one example-it is just one such problem. The largest part of welfare fraud is not due to the assumption of a false identity but to overpayments resulting from clerical errors and unintentional misunderstandings of the terms and conditions of benefits and the failure to disclose changes in circumstances. Let me take honourable senators back to the beginning. Senator Aulich —If you believe that you believe that the bottom of the harbour does not exist. Senator CRICHTON-BROWNE —I am sorry, this was put to me by the Government department that the honourable senator is seeking to protect. This is what the Department of Social Security said in its submission. Government senators put to me that I should read the Bill. I am telling them that they should read the excellent report which was subscribed to by their colleagues, my colleagues and even the Australian Democrats. The Department is saying that much of the overpayment is a result of clerical errors. I put it to honourable senators, as has been pointed out by Senator Puplick, that the Australian Electoral Commission indicates that there are something like 1.2 million changes, corrections or variations to the Australian electoral rolls every year. How many errors do honourable senators opposite think there will be as a result of changes and variations to the Australia Card? Of course, the proposal is fraught with the risk that the cards will be in error, inaccurate and incorrect and that false and improper information will be provided to little bureaucrats sitting in front of their spook machines. It is interesting that this card is being foisted upon us because, it is put to us, we are losing so much money and revenue in taxes through false identities. The Department-again, the very Department that the Government is seeking to assist-estimates that false identities account for no more than 0.6 per cent of overpayments. Does the Government mean to say that this card is to be introduced because of 0.6 per cent of overpayments? What is the Government doing about the rest? What is it doing about clerical errors, lack of identification and changed circumstances? It is doing nothing. However, the Government is hellbent on giving us this card all the for the sake of perhaps correcting 0.6 per cent of overpayments as a result of false identification. So the card will not be attacking the major areas of fraud but rather only one of the more minor areas. Perhaps an even more powerful criticism of the proposal is the Department of Social Security's expectation that it will not be rewarded with any cash benefit as a result of this card. The Department told the Joint Select Committee on the Australia Card that it would cost it as much to administer the card to cover the small area where it might yield some advantage as it would save by reduced fraud. The claims about social security gains are therefore illusory. There will be no gains to the Department as a result of the introduction of this card. Yet, this has been the corner-stone of most of the speeches I have heard from Government senators in the last two days. The Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs told us that it would cost $21m to implement the card but that the revenue gains would be in the range of $1,292m. What an enormous windfall that would be! We checked what was said by the Department of Social Security and the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs and found that of the illegal immigrants in Australia, guessed by the Department to be 50,000-a wild underestimation, if ever I saw one-0.4 per cent are in receipt of benefits. When the Department of Social Security checked out the list given to it by the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs in respect of illegal immigrants, it found that almost without exception the people on the list were not receiving a benefit at all. So the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs was found to be hopelessly incompetent in making judgments. In my view the Committee's report is a damning indictment of the Department's efficiency and competence in making judgments. Finally we find that the Australia Card will not help that Department at all. The Government has indicated in its final estimate that the card will cost $759m over 10 years and that the employment of an extra 2,150 public servants will be required. That calculation, which has been done over a period of 10 years, has been varied. It is guesswork and it has been changed from time to time. As we all know-everybody in this chamber will agree-every time the Department gives us an assessment it is miles too low. Look at what happened in respect of the Sydney Opera House. Look at the estimates that have been given in respect of the new Parliament House. Have they been right yet? No. The costs are always underestimated. The Australia Card is not a high integrity system. It is open to be walked around by those people who the Government would like the public to think the card will catch-people involved in tax evasion, large scale social security fraud and organised crime. It will be very costly for the Government to introduce and therefore, of course, very costly for taxpayers and for businessmen who will have to comply with yet another mountain of paper. The advantages of the system have been enormously overstated. Let us turn to the grave dangers the system presents for the privacy and freedom of Australians, something that Dr Blewett dismissed out of hand as inconsequential and something that is the first hazard and the first casualty of this card. The mere fact that individuals are termed `card subjects' in the Bill sets the tone for what the attitude of the bureaucrats will be towards the millions of people they will have on their files. People, of course, will simply become numbers to them with no recognition or thought given to their individual personalities. I take issue with the Government's claim that there will be no central data file on people. In the strict sense of the word, for the moment that is true. Senator Robert Ray —That is not what your colleagues said this morning. Senator CRICHTON-BROWNE —With respect, Senator Ray, I will go on. All the information about a person will not for the moment be kept on one file. However, on any fair, genuine and honest assessment of what will take place one must come to a different conclusion. All information will not be on one file but the Australia Card number, which will be on every file, is the marker which can lead a person to the files in other departments. This is centralisation of information as it stands and it is utterly false and misleading for the Government to try to deceive people that it is not. Right at the outset, of course, the Government is prepared to engage in subterfuge. In time, as this information is already kept on satellite files, as one might describe them, within the relevant department I believe that there will be a trend towards centralisation. After all, as the information is already in existence it will be only a matter of time before someone, quite naturally, in the interests of efficiency, suggests that significant administrative savings could occur by the centralisation of the information. This may be perhaps as far away as 20 years but once people have become used to the physical presence of a card, no public outcry against centralisation of the information on to a file will prevent this inexorable movement. Certainly, it will be made to look administratively irresponsible not to centralise. The Government has led the population to believe that the Australia Card will be used only to stop tax evasion, social security fraud and medifraud. In attempting to achieve this goal, the Government has already obtained information about bank accounts, people's work habits, occupations, financial dealings, land transfers and so forth. I referred to this earlier in my speech. There is nothing more certain than that once people accept the inevitability of carrying a card, the system will quietly expand. I remind honourable senators that in the Government's submission to the Joint Committee, possible uses for the Australia Card were suggested by the Australian Taxation Office, the departments of Health, Social Security, Housing and Construction, Education, Veterans' Affairs, Community Services, Employment and Industrial Relations, Foreign Affairs, and Immigration and Ethnic Affairs as well as the Australian Institute of Health, the Australian Bureau of Statistics and the Australian Federal Police. They all felt that they ought to have access to information on the card. They all felt that there was something in it for them. In time the bureaucracy will convince itself that life without the Australia Card will just not be possible. This has, in many respects, been foreshadowed by the same Government submission, and I quote the following from page 61: The Government cannot rule out categorically the possibility that at some future additional uses may suggest themselves as being desirable or essential to meet the emerging problems in the taxation and welfare or other areas. I underline the words `essential' and `other areas'. They indicate precisely the very problem that I fear. Having created a new tool, the desire to use it will be almost irresistible. To how many uses the Australia Card will be put, one can only speculate, but it is worth examining the various uses to which an identification card has been put in the United States. There the social security number is used in relation to credit bureaus, retail stores, banks, oil companies, credit facilities, supermarkets, cheque cashing facilities, utilities such as telephone companies supplying services for new customers, insurance, hospitals and doctors, drivers licences, employers and schools and universities, and so on. Of course those uses are not presently designed for the Australia Card, but it is inevitable that very shortly they will be. It is interesting that in 1973 the United States Department of Health, Education and Welfare recommended against the introduction of a universal identification number, and suggested a halt to the drift towards the use of the social security number in this fashion. Despite that very real fear, the drift in the United States has continued. The Joint Select Committee drew attention to the fact that the number of Federal departments which nominated for access to the Australia Card Register rose from eight in August 1985 to 13 by February 1986. It is very likely that having the card at its disposal the Government will discover entirely new areas where it may interfere in people's lives, which would otherwise be unavailable to it. In fact it is worth reading, for those who are interested, what the Health Insurance Commission has already done in terms of checking the card by way of a pilot study. It indulged in areas which were quite properly none of its business and, as the report says: Such studies not only breach the 1981 OECD guidelines to protect privacy to which Australia is supposed to adhere and prospectively breach the information protection principles embodied in the proposed privacy legislation. Already there has been an intrusion way past that which is described within the parameters of the card. We have to have a very real concern about the way in which the card will be used, given further information which will attract to it. It is interesting to note that the New South Wales Privacy Committee has reported that computers have been used to establish profiles to detect skyjackers, drug couriers, taxation defrauders, welfare cheats, insurance defrauders, public examination cheats, employees who may be drug users and credit card thieves. That Committee worked out a model of who all these people may theoretically be. All someone would have to do is run through our cards and we could find ourselves in a category in no time flat. Given the prospect of errors and the prospect of the fertility of the imagination of people looking at the information which is stored as a result of the cards, no doubt we will all find ourselves pigeonholed in some shape or form. I conclude by recording my philosophical objections to this rather obnoxious card. In our society our basic legal tradition is one which gives the citizen the liberty to do whatever he likes, unless that is constrained by the law. The best illustration of that can perhaps be found in the ten commandments, which are all based on a series of `thou shalt not', indicating that if a thing is not prohibited, it is permissible. Unless it is clearly stipulated that it is illegal, it is automatically legal. From this has grown the idea that liberty is not something which is granted by governments, it is not something for which we look to governments; it is instead the natural right of mankind. A government may only constrain this liberty with the permission of the people and after, of course, rigorous public debate. Yet in this Bill, unless we have a card and unless we have the Government's permission, the Government takes away our very ability to work, to bank, to buy and sell land, to buy and sell shares and to buy and sell primary produce, to name but a few examples. That is what we cannot do without the permission of the Government, through the granting of this card, which we are invited to apply for-an invitation that we find irresistible. The concept of liberty being granted from the state, not surprisingly, of course, is a particularly socialistic one. The Government has made much of the fact that many European countries have identity cards. Of course it has not gone on to explain, as Senator Puplick quite properly pointed out yesterday, that those countries have entirely different judicial histories to those of the common law countries such as Australia, England, New Zealand, and Canada. Whereas the basis for common law has been derived up from the customs of the people, the basis of civil law is in statutes imposed down from the government above; a very real difference, a profound difference, in making judgments of the type that are before the Senate right now. Of course the European countries cited by the Government are all civil law countries, every single one of them. I seek leave to incorporate in Hansard a list of the countries that have an ID card. Honourable senators can look at their political persuasion and their judicial process. Leave granted. The list read as follows- The following countries have ID cards or documents which are legally required at all times: Algeria Malaysia Egypt Pakistan Kenya Philippines Morocco Singapore Mozambique Sri Lanka Senegal Syria South Africa Taiwan Sudan Thailand Tanzania Vietnam Tunisia Belgium Zaire Bulgaria Cuba Czechoslovakia Mexico Denmark Panama France Argentine Germany (Democratic Republic) Brazil Greece Chile Hungary Columbia Italy Ecuador Norway Venezuela Poland China Portugal Hong Kong Romania Indonesia Spain Iraq Turkey Israel USSR Korea, North Yugoslavia Korea, South The following countries have ID cards but they are not legally required at all times. In the case of Sweden, it is not compulsory to have an ID card. Germany (Federal Republic) Sweden Senator CRICHTON-BROWNE —The Government has also not acknowledged that identification cards have been the hallmark of totalitarian regimes which find the information gained from them vital to the control they exercise over their people. The history of man's struggle for liberty has typically been a struggle against the power of autocrats, bureaucrats, kings, dictators and generals. With the emergence of democracy it seems we have let our guard slip. We have a democracy, a very fragile democracy, as all democracies are. In my view, in the six years I have been in this Parliament, this has probably been the most intrusive, obnoxious and dangerous piece of legislation, in terms of its far-reaching effects, that I have ever seen, and I am sure that I am ever likely to see. I hope that the legislation is defeated before the Parliament rises tonight. Senator TATE(Tasmania)(3.37) —It was very consoling to hear Senator Crichton-Browne's rhetorical flourishes at the end of his speech on behalf of democracy and on behalf of the common law. Of course this proposal to establish an Australia Card identity system is not one easily embraced by, I think, any parliamentarian in this Australian Parliament. But the fact is that I believe this democracy is being undermined at the moment by a failure on the part of many people to contribute to the sinews of government, to make their fair contribution to the revenues which government, democratically elected, needs to fulfil the programs for which it has been elected. It is entitled, having faced an election of the people, having set down certain programs which are to be implemented during its term of parliament, to have those taxation measures which are fairly voted upon and imposed on the Australian people implemented in possibly a begrudging but somewhat co-operative spirit on the part of those who fall within its terms. The fact is that there are many occasions on which the ordinary, honest taxpayer in Australia finds himself or herself something of a mug if he or she pays the tax which is due, whereas others find ways to avoid or evade their taxation obligations. There are quite a few instances where that taxation obligation is avoided because the person who ought to be a taxpayer assumes a false identity. Multiple identities are quite common where people hold down several jobs, and of course they do so in order to take advantage of the tax threshold arrangements in relation to the taxation which the employer ought to deduct. There is quite a difference, of course, if the employer knows that it is a second or third job being held by that person. The same relates to the spouse rebate arrangements. The fact is that a false identity can be manipulated in a way which deprives the revenue of tax which is due to the Government and, therefore, in the absence of a cutting down of the programs for which the democratically elected government was elected to implement, leads to a further onerous burden, an additional burden, being placed on the shoulders of ordinary taxpayers to fill that gap. Senator Crichton-Browne also spoke about the common law, et cetera. Which common law principle does he appeal to which allows people fraudulently to misrepresent their identities in order either to avoid the payment of tax which is imposed on them by lawful statute of this Parliament or to obtain a benefit from the social security or health system to which they would not otherwise be entitled? Where does the common law found that particular right to misrepresent an identity? I believe that Senator Crichton-Browne will find, going back to whichever century he likes, that at no stage has the common law recognised a right or liberty to misrepresent one's identity. The fact is that there is a small portion-nevertheless a very real portion well known out in the community-of persons who misrepresent their identity. One has to consider the overall impact on the sense of fairness of the system which is so important for the full co-operation of citizens in their contribution to revenue and their willingness to uphold a fair social security system. The fact is that when one gets publicised, as well as it has been, instances of abuse of the social security system by persons manipulating multiple identities in order to secure benefits, that creates a political atmosphere where the ordinary taxpayers feel that they are not willing to support even a fair social security system because of the abuses they perceive. I believe that it is incumbent upon governments, acting as they do on behalf of those genuine social security recipients, to devise a system that ensures that abuses do not occur in relation to identities being misrepresented in relation to getting social security benefits, so that there can be such confidence in the system that taxpayers are willing to support the expenditures necessary to give those who are due their benefit a reasonable degree of sustenance, given their social situation. It has been said that perhaps we do not need an Australia Card to do that, that a tax file number would do. Regrettably, a tax file number is properly described as a tax file number. That is all it is. It is a system of numbering certain sheaths of paper in a manila folder. It is a number attached to a manila folder, shall we say, in order to enable it to be more easily traced in the Australian Taxation Office, wherever it may be in a particular department or, indeed, around Australia. It is a paper processing number. It enables a sheath of papers in a manila folder to be traced. It in no way guarantees that the name of the person in the file is linked correctly to a person who ordinarily uses that name. I think honourable senators realise from evidence given by the Tax Office before the Joint Committee that the tax file number, if it is used as an identity link to a particular person, is a bodgie number. Ordinary taxpayers understand this. I believe that they are willing to see a substantial upgrading of that tax file number and that they would agree, as I have come to agree, having flirted with the idea of an upgraded tax file number at one stage, that really we have to start afresh. If one wanted to upgrade the tax file number to a sufficient degree to enable it to have real integrity in relation to the identity of the person referred to within that manila folder, one would need substantially to go through the same operations in relation to the production of particular basic documents as will be required for the Australia Card. I really think that the tax file number is not an adequate substitute. I do believe that the Australia Card Bill 1986 does try to set down, as a fair way of overcoming the sorts of problems I have alluded to, those occasions on which the Australia Card might properly be asked for. The draconian picture that has been portrayed by some of the speakers I think is entirely unmerited. In fact, there are very substantial barriers suggested by the clauses of the Bill which this Parliament ought to adopt in order to set up hurdles against the intrusive, authoritarian, even totalitarian, structures of government which lay behind some of the more genuine fears-there are some very ungenuine motives, if I can use that term, which I will elaborate on in a moment-concerning the opposition to this legislation. For those who are genuinely fearful, let us recall that clause 167 of the Bill states: Except as authorised by this Act, a person shall not required another person to produce a Card. Penalty: $5,000 or imprisonment for 2 years, or both. Could anything be more express or explicit as a manifestation of this Parliament's will than that the emerging of a police state ought to be prevented, by imposing a very severe penalty by way of a fine of $5,000 or imprisonment for two years or even both on those police officers, officers of government or anybody else in society who might be minded to demand the production of this card? That is the sort of penalty they will suffer and that would be the expression of this Parliament's will in relation to the curtailing of this particular card to certain specific uses to do with the engaging in transactions, whether they be employment or property transactions or dealing with banks, which may have a tax implication, or obtaining a benefit from society's revenues which we all have to contribute to, either as taxpayers or in relation to the underwriting of loans by governments, et cetera. I really do believe that these sorts of clauses I have pointed to help dispel some of the fears of a totalitarian-authoritarian approach lying behind this legislation. I am not saying it is a perfect Bill and I will come to some comments on that in a moment. But given the very obvious problem that I have outlined and, I believe, the straightforward approach to trying to deal with cases where false identities are offered, I ask: What is really wrong with saying to people that between late 1987 and 1989 they need to apply to the Health Insurance Commission-in effect, their local Medicare office-to obtain a form, which they then fill in with certain information, that they then present themselves to their Medicare office, have a photograph taken and provide a sample signature, and a few weeks later they get a card that enables them to engage in the sorts of transactions we are talking about? It is not as though, as Senator Crichton-Browne said, people will not be able to withdraw money from banks. They will have 15 months to verify their identity in relation to an account. One should not forget that these are all initial verifications. When one opens an account, one shows the card. When one is engaged in employment initially, one shows the card. When one wants to obtain a social security benefit of a new type, one shows the card. One does not have to show the card on every occasion one withdraws money from the bank or every time one goes to the counter to deal with a matter in relation to a benefit. It is simply that the cardholder identifies himself or herself correctly. The idea that this is some terrible intrusion I think is quite overstated. In Victoria if one wants to drive, one has to have a photographic drivers licence. If one wants to undertake employment or engage in a particular transaction which has taxation implications, one will have to have a photographic identity card, in the same way that, if one wishes to drive, one has to have a photographic licence in Victoria. When I was talking with some students at the University of Tasmania, they indicated to me their rejection of the Australia Card, but if they wish to borrow a book from the Morris Miller Library for reference for their studies or if they wish to sit for an exam, they produce a photographic identity card. The fact is that such cards are not as intimidating as they used to be some 10 years ago. I believe that people find the idea quite acceptable that they should carry a card, as many people do in relation to their employment at the moment. I was speaking to the Secretary of the Hospital Employees Federation in Tasmania and he said that his members were quite happy about a card because, in relation to their employment in moving around hospitals, they must have a photographic identity card-it is part of the natural security measures undertaken within the hospital framework. So that all taxpayers who are properly subject to the law make a fair contribution to the raising of revenue and so that all people applying for benefits are entitled to them, it is reasonable to require people to produce photographic identification. Given all that, why does the Opposition find this idea so intolerable? Even on this side of the chamber there are genuine concerns about civil liberties and invasions of privacy. I do not deny those. Nevertheless, there is a surprising unanimity on the other side of the chamber in relation to this matter. I shall not reiterate some of the previous statements and utterances from spokesmen of those opposite. That has been done as a debating technique, but given some of those expressions of support for an Australia Card identity system from the other side of the chamber, it is surprising that there is this unanimity. The simple answer is that a much more comprehensive, cruder political objective is in mind. There is no doubt that those on the other side of the chamber would like to see this Labor Government deprived of the revenues which are essential for the carrying out of its program. They want the hundreds of millions of dollars which would otherwise flow into the coffers from the existence of a correct identification system not to go in so that the Government, if it is to maintain the programs for which it was elected, will have to impose further tax burdens, more onerous tax obligations and rates, on the honest taxpayers in Australia or will have to cut some of those programs in a politically painful way. I am convinced that the unanimity of political objective on the other side is definitely to do with stripping the Labor Government of the revenues that it needs to carry out its programs. I emphasise that this legislation is not presented in isolation; it is presented as a package of Bills which we are debating cognately. The Privacy Bill 1986, which is part of that package, contributes to the context of the Australia Card Bill which we are considering. In this proposed Act of this Australian Parliament for the first time certain principles will be laid down-information and privacy principles as they are called-concerning the gathering, dissemination and secure holding of information by the Australian Government at all sorts of levels from Minister's offices through to the meanest and smallest of the agencies and departments of government. Eleven principles are set down which in a very comprehensive way attempt to impose on the Australian Government certain constraints in relation to the obtaining, secure holding and dissemination of information. So comprehensive are the principles that they cover three or four pages so I shall not read them out. But I emphasise precisely that the Privacy Bill is being put forward as part of the package. Of course, the contents of the package are not immutable but I believe that this chamber ought to give a second reading not only to the Privacy Bill, which I believe the Australian Democrats are willing to support at least to the second reading stage, but to the whole package and then let us discuss the particular clauses which are still giving true concern relating to civil liberties and invasions of privacy. After all, as I said, the Committee stage is designed for precisely that. The package of Bills concerning privacy in relation to the Australia Card Bill flows from a very conscious decision of the Parliamentary Labor Party that an Australia Card Bill should not be introduced into this Parliament and should not be imposed on the society without a full affirmation by this Parliament of the sorts of principles which it wants to see government apply in relation to the protection of privacy. In fact, in the relevant Caucus committee we insisted that the Australia Card Bill not be brought into the Caucus, and certainly not the Parliament, without the Privacy Bill being a cognate part of the package. Senator Macklin merely dismissed this Privacy Bill as an adjunct but that is far too disparaging and demeaning of the important role which I believe it will come to play in protecting citizens' privacy from possible interferences by practices engaged in by government. We have not slavishly followed the Australian Law Reform Commission report in regard to the privacy principles. I hope that we never slavishly follow any report of any commission but take on board its recommendations and try to come to a sensible implementation of the principles underlying the recommendations. I believe it can be fairly said that this Privacy Bill does precisely that in setting the overall context within which the Australian Government and its agencies should operate. Do not forget that, whereas the ALRC thought that its privacy principles should operate as aspirations or guidelines, the principles in the legislation are intended to be part of the law, binding on Commonwealth government. In fact, this legislation is binding on agencies of government. In the interpretation part of the Privacy Bill `agency' means a Minister, a department, a body or a tribunal established or appointed for a public purpose, a body established or appointed by the Governor-General or by a Minister, a person holding or performing the duties of an office established by or under, or an appointment made under, a Commonwealth enactment and so on. These privacy principles will apply in the most comprehensive way to Federal government agencies. When one sees the Australian Card Bill in its cognate setting with the Privacy Bill some of one's fears are allayed in relation to the genuine concerns on civil liberties and the interference with privacy that are said to be part of the operation and impact of this Australia Card legislation. Much of the concern is exaggerated and the Bill contains constraints, barriers and hurdles put up against the emergence of an authoritarian regime. If there is anything that I may throw back at the Opposition from the Australian Bill of Rights debate it is the use by the Opposition of that aphorism from Sir Harry Gibbs that if society is tolerant and rational one does not need a Bill of Rights and if it is not a Bill of Rights will not save it. In this society we have a democracy which is working well and which I believe will not be fundamentally or radically altered by the mere requirement that a person engaging in a transaction in relation to which taxation ought to flow to the Federal Treasury or a person who presents himself to obtain a social welfare or Medicare benefit will have to identify himself. This requirement will not cause such a fundamental attack on the integrity of our democratic system as to lead down some authoritarian road. The draconian picture that is sometimes painted is totally out of proportion to the reality that will emerge. Nevertheless, there may well be-it would be surprising if there were not-in legislation of such a comprehensive and new character, clauses which need adjustment, modification and amendment. Let us do that at the Committee stage, which is the proper time at which to undertake such an examination. But let this chamber say to the Australian people that we are in favour of devising a system which will lead to a fairer tax system and a fairer system of distribution of those benefits which are needed to sustain people who are in various difficult circumstances. It is in order to create and to help to sustain that fair system that I support this package of legislation. Senator BJELKE-PETERSEN(Queensland)(4.00) —I rise this afternoon to speak on the Australia Card Bill, a Bill which I consider to be one of the most damaging and intrusive pieces of legislation to have come up in this country. The Australia Card legislation has me extremely worried and I know that my concern is shared by many other Australians. Labor Party senators say that 60 per cent of Australians are in favour of it. After listening to the excellent speeches that members of the Opposition have made during this debate, I believe that anybody who has been listening will certainly have changed his mind. With the exception of one letter, every letter I have received has been very much against the card. I had a conversation with one of our Commonwealth drivers the other day, who said: `No, Senator, I think you will find that there are a lot of people who want this card. We had a card during the last war'. I said: `So we did, but that was a card to get your rations, if I remember correctly, and it certainly wasn't anything like this card'. Then I heard Senator Tate talking about having a photograph on a driving licence in Victoria. The latest thing is that those living in Queensland also have to have a photograph on their driving licences. Those cards are not anything like the Australia Card, whereby the Government wants all our information records to have a common user index, with medical records, taxation records, employment records and social security records being linked together. I have no desire to protect tax cheats, illegal immigrants, the cash economy or social welfare fraud. I believe that all Australians have a responsibility to pay their taxes and be honest with the social welfare system. If they are not, I believe they should be justly punished. I am as opposed as anyone else to those who defraud this country of billions of dollars each year, but it is the way in which the Government has sought to deal with these people that really upsets me. The purported aim of this Bill is to create a national system of identification to facilitate the administration and operation of Commonwealth laws relating to taxation, social security, medical and hospital benefits and immigration, but it will do far more than that. The Australia Card is a very sinister intrusion into the privacy and freedoms of all Australians, and these of course we treasure very much. It is Big Brother alive and well in 1986. Under Labor's proposals we will have to present our ID card to deposit or withdraw money from a bank, to be admitted as an inpatient to a hospital, to get a job, to claim Medicare benefits, and to sell primary produce to a marketing authority or agency. Here just let me say, as I heard Senator Brownhill and, I think, Senator Boswell saying in this chamber, that, if we live a long way away from a country town and want to sell cattle through Dalgetys or Elders or one of these firms, we can ring them up and tell them that we want to buy or sell. If we have to provide an identity card, does that mean that we have to go and see these firms before we can do anything? From the way I read this legislation, it certainly does. We have to have the card if we want to buy or sell real estate or if we make any financial transactions such as buying or selling shares. So, it seems to me that we will need to carry our card at all times. What happens if we forget? We will be fined $20,000-for a mere oversight. I wonder whether the Treasurer (Mr Keating) will have to pay $20,000 for his oversight in forgetting to put in his tax return. If we lose our card and fail to report it, we can be fined $5,000. If we fail or refuse to present our card to the Tax Commissioner on request we can be fined $20,000. These seem to me to be some very clear reasons why people would not want to proceed along this Australia Card line. It is a costly and overly bureaucratic attempt to put the financial and private lives of all Australians on to a centralised data collection bank. I have not fallen for this and I am sure that many of the people of Queensland whom I represent in this place would not agree with it either. Even the Labor Party itself is divided on the issue. A number of Labor Party members and senators have gone on public record with their disapproval of the ID card, and rightly so. Some Opposition speakers have mentioned them in the Parliament, so I will not go over them. There are other prominent Australians who have spoken out against the ID card. Mr Justice Michael Kirby said: What is at stake is nothing less than the nature of our society and the power and authority of the state in relation to the individual. Then I heard various senators on this side of the chamber talk about Mr Frank Costigan, who said: There is no doubt that the introduction of an Australia Card of the kind contemplated by the submissions that I have read is a significant intrusion into individual privacy. He also said that an ID card would have done little to assist the important matters he was looking into regarding organised crime in Australia. Senator Peter Baume —That is important, too. Senator BJELKE-PETERSEN —As Senator Peter Baume says, that is very important indeed. The establishment of a centralised data linking system will provide unparalleled opportunities for government abuse of confidential personal information held by Health, Taxation, Social Security and other departments. It has been estimated that the whole operation will cost nearly $1 billion to set up and will require over 2,000 new public servants for administration. Then we do not want to forget the costs to business and the non-government sector, which have been estimated at roughly $377m. Of course, we have to add the cost to State and local governments. The Australia Card supposedly will, firstly, reduce tax avoidance; secondly, reduce social welfare fraud; thirdly, expose organised crime; and fourthly, reduce illegal immigration. Senator Sheil —Supposedly. Senator BJELKE-PETERSEN —But it is extremely doubtful that the Australia Card will do any such thing. Actually the Tax Office cannot give accurate estimates of the amount of revenue that might be saved by an ID card. No ID card system can stamp out the major unchecked area of evasion, namely, the cash economy. The Department of Social Security has confirmed that an ID card will do little to solve social security fraud because most fraud takes the form of overpayment of benefits, not false identity. We have heard other speakers on this side speak in more detail about that. The Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs has already stated that the ID card is not likely to do much at all to prevent illegal immigration. What is desperately needed to combat social security fraud is better management of the Department of Social Security. If it followed its own identification procedures to the letter, fraud would be greatly restricted, and I feel that people who are on social security should have to report to collect their social security payments. I do not know whether it is true, but someone told me about two young ladies on supporting mother's benefit who were living in the south of France and having their money sent to them there. I cannot guarantee that that is true. Senator Newman —Nice if you can get it. Senator BJELKE-PETERSEN —It would be rather nice. The same applies to dole payments. I really think that everybody who is getting the dole should have to report before they can collect it. We hear from time to time-we did before the last Queensland State election-about all the unemployment in Queensland. So many of them are receiving their dole payments at lovely beach resorts, such as Airlie Beach, or the Gold Coast. We have so many lovely places in Queensland where they can go. Senator Button —Now, Senator, you musn't be too commercial. Come on! Senator BJELKE-PETERSEN —It is a good opportunity. I really believe that, if the Social Security Department and the Government brought in the idea that people should have to report for the dole and that they should have to work for it, that would help the Social Security Department to combat the fraud that we hear so much about. Of course, the National Party of Australia completely supports genuine efforts to crack down further on tax avoidance, social welfare fraud, organised crime and illegal immigration, but it believes that there are more effective, less costly and less intrusive ways of achieving those ends. Despite what the Government has said, the possibilities of duplication with the ID card are enormous. It has been suggested that there are tens of thousands of duplicate Medicare cards already in circulation. The fact that the ID card has to be updated every few years means that duplicate cards will be in abundance within a few short years. I think it would be very naive for us to believe that there will be no forgery in relation to the ID card. Of course there will be. Almost all business and industry will have to change their systems and this will especially hit the small business sector. Banks will need to change their customer account systems to allow information to be supplied to the Australian Taxation Office in the form that its officers require. Many organisations have publicly announced their opposition to the Australia Card. The Confederation of Australian Industry, the Council of Small Business Organisations in Australia, the Real Estate Institute of Australia, the Law Council of Australia, the Australian Catholic Social Welfare Commission, the Administrative and Clerical Officers Association, the Federated Clerks Union of Australia and the Victorian Teachers Union, have all voiced their opposition to the Australia Card. Senator Button —You wouldn't want all of them on your side, though, Senator. Senator BJELKE-PETERSEN —On this occasion I must agree with them in their opposition. I would not agree with them ordinarily on lots of other matters but I do agree with them on this matter. This proposal is not just a means of cracking down on fraud in this country; it is an invasion of our individual right to privacy and freedom of movement and association. I suppose that the next thing that the Government will want to do is put our fingerprints on the card. Only in communist countries would we find things such as identification cards. I understand that even in South Africa the internal pass system has been abolished. No matter what sort of card we introduce, there will always be those who will get around it. Unfortunately, there will always be duplicate cards. My thought on the matter is that there should be a greater tightening up of our existing systems. The Taxation Office, the Department of Social Security, the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs and the Department of Health already have abundant information on our personal lives and our financial affairs. As a matter of fact, all honourable senators would realise that, at present, we all have a tax file number in the Taxation Office because every time we make out our tax returns we have to quote our tax file number. At least information on these matters should be available. As far as the taxation system is concerned, the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Expenditure reported on five of the Auditor-General's efficiency audits of the Australian Taxation Office. A book was tabled in this Senate entitled `A Taxing Problem', which puts everything in very clear perspective. The Auditor-General estimated that the amount of tax revenue forgone, because of undisclosed dividend and interest income, is in the range of $308m to $512m per annum. The Auditor-General claimed that, if the Australian Taxation Office had adopted a more active approach to demanding more information from financial institutions, in particular trading and savings banks, the appropriate information should have been more readily available. Nevertheless, even if the information had been provided, the Expenditure Committee claims that the Australian Taxation Office lacks the necessary capacity to process. The Commissioner of Taxation is reported in his evidence to the Committee as stating: . . . looking back over those years we have not had sufficient resources to check more information than information we have got in. In addition to the failure of the Australian Taxation Office to demand the appropriate information from the banks and financial institutions and its inability because of its failure to develop an effective matching mechanism, there is also a loophole in the Australian Taxation Office's collection powers. Whilst the ATO can demand information from banks and other financial institutions, it does not demand such information from the Reserve Bank of Australia. It is quite clear from the evidence in the reports of the Auditor-General and the Expenditure Committee that action needs to be taken by the Australian Taxation Office, firstly, to improve the information provided to it by banks and financial institutions; secondly, to ensure that all such institutions, including the Reserve Bank, report interest paid; and, thirdly, to upgrade its computerisation and to implement an effective matching system. This is what the Opposition believes should be done. By immediately acting to overcome the serious administrative problems highlighted by five Auditor-General's reports and the House of Representative Expenditure Committee, tax evasion could be attacked with effect from 1987-88, with the full impact in 1988-89 and not 1992-93 as in the ID card proposals. These proposals would be more cost effective than the ID card and would impact immediately, not in four or five years time. Of course, another angle is that, if the taxation system in Australia were more equitable, a lot of the incentive for defrauding the Commonwealth would be diminished. Honourable senators would know of my own support for a single, flat rate of tax. Senator Button even mentioned this in the Senate just recently. The only thing is that he compared it with a flat earth policy. I do not go along with that, of course, but I do believe in a flat rate of tax because I feel that this would be a fairer way of gathering the necessary revenue for government expenditure. Half the problem for people who try to defraud the Government is that they feel that their taxes are too high and they deserve to get a bit back from the Government in any case. I am hopeful that, when the coalition parties are returned to office, which I know will be at the next election, a much fairer taxation system will be introduced, therefore reducing the incentive for people to abuse the social welfare, immigration, health and taxation systems. The Australia Card is not the answer to the problem. Only in totalitarian regimes would we see such a system introduced. Have we really sunk so low that the Government is reduced to implementing such a radical system to stop fraud? I am appalled by this legislation. I do not support it and will vote against it. It is an un-Australian proposition which I believe is unacceptable in Australia. I am quite sure that the majority of Australians do not support it. We cannot always believe the results of polls that are taken; we found that out at the last Queensland election. All the polls said that the National Party would not win and we certainly did. I believe that the majority of Australians do not support the Australia Card. The Government will find out that it has gone against majority opinion at the next election. I support the Opposition's amendment and reject the Australia Card Bill. Senator NEWMAN(Tasmania)(4.19) —I have found a common thread going through this debate. A number of honourable senators have said that when they first heard about the idea of an Australia Card they were superficially attracted to it. I remember Senator Haines said that, I know that a number of honourable senators on this side of the chamber said that, and I know that there is some division on the opposite benches even now as to whether there is real support for it. The interesting thing is that anybody who has had the benefit, as we have in this place, of studying both the legislation and the material which has been available over the last few months has been forced to the conclusion that this cannot and must not be the way to go. It is a superficially attractive idea. It is one that, until one studies the fine print, does seem as if it may be a way to cope with social security fraud; it may be a way to cope with illegal immigrants; it may be a way to cope with the cash economy; it may be a way to cope with organised crime. But, as I say, it just looks like a good idea. It is not a good idea at all. I was very interested, a little earlier this afternoon, to hear Senator Tate, from my own State of Tasmania, talk about students at the University of Tasmania having no difficulty with a library card which identified them. I am really concerned that Senator Tate, with his background in the law and his concern, I understand, for human liberties and freedoms, could so superficially compare the Australia Card, the proposal that is before us today, with a library card which is used by university students. Senator Peter Baume —A very bad analogy. Senator NEWMAN —It is an extremely bad analogy. I would compare it myself more to the card index which one uses in a library to look up a subject matter or to look up material for research. When one finds one's subject matter, one is referred to where one will locate that material, and it can be a wide-ranging coverage of material. That is what the Australia Card does. It tells the Public Service and the Government where the documents on every Australian citizen are located throughout the Public Service. That is what makes it different from a bank card; that is what makes it different from a university student's library card. It is the long arm of government stretching right across all these areas of information which is the danger to us all. People say `I have nothing to hide'. Of course they have nothing to hide; but do they want all their private arrangements and every inch of their lives available to hundreds of thousands of public servants? Do they want them, as the doctors found in New South Wales, distributed to the media? It is one thing having something to hide; it is quite another thing again to have the world knowing one's business. Honest and honourable though one may be-and I hold no brief for tax cheats, rorters and all the other things that the Government would like to suggest that we are supporting in our opposition to this card-it is a much more serious matter than that, and I believe there are other ways of dealing with the very serious problems which this country faces. I believe that this card represents the greatest attack on our privacy ever contemplated by any Australian government. The card has been called a licence to live, but apart from the Big Brother implications, another reason for the overwhelming opposition is simply that the Australia Card will not work. It will not stop social security fraud; it will not catch up with illegal immigrants; it will not stop the operation of the cash economy; it will not combat organised crime. One has to ask: Is it really worth the 2,150 extra public servants, the cost to taxpayers of $1 billion over the next 10 years, and the estimated cost-and it can only be estimated, because the Government will not come clean on this-of $2 billion to businesses large and smaller? Is it worth the fines for failing to report the loss of the card, or for failing to demand its production when carrying out everyday transactions, or, as Senator Bolkus tells us, the fact that 100,000 public servants would have access to the computer and would have temptation before them? I draw the Senate's attention to the paper just received from the Law Society of New South Wales, in which it refers to the Government's submission to the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card. The Government suggested that the following departments should have access to the register: The Australian Taxation Office, the Department of Health, the Department of Social Security, the Department of Veterans' Affairs, the Department of Housing and Construction, the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the Australian Federal Police, the Australian Institute of Health, the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs, the Department of Foreign Affairs, and the Department of Employment and Industrial Relations. That was not enough. The Government's submission went on to say that the Government cannot rule out categorically the possibility that at some future date additional uses may suggest themselves as being desirable or essential to meet emerging problems in the taxation and welfare or other areas. It is a Big Brother measure. If the Australia Card recouped the millions of dollars that are lost each year through social security fraud, through the activities of illegal immigrants and through the inefficiency of the Taxation Office, perhaps it could be justified. But the benefits to be gained from the massive costs and the frightening implications of the card do not justify it at all. The Government's submission contained a cost-benefit summary which showed that over a 10-year period the revenue savings are not much greater than the cost of implementing the system in the particular departments. As I said before, they are not the only costs involved. Small business is quite clear where it stands, and I would like to quote from a telegram received by Senator Warwick Parer from the Australian Free Enterprise Foundation in Brisbane. It reads: Dear Senator, On behalf of the Australian Free Enterprise Foundation and its 30,000 plus members representing small business and private citizens, we wish to register the strongest possible objection to the proposed ID card named the Australian Card. We would be pleased if this objection could be noted in the Senate by you in the strongest possible terms. Senator Parer has already made a speech in this debate and this was received afterwards, so I am very pleased for the Australian Free Enterprise Foundation to read that into the record. There is opposition right around this country to this card. We found that in a February 1986 poll 22 per cent of Australians said that they saw the main advantage of ID cards as reducing social security cheating. But as a number of senators have already said, the case presented by the Department of Social Security in favour of the card is extremely unconvincing. The Department told the Committee: The overall savings likely to accrue from the new system are impossible to estimate. Savings would occur in two main ways. Firstly, there will be some deterrence from claiming pensions and benefits in false names. Only a very small percentage of social security payments is due to this cause and estimated savings would be unlikely to exceed $10m a year. Secondly, claimants for social security assistance and existing beneficiaries would be less likely to misrepresent details of their income in the knowledge that there were linkages between income and identity. The savings from this source are however impossible to estimate. The Government's submission to the Committee reveals that there would be no net gain to the Department of Social Security from the introduction of the national identification system. What is even more interesting, I think, is that in spite of this marvellous identification system that the Government trumpets, the Department of Social Security has said that it would not accept the card alone as sufficient proof of identity anyway. So much for an extremely expensive, very intrusive piece of plastic. Only 0.6 per cent of fraud on the Department of Social Security is estimated to involve false identity. Something that people do not always realise is that the vast majority of overpayments occur because of the failure of benefit recipients to report accurately changes in their economic circumstances, sometimes through clerical error and sometimes through unintentional misunderstanding of the conditions and provisions of payments. Sixty-one per cent of frauds on the Department are due to unreported income variations. Even if the Department were prepared to accept the card as proof of identity, it would have no impact at all on the overwhelming majority of the overpayments. Those who are working while they are claiming unemployment benefits-and that is an area which happens all too frequently-or the supporting mothers who live with their boyfriends without declaring their support will not be caught by the card. Those are some of the things that people would like to see dealt with, but they will not be caught by the Australia Card. Ian Temby, the Director of Public Prosecutions, stated in his annual report that many serious social security fraud cases were not being investigated. They did not need a card; they needed investigation. There is clearly a need for action to be taken at departmental level, and a number of speakers have emphasised this. There has to be a more accurate check on people's actual circumstances-not their names but their circumstances. There must be a stricter enforcement of the work test. The Department of Social Security must ensure that applicants for benefits fully understand the conditions which apply to the benefits and it must take action to ensure that clerical errors are kept to an absolute minimum. Compulsory work for the dole would make is very difficult to obtain more than one dole cheque. Turning to the area of immigration, we find that the Government's submission to the Committee claimed that one of the largest gains to revenue through the introduction of the card would be in the area of identification of illegal immigrants through the requirement to produce the card when obtaining employment. But the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs, in producing its evidence to the Committee, had to admit that its estimates for the number of illegal immigrants entering Australia and the number working illegally, based on a departmental study, were nothing more than guesswork. In case anybody thinks I am exaggerating I quote from Mr McKinnon's evidence to the Committee. In pointing out that the Department's information came from a departmental study, he said: It was done about four or five years ago. If we did the same study now we probably could not find the same crystal ball that was used then, but it is very close to that standard of accuracy, let me say quite frankly to you. In other words, the Department was prepared to admit that it had been doing a bit of crystal ball gazing and it was not prepared to stand by the reliability of its evidence. The Department has indicated that the card is likely to do little to combat illegal immigration. From the evidence given to the Committee it is clear that the area sorely in need of attention is the administration of the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs. It is interesting that the Department of Social Security, in trying to match benefit recipients with the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs' list of visitors who had outstayed their visas, found that the overstayers' file was of such poor quality that it could not be matched. Overall the Committee found that the statistics kept by the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs were inadequate and that its files were in an appalling state. The ID card will not do anything to control the entry of illegal immigrants which could not be achieved more cheaply and effectively through the tightening up of entry and administrative procedures. The identification of illegal immigrants should be carried out by the entry and exit control system of the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs. The present system is inadequate and therefore ineffective and there are long delays in processing. The urgently needed upgrading of the Department's computer system is apparently taking second place to the installation of the Australia Card computer, which it has been stated in the Senate Estimates Committee B report will have little effect in detecting illegal immigrants. The Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs has no power under this legislation to demand the production of the Card from suspected illegal immigrants. That is laughable. In fact, if an officer of that Department wanted to ask a suspected illegal immigrant to produce his or her card, the officer would be liable for a fine of $5,000 for doing so. That explains why Senator Aulich in his contribution yesterday skated very carefully over this area of immigration. He said: The point that I make is that in illegal immigration terms the Australia Card has a deterrent effect. I highlight the next sentence, when he said: It will not necessarily catch people at the moment. What emphasis should we give to that last phrase `at the moment'? It is clear to honourable senators opposite, as it is clear to me, that that simply means that stage 2 is waiting in the wings. Senator Puplick —More on the way. Senator NEWMAN —More on the way. The Government wants to put its foot in the door first, then get into people's lives completely. Of course, special ID cards will be issued to visitors staying more than six weeks, but there is no provision for those cards to be returned when the visitor departs. Maybe I just have a criminal mind, but I would have thought that this would be a marvellous opportunity to have a growth industry in handing on special visitors' cards. There will be a lot of those floating around overseas and maybe in Australia; easy prey for forgers and a growth industry for illegal immigrants. The Government is clearly far from confident about the effectiveness of the card in controlling illegal immigration. The best the Government could do in its submission to the Committee was to say that this would help to ensure that illegal immigrants are excluded from the Australia Card Register and hence from possible access to Commonwealth benefits and services. Because of the existing fears of detection, many illegal immigrants-the Department estimates about half of them-escape the tax system through the black economy. It is my conviction that the Australia Card will only make this situation worse because it will drive a higher proportion of illegal immigrants into the black economy. Let us talk about this black or cash economy, because a major loss of taxation revenue occurs through the operation of the cash economy. The value of that has been put at between 5 per cent and 15 per cent of recorded gross domestic product-that is, between $10 billion and $30 billion-by the Australian Tax Research Foundation. This issue is of tremendous relevance to this debate. Despite the Government's trumpeting about the revenue that the Australia Card will recoup, the card will have little positive effect on the cash economy; it is more likely to make the situation worse. The Australia Card will be required to be produced only for written transactions such as wages records. If an employer chooses to keep no records and to pay below award rates, which I would deplore, the employee would pay no tax at all and could still claim unemployment benefit using his or her ID card-so what value an ID card? Mr Doug Meagher, who is a Queen's Counsel and a former counsel to the Costigan Royal Commission on the Activities of the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union-he has been quoted on other matters-gave an opinion to the Committee that an identification system would have no impact in this area and, further, that since cash payment of wages occurs frequently in cases of casual employment for gardening or house cleaning, it is likely never to be banked and, therefore, this tax could never be collected. In fact, the only way to recoup this tax is to place greater emphasis on indirect taxation. I turn to taxation because great concerns have been expressed, and rightly so, about the loss to revenue by people avoiding taxation. Loss of taxation revenue through the cash economy is not the only problem confronting the Australian Taxation Office, but the problems facing the Tax Office have very little to do with identity. While it is fair to say that the Tax Office would be able to recoup some of the revenue currently lost if an ID system were implemented, there are much cheaper solutions to many of the problems the Tax Office has in collecting all the taxation it is owed. Like the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs, the Tax Office should tidy its own back yard before looking for expensive and dangerous solutions such as the Australia Card. The Tax Office is losing $2 billion a year through its own inefficiency. It is sheer nonsense for the Tax Office to claim that an Australia Card is the only way to collect the shortfall in revenue. This is not my claim. This is the Claim of the Australian Audit Office and of the House of Representatives Committee on Expenditure. The matters revealed in those reports are appalling for any Australian taxpayer. The non-disclosure of dividends and interest income by taxpayers alone accounts for about $500m of lost taxation revenue every year. The Tax Office revealed to the Committee that only 18 to 20 per cent of the total interest paid in Australia is reported to it; only a little of that is checked, and only 50 per cent of what is checked is successfully matched. That is due to the Tax Office's failure to acquire adequate data processing equipment and to revise its work practices. Even the Reserve Bank of Australia is not required to provide interest details. The Acting Assistant Auditor-General, Mr Antony Minchin, told the House of Representatives Committee on Expenditure that `from what we have seen of the dividends and interest check in the Taxation Office it seemed to us that they would never get it right' and `it did seem to us that the ADP area was not well organised. Had it had more resources it might have made a bigger mess'. What a comment from the Auditor-General's Office! This lack of up to date technology also means that the Taxation Office has failed to chase up unpresented group certificates and does not properly administer the prescribed payments scheme. The Tax Office estimates that revenue lost through unpresented group certificates amounts to $100m a year. The Auditor-General considers this to be an underestimate. The Auditor-General also disputes the Tax Office's assessment that the prescribed payments system recoups half of the tax evaded in the building industry and suggests that that is overly optimistic. Over 10 years the Tax Office has underspent by $49m funds allocated to it for the purpose of upgrading its computer equipment. Apparently it prefers to stick to its labour intensive system whereby 2,500 staff are used to review and assess the nine million tax returns submitted annually. I find that statistic absolutely fascinating. It means that every assessor in the Tax Office is required to process 270 salary and wage returns a day, or approximately 35 an hour. Is it any wonder that they are missing the tax evaders? Mr Andrew Prtyz of the Administrative and Clerical Officers Association said of the Tax Office: They do a lot of manual checking now where theoretically they should be able to run two computer tapes, interface them and get a computer printout. The form in which information is provided to the Tax Office is also to blame since, while it is stipulated that interest payments over $100 be reported, there is no stipulation as to what medium the information should be carried on. The existing legislation should be amended to make supply of information in a compatible and easily processed form compulsory. However, in the view of the Expenditure Committee the Tax Office's failure to implement effective computerisation has severely limited its processing capacity and it is vital that this problem be rectified to utilise fully information when it is available. At present, Tax Office computers are not programmed to search for tax numbers. Matching of interest payments and tax instalments to individuals is done manually and it is consequently very difficult. Mr Frank Costigan, QC, has been quoted a number of times in this debate, and rightly so. He knows more about organised crime and the tax system taken together than anybody else in the country. He says: It is a far less expensive exercise to write a program for that problem than to do the kind of thing you are talking about. He was referring there to the Australia Card. No ID card system will solve the problems of the Tax Office. It boils down to antiquated, labour intensive work practices. It is a fact that as long as these issues are not addressed the Tax Office will continue to lose enormous amounts through tax evasion, and I refer to the quote that has been used before about using a jackhammer to crack a nut. The Labor member for Aston, Mr Saunderson, has said: . . . issuing of trinkets to the public in Australia will not win votes at election time when they realise we have failed to address the real issue, when we have failed to improve the efficiency of the Taxation Office. I move, lastly, to organised crime-a matter which, I am sure, concerns all honourable senators. Frank Costigan has strong objections to the Australia Card proposal on the basis that it is a significant intrusion into individual privacy. In his view it is possible to justify such an intrusion only if, on balance, the evil that the community is attempting to correct and the cost of doing it are justified. He told the Committee: The benefits that might flow from it are to some extent illusory, certainly speculative, and can be achieved by other means. The Minister for Health, Dr Blewett, said in his second reading speech on the Australia Card Bill: No one doubts that by facilitating the pursuit of the money trail it will provide an invaluable instrument against corporate and organised crime. But it would seem that a number of people do have doubts. The Government itself in its submission to the Australia Card Committee noted that the effectiveness of the card in combating organised crime was difficult to predict. I believe that it is abundantly clear that the card will not be at all effective in combating organised crime and is far more likely to provide a tool for organised crime to use to carry out its activities. We all know that the laundering of money is one of the secrets of the success of organised crime. What will the Australia Card do to deal with money being laundered at the race track or at the blackjack tables of the Launceston, Hobart, Perth or Adelaide casinos? Will the casinos be required to sight the card before cashing a cheque or agreeing to a gambler using credit? Not under this Bill. The Australian Federal Police has said: There are no realistic grounds for anticipating any impact on the level of organised crime generally. What is more sinister is that the Committee concluded from Mr Costigan's evidence that the card would be used by organised crime to legitimise its activities. Mr Costigan said: I do not believe it would have inhibited the more important matters that I was looking at in the last couple of years. In a public statement, he said: If all you are going to achieve is the catching of small time crooks, the intrusion into privacy cannot be justified. American studies have rejected this form of identification since it would benefit rather than combat organised crime. A forged card would give bona fide proof of identity to those who benefit by having a false identity. The Law Society of New South Wales has said: Considering the gains to be had from forging or counterfeiting Australia Cards, the Society feels that the expense of reproduction by forgery or counterfeiting would be minimal and could lead to a `Black Market' in Australia Cards similar to that in the United States in Social Security Cards. Senator Crowley referred earlier to those social security cards in America. I believe that this gives the lie to the apparent efficiency of the United States system. The Law Society continued: This appears to add another string to the bow of organised crime, the Government having already acknowledged that people who are absolutely determined to abuse the system will attempt to do so. We on this side of the chamber reject the ID card because the Government has failed to convince us that the card will achieve its stated aims which I repeat: To reduce tax avoidance and evasion, to reduce social security fraud, to stop illegal immigration and to help combat organised crime. Not only has it failed to convince the Opposition but also it has failed to convince the Australian Democrats. We know from the silence of many members of the Government that the Government has also failed to convince them. Mr Costigan said: I am bemused by the attempt to correct what are articulated as problems in the community by a solution such as the Australia Card. The Government has failed to convince its own members, many of whom would dearly love to break the ban of Caucus and vote with us on this legislation. I conclude by referring again to a statement by Senator Nick Bolkus, to whom I referred at the beginning of my speech. In May of this year he said: I welcome the majority finding of the Joint Parliamentary Committee on the Australia Card and feel relieved that common sense has prevailed. Let us hope that common sense prevails once again and that the Australia Card is rejected once and for all. Senator MICHAEL BAUME(New South Wales)(4.47) —There are two things that have categorised this debate that are of a most unfortunate nature. The first is the McCarthyite style of Government members attacking anyone who dares to disagree with them. That is probably the most appalling element of this debate. Anyone who decides for very sound reasons that there is a case against this identification card-let us not call it an Australia Card, it is an identification card; this is the mark we will bear, the mark of the authoritarian state-- Senator Maguire —What rubbish! Senator MICHAEL BAUME —I am glad that the honourable senator says `What rubbish', because the sort of McCarthyism we have had in this chamber has come from him, as it has come from his leader, the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke). I quote to the Senate what the Prime Minister has said: . . . the Opposition will continue in its role in the community as the friend of the tax cheats and avoiders and its blatant hypocrisy on social security fraud will have been fully revealed. That is what the Prime Minister said about the Opposition on 21 October 1986. He said that if it chooses not to support the Australia Card, as he calls it, they will be the consequences. We are, apparently, because the Prime Minister says so, offensive because we dare to oppose him. Opponents of this ID card are smeared not for the quality of their thought, not for the right of their position, but for the very fact that they dare to stand up to this authoritarian Government. Of course it is not just the Opposition that stands up to the Government, but the important point is that in this debate we must get rid of the smears, of the McCarthyism, of the attempt to steamroll through this chamber a piece of legislation by passing it by abuse rather than debating it on its merits. What are the merits of the Australia Card Bill? I can advise the Senate that so great, so well thought out, is this legislation that it has now been admitted by the Minister for Health (Dr Blewett)-this has not been revealed to the Senate yet-that there are to be three amendments in the new year. No doubt that is something that honourable senators on the Government side opposite are not aware of. There are to be three amendments in various areas following criticism of the legislation by the bipartisan Senate Standing Committee on the Scrutiny of Bills. These three amendments might not be of major moment, but they do strike at some very significant elements of this legislation, because they seek to protect the rights of individuals. Let me just tell honourable senators the headings under which these amendments are to appear. There is `lack of parliamentary scrutiny; lack of limitation as to reasonableness as to time or place', when one is required to do something under this legislation; and excessive `delegation'. They are the three areas in which the amendments are to be made. As a way of looking at this, one could think: Is not the Minister reasonable, kind and sensible to give way to the pressure from the Scrutiny of Bills Committee and to make these amendments-even at this late stage, amendments which surely should have been in the original legislation. Let us look at this question of lack of parliamentary scrutiny. The Scrutiny of Bills Committee noted: Sub-clause 12 (15) provides that persons included in a class of persons specified by the Minister . . . are not to be obliged to comply with requirements made by an issuing agency with respect to the making of photographs, the provision of specimen signatures and attendance at interviews. No provision has been made for parliamentary scrutiny of such notices and are therefore not subject to tabling and disallowance . . . That is, disallowance by the Senate. Of course, that tabling and disallowance would be possible if the classes of persons to be exempted were to be prescribed by regulation. But the Government decided to go about it in a different way, doing it by gazettal. The Scrutiny of Bills Committee considers that this `might be considered to subject the exercise of legislative power insufficiently to parliamentary scrutiny', if that procedure continued. The Minister has written back saying: `I agree. There should be parliamentary scrutiny of such notices and they should be subject to tabling and disallowance provisions'. As a result, he has indicated that `the necessary amendments will be made through the Statute Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill in the Autumn Session' of next year. The Committee then thanked the Minister for this undertaking, but it said it `would prefer to see the amendments made to the Bill while the Bill is before the Parliament'. But, of course, we know that because of the desperate situation which the present Government is in, as evidenced by the current opinion polls, the Prime Minister wanted to get the House of Representatives up and away and out of Canberra as quickly as possible. Obviously if these necessary amendments-amendments that the Minister agrees should be made-were to be made now, the members of the House of Representatives would have to come back. As a result, the Committee is prepared to accept the fact that we will have to put up with second best; that is, having this allegedly very well prepared, very thought out, bit of legislation amended next year in respect of that matter. What about the matter of the lack of limitation as to reasonableness of time or place? I quote from the Committee's report. Sub-clause 121 (1) and 145 (1) provide that a member of the Data Protection Agency or an Associate Commissioner conducting an inquiry in relation to a reviewable decision or an investigation into a complaint may require a person, by notice in writing, to furnish information and produce documents or records relevant to the inquiry or investigation `at such place and within such period or on such day and at such time, as are specified in the notice' . . . Failure to comply with the notice . . . without reasonable excuse is an offence punishable by a fine of $2,000 or imprisonment for 12 months or both in the case of a natural person and by a fine of $10,000 in the case of a body corporate. Failure to attend a compulsory conference as required . . . without reasonable excuse is an offence punishable by a fine of $1,000 or imprisonment for 6 months or both in the case of a natural person and by a fine of $5,000 in the case of a body corporate. In none of the three sub-clauses is it specified that the times and places at which persons may be required to attend or to furnish information or produce documents must be reasonable. They can be unreasonable as things stand. The Minister has written back saying: . . . I appreciate the viewpoint expressed by the Committee that the provisions specified should include a proviso that the times and places referred to in notices should be reasonable-and I undertake that this test of reasonableness will be made explicit on the face of the legislation. Once again, the Minister has indicated that the necessary amendments will be made to the Statute Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill in the autumn session of next year. Delegation is the next matter. The report states: Sub-clause 186 (1) provides that the chief executive officer of the administering Authority and the President of the Agency may each delegate to `a person' all or any of their powers under the Act . . . that is, of course, other than the power of delegation. In relation to that the Scrutiny of Bills Committee report states that it: . . . has been critical of such powers of delegation which impose no limitation, and give no guidance, as to the attributes of the persons to whom a delegation may be made. Given the nature of the powers to be delegated in the present situation, the Committee recognises that it is `unlikely that it would be necessary for the scope of the delegation to extend beyond the confines of the staff of the Authority and the office holders and staff of the Agency'. But the fact is the legislation does not say who a `person' should be and the delegation could well go beyond those people. The Committee drew to the attention of the Minister the following: It might be considered to make rights, liberties and/or obligations unduly dependent upon insufficiently defined administrative powers. The Minister for Health responded by undertaking: The legislation should be amended so that the intention to restrict the scope of the delegation in this way appears on the face of the legislation. He indicated that the amendment will be made through the Statute Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill in the autumn session of 1987. So we have before us this `very well prepared' legislation which has to be amended already in three respects after such a short amount of time in this place. But, in fact, one more serious element was brought up by the Scrutiny of Bills Committee which the Minister has chosen, in fact, not to amend. I must say I am concerned about this, because it strikes at something very important indeed. It strikes at the availability of personal information for public access. In brief, the report states: Sub-clause 25 (6) provides that the provisions of the Act . . . apply in relation to applications and requests made to the Authority and documents given to the Authority to verify the identity and eligibility of persons as if those documents formed part of the Australia Card Register. Such applications and documents will contain personal information to be included on the Register and it is therefore important that they be given the same protection with regard to unauthorised access and improper disclosure as is given to the Register itself. That is the view of the Scrutiny of Bills Committee. The report further states: However, sub-sections 55 (1) and (3) are the provisions which exempt the Register from the application of the Freedom of Information Act 1982 and (except to the extent that the Register contains information that relates only to persons who are dead) the Archives Act 1983. It is therefore apparently intended that, subject to the exemptions specified in those Acts, access-that is, access to personal information-will be available to the applications and documents referred to above pursuant to those Acts, even though the Register itself will be exempt. How meaningful is it to keep information private-we are assured it will be kept private-if, in fact, it is possible to have access to this kind of information which is not yet on the Register? The Scrutiny of Bills Committee stated: . . . it seemed clear that the relevant applications and documents, to the extent that they contained personal information, would be exempt from disclosure under the two Acts on the ground that to make them available would involve an unreasonable disclosure of information relating to the personal affairs of a person . . . However, the Committee raised the question why it had been chosen to rely on these exemptions, which might be uncertain in their application, rather than to include the applications and other documents in the blanket exception to be provided by sub-clauses 55 (1) and (3). Such applications and other documents by their very nature could only contain personal information required to be entered on the Register, information relevant to such information or to the verification of such information and information relating to the identity of a person or the eligibility of a person for the issue of a Card. The Committee drew the attention of the Senate to this matter by suggesting that `by leaving open the possibility that such personal information might be made available for public access it might be considered to trespass unduly on personal rights and liberties'. This is essential to the discussion of the ID card. We are continually assured that there is no risk that information will be available, yet here we have that Committee report which says that the Government, by going about it in the way it has in respect of material to go on to the Register, is leaving open the possibility that such personal information might be made available for public access. That seems to me to be of major concern. Having received a response from the Minister, who chose not to follow the Committee's requests, the Committee did the courteous thing of thanking him for his response, but it said: While in practice the protection accorded to personal information by the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (`FOI Act') and the Archives Act 1983 (`Archives Act') may- I emphasise the word `may'- be no less than that provided for information on the Australia Card Register under the Australia Card Bill 1986, the Committee notes that it is structured differently. Whereas under the Bill only the Card-subject or the prescribed representative of the Card-subject (apart from officials of the Department of Social Security, the Taxation Office and the Health Insurance Commission) are to be entitled to access to the Register, under the FOI Act and the Archives Act there is a prima facie right of public access. This is the key problem. The Government, by going about it in the way that it has, provides a situation in which, under the Freedom of Information Act, there is a prima facie right of public access to this personal, private information to be collected under the ID card. In other words, the strong case put up by the Government-`There is no need to worry, chaps. Everything is all right. Your information will be private and will not be available to public access'-appears to rest on very tenuous grounds. Clearly, there is a prima facie right of public access to this confidential information that, we are assured by the Government, will never see the light of day. Would it not be nice if the Government addressed itself to this kind of issue in the debate instead of the McCarthyist smearing of anyone who dares to bring up a critical point? Of course, the Government has not addressed itself to it. This report is in the hands of the Government. The Government has decided to do nothing about this element of it. As I said, the Minister has said that he intends to propose three amendments. I do not know whether they have gone to Cabinet yet. From the stunned mullet expressions on the faces of senators opposite, apparently it has not gone to Caucus yet. I do not know whether it has gone to Caucus yet. Senator Childs —Oh, come on. Stunned mullet? Senator MICHAEL BAUME —Maybe Senator Childs will be able to advise us whether the three proposed amendments to this significant Bill have gone to Caucus yet. I doubt it. All we have had is a letter from the Minister. I doubt whether the Minister at the table, the Leader of the Government in the Senate (Senator Button), would be prepared to tell us yet whether these proposed amendments to this Bill have gone to Cabinet. Maybe he does not know. Frankly, I doubt whether the Ministers have got round to it yet. Ministers seem to be having so many other problems in Cabinet these days. They do not have time to talk to farmers, so I suppose they have not had time to consider the serious problems in this legislation or the need to make amendments. The Committee's report continued: In both cases an appeal from the refusal to grant access lies to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. Thus the protection accorded by the FOI Act and the Archives Act may be said at least to be less certain than that provided to information on the Australia Card Register by the Bill. Here we have a clear cause of concern about the confidentiality of information which is to go on the Register but which has not yet gone on it. That situation is only part of the problem we face when considering a thing such as the Australia Card. The other day the Age newspaper ran a comment from Michael Barnard, who went to this point about trust, as to, firstly, whether the Government will be able to keep the information secret and, secondly, whether we could trust a government with these kinds of powers. Senator Crowley quite sensibly raised the matter of trust. She said that the only reason we are attacking this is that we do not trust the Government. She is absolutely right; we do not trust the Government. How could we trust a government which has broken so many of its promises? I do not know of any of the 1983 election promises that are extant. Maybe the one about providing jobs has lasted for a while, but that will be wiped out within the next 12 months. As Michael Barnard said in the Age: How can one take seriously assurances from a Government which, as its own Left rump repeatedly reminds us, has broken one undertaking after another, and whose Treasurer cannot remember even to lodge his income tax return? He goes on: Even if the Government's protestation that the Australia Card is merely a piece of identifying plastic that will help stop tax and welfare fraud were wholly true, it still does not answer the point that in the process, and at a time of nagging doubt over the country's future economic and political stability, the Government would be setting in place a centralised data linking system that, in Senator Chaney's recent words, would `provide unparalleled opportunity for abuse of confidential information held by the Health, Tax, Social Security and other departments'. No government could honestly guarantee- I suppose the word `honestly' is whimsical in the present circumstances of this Government- that such a system, even if relatively innocent now, would not soon be refined and expanded by one administration or another. Indeed, experience suggests it inevitably would be. Governmental and bureaucratic demand for personal information is relentless. When did the reader last notice a decline in official intrusions into his or her life? That is the essential point. What say the Government makes some mistakes? Michael Barnard made the neat point there. What say there were mistakes and things got out-there were errors? He says: Be assured, the Government now trumpeting the claimed virtues of the Australia Card would be quite cavalier in brushing aside any failures. The prevailing indifference to error was nicely encapsulated recently by Senator Grimes. Confronted with controversial cultural grants to trade unions (we live in an age when every union deserves a musician or artist in residence at taxpayers' expense) he told the Senate (Hansard 19 November p 2544): `If some mistakes were made and some funding went in the wrong direction, I ask you honourable senators, so what?' That is the Government's answer when there are mistakes, failures or muck-ups-so what? Michael Barnard continued: So what, indeed. Mistakes and mid-course changes in policy are an unremarkable feature of government. What matters most, it seems, is the packaging. That is one of the reasons it is calling this the Australia Card. It is a phoney bit of packaging. It is an ID card, and let us not pretend otherwise. But will it work? Would an ID card be effective in combating welfare fraud? Would an ID card facilitate the collection of taxes? Would an ID card control illegal immigration? Would an ID card be cost effective under the system this Government is introducing? Would personal privacy be safeguarded under this ID arrangement? What did the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card find? The majority of members of this bipartisan Committee concluded that the ID card proposal failed on all those tests that I have just outlined. On not one of them would it pass. In welfare fraud, for example, the greatest fraud-99.4 per cent, it was found-is a deliberate provision of false information and failure to report changed circumstances rather than through false identities and names. So 99.4 per cent of social security fraud is not directly open to contest by this ID card. Five Auditor-General reports and the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Expenditure have all made it clear that in the tax area the ID card is of minimal import compared with the proper function of existing arrangements within the Australian Taxation Office. All these reports have made it clear that the administration of the Tax Office is costing the community dearly. The Expenditure Committee said: . . . taxation revenue losses through non-detection of total taxpayer incomes could conceivably amount to several billion dollars each year . . . In large measure it can simply be attributed to Australian Tax Office's internal inadequacies. The Australia Card will not correct the internal inadequacies of the Tax Office. Not even the greatest advocates for this ID card on the Government side can pretend that. The reality is that the Tax Office cannot handle at present the information which is or should be available to it-that is the essential element. Senator Messner —Hear, hear! Senator MICHAEL BAUME —I am glad to have Senator Messner's support because he is only too well aware of the inadequate handling by the Tax Office revealed in many reports. We have had a taxing problem, and that has been referred to repeatedly in this debate. I commend to honourable senators an article in the Age of 2 September about why the United States rejected the sort of ID card that this Government wants to introduce. The article is by Tracey Westen, an assistant professor of communications law and policy at the Annenberg School of Communications of the University of Southern California. It creates a situation which shows quite clearly what can so easily happen once this kind of central computer information bank is introduced. I will not read the article but I will mention this: In it Tracey Westen points out that the greatest supporter of the national ID system, in his argument in favour of it in the United States `does little to dispel the fear that error, fraud, tampering and deliberate abuse could trigger rampant invasions of liberty and privacy under a national ID system'. That is exactly the situation we face here. No assurances from a government whose only response to error is `So what?' will provide us with any more genuine resolution of those concerns. What do the Australian people really think about this matter? We have heard about opinion polls and how the Government says it is backed by 72 per cent support. What bunkum. We know that, long before this legislation came into the Parliament, the Government set out on a propaganda campaign, funded of course by taxpayers. In January it spent $22,000 on a survey of attitudes of Australians to the Australia Card. Once it got the results of that survey, it went on to advertise it. It produced 664,000 pamphlets entitled `Explaining the New Australia Card', at a cost of over $17,000-my goodness, that is a familiar figure; it sounds like Paul Keating's living away from home allowance-again an example of government wastage. These were produced before there was any suggestion of legislation coming into this place. They launched a publicity campaign and then said: `Isn't it astounding; people are in favour of this'. Let us have a look at letters to the editor in recent times. In the last three weeks I have had a quick look at the number of letters for and against the Australia Card in the Sydney Morning Herald, the Age and the Australian. There were 13 in favour and 43 against. That 3:1 balance reflects the attitudes of thinking, literate and coherent Australians to the Australia Card. It is in conflict with the propaganda, once again, being put out by the present Government. Let us look at the people whom the Government categorises as cheats, rogues and friends of tax cheats in its phoney and disgusting argument in favour of this ID card. I hope that if we have any more Government speakers on this matter they will address the issues of the ID card and its merits and not seek to attack the integrity of anyone who opposes it. There was a letter to the Bulletin in the middle of this year signed by Professors Chris Barter, Roger Brown, Lauchlan Chipman, Garth Nettheim, Geoffrey Walker, Martin Webb-all from universities around Australia. Other signatories included Peter Graham, from Griffith University, Graham Wrightson from Macquarie University, Associate Professor Jane Levine and Graham Greenleaf from the law department of the University of New South Wales, Assistant Professor Paddy O'Brien from the University of Western Australia, and Roger Clarke from the commerce department at the Australian National University. Senator Giles —There's another one. What a bunch you have there. Senator MICHAEL BAUME —I hear the interjection: `There's another one'. They are all crooks and thieves, according to Government senators-they are all rogues because they dare to oppose this authoritarian legislation. That is the sort of attitude we have got from Government senators. Are these people who sign these letters all crooks? Is Alan Ransom of Macquarie University, Ryde, a crook because he says that the Australia Card is a fraud? His letter states: Is it not designed to deter cheating on taxes or income where it really counts: it is designed to make the people think the Government is doing something about it . . . It further states: . . . neither the Tax Office nor the Department of Social Security have effective recovery systems. He is another, I suppose, of the crooks and frauds helping the tax cheats that the Labor Party accuses everyone of being! Mr S. M. Rubens of Brighton in Victoria wrote: During the Nazi occupation of Holland . . . the Germans introduced ID cards, not only with photographs but also with fingerprints. The Germans were more efficient and ruthless in enforcing their ``laws'' than Australians could ever be. Yet, I survived the German occupation of the Netherlands thanks to a forged ID card. Peter Dawes of Rowan Street, Orange, is another crook according to the Labor Party. Ken Hay from Bendfordale in Western Australia is another. These people are from all over Australia and they are writing letters to the newspapers. There were letters from George Oughton of Homebush West, Peter Truelove of Turramurra, New South Wales, B. White of Wollongong, C. M. Coates of Queanbeyan. These people are from all over Australia and they complain, quite properly, about this card. Of course, my cousin and colleague Senator Peter Baume outlined the views of Frank Costigan and a whole host of other people, including Peter Garrett. Let us have another look at the question of safety. `Blewett says fake cards could pass' was a heading in the Canberra Times on 19 November. What is the security involved with this card? The article states: A forged Australia Card might not immediately be identified, The Minister for Health, Dr Blewett, admitted . . . We have another article in the Australian Financial Review of 24 November which reads: A fake ID card from a Times Square shop can cost: $15. With a phony birth certificate: $27. Here we have a great sense of security about this card! We have great confidence that it will not be easily forged! We have no confidence at all that the information will remain confidential, that the information will not be improperly used by this or a successive government because of the need, apparently, for governments to keep extending their control over people in Australia. We must take a stand against this on that basis alone, apart from the fact that this is flawed legislation needing to be amended. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT(Senator Giles) —Order! The honourable senator's time has expired. Senator GEORGES(Queensland)(5.17) —I have found it enlightening to listen to the debate over two days and to realise that many Opposition senators who favoured the proposal have now changed their minds. It reminds me of an interview that I gave to the Special Broadcasting Service on the identification card quite some time ago. Just before entering the room to give that interview I spoke to a leading member of the Liberal Party of Australia, who said that he was in favour of the ID card. I said to him: `How is it that you, a Liberal and a capitalist, are in favour of the card, and I, a socialist, am opposed to it?'. I proceeded to the interview and one of the comments I made was that the matter would be re-examined by both political parties, that I considered this proposition to be an extremely dangerous one as far as our democracy is concerned and as far as our society is concerned. Unfortunately, because there was no widespread opposition to the card, a certain momentum has been created in support of the card. That momentum is only now beginning, to a certain extent, to be opposed, and not before time. The debate over the last two days has been invaluable. Those who have considered the cost of our meeting over the last two days ought to think again. Even if we were not here we would be engaged in committee work, so cost ought not to be a consideration in this very important matter. Debate has taken place. I am pleased that a number of views have been put forward. In the main I support the view of those who oppose the card, although those views are being presented with strange motives. I have been consistently opposed to the card from the moment it was proposed as being a very serious intrusion into the rights of the individual in our society. Although I am a socialist, I believe strongly in the rights of the individual to exist without unnecessary bureaucratic interference by the state. As a socialist who believes that the economic arrangements of our society should be in the hands of the state, I believe that the rights of the individual must be even further protected in that sort of society. When Dr Blewett says that privacy is the right and privilege of the rich, he is not quite correct. Privacy is the right of every individual, no matter which society he lives in. The right to privacy is perhaps more the right of a socialist than of a capitalist. It is perhaps even more necessary. So let us put to one side the question of privacy. Privacy is the right of each one of us, no matter what sort of society we live in. To destroy the privacy of the individual would destroy society. I believe that the ID card is intrusive, cumbersome and unnecessary. The ID card has been presented to us as a licence to exist in our society. If one does not have that licence one cannot exist. On those grounds alone the whole proposition ought to be discarded. It ought to be put to one side and we should consider the alternatives. The alternatives are there to achieve what the ID card is supposed to achieve without interfering with our basic rights. The Australian Taxation Office has come under considerable criticism-unfair criticism. Governments of both political complexions have taken the attitude that we ought to restrict and limit the size of our bureaucracies. We have made decisions across the board. We have allowed certain bureaucracies to grow, perhaps unnecessarily. Having reached the position where we cannot afford the size of bureaucracies, we have decided to cut those bureaucracies across the board without considering the needs of each of the departments concerned. One of the departments which was so limited and which demanded services in the face of the considerable evasion of payments to the public purse is the Taxation Office. It is no use coming into this place and criticising the Taxation Office for its faults, errors and so-called inefficiencies unless we properly examine what we have done. We have not provided the facilities or funds necessary to the Taxation Office to meet the challenge of tax avoidance and evasion. We all agree that taxes have been too high and that people have endeavoured to evade, minimise or reduce the imposition upon themselves or their companies. The Taxation Office has not been able to cope because the funds have not been made available. Nor has the technology been made available. Only now, belatedly, under the scrutiny of the Auditor-General and the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Expenditure review is it starting to be realised that there are errors. We ought to respond to those errors by supplying the Taxation Office with the funds and technology it requires to gather the tax which the nation demands. Yet we are going to spend a massive amount to put into place the ID card system which will survey everyone in order to catch the few. Rather than provide the vast amount of money and vast number of public servants to set up this new bureaucracy, would it not be better to direct the funds to the Taxation Office and give it the technology, techniques and personnel to gather the funds which our society needs to carry out its responsibilities? Recently the Joint Committee of Public Accounts considered the ID card in regard to social security overpayments and dismissed it because it realised that identity was not the problem. Overpayments result because the Department cannot respond quickly to the information it receives. It pumps out cheques endlessly despite the fact that someone has rung and said: `My husband has died, I no longer need the pension cheque'. The pension cheques continue to arrive. A pensioner who has died in a village somewhere on the side of a mountain in Greece continues to receive his cheques, despite the information that has been fed back to the Department that the pensioner no longer lives. We discovered that it was an administration problem, not a problem of identity. In our investigation we also discovered that in the area of computer technology and programming in the Australian Public Service, including the Taxation Office, there is a 54 per cent shortfall of people with the techniques to work the technology that has been provided. Yet there is such massive unemployment amongst young people. As a society we cannot respond to the challenge to provide the personnel to the departments to man the technology which could prevent the massive tax evasion we are now trying to correct by the establishment of a national identity system. My fear is that, once put in place, the system will not remain at the level the Government seeks to achieve. The very draconian penalties which will be imposed to prevent the misuse of the ID card are an argument against the card and its introduction. No argument has been addressed to the right of an individual in our free society to disappear, to change his past, to get away from-- Senator Walsh —A criminal record that you are about to be caught up with? A record of criminal activity? Senator GEORGES —Yes. Why not, if that criminal activity took place during a person's teens? Senator Walsh —If you had been running heroin and made a few million out of it you are arguing that all you have to do is to change your identity and you should be able to walk away from that record of criminal activity? Senator GEORGES —I am not saying that. Senator Walsh —That is what you are facilitating. Senator GEORGES —No, I am not facilitating that at all. If the Minister directed his attention to the big boys around the place and if the system were directed to the major frauds in this society, we would not need to have to introduce the ID card. I received a letter the other day which indicates that 12 doctors in Sydney are ripping off the system. Yet, there is no use in exposing that as the Joint Committee of Public Accounts exposed fraud and overservicing because the Australian Federal Police do not have the techniques, the facilities or the personnel to follow it up and the Director of Public Prosecutions does not have the power to bring these people to account. What the Minister is saying to me is that if a youngster were in some way to come into conflict with the law-- Senator Walsh —What I am saying to you is that your formula will facilitate people walking away from a record of criminal activity. Senator GEORGES —I would suggest that in the minds of reasonable people those who may have been in breach of the law or in breach of the normal behaviour of society should have a right to escape from that. All I am saying to Senator Walsh is that they should have a right to escape. They have a right to change their identity. One would not be able to escape at any time because of the procedures which the Government is trying to impose upon us. One would not be able to change one's identity. People who are poor, underprivileged, abused or socially disadvantaged will have no chance. All I can say is that we must realise that magnitude of what we propose. I would suggest that there are other means of dealing with the problems that Senator Walsh has raised about the mighty who can use the courts and sophisticated lawyers to escape the penalties. But let us not, because of them, impose upon the weak the need to be identified at will. Although one is not supposed to be asked one's identity by the police, if in a certain situation one were stopped one would be expected to volunteer that information. The problem that emerges is that one would be expected to volunteer. If for some reason a person was in some place which the police determined that he should not be, he could now tell them: `No, I am not in breach of the law. I am not going to give you my name and address'. In such a circumstance the police would have to charge a person with vagrancy. They did it to me on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day. I was convicted of loitering with intent. I am a convicted vagrant, and that is on my record. Not only will that be on future records, but so too will information of all of my associates. That is not part of the system which the Government has in mind at present. But at some future time that information held in the criminal record will also find its way into the universal record which the Government is endeavouring to set up under this legislation. It is very convenient to have a universal ID card. It is very convenient to those who want to use it as a management tool. But let me say this: Beware, because it will become a weapon for social pacification. When all the information is gathered we will find that it contains not only a person's financial position but also his social position and social behaviour. Those people who think they have nothing to fear from that should remember that the categories can change as to what is normal and what is not normal. The categories can change quite easily on the basis of religion or race. This has happened before and it can happen again. The Government's ID system will not be one of high integrity unless a couple of things are done. First of all, a person will be obliged to carry his ID card at all times. Such is technology that all the information can be put on a very small card. The card will be a sort of dog tag that people wear in the army. It will be able to be carried quite easily. If that arrangement becomes too cumbersome, it is quite possible to put all of the information on a very small metallic or plastic card which can be suitably inserted as farmers are now doing with cattle that they want to identify from a distance. People will be able to be identified easily at will by anyone without any interference and without them knowing. Let me tell the Senate this: The steps that are being taken are steps towards that draconian situation. I am not prepared-I have not in the past and I will not now-to support a proposition that will set us along that path. It has been fairly clear in the past that I do not support an identification system. I do not support the legislation. Honourable senators will recall that on a previous occasion I cast my vote against a piece of legislation which the Government brought forward-I cast my vote against every one of you-and for that I was suspended from my Party. As part of that suspension there was the warning: `Don't ever do it again'. Senator Mason —So much for democracy. Senator GEORGES —That is done in the honourable senator's party. It is also done in other parties. But I was under suspension and was warned: `Don't ever do it again'. Whether it was anticipated I would or not, I am not quite certain. But one thing is now clear-that is, I am not going to support this legislation. I am not going to oppose it; I am not going to support it. There is one more thing that I have to do. I have to cast my vote this Saturday in support of my successor and that vote will be cast. But I will not embarrass my colleagues after that task is finished because I have a concern for quite a number of my colleagues who are embarrassed by what has happened to me. So once that is over I will not seek to do that which will expel me from the Party. I will resign from the Party. But that will happen next week. The thing that has to be made clear is that when one begins to lose one's faith in a party which either denies its policy or moves away from its basic principles one can only come to a point of making a decision. So the decision is clear. I am not going to support this piece of legislation. When it comes back to the Senate, as it will come back, I will oppose it. But in the meantime, to clear the decks, I will resign. Senator Walsh —Why don't you resign from the Senate too, then? Senator GEORGES —Senator Walsh put that to me when I appeared before the National Executive. I will have that in mind. But let us wait, shall we? I have that in mind as well because I am not prepared to limit the position of my Party in this place. I know what Senator Walsh has in mind-that the last 18 years of working in this place count for nothing. So what he would demand is that I resign not only from the Party but also from the Senate. I will make that decision in my own time to suit myself and those people who have supported me. But what Senator Walsh and a number of others have succeeded in doing is destroying my constituency, whom I do not represent in this place any more. They have reduced me to the point of being embarrassed and sometimes humiliated when I move amongst those people who support me. Well, I have had enough of it. Senator MASON(New South Wales) —Madam Acting Deputy President, I seek leave to make a personal explanation. Leave granted. Senator MASON —I noticed that in yesterday's Hansard, when Senator Maguire was in full flight on the Australia Card debate, he made this comment: I recall that in 1983 some of the Australian Democrats-in fact, Senator Haines, Senator Mason and Senator Macklin-voted repeatedly with the Opposition to block legislation introduced by this Government to crack down on the so-called bottom of the harbour schemes. A little later he commented: Senator Haines, Senator Macklin and Senator Mason now want to vote as they did in 1983. They want to ally themselves with this discredited, carping, negative and knocking Opposition. I merely wish to make the point that the Hansard record will show, if Senator Maguire wishes to look at it-this is something that most honourable senators would know-that in fact Senator Jack Evans and I for the Democrats supported the Government's bottom of the harbour legislation on that occasion. Senator HAINES(South Australia-Leader of the Australian Democrats) —by leave-I move the following amendment to the amendment moved by the Opposition to the motion for the second reading: Leave out the words proposed to be inserted, insert: ``this Bill be withdrawn and redrafted to reflect the recommendations of the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card, as follows: 1. That the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs upgrade the quality of its records including its movements database, citizenship index and overstayers file and transfer all records from the manual system to the computer database as a matter of urgency (paragraph 1.62). 2. (a) That the computerisation of all State and Territory Registries of Births, Deaths and Marriages proceed. To this end, the Committee supports the continuation of the current negotiations between the Commonwealth and the States. (b) That the Commonwealth provide appropriate assistance and advice to the States to ensure that the computerisation of births, deaths and marriages registers can proceed within the earliest possible timeframe. (c) That the only Commonwealth Departments permitted to have access to the computerised registry of births, deaths and marriages be the Australian Taxation Office, the Department of Social Security, the Passport Office of the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Health Insurance Commission. That access to computerised births, deaths and marriages data be restricted to verifying documentation submitted for the purposes of obtaining nominated services from the Commonwealth. (d) That extension of access occur only after the widest possible public discussion after the system has been in operation for some minimum period (paragraph 2.14). 3. (a) That the Commonwealth establish an independent statutory body, known as the Data Protection Agency, to control the collection and use of personal data. (b) That this body have powers, functions and objectives similar to those outlined in paragraphs 14.6.4-14.6.6 of the Government's submission and as further outlined in paragraphs 2.23-24 of this Report. (c) That the jurisdiction of the proposed Data Protection Agency cover from the outset all Commonwealth computerised data banks. (d) That a Parliamentary Committee be established to investigate and monitor the following: (i) the implementation and operation of the proposed Data Protection Agency. (ii) the extension of the Data Protection Agency's jurisdiction to cover all private sector data bases falling within the Commonwealth jurisdiction three years after the establishment of the Agency; and the extension of the Data Protection Agency's functions to cover all written personal data banks three years after the establishment of the Agency. (e) That the right of an individual to have access to and correct personal data on a database be on the same basis as that provided under the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act and that it be extended contemporaneously with any extension of the access provisions of that legislation (paragraph 2.35). 4. That the Commonwealth introduce privacy legislation based on the recommendations of the Australian Law Reform Commission Report on Privacy as soon as possible (paragraph 2.42). 5. (a) That the Government adopt without further delay the banking control regulations contained in the Costigan Royal Commission Report where they are not already subsumed within the Committee's own recommendations. (b) That the Federal Government consult with the State and Territory Governments on controls on banks and other financial institutions under State jurisdiction with a view to the early introduction of uniform controls as recommended. (c) That legislation be introduced to require banks to notify the relevant Commonwealth and/or State law enforcement agencies about any fraudulent or suspected fraudulent activity within the banking system (paragraph 2.49). 6. That the outstanding recommendations of the Report of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Expenditure on control of prohibited immigration be implemented as soon as possible (paragraph 2.57). 7. That legislation be passed allowing Commonwealth departments and authorities to inform the appropriate department or authority about suspected cases of fraud. The question of whether departments should be required to report such cases should be considered by the Government (paragraph 2.65). 8. (a) That the responsibility of processing applications and payments under education assistance schemes be transferred from the Department of Education to the Department of Social Security along with all staff involved in administering the schemes. (b) That the Department of Education retain policy control over the schemes and budget allocations for education assistance continue to be held against the Education vote (paragraph 2.68). 9. (a) That the Department of Social Security conduct a progressive review of proof of identity for all existing pension recipients and all current unemployment beneficiaries whose claims were determined before the introduction of the new procedures. (b) That the Department of Social Security match all recipients of social security benefits with the proposed computerised register of births, deaths and marriages as soon as that reform is implemented. (c) That the Department of Social Security immediately begin verifying birth and marriage certificates offered as proof of identity with the relevant State or Territory Register. (d) That the Department of Social Security not accept birth and marriage certificates as `sound' documents for proof of identity purposes until registers of births, deaths and marriages are computerised and linked (paragraph 2.95). 10. That legislation be enacted to require financial institutions to provide information reported to the Australian Taxation Office in an acceptable format (paragraph 4.20). 11. That, irrespective of whether a tax file number or an Australia Card number is introduced, a withholding tax on interest payments be imposed on interest-bearing accounts which are not associated with a number (paragraph 4.26). 12. (a) That the use of the tax file number be extended to cover all the financial transactions proposed in the Government submission for use of the Australia Card number by the Australian Taxation Office, as well as for social security purposes. (b) That all other Departments (i.e. other than the Australian Taxation Office and Department of Social Security) be barred from access to and use of the tax file number. (c) That the Medicare system continue to operate as a separate entity, but that the method of issuing new Medicare numbers and cards, be they new or replacement, be altered in order to improve the integrity of the system and reduce the issuing of multiple cards. (d) That the integrity of the tax file number be upgraded to that of the proposed Australia Card number based on the following premises: (i) that taxpayers with a continuous tax record exceeding five years not be required to make an application; (ii) that the file numbers of these taxpayers be verified by normal audit processes over a period of time; (iii) that all other taxpayers and persons who do not currently possess a tax file number verify their identity to the same level of integrity as proposed under the Australia Card program; (iv) that the interview process for verifying identity be conducted by the Department of Social Security or nominated agents; and (v) that temporary arrangements be made where necessary to facilitate payment of tax before verification of identity. (e) That a Parliamentary Committee be established within three years of the introduction of the upgraded tax file number system with the express task of reviewing the implementation of these recommendations. The Committee to report to Parliament on these matters and to recommend further action where necessary (paragraph 4.58). Senator SHORT(Victoria)(5.41) —I feel very humble to speak immediately after Senator Georges, a man whose politics are quite different from mine but who has just made a speech which I think will remain long in the memories of those of us privileged to have heard it tonight. Senator Elstob —He is an old scab, that is what he is. Senator McKiernan —Madam Acting Deputy President, I take a point of order. There was a reference, unfortunately from my own side of the chamber, made to a senator, and I would ask that it be withdrawn. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT(Senator Bjelke-Petersen) —Senator Elstob, I think you should withdraw that reference to Senator Georges. That is not a parliamentary expression and I regret you made it. Senator Elstob —It may not be a parliamentary expression. It is the truth, but I will withdraw it. Senator Childs —Madam Acting Deputy President, I raise a point of order. The word `scab' is very offensive to anybody who has any involvement with the Labor movement and any trade unionist should not dare to qualify the withdrawal. I demand that the honourable senator withdraw that word `scab'. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Senator Elstob, you have been asked to withdraw without reservation. Senator Elstob —I withdraw unreservedly; yes, all right. Senator SHORT —That interjection from Senator Elstob, I would point out to those listening to this broadcast of the Senate, came from a man who, last night, I believe made the most objectionable speech that has been heard in this House for a long time, about a matter of grave issue to every Australian. He demeaned the whole being of the Senate with his disgraceful performance last night, and he has just repeated it today. The Hawke Government's Australia Card Bill 1986, the purpose of which is to force every Australian to carry an identity card-- Senator Walsh —That is a lie, and you know it. Senator SHORT —It is not a lie. Senator Chaney —Madam Acting Deputy President, I take a point of order. The Minister, whose behaviour is usually thoroughly objectionable, is now shouting `that is a lie' across the chamber, and I ask you to call him to order. I ask him to withdraw that interjection. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Senator Walsh, the word `lie' is not-- Senator Walsh —To say that the purpose is to force every Australian to carry an identity card, that is a lie, and Senator Short knows it is a lie. But since it offends the Standing Orders, I withdraw it. Senator SHORT —It is-- Senator Walsh —If you had a proper case you wouldn't have to resort to that sort of thing. Senator SHORT —Is Senator Walsh trying to tell the Australian people-- Senator Chaney —Mr Deputy President, I take a point of order. It is again-- Senator Walsh —It is a substitute for an argument. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Order, Senator Walsh. Senator Chaney is taking a point of order. Senator Chaney —It would be funny if it was not so tragic. The Minister's withdrawal was qualified and I ask for an unqualified withdrawal of his comment. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT —As I heard Senator Walsh's withdrawal, it was unqualified, but I will treat it as-- Senator Chaney —Mr Deputy President, I am sorry. What Senator Walsh said was that because it was in breach of the Standing Orders he would withdraw it. That is a qualified withdrawal. That is not the reason and he must withdraw it. Senator Tate —That is a description, not a denial. Senator Chaney —That is a denial of the withdrawal in the same sentence. The DEPUTY PRESIDENT —I think it would speed the process if Senator Walsh were to withdraw without comment. Senator Walsh —I withdraw, Mr Deputy President. Senator SHORT —The proposal to force every Australian mandatorily to have an identity card is one of the most important proposals-- Senator Walsh —You have qualified it now. Are you withdrawing what you said before? Senator SHORT —In my view, the two are one and the same. If Senator Walsh is going to be squeamish about it, okay. Senator Cook —That is an admission by you that you were wrong. Senator SHORT —I was not wrong, and the honourable senator knows I was not wrong. It is one of the most important proposals that have ever been put before the Australian Parliament and the Australian people. The Liberal and National parties are totally opposed to this Bill and we will continue to oppose it, however many times the Hawke Government chooses to bring it into the Parliament. It has been said by some people that the Government will have a double dissolution when the Bill has been rejected twice by the Senate. I would welcome that. I would welcome going to the people of Australia and telling them why the Liberal and National parties have rejected this intrusive socialist Government's plan to impose on every Australian a major and costly invasion of his or her privacy or his or her civil liberties. I would certainly have a wide range of support and company in doing so. I would have the support of a vast range of organisations and individuals across the spectrum of community involvement and interest and across the spectrum of political thought in this country. For example, I would have the support of several of the major trade unions. I would have the support of the Law Council of Australia, the Australian Catholic Welfare Association, the Council of Small Business Organisations of Australia, the International Commission of Jurists, the Council for Civil Liberties in each State and Territory, the Australian Retired Persons Association, the Australian Computer Society Inc., the Victorian Branch of the Australian Labor Party and the ALP's national Legal and Administrative Policy Committee. I would also have the support of the Confederation of Australian Industry, the Real Estate Institute of Australia, the Australian Associated Stock Exchanges, the Anglican Social Responsibilities Commission of Western Australia and many more organisations of responsible and concerned people. In campaigning against this iniquitous identity card proposal, euphemistically and misleadingly called an Australia Card proposal, by this misleading, arrogant and intrusive Government-it is really an un-Australia Card-I would also have the support of such eminent Australians as Frank Costigan, QC, a person who, probably more than any other Australian, has led the fight against organised crime, including tax fraud, in this country. I would have the support of His Grace the Right Reverend Michael Challen, the Anglican Bishop of Perth, Mr Justice Michael Kirby, former Chairman of the Australian Law Reform Commission, law Professor Geoffrey Walker, leading business people such as Hugh Morgan, author Frank Moorhouse, youth affairs director Robert Hudson, former Lord Mayor of Melbourne Irvin Rockman, and countless thousands of other concerned individuals. In campaigning against the ID card I would also have the support of the majority of the members of the parliamentary Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card, which was established in November 1985 to examine the Government's proposals and which reported in May of this year. The majority of the members of that Committee rejected the Government's proposals. The members of the Committee making up that majority included members from every political party in this Parliament: The Liberal Party, the National Party, the Australian Democrats and the Labor Party. It is said that surveys indicate that the majority of Australians support the idea of an ID card. I doubt that very much. But if that is correct at the moment, it is simply because the Hawke Government has managed to hoodwink the electorate through a combination of lack of information and quite deliberate misinformation. Those members of the public who have had an opportunity to study the Government's proposals have a duty and a responsibility over the months ahead to get out and alert the rest of the Australian community to the dangers inherent in these proposals, and that we will certainly be doing. Why are we so opposed to the Government's ID card proposals? In broad terms we are opposed for the four reasons set out in the amendment that we have moved to the second reading motion. These are: Firstly, the card would not solve the problems of tax and welfare fraud, both of which generally involve people whose identity is not in question. Secondly, the card does not address serious administration failings and operational deficiencies in the Australian Taxation Office that have been revealed by the Commonwealth Auditor-General and that remain a major cause of failure to collect revenue due to the Government. Thirdly, we oppose it because the costs of the ID card have been grossly understated and the benefits grossly exaggerated. Fourthly, the details of the proposal will constitute an unprecedented and unjustifiable intrusion into the individual privacy of all Australians and will greatly damage our civil liberties. I will come back to these fundamental concerns and other concerns in more detail in a few moments, but first let me outline, particularly for the members of the public who may be listening to this debate, the main details of the Government's ID card proposal. In doing so I stress that it is not the card itself that is the major concern but rather the consequences that flow from the existence of the card. Let me also make the point at the outset that not one country in the world with a common law system like Australia's has a comprehensive ID card system like that proposed by the Hawke Government. The Government first floated its ID card proposal at the National Taxation Summit in July 1985. It was then promoted as a major element of its tax reform package and there was little or no comment of the card's potential for attacking social security fraud. An amazing and absurd feature of the Government's handling of its ID card proposal since day one has been that the ministerial responsibility resides with the Minister for Health (Dr Blewett), not with the Treasurer (Mr Keating) who is responsible for taxation, not with the Minister for Social Security (Mr Howe) and not with the Attorney-General (Mr Lionel Bowen) nor the Special Minister of State (Mr Young) who are responsible for fraud detection and prevention. No, the Government has left the matter with the Minister for Health. The reason given for this is that it is the Health Insurance Commission which will be the administering authority for the ID card. That, I submit, is a totally insufficient reason for leaving the carriage of the scheme with a Minister whose portfolio has absolutely no responsibility for the detection or prevention of tax or social welfare fraud, which are said by the Government to be the very reasons for the ID card in the first place. It makes no sense to have this matter lie with the Minister for Health. That stupidity, though, is dangerously compounded by the particular person who has been the Minister for Health throughout the life of the Hawke Government. I refer, of course, to Dr Neal Blewett. Dr Blewett is not a medical doctor-he is a doctor of philosophy. Let me give the Senate an example of Dr Blewett's philosophy. Addressing the 1986 South Australian Labor Party conference, Dr Blewett had this to say: Let me say as a socialist that it is the interests of the community that should come before the individual right . . . We shouldn't get too hung up as socialists on privacy because privacy, in many ways, is a bourgeois right that is very much associated with the right to private property. Those words are from the person who has been given the responsibility to force every Australian, from the day they are born to the day they die, to have an identity card, thereby setting in place the basic framework for the development literally of a police state in Australia, if not by this Government or the next government, by some government in the future. Under the Government's proposal every Australian will be forced to have an ID card. The card will look rather innocent and innocuous. It will simply contain a person's name, identity number, card expiry date, photo and signature-not much different to a driving licence. But there the deception begins. I will outline that deception as I proceed with my remarks because the card would be required to be produced on a very wide range of occasions, including dealing with banks and financial institutions, for land transactions, for initiating investments, for initiating transactions with cash management trusts, for employment, for admission to hospital, claims for Medicare benefits, when required by the Taxation Office, for primary producers transacting business with stock agents and marketing authorities, for investing in shares in public companies and for dealings with the Department of Social Security. The Government proposes massive fines for failure to produce the ID card on such occasions. Most of those fines are $20,000. For bodies corporate the fines are up to $100,000. To give just a couple of examples, a householder who gives casual employment to, say a cleaning lady, for a few days a week without sighting the lady's ID card and notifying the Taxation Office is guilty of an offence-penalty, $20,000. A farmer who, during the fruit picking season, takes on a young itinerant looking for a few days work who does not have his ID card on him, will have committed an offence-penalty, $20,000. Senator Maguire —Senator Brownhill tried that yesterday. Senator SHORT —But is is true. Is Senator Maguire denying the accuracy of that? A small businessman giving casual employment to young people or to pensioners without sighting their ID card is guilty without trial-fine, $20,000. So it goes on and on and on. But there are loopholes. For example, there is the loophole in clause 36 of the Bill which makes it possible to forward, through the ordinary mail, a so-called certificate of identity in place of the ID card. That is a sensible idea for all those engaged in transactions involving the requirement of identification where the two parties are separated by distance. But just think of the scope for theft, loss or forgery of these certificates in these circumstances. Yet the Government is trying to tell the Australian people that the whole system is virtually guaranteed against forgery or duplication. What nonsense. Even the ID card will be forgeable. Experience around the world with identity cards, passports, drivers licences and similar identification documents has demonstrated beyond any doubt whatsoever that no such system is foolproof against forgery and fraud. A letter to the editor of the Melbourne Age earlier this week summed up the situation very neatly. It was a letter from someone who had gone through the identity card requirements of Hitler's Germany and the processes in Holland during the war. He said, amongst other things: The introduction of the Australia Card will most probably give rise to a flourishing forgery industry. The Australia card will only be effective after we have managed to remove all crooks from our society, but then we won't need the card any more. It is indeed possible that the introduction of the card will legitimate a false identity which will aid and abet the criminal element in our society and may well encourage tax and welfare fraud. The Government's stated objective for the ID card, according to the Minister's second reading speech, is to fight tax avoidance and evasion and social welfare fraud. The Opposition, of course, fully supports those objectives. Our concern is that the ID card will not achieve these objectives. So far as tax evasion is concerned, the evidence produced to the parliamentary Select Committee indicates that it is very doubtful whether tax evasion would be seriously restrained through the use of an ID card. One of the witnesses before the Committee was Mr Costigan, QC, the former Royal Commissioner who is famous for his investigations in the late 1970s and early 1980s into tax fraud in Australia. Mr Costigan expressed strong opposition to the Government's ID card proposal and he said that the card would not have prevented the criminal tax fraud he found in his inquiries. It is universally accepted that the existence of the cash or underground economy poses the biggest single threat to our tax base and is the largest source of tax revenue leakage. An ID card will not solve the problems associated with the cash economy for the simple reason that cash economy transactions will not be identified by the card. Indeed, it is arguable that the existence of the ID card would actually increase the size of the cash economy by encouraging more people to engage in it. The Government has given the impression that the ID card will hit hard at social welfare fraud. The facts indicate overwhelmingly that this is simply untrue. Whether the Government is deliberately lying to the Australian people or whether it is wilfully ignorant of its own proposals, I do not know. The primary way in which an ID card might be able to reduce social welfare fraud is in the area of false identities, but the Department of Social Security, in its evidence to the parliamentary Select Committee, said that false identities were not a major component of social welfare fraud. The Department said that less than one per cent of social welfare fraud-less than $1 in every $100-results from the use of false identities. The major form of social welfare cheating comes from people falsifying their circumstances, not their identities. The ID card would have no direct effect on this form or other forms of welfare fraud. So the overwhelming weight of evidence is that the Government has grossly overstated the extent to which its ID card proposal will improve the exchequer by reducing tax revenue losses and fraudulent social welfare payments. In other words, the benefits side of the cost-benefit equation on a national interest basis is thin indeed. What about the costs side of the equation? The Government has not come clean on the costs side. It has produced confusing, contradictory and incomplete figures. The Government claims that the total cost of introducing and operating the card would be $759m over the first 10 years. Note the accuracy. How on earth could one come to such a figure as that? The basis of the Government's costings to arrive at this figure is very shaky. The parliamentary Select Committee placed little if any credence in the figures. What we do know, however, is that as a minimum 2,150 additional public servants will be required to administer the scheme and more than 300 Medicare officers will either be appointed or relocated and upgraded. The Government has made no allowance for the cost to State and local governments of their compliance with the requirements of the ID card system. These costs obviously would be very heavy. Nor do the costs include the costs of compliance by the business sector. On the basis of calculations by the Government's own Business Regulation Review Unit, the cost to the business sector could amount to $2,000m to $3,000m over the next 10 years. Senator Cook —That is a discredited figure. Senator SHORT —That is the figure from the Government's Business Regulation Review Unit and Senator Cook well knows that. That is a staggering additional burden to impose on a business sector that is already reeling under a massive onslaught of Government-imposed taxes and charges. It is beyond dispute that the financial costs of the ID card scheme would be enormous, but there are other non-financial costs that must also be considered and in the longer term they may be of even greater significance. The non-financial cost of the greatest concern is the cost to the privacy of every individual Australian and the costs to our civil liberties. The ID card, because of its common number, inevitably would provide a centralised database. It is not possible to guarantee that access to that database would be restricted to the degree the Government suggests. Unauthorised access would always be a major threat. Other dangers exist too with centralised databases. One of the major ones is that the data may be incorrect. The proposals by the Government to deal with this problem are not sufficient to overcome the concerns. Indeed, no system would be able to overcome those problems. These types of problems were very well outlined by 12 public servants from the Department of Social Security in a letter to the parliamentary Select Committee in March 1986. I believe their letter is very important and very significant. I shall quote it in full. It reads as follows: Sir: As public servants in the Department of Social Security, we are concerned at the proposed Australia Card. Dr Blewett . . . does not point out that the computer records of Social Security already hold the following data: A person's name, date of birth, residential address, postal address, bank account, branch and number, sex, marital status, family composition, and details of any financial income and assets. If this proposed Australia Card number was added then we would indeed have a `centralised computer data bank' holding large amounts of information. We are concerned about the pressure put on various officers by outside agencies such as debt collectors attempting to gain information. Cases of this nature have already occurred. While there may be a `watchdog' authority set up, it will not stop information being leaked. It will only provide a source of retribution after the event. We question the need for this card at all. Proof of identity procedures already in existence are adequate, the only problem being a shortage of staff to fully investigate possible abuses of the welfare system. We also object to the Australia Card on moral grounds; we don't want to become a number in a system. Anyway, what is to stop any future government legislating to amalgamate all computer records of the Department of Social Security, and Police Department, the Taxation Office and all other government bodies? That is the end of that very significant letter from 12 officers of the Department of Social Security, who obviously know in detail what they are talking about. I could say much more about these privacy problems. For example, I could point to the privacy discrimination against women who legally work and live under names other than their married names and whose personal privacy and anonymity are not only highly valued but also are necessary for their survival and psychological integrity. With this scheme they are under the very real risk of not being able to have a card in other than their married name. However, at this stage suffice it for me to say that the privacy problems are of enormous potential. We would need to be absolutely convinced of the overall advantages of the introduction of ID cards before subjecting every Australian to this threat to privacy. Rejection of the ID card proposal leads to the legitimate question: What would the Liberal and National parties do instead to reduce tax evasion and social welfare fraud? We would take several actions which would be much more effective, less costly, and not have the dangers inherent in the Government's proposals. First, we would force the Taxation Office to be much more efficient in its collection activities. The House of Representatives Expenditure Committee has recently produced a very important report which examines five inquiries by the Auditor General into the operations of the Taxation Office. That report found: . . . taxation revenue losses through non-detection of total taxpayers incomes could conceivably amount to several billion dollars each year . . . in large measure it can simply be attributed to Australian Tax Officer's internal inadequacies. The Liberal and National parties would act immediately to rectify this disgraceful situation and improve the efficiency of the Tax Office. The Liberal and National parties in government would also attempt to do much more to stop the tax drain through the cash economy. I recognise that that is a very difficult task but it is a task that the ID card proposal does not address at all. We would also strengthen the reporting requirements of banks in respect of interest income, an area generally agreed to be the major source of tax revenue loss. In the area of social welfare fraud, we would introduce a requirement whereby persons in receipt of the unemployment benefit would work for that benefit. We would also tighten the existing identity requirements for social welfare recipients. That is an extremely important point. I note that the Minister for Finance, Senator Walsh, in a speech several months ago pointed out that in 1981-82 the ratio of unemployment benefit recipients to the Australian Bureau of Statistics survey estimate of unemployed persons seeking full time employment was 94 to 100. It is now 116 to 100. In other words, according to the ABS figures, for every 100 persons seeking full time employment there are 116 persons actually receiving unemployment benefit. What this debate we are having on the Australia Card Bill really boils down to is this: Do we want to see the introduction in Australia, at great financial cost, of an identification card system which the overwhelming weight of evidence indicates will not achieve its laudable objectives of reducing tax and social welfare fraud? Do we want to introduce an identity card system which is an open invitation to some government at some time in our future to turn Australia into a virtual police state? Do we want to propel Big Brother and Sir Humphrey another huge step forward in the monitoring, oversighting and controlling of our daily lives? De we want to introduce into Australia an identification system which is un-Australian and which is contrary to our history, our traditions and our great strength as a free, open and civilised society? Do we want to introduce a system which is more embracing and intrusive than any other identification system in any other common law nation in the world? I submit to the Senate and to the Australian people that we do not. Yet these will be the inevitable consequences of the Hawke Government's Australia Card Bill. I therefore urge the Senate to reject the Bill. Senator Sir JOHN CARRICK(New South Wales)(6.10) —The Senate is debating a Bill entitled the Australia Card Bill 1986 and, in association with it, two privacy Bills. The Bill comes to us as a suggested mechanism-not as an end in itself-which purports to be able to overcome or to mitigate a number of offences and crimes, and one should examine it in that regard. It purports to be able to deal with offences such as tax evasion, social security cheating, illegal migrants and organised crime. It points out, as will be accepted by all sides of this chamber, that there are serious breaches of the law in all these matters. The real questions to be asked are: Will it work? Is it the best way? What are its defects? How does it affect personal privacy and civil liberty? Most importantly, are there better ways? This is not a debate only about whether we have an Australia Card or nothing. That is not the debate. Let me say from the outset that it is not a debate between the Government saying `We are out to get villains and tax cheats' and an Opposition, of whom the Government, for a sense of melodrama, says: `You are the protectors of tax cheats and social security frauds'. Let us have none of this. It does no sense to the debate at all. Let us accept that on both sides of this chamber we are out for the same goal-to eliminate or at least reduce to the minimum the offences and crimes that we have identified. Let us look at the debate from the point of view of whether the Australia Card is the best method, whether it has advantages, whether it has defects and, above all, whether there are better methods. Let me say this: Over the course of my lifetime I have frequently deliberated in my mind whether we ought to have an Australia Card. Would it have advantages in this regard? I remember that during the Fraser Government, in which I was privileged to be a Minister, we set up an inquiry into an Australia Card to see whether there would be benefits to it. We sent officers overseas to look at the experience overseas. The officers reported that nowhere in countries similar to ours, countries that espoused democracy and the common law, was there any support at all for an identity card for a range of purposes and nowhere was there any advocacy that such an identity card would work. There was evidence that in one or two countries, such as the United States of America, there were social security cards and also evidence that those cards had very grave defects and very limited use, and were subject to very grave abuses. So, we set it aside. I also want to say that, in the pursuit of these goals to reduce the offences, no government has acted more strongly or more vigorously than did the Fraser Government. Since there has been some suggestion that that Government allowed tax cheats, I have to say, with objectivity, that the Whitlam Government which it succeeded did little or nothing to deal with any of those matters and that at a time when the bottom of the harbour situation was emerging it did little or nothing to tackle that. By 1982, a year before the Fraser Government went out of office, the Commissioner of Taxation was able to say that the actions by the Fraser Government and by John Howard, the Treasurer, had put at rest, had eliminated, that particular fraud. I am very proud to say that John Howard brought in some 17 major measures. Lest anyone should have this kind of debate that has gone on as a slanging match, with the Government trying to prove that the Opposition is by opposing trying to protect tax cheats, dole frauds and so on, let me say that over the last decade governments of the Liberal faith, both State and Federal, have brought in the five main royal commissions that have revealed the extent and nature of organised crime in Australia. It was in fact a State government of New South Wales that set up the Moffitt Royal Commission on Alleged Organised Crime in Registered Clubs in New South Wales which showed the magnitude of drug-related organised crime. It was in fact the Fraser Government which set up the Costigan Royal Commission on the activities of the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union which revealed not only the magnitude of the offences of the ship painters and dockers but a whole series of organised crimes, including tax offences. From those action emerged. Then there was the Woodward Royal Commission into Drug Trafficking, the Williams Royal Commission of Inquiry into Drugs and the Stewart Royal Commission of Inquiry into Drug Trafficking-one after the other. So let nobody say of my side of government that we have not set out to expose crime, wherever it is, to expose offences, wherever they are, and to seek to overcome them. It was in fact the Fraser Government that set up the National Crimes Commission and indeed it was the incoming Hawke Government that weakened that Commission and took away some of its powers. Let us therefore deal with this situation, not by poking tongues out at each other and not with the Government saying that it has solutions and that we are the people who are supporting those who are tax dodgers and dole cheats. I remind the Senate on my journey that the evidence from the Auditor-General and from the Standing Committee on Expenditure shows that those who are in fact shielding such people at this moment are those in the Hawke Government. So, do not let us trade in that kind of stuff. If there are basically tax cheats today, four years of Hawke Labor government are to blame. It has had four years now-not four months, not four days, not four weeks, but four years. Those in the Hawke Government can turn back and look at others. If there are breaches in social security, let them-- Senator Cook —How many Bills have you knocked off which we tried to get through to get at tax avoiders? Senator Sir JOHN CARRICK —I want the people of Australia to listen to these interjections because, of course, when we touch someone on a sore spot he is bound to cry out. I do not call some biased person as witness. I call the Auditor-General as witness, as I will in a moment, and I call the Director of Public Prosecutions as witness. Senator Button —What do you think you are? Senator Sir JOHN CARRICK —I will call them to say that those who are doing nothing about social security cheats at this moment are those in the Hawke Labor Government, in which Senator Button, who has just interjected, is a senior Minister. I refer to the recent report of the Director of Public Prosecutions. What have we got? The situation is that at this moment, after four years of this Government, in those two areas of crime an attenuated authority has been set up. We ask ourselves: Is this the best way? Will it work to deal with tax evaders? Will it work to deal with social security cheats? Will it overcome the problem of illegal migrants? Will it deal with organised crime? Will it work? Is it the best way? What are its defects? How will it affect privacy and civil liberties? Are there better ways? Because the Opposition believes that there are better ways it has moved an amendment which states: Leave out all words after ``That'', insert: ``this Bill be withdrawn because: (a) it does not address serious administrative failings and operational deficiencies in the Australian Taxation Office which remain a main cause of failure to collect revenue due to Government; (b) the Card would not solve the problems of tax and welfare fraud, both of which generally involve people whose identity is not in question; (c) the costs have been grossly understated and the benefits grossly exaggerated; and (d) it will constitute an unprecedented and unjustifiable intrusion into the individual privacy of all Australians and will greatly damage our civil liberties''. That amendment expresses, in general terms, our criticism of the Australia Card and points to an alternative-an alternative that would work, an alternative that would collect money from those who should legally be paying their tax. It would overcome or mitigate against social security fraud. It would move to deal with illegal migrants and it would strengthen our attack against crime. What a dreadful thing that the report of the Board of the New South Wales Police Force, whose Chairman is Sir Maurice Byers, a former Solicitor-General, should have said: `Everybody knows who the Mr Bigs of crime are in Australia. The police could get them if they were given sufficient powers. Everybody knows the Mr Bigs. They could be got if only the police had the powers'. That is a simple situation not needing an identity card at all. Let us look at this issue both positively and negatively because it is not good enough simply to ask whether we ought to have a card. We can call on the Auditor-General, a completely objective witness, and we can call on the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Expenditure, an all party committee of the Parliament. What does the Auditor-General say? Senator Button —What are you trying to turn this place into? You call him, you call someone and you call somebody else. Senator Sir JOHN CARRICK —I do not want to know, and I am sure that other honourable senators do not want to know, what Senator Button is saying at the moment. He is simply mouthing words because he does not like my argument. He does not like the fact that the Auditor-General has said that the Hawke Labor Government is covering up tax frauds and it is not collecting tax. The Treasurer (Mr Keating) is particularly responsible. Every day he gets lists of people who have forgotten to put in their tax returns or who have overlooked them. This does not remind him of his own default. He says: `I forgot'. He does not forget that 170,000 Australians have done this, because he is reminded of those cases. The Treasurer is in charge of the Australian Taxation Office. The Auditor-General has said: `Let us just take the ordinary group certificates that every pay as you earn wage earner gets'. Clearly, thousands of those group certificates are not lodged. The Tax Office knows that because it has a copy of them. The Tax Office has not followed up those cases. The Tax Office thinks that about $100m is not being collected as a result. It would not need an identity card to collect that amount; it could be collected if ordinary, administrative arrangements were made. The Auditor-General says that, in his opinion, much more money could be collected. It has not been collected simply because of default by the Treasurer, the Commissioner of Taxation and the Tax Office in the last four years. It has nothing to do with the need for an ID card. The report of the Expenditure Committee on the Auditor-General's five efficiency audit reports into the Australian Taxation Office stated: The ATO had failed to take full advantage of technological advances that should permit computerised processing . . . Their ability to extract the required data and to be able to interface that data between different systems, is inadequate. Quite clearly, if there is a default in collecting tax it is because the Hawke Government is running dead, the Treasurer is running dead and the Tax Office is inefficient. It is not the Liberal and National parties saying this but the Auditor-General and the Expenditure Committee, a committee comprising members of all parties. In the first place, there is a better way. A better way to deal with the problem is to get some efficiency and some computerisation in the Tax Office. Why has the Tax Office underspent the money that it has been given to put into computers? By the Auditor-General's own statements the Tax Office is grossly inefficient in this area. It is no good saying that the Fraser Government ought to have done more during its period in office. In the four solid years of the Hawke Government all we have had is lectures on tax collection. Physician, heal thyself! The real reason for the first two defects is the Hawke Government itself. What about social security fraud? What about chasing dole cheats and social security cheats? What does the Director of Public Prosecutions, Mr Temby, say-a man who was appointed by the Australian Labor Party, a man who has been fearless in what he has said on these matters? He says that the Government is not following up information on tax cheats. The fact that we are doing nothing about it has nothing to do with the need for an identity card. The Government is not acting at all in that regard. As a start, the Government has come up with a drastic solution to the problem. It will force every Australian into obtaining an identity card that he or she has to produce in a number of circumstances. There will be great penalties for those who do not demand to see the card in business dealings. The Government says that we need the Australia Card. But does the Tax Office need it? The Auditor-General says that the Tax Office can collect an enormous amount of additional revenue. For example, he has revealed that about $2 billion in outstanding tax on dividends and, in particular, interest payments is not being raked in. The Tax Office does not need an identity card to do this. All the information is in the hands of the financial institutions. The Tax Office has the absolute power to demand that information from the institutions. This information is not being collected by the Tax Office. We do not need an identity card to do this. We do not need anything else. It is absolutely wrong to take the blame away from the Government and to force people to surrender some of their liberties in this regard. In summary, the Government has said that there are tax evaders and social security cheats. The Auditor-General has said: `Physician, heal thyself'. The Government, the Treasurer and the Tax Office are failing to collect this revenue. They have the system to enable them to do it now. The Director of Public Prosecutions, Mr Temby, has said: `The Government and the Minister for Social Security, Mr Howe, are failing to collect revenue because they will not follow up social security cheats even though they know who they are at the moment'. The defect lies with the Government. The Government is protecting the tax evaders and the social security cheats and nobody else. Sitting suspended from 6.30 to 8 p.m. Senator Sir JOHN CARRICK —Before the suspension of the sitting I was talking on the Australia Card Bill. I had made the point that it was a mechanism which the Government had put forward purporting to deal with tax evaders, social security cheats, illegal immigrants and organised crime. I asked the questions that should be tested: Will it work? Is it the best way? What are its defects? How does it affect privacy and civil liberty? Are there better ways? I have been taking the matters one by one and examining them. What has come out is quite clear, and that is that the Auditor-General and the Expenditure Committee of the Parliament have said that the Australian Taxation Office is grossly inefficient in dealing with the collection of tax and that there are many hundreds of millions, maybe billions, of dollars of tax uncollected. As a result of that, of course, pensioners had their pension rise deferred, taxpayers had their tax cuts deferred, and public servant pensioners had a 2 per cent discounting of their pensions. Everybody paid because of the inefficiency of the Government. I pointed out that the Director of Public Prosecutions had said that the Government was failing to follow up the social security cheats, and so instead of the others being responsible for allowing tax avoidance or tax evasion or social security cheats, it turns out that the Auditor-General has said that it is the Government that is to blame and the Director of Public Prosecutions has said that the Government is to blame. In looking at the situation I will take the matters one by one. Let us take the value that the Australia Card purports to be for social security. The Department of Social Security says that only 0.6 per cent of people committing fraud in social security are using false identities, and therefore that the Australia Card would be next to useless for social security; that in the broad base of the defects in social security, 61 per cent of overpayments are due to misstatements by people and not to people giving false identities. So in 61 per cent of the cases, the Australia Card will be no use at all. The Department of Social Security has said that it would raise no more money. So, why an Australia Card for social security? Why an Australia Card for tax? First of all, it is important to understand that the great bulk of the ordinary tax collections can be done simply by better administration, by better government. The important thing again to understand is that Mr Frank Costigan, who so brilliantly conducted the Costigan Royal Commission on the Activities of the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union, has said that an Australia Card would not be useful in the pursuit of crime, whether it be tax avoidance or otherwise. In point of fact, one of the ugly things about this is that if people are given an Australia Card, or an identity card, which purports to be valid, the forger has his or her case strengthened, because one gives to the forger, one gives to the master criminal, a means of credibility; one gives him or her respectability. The ugly thing is that rather than preventing major crime, the Australia Card itself helps the master criminal, because he or she can then go around and establish his or her identity by it. If in fact the card is not accepted for him or her, it should not be accepted for anybody at all. There is a strange kind of paradox in this. The very Minister who is responsible for this Australia Card and says it will have integrity is, of course, the the Minister for Health (Dr Blewett) who put out the Medicare card. Everybody has a Medicare card. One would presume that it is a card of great integrity that cannot be forged; after all, it has a number on it. Senator Walters —How many did you get? Senator Sir JOHN CARRICK —There we are. If the Minister cannot run the Medicare card, how can he run an identity card? Why does the Government want to link the Tax Office, the Department of Social Security, the Department of Health and the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs? The Department of Health has its own discrete identity card; let it stay that way. Then many people would have fewer worries about their health records becoming public. Let it remain in containment. The Minister for Health, who said that this would be kept in containment, is the Minister whose Department was capable of leaking information during the doctors dispute. First of all, there is absolutely no need for an identity card for the Department of Social Security; it is less than useless. There is no need for a new identity card for the Department of Health, and the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs says that it will be of no help to it. What it needs is a standardisation of the births, deaths and marriages records of the Registry offices throughout Australia. That would be helpful to it. Therefore, the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs does not want the card. As to a card for the Tax Office, in all the years I served in the Fraser Government and heard submissions from commissioners of taxation, I never once heard a tax commissioner say that he wanted an identity card. Until recently there was no such suggestion at all. The fact is that there are two types of tax offenders; small ones and big ones. The big ones have access to fraud; they can get forgeries and can use the card. The paradox is that the card will help them towards fraud by making the job of the master criminal so much easier. In America, Canada and wherever else identity cards were looked at, it was seen that they were a perversion of what was necessary. One wonders what this is all about. My colleagues have pointed out the great dangers to privacy. I will deal with the tests for this card. The first test is whether it will work. It will not work for tax evaders because the Auditor- General inferred that the only thing that will work is to put in a new government so that we can have efficiency in the Tax Office and a better Treasurer. Will it work for social security cheats? The Department of Social Security says it will not; very little fraud relates to dual identity and the card will not raise any money. Will it work for illegal immigrants? The Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs says no. Will it work for organised crime? Mr Frank Costigan, the person who is the expert on this, says it will not work at all. Is it the best way? Clearly it is not the way at all. Does it have defects? It has every defect that one can conceive. It can be forged, it can open up links between departments and it will involve a data base which is not necessary at all. Why is it necessary, when we already have a Medicare card to link health? How will the card affect privacy and civil liberties? My colleagues have referred to those matters. Are there better ways? Of course there are. Why is it that such eminent bodies as the Australian Catholic Social Welfare Commission and other church bodies, the Law Society of Australia, civil liberties bodies, various branches of the Australian Labor Party, a number of trade unions and a whole host of very distinguished people have said that this is the wrong way to go about things? What do we want to do? We want to catch tax cheats and social security cheats. We have shown the way. The way to do that is with a better administration, better organisation through the Director of Public Prosecutions and a better approach through government. The only body which is harbouring tax avoiders and social security cheats is the Government, as determined by the Auditor-General, the House of Representatives Committee on Expenditure and the Director of Public Prosecutions. So the Government has hoist itself on its own petard. There is no case for an Australia Card. There is a case for better administration and better government, and that can be answered in the ballot box. Senator WALTERS(Tasmania)(8.10) —Tonight we are debating legislation brought forward by the Government that attempts for the first time in Australia's history to introduce the type of big brother identification system used by socialist countries all over the world. This socialist Government, in line with its ideology, has decreed that from the time of birth people will carry a number to identify themselves. This number will relate to a person's medical history, financial dealings and social security record-and that is just for starters. It is inconceivable that the Department of Health, the Department of Social Security and the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs, which it is proposed will have control of the Australia Card, will not at some time in the future be expanded. We have been told that the Government will only require information on one's social security movements, financial transactions, tax records and medical history and that it promises-I repeat, it promises-that privacy provisions will guarantee-note that it says that the provisions will guarantee-that this often very personal information will remain confidential. We have been told that the card would be effective in combating welfare fraud, it would help control illegal immigration, it would overcome tax evasion, it would be cost effective and there would be privacy clauses. Let us deal with each of those points. During our examination of the Department of Social Security estimates last year I asked whether the ID card would be of any benefit. The unequivocal answer I got from the Department was no. The Department of Social Security in evidence to the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card stated: The fact is that in our experience the main problems within the departmental portfolio are not with identity as such, but a failure to notify change of circumstances. Mainly these are what lead to overpayments. There are circumstances which may be financial or there may be other changes, but by way of information the overpayments file for the Department shows that 0.6 per cent is attributable to identity and 61 per cent is due to income variations. Those are the issues which make us believe that it is of minimal relevance in the identity areas which is of course the primary initiative that the card will help address. That is the Department's view and, seeing that the Department is the organisation that would be using the card, we can only take it for granted that it is right. So that deals with that. The second point is that the Australia Card would help to control illegal immigration. The Government has already acknowledged that that would not be the case. Illegal immigration would only go underground and, seeing that the Government has promised that people will not be asked to show their identity card for identification, it would not be of any great benefit. The same applies to the third matter. The Government says that it would overcome tax evasion. We have before us-several of my colleagues have already commented on this-a review of five Auditor-General's efficiency audit reports into the Australian Taxation Office. It is entitled `A Taxing Problem' and is a report of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Expenditure which comprised members of the Australian Labor Party, the National Party of Australia and the Liberal Party of Australia. The report says: As this inquiry progressed it became obvious to the Committee that ATO's current tax assessment and collection operations left a great deal to be desired. As outlined in previous chapters of this report, significant weaknesses particularly within ATO's compliance and enforcement capabilities, have emerged placing doubts on the ATO's ability to effectively collect all taxes due and payable. The report goes on: It is therefore not unreasonable to assume that had ATO been more successful in its collection of existing taxes, the need for further taxes and higher rates of current taxes may well have been lessened, relieving in part the onus already shouldered by those who pay tax. That report is a general indictment of the Australian Tax Office. It says, very clearly, that its data base is woefully inadequate. Again I quote from the report: Their computer system, their ability to extract the required data and to be able to interface that data between different systems, is inadequate. They do a lot of manual checking . . . theoretically, they should be able to run two different computer tapes, interface them and get a computer printout. In defence, one of the senior officers of the Australian Taxation Office said: Our equipment is old and our systems are old. In the last 10 years the Taxation Office has underspent $49.4m that had been appropriated to it to give it the ability to buy the appropriate technology, the appropriate computers-and it did not do it. The report said that there was evidence that the Australian Taxation Office `had also suffered from poor management and direction' of its data base area. The whole book says that the inefficiency of the Taxation Office is beyond belief. There are so many areas that I really do not have time to quote from all of them tonight. The report says, in part: The inadequacy of ATO's current approach is distressing. The ABS estimates that for 1984-85 approximately $13,871m was paid in interest to Australian households. Using the figures quoted to the Australia Card Committee . . . only $2,774m of this is reported. Out of $13,871m only $2,774m was reported. Also, it says: Of this reported information only $1,387m is actually matched to taxpayers' returns. That is interest. So if one does not declare one's interest in one's tax return one has a jolly good chance of getting away with it. The whole thing, as I said, is a dreadful indictment of the Australian Taxation Office. The report goes on to say: Apart from the obvious revenue aspects of PPS, the system has also proved successful in detecting persons who although required to do so, had not previously lodged tax returns. Referred to as non-lodgers, the ATO through PPS checking has detected 22 297 non-lodgers and subsequently issued 20 335 assessments yielding revenue of $13.87 million. I wonder whether Mr Keating was one of those non-lodgers, because Mr Keating had not lodged his tax return. He would not have been picked up by the use of the Australia Card. He would not have to go through what the other taxpayers would go through. He would just get a telephone call from the Deputy Commissioner of Taxation and be told: `Don't forget, Paul, you haven't filled in not just this year's but also last year's tax returns'. The Taxation Office obviously can be efficient when it comes to the Treasurer, but it is not efficient in relation to the normal taxpayer. Although the Government says we need an Australia Card because it would overcome tax evasion, obviously there are better ways of doing it. All the Government has to do is make sure the Taxation Office abides by this report, spends that $49.4m on updating its equipment and gets going. It does not have to have an Australia Card to overcome the tax problem. Indeed, this report says very clearly that tremendous amounts of money are not being collected by the Taxation Office. So we do not need an Australia Card; we just need to get the Tax Office going. The Government also says that it would be cost effective. Let us look at what it calls cost effective. It has admitted that it would require another 2,150 public servants for the operation of the Australia Card. It says it would cost it $1,000m over 10 years. That is just the government expenditure. It would cost private business $2,000m. No estimation has been made of the cost to State governments and local government, but we know they will have to upgrade their capital equipment. This is meant to be cost effective. The next matter is that we would have privacy clauses. The National Times of a couple of months ago carried the headline: `For sale: Social Security files'. Public servants were selling off private, confidential information to debt collectors. This Government tell us that it can bring in privacy clauses that it will guarantee cannot be breached. Of course it cannot guarantee it. Senator Knowles —A bit like Medicare files. Senator WALTERS —A bit like Medicare files. I am just coming to that. I am quite sure everybody will remember that we had a doctors dispute. During that dispute, under the heading `Sydney's leading doctors: a Medicare cheque list', the Sydney Morning Herald said: How are NSW doctors doing financially under Medicare? It listed the names of doctors and their incomes, from A to Z. Medicare is also meant to be confidential, just as confidential as the Department of Social Security records are meant to be. The Australian Medical Association demanded an inquiry into the leak. What did the Government do? It did absolutely nothing. The Minister for Health, Dr Blewett, said that it was in the hands of the Australian Federal Police but they had not been able to detect anyone. All this happened under a government which assures us that the card can have all the privacy under the sun and that it will guarantee that it will work. There is no way that the Government can guarantee that it will work. A gentleman rang Senator Knowles this even- ing and said that he was from Victoria and that he had arrived in Australia as a migrant 18 months ago. On his arrival he was told to get a Medicare card. Within five days he received five Medicare cards, all in different names; all similar but different. Senator Crowley has told us that a person's medical history is private and that details cannot be obtained from Medicare. What rubbish! She calls herself a doctor. If anybody looked at a person's records and saw that that person had been to a psychiatrist five times in a row, he would not have to guess too hard what was wrong. If he found that a person had been to a cardiologist five times in a row he would not have to guess what was wrong. Of course the details are there for any public servant to sell at the drop of a hat. A person's medical history, financial transactions, tax and social welfare history would be there to see for any public servant who cared to look; for any public servant who cared to sell it off. The Minister has already acknowledged that fake cards could pass. Of course he has to acknowledge that. We have not only fake passports and driving licences, but also fake dollar notes. We know that anything can be forged. As has already been said tonight, once a card is forged it is a true, accurate identification for any criminal. A criminal has only to come along with a forged card and say that it is his identity and it will be accepted by anyone. Tonight we had a great kerfuffle when Senator Short said that people would have to carry their identity cards with them. A great scream went up by Government members saying that they did not have to carry their cards. We did not have to carry our driver's licences with us once, but we do now. We are told by this Government that we will not have to carry our identity cards. Senator Maguire said that there was an unequivocal promise that we would not have to carry our identity cards. I am sure honourable senators will remember the unequivocal promise of the Prime Minister, Mr Hawke. His words were: `Let me make a promise so that even the Opposition can understand it. There will be no capital gains tax'. What did we get? We got a capital gains tax. Senator Gareth Evans —One election later. It was not before that election. Senator WALTERS —Senator Evans says: `One election later'. Ladies and gentlemen, we do not have to carry the card this election but, one election later, we may well have to carry an identity card. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT(Senator Elstob) —Order! Senator Walters, you must address your remarks through the Chair and not to the gallery. Senator WALTERS —I am sorry, Mr Acting Deputy President. Let us note what the Minister has just said. He has said to us that the promise was for one election but at the next election we may well be told that we do have to carry an identity card. That was a freudian slip by the Minister, off the top of his head, which he always makes in this place. I can assure honourable senators that the garrulous gourmet opposite always tells us something truthful. Next year we can expect to have to carry the card. Next year the Government will say to us: `You will carry the card'. From birth onwards one will have a number for life. There is no doubt that we will be carrying the card. There is also no way that this Government or any future government can legislate for individual behaviour. One cannot legislate for human behaviour. There will be no privacy. Public servants will make the identical slip they have already made. They will sell our information to the biggest buyer. Senator COOK(Western Australia)(8.32) —People listening to this parliamentary broadcast and those in the gallery would not know-I am sure that many honourable senators would not know-from the last address what this debate is all about. Grinding on to a massive anti-climax, we are debating cognately the Australia Card Bill 1986 and the Privacy Bill 1986 because there is a major problem with our taxation system. Over many years of conservative government the taxation base of Australia has haemorrhaged so that ordinary wage and salary earners bear an extraordinarily disproportionate share of taxation. Those who have an income which enables them to fiddle their tax are able to escape taxation and thus get off scot free, or almost scot free. Thus the tax bill for the Commonwealth is met by most ordinary, honest Australian wage and salary earners who have their tax taken from their wages when they receive them. All the others manage to fiddle their tax returns and responsibilities to escape their burden. This debate is about one of the pieces of the mosaic which came out of the National Taxation Summit and which was canvassed widely in Australia last year in the White Paper on taxation reform, one of the pieces of the mosaic which fits together with all the other items of legislation and administrative changes we have made to try to guarantee that the tax burden in Australia falls equally on all according to their obligations and that those who meet their full obligations know with complete integrity that no one else is escaping his obligations and everybody is paying equally. That is the central proposition from which this legislation arises. It cannot be seen in isolation from the whole tax reform package or from the revenue implications there will be if these Bills are passed. There will be significant revenue implications. It is estimated that the Australia Card, by wiping out welfare fraud, will be responsible for the recovery of about $1 billion. That will enable the burden of taxation to be shifted. The Government will be able to give tax cuts to ordinary wage and salary earners, as it did last week in honouring one of the fundamental promises of its tax reform package. It will be able to reduce the taxation burden on wage and salary earners by reducing income tax in the significant tax break that it initiated last week. The introduction of the Australia Card will also mean that as a Government we will be able to honour again the undertaking that we gave to reduce taxation and to make the system fairer for ordinary wage and salary earners on 1 July 1987. We will be able to finance those two tax cuts because the taxation system will be made fair and more honourable. The integrity of it will be better guaranteed and the burden of taxation will rightly fully shift from those who are at the lower and middle wage levels on to the shoulders of those who have been escaping paying their fair share of taxation. Our whole program has been aimed at achieving that outcome. I am told that the Australian Democrats and the coalition parties opposite will combine to defeat these Bills in an effort to prevent and frustrate this Government from achieving a fair tax outcome. It is not surprising that they would do that because they have a history of interfering with tax legislation to prevent fair tax outcomes. We as a government have presented no more than four Bills in our period of office under the Hawke Administration in order to recover revenue lost through tax avoidance and evasion in bottom of the harbour schemes. The Opposition and some Democrats-certainly not all-combined to defeat that legislation and prevent the recovery of tax dollars that had been illicitly evaded by bottom of the harbour and other fraudulent schemes. They combined to do that, just as they may combine again tonight to frustrate the legislation before us. Figures that I have indicate that the revenue base has been frustrated by in the order of $1 1/2 billion. However, the fairness of the tax system is not one of the Opposition's strong points. It has never been the jewel in the crown of the Liberal-National Party coalition. We know that under the Fraser Government taxation avoidance and evasion ran rampant in this country. Virtually nothing was done by that Government to introduce equity and fairness in the tax system. One of the reasons why the Hawke Labor Government was elected to national office in this country was its promise to reform the tax system. One of the hardest jobs any democratic government has is reform of the tax system. We as a government have not shirked that task. We have been told by political commentators that tax reform is a poison pill and that we should spit it out. But we have pursued logically and systematically the course of trying to bring tax justice to this country. It is those opposite, who now seek to interject and frustrate the point that I am making, who have tried to prevent that from happening. They have argued and voted in this place on the side of inequity, unfairness and injustice. The measures that we have introduced started with a wide scale public debate last year on the White Paper which we brought out and which canvassed the options of tax reform. Three options were considered by the National Taxation Summit. Senator Parer —Tell us about option C. Senator COOK —The honourable senator asks about option C. Let me tell him about it. Option C was properly canvassed, along with options A and B. We are not a government of confrontation, we are not a government that says: `You shall cop this no matter what', as the Fraser Government, particularly in industrial relations, was notorious for doing. We canvassed the hard and difficult question of tax reform at the National Taxation Summit in June last year. Out of that summit we got sufficient community opinion to be able to move to reform the taxation system in the way in which we have. We have moved to do that by introducing fairness, by lowering the burden of tax of the ordinary taxpayer and by holding up, as a precept, that those who have the ability to pay tax should pay tax. We have introduced the fringe benefits tax on a small proportion of taxpayers who were, by virtue of getting benefits in kind, rather than in money, escaping their taxation obligations. We have introduced a capital gains tax, which admittedly is a mild one, so that those who make income by capital gains can meet their obligations to the tax base. We have introduced legislation concerning negative gearing to prevent that tax avoidance technique, and we have outlawed the free lunch. We have tried, as I have said, to introduce some retrospectivity to recover money that has been lost to the revenue by tax avoidance techniques. The Opposition fails to recognise that if this Parliament and the Senate were to carry legislation which said that once we clearly identify a tax avoidance operation which defrauds the revenue base, we then retrospectively move to recover the ill-gotten gains from that defrauding, the whole purpose about defrauding taxation is lost. If those who indulge in tax avoidance and evasion know that once they are uncovered, retrospectively their ill-gotten gains will be taken from them, the whole purpose about taxation avoidance and evasion is lost. Once they know that we can guarantee the integrity of the tax base. But the Opposition has voted against that. We have tried to introduce that. We have introduced tax cuts which, as I have said, in terms of the overall give back to taxpayers amount to $4 1/2 billion. Taxation raising measures amount to $1 1/2 billion. So there has been a net reduction in the burden of taxation in this country. That is what we are doing. As part of that we also need to stamp out the tax evasion that is indulged in through false identity and through false names. We also need to be able to guarantee to taxpayers that their tax dollar is being spent wisely, and that those who need support in the welfare system get genuine support, by guaranteeing that people do not defraud the welfare system by claiming more than their due. One of the arguments I have heard in this debate is `Effectively there is nothing in it for us in terms of welfare fraud', because the total of welfare fraud based on false names is less than one per cent. Senator Parer —That is right. Senator COOK —I am glad Senator Parer confirms that, because that is a view which has constantly come from the Opposition benches. But where the honourable senators opposite are dishonest about that argument is that they do not say any more about it. If Opposition senators were to say any more about it, they would say that that is the known and detected level of defrauding. If we have a high integrity identification card we will discover how widespread that defrauding is. All the studies indicate that the defrauding level is much higher than the Opposition says it is. Therefore if we are to recover money from the people who are defrauding the system, we will have more available to pay to those in real need. That is a matter of fundamental principal. Why should the defrauders be able to get away when there are people in this country who do need the assistance of the welfare system and who do suffer? It is our objective to make sure that they do not suffer. It is on that basis that this legislation comes forward. Let me deal with this legislation in its direct form. Let me deal with it first by citing a number of quotations. I am glad that some of the members of the coalition have left at this point because it is uncomfortable for them to hear the quotations. Let us take Mr Ray Braithwaite, the shadow Minister for Trade, who was quoted in the Brisbane Courier-Mail of 16 May 1985 as saying: What we need in Australia to effectively fight all forms of abuse is a proper identification of each Australian with a number, photograph and even a fingerprint. Senator Maguire —What party is he from? Senator COOK —He is from the National Party of Australia. We do not think that the draconian view of Mr Braithwaite should hold sway in this country. My God, a finger print! That is ridiculous. That is not our position. But Mr Braithwaite occupies that position, unless somewhere along the road to Damascus he has been stood over, because I am sure that he is numbered among a number of members of the coalition who would like to cross the floor, vote with the Government, and carry this legislation. Of course, the rumours are rampant in this place about what has been going on in the Party room of honourable senators opposite to stand over individuals who might want to express their own views on this, cross the floor and vote with the Government. We know that probably no honourable senator opposite will have the guts to do it, even though the Party celebrates the right of individuals to do these things. Let us just move on because Mr Braithwaite is not alone; he is not the only swallow who makes a spring. Mr Ralph Hunt, Deputy Leader of the National Party, in a media release-if there is anything to be said about Mr Braithwaite's shooting off the top of his head, at least a media release is a considered comment by a spokesperson from the Opposition-said: The use of plastic cards for an effective means of identification would streamline the collection of tax revenue, imposing a greater accountability on that small minority of taxpayers who sought to evade their responsibilities to the community. That was a quite responsible response from Mr Ralph Hunt. He is not the only one. There are several more. Charles Blunt, the shadow Minister for Social Security, in a media release-again a considered comment-of 8 June 1985 said: The introduction of a national identification system using ID cards offered benefits to the Australian people which outweighed any civil liberties considerations. He went on to comment further: With the Government's White Paper on tax reform recommending the introduction of ID cards, there is now broad bipartisan support for this measure. It should therefore be implemented. They are Federal spokespeople for the coalition, but they have been joined by voices from the States. On 13 November 1986 in the Adelaide Advertiser Mr Trevor Griffin, the Liberal shadow Attorney-General, was reported as saying that ID cards with photographs should be introduced. He went on then to propose a more draconian dimension, which we would not countenance or allow and which we would specifically forbid-that it should be used to prevent under age drinking. Obviously, as Senator Walters wants us all to believe, to achieve that people would have to carry the card all the time. Of course, that is not the intention of this legislation. The Leader of the Opposition, Mr Howard, has been one of those who has equivocated over this issue. In interviews on the Sunday program on Channel 9 and in other areas he has indicated tacit support for the proposition. In order to try to seize what he sees as a main political advantage, he has walked away from his earlier proposition. When he came to power as the Leader of the Liberal Party of Australia he said that he would reserve his right to speak out honestly on issues, but he has now been overtaken by John Howard, politician, and now he speaks out in order to try to take the sleazy road to political success and follow what he imagines wrongly to be a populist view on these matters. They are some of the quotations of Opposition members. Because of those on the record remarks we know that there are a number of people on the Opposition benches who would like to cross the floor and vote for this legislation. Unfortunately, none of them will have the guts to do that and that is a sad commentary on the once great Liberal Party, which is now in disarray and tatters as it tries to regain its feet and as it wonders from one week to the next who will lead it. In Senator Walters's address she said that we do not need an Australia Card, that we just need to get the Australian Taxation Office going. Senator Sir John Carrick accused this Government of being responsible for the social security fraud and tax evasion in this country. He was disgusting in his selectivity in ignoring the fact that he was one of those who voted to prevent the passage of three Bills that we proposed that would have recovered $570m in taxation rip-offs. That would have been the result had the Taxation (Unpaid Company Tax) Assessment Amendment Bill and two other Bills been carried. Nonetheless, in order to exercise his selective and creative memory he accused us. Let us go to the record to find the facts. The allegations made by both Senator Walters and Senator Sir John Carrick are just not true. In the case of the allegation by Senator Sir John Carrick, it was the Fraser Government that put a universal freeze on Public Service appointments and thus starved the Taxation Office of staff to carry out investigations of tax avoidance and evasion. The Fraser Government could have exempted the Tax Office but it did not; it starved it and for over three years a prosecution languished in the bottom drawer in the Crown Prosecutor's Office in Perth which could have been a landmark prosecution in tax avoidance. It is on that record that Senator Sir John Carrick appeals to us. We increased the staff of the Tax Office in order to seek out tax avoidance and evasion and we are presenting this legislation to the Senate to prevent the very things he complained to us that we are guilty of not confronting. He complains to us that we are doing nothing and votes down the very legislation aimed at achieving the result that we want. I do not need to go into any detail about Senator Walters's remarks because they are covered by what I just said about Senator Sir John Carrick. They are equally wrong and inappropriate. An honourable senator who spoke today said that Australia will be the only country that introduces such legislation. Again we have an example of selective memory or selective information. That is not true. Other countries which have a strong democratic tradition and which have an inoffensive means of identification, as the Australia Card will be, are Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Portugal, Switzerland, Sweden, Spain, West Germany and there are others. Because of the operation of the social security number system in Canada and the United States of America there is an effective de facto means of identification in those countries. The arguments that have been put here on privacy are, to say the best, specious. They start from the premise: This is what the legislation proposes but what if this, that or something else? The legislation proposes specific measures that do not allow the creative scenarios of the knockers of a system that guarantees the integrity of a card such as this to be realistic. Nonetheless, lurid scenarios have been painted in this chamber as to what might happen. The legislation is there; the legislation is clear. It provides a central registry. Senator Walters, in her previous address, made the accusation that this legislation somehow will enable the gnomes of the Tax Office to fiddle with Medicare files. That is patently false. If she had bothered for one minute to read the legislation and to understand what it says she would know that what she was talking about was just rubbish. There will be specific, dedicated computer banks. One will be for the Australia Card file. This central file will contain just the bare essentials of information for national identification-name, address, an allocated number and a photograph. None of the other information that the Opposition suggested would be on the file will be on that specifically dedicated central bank. It will be distinctly different, and discretely so, from the Medicare file system. People who have access to one will not automatically have access to the other and of course, whilst the information will be kept by Medicare, the Tax Office will not have access to the Medicare files. Let us put that allegation also equally to rest. There is another unfortunate dimension in this debate for the Opposition, that is, the proposal we are putting is popular as opposed to what those opposite are arguing. All the public opinion polls as to whether Australians want such a system are overwhelmingly-- Senator Boswell —It was 67 per cent; it is about 52 per cent now. After this debate it will be even Steven. Senator COOK —I thank Senator Boswell. It was 60 per cent and it is now 52 per cent. Although Senator Boswell comes from Queensland, where they think 39 per cent is a majority, I always thought that 52 per cent was a majority; and that is an overwhelming endorsement of this proposal by those who have responded to those polls. Senator Baume has been bold enough to allege that this will be some form of internal passport. Senator Maguire —Which Senator Baume was that? Senator COOK —I think it was Senator Peter Baume, if I remember correctly. He is in the chamber. He alleges that this will be some form of internal passport. He knows differently. He knows that that is not the case. He knows that this legislation does not propose that. Yet he stands in this chamber and alleges that it will be. He knows that it will not be compulsory to carry it. He knows that police cannot ask one to product it. He knows that it is only to do with certain transactions of a money kind at the bank and at the place of employment in order that we are able to verify who are the people who earn income so that that income can be correctly taxed. He knows all of those things. Senator Crichton-Browne —What is the penalty for demanding the card? Senator COOK —I would not open my mouth if I were Senator Crichton-Browne because we are never quite sure under what name he is carrying out business in this country. The allegation of Senator Peter Baume is, of course, patently false. One of the other allegations made in this debate is that the card will prevent people being able to conduct business by telephone. It was alleged that every time people want to sell a pig or buy some shares or front up to a stockbroker, marketing authority or produce agent, they will have to produce their Australia Cards. Once again, obviously, those opposite have not read the Bill. The facts are different from what they allege. The Government has recognised that people living in isolated areas or those who lack sufficient mobility may sometimes find that it is difficult to visit their produce agents or marketing authorities who may not have sighted their cards. Just as occurs when people apply for a passport, the Government will allow certain individuals who are prominent within the community to sign certificates of identity. All politicians here know that they can witness an application for a passport. For the sake of convenient operation for the consumers in this country there will be some who equally will be able to sign certificates of identity. The certificate of identity will work like this. Let us say, for example, that a person wants to open an account with a stockbroker in Sydney or Melbourne but, being a remote dweller, he is unable to travel there just to produce his Australia Card. He will go to a designated person in his local community who is authorised to sign certificates of identity. He will sight the Australia Card and sign a form verifying that he has produced it and that it would not have been reasonably practical for him to have physically produced his card to his marketing authority, bank, stockbroker or produce agent. His certificate of identity can then be posted to the stockbroker or whoever else he is dealing with on a business basis who will then use it instead of his Australia Card as proof of his identity and open his account. Recorded on the certificate will be the Australia Card numbers of both the cardholder and the authorised person filling in the form so that it will be possible to trace the person who provided the certificate. Those authorised persons will be made fully aware that if they knowingly make a false statement they face a severe penalty. Thus, both the security and the integrity of the Australia Card program will be assured, while a convenient service will be provided for those who might have been inconvenienced by any requirement to produce their Australia Cards in person. Once an Australia Card has been sighted or a certificate has been received, customers may continue to transact all business in their preferred way, including by mail or by telephone. After the card or certificate has been produced once to an agent, marketing authority, or the like, and the number recorded, there will be no further need to produce the card for normal business with those bodies. Once a stock and station agent or marketing authority has recorded a farmer's Australia Card number the farmer may conduct further business over the telephone or by mail. Of course, an Australia Card will not need to be produced for one-off sales or for sales of livestock which are not conducted through a marketing authority or agent. So on the basis of the earlier allegations that this will inhibit the convenience of phone or mail transactions by country dwellers, on the very evidence of what the legislation contains that assertion by the Opposition, like so many that I have recounted, is palpably false. In the few minutes left to me let me return to the basic premise of the legislation. We have set out to try to achieve what is fundamentally the most difficult political act any government can confront. It is so difficult, in fact, that the Fraser Government spat out the dummy in all the years that it occupied the treasury bench. It did not have the guts to proceed and, therefore, it smiled benignly while tax evasion and avoidance ran rampant in this country, while the revenue base was dudded and while ordinary wage and salary earners had to pay their full amount of tax, but those who could afford to manipulate the system got off scot-free. We have addressed that matter comprehensively. This is one essential part of the overall package, along with all our other tax reforming measures, that shifts the fundamental burden of taxation more fairly, that introduces fairness and equity into taxation for the first time in many years in this country and which guarantees that we can reduce the tax burden on the ordinary people of this country while properly taxing those who have got off scot-free. This device, the Australia Card, a high integrity card, guaranteed to protect the essential requirements of privacy of ordinary citizens will be a method of making sure that there is not fraudulent manipulation of the social welfare system or the taxation system. Essentially, it is as innocuous as that. The guarantees that are inbuilt into the Privacy Bill which is before the Senate will make sure that the real interests of the community are properly protected. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT(Senator Elstob) —Order! The honourable senator's time has expired. Senator CROWLEY(South Australia) —Mr Acting Deputy President, I claim to have been misrepresented and seek leave to make a personal explanation. Leave granted. Senator CROWLEY —I did not want to interrupt Senator Cook's speech and I arrived in the chamber too late to follow immediately after Senator Walters, who actually commented in the course of her speech that I had said certain things. She added that I, Senator Crowley, call myself a doctor, the clear implication being that I am not a genuine doctor or the understanding that that is a false claim. For the record I think it is very proper for me to say that, by any criteria-certainly the certification of the Melbourne University-I am a proper doctor. In addition to her imputation that perhaps I am only a pretend doctor or a person who just calls myself a doctor she addressed remarks to me claiming that medical documentation and the medical history of people will be released to the public. She is inaccurate and wrong in her statement and it is inaccurate and wrong of her to attach that to me. Senator Puplick —That is not a personal explanation. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Order! The honourable senator must keep to her personal explanation. The honourable senator is ranging too wide. Senator CROWLEY —Thank you, Mr Acting Deputy President. It is difficult for me to separate these two issues because Senator Walters, in her wild claim, suggested that I was not a proper doctor and that I just call myself a doctor. I take this opportunity in the Senate to put the record straight about that and to suggest that if Senator Walters was wrong about that, people should be very cautious about whatever else she said. Senator WATSON(Tasmania)(9.04) —Given the importance of this Australia Card to the Australian Labor Party I ask: Why did the Government introduce this legislation into the Senate in the last stages of the 1986 Budget session? Why did it then decide to bring the Senate back for two days just to test this legislation here? The consequences of this Labor Party grandstanding in this particular manner will be far-reaching for that Party, given the incidents that occurred late this afternoon in the Senate. This draconian legislation is using the latest technology available in Australia. Just as the dawn of an electronic world has burst upon our society, it is not surprising that this Australian Labor Party Government has been keen to latch on to plastic cards and computers to exercise a George Orwellian control over Australian society. More subtly, many in the Australian Labor Party see this mechanism being used to control individual behaviour. Senator Cook —You don't need to pay fair taxes, do you? Senator WATSON —As a senator from Senator Cook's side said this afternoon, it is no more than a licence to exist. Others who are less radical than Senator Cook perhaps see it as some sort of mechanism to maximise revenue collections, to discharge government responsibilities, including the dispensing of social justice. But the retail credit card, the Medicare card, the pass card and the authority card, with their numerals, the person's name and sometimes a photo embossed on the front, are all part of this new scene with which we are becoming familiar. To this list this Hawke-led Labor Government now wishes to add the identification card for every Australian citizen. At birth everybody will be given a number for life. The Government will therefore be able to identify continuously everybody's medical treatment, everybody's significant financial transactions, all one's employment engagements-just at the press of a button. The law in this field is quite deficient, despite the fact that the legislation is being accompanied by two other Bills, the Privacy Bill 1986 and the Privacy Bill (Consequential Amendments) Bill 1986. I submit that these Bills in themselves are also deficient in assisting the privacy of the individual. Not only in this field of electronic banking is the law deficient, but it has not kept abreast of the technical wizardry of the designers of the machines, whose owners keep them in units in central locations which are operated by pass keys and pass numbers through literally tens of thousands of terminals spread all over Australia, in country and city areas alike. We have before us this evening a Bill which has the mechanisms for introducing and operating an identification system. But at the same time we do not have the proper safeguards for the individual. It is the conditions that are attached to this Australia Card that are the frightening features of the legislation before us tonight. This package of Bills is quite deficient in any proper safeguards to protect the privacy and the integrity of the individual. I think it is the integrity of the individual that is perhaps of most prime importance, because time and time again we have seen this chamber used to denigrate the integrity of individuals who cannot respond in an appropriate way to protect their own privacy, individuality and integrity. One Labor senator said that this is the time, this is the opportunity, this is the debate, when we should be debating the protection of privacy. I would like to contend that, surely, this attitude is at variance with the leadership of his own Party. This is an admission by a Labor senator that the Bill is deficient. The Australian Labor Party has brought this Bill in here in the hope of one Labor senator that we will have a nice debate to overcome the problems of lack of privacy in this legislation. I believe that that senator has been conned and misled and he will be carried away with the tide of Labor Party opinion. This information is supposed to be kept secret, available only to a limited number of specified individuals who are mentioned in the Bill, but we have seen that an increasingly large number of bodies are able to get access to information from the Australian Tax Office. Sometimes the integrity of the information available to those bodies is not as strong as within the Tax Office, so the information can be misused, abused and spread around the community. Naturally, given the electronic world in which we live and the control it will have over individuals, unauthorised access can be a consequence of the use of electronic impulse systems. For example, the doctors in dispute with the New South Wales Government some months ago soon realised this to their detriment, when their remuneration became available through the Commonwealth Medicare computers to State Government personnel. Few issues have come before the Senate which have seen Australians as divided as they are on the matter of this identification card. This division, as we saw this afternoon, does not follow traditional party affiliations. It is unfortunate that many of the Labor Party senators, in speaking to this Bill, used arguments that were debunked by a Senate Committee which threw out those sorts of arguments in its report some time ago. All of the quotations from statements of certain Liberal Party of Australia people who were in favour of an Australia Card were made well before that Senate report, well before those people saw the legislation and the draconian conditions that attached to this card. The Liberal Party is united when confronted with this sort of legislation, brought up by the Labor Party to take away the rights and integrity of individuals. The Fabian Society within the Labor Party sees this legislation as a great leap forward as a control over individuals. Less radical members believe that it is one more way of adding some armoury to a system of cracking down on social security problems and trying to collect some more revenue in the Tax Office, despite the lethargy of inaction from the Tax Office and the Department of Social Security. The efficiency audit report of the Auditor-General into the Tax Office has been quoted frequently. That report said that the Tax Office was not using its financial resources to acquire the latest technology for cross-referencing and was not applying its personnel in the most efficient way to overcome some of the problems of tax avoidance. The Australia Card will in no way overcome the problems of the cash economy and it will barely touch the problems of social security fraud. The Committee of Public Accounts examined very closely about 12 months ago some of the problems of social security fraud. The Committee dismissed the idea of an identity card being able to rectify the problems in this area in an efficient way and said that it is an administrative problem which has to be accounted for in a different way. I remind people listening today that that Committee was an all-party Committee dominated by the Australian Labor Party. I remind the Senate that this card can be reproduced by forgery. Therefore, while I acknowledge that it might be able to assist in some areas, such as in the detection of petty offences and petty criminals, it will provide the mechanism for the very big cheats-the rorters, as they are called in this place-to get away with crime. Those people will be able to have access to forged cards and documents and, therefore, will be able to go on a rampage of unprecedented abuse. This Australia Card could assist those with real criminal intent. So what is the Government going to do? It will provide a mechanism for catching the little people, the small offenders. We are told that the card will do very little to prevent illegal immigration. As I have said, while some concede that there are some benefits from the limited use of a plastic card, the onerous provisions that the Labor Party is attaching to this card are truly horrifying for anybody who has any concern about the future of democracy in this country, for anybody who is concerned about civil liberties issues. There is tremendous doubt as to whether this card will be cost effective. However, it is certain that there will be an enormous increase in the size of the bureaucracy. There will be bigger government. As I have said, Frank Costigan believes that it will do very little to stop organised crime. Computer matching programs will effectively place everybody under surveillance, not just those suspected of illegal conduct. Therefore, this Bill is just going too far for ordinary Australians. They will not accept legislation which gives government and ultimately private sector agencies access to an information record without the consent of the data subject. I believe that on this day, the 38th anniversary of the adoption by the United Nations General Assembly of the Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, this human rights infringing Australia Card will be defeated in the Senate. It is appropriate that this legislation, introduced by the Labor Party, be defeated in the Senate tonight, on the last day of sitting. Senator VIGOR(South Australia)(9.17) —This identity card legislation is an admission of failure by the Hawke Government. It will be a double failure because not only has the Government failed to control the Public Service and failed against the awesome power of Treasury, which itself has failed to operate properly the existing taxation system, but also it has failed to introduce new ideas to tackle the fundamental questions of tax and social security equity. The Government has also failed because the Australia Card Bill itself will fail tonight. I believe that that will be a just end to it. This legislation seeks to sweep all manner of administrative and policy deficiencies under the carpet. It is a monstrous sledge-hammer, a sledge-hammer which cannot be effective in achieving its stated purpose but which would expand in a hydra-headed fashion as its failures were noted more and more. Had Ministers demanded better performance from their senior public servants and senior advisers instead of better excuses, there would not have been an apparent need for such a card. If Ministers had thought creatively about smashing the cash economy, they would not have fallen for this one-card trick. Had the Labor Caucus been allowed to examine the matter on its merits, it would not have been party to this unparalleled attack on the privacy of ordinary Australians. If the ID card legislation were allowed to go through it would cost more than has been estimated. A realistic cost would be around $1 billion. The estimated cost to business and commerce is $2 billion, on top of the cost to government in introducing the new systems which would be necessary to cope with the requirements of the card. The increasing use of electronic mail and electronic transactions make the ID card itself out of date and a complete encumbrance to free trade. The ID card would have returned less revenue than estimated. The ID card would in no way stop social security fraud as, in fact, from the statistics, only 0.6 per cent of welfare fraud is due to mistaken identity-- Senator Walsh —That is detected. Senator VIGOR —Sixty-one per cent is due to misstatement of circumstances. So in fact, 0.6 per cent will really not make much difference, since 61 per cent is due to misstatement of circumstances, for the information of Senator Walsh. The ID card will not eliminate tax fraud. The Australian Taxation Office cannot currently cope with the information it already receives. It cannot correlate the interest paid by banks with the declarations made by taxpayers. This, in fact, came out at a House of Representatives Standing Committee on Expenditure hearing when the Committee investigated this matter. So how will the Taxation Office do these things with the ID Card? It is unable to match the records supplied by the banks and other financial institutions with taxpayers' returns. It cannot even run a very simple computer system such as that, let alone the type of large computer system that will be involved with the card. The ID card would not reduce the cash economy. I believe it would encourage it. More and more money would be freed from the need to bank it, because those involved in the cash economy would avoid transactions which involve the use of ID cards. The ID card as proposed could not be secure. A photograph is not as effective as an identification and the need would soon arise for fingerprints. Eventually we would all end up with tattoos. The more the system falls into disrepute the more outrageous will be the calls to fix it. The documentary evidence produced to obtain an ID card is no more secure than the documentation that is currently required when we get a passport. In fact, passports are notoriously easy to forge and falsify. The ID card could be bypassed by people using foreign passports, and loss and theft of ID cards would also throw the system into disarray. I have tried to look into what could be done about this. The theft of ID cards would reduce their effectiveness, especially since they would not be needed daily, according to the Government, and therefore the theft could probably go unnoticed for a considerable amount of time and get people into trouble. The ID card would not affect corporate fraud because ID cards would be issued only to individuals. The ID card would in fact go even further. It would provide a new bread and butter income for organised crime. Those people now using multiple and false identities would continue to obtain the necessary identifications. The cards would probably be much harder to forge. This would take the supply out of the hands of the small operators and put it into the hands of organised crime operators. People obtaining forged identity cards would be vulnerable to blackmail and become recruitment pools for other criminal activities. The centralised keying of information on all Australians would have a commercial value commensurate with the cost of collecting the information legally, plus, indeed, a scarcity value because of its uniqueness. A complete set of records, I believe, could fetch many billions of dollars through multiple sales to relevant commercial outlets or to criminal organisations. The theft of information could in fact remain secret, since the physical records would remain intact and only the information content would be stolen. The information would therefore attract the attention of top criminals and espionage organisations. Even if theft of records were uncovered, as with the Canadian experience, there would be delays in reporting the loss of records, again, as happened in the Canadian situation when all of this year's taxpayer's records disappeared and we do not know whether or not they were copied. As a computer professional for over 25 years, I have come across several self-acknowledged computer criminals who have escaped prosecution because large institutions did not want to admit that their records were not secure. One such person applied to me for a job in a consulting organisation of which I was technical director. He told me in open discussion that he had successfully siphoned off millions of pounds by accumulating the rounding error in commissions in the British Central Clearing Bank's computer system. He escaped prosecution because the cost to the banks, in public esteem, of admitting the theft and the actual cost of making restitution to those defrauded would have been a real problem for the banks concerned. I believe that type of thing could happen with the Australia Card. Access to the information would allow criminals to choose victims for kidnapping, blackmail and theft, and it would give them a full pattern of the personal, banking, health and other details and an ability to extract names of suitable targets for any type of activity beyond imagining. The ID cards would invade our privacy. The information kept on file is liable to error. The cost of getting each individual to check this information at regular intervals would be prohibitive. It would be the same cost as putting it on originally. However, wrong information could have dire consequences for people in their normal living, without those people being aware of those difficulties. The existence of the information would lead to pressure for increased use, and probably most government departments would eventually gain access and contribute to it. No limit is set on how long the information would be kept, nor a requirement to notify a person each time his or her file is accessed. We would not know what information is accessed, for what purpose or by whom. If we had to put in safeguards against those types of uses it would cost a fortune to operate the system. There would be no freedom of information records or safeguards for this use. Senator Peter Baume —Senator, you are an expert on computers, aren't you? Senator VIGOR —Yes. Senator Peter Baume —Do you think it is really dangerous? Senator VIGOR —I think it is a very dangerous operation. The loss of a card could severely embarrass a person in financial difficulties, or it could even endanger a life if a person needed immediate hospital care. Delays in receiving payment for produce or in finalising a financial deal because the ID card could not be found could well cause financial and health problems for people. In the initial allocation of the ID cards extra identities could be procured. They could be for sale later on the black market. I point out that the current price for a counterfeit driving licence in the Australian Capital Territory is $30. Young kids are buying them so that they can identify themselves as being over 18 and drink alcohol. The ID card would also be a threat to national security. Those Australians, like me, who were born in continental Europe are aware of the use of ID card records in the Nazi period, in the holocaust, in tracking down Jews. It is not surprising to find a government calling itself national and socialist trying to introduce identity cards here. A dictatorship in Australia or an alien force taking control could use the records as a means of controlling the movements and activities of the whole population or of selectively getting rid of classes, races or individuals who are considered dangerous. A cross-reference information system for the whole population constitutes a threat to national security, from both internal and external enemies. I believe it should be resisted. There are, however, quite reasonable opportunities to have something different from the ID card, to try to solve the problems which the ID card would never solve. These involve improvements to the current system. We could have improved integrity of the current tax file numbers; increased efficiency in the Tax Office-that is sorely needed; deduction of withholding tax on interest and dividends, on produce and contract payments; improved efficiency of processing information in the Department of Social Security, which would reduce the number of overpayments, and so the temptation to keep those overpayments, which seems to be one of the main ways in which Social Security loses money; a faster response in paying welfare and unemployment benefits so that taking a job for a week would not leave a person destitute for the following ten weeks while his or her employment status is reassessed, and so that short term jobs would be reported instead of being hidden, as they are currently. We need to streamline bureaucratic regulations and paper works so that people do not shy away from declaring incomes or other relevant details because of the sheer work that is entailed in so doing. Obviously, the Treasurer (Mr Keating) himself has found this problem. We need radical changes to the tax and welfare systems to take the administrative burden off the Taxation Office, off individuals and off welfare workers. We need to remove or at least to decrease substantially taxes on employment and therefore increase incentive for production and productivity. Eventually, income tax should be payable only by the very rich and then at a level which is not punitive. We need to spread income over all dependants so that families are not disadvantaged. We need to put a tax on the use of non-renewable resources and energy to encourage conservation and to compensate Australians for the loss of those resources. We could in fact solve the problems associated with the ID card and get more taxable income in a fair way if we had a materials-added tax. This is a turnover tax which exempts all labour costs and all inputs on which tax has already been paid. Such a tax would automatically record all transactions so that organised crime could be traced, and the cash economy could be smashed by giving a strong incentive to people in business to declare all labour transactions and previously taxed inputs. Such an indirect taxation would be much less avoidable than the current system. We also need to provide a national support income through some type of negative taxation safety net for all Australians so there is no need to cheat the social security system. People need to have sufficient income to live in dignity and to contribute their share in indirect taxation. We need to tax moneys leaving the country so that speculative and non-productive foreign capital flows in and out of the country are discouraged and so that excesses of imports over exports are taxed. This would stabilise the Australian dollar to its true world market value and do a lot more for the economy than this particular dramatic measure of the ID card. We should also close down the transfer pricing rorts and negative gearing rorts. I will not spend much time on the privacy aspect of the card. It has been well underlined in this debate that the ID card is a direct attack on the privacy of Australians. The ID card itself, that is a card with a photograph and a signature, standing alone as an identification, is not viewed as a threat in itself. We are all used to carrying some type of identification. If the card is issued to everyone, if the records are held centrally, and if everybody believes in the integrity of the card, which I don't believe can be established, we really have a problem. We can have false use of the card which can cause enormous problems to ordinary people. The ID card is an attempt to use one card for a multiplicity of purposes and, therefore, it requires a multiplicity of personal records to be tied together through one identifier. It is the multiple use of the ID card which requires multiple approval of the card before it is issued and multiple records, all tied back to the one identifier, which multiplies the danger to privacy and integrity in the use of such a card. Moreover, whenever any records are maintained by any agency, or any personal information is changed, there is the potential and the possibility for invasion of privacy. The first invasion of privacy is neglecting to obtain consent for such information to be kept. This is often an implied corollary to accepting a particular service such as banking or medical services. The privacy of such records is protected by law and by custom. Consent is needed for any records which contain information allowing the person referred to to be indentified individually. This card removes that particular protection. The second invasion of privacy comes from neglecting to check the accuracy of records which are kept, either mandatory or by consent. Many cases are known of people who have suffered loss of employment through mistaken police or security records, or loss of business through inaccurate credit information being given out. It must be mandatory for people keeping records to have their accuracy checked and, if necessary, challenged by the person whom that record concerns. The third invasion of privacy comes through the disclosure to third parties of information kept on record. Permission to disclose the information must be given by the person concerned and a list kept for that person of all such disclosures, including details disclosed and to whom. Privacy legislation is necessary to safeguard all these elements, both in government records and in commercial and private files. I commend the Privacy Bill, which is a first attempt at such legislation by the Government and look forward to its speedy passage through the Parliament. We will be moving the modifications necessary to maintain the independence of the Data Protection Agency from the ID card. The Australia Card is a result of minds manipulated by fear and control. The very name reveals the Government's desperation to dress its proposal in a cloak of false nationalism. It is a fascist concept which, were it to succeed, would change the character of Australia, restrict the freedom of Australians and increase the immorality of our society, as I stated. It fails to come to grips with the economic crisis in which this country is plunged. It offers the same glib, simplistic solutions which have undermined Australian industry over the last 40 years. It is a useless cost burden on the Australian people. It is an indictment of the foresight and planning ability of this national socialist Government. It should be cast into the dustbins of history. Senator Maguire —That is a slur on the people of South Australia. Senator VIGOR —Senator Maguire is both a socialist and a member of a national government. I urge the Senate to maintain the freedoms of Australians. I am glad to help in the rejection of this pathetic legislation. Senator CHANEY(Western Australia-Leader of the Opposition)(9.37) —The Senate is debating the Australia Card Bill 1986 and related privacy legislation. We have had debate by some 30 speakers. It would be fair to say that almost every argument that could have been canvassed has been canvassed. I suppose that the disappointing thing about the debate has been the thoroughly predictable contributions by people such as Senator Maguire and Senator Cook. They have followed the tradition they have followed in all debates in this place of faithfully trotting out the Government line. I would like to deal with a couple of points that were made by Senator Maguire because they typify what is wrong with the case being put by the Government. We had a repeat from Senator Maguire yesterday of the pathetic suggestion that the Australia Card proposal is in some way part of a tax package which will deliver lower taxes to the Australian people. The simple reality is that if Senator Maguire and other Labor senators like to present themselves in front of a set of Budget Papers they will see that the amount of taxation being collected from the Australian people is about 25.5 per cent of gross domestic product. In other words, the Hawke Government continues to take greater and greater amounts of taxation from the Australian people. This measure is not part of some fairer tax deal for the Australian people. The tax deal that has been offered to the Australian people is the reason why this Government languishes at 42 per cent in the polls. It is widely understood by the Australian people that they are grossly overtaxed by this Government and by its Treasurer (Mr Keating), who cannot even remember to submit his taxation returns. That is the simple reality. We are not dealing with an integrated set of reforms. We are dealing with a botch-up of the tax system which commenced when the Prime Minister (Mr Hawke) did a deal on taxes with the Australian Council of Trade Unions in a hotel room. This country has been going backwards in the tax field ever since. The second canard that was put forward, principally by Senator Maguire and Senator Cook, in this debate was the suggestion that by voting against the Australia Card the Opposition and the Australian Democrats are placing themselves on the side of a selfish and greedy minority in the Australian community. I have waited for a debate in which either of those honourable senators addressed themselves in any way to a question of principle. Instead that sort of canard is put forward by them, totally ignoring the contributions which came from their own side of the chamber. I draw those senators' attention to the contribution of Senator McKiernan, who expressed the difficulties which exist about this issue, not only within the Australian Labor Party but also within the community. This is an issue which raises arguments of principle-often conflicting principle-and Senator McKiernan had the sense to acknowledge that in his contribution to the debate, as did Senator Tate. Senator Mason —And Senator Georges. Senator CHANEY —Senator Mason, by way of interjection, refers to Senator Georges. He, of course, stands in even sharper contrast. I will refer in a minute to the combination of people who have expressed concern about this new move by the Government to impose an Australia Card, an identity card, on every man and woman in this country. Senator Georges made a couple of quite simple points which I think bear repetition. I hope that Labor senators and the Minister at the table, the Minister for Finance (Senator Walsh), who slanders anybody who dares to oppose the view of the Government, would not oppose the fact that, as Senator Georges pointed out, he has consistently opposed the card. Senator Georges is of the view that the card poses a serious intrusion into the rights of the individual; that the right of privacy is something which needs to be respected, even by socialists; and that the card represents a licence to exist in our society, a view which I might say was put by Senator Baume in the debate and laughed at by Senator Maguire. However, it is a view that was repeated by Senator Georges this afternoon. Senator Georges made the point that all would be surveyed to catch the few. He said that there would be a need for vast amounts of money and for a large new bureaucracy to survey all and to catch the few. I make that point simply because we have had from predictable Labor senators a torrent of abuse and no doubt that will be repeated by Senator Walsh when he responds on behalf of the Government. He will endeavour to claim that anyone who opposes this measure is in some way opposing it merely because he is concerned to protect those who would cheat at tax or social security. Nothing could be further from the truth. But the fact that it could not be further from the truth is not likely to stop Senator Walsh from making that assertion. The Opposition has put its view which it developed after it had had the chance to study this measure in some detail and to consider the report of the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card. It is important to note that the Opposition's view, which has been put forward in this debate by some 20 speakers, is a view which is shared by an extraordinary cross-section of Australian people. It is not a view which to this point has been shared by a majority of the Australian people. That is a point which is worth stopping to consider. The Opposition did not make its decision to oppose this card on the basis that opposition to it was popular. Again, a Government speaker suggested that we were taking a populist position on this, that we were chasing votes, when the reality is that the Opposition has taken a stance which it knows initially is not a popular one. It has taken that stance because it believes that it must in the interests of the community and in the interests of Australia. Political parties do not take unpopular stances for the sake of it. They take them because they believe that it is necessary to do so, and that is certainly our position. As I said before, it is a position which is shared by a most extraordinary range of Australians. The Weekend Australian of a few weeks ago contained a paid advertisement which was inserted by the authority of Mr Ron Castan, QC, who is the President of the Victorian Council for Civil Liberties Inc. Ron Castan is not some right wing lawyer. I know him well. I remember mooting with him in Adelaide in the law moots of 1961. So my connection with him goes back a long way. I would not have understood him to be a supporter of right wing politics. He has been involved in working with Aboriginal Australians for many years in the legal aid area. He has been engaged in the protection of civil liberties as well as carrying out a major commercial practice. It is he who has sponsored this advertisement which calls on people to oppose Canberra's identity card. He has been joined in that opposition by Michael Challen, the Assistant Bishop of Perth. He is a man who, I would have thought, had a reputation in Western Australia certainly, if not a national reputation, of being on the side of the underdog and concerned about the welfare of his fellow Australians. He is a man who has promoted discussion and debate and has been involved in the welfare services of this community in a substantial way. Senator Walsh —He is pig ignorant about this subject. Senator CHANEY —We are told by the Minister at the table, in his charming way, that Bishop Challen is pig ignorant. Senator Walsh —Pig ignorant about this subject. Senator CHANEY —Pig ignorant about this subject. I would not wish to misquote the Minister. Bishop Challen joined in the company of Frank Costigan, who also sponsored the advertisement. Frank Costigan, as has been said in this debate, has spent more time than any other Australian in pursuing organised crime and his hatred of organised crime and tax evasion is well known to every Australian. He has joined in this advertisement saying that we should not be accepting the Government's identity card. Roger Clark, an academic, whom I do not suppose the Minister will say is pig ignorant about these matters, has some academic knowledge of these areas. We all remember that when his name came up in the Senate he was traduced for daring to put forward a view that the identity card should not go ahead. So he has been traduced not in the debate tonight but on another occasion by another Government Minister. We find Joan Coxsedge, notable I gather as a fairly left wing member of the Australian Labor Party in Victoria, joining in this extraordinary group in the company, of course, of the senior executive of the Western Mining Corporation Holdings Ltd, Mr Hugh Morgan. What is the common denominator of these people? We cannot say that it is religion or politics and we cannot say that is is their profession. What is the common denominator? It is that they see that there is a genuine threat to the civil liberties of Australians in what this Government is proposing. The fact of the matter is that we can join with the many names who have put themselves forward-lawyers, professors of law, academics of other sorts, authors, people with all sorts of expertise-as being in opposition to this card. It was an unpopular view at the time but a view which they believed needed to be expressed. They have joined with this extraordinary group of organisations: The Confederation of Australian Industry, the Council of Small Business Organisations of Australia, the Real Estate Institute of Australia, the New South Wales Council of Australian Small Business Associations, the Australian Associated Stock Exchanges, the Victorian Chamber of Commerce, the South Australian Chamber of Commerce, the Law Council of Australia, the International Commission of Jurists, the Australian Catholic Welfare Commission, the Anglican Social Responsibilities Commission of the Anglican Diocese of Perth, the New South Wales Privacy Committee, the New South Wales Anti-Discrimination Board, the Administrative and Clerical Officers Association, the Federated Clerks Union of Australia and the Victorian Teachers Union. That is an extraordinary range of organisations, just as we have had an extraordinary range of individuals who have chosen publicly to express their opposition to this proposal. Again, that opposition can be explained only by a common view of the threat to the liberty of every man, woman and child in this country. There has been public sympathy for this card, which was at about 80 per cent but which, according to the last survey, dropped to somewhere in the 50s, and that drop will continue as more and more people understand the reality of this card. The sympathy for this card is based on the practical and proper concern of the men and women of Australia to see that tax evasion is brought to an end and that welfare fraud is brought to an end. They are the key areas of concern which underpin the sympathy there has been for the Australia Card proposal. As has been canvassed over and over again in this debate, the reality is that those matters can be dealt with other than by the creation of this enormously expensive and enormously intrusive new mechanism. In bringing this debate to a close before the Minister gets up for his little performance, it is necessary simply to remind the Senate that it is not a matter of partisan politics that the present loss of taxation revenue in this country is substantially caused by the maladministration of the Australian Taxation Office. It is a matter which has been attested to not by politicians but by the Auditor-General. I do not think that even Senator Maguire has yet impugned the motives of the Auditor-General. The reality is that, as a parliamentary committee from the House of Representatives, the Standing Committee on Expenditure, reported in September of this year when it reviewed those five Auditor-General's reports on the Taxation Office, we have a problem of gross maladministration in the Taxation Office. Put at its most simple, if I may quote from paragraph 3.18 of the report, the Committee talks about the massive loss of revenue, not simply because of highly organised evasion schemes but rather, in large measure, because of the Australian Tax Office's own internal inadequacies. In this debate many senators have canvassed the detail which appears in the Auditor-General's report and in this report. The simple fact is that the Tax Office has access to massive amounts of information which it cannot get round to using. It receives information which it does not bother to check, whether it is the information it gets from the withholding tax or the information on interest payments which on some occasions it chooses to get. We have the ludicrous situation of billions of dollars being lost because the Taxation Office has not been competently administered. It has been incapable of getting its house in order. It has ample powers and information which it can use but which it is not using. The Government's solution to the problem is to impose another bureaucracy on top of all this. Its solution is to employ another 2,000 people, to spend another $750m worth of taxpayers' money and to cause enormous additional expense to the private sector-at least twice that amount. That is the way this Government is proceeding with this matter. It is an absurdity and it is something which I believe is becoming much more widely understood in the community. The reality is that this Government, which has been in office for nearly four years now, is responsible for the situation that has been so accurately described by the Auditor-General and by the House of Representatives Committee. The Government's answer is not to fix the problem by dealing with existing powers and existing information but to seek to put all of us on to a central register in a way which has caused horror to that great range of Australians I mentioned earlier in this debate. In exactly the same way we get the vexed problem of social security fraud. Of course, every Australian, every member of the Opposition, I believe even every member of the Australian Democrats-even every member of the Government-wants to see an end to that. It is not a new problem. When Senator Dame Margaret Guilfoyle was the Minister we had some problems with social security fraud, as we had problems when I was the Minister, and those problems continue today. Various attempts have been made to come to grips with that. When Senator Dame Margaret Guilfoyle was the Minister I understand that she examined the option of a card system. It was rejected at that time because, on her examination and on the examination of her Department, it was not seen to be an effective measure. When I became Minister I did as all Ministers do and followed the tracks of my predecessor. I said: `Right, what needs to be done?' I too looked at the question of social security fraud. I got the same answer as that given to the Joint Select Committee, that this proposition would not work. This proposition of the Government will not work. Again we have the Government piggybacking on the justifiable public concern about social security fraud, but doing so when the evidence of its own Department and the evidence submitted to the Parliament by the Government itself says that it will not solve the problem. What sort of Alice in Wonderland world are we living in when Government senators support this proposition in the face of evidence that has been examined by a parliamentary committee, which is not contested? We have the clearest possible indication that, in the case of social security fraud, this is not an effective approach and other measures are more appropriate, and that in the case of taxation existing powers are not being used, to the detriment of the revenue to the extent of billions of dollars. We have a situation where I believe the only conclusion one can draw is that this Government, as in so many areas, is simply playing politics. It sees this as a handy issue. I simply say to the Government that I believe that the coalition of forces opposing this card will ensure that the Australian people understand why it is a proposition which should be rejected. I have absolute confidence that this is an argument that we will win because there are people across the political spectrum who support our position. It will be impossible to accuse us of playing some sort of political game when people from Joan Coxsedge across to the other side of the political spectrum stand shoulder to shoulder against this proposition. It escapes me how anybody could doubt the sincerity of the opponents of this card after the debate this afternoon and the contribution by Senator Georges. I was struck by the words of John Saunderson, a member of the Australian Labor Party and one of the Committee majority that reported against the card. He said: To continue with the view that we must issue some card with a photograph because it is popular, is to believe in the cargo cult theory. Issuing of trinkets to the public in Australia will not win votes at election time when they realise we have failed to address the real issue, when we have failed to improve the efficiency of the Taxation Office. That was said by Mr Saunderson, a member of the Labor Party whom even honourable senators opposite would not accuse of trying to protect those who would rort the tax system and the social security system. This has been a debased debate. In common with what has happened in debates in this place over recent years, anybody who has dared to oppose this Government has been trampled down, abused, vilified and accused of being a crook. I for one express my contempt for the debating techniques which were adopted by some Government senators and Ministers in addressing these issues which go to the welfare of this country. To demonstrate the farce of all this I shall give a simple personal example. I refer to my vilification over my association with my law firm. I walked up to two Ministers in the dining room with a leading trade unionist from Western Australia who said: `Oh, one of your partners is representing me in an action'. That is typical of the pathetic way things are conducted in this chamber. I will be vilified, everybody will be vilified, on the basis of some supposed association that the bunch opposite can dream up. It is pathetic and it debases argument in this place. I thank the numerous Opposition senators, led by Senator Peter Baume, who contributed to the debate and who tried to keep this debate on the facts. I thank the Australian Democrats, who contributed positively to this debate. In particular, I thank the members of this Parliament who, as members of the Joint Select Committee on the Australia Card Bill 1986, spent months getting to the facts of this matter. I wish that every Australian would read the report of the Committee as I wish that every Australian would read the report of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Expenditure. I wish that every Australian would read the 40 pages or so of additional views put into the Joint Committee report by Senator Christopher Puplick. As information about this proposition seeps out of the community there will be utter revulsion at what the Government proposes. If the Government chooses to reintroduce this legislation next year there is absolutely no doubt that it will do so in the teeth of public opinion. Knowing the pathetic approach of this Government to running the affairs of this nation, I confidently predict that if the opinion polls are running the other way we will never see this legislation again. We have heard mealy-mouthed nonsense about devotion to principle from Labor senators who in an unadulterated way have defended the position of the Government in this debate, notwithstanding the anguish of so many people in the Labor Party over it. I am sure that they will not be loudly urging the Government to push this legislation forward when we have advised the Australian people of its irrelevance to the solution of the problems that we have, its inadequacy and the dangers it poses to our future freedom in this country. I shall close on the point of civil liberties. The view of people that it could not happen here, that abuses of civil liberties would not be imposed by future governments or future bureaucrats, flies in the face of reality. I think that one has only to read the daily newspapers of Australia to know that we in Australia are just as capable of bad conduct, of often hideous conduct, as any other society. I believe that it is the duty of this Senate in particular, as a House of review, as a place where the Government does not usually have the numbers, to carefully scrutinise legislation such as this. Where we see long term dangers to the future freedom of Australians and to the sort of society we have, we have a very serious duty to debate legislation fully, as we have debated this Bill, and, if we have doubts about it, to reject it. I am happy that on this occasion an important measure, a potentially very damaging measure, has been debated very fully and is going to be rejected. I believe that it is on occasions such as this that we can all say: `Thank God for the Senate'. Senator WALSH(Western Australia-Minister for Finance)(10.00) —What seems an interminable time ago Senator Peter Baume opened the debate on the Australia Card Bill and said that the legislation was opposed by Joan Coxsedge, Hugh Morgan and Peter Garrett and, therefore, there must be something very wrong with it. I am afraid that that list did not impress me at all. The debate from the Opposition side since then has deteriorated steadily and, although there are some people with genuine objections to what is being proposed, the debate, as it came out of the mouths of the Opposition, was overwhelmingly intellectual dishonesty, in some cases supplemented by pig ignorance. Senator Chaney would have us believe that the Opposition is opposing this legislation on principle and not because it is the party which protects tax evaders and welfare cheats. I might have been more persuadable on that point were it not for the fact that only one week ago that same Opposition voted against legislation which sought to strike down a wildcat decision of the Supreme Court of Queensland which, had it been allowed to stand, would have lost $900m in revenue. It concerned people who had set up paper tax avoidance schemes in the late 1970s, who had been assessed by the Commissioner of Taxation but from whom the debt had not been collected within a six-year period because legal processes were not exhausted. What the Opposition sought to do on that occasion was to cancel $900m-worth of debt owed to the Commonwealth of Australia by the people who set up contrived paper tax avoidance schemes in the 1970s and for whom the possibility of the repudiation of that debt was opened up by a wildcat decision of the Supreme Court of Queensland. The Opposition voted against that legislation. Only one week ago this Opposition voted to take $900m off the honest taxpayers of Australia and donate it to the people who set up paper tax avoidance schemes in the 1970s which were disallowed by the Commissioner and which ultimately failed in the courts. Senator Maguire —What is new about that? Senator WALSH —I just make the point that it does rather colour one's view of the commitment of these people who sit across the aisle to the stamping out of tax avoidance. I do not want to say too much about Senator Georges except that the major point he made just happens to be wrong as a question of fact. He made much of the allegation that some person who might have been convicted of some peccadillo in youth like joyriding in a motor vehicle or a bit of housebreaking would be forever damned if the Australia Card came in with the name under which that conviction was recorded. As a question of fact that is wrong. There are provisions which enable people at quite low level to adopt a new name and to say `I wish to be known by this name in future', but the system and the integrity of the card are protected by matching that alteration against the birth certificate. At a much higher level, at the personal discretion of the General Manager of the Health Insurance Commission, more complete changes of identity may be accommodated. It is a pity that before Senator Georges raised that question and made it the major feature of his argument he did not bother to check out the facts. So far as the civil liberties argument is concerned, again I accept that in many cases the people who raise that argument are sincere. But I find it very difficult to accept the sincerity of a civil liberties argument coming from the people who gave us the Vietnam war, coming from the people who, 14 years ago, were still conscripting Australian youth to fight in the Vietnam War and yet they have the effrontery to talk about civil liberties. If the Liberal Party really had a valid argument to put against this legislation it would not have needed to resort to gross distortion and false assertion to the extent that it did. Foremost among the false assertions was the contribution of our old friend Senator Baume. Senator Maguire —Which one? Senator WALSH —Michael Baume, or whatever he calls himself these days. He said that anybody could get information on anybody by putting in a freedom of information request. It is a pity that Senator Baume did not take the trouble to have a look at the legislation before boring the pants off everyone for yet another half hour with his contribution to the debate. All information on the Australia Card is covered by a secrecy provision in clause 169. Section 38 of the Freedom of Information Act states that all information covered by a secrecy provision is exempt from access. Australia Card information cannot be released under the Freedom of Information Act except to the subject of the information. I suppose that we could not expect too much accuracy from a senator who, in his former incarnation, used to write the prospectuses for Patrick Partners. The second false assertion, and the one most commonly repeated, was the false assertion that, put in two forms, the Australia Card is an internal passport and everybody will be forced to carry it. I personally heard Senator Short making the second false assertion. The plain fact is that there will be no need to carry a card at all; there is no requirement to do that. There will be no need to produce a card except in situations where proof of identity is already required. The difference will be that proof will be effective with an Australia Card and, without it, it is not. But perhaps the most fraudulent of all the false assertions made and repeated by almost every speaker on the Opposition side concerns social security fraud and the allegation that social security fraud amounts to only 0.6 per cent of total social security payments. That comes from a misrepresentation of the evidence given to the Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card and the report produced by it. The Joint Select Committee stated: The Committee . . . notes that the . . . estimate of 0.6 per cent . . . is not a reliable estimate. It only relates to fraud that is known and does not include the amount of fraud that exists but which has not been discovered . . . For any of those who are interested in the facts-I do not expect that there are too many across the aisle-the Joint Committee's reference in paragraph 1.48, states: While the Committee accepts the Department's difficulty in establishing the amount of social security fraud due to false identities, it believes that there is still significant fraud within this area. That was the conclusion of the Committee. Who would have thought that, if they had been listening to the false assertions that have been pouring out of the mouths of the people on the Opposition side for the last 30-odd hours? The 0.6 per cent relates only to the fraud which is known and does not include the amount of fraud which exists but has not been discovered by the Department. The next assertion is: The Australia Card will not attack the cash economy. The Australia Card would not eliminate entirely the cash economy, and nobody on the Government side has ever claimed that it would. However, it would provide something very close to a watertight guarantee that in every case where the employer claimed the payment as a deduction from the employer's taxable income, that payment would be accurately reported to the Taxation Office, and in the correct name of the employee. In other words, for those people who are presently doing a bit of moonlighting under a false name given to the employer, the employer meeting the employer's obligation of making the appropriate pay as you earn deductions and so on for somebody who had only one job, that practice will be eliminated by the Australia Card. Through chasing the money trail-I would have thought that, since so many people opposite seem to be interested in what Mr Costigan's views on this matter are, they might have paid some attention to his comments about chasing the money trail-even in those instances where the payments received are not claimed as a deduction from taxable income by the payer, the Australia Card, through facilitating the chase along the money trail, will catch those who are operating in the cash economy to a very significant extent. It is freely acknowledged that it is unlikely to catch those people who mow the lawn for $10, or somebody who comes in to do a bit of domestic cleaning for, say, $20 or something like that and is not deriving a great deal of income from that source. Sure, it is not likely to be effective against such people. In other areas of the cash economy it will be either very substantially or entirely effective. It was also implied, of course, that just about every department of the Government would have access to the Australia Card and that each agency would leak the details. Firstly, only three agencies would be involved: The Health Insurance Commission, the Australian Taxation Office, and the Department of Social Security. In every case they would be subject to existing secrecy provisions, and most importantly, all attempts to access the computers in those agencies would be logged. That is a very important point, and I think I should expand on it. It was taken up by Professor Whalan, Professor of Law at the Australian National University, who said in evidence to the Joint Select Committee: If we do have an Australia Card it is vital, I believe, that we have both very carefully circumscribed limits on its use and a protective body with similar independence to that possessed by the Ombudsman. Perhaps one irony would be that if we do have an Australia Card with all those protections . . . our privacy may be better protected than it is now. I interpolate that that is the proposal: To have an Australia Card with all those protections. Professor Whalan continued: On the one hand, a person's privacy I think ought to be protected; on the other hand, an individual citizen ought not to be able to use that shield of privacy . . . to defraud the state . . . or anyone else . . . Senator Kilgariff —What are you going to do about the Taxation Office to recover all that money that has been lost? Senator WALSH —I am coming to that. Do not be so impatient. Another popular false assertion, especially from the rednecks of the National Party of Australia, is that people who are in remote areas will have to fly 500 miles if they want to open a bank account or for any number of other matters. Under the certificate of identity provisions there is provision for the issue of a certificate provided that someone who holds an Australia Card and quotes his or her Australia Card number testifies that the person making the application is who he or she claims to be. One thing that an Australia Card would do is eliminate a practice which I have mentioned in the Senate before. It was a common practice some time ago in the wheat belt town of Merredin in Western Australia, near the area from which I came, for stock agents such as Elder Smith and others, even before John Elliott took over Elders, to come along to a pig sale with a gladstone bag full of #10 notes, or $20 notes in the present denominations. The farmers brought in their pigs to sell under invoices in such creative names as Bob Menzies, Ned Kelly and so on. Ten pound notes were handed over to the people who sold their pigs and the only information the Commissioner of Taxation ever got about that sale was that Bob Menzies had sold #20,000 worth of pigs at Merredin last Wednesday. I do not expect that he ever received an assessment from the sale. That sort of fraud and wholesale tax evasion would be totally eliminated. The individual farmer, once having established his identity with an agent, will not be required to produce the card for subsequent transactions. Something which is superficially attractive as an alternative to the Government's Australia Card proposition, until it is delved into a bit further, is a tax file number. Most of those who advocated that alternative put up a proposition that people who have a five-year history with the Australian Taxation Office would not be required to do anything else and those who do not have a five-year history with the ATO would be required to establish their identity through, it was suggested, an interview with an officer of the Department of Social Security. The big problem with that is that false identities are already in the system. Those people who have false identities now, or more than one identity, would be totally protected by that proposition, provided their false identity or identities were of more than five years' duration. People with false identities are the types of people who have second jobs under false names and in many cases are involved in criminal activity. No attention is paid by those who put that argument to the fact that very considerable resources would be required in the Department of Social Security to deal with the remainder. As the Taxation Commissioner said: I expect that by the time you take all the steps that need to be taken to get high integrity into, say, a tax file number, then there's the same effect, the same costs, the same privacy questions that you'd get with the Australia Card. Indeed, that also applies to much of what Mr Costigan had to say. What Mr Costigan advocated was very little different from what is taken up by the Australia Card. One of the reasons why an agency such as the Department of Social Security could not under that alternative tax file system adequately deal with the people who do not have a five-year history with the Australian Taxation Office is that agencies such as the Department of Social Security in those circumstances would not have access to either the Australia Card Register or the centralised register of births, deaths and marriages. In other words, the Department would have absolutely no means of validating the documentation offered by the applicant as proof of identity. A proper identification system must have a secure document linked to both the verification procedure and, most importantly, the person to ensure that this time and effort is not wasted. The tax file system falls down on both counts. It falls down also, at least to the same extent as the Australia Card proposition, on civil liberties grounds for those people who are genuinely concerned with civil liberties-a group among whom I do not count the members of the Opposition. It has also been suggested that an interest withholding tax is a satisfactory alternative. There is only one way in which one could guarantee that all interest payments due would be collected by an interest withholding tax, and that is if the withholding tax were levied at the maximum marginal tax rate and as a once only and final payment. If that were not done tax could still be evaded at any lower rate of interest withholding tax if people had interest bearing accounts under false names. It could still be evaded even if the rate was something lower than the maximum personal tax rate, for the same reason as when people have false accounts. Instead of having one income that might aggregate to $100,000 or whatever, the records of the Australian Taxation Office would show that four different people had income of $25,000 each and, therefore, their average tax rate was very much lower than it ought to be. There would be no way, in the absence of what the Government is proposing, that the Tax Office could determine with certainty that the four names on its records were in fact the same person. Let us follow up the interest withholding tax a little further. The Opposition's interest withholding tax proposal would have this effect: Every pensioner in the country who has a bit of money with a building society would have some of that money stopped at source, whether or not the pensioner ultimately had a taxation liability. That is what the Opposition is proposing with an interest withholding tax. It is proposing to put a tax on every pensioner in Australia who has a bit of money earning interest in a building society account. I guess that nobody can guarantee absolutely that there will not be attempts at forgery. The fact, however, is that the equipment required to produce the Australia Card is extremely expensive and if anybody wanted to go into the business of producing an Australia Card that person, as an economic reality, would have to be selling into a mass market. It is highly unlikely, to say the least, that anybody could forge and market on a mass scale Australia Cards without being detected. An analogy has been drawn between forging a passport and forging the Australia Card. It is a false analogy, if only for the reason that the card has a computer printed photograph in the card itself. A passport has a detachable photograph that can be slipped in or out without any trouble at all. Senator Vigor, in a flight of fantasy-it is worth noting, since Senator Vigor made one of the more passionate contributions to this debate, that he is so highly regarded within his own Party that he is No. 3 on the South Australian Democrats ticket-suggested that this was the first step in the introduction of a totalitarian society and so on. If anybody wants to believe that nonsense, let it be noted also that these countries are on the way to becoming totalitarian societies: Austria, Belgium, Finland, West Germany, France, Greece, Switzerland, Spain and Portugal. They all have identification cards. I know it is true that some of them have had totalitarian societies, and in the not too distant past, but in fact they are moving away from totalitarian societies and not towards them. Opposition members have used the Australian Taxation Office as a smokescreen, or as camouflage, to hide infamy of what they are doing this week, added to the infamy of what they did last week. First, the reports they have quoted refer to events which happened more than two years ago. They do not refer to what is happening now. Many of the matters raised in reports of the Auditor-General had already been acted upon within the Tax Office before those reports were published, let alone before the Opposition became aware of them. It is a matter of record that the present Commissioner has under way a major program of change to provide for more effective and efficient administration of the tax laws. In the area of technology, for example, the Tax Office is finalising detailed plans that provide for a major computer re-equipment and systems redevelopment program. Opposition senators interjecting- Senator WALSH —Mr President, does one have to put up with this gibberish? I am well aware of its purpose of course. Honourable senators opposite do not want the audience to hear the exposure and the debunking of the frivolous and fraudulent arguments which they advanced when opposing this Bill. I do not intend to make a complete defence of the Taxation Office. I think that is a job more for the Commissioner or the Treasurer than it is for me tonight. But, as evidence of the fact that the Taxation Office is not the inefficient organisation which those opposite would have us believe it is, I want to draw the attention of the Senate to views expressed in a letter by a large and respected firm of independent management consultants. The firm, incidentally, was rated in today's Australian Financial Review as one of the management consultants most favoured by Australia's top 150 companies. The firm to which I refer is PA Consulting Services, and I seek leave to have incorporated in Hansard a letter to the Commissioner dated 21 November 1986. Leave granted. The letter read as follows- Mr T. P. W. Boucher, Commissioner of Taxation, Australian Taxation Office, 2 Constitution Ave. Canberra, A.C.T. 2601 21 November 1986 Dear Mr Boucher, You asked me for some general comment on the ATO, based on our recent experience of working with the organisation. In the last two years, we have been involved in the following major projects: Assistance with a wide ranging internal efficiency review, participation in the project to introduce self-assessment, assistance with a review of the top level organisation of the ATO. We have also had input to a number of smaller projects and have submitted proposals in other areas. This has given us the opportunity to form fairly detailed impressions of the managerial style and the effectiveness and efficiency of the ATO's operations both at Head Office and at most Branches. The first point to make is that the ATO is a very large organisation which is subject to quite unusual pressures for change, due to the highly dynamic environment in which it operates. In 22 years as a consultant, I have not personally experienced an organisation which has to cope with so many major initiatives simultaneously. The second point is that, in our reviews, we found an organisation which is systematically tackling these major change projects according to a clearly articulated set of priorities. In the opinion of myself and my colleagues, it is tackling them very well. We believe that we have been able to contribute to the ATO's program. However, as I said at the meeting at which we helped to present the proposed Head Office structure, what we found was not an ``organisation in trouble'', but an effective organisation which had recognised the need for further adjustment to meet changes in the environment. In terms of efficiency and effectiveness at operating level, everything we have seen has tended to confirm our view that standards of operation in the ATO are generally well up to the best we have seen elsewhere in the public sector. Naturally, there are some areas of difficulty; many of these are areas which, by their nature, involve a long lead time, such as the development of the highly sophisticated systems required to support new taxation initiatives. The areas requiring improvement have largely been identified and priorities assigned to them. It would be wrong of me to finish without mentioning the impact of your own management input and style. There is a clarity of purpose and a sense of urgency among the senior and middle management of the ATO which is rare in very large organisations, and there is no question that it comes from the top. Yours sincerely A. W. W. GODFREY Manager, Canberra Senator WALSH —Finally-and I have already recognised this-there are some people who have genuine civil libertarian concerns about this Bill. I believe they are misplaced civil libertarian concerns. But I cannot accept that the Party which gave us conscription and Vietnam has genuine civil libertarian concerns about anything. That is the first point. The second point, which is, I believe, of paramount relevance to the attitude that the Opposition has adopted to this Bill is the fact that only one week ago in the Senate the Opposition voted against legislation not to impose a tax liability but to recover the debts which have been legally found to be owing to the extent of $900m by those who perpetrated and devised failed paper tax avoidance schemes in the last 1970s. Honourable senators opposite showed then that they are in opposition what they were in government-the friends and protectors of tax evaders and avoiders. I believe that it is that motive which prompted them to take the attitude to this Bill which they have taken, not any concern about civil liberties, misplaced or otherwise. I understand that there will not be any defectors, not because there are not plenty of people on the Opposition side who believe in this legislation, but because there are not any of them who have sufficient moral courage to do the right thing by Australia, the right thing by honest taxpayers, and vote for this legislation. Senator Peter Baume —I rise to a point of order, Mr President. The Minister has now said that there is not a single person here who is willing to do his duty by Australia, and I draw your attention to standing order 418. The Minister's comment was clearly an imputation of improper motives directed towards the Opposition and I ask that the Minister be directed to withdraw it. The PRESIDENT —In the course of debate, I do not regard that as a valid point of order. I call the Minister for Finance. Senator WALSH —I have finished, Mr President. Question put: That the words proposed to be left out (Senator Peter Baume's amendment) be left out. The Senate divided. (The President-Senator the Hon. Douglas McClelland) Ayes . . . . . . . . . . . 32 Noes . . . . . . . . . . . 26 —— Majority . . . . . . . . . 6 —— Alston, R. K. R. MacGibbon, D. J. Archer, B. R. Macklin, M. J. Baume, Michael Mason, C. V. J. Baume, Peter Messner, A. J. Bjelke-Petersen, F. I. Newman, J. M. Boswell, R. L. D. Parer, W. R. Brownhill, D. G. C. Puplick, C. J. G. Carrick, Sir John Reid, M. E. Crichton-Browne, N. A. Sanders, N. K. Durack, P. D. Sheil, G. Guilfoyle, Dame Margaret Short, J. R. Haines, J. Teague, B. C. Hamer, D. J. Vanstone, A. E. Kilgariff, B. F. (Teller) Vigor, D. B. Knowles, S. C. Walters, M. S. Lewis, A. W. R. Watson, J. O. W. Aulich. T. Jones, G. N. Black, J. R. McClelland, DouglasChilds, B. K. McIntosh, G. D. Coates, J. McKiernan, J. P. Coleman, R. N. Maguire, G. R. Cook, P. F. S. Morris, J. Cooney, B. Ray, RobertCrowley, R. A. Reynolds, M. Devlin, R. Robertson, E. A. (Teller)Elstob, R. C. Sibraa, K. W. Evans, Gareth Tate, M. C. Gietzelt, A. T. Walsh, P. A. Giles, P. J. Zakharov, A. O. Hill, R. Bolkus, N. Withers, R. G. Ryan, S. M. Jessop, D. S. Grimes, D. J. Townley, M. Foreman, D. J. Powell, J. F. Richardson, G. F. Chaney, F. M. Button, J. N. Collard, S. J. Colston, M. A. Question so resolved in the affirmative. The PRESIDENT —Order! It being after the hour of 10.30 p.m., pursuant to order the question is: That the Senate to now adjourn. Question resolved in the negative. Debate resumed. Question put: That the words proposed to be left out (Senator Haines's amendment to Senator Peter Baume's amendment) be left out. Question resolved in the negative. Question put: That the words proposed to be inserted (Senator Peter Baume's amendment) be inserted. The Senate divided. (The President-Senator The Hon. Douglas McClelland) Ayes . . . . . . . . . . . 25 Noes . . . . . . . . . . . 31 —— Majority . . . . . . . . . 6 —— Alston, R. K. R. Knowles, S. C.Archer, B. R. MacGibbon, D. J.Baume, Michael Messner, A. J.Baume, Peter Newman, J. M.Bjelke-Petersen, F. I. Parer, W. R.Boswell, R. L. D. Puplick, C. J. G.Brownhill, D. G. C. Sheil, G.Carrick, Sir John Short, J. R.Crichton-Browne, N. A. Teague, B. C.Durack, P. D. Vanstone, A. E.Guilfoyle, Dame Margaret Walters, M. S.Hamer, D. J. Watson, J. O. W.Kilgariff, B. F. (Teller) Aulich, T. McIntosh, G. D.Black, J. R. McKiernan, J. P.Childs, B. K. Macklin, M. J.Coates, J. Maguire, G. R.Coleman, R. N. Mason, C. V. J.Cook, P. F. S. Morris, J.Cooney, B. Ray, RobertCrowley, R. A. Reynolds, M.Devlin, R. Robertson, E. A. (Teller)Elstob, R. C. Sanders, N. K.Evans, Gareth Sibraa, K. W.Gietzelt, A. T. Tate, M. C.Giles, P. J. Vigor, D. B.Haines, J. Walsh, P. A.Jones, G. N. Zakharov, A. O.McClelland, Douglas Hill, R. Bolkus, N.Withers, R. G. Ryan, S. M.Jessop, D. S. Grimes, D. J.Townley, M. Foreman, D. J.Lewis, A. W. R. Richardson, G. F.Collard, S. J. Colston, M. A.Chaney, F. M. Button, J. N.Reid, M. E. Powell, J. F. Question so resolved in the negative. Senator PETER BAUME(New South Wales)(10.45) —Mr President, my understanding of the procedures is that we have now ended up with the word `That' and nothing more. If it is the wish of the Government to have the second reading motion put and tested, I would invite Senator Walsh to seek leave to move the second reading of the Bill and we could then vote on this simpliciter. Senator WALSH(Western Australia-Minister for Finance)(10.46) —Mr President, I think I have to agree with Senator Peter Baume's assessment that it would look a little strange, to say the least, if all that was left was the word `That'. I seek leave to move the second reading motion. Leave granted. Senator WALSH —I move: That the Bill be now read a second time. May I also state that, although I recognise that the second reading motion will be defeated, for the purpose of the record and history I will call for a division to give Government senators the opportunity of voting for the second reading. Question put: That the Bill be now read a second time. The Senate divided. (The President-Senator the Hon. Douglas McClelland) Ayes . . . . . . . . . . . 26 Noes . . . . . . . . . . . 32 —— Majority . . . . . . . . . 6 —— Aulich, T. Jones, G. N. Black, J. R. McClelland, DouglasChilds, B. K. McIntosh, G. D. Coates, J. McKiernan, J. P. Coleman, R. N. Maguire, G. R. Cook, P. F. S. Morris, J. Cooney, B. Ray, RobertCrowley, R. A. Reynolds, M. Devlin, R. Robertson, E. A. (Teller)Elstob, R. C. Sibraa, K. W. Evans, Gareth Tate, M. C. Gietzelt, A. T. Walsh, P. A. Giles, P. J. Zakharov, A. O. Alston, R. K. R. Lewis, A. W. R. Archer, B. R. MacGibbon, D. J. Baume, Michael Macklin, M. J. Baume, Peter Mason, C. V. J. Bjelke-Petersen, F. I. Messner, A. J. Boswell, R. L. D. Newman, J. M. Brownhill, D. G. C. Parer, W. R. Carrick, Sir John Puplick, C. J. G. Collard, S. J. Sanders, N. K. Crichton-Browne, N. A. Sheil, G. Durack, P. D. Short, J. R. Guilfoyle, Dame Margaret Teague, B. C. Haines, J. Vanstone, A. W. Hamer, D. J. Vigor, D. B. Kilgariff, B. F. (Teller) Walters, M. S. Knowles, S. C. Watson, J. O. W. Bolkus, N. Hill, R. Grimes, D. J. Withers, R. G. Ryan, S. M. Jessop, D. S. Button, J. N. Townley, M. Richardson, G. F. Reid, M. E. Colston, M. A. Chaney, F. M. Foreman, D. J. Powell, J. F. Question so resolved in the negative. Debate resumed. Senator Walsh-Should the second reading motion be carried, the Government does not intend to proceed with the Committee stage tonight. Question resolved in the affirmative. Bills read a second time. Motion (by Senator Walsh) agreed to: That consideration of the Bills in Committee of the Whole be made an order of the day for the next day of sitting. Motion (by Senator Walsh) agreed to: That, unless otherwise ordered, the Senate, at its rising, adjourn till Tuesday, 17 February 1987 at 2.00 p.m., or such other day and/or hour as may be fixed by the President or, in the event of the President being unavailable, by the Deputy-President, and that the day and/or hour of meeting so determined shall be notified to each Senator. Provided that the President, upon a request or requests by an absolute majority of the whole number of Senators that the Senate meet at a certain time, shall fix a day and hour of meeting in accordance with such request or requests, and such time of meeting shall be notified to each Senator. For these purposes a request by the Leader or Deputy-Leader of the Opposition in the Senate shall be deemed to be a request by every Opposition Senator and a request by the Leader or Deputy-Leader of the Australian Democrats shall be deemed to be a request by every Australian Democrat Senator. Provided further that the request or requests may be made to the President by leaving the same with, or delivering the same to, the Clerk of the Senate, who shall immediately notify the President. In the event of the President being unavailable, the Clerk shall without delay notify the Deputy-President or, should he be unavailable, any one of the Temporary Chairmen of Committees, who shall be deemed to be required by the Senate to summon the Senate on behalf of the President, in accordance with the terms of this Resolution. Motion (by Senator Walsh) agreed to: That leave of absence be granted to every member of the Senate from the termination of the sitting this day to the day on which the Senate next meets. The PRESIDENT —Order! As has been rumoured in the Parliament for some time, this is expected to be the last night that I will occupy the chair of the presidency of the Senate. Therefore, I seek the indulgence of the Senate to make one or two passing remarks. It was 25 years ago yesterday, namely on 9 December 1961, that I was first elected as a senator for New South Wales. It is said that a week is a long time in politics. Honourable senators will realise that the political timespan involved in a quarter of a century is much longer than a week. But I must say that, despite the 18 long years that I served in opposition, my total period of 25 years in the Parliament has provided me with magnificent memories of many wonderful people and an enormous wealth of stories that could probably fill a couple of volumes. I have been most fortunate to have made many friends in all political parties in the Parliament, in my own State of New South Wales, throughout Australia and internationally, and I am grateful to the Labor movement and to my fellow New South Welshmen for having given me the opportunity to serve them for so long. I have enjoyed my period of service as a Minister of the Crown in the two portfolios I occupied between 1972 and 1975 and I was particularly honoured to have been chosen to serve as President of the Senate from 1983 to now. It is the highest honour that can be conferred on any member of the Senate and I have always consciously tried to keep that fact in mind. I am privileged to have occupied this chair. I am indebted to my present and erstwhile colleagues of the Federal Parliamentary Labor Party for the support they have given me over the years. They have been great friends and great mates and I shall cherish the memories I shall always have of the historic times we have gone through together and also the very happy and convivial evenings we have had from time to time. I thank the Leader of the Opposition and all members of the coalition for the co-operation I have received from them in the maintaining of order in the Senate. I am most grateful to them for having invited me and my wife to their Christmas function last Thursday night. Senator Kilgariff-With some of your friends. The PRESIDENT —With some of my friends too. As I told the members of the coalition, when I first entered Parliament one of the old Labor stalwarts at the time advised me to make sure that I made friends across the whole of the Parliament, not merely on one side. I must say that that was some of the best advice I have ever received. I also thank the Australian Democrats and the independents for the warmth of their personal friendship and the co-operation they have extended to me. I pay tribute to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mrs Joan Child, for her ready willingness to review the overall administration of the Parliament. She has been a great help. I also thank her predecessor, Dr Jenkins, for his co-operation during the time we jointly served as Presiding Officers. I pay tribute to the Clerk of the Senate, his various Clerks Assistant and to all officers of the Senate, especially to my friend the Usher of the Black Rod, and to the Deputy Usher of the Black Rod, who personally have looked after me so well. To the Clerk of the House of Representatives, the Parliamentary Librarian, the Principal Parliamentary Reporter, the Secretary of the Joint House Department and all their officers, I say thank you for a job well done in difficult and trying conditions. The time is now not far off when Parliament will go to another building and the present acute accommodation arrangements will be considerably eased. I express my great appreciation to the members of my present and past personal staff, including my electorate staff, for their long, patient, untiring and dedicated service. All of them have been wonderful. I should also say that I am indebted to my football club, the great St George Rugby League Club, for having honoured me by awarding me its No. 1 supporters badge. I am so proud to have had that tremendous honour bestowed upon me. I thank the members of the Press Gallery and especially the members of the Press Gallery committee for the constructive discussions they have had with me and the Speaker from time to time concerning their difficulties in reporting the Parliament. I trust that I have not left anyone out. Everyone I have mentioned has played a great part in making my life satisfying and rewarding, and I am most grateful. I particularly thank my wife Lorna for her constant devotion. I could not have had a better minder. Had Arthur met her he would have sacked Terry. She has been terrific. Few people outside politics realise the strains and demands that politics makes on the lives of spouses. My wife has been tolerant and understanding at all times, even understanding those happy and convivial parties that we have had. As with the wives of most members of parliament, she literally reared our three children by herself while she was in Sydney and I was in Canberra. She has been a devoted wife and mother and, to ensure that I kept my feet firmly planted on mother earth at all times, she has been my most constructive critic. As I said at the outset, there is a rumour around that next year the Government is contemplating another job for me. I hope the rumour is true because while we still enjoy good health Lorna and I would both very much like to serve Australia in another important capacity before we retire. If it is true, I trust I will get as much satisfaction from that job as I have obtained from this one. Again, if it is true, I am positive that I will continue to see many of my parliamentary colleagues. I take this opportunity to thank His Excellency the Governor-General and Lady Stephen for the many courtesies they have always extended to me and my wife and for the warmth and generosity of their hospitality. I am also grateful to the various high commissioners and ambassadors for the co-operation and assistance they have extended to me. The Australian Parliament is a great institution. There is no better political system. I hope that posterity will hold that in the time I have been here I have been able to contribute something to the enhancement of our system. I think it is fair to say that over the last two weeks I have had more farewells than Dame Nellie Melba. I thank everyone involved for going to so much trouble. I guess I am one of the few lucky ones who have been able to choose their own time of exit from the political life of Australia. I have chosen to go out while I am on top and I know that I leave the Parliament in good and capable hands. It has been a great honour for me to have been chosen to serve the Parliament and the people of Australia as President of the Senate. I am indebted to everyone for giving me the opportunity to contribute to the political life of our nation. I wish all honourable senators the best in their future deliberations, which really are all about the future of Australia and the welfare of our fellow Australians. I say to all of you goodbye and good luck. Senator WALSH(Western Australia-Minister for Finance) —by leave-Circumstances which were not anticipated until very recently are such that I find myself as Acting Leader of the Government in the Senate on this last day of the sitting. I know that both people who have positions senior to me in the Senate-in particular, Senator Button, in the first place-would wish that they were here tonight to respond to your statement. The PRESIDENT —You are going to talk about McClelland and not McLachlan, aren't you? Senator WALSH —Yes, Mr President. May I, firstly, express on behalf of Senator Button and Senator Grimes their good wishes and regret that they are not able to be here tonight; and I guess that the same could be said for a number of other people who are not here. We seem to have had a number of speeches over the last couple of weeks that have reviewed Doug McClelland's career in the Parliament. I will run over it very briefly again: Almost 25 years in the Senate. If I recall correctly, Doug, you did not take your seat in the Senate until 1 July 1962 but were elected pursuant to the election held 25 years ago yesterday. You were a Minister in the Whitlam Government for almost three years and have been President of the Senate now for more than three years. If I may reflect in a personal way on that election at which Doug McClelland became a senator-elect, I recall that it was an election at which the Australian Labor Party had done very much better than most people had anticipated. Indeed, it was in the euphoria following that election that I formally joined the Labor Party. So, I guess, Doug, your success at that election and the success of all the others had some ramifications even in far away Doodlakine in Western Australia. When I first came to the Senate as a simple country boy 12 1/2 years ago, Doug, you were Minister for the Media and I was somewhat baffled by the procedures of the Senate and Question Time and all that sort of thing. Opposition senators interjecting- Senator WALSH —We are not going to be vituperative now, are we? I recall-I am not sure whether you do, Doug-that it was during the first sitting of that Parliament that I was one of the people who were invited to your ministerial office. My knowledge of the geography of Parliament House was not so good in those days, but I think it was on the middle floor in the far wing of the Senate. I was invited to your ministerial office along with Cyril Primmer and a few other people to have a drink one evening, which was something that I appreciated. Indeed, I think that anybody who has been around here at all will know that Doug McClelland has been a very convivial host and also a very significant politician in the offices that he has occupied. The second last point I want to make, Doug, is that, looking around, I can see a large number of people on both the Opposition and Government sides who were elected at the 1974 Federal election, including Senator Chaney and Senator Peter Baume and a few other people I can see in front of me. Doug, if you should leave the Senate, I think there will be only three people who were in the Senate prior to that 1974 election when about 14 or 16 of us were elected. Of course, Doug, you have been for some considerable time known as the father of the Senate. Finally, Doug, wherever it is that you may be on 17 February if you are not occupying the presidential chair here and wherever you may go thereafter I want on behalf of the Labor Party to wish you and Lorna a long and contented life. I believe also that you will have a useful life in the future as you have in the past. I express our appreciation for that almost quarter of a century, almost half of your lifetime, that you have spent in the service of the Parliament and of the Australian Labor Party. Senator CHANEY(Western Australia-Leader of the Opposition) —by leave-Mr President, I am very relieved that your wife, Lorna, is in the chamber. I can imagine that, if she were in Sydney and she turned on the radio and heard what Senator Walsh had to say and what I am about to say, she would immediately assume that we were on a condolence motion and that she had assumed widowhood. So I am glad that she is here to see you sitting healthily in the chair and having these comments addressed to you in your presence. The question about saying something about you tonight did exercise my mind because I thought: How can I possibly stand up and say anything other than positive, nice things about a member of the Australian Labor Party? I am glad that you have given me an opening. I can only say, after your reference to rugby football, that I am pleased to see that this is a Sydney swan song because the code is one which I think should be barred and I know that that will not endear me to you. Mr President, I believe that in response to your comment that you have been privileged to have occupied the chair as President of the Senate it is appropriate to say that we in the Opposition believe that we have been privileged to have you as our President. I think you have brought to the office of President the precise mixture of qualities that is required to do the job to the satisfaction of both Government and Opposition senators and, I am sure, independent senators and members of the Australian Democrats. I think, first and foremost, you brought qualities of fairness which are essential if you are to have the trust of all honourable senators. I would like to thank you personally for that and I thank you on behalf of all my colleagues. I think you very genuinely were the President of us all. I would have to say that the only time I found it vaguely uncomfortable in addressing the Chair when you were in it was when occasionally, for some odd reason, I would find myself attacking the New South Wales Right and I would suddenly realise that perhaps I was addressing you in a way that you found quite unbecoming. Mr President, I think you have ruled over us with great fairness and I think that is a great contribution to the Senate. We, as members of a party, are here purely because of our party endorsement; we are all involved in the activities of life of our respective parties. To achieve a balance between your partisan involvement in the Labor Party and your institutional role as President is something which is not easy. If you leave the presidency you will have set a very high standard for your successors to follow. I believe that the next President will really have to watch his p's and q's because he will find that he will always be compared with your performance in the chair. You have been here for 25 years. You mentioned that for 18 of those years you were in opposition. I cannot understand how you have maintained your balance and sense of humour after 18 years in opposition. I say with deep and personal admiration that I think that is a sign of your character. Bearing in mind the relative sweetness of Senator Gareth Evans these days now that he is in government it proves the point in a different way. In acknowledging your contribution to this place, which the Opposition believes has been very considerable, I acknowledge, as Senator Walsh did and as you did in such a gracious way, the role of your wife. I have seen her put out only once and that was when you introduced me to her when I arrived here 12 years ago. I remember that you had been here for 12 years then and that she, of course, knew the place backwards. You introduced me to her and I addressed her as `Mrs McClelland' and she was very affronted. I think she thought it was a most inappropriate way for another senator to address her. I would like to acknowledge her graciousness over the last 3 1/2 years. She has joined with you in making all of us feel welcome in the President's chamber. No doubt she has been a major contributor to your own balanced approach to the difficult job that you have done on behalf of us all. I also wish to mention your genuine interest in achieving greater efficiency in the Parliament. The Parliament consumes a lot of public resources. The Minister for Finance, Senator Walsh, who spoke earlier, has the responsibility on behalf of the Government of trying to ensure that this Parliament, like the rest of government, is conducted in as frugal a way as possible. In maintaining the balance between our institutional independence and the proper requirement of government that taxpayers' funds not be wasted you have shown a very nice touch. In your chairing of the parliamentary committee which looks at the Senate expenditure, again I think you have shown a proper concern for both the responsibilities of the Government, which we must all heed, and the responsibilities you have as President to maintain the integrity and independence of this Senate. As I said, Mr President, if I go on talking it will sound like a condolence motion. Again, on behalf of the Opposition, I wish you very great satisfaction in whatever role you play on behalf of Australia in future. If I may personalise that a little, my own father left the Parliament in 1969. It has been a great joy to me that his life has been so full and interesting in the many years which have passed since his retirement. I can only wish for you and for Mrs McClelland the same great satisfaction and enjoyment which my parents have had in post-parliamentary life. I think that one thing you owe your wife, Mr President-one thing we all owe our wives-is a decent period after politics in which to give her some reasonable amount of domestic life; and I wish you well. Senator COLLARD(Queensland-Leader of the National Party of Australia) —by leave-My National Party colleagues and I have also heard the same rumour that seems to be running around this chamber tonight, and we wish to join the two previous speakers in the kind words they have said about you and Lorna. It has been a privilege and a pleasure to work with you in your years as President of the Senate-as you rightly said, the highest office we can give you. I can recall, before I even knew you very well, that when I was elected to this place, friends of mine who are in business-they are, of course, on my side of politics-and who had dealings with you when you were a Minister had only kind and good words to say about you and about the way you handled your ministerial office. Those words still ring in my ears and, indeed, nothing you have done since then has let me believe that they were other than true. Senator Chaney quite rightly talked at length about your handling of this chamber, and I can only concur completely. I think it must also be recognised that the President's job is not just running this unruly mob in here but that, as one of the Presiding Officers, you are also responsible for the running of this Parliament House. That you have done so at a time of increased complexities and new technologies, when the demands on our services are greater and consequently the demands on the services provided by you and your officers are greater, and that you have tried to meet all those demands in an inadequate and outmoded building, is a credit to you and your staff. On top of that, as one of the Presiding Officers you are also responsible for all that is waiting for us in the new and permanent Parliament House. We are not sure yet-indeed, you will then be long since gone from here-whether we will praise you or curse you when we get there. I think, Mr President, that if what you have done for us here in the circumstances is any indication, we will be more than adequately looked after when we get further up the hill. So, on behalf of my colleagues, it does give me a great deal of pleasure to join in wishing you the best and thanking you for all you have done. I am quite sure that wherever you may go-I have also heard rumours, as you have, of where you might go-you will serve the people of Australia well, once again, in a completely different position but a position in which you will do us proud, do yourself and Lorna proud and, indeed, serve the people of this nation for still another period. Senator HAINES(South Australia-Leader of the Australian Democrats) —by leave-On behalf of the Australian Democrats it is important that I put on record that we are united in believing that you, Mr President, have been a most excellent President in your time in the chair. As Senator Chaney said, you have been particularly fair and I would add that you have been totally impartial, always courteous, extremely dignified and, for what it is worth, in your future life, wherever that may take you, absolutely diplomatic. Most importantly, as has been said before tonight, you have maintained a sense of humour and that is not always easy in this place. Indeed, with those qualities it is hardly surprising that you have won very quickly the respect and affection of people on both sides of this chamber and, I suggest, on all sides of your own Party, something which again is not always easy to achieve, particularly when this chamber is as volatile as it often becomes when one considers that it is not in the hands of the Government. You have done a difficult job with style, humour and dignity and we have all appreciated that. In addition, since it seems to me that when- ever we are out of session the Presiding Officers spend most of their time roaming the rest of the world, you have done a remarkable job in representing this country and this Parliament at international parliamentary gatherings. Your successor, whoever he or she may be, will have a particularly hard act to follow. Many of us who have experienced your hospitality in the past are looking forward to the time when our steps follow yours and we can impose on the good nature of yourself and Lorna at some time in the future. It is important to recognise the wives and husbands of members of parliament. They do a sterling job and the more important the position that the member or senator holds, the more strains there are on spouses and the marriages of members and senators. Certainly we all know of far too many marriages that have broken up under the strain of fewer than 25 years in the Parliament. I say to you, Mr President, and to your wife that you are an inspiration to all of us in the stability, solidarity and loving nature of the relationship that you two have maintained and the support you offer to each other. On behalf of my Party, I wish you and Lorna well in your return to what I hope will be something close to a normal life. Senator WALSH(Western Australia-Minister for Finance)(11.23) —I move: That the Senate do now adjourn. In doing so, I observe that, should the rumours which have been discussed tonight turn out to be true, no doubt many other people in the Senate would like to take an opportunity, either on 17 February or at some time close to 17 February, to add their remarks to those which have already been expressed tonight. As I said earlier, circumstances which were not apparent until very recently are such that it is also my responsibility now to deliver the valedictory speech, if that is not too pretentious a title, for this session of the Parliament. In doing so, I express my sincere thanks and those of the Government-I hope I do not leave anyone out-to the attendants at Parliament House, whether they be the formal Senate attendants or other attendants, the Hansard staff, the catering staff in the dining room, the Senate administrative staff and the Parliamentary Library staff, all of whom serve the physical and other requirements of the people in the Parliament in their normal high standard. This has been a long session of the Parliament, and in particular a long final continuous period of sittings. I know that I am certainly feeling fatigued and I guess that that goes for many other people on both sides. At this time it is customary also for whoever represents the Government to convey the compliments of the festive season to all senators, whether they be on the right side or the wrong side. Without wishing to be unduly provocative, I might say that after what the Opposition tried to do to the Taxation Administration Amendment (Recovery of Tax Debts) Bill last week I find it rather difficult to wish Opposition senators well. But I rise to perform the duty required under the circumstances, and wish everybody, whether on the right side or the wrong side, the compliments of the season and trust that those of us who are coming back here on 17 February will come back much less fatigued than most of us are now. Senator CHANEY(Western Australia-Leader of the Opposition)(11.26) —I just want to say that I think I heard a ghost of Christmas past. I am surprised that a Government that has its public relations so well organised did not have the clanking of chains hollowly coming from the foyer. Mr President, may I on behalf of the Opposition also thank all the people mentioned by Senator Walsh for their service to the Parliament and to the Senate over the last 12 months. I particularly thank a group mentioned by him, the Clerks, and in particular I thank Harry Evans, the Clerk who was assigned to work with the Opposition, for the very ready assistance that was always provided. I hope that that does not damage his future career in the civil service. In fact at all levels, as Senator Walsh has indicated, we were given great service and on behalf of the Opposition I also extend our thanks to all of those people. I also wish all the members of the Government, as well as members of the Opposition-and you, of course, Mr President-a very happy Christmas. I hope, as Senator Walsh hopes, that we come back rested. I hope that the Government comes back repenting some of its more obvious follies but I do hope that for all of us it will be a time when we can put aside politics for at least a few days and enjoy a little normal Australian good cheer at one of the most pleasant times of the year in this country. I am happy on this occasion to join with Senator Walsh in the expressions of view he has just put before us. I wish everybody a wonderful Christmas break. Senator COLLARD(Queensland-Leader of the National Party of Australia)(11.28) —I join Senator Walsh and Senator Chaney in thanking the staff of the Parliament for the way in which they have looked after us. I suppose I am probably one of the first ones to partake of the services provided in the refreshment rooms. Not too many people get there before me, although some get there at about the same time. I acknowledge Senator Elstob. Staff arrive before us and prepare breakfast, and of course they are here long after we are gone, after this place rises. That is indicative of the work that the staff do for us and we are very appreciative of that. I add my best Christmas wishes to all senators. It is a time of good will, and from this moment on there will be good will until 17 February when we come back. Senator McKiernan —Is that a promise? Senator COLLARD —No, it is not a promise. It is a resolution. Obviously we will come back rejuvenated. At the end of every year one thinks: `Heck, what a year; the next one cannot possibly be any worse'. We all know darned well that it will be, from both the Government's point of view and our point of view. Things are not that good out there. So we will need to come back rejuvenated if we are to do the job that is required of us. I would just like to support what the two previous speakers have said, wish everybody the best for the festive season and hope it is a happy and a prosperous new year. Senator HAINES(South Australia-Leader of the Australian Democrats)(11.30) —I would like, on behalf of the Australian Democrats, to echo the thanks that have been expressed tonight to the Clerks, to the attendants, to the Hansard staff, the Parliamentary Library staff, the Parliamentary Refreshment Rooms staff and other staff. They do a sterling job. As we bolt out of this place regularly at half past 10 leaving them here to tidy up after us, I think some of us are too often likely to forget that without them this place could not operate. We make it difficult enough anyway at the best of times, but they do a wonderful job. Having said that, my colleagues have instructed me that I must limit my remarks to the preceding comments and to saying that we wish a merry Christmas to all and to all a good night. Question resolved in the affirmative. Senate adjourned at 11.31 p.m. until 2. p.m on Tuesday, 17 February 1987, unless otherwise called together in accordance with the resolution passed earlier this day. The following paper was tabled: Seat of Government (Administration) Act-Ordinance 1986-No. 13-(Children's Services)-Corrigendum to Explanatory Statement, tabled 10 June 1986. The following answers to questions were circulated: (Question No. 1430) Senator Kilgariff asked the Minister representing the Minister for Territories, upon notice, on 14 October 1986: (1) What is now considered to be the economic life of phosphate mining on Christmas Island. (2) How many mine workers are expected to be employed up until the closure of the mine. (3) How many of the 150 mine workers recently made redundant are expected to remain on Christmas Island. (4) What training will be provided for the redundant mine workers, and in what areas are they expected to be re-employed. Senator Gietzelt —The Minister for Terri- tories has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: (1) 3 years. (2) About 280. (3) Preliminary results from counselling sessions currently being undertaken on the Island by the Departments of Employment and Industrial Relations and Territories would suggest that approximately one third of the 150 will remain on the Island, one third are seriously considering resettling elsewhere, and a further third remain undecided. (4) Current training courses on the Island are in English, Job Oriented Migrant English and Clerical Skills which were developed to take account of the current skills, knowledge and aspirations of the Islanders. Approximately half of the 150 redundant workers are currently attending one or other of these courses. Islanders who resettle on the mainland will have access to normal mainland retraining courses. Re-employment of redundant workers who remain on the Island is expected to be in areas related to the developing tourist industry. (Question No. 1431) Senator Kilgariff asked the Minister representing the Minister for Territories, upon notice, on 14 October 1986: (1) Is it the intention of the Federal Government to alter its procedures for tendering shipping contracts to the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, as discussed in the course of the Senate Estimates Committee hearings, when it is proposed that the method will change from tenders for 2 to 3 trips to tenders for longer periods; if so, for what period will tenders be called from prospective shippers. (2) Is it anticipated that this change to tendering procedure will bring about a more efficient service to the Islands. (3) Is it proposed that shipping runs will be made more frequently and on a more regular basis; if so, what is contemplated. (4) Will the Government consider operating barges from other supply ports, such as Darwin, to provide a more efficient and less costly ship charter service to the Cocos (Keeling) Islands. Senator Gietzelt —The Minister for Territories has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: (1) Yes. The contract will be for a period of two years. (2) Yes. (3) Intending shippers will be asked to provide a regular service. It is envisaged that the period between ships will be between four and eight weeks. (4) The Department of Territories would have no objections to the use of a barge as a supply vessel provided that it: is suitable to users on the Cocos (Keeling) Islands; is licensed by the Department of Transport; complies with the terms of the tender specifications; is cost effective. Use of Darwin as a port of lading would also be dependent on costs to users. The Cocos Co-operative has purchasing arrangements based in Perth and it would be difficult and costly to alter these. Airlinks between Cocos and the mainland are also based on Perth and there are common supply arrangements for air and sea freight to the Territory. (Question No. 1433) Senator Kilgariff asked the Minister representing the Minister for Territories, upon notice, on 14 October 1986: (1) What proposals have been put forward to the Federal Government regarding the development of tourist facilities, including a casino, on Christmas Island. (2) What decision, if any, has the Federal Government made concerning these proposals. (3) Under what terms and conditions has the Federal Government agreed to the construction of tourist facilities on Christmas Island. (4) Is land to be granted as a site for the construction of the proposed casino. (5) Is land to be made available for other commercial use and development. (6) Is land to be made available to the citizens of Christmas Island in the form of residential leases. (7) What form of land holding is presently available to individuals-freehold, leasehold or other. (8) Is it proposed that this situation will be altered; if so, in what way. Senator Gietzelt —The Minister for Territories has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: (1) The Department has received 4 (four) detailed expressions of interest for tourist/resort complexes, one of which includes a casino. (2) The Government has agreed in principle to the establishment of a resort/hotel with a casino on Christmas Island subject to a detailed proposal. (3) Formal approval of terms and conditions will be considered when detailed proposals have been submitted. (4) Yes, if the proposal is approved. (5) Yes. (6) Yes. (7) and (8) The Government is preparing legislation which will facilitate the leasing of Crown Land. (Question No. 1531) Senator Mason asked the Minister representing the Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs, upon notice, on 19 November 1986: (1) Was the Temple Society Trust Fund set up in 1949 to allocate funds resulting from the dissolution of the Temple Society in Palestine to ex-members of that society who had settled in Australia. (2) What current activity does the statutory authority known as the Temple Society Trust Fund Advisory Committee pursue. (3) Does the Committee submit annual reports; if not, why not. (4) What have been the Committee's costs either to public revenue and/or to the Trust Fund for the past 2 financial years. Senator Grimes —The Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: (1) Yes. (2) All moneys standing to the credit of the Temple Society Trust Fund were distributed during the 1980-81 financial year. The Temple Society Trust Fund Advisory Committee has not been active since then. (3) No, there has been no activity since 1980-81 on which to report. (4) Nil. Senator Grimes —On 24 September 1986 (Hansard, page 760), Senator Vigor asked the Minister representing the Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs, without notice, a question covering a range of matters concerning the Australian Institute of Multicultural Affairs. Senator Button provided an answer to the honourable senator's question, together with an undertaking that an answer to the factual matters in the honourable senator's question would be provided as soon as possible. The Minister for Immigration and Ethnic affairs has supplied the following answer to the honourable senator's question: My news releases of 12 August and 21 August and the Prime Minister's statement to the House of Representatives of 22 August reconfirmed and reinforced this Government's commitment to multiculturalism. In the context of the Government's new strategy-as I indicated in my Second Reading Speech on the AIMA Repeal Act-AIMA is no longer the most effective vehicle for expressing this commitment. Our continuing commitment is demonstrated by the fact that the Prime Minister has appointed me as Minister Assisting him on Multicultural Affairs as from 18 November. Our strategy will be developed by a new Advisory Committee and by the Office of Multicultural Affairs being set up within the Prime Minister's portfolio. The Institute was improved through my reforms of 1 July 1985 which widened membership of its Council under the chairmanship of the Anglican Archbishop of Melbourne, Dr David Penman, to comprise a broader and more representative cross-section of the Australian public. The members I appointed are people with special relationships with the community and who are linked with special community interests. The Institute was also improved by its new Director developing a more prominent public profile for its activities and making its existence better known around Australia. The reduction in the Institute's budget at this time reflected the reorientation of the Institute's activities away from research and towards community education. This redirection resulted in valuable work being done by the Institute in developing understanding and appreciation of multicultural objectives over the last year. The Institute was also given at this time specific responsibility to promote co-ordination and liaise between the Commonwealth and State and Local Governments and community organisations in multicultural activities. The extent to which the Institute could develop this role has proved to be limited by its physical location in Melbourne without a supporting network of regional offices. An inference in the Senator's question that the Jupp Committee of Review of Migrant and Multicultural Programs and Services advised against the disbandment of AIMA is wrong. None of the 32 recommendations in the Committee's Report specifically recommend the retention of AIMA, although one (Recommendation 26) cites AIMA as joint implementer with DIEA and the Bureau of Statistics of a proposal to develop birthplace profiles. Otherwise the degree of ``support'' for AIMA expressed in the Report is limited to a comment about its continuing role in relation to the functions proposed for an office of ethnic affairs. It is only in the context of discussing the functions of an office of ethnic affairs that the Committee's Report discussed the functions which should continue to be performed by AIMA. In fact the Review Committee simply accepted the continued existence of AIMA and allocated functions to the proposed office of ethnic affairs on that basis. Moreoever in recommending the establishment of an office in Canberra the Report rejected using AIMA either by relocating it in Canberra or establishing a regional office there. Rather the Report saw AIMA's future role as an independent research and community education organisation. The Report makes many similar observations about other areas of policy without elevating them into formal recommendations. Over the past year it has become increasingly clear that we can no longer afford to have one or two agencies at the Federal level as custodians of multicultural goals and values. These goals and values need to be pursued as dimensions of all relevant policies and programs. Our ``Access-and-Equity'' strategy is a program of administrative reform dedicated to precisely this objective. It recognises the importance of agencies such as the Federal Departments of Education, Health and Employment and Industrial Relations to the daily lives of Australians, and their central role in planning policy and action to ensure equal rights to common services and to full participation in society are accorded to Australians of all backgrounds. The decision to abolish AIMA was consistent with but independent of the Budget strategy to generate economic recovery. The other Budget decisions referred to were all hard decisions taken in relation to feasible options; the particular reasons for them are matters for my Ministerial colleagues the Ministers for Education and Communications. The decision to close six area offices of my Department has been reviewed. At my request, my Department has found some alternative savings in its administrative and staffing costs which now allow the three larger area offices in Wollongong, Newcastle and Geelong to remain open, albeit at a reduced level of activity. (Question No. 1254) Senator Bolkus asked the Minister representing the Minister for Health, upon notice, on 13 June 1986: (1) How much was spent on the Drug Offensive (a) nationally; and (b) in each particular State and Territory of Australia. (2) How many phone calls were received by the Drug Offensive Hotline, as a consequence of this campaign, in each month of the campaign's operation. (3) How many of these phone calls led to either (a) assistance being given to drug users; and (b) arrests by law enforcement agencies. (4) In case of arrests, how many persons arrested were charged with (a) possession and cultivation of small amounts; and (b) trafficking. Senator Grimes —The Minister for Health has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: (1) (a) The Drug Offensive is the information/media aspect of the National Campaign Against Drug Abuse (NCADA) and includes Australia-wide activities such as the National Drug Information Line. In 1985-86 $5.2 million was spent on the Drug Offensive out of a total expenditure on NCADA of $33.85 million. (b) It is not practicable to split funding for the Drug Offensive on a State/Territory basis. (2) The National Drug Information Line recorded the following numbers of calls: April-23,631; May-15,352; June-5,446; July-3,361; August-5,328. (3) (a) The National Drug Information Line was set up to provide written information and referral numbers for counselling services. It is estimated that approximately 30% of the total number of callers were referred on to counselling services in their State by the National Drug Information Line. (b) The National Drug Information Line was designed primarily to provide information and advice to callers on the use and abuse of drugs. However, callers wishing to report offences were referred to the Drug Intelligence Reporting Centre or their local police. The number of resulting arrests is not known. (4) See 3 (b) above. (Question No. 1267) Senator Walters asked the Minister representing the Minister for Foreign Affairs, upon notice, on 20 August 1986: (1) What countries received foreign aid from Australia in the years 1982-83, 1983-84 and 1984-85. (2) What was the value of such aid in $A terms for each of the countries in the years in (1) above. (3) Would the Minister for Foreign Affairs indicate in what form the aid was provided; was it- (a) cash grants; (b) technical assistance; (c) education programmes; (d) supply of Australian-made products or produce; (e) supply of foreign-made products or produce; (f) purchases of Australian products or produce on favourable terms of credit or at discounted or subsidised rates; or (g) other. (4) If any, or all, of the aid provided for the years nominated in (1) above was provided to foreign governments by a means other than (3) (a) what was the value of such aid on a by year and by country basis. (5) Has the Australian Government conducted any enquiries within the recipient nations with regard to- (a) the effectiveness of the Australian aid; (b) the percentage of Australian aid that reaches the people or purpose for which the aid was granted; and (c) areas in which obvious gains are made by entrepreneurs or governments in recipient nations by way of fraud or conversion. (6) Where malpractice has become apparent in relation to supply or distribution of Australian aid in foreign nations what action has been taken by the Australian Government to ensure such malpractice is not recurrent. Senator Gareth Evans —The Minister for Foreign Affairs has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: (1) The number of developing countries receiving Australian aid during 1982-83, 1983-84 and 1984-85 was 91, 93 and 107 respectively. (2) The value of Australia's bilateral aid (at current prices) and the readily identifiable portions of multilateral aid received by developing countries are shown below: TABLE 1: Total Aid Expenditure Developing countries 1982-83 1983-84 1984-85 $'000 $'000 $'000 Afghanistan ... . . 6 29 Algeria ... 59 14 76 Angola ... 461 18 927 Antigua ... 35 19 8 Argentina ... 4 70 . . Bahamas ... 59 60 46 Bangladesh ... 21,501 30,681 19,509 Barbados ... . . 3 7 Belize ... . . 31 29 Benin ... . . . . 340 Bhutan ... 668 860 451 Bolivia ... . . . . 56 Botswana ... 2,665 382 796 Brazil ... 8 10 47 Brunei ... . . . . 135 Burma ... 12,633 10,747 9,148 Burundi ... 284 . . . . Cameroon ... 120 . . . . Chad ... . . . . 27 China ... 8,613 14,017 34,930 Chile ... 10 5 43 Columbia ... . . . . 27 Congo ... . . 195 . . Comoros ... 1,265 325 404 Cook Is. ... 699 371 995 Costa Rica ... . . . . 24 Cyprus ... 36 71 59 Djibouti ... 123 . . 522 Dominica ... 35 14 4 Dominican Republic ... 2 . . . . Egypt ... 7,228 6,677 7,940 El Salvador ... . . 75 81 Equador ... 20 669 20 Equatorial Guinea ... . . . . 27 Ethiopia ... 4,331 5,423 23,945 Fiji ... 12,757 10,524 16,384 Gambia ... 1,321 265 231 Ghana ... 2,037 2,115 1,189 Greece ... 2 . . . . Grenada ... 39 71 57 Guatemala ... . . . . 10 Guinea ... 47 117 111 Guinea Bissau ... . . . . 105 Guyana ... 11 42 88 Haiti ... . . . . 7 Honduras ... . . . . 8 Hong Kong ... 106 105 12,682 India ... 2,079 2,048 3,429 Indonesia ... 45,071 61,104 76,029 Israel ... . . . . 17 Jamaica ... 308 382 304 Jordan ... 557 421 741 Kampuchea ... 4,575 3,417 6,038 Kenya ... 6,926 3,135 7,846 Kiribati ... 2,289 2,283 3,459 Korea, Republic of ... 199 220 1,002 Laos ... 2,131 3,110 3,816 Lebanon ... 10,666 4,106 467 Lesotho ... 569 211 442 Liberia ... . . . . 17 Madagascar ... 1,163 654 851 Malawi ... 229 1,987 543 Malaysia ... 8,553 7,465 64,649 Maldives ... 458 615 1,287 Mali ... 4,060 1,950 150 Malta ... 131 249 32 Mauritania ... . . . . 71 Mauritius ... 2,760 2,922 2,512 Mexico ... 64 87 190 Morocco ... . . . . 113 Mozambique ... 3,165 2,602 4,400 Nauru ... 6 48 58 Nepal ... 2,317 3,286 2,738 New Caledonia ... 3 5 54 Nicaragua ... . . 82 198 Nigeria ... 458 467 553 Niue ... 251 132 105 Pacific Is. (US) ... 15 94 227 Pakistan ... 7,881 6,916 5,375 Papua New Guinea ... 274,947 302,280 321,699 Paraguay ... . . 5 . . Peru ... 38 15 13 Philippines ... 17,092 20,041 20,457 Polynesia (French) ... 13 12 96 Rwanda ... 45 . . . . Sao Tome & Principe ... . . . . 589 Somalia ... 2,306 3,583 3,742 Senegal ... 53 152 48 Seychelles ... 391 707 715 Sierra Leone ... 71 34 46 Singapore ... 2,029 2,273 10,523 Solomon Is. ... 8,830 7,270 8,629 Sri Lanka ... 9,025 5,663 6,991 St. Kitts-Nevis ... . . 45 38 St. Lucia ... 41 13 77 Sudan ... 3,509 1,186 3,600 Swaziland ... 544 325 511 Syria ... 61 198 574 St. Vincent ... 56 82 45 Thailand ... 15,676 24,615 30,544 Taiwan ... . . . . 186 Tanzania ... 9,145 10,858 6,572 Tokelau Islands ... 1 5 . . Tonga ... 4,602 4,986 6,789 Tunisia ... 41 13 83 Turkey ... 1 535 . . Tuvalu ... 1,148 1,187 1,385 Uganda ... 5,636 4,892 534 Vanuatu ... 5,881 5,134 5,584 Venezuela ... . . 4 10 Viet Nam, Soc. Rep. ... 1 498 4,061 Western Samoa ... 8,728 5,314 5,271 Yemen Democratic ... 549 1,047 664 Yemen ... 72 14 54 Zaire ... . . . . 33 Zambia ... 2,793 3,816 3,095 Zimbabwe ... 2,115 5,774 6,051 Total countries ... 559,503 606,556 768,546 Bilateral aid not allocated to countries ... 26,044 41,970 42,871 Multilateral aid not allocated to countries ... 144,637 169,397 182,286 Administrative Costs ... 14,436 15,245 17,690 Total Official Development Assistance (Net) ... 744,620 833,168 1,011,403 (3) It should be noted that the categories of aid specified in this question are not mutally exclusive. (a) Aid in the form of cash grants is almost entirely given as budget support to PNG. In 1984-85, this budget support was $299 million. A small proportion of bilateral aid is also provided in the form of accountable cash grants. All Pacific recipients of Australian aid receive some proportions as accountable cash grants. Some Indian Ocean states have also received small accountable grants. Each grant is provided for a specific development project which is subject to normal appraisal procedures. Since these grants are often a component of wider project aid, specific figures of cash grants in the years 1982-83, 1983-84 and 1984-85 would require detailed analysis of many current and completed projects. In 1984-85, however, accountable cash grants comprised only about 1% of total bilateral aid. (b) Technical assistance by definition includes many aspects of Australia's bilateral aid projects and all education programs and staffing assistance schemes. In 1984-85 bilateral projects (other than for PNG) accounted for approximately $147 million while staffing assistance involved about another $7 million. The net value of education and training programs in 1984-85 was approximately $139 million. (c) As indicated above, eduation and training accounted for $139 million dollars of aid expenditure in 1984-85. (d) The supply of Australian-sourced goods and produce to developing countries was approximately $133 million in 1985-86. Figures for 1984-85 are not available. Most goods are supplied through bilateral aid projects or as food aid. This does not include those monies spent on services provided by Australian institutions, firms and individuals. It also does not account for purchases of Australian goods directly by PNG as a result of Australian budget support. Of the major components of the aid program, only two-Papua New Guinea and non-food Multilateral Aid-are untied. These represented 49 per cent of the program in 1984-85. The remaining parts of the program are subject to some degree of tying and after allowing for such items as third country training, freight costs, local cost financing etc., approximately 45 per cent of total Australian aid can be regarded as tied. In particular, almost all the non-PNG bilateral aid program is tied in that: (i) contracts for services are let only to Australian companies (majority Australian shareholding); (ii) contracts for goods are subject to the 20% Australian content preference rule (e) No specific information is available on the supply of foreign made products or produce to the aid program. In particular some of the aid provided as cash grants is spent on goods not available in Australia or the developing country. An accurate estimate of the total figure would require the analysis of several hundred projects. (f) Australian suppliers of products or produce may apply for assistance under the Development Import Finance Facility to match offers made by vendors being assisted by their countries' mixed credit facilities. Such assistance is only provided to Australian firms where the supply of the goods or services is related to developmental need. In 1984-85 expenditure for this facility was about $12.5 million. Certain developing countries are provided with access to the Development Import Grants Scheme, which assist them in importing needed goods from Australia. This amounted to approximately $9 million in 1984-85. The use of such funds is closely monitored for compliance with established guidelines. (g) The majority of aid not covered above is provided to multilateral agencies and international financial institutions. This totalled approximately $182.3 million in 1984-85. Administrative expenditure accounted for approximately $17.6 million and the Overseas Officers of former Administrations and Australian Staffing Assistance Group (PNG) involved expenditure of about $12.4 million. (4) Non-grant aid to PNG amounted to $12.2, $14.2 and $21.4 million in the three years in question. The level of non-grant aid to all other recipients is approximately 99% of all bilateral aid expenditure (shown in Table 1). (5)- (a) The effectiveness of Australia's individual aid projects and activities are assessed through formal evaluations undertaken jointly by the Australian Development Assistance Bureau and the aid recipient following completion. Recipient countries also participate in all appraisals of proposed projects and activities prior to their implementation, to ensure that they will meet their agreed objectives. (b) Projects and activities are assessed against their stated objectives. While it is not possible to accurately quantify, the proportion of aid reaching the target group or groups is generally found to be very high. (c) The possibility of fraud or conversion in Australian-administered activities is low. The majority of aid is provided in the form of goods and services under the control of Australian program administrators. Normal Commonwealth Government financial controls apply to these activities. Where food aid is provided, Australian aid missions monitor the destination and use of shipments. The local costs of projects are generally funded by the recipient government. Where local costs are jointly-funded and tenders called within the developing country, procedures such as joint Australian-recipient tender boards are used to ensure that appropriate practices are followed. In the case of accountable cash grants, the appropriate use of the funds must be certified by the Auditor-General or equivalent senior official in the recipient country. This occurs at set stages of the funding before further payments are made. (6) In a program of almost one billion dollars expenditure each year, it is inevitable that some minor malpractice in recipient countries might go undetected. However there has been no significant case where a recipient has been found to benefit corruptly from Australian aid. All forms of Australian aid delivery are actively monitored and controlled and any proven misuse of aid could be responded to by the cessation of further aid within a short period. (Question No. 1485) Senator Mason asked the Minister representing the Attorney-General, upon notice, on 12 November 1986: Has the legal attache of the United States Embassy given information to you or your Department concerning an alleged record of criminal conviction of Dr Arthur J. Hempel of the USA; if so, what were these allegations. Senator Gareth Evans —The Attorney-General has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: On 27 June 1986 personal representations were made to me by Arthur J. Hempel. During that meeting documentary evidence purporting to verify the fact that Arthur J. Hempel had no criminal record in the United States of America was provided to me. As the question had been raised by Arthur J. Hempel, my Department wrote to the legal attache of the US Embassy on 30 June 1986 seeking to verify the claim. The legal attache responded to my Department's inquiry on 2 July 1986. In all the circumstances of this matter I consider that it is not appropriate for me to make further comment. (Question No. 1488) Senator Vallentine asked the Minister representing the Minister for Foreign Affairs, upon notice, on 13 November 1986: (1) Which companies have obtained a grant from the Development Import Finance Facility (DIFF), administered by the Australian Development Assistance Bureau, in each of the financial years 1982-83, 1983-84, 1984-85 and 1985-86. (2) Which companies applied for but were not able to obtain a grant from the DIFF scheme in each of the financial years 1982-83, 1983-84, 1984-85 and 1985-86. Senator Gareth Evans —The Minister for Foreign Affairs has provided the following answer to the honourable senator's question: (1) The following companies received DIFF grant funds in the financial years, and for proposed contracts in the countries, set out below: 1982-83 Snowy Mountains Electricity Corporation (SMEC) (Malaysia) 1983-84 Australian Overseas Project Corporation/Vocational and Technical Training Corporation of Australia (AOPC/VTTC) (Indonesia) SMEC (Malaysia) (same project as in 1982-83) 1984-85 AOPC/VTTC (Indonesia) (same project as in 1983-84) Broken Hill Engineering Pty Ltd (China) Pandrol Australia Pty Ltd (Indonesia) Vickers Keogh Pty Ltd (India) 1985-86 Australian Shipping Industries (W.A.) Pty Ltd (Solomon Islands) Broken Hill Engineering Pty Ltd (China) (same project as in 1984-85) Connor Shea and Co. Pty Ltd (Ethiopia) Transfield Pty Ltd (Indonesia). (2) In order to obtain grant funds under the DIFF scheme, an applicant company must first satisfy the Government's DIFF eligibility guidelines and then win an export contract from the developing country. The majority of applicants since the scheme's commencement during 1981-82 have satisfied the eligibility guidelines. Since 1984-85, when records commenced on the reasons why applicants have been found ineligible to receive DIFF offers, ADAB has rejected 19 out of some 70 applications. Most unsuccessful applicants failed either because their proposals were not of sufficient priority in the recipient country's national development plan, or because they were unable to show that foreign competitors were offering aid support to the recipient country (DIFF funds are offered only to match such competition). Some other applications could not be accepted due to insufficient DIFF funds, or because the proposed recipient country was not included in Australia's official development assistance program (another of the DIFF eligibility guidelines). On this basis, the following applications to ADAB for DIFF grant funds were rejected in 1984-85 and 1985-86: 1984-85 AOPC (Indonesia) Balfour Beatty Power Construction Australia Pty Ltd (Indonesia) Bundy Tubing (China) Fox Manufacturing Co. Pty Ltd (Thailand) Hawker Pacific Pty Ltd (Burma) John Holland Constructions Pty Ltd (China) Kailis Gulf Fisheries (Burma) NEC Australia Pty Ltd (Papua New Guinea) Omark (Bangladesh) Readings of Lismore Pty Ltd (India) Sabemo Pty Ltd/Airport Consulting and Construction Australia Pty Ltd (Indonesia) Sagric International Pty Ltd (Pakistan) Shedden Pacific Pty Ltd (Malaysia) SCEL Pty Ltd (Malaysia) Vickers Xatal Pty Ltd (India) Western Australian Overseas Projects Association (Thailand) Winslade and Co. Pty Ltd (Thailand) 1985-86 LSE Technology Pty Ltd (Papua New Guinea) Senator Grimes —On 13 November 1986 (Hansard, page 2140), Senator Michael Baume asked me, as Minister representing the Minister for Health, a question without notice concerning the amount spent so far on planning for the Australia Card. The Minister for Health has provided the following information: Expenditure for the 1985/86 financial year was $2,139,061, as well as a further $1,620,415 to the end of October this year, totalling $3,759,476. This money was appropriated for establishment of an Australia Card Secretariat within the Department of Health and for Australia Card planning by the Health Insurance Commission. There has been no ``secret project'' at the Government Printing Office for much of this year. As part of the planning process the Government Printing Office was consulted about the detection of security features in secure cards, but this extended only over a brief period of 2-3 weeks and did not involve 20 people working on a full-time basis. The Joint Select Committee on an Australia Card concluded that, regardless of the type of numbering system to be introduced, it was necessary to introduce some form of unique identifier in order to reduce tax evasion and welfare fraud. The Australia Card is the most effective form of unique identification system. Senator Grimes —On 14 November (Hansard, page 2252) Senator Knowles asked me, as Minister representing the Minister for Health, a question without notice concerning costs to the private sector in implementing the Australia Card program. The Minister for Health has provided the following information: In January 1986 the Government established an interdepartmental committee to evaluate, with the private sector, compliance costs of proposed taxation uses of the Australia Card. The committee wrote to 116 organisations inviting written responses. The letter to these organisations: conveyed a document outlining how various taxation uses of the Australia Card would apply in practice to individuals and entities within the private sector; and sought advice regarding quantification of any perceived costs and benefits which would apply to the organisation in complying with the tax use requirements. By May 1986, only 25 responses were received. All remaining organisations were contacted, and a further 8 responses were received. The detailed estimates across the banking industry (the only industry to provide such costs) concluded that establishment costs would be $60.6 million and the annual running costs would be $4.6 million. Comments made by the Business Regulation Review Unit (BRRU) concerning costs to the private sector do not apply to the Australia Card program. Dr Moran (Director of BRRU) said that, in general, there is a 2:1 business/Government ``paperburden'' cost in introducing government regulations. However, he said there was no evidence to suggest that such a ratio was applicable in the case of the Australia Card program. Senator Grimes —On 27 November 1986 (Hansard, page 2879), Senator Sheil asked Senator Walsh, as Minister for Finance, a question without notice concerning the Australia Card. Senator Walsh referred the question to the Minister for Health as the matter falls within his portfolio. The Minister for Health has provided the following information: Any person who has agreed to be an ``eligible representative'' of a club or business will be required to verify accounts operated by the club or business by providing his or her Australia Card number. The Australia Card number of the eligible representative will not, however, be reported to the Taxation Office. Once an account has been verified, subsequent transactions on that account will not require production of an Australia Card. Eligible representatives writing cheques on behalf of a club or business will not be required to include details of their Australia Card numbers on each cheque.