1998-06-263817SENATE420501998-06-26The PRESIDENT(Senator the Hon. Margaret Reid) took the chair at 9.30 a.m., and read prayers.Committees420542054205Motion (by Senator Calvert, at the request of Senator Crane)—by leave—agreed to:That the Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport Legislation Committee be authorised to hold a public hearing during the sitting of the Senate on Monday, 29 June 1998, from 12.30 p.m. till 1.00 p.m. for the purpose of taking evidence for the committee's inquiry into the Wheat Marketing Legislation Amendment Bill 1998 .Business42054205Motion (by Senator Ian Campbell) agreed to:That:(1) On Monday, 29 June 1998: (a) the hours of meeting shall be 12.30 pm to 6.30 pm and 7.30 pm to 11.10 pm; and (b) the question for the adjournment of the Senate shall be proposed at 10.30 pm.(2) On Tuesday, 30 June 1998: (a) the hours of meeting shall be 2 pm to 6.30 pm and 7.30 pm to 11.10 pm; (b) the routine of business from 7.30 pm to 10.30 pm shall be government business only; and (c) the question for the adjournment of the Senate shall be proposed at 10.30 pm.(3) On Thursday, 2 July 1998: (a) the hours of meeting shall be 9.30 am to 6.30 pm and 7.30 to 11.10 pm; (b) the consideration of general business and consideration of committee reports and government responses shall not be proceeded with; (c) the routine of business from 7.30 pm to 10.30 pm shall be government business only; (d) divisions may take place after 6 pm; and (e) the question for the adjournment of the Senate shall be proposed at 10.30 pm.(4) The Senate shall sit on Friday, 3 July 1998, and that: (a) the hours of meeting shall be 9.30 am to 4.25 pm; (b) the routine of business shall be government business only; (c) the sitting of the Senate shall be suspended from approximately 12.30 pm for up to one hour until the ringing of the bells; and (d) the question for the adjournment of the Senate shall be proposed at 3.45 pm.Bills4205r518Billsr5164205Debate resumed from 25 June, on motion by Senator Newman:That these bills be now read a second time.upon which Senator O'Brien had moved by way of amendment:At the end of the motion, add:"and that the Senate:(a) notes the use of public funds to facilitate the payment of redundancies on the waterfront; and(b) reaffirms the principle, stated previously in resolutions of 9 December 1971, 23 October 1974, 18 September 1980, 4 June 1984 and 29 May 1997, that there are no areas in connection with the expenditure of public funds where any person has a discretion to withhold details or explanations from the Parliament or its committees unless the Parliament has expressly provided otherwise; and(c) reminds the Government of the Senate's expectation that the operations of the Maritime Industry Finance Company (MIFCo), supported by Commonwealth guarantee, will be transparent and accountable to the Parliament".09:32:004205Cooney, Sen BarneySenator COONEYSF4VICALP00—Last night I was pointing out that the Stevedoring Levy (Collection) Bill 1998 in its thrust is similar to the Employment Security Bill 1998 that was debated yesterday on the initiative of Senator Sue Mackay. I say that because in both bills there is an expectation that related companies will take responsibility for the wages that a particular member of that group has to pay to its employees. It would be a good thing if these two bills were to set a trend that had general application, but whether that happens remains to be seen.May I say that the Stevedoring Levy (Collection) Bill very much reflects the philosophy of the collective responsibility of people which comes from a different philosophy from that which says each company, each person, each individual, should be responsible for his or her or its own actions. The philosophy which says, `Look, market forces, efficiency and competition should rule the day,' is denied by this Stevedoring Levy (Collection) Bill, as it is with Senator Sue Mackay's Employment Security Bill in so far as it says that actions taken by one particular company should be the responsibility of a whole group.There are some matters which, if I raise them now, will save time during the committee stage. What I am concerned about are clauses 14 and 15 in part 4 of the miscellaneous section of this bill. Clause 15 provides that an inspector may be appointed in writing by the secretary. That person can be a person employed by the Commonwealth and a person employed by a state or by the Northern Territory. It is a very broad provision. That inspector is given power on the basis of a warrant from a justice of the peace to break into houses to get information that may be relevant to the matters raised by this bill.It seems to me a very serious business that this bill should provide powers to anybody chosen by the Commonwealth, as long as he is employed by the Commonwealth, to break into people's houses on a warrant issued by a justice of the peace. I have always had great respect for justices of the peace, but I am concerned that lay people, as justices of the peace are, should have the power to give people who are not trained as police are in proper investigative procedures to any employee of the Commonwealth to break into houses to search for documents.I hope when the Minister for Communications, the Information Economy and the Arts (Senator Alston) comes to speak about that he will address that concern. We are seeing our liberties more and more curtailed by provisions such as this. No doubt there will be a suggestion that these sorts of provisions are in other acts. Of course, that is the problem. What happens is that these bills are simply drafted on the basis of precedence and, because the precedent is there, it is said that it is all right.We have come to the stage where people should be able to walk free and should be able to go about their business without employees of the Commonwealth, with no particular training in this area, breaking into premises to look for documents. They could do it at night, as I look at this. I had not realised that until I went through this provision again. Such a person can use force to come into a person's premises at night to search for documents. It seems to me that that is a matter of great concern.The other issue I want to address is clause 19 of the Stevedoring Levy (Collection) Bill 1998 which says:19 Distribution of Surplus Levy(1) If the Minister is satisfied that more levy has been received by the Commonwealth than is needed for the purpose for which the levy was imposed, the Minister may determine that the surplus is to be distributed in accordance with a scheme prescribed by the regulations for the purposes of this section.(2) The Consolidated Revenue Fund is appropriated for the purposes of payments under subsection (1).That allows the minister, by regulations, to apply money for any purposes at all, whether in accordance with this act or outside it. It seems to me to be an extraordinary provision that would allow a minister, without the sanctioning of parliament, at a primary level at least, to spend money for whatever purpose. It may be for paying legal costs, it may be for using in the same way as a grant may be used by the Minister for Finance and Administration, and so on. I think it is a dangerous trend to have money spent by a minister without the sanctioning of parliament.If that scheme was prescribed by regulations while parliament was not sitting, for example, the money would be spent and disposed of before we came back to do anything about it. It would be all right looking at and disallowing the regulation once the money was spent, but it is a very dangerous trend that I see in the miscellaneous parts of this bill where money is spent according to a scheme which has not been sanctioned by parliament, where we have untrained investigators going into houses on the say-so of a justice of the peace—justices of the peace not trained in the law. It is a very worrying trend which is brought out by this particular bill.The other thing concerns collection of the levy. Clause 13 of the bill says that if somebody does not pay the levy then that becomes a debt due to the Commonwealth and that the Commonwealth can collect a levy on the basis of evidence provided by a statement or averment in the complaint. What will happen is that stevedoring companies which in no way have contributed to the awful and horrible events that we have experienced on the wharf, as has so eloquently been pointed out by previous speakers, where men were shut out of their job—companies who have treated their workers as they ought to have been treated and have a very appropriate scheme in place to see that the work force is properly cared for and where there is a mutual exchange of responsibilities between employer and employee—are going to have to pay money for something that was not in any way their responsibility. If they do not pay, they are going to be taken to court and the evidence to be used against them will simply be a written statement.I know, Madam Deputy President, in your high regard—as I have noted over the years—in here for there to be proper evidence, that people should stick by their word and that there ought to be proof, you would understand the real danger in all this. Again, it will be said that this has been done before. Having been done before is no reason why it should be done now, particularly where a decent company that has acted correctly is going to have to pay for a company that has not acted properly, and the evidence against the company which has acted properly is simply going to be an averment, a statement, on a piece of paper. It would be interesting to see who would make the averment, whether it is somebody who knows in fact that the debt is due.I think the concept behind this act—that there ought to be mutual help and responsibility between a group of companies or a group of people who pursue the same profession, employment or industry—is a good idea. I think it is proper that we come back to a communal idea of things rather than the individualistic one which is presently operating. If we are going to do that, it is proper that we treat everybody fairly so that the one who is responsible for the problems in the first place is not allowed to simply put all their burdens onto somebody else and that those other companies should be treated in the way that clause 4 of this particular bill treats them, not in the way that clause 13 treats them.Turning to clause 8(1), it says:(1) Subject to this section, levy on loading or unloading is payable by the person (the responsible person ) who was responsible for the loading or unloading (otherwise than in the capacity of agent of the owner or charterer of the ship).That of course puts it onto the stevedoring companies. At clause 8(2) it says:(2) If the responsible person is a body corporate, then the following persons are instead jointly and severally liable to pay the levy:If in fact Patrick's, in this case, did not pay the levy, then other people are responsible—that is, the responsible person, Patrick's, and each other body corporate that is a related body corporate at the time of the loading or unloading. A responsible body is defined in section 50 of the Corporations Law as being:(a) a holding company of another body corporate;(b) a subsidiary of another body corporate; or(c) a subsidiary of a holding company of another body corporate; the first-mentioned body and the other body are related to each other.Of course, that concept goes against the stripping exercise that was performed by Patrick in this case, and that is good to see.I conclude by simply saying that this bill does a lot of good things, though it has to be put into proper shape. But the tendency of government to oppress people must be stopped. Simply because a person belongs to a company, simply because a person may come from a body that is seen as being powerful in the community or simply because a person is in a powerful position does not justify others treating them in a manner less than their civil rights demand.This is an outrageous bill in terms of the civil rights it treads upon. Everybody—no matter whether they are the poorest or the richest, and all those in between—is entitled to civil rights. To simply pass the provisions that are set out in clause 4 of this particular bill seems to me to be quite outrageous.09:49:004208Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—I thank senators for their contributions. I think it is clear that the opposition is not serious about waterfront reform. We know they had many years in which to make these changes and all we saw were incremental changes at great cost to taxpayers. We have a different approach, and we believe that we have the basis for real reform which can be achieved.We have an effective statutory regime. Funds will be provided to support the reform and restructuring of stevedoring, not paid for by taxpayers, with all costs recovered by a levy on containers and vehicles. A number of people, particularly Senator Calvert, have argued strenuously and successfully to protect Tasmanian interests, and I note that the opposition now agrees that Tasmania should not be subject to the levy for Bass Strait trade.The Minister for Workplace Relations and Small Business, Mr Reith, has already announced that there will be an exemption applying to local cargo. It was proposed to introduce an amendment to that effect, but we have been advised of some difficulties with it. Instead, a regulation will be introduced to take effect at the same time as the legislation comes into force. Mr Reith has discussed this approach with the Premier of Tasmania, who accepts it.The legislation provides considerable incentives to stevedores to drive reform and to meet the government's productivity objec tives. It allows them to reduce the appalling level of overmanning, improve training, reduce the unacceptable level of injury and introduce new technology. It does so in a manner and through a mechanism which ensures high levels of accountability and parliamentary scrutiny. More than two years ago the government committed itself to an active role in bringing desperately needed reform to a waterfront where overmanning and rorts prevailed. With this legislation, we deliver on that promise.The MUA and the ACTU have now signed up to productivity improvements they have fought and rejected year after year. The legislation will ensure that the government, through the Maritime Industry Finance Co., will be able to pay redundancy benefits to at least 736 Patrick Stevedores employees at absolutely no cost to taxpayers. It will ensure that P&O Ports and indeed other stevedores will be able to implement a similar strategy in the near future. Within a few months, the government, through its unwavering determination, will have achieved dramatic and longlasting reform of the waterfront. The legislation is a key component in bringing that about. I commend the legislation to the chamber.Amendment agreed to.Original question, as amended, resolved in the affirmative.Bill read a second time.4208STEVEDORING LEVY (COLLECTION) BILL 1998The bill.09:52:004208Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—by leave—I move:(1) Clause 5, page 3 (after line 16), after the definition of loading , insert: local cargo means cargo that is consigned from a port in Australia to another port in Australia, other than cargo that is consigned, on a through sea-carriage document, to or from a port outside Australia. For the purposes of this definition, Australia includes the external Territories.(2) Clause 5, page 3 (after line 17), after the definition of month , insert: sea-carriage document means any of the following: (a) a bill of lading; (b) a consignment note; (c) a sea waybill; (d) a ship's delivery order; (e) any similar document.(3) Clause 7, page 5 (after line 18), at the end of the clause, add: (4) Levy is not payable on the loading or unloading of local cargo.The opposition moves these amendments to exempt domestic cargo. In his summing up in the second reading, the minister said that domestic cargo for Tasmania will be exempt, but I was not quite sure about his explanation for the rest of domestic cargo in Australia. The drift I got—and I would appreciate some more information on this—is that the rest of Australia's domestic cargo will be exempt, but it will not be done by provision in the legislation; there will be some regulatory arrangement whereby the rest of domestic cargo will be exempt.The opposition is always willing to cooperate because we are the alternative government and we understand that many things have to be done by regulation. However, with the long history of this sorry saga of the government trying to deal with waterfront reform and the way it has gone about it—on which many senators have eloquently spoken—by trying to destroy the MUA and the workers on the waterfront, the opposition is not exactly trustful at the moment of allowing things to be done by some future regulation. Although it will obviously be a disallowable instrument, once you allow something to be a regulation we know in the Senate that it is basically in the hands of the government and you can only reject a regulation.It is very difficult to make policy by regulation or amend it in the Senate. You can keep rejecting it and the government can keep putting in another regulation. We are very cautious at the moment about leaving this to a commitment from the government to do it by regulation. We would like much more information as to why this has to be done by regulation rather than, as we are proposing, by— 5F4CALVERTSenator Calvert—Read the constitution.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—Thank you, Senator Calvert. If that is the case, then the minister should have explained it in his summing up of the second reading debate. We would like to get much more detail on the record from the minister and from the government as to why we can trust this being done by regulation rather than by what we are proposing, which is an amendment to the legislation that is open, clear and transparent to everybody.Minister, before I move formally and ask for a vote on our amendments, I would like you to respond in more detail about how this is going to be achieved by regulation. At the moment, the opposition is in no position to trust this government on anything it says about the waterfront in view of the fact that your government has consistently misled the Australian public and the parliament over policy issues on the waterfront.09:55:004209Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—Firstly, we would not be interested in ratting on an agreement with the Premier of Tasmania, Tony Rundle. In fact, we would not be able to discriminate in favour of Tasmania and against other states. Given that we have reached publicly disclosed agreement with the Premier, clearly the benefits of that will flow on to other states as well. The regulatory approach avoids some of the constitutional difficulties that are implicit in legislation that may or may not be invalid in terms of discrimination between states.If you came to government, Senator Schacht, you would have the ability to proclaim regulations to give effect to this across the board, so it is not just for the benefit of Tasmania, but it gives you all the flexibility you require, and it does not expose you to some of the constitutional and other legal difficulties that might flow from trying to embed it in legislation.09:56:004209Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—On this matter, Minister, are you saying that even the exemption for Tasmania, which is an agreement reached between Mr Reith and Mr Rundle, would be covered by regulation? 09:56:004210Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—I am saying that that is simply the most visible aspect of what will be an across-the-board exemption for local cargo. Tasmania was particularly concerned. Mr Reith had discussions with the Premier, who agrees that regulation is preferable in these circumstances and, because you cannot discriminate between states, the benefits will flow through to the other states. So all states will get the same benefits; it was just that Tasmania was the one that was most visible in raising its concerns.09:57:004210O'Brien, Sen KerrySenator O'BRIEN8O6TASALP00—It seems to me that it is important, firstly, to protect Tasmania, it being the state most reliant on the coastal trade and the state that would have potentially suffered most from the imposition of a levy on its cargo, given the unsatisfactory state of the so-called undertakings to absorb the levy by Patrick's and P&O and, certainly, no undertakings by Brambles, for example, which is heavily engaged in that cargo. It seems to me that, in relation to the argument that the minister puts that somehow the constitution is relevant to whether this matter is dealt with by regulation or amendment, if there is a constitutional problem with an amendment to the legislation, then the sublegislative prescription—the regulation—would be subject to the same problem.It would also be much more appealing to me, representing the state of Tasmania, if this matter were clear from day one, and that, at the point where this bill is being voted on at the third reading stage, all parties—be it the Tasmanian Premier, the government, the opposition, the other parties, the stevedores, or the users of stevedoring services—knew that this matter was put beyond doubt. The way to put it beyond doubt is to carry the amendment that the opposition has moved. In the interests of my state, I urge the government to reconsider its position, to accept the amendment, or to show us what the actual difficulties are with the words of the amendment so that we can understand why there is a difficulty. Frankly, I cannot understand what the difficulty is—and it has not been enunciated.It has not been enunciated for the Senate; it has not been enunciated publicly anywhere else, as far as I am aware. It may have been enunciated for the Premier of Tasmania but, as far as I am aware, he has not revealed any difficulties with this approach. I suggest that he would be quite happy, as would the whole of Tasmania, with the amendment moved by the opposition. Indeed, all states would be happy with the certainty that our amendment would give this legislation in relation to ensuring that containers carried by sea to all parts of Australia, by way of domestic trade, would be exempt from the levy. That is the sole purpose of this amendment. Minister, the point ought to be made clear as to why there is a technical problem—if there is a technical problem—with the amendment so that we can consider this properly now, resolve this matter now, and have certainty on this matter, before this bill is passed by the Senate.10:01:004210Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—If the opposition is interested in certainty, I will give it to them. We will undertake that, as soon as the regulation making power is in place, a regulation will be proclaimed as soon as possible thereafter which will give full effect to this, and not just for the benefit of Tasmania, but for the benefit of all other states. In that way, you will be free of any constitutional challenge. You will have what you want. What you want is certainty that Tasmania and the rest of the states will be protected, and they will be protected by a regulation which will be proclaimed as soon as possible, which I understand to mean a matter of days. So if you want maximum certainty, you will get it.10:01:004210Cooney, Sen BarneySenator COONEYSF4VICALP00—The issue raised by Senator O'Brien should be answered. Can you give us an example of where a regulation was able to do more than the act that it depended upon? That is what he is asking, and I think that has got to be answered. In my view, from what I have read over the years, regulations cannot go beyond the power given to them by the act, and that is what Senator O'Brien is asking about. I think we need an answer.10:02:004211Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—Minister, our amendment proposes that all domestic cargo, between all states and territories of Australia, be exempt. Therefore, how can that be constitutionally challenged? If our amendment was proposing that the exemption only be for one or two states, then I would agree with you that it could be constitutionally challenged in that we would be discriminating against one state or another. But we are not proposing that. We are proposing an amendment that does not name any state or territory. It is an exemption for all domestic trade, and we have the sovereign right to make legislation about that, under the Australian constitution. You say our amendment is going to be constitutionally challenged, when we are not playing footsies or having favouritism between states or territories. Until you can answer that, Minister, we think you are up to no good.10:03:004211Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—I have told you that we have precisely the same aim and objective as you do. Do you want to get political advice on how to stall the bill or do you want to get an answer to the question you have just asked?4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—If you want to play that game, Richard, we'll be here for days.LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—Do you want an answer or not? You cannot do two things at once. I will give you the answer. Let them play their little games on the side when someone else is talking.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—You talk all the time to your advisers and I don't abuse you about it. So don't abuse me when I'm talking to one.10000TEMPORARY CHAIRMANThe TEMPORARY CHAIRMAN (Senator Knowles)—Order! Senator Schacht!LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—The answer is that not only are there constitutional problems that arise when you discriminate between states but there are also concerns about—4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—We're not discriminating between states, you dope.LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—Just a minute! About adhering to your international obligations, and you know as well as I do that the scrutiny that is brought to bear by bodies such as the WTO is very much focused on legislation. If you want to make sure that you have maximum flexibility, the best way to do it is by regulation. If you want to run the risk of having one form of words that turns out to be wrong, then you put it in legislation. If you want to have the flexibility to be able to ensure that you comply with your international obligations but achieve the objective that I have given you a guarantee that we will implement, then you do it by way of regulation.10:05:004211Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—Now, for the first time, we have extra information provided. After three questions to the minister, he now mentions the WTO. But we are talking about domestic trade. As I understand it, the WTO is about international trade. How can you now raise that we have a problem with the WTO, Minister, when we are only talking about domestic trade? So we have knocked you over on the constitutional argument because there is no discrimination in our amendment between states or territories; it is about domestic trade. Now you are raising the WTO, but that is about international trade and this amendment is about domestic trade.How can you raise the issue of the WTO, on the advice that you have got? Many people in this parliament as well as elsewhere in Australia will be staggered to hear that we cannot make decisions about our own domestic trade because it is in contravention of the WTO, which is an international trade arrangement.10:06:004211Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—I have told you I gave the WTO as an example—4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—As an example?LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—Of international obligations. It is particularly important to ensure that legislation complies. Our view is that you have much more flexibility and confidence that you will achieve your objective if you go down this path. Do you want to see local cargo exempted in all states or don't you? We guarantee it by regulation. You want to put in place legislation that may or may not turn out to be valid. If you want absolute certainty, you give the same undertaking that we give. You go down that path, you put in a regulation making power and you allow that regulation to come into force as soon as possible. That is the only way in which you will get certainty. If you do not want certainty, you are simply playing games.10:07:004212Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—Minister, it is extraordinary to say that you will get more certainty by regulation—regulations as yet unsighted. You have not even given us a draft of the regulation. I would have thought that, if this would give us more certainty than our amendment, you would have fronted up today and given us a draft of the actual regulation.That is not available, so we are asked to buy a pig in a poke. As I say, the record of this government does not commend us to have any trust in buying something on regulation. You have not been able to answer either of the two issues I have raised with you. The constitutional argument you raise is absolutely flawed, because we are not discriminating between states and territories in our amendment. And you cannot answer the argument that domestic trade is subject to the WTO, the World Trade Organisation. You only qualified your words and are now saying `Maybe'. That is unsatisfactory. The opposition will insist on its amendment, and we will get on with the job of putting certainty for the Australian people into the legislation.10:08:004212Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—The Australian Democrats will be guided throughout the consideration of these bills by two considerations; firstly, that the bills are primarily for the benefit of retrenched workers; and, secondly, that the matter is urgent. Accordingly, I should advise my Labor colleagues in the Senate that I have listened to this discussion and what I have heard very clearly from the minister is as follows. He has given an unequivocal guarantee that local cargo will be exempt. Frankly, I think the Labor Party's choice of route is better—a legislative route—but if the govern ment introduces it by regulation and does so soon enough, I and you will be content if it happens. Your concern, Senator Schacht, is that it might not happen.A minister of the crown has guaranteed that it will happen—and very seldom in my experience have I heard Senator Alston, of all people, unequivocally give such a guarantee. Because of that and because of the need for speed and to look after those workers, I will accept the minister's guarantee and I will not vote for Labor Party amendments (1) and (3) if the minister is opposed.I wish to ask a question of the minister concerning item (2) on sheet 1061. Minister, item (2) seems to me to provide a helpful additional definition. It is possible that the wording of the definition may in fact exclude legitimate matters which should have been included. If you were inclined to accept amendment (2), I would obviously accept that, but if you were inclined to reject it and the word `means' were changed to `includes', would that second definitional amendment on sheet 1061, item (2), be acceptable to government? What is your attitude to that, please?10:10:004212Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—I am not clear what Senator Murray is referring to on the latter point, but on the first point I am grateful for the acceptance of our undertaking. I can go further in providing a copy of the draft regulation in the not too distant future.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—That is today, some time?LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—Yes, within a matter of minutes, as I understand it. If Senator Murray could explain to me a little more carefully—for my benefit—what he was referring to, then I will certainly answer it.10:11:004212Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—These have all been moved together. Frankly, I would have preferred if (1) and (2) had been moved together and (3) separately.LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—Are you talking about the amendments standing in the name of Senator Schacht?3M6Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY—Yes, I am. Item (2)LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—I see, item (2) about the levy. That is the Sealand amendment, is it?3M6Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY—No, we are referring to sheet 1061. Item (2) has a definition on the sea-carriage document. Perhaps, Minister, I can recap. If you refer to sheet 1061, items (1) to (3) were moved together, but item (2) is distinct, in my view, from items (1) and (3), which refer to the matter which has been previously discussed. Item (2) is a definitional addition which struck me as being helpful, and I wondered what your attitude was to the definition and, if you were inclined to reject it, whether changing the word `means' to `includes' would be acceptable to you. I just need to know your attitude to all three of the amendments which are before us.10:12:004213Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—I think the short answer is that amendment (2) provides a definition of sea-carriage document but that is relevant only because it is amplifying what is contained in amendment (1). In other words, amendment (1) talks about sea-carriage document, and if you do not proceed with item (1) then there is no point in defining in amendment (2) what you meant.10:13:004213Cooney, Sen BarneySenator COONEYSF4VICALP00—As I understand it, the government is going to carry out the intent of the amendments moved by Senator Schacht by means of regulations. But clause 7 of the bill is very specific. It says, `Levy is payable', and it imposes a series of levies on containers and on self-propelled loading of vehicles. So that is very specific. Every container and every vehicle described in clause 7 is going to have to pay the levy.As I understand it—and this is what I want an explanation about—the regulations are going to have to be made under clause 20. There seems to be nothing, as I read down the regulations there, that would enable the government—or anybody else for that matter—to make regulations that override the requirements of clause 7. Indeed, there is no provision in the regulations power that would enable you to do it. Regulation 1 states:The Governor-General may make regulations prescribing matters: (a) required or permitted by this Act to be prescribed;There is nothing that would permit an exemption in the act. The regulation further states:. . . necessary or convenient to be prescribed for carrying out or giving effect to this Act.Again, there is nothing in there. If you look at subsection (2) of the regulation power contained in section 20, there is nothing in there. What I would be interested to know is where you are going to get the power in the bill, or from the act if the bill becomes an act, to make the regulations. If you read the bill as a whole, it is quite contrary to the regulations that you want to make. If you look at the regulation power, there is nothing in there to enable you to do it.10:15:004213Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—The answer is that the regulation making power is contained in the imposition bill, not the collection bill. If Senator Cooney looks at clauses 5 and 6, he will see that 5 permits a zero rate to be prescribed and 6 permits regulations to be made to give effect to any part of clause 5.10:16:004213Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—There is one other matter about this levy. Does the exemption on domestic trade on levy mean that a car going on a fast ferry from Cape Jervis to Kangaroo Island—which is very important for the tourist trade on Kangaroo Island—would have to pay the levy or not under your regulation?LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—No levy. Question put: That the amendments (Senator Schacht's ) be agreed to.10:21:00The committee divided. (The Chairman—Senator S. M. West)23Bishop, M. Brown, B.Campbell, G. Carr, K.Collins, J. M. A. Conroy, S.Cooney, B. Crowley, R. A.Denman, K. J. Evans, C. V. *Forshaw, M. G. Harradine, B.Hogg, J. Lundy, K.Mackay, S. Margetts, D.McKiernan, J. P. Murphy, S. M.Neal, B. J. O'Brien, K. W. K.Quirke, J. A. Schacht, C. C.West, S. M.35Abetz, E. Allison, L.Alston, R. K. R. Bartlett, A. J. J.Boswell, R. L. D. Bourne, V.Calvert, P. H. *Campbell, I. G.Chapman, H. G. P. Coonan, H.Eggleston, A. Ellison, C.Gibson, B. F. Heffernan, W.Herron, J. Kemp, R.Knowles, S. C. Lees, M. H.Lightfoot, P. R. Macdonald, S.McGauran, J. J. J. Minchin, N. H.Murray, A. Newman, J. M.O'Chee, W. G. Parer, W. R.Patterson, K. C. L. Payne, M. A.Reid, M. E. Stott Despoja, N.Tierney, J. Troeth, J.Vanstone, A. E. Watson, J. O. W.Woodley, J.Bolkus, N. Tambling, G. E. J.Cook, P. F. S. Crane, W.Crossin, P. M. MacGibbon, D. J.Faulkner, J. P. Synon, K. M.Gibbs, B. Brownhill, D. G. C.Ray, R. F. Ferguson, A. B.Reynolds, M. Hill, R. M.Sherry, N. Macdonald, I.* denotes tellerQuestion so resolved in the negative.10:25:004214Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—by leave—I move:(1) Clause 5, page 3 (after line 17), after the definition of month , insert: payment in connection with this Act means a payment: (a) upon termination of employment, to a person employed in the stevedoring industry, equivalent to the payment that person would normally expect to receive upon termination of his or her employment on the ground of redundancy, including: (i) redundancy pay; and (ii) payments in lieu of notice; and (iii) payments for accrued leave entitlements; and (b) funded, directly or indirectly, from amounts raised by the levy imposed by the Stevedoring Levy (Imposition) Act 1998 .(3) Clause 18, page 12 (lines 2 to 4), omit subclause (1), substitute:(1) The Minister may authorise payments for the reform or restructuring of the stevedoring industry provided that such payments are for the purpose of: (a) payments in connection with this Act; or (b) the reasonable costs of administering the scheme.(4) Clause 18, page 12 (after line 4), after subclause (1), insert:(1A) The Minister must not authorise payments for the purpose of paragraph (1)(a) except in relation to persons employed by stevedoring companies that were employers of stevedoring labour on 30 June 1997.These amendments are specifically designed to ensure that the payments are not made to the Patrick companies but go to where we want the money to go—that is, to the workers. Again, this is about honesty and ensuring that this government does not slip out of its obligations. As I have said before, the opposition on this matter does not take the word of the government because we believe there is now a demonstrably proven history that this government will say one thing in parliament and do another thing privately as part of their obsession to attack the workers in the Maritime Union. These recommendations are open and transparent, to make sure that the appropriation—the money being provided by the levy—goes to the workers in accordance with the agreements reached in negotiation. These amendments are consistent with the recommendation of the minority report from the Labor members of the Senate Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport Legislation Committee. We understand the government has indicated broad support for this approach but has yet to give us a form of words despite a number of meetings. I do not know whether that is still the case or whether they have given us further indication of what the form of words are and whether they will accept this amend ment. It seems to us it is just good public policy to accept this amendment. If this form of words is not appropriate and you have a better form of words, being a cooperative and constructive opposition, we will be willing to have a look at it. But we believe, as a minimum, our amendments should stand because they will ensure, in an open and transparent way, that what the parliament desires to happen will happen and there is no backsliding from the government.10:27:004215Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—We will not support the amendments moved by the opposition, but we will support an amendment that the Australian Democrats have put forward. The reasons are briefly these: the opposition amendments would limit the purposes for which payments may be authorised by the minister under clause 18. We have noted the concerns of the Senate Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport Legislation Committee which has itself proposed amendments that would specify the limits of the power of the minister. However, the effects of the limitations proposed by the opposition would be to inappropriately circumscribe the minister's powers. So we are proposing to support the Democrats on the reporting arrangements.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—Is that on sheet 1054?LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—Yes, I think that is right.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—That is the Democrat amendment. You circulated to the Senate a government amendment. LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—We would not support the Democrat one on 1054, but we would support the Democrat reporting one on 1059.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—Can I ask, Minister, if the government amendment sheet covers the same area. If it does, are you withdrawing that in favour of the Democrat amendment? There is one here without a number on it. Madam Chairman, can you put a number on it to help us?10000CHAIRMANThe CHAIRMAN—I cannot put a number on it. It is to clause 18, page 12, lines 2 to 4.LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—The one without the number on it we are not withdrawing.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—That covers a completely different area from the Democrat one. Did I get that clear? LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—Yes.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—Thank you. Minister, did you circulate any amendment that you have now withdrawn in favour of the Democrat amendment on this matter?LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—No.10:30:004215O'Brien, Sen KerrySenator O'BRIEN8O6TASALP00—I think it is rather curious that the government is not prepared to accept the amendment that Labor proposes. In the inquiry stage of this bill, it was clear from the evidence given by Mr Corrigan that the only matter that seemed to him relevant to the seven benchmark areas with which he had undertaken to comply as a quid pro quo for accessing the provisions of this legislation was to achieve redundancies. So the Labor Party's amendment in relation to this matter is clearly attending to the only matter that Mr Corrigan put forward as relevant to achieving those seven benchmark achievements which were proposed by the government when they announced this stevedoring bill prior to Easter.Having seen what is reported to have been Mr Corrigan's comments in the Australian Financial Review this morning, I can foresee that Mr Corrigan and Patrick's are going to use what is effectively a suggestion that they will not pass on savings they achieve through reform unless they get more money from this government one way or the other. Leaving the bill as it stands allows the minister to be pressured in that regard given the total discretion that I believe he will have in determining just what matters will attract payments under this bill.I am not very satisfied that this parliament will pass legislation which will allow this game to take place, because there is no doubt that Patrick's and Mr Corrigan will play whatever games they can to get their hands on further Commonwealth moneys. I think the gambit has already commenced. If you want any further evidence of the lack of good faith in this matter from Mr Corrigan, you have only to see what is reported in today's paper, where he says of the negotiations with the Maritime Union:"People who want you to believe this could have been achieved through peaceful negotiations are living in fantasy land," he said. "There is a timeframe of more than two years [of negotiation] where we achieved nothing."That absolutely contradicts the evidence that we received that there were 217 jobs on the table last year and Mr Corrigan's excuse to the Maritime Union for not being able to agree at that time was that he did not have any money to pay redundancies. He is not even being honest with the newspaper reporter who quoted him when he said that nothing was achieved. It was achieved.There is only one thing which will come out of leaving the bill as it currently stands in relation to the total discretion of the minister to make payments, and that is to allow Mr Corrigan and Patrick's to play the game to try to get public moneys up-front to fund whatever costs he wants to have funded, and we really do not know what they could be because of the breadth of this bill in this regard. In relation to that matter, he will then have the benefits of his competitors, if the bill is not amended in the way we propose later, funding the making of those payments to Patrick.It may be that P&O seeks similar assistance. We do not know. What this parliament has to do is make certain that this bill provides for bona fide redundancy payments and associated administrative costs. That is what the Labor amendment proposes. That will give this parliament certainty, and that will prevent the minister being willingly or unwillingly forced to make extra payments to Patrick outside of that area.10:35:004216Cooney, Sen BarneySenator COONEYSF4VICALP00—As I understand it, the opposition is moving amendments 1, 3 and 4 on sheet 1041. The minister has said that the government opposes the Democrat amendment on sheet 1054, which does seem to be in the same sort of area as that, but supports the amendment on sheet 1059 as a substitute for the opposition's amendment. The amendment on sheet 1059 seems to have nothing to do with the matters that Senator Schacht and Senator O'Brien have addressed. Sheet 1059 talks about `Reports by Minister'. Could the minister clarify that? That seems to be a different issue from the issues that have been addressed so far by Senator Schacht and Senator O'Brien?10:36:004216Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—The answer is that the amendment on sheet 1059 relates to reporting, and I made that clear before. The vice that we see in the opposition amendments, and they are substantially mirrored by the Democrat amendment, is that they are far too narrow.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—Oh!LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—I will come to that in a second. Taking Senator O'Brien's point, Mr Corrigan has publicly signed off on an agreement that will involve a certain number of redundancies at no cost to the taxpayer on the basis that they will absorb those costs. If that is not the case or if there is anything that we believe is not in good faith support of those arrangements, then there is the discretion in the minister not to proceed to make payments.The difficulty we have with the opposition amendments is that they are very narrow. They only allow payments for a very small number of specific items. It seems to us that that would allow payments to redundant employees, but it would not allow the minister to make a number of other payments that are essential for the scheme to facilitate reform and restructuring. Particularly, they would not allow the making of payments to a third party for the purpose of assisting third party payments to redundant stevedores. That is exactly the mechanism we have in mind by establishing MIFCo. We have been advised that that approach will minimise the up-front call on taxpayers' funds. Furthermore, opposition and Democrat amendments would not allow the government to support reform initiatives such as occupational health and safety programs, training programs, the introduction of new technology or the improvement of wharf facilities. Those additional matters are all contained in our government amendments.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—We're just going to give Corrigan a bagful of money, are we?LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—No, quite the opposite. That is why I say, if you look at the very beginning of it, it says, `The Minister may authorise the following payments.' We have the ultimate discretion. If we think that what Mr Corrigan or anyone else is doing is not in line with those agreements, then we simply do not pay. We want the flexibility to pay via not only third parties but also the range of matters that are contained in that amendment which are not simply confined to the redundancy, pay in lieu of notice and accrued leave entitlements that are the substance of the opposition amendments.10:38:004217Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—The minister has just explained exactly why we are insisting on our amendment, and as Senator O'Brien has pointed out. In our view, the Democrat amendment does not go far enough in limiting the range of payment. What you want is the flexibility to make payments beyond what most people believe this legislation is designed for with the redundancy payment. We make that quite clear in our amendment (3)—and we do not apologise for this—because our amendment on sheet 1041 says:(1) The Minister may authorise payments for the reform or restructuring of the stevedoring industry provided that such payments are for the purpose of: (a) payments in connection with this Act; or (b) the reasonable costs of administering the scheme.You are after a much wider scope to make payments where you think they are necessary. For example, you may be called to pay the substantial legal costs which have been incurred by Mr Corrigan and others in the courts over recent months as part of the conspiracy to try to destroy the MUA. You can say you will do this by regulation but, as I say, once it is in regulation it is much harder for the parliament to control and to have a view about it than if it is in the legislation as specifically prohibited.When you mention `new technology' as a definition, what does new technology mean? Does it mean that you can be called upon by Mr Corrigan to buy new equipment for the wharf under the guise that that is new technology? That is a definition the lawyers would have a field day fighting over in a dispute. Of course they will collect their fee on the way through which you might as well pay for out of this fund.As I said when we debated the previous amendment, the opposition does not trust the government on this matter—full stop. We do not accept the word of the minister, Mr Reith, because he has been proven demonstrably to have misled parliament and the Australian people about his involvement with Mr Corrigan on this matter. The Prime Minister was shown earlier this week to have misled the Australian people as well.Therefore, we are going to propose amendments that, as Senator O'Brien has already said, specifically tie down where substantial amounts of money are going to be collected and where they are going to be paid. We do not trust the minister having a discretion in this area, particularly this minister, Mr Reith. Therefore, that is why we insist on the proposal we have in sheet 1041 which specifically and clearly defines the purpose for which the payment can be made.Minister, if you have, as a result of the lessons you have learnt over the last three months in trying to deal with waterfront reform, had a conversion on the road to Damascus, so to speak, and you want to propose in the future using some of the money in various areas for further waterfront reform—either in the equipment area or for further redundancies, or for a number of those other areas you mentioned—come back to the parliament with the legislation. That is how we will know that we will get an outcome that we, the workers and the Australian people will not get doublecrossed on. As far as it goes, we believe that you cannot object to Senator Murray's amendments.SF4COONEYSenator Cooney—He objects to Senator Murray's amendments.LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—In relation to reporting.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—Okay, relating to the reporting, but the substance of our amendment means that we will hold the government absolutely to what it does by legislation and not let it get out of it. We do not want to give discretion to this minister to go off and have, as Senator O'Brien has said, his arm twisted by Mr Corrigan. Why wouldn't Mr Corrigan be able to twist the arm of Mr Reith when they are both up on a conspiracy case?ZS6QUIRKESenator Quirke—Corrigan has also proved to be a lot smarter than Reith.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—Yes, on a lot of areas. I agree with Senator Quirke on that. Why wouldn't Mr Corrigan be able to have some influence over the minister, because if they are up on a conspiracy case together Mr Corrigan's evidence may well be germane to the political future of this minister? Isn't that an influence that could be used to get the minister to make further payments to the advantage of Mr Corrigan beyond the scope of what ordinary Australians believe this levy bill is about and how the money can be spent? Therefore, the opposition will insist on its amendments.10:44:004218Cooney, Sen BarneySenator COONEYSF4VICALP00—The Minister for Communications, the Information Economy and the Arts (Senator Alston) has been saying that this has all been done without cost to the taxpayer and therefore it is all right. I take it that he means by that that this is a levy and not a tax. But it is a levy imposed on people other than the person that gave rise to this problem, namely, Patrick's. We as a parliament have to be concerned about those other persons who have to pay a tax or a levy—we could argue about that but, in any event, it is other people's money—to accommodate Patrick's.That money is money that the government raises by a means similar to a tax. It is money that is left to be distributed at the discretion of the minister. If you look at clause 19 of this bill, it enables in its terms the minister to use the money for anything. It reads:. . . the surplus is to be distributed in accordance with a scheme prescribed by the regulations for the purposes of this section.That is clause 19. In theory at least, any scheme could be prescribed. That money which has been raised from people—it certainly includes Patrick's but goes beyond Patrick's—is money that I think we as a parliament have to look at in the same way as we would look at taxes raised from people. To simply say that no taxpayers' money is involved in this, therefore it does not matter, does an injustice to those stevedoring companies that sit outside Patrick's. There must be some limitation to the breadth of clause 18 which leads to an unlimited discretion as set out in clause 19. I think that the matters raised by Senator Schacht should be persisted with.10:47:004218Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—The answer is that clause 19 is couched in wide terms quite deliberately, and the opposition has not indicated any disagreement with it. It is there to cater for the situation where there might be an overcollection with hindsight—4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—An overcollection?LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—It is precisely what happened, for example, with the gun levy that was collected through Medicare. You do not precisely know what the true cost is going to be. You raise what you think is a reasonable estimate, but you require yourself to spell out what you are going to do with any surplus proceeds. It is significant that, despite the broad terms in which clause 19(1) is couched and to which the opposition has taken no objection, if you look at our amendment, you will see that is couched in much narrower terms. Our amendment reads:. . . payments in connection with the following activities—that is, occupational health and safety programs, training programs and the introduction of new technology—that are undertaken after the commencement of this Act in connection with the reform or restructuring of the stevedoring industry . . .It is very much to do with the overall package. Corrigan and P&O are both on the record as undertaking to absorb the costs within their own structures, not to pass them on, and at no cost to the taxpayer. We regard that as the essence of this agreement.ZS6QUIRKESenator Quirke—He told us he didn't know about Dubai too, didn't he?LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—We can discuss other matters at another time. The important point to remember is that we have the ultimate discretion to pay or not to pay. The advice, as I have indicated, is that your amendment is very narrow.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—Yes, but specifically so.LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—But it does not even allow payments to be made through MIFCo, yet MIFCo is by far the most effective way of ensuring payments are targeted. Unless you have a third party capacity, then you are simply limited to the very narrow items that are specified in your amendment.We need that flexibility. We will do it in aid of reform or restructuring of the industry. Training programs and the other matters are very important in many respects in ensuring that these agreements and undertakings do result in significant productivity gains. So we want to have that flexibility to ensure that it happens at no cost to the taxpayer.10:49:004219Cooney, Sen BarneySenator COONEYSF4VICALP00—Amendments Nos 1, 3 and 4 put forward by the opposition on sheet 1041 enables those people other than Patrick's who have paid the levy—who, after all, are entitled to the consideration of this parliament and to a degree at least of fairness and consideration—to have criteria against which they can measure whether or not their money is being properly spent. It allows for accountability and transparency which, after all, is what we are supposed to provide to those people who pay money to the government, whether you want to call them taxpayers or you want to call them levy payers. Nevertheless, it is money taken by the government from people that have in no way incurred a liability for it outside the legislation. All this is imposed on them by what we do. Certainly, they are entitled to some sort of accountability and transparency, if they are to get Patrick's off the hook they are on. The opposition has put forward some provisions which, far from being too narrow, are probably too broad. I think that, as a matter of justice to those stevedoring companies outside Patrick's, this sort of provision should be made explicit.10:51:004219O'Brien, Sen KerrySenator O'BRIEN8O6TASALP00—I want to touch on the explanation that the Minister for Communications, the Information Economy and the Arts (Senator Alston) gave on the government's own amendments on this matter and explain very clearly why we do not believe the government's amendments are appropriate. To broaden the scope for the making of payments under this legislation is to open up a great range of opportunities to make payments, potentially inappropriately, that will be entirely at the discretion of the minister.The government's proposed amendment, where payments could be made, for example, for the introduction of new technology or for the improvement of wharf facilities, is a great example of where the minister could effectively pick winners or favour one particular operator against another and, through this bill, potentially impose the cost on competitors. That is what this bill does. When the previous WIRA proposals were put in place, there was common employment and you did not have an employer based set of arrangements that had to be funded separately. There was funding which went into a whole pool of employment.Now we are talking about a different situation on the waterfront where there are individual employers. You are, by this legislation, going to target—advantage or disadvantage, potentially—individual employers, one against the other, port against port, facility against facility, and all that we have to control that is the minister's discretion and the reporting of the exercise of that discretion. There is no role for the parliament to control that other than to receive a report.In terms of the Labor Party's amendments, we say clearly that no item has been identified as needing expenditure at this stage other than redundancies. If the Democrats are concerned that the passage of this bill not impede the settlement on the waterfront that has been achieved, let them demonstrate that something more than what we propose is needed at this time.If matters arise—and let me say we had P&O and Patrick before us at the committee and none of their evidence indicated that other matters specifically needed funding—all I can say is that the government's amend ments will leave great loopholes in the making of payments: firstly, inappropriately for the benefit of one competitor against another, or for one port against another, funded by the operations of another port or a competitor under this legislation; and, secondly, they will leave a great loophole in the making of payments ostensibly for one purpose when in fact they are for another. Notwithstanding what is proposed in relation to reporting, I believe that the means would still be available for the making of payments, even if they were ostensibly for one purpose when in fact the moneys supplied were used for another.I suggest that the only responsible course for the Senate today is to pass the opposition's amendments. If there are further matters that the government can bring before the Senate which justify further amendments, then that is quite possible, but there is no pressing need for the breadth of the bill that is proposed now.10:55:004220Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—What particularly concerns the opposition, as Senator Cooney and Senator O'Brien have pointed out, is that when we look at the government amendments—which are not on a numbered sheet but are on the only government sheet that has been circulated with amendments, which I will call the government amendments—we see that (c) says:. . . payments in respect of activities that are prescribed by regulation, being activities in connection with the reform or restructuring of the stevedoring industry . . . We believe that definition is far too wide. It will provide the opportunity, as Senator O'Brien and Senator Cooney have said, to play favourites, to make arrangements to put different amounts into different companies.New technology is also mentioned. Only recently there was a story in the media where Mr Corrigan was quoted as speculating about introducing a fully robotic wharf operation. That is new technology. I must say there would be a fair bit of concern in the community if we suddenly found that some of this money was being used to encourage—without proper discussion and consultation with all the parties concerned—a fully robotic wharf and that it was to be paid for out of public money through this device without proper debate.Our concerns are about the way you have put your amendment and the structure of it. In the climate of mistrust that this government has created over waterfront reform, we do not believe we can accept your amendment or your general assurances that this money will automatically be spent to the benefit of waterfront reform in the way in which, in common terms, ordinary Australians would expect it to be spent.Although you call it a levy, for all intents and purposes it is a tax on all stevedoring companies, irrespective of whether they were involved in the conspiracy to destroy the Maritime Union of Australia and its workers—and we will get to that a bit later. Sealand in South Australia will have to pay it. Even though they were quite happy with the arrangements and discussions with the union to get improved productivity in South Australia, they will have to pay the levy.The government made it quite clear at the time of the debate that they disagreed with the Sealand view of how to conduct waterfront reform. How do we know that, although you raised the money from them, you will not use their money to make payments to one of their competitors, the Corrigan company? That is what is open. You would say that governments would be open to considerable criticism if they tried that sort of approach. This government have been very thick-skinned over criticism of their handling of waterfront reform. The only reason this bill is before us is that the whole of the waterfront reform policy of this government has ended up in ignominious defeat, as I said yesterday.This bill started off, of course, as a way to pay out all the sacked workers that Mr Corrigan wanted to get rid of as part of the government's plan. Now that you have retreated and been defeated on this issue, we accept that the redundancy payments should be paid as an agreement between the workers and the company. But we cannot accept the word that you have given here or the assurances you have given in view of the track record of this government generally on water front matters in the last few months. Therefore, we will insist on our amendments.10:59:004221Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—I wonder if I could address through you, Mr Temporary Chairman, a question to Senator Schacht concerning amendment (4) which we are dealing with on page 1041. Senator Schacht, I could not find definitions of `stevedoring companies' or `employers' in the bill, although there is a definition of `stevedoring industry'. It occurs to us that there may be a problem with your amendment (4) because it could result in payments not being capable of being made to a parent company.As I understand it, the stevedoring companies which are employers in the Patrick's situation at the moment are subsidiaries, and those subsidiaries are without any money. For them to receive money to pay these redundancies, it would probably have to come through the parent company. I may or may not be right on this because I have not been party to those matters.I also do not know, with regard to any other stevedoring companies, what their corporate structure is. It seems to me that, if there is an indirect process whereby the payments actually come from a company which is not the direct employer—which is, in fact, contracting to a stevedoring group—we could have a problem with it. I just ask you the question: are you able to satisfy me that amendment (4) does not, in fact, exclude some possible employees from accessing this fund as a result of being made redundant?11:01:004221Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—I am advised that the payment will be made to Patrick companies 1, 2 and 3—the employment companies—and, even though they were asset stripped, the employment arrangements are still with those companies and therefore the payment will be made to those employees in those companies. Therefore, we believe that there is not a problem of the money being diverted to be paid to shell companies. Although they are shell companies in terms of asset stripping, they are still the companies, I am advised, that employ those stevedores that are being made redundant.11:02:004221Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—Thank you, Senator Schacht. Minister, am I right: is there some danger here that some companies or employees could be excluded because of the insufficient definitions attached to (4)? Am I on the wrong track here?11:02:004221Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—We think you are on the right track. The difficulty we have with this whole series of amendments is that they are far too narrowly focused. That is the classic unintended consequence, or it may be intended. It would certainly be very unfair if it were to have the effect that you apprehend, and I do not think we would be wanting to take that sort of a risk.The irony of this in many ways is that, if you took the approach advocated by the opposition, you would essentially only be able to make payments to people who are made redundant. Therefore, if people want payments, they effectively have to leave. We want the flexibility to pay people like Sealand or other small employers who may be prepared to make improved productivity arrangements without actually reducing their work forces. That would be very much in aid of achieving waterfront reform, but it would not result in redundancies.Under the opposition's approach, no payment would be able to be made because all that you can do is pay people who are made redundant. So the ironic effect of your approach, Senator Schacht, would be to provide incentives for people to be forced out of the work force, rather than for them to be kept in the work force but working more efficiently. That is why we think our flexibility is vastly more desirable than simply the narrow targeted approach of effectively putting people on the equivalent of welfare, as you would do, rather than looking at the ultimate objective which is to increase the levels of productivity for the existing work force.11:04:004221Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—I am advised that this amendment was drafted very carefully on advice in view of very detailed consultation with the union which represents the workers who are being made redundant and it is very confident that this amendment does it.Senator Heffernan interjecting—4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—You may laugh, Senator Heffernan, but we are not afraid of having consultations with the MUA and with any other union and group in the community. We do not black-ban and lock out people, put dogs onto them and wear balaclavas at midnight. We do not treat Australian workers that way.We are very pleased to be able to have those discussions. We would be stupid to draft amendments about which we did not seek consultation with the union and the workers it represents. The union is confident that this means that the workers who are eligible—who are employed in those Patrick's companies—will be guaranteed of getting the payment under the definition in this, Senator Murray. That is my advice.11:05:004222Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—We do not support the amendment because its purpose is to confine payments to established stevedores. It assumes that all potentially redundant employees during the operation of the reform arrangements will be employees of stevedoring companies which were the actual employers of stevedoring labour on 30 June 1997. This may have the unfair result that some employees who should be entitled to their full redundancy payments would miss out because of a statutory restriction. For example, if the continuing employment of some employees was not resolved until reform related restructuring had been put in place, redundancy payments would not be available to them.11:06:004222Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—I do not disagree with the minister: that is the purpose and the intent and that is what people believe this legislation is about. The minister keeps raising as an aside, `We need flexibility to do something else,' but he does not give us an example of what that flexibility is. Even the one you gave there, Minister—LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—Training in new technologies and occupational health and safety. You want to sack people.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—That is the very point. Minister, we do not trust you when you start raising issues of new technology. We have certainly always accepted training matters, occupational health matters, et cetera. But the way you use it is as a weapon to create instability and also to have flexibility to make payments way beyond what normal workers would expect from this bill and its intent.We just do not trust the government. That is why we are tight with these definitions. We want the money to be spent in the way in which the agreement has been reached, and not find out later there were some side payments going off to Mr Corrigan for other purposes or for other stevedoring companies to suit the political agenda of this government.11:07:004222Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—I should have said this earlier, as it might have helped the Senate. If you look at our amendments, at the bottom of that page in clause (2) you will see (4). The effect of (4) is to say that no payments could be made pursuant to regulation until the expiration of the period by which regulations could be disallowed. In other words, it would not be open to us to make payments without any parliamentary scrutiny. We would have to proclaim the regulation—in other words, spell out what we had in mind—and it would only be if the parliament allowed that to occur that the payments would then be made. So you retain full parliamentary scrutiny over any payments. It is quite transparent. Again, I say that under our model you would provide incentives for people to remain in the workplace but be able to provide financial assistance for improved productivity measures, whereas going down your path you would be providing incentives for more and more people to leave the work force so they could take redundancy payments.11:08:004222Cooney, Sen BarneySenator COONEYSF4VICALP00—Senator Schacht was taken to task because the opposition amendments on 1041 used the expression `stevedoring companies'. When I say `taken to task', I mean that he was asked about that as if that was a concept that needed to be defined. But the Democrat amendments on page 1054, for example, talk about stevedoring industries, and the definition in the bill itself talks about stevedoring industries. The government amendments talk about stevedoring work. Everybody knows what is meant by stevedoring companies or industries or work. It seems a very interesting point to take, that when the opposition tries to bring some rectitude to the way this money is going to be spent, people suddenly find that it is very difficult to get the concept of what stevedoring is all about when the whole debate has been based on that concept. It seems to me quite clear what opposition amendments Nos 1, 3 and 4 talk about. People should not slide away from that simply because they suddenly find it difficult to understand what `stevedoring' means.11:10:004223Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—Minister, all of us are very conscious—and in fact I have just had a discussion with Senator Schacht on this—of the pressure of bills and legislative work which is before us, and there is the prospect, as we all know, that we may not return to this place until after an election. That being so, what is the likely fate of amendments to this bill that go down to the House? What is the government's view of both how it would consider those amendments and in what way legislation could be returned to the Senate if amendments are rejected?11:11:004223Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—We have every intention of taking the bill back to the House of Representatives so that we can consummate the agreements as quickly as possible. Obviously, if it contains unacceptable amendments that will not be able to occur then the whole deal will effectively be off. We are not concerned with election timetables, we simply want to get this—8O6O'BRIENSenator O'Brien—The case is back on, though. LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—No, we want to get this in place as quickly as possible. If the amendments that are acceptable to the government are put in place then it goes straight back to the House of Representatives, it becomes law, and you can, as I say, consummate the agreements that have already been signed. If it does not, then of course we will not be able to take it any further and the deal will be off.11:11:004223Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—Thank you, Minister, for that answer. The opposition has quite rightly made the point that this whole unsavoury exercise has generated a most unfortunate consequent lack of trust about all these issues. However, the prime thing in my mind is the employees. I am deeply concerned that amendment No. 4 may have unforeseen problems attached to it. That is all. My concern is that no employee of any stevedoring company should be in any sense denied access to these funds. The reason I have become concerned and alarmist is due to the restructuring problems that we saw with Patrick. I just do not know what is out there. Frankly, I have not done the research and I do not know how the companies are structured.Obviously, I am a strong supporter of amendment No. 1 because it is our own amendment and the opposition have put very adequate arguments. I am somewhat helped by the government's own amendment. In a narrow sense, you have addressed some of the issues that concern us. In particular, I note item (1)(c) on the government amendment. I assume, Minister, that those would be disallowable regulations, which would assist the Senate if any payments for any activities were envisaged which were in the category that Senator Schacht and his colleagues rightfully are concerned about as possibilities. I advise you, Senator Schacht, that my intention therefore is to vote against your amendment No. 4 and I would like to hear from the minister whether he thinks it is likely that amendments Nos 1 to 3 would be seriously considered in the House of Representatives as appropriate amendments.11:14:004223Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—I think I have already indicated that we would regard them as fundamentally unacceptable because they are far too narrow. The effect of them would be that they would simply focus on redundancies, so you would be in effect driving people out of the work force to take the money rather than trying to achieve our fundamental objective of restructuring.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—That is what the levy is for. It is a levy for redundancies.LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—It is not. We want the flexibility to be able to use that levy for the purposes of promoting restructuring and reform that result in increased productivity. There may well be all or some of those stevedoring employers who come to the government and say, `We have a very sensible approach that will not involve any reduction in the work force but that will, however, result in substantial increases in productivity.' That is essentially an application of those funds and we would be very much wanting to do that.The answer to Senator Murray in relation to 1(c) is that (4), beneath (2), says:(4) The Minister cannot authorise payments under paragraph (I)(c) or (I)(d) . . . until after the end of the period within which those regulations can be disallowed . . .I hope that makes it clear that we simply would not have the capacity to go off and provide the funds for something the parliament might regard as quite unacceptable. It could only be after the period of disallowance had expired—in other words, the parliament had effectively approved the purpose—that we would then be able to make the payments. That is a very important safeguard. It has been put in deliberately. It does address those concerns but still retains the flexibility to have regulations that will allow you to promote real reforms rather than simply handing out money to people who are made redundant.11:16:004224Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—I have just been advised that the phrase `flexibility to promote real reform' was not an issue raised with the opposition when this bill came into the lower house or raised with the shadow minister, Mr Tanner. Whether Senator Alston, as the minister representing the minister, Mr Reith, has used that phrase of his own invention, I do not know.LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—I would have said, `for example'.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—This is why we are concerned. The government keeps shifting the description and the nature of what they think is the purpose of this bill and the money raised by this tax on all stevedoring companies other than those in the domestic area. If the regulation stands up, the money is, according to the minister, for redundancies. It is now being put to us that the government, according to the minister representing Mr Reith, wants flexibility. On this particular issue we do not believe, and cannot trust, the government on a phrase like `flexibility'. Its track record on its so-called `agenda of reform' is to say one thing in the parliament and secretly do something else quite different behind the backs of everybody. It is just a further concern to us.The minister may well have been honest for the first time in describing some of the policy intent and saying that they need this flexibility. In that sense I thank him. But it further raises our concern about what is really going on here. To use the classic analogy, which even the minister would understand, in Aussie Rules football terms the government is shifting the goalposts from full-forward around to the half-forward flank and expecting us still to accept that nothing has changed. We do not accept that. We do not trust the government on this. Those phrases that the minister just used create considerable concern in our minds that the government is changing its agenda on how it wants to use this substantial amount of money—a tax on stevedoring companies. That is why we want to define it. We do not trust the government in relation to how it would use this money, even through a disallowable instrument. We all know that a disallowable instrument is much harder—you can knock it back or defeat it but the government always has the drop in cases of regulation. You have to keep defeating a regulation and then you put a new one in and until the new one is voted on, the old—LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—We could never make any payments until we got it through.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—That is the blackmail you would use. The political blackmail would be, `If you do not accept this regulation now no payment will be made.' You would be in the Senate saying, `The Labor Party is refusing to support this regulation and by refusing it no payment will be made.' That is exactly how governments use the power over regulation as a way to get their will. On waterfront reform, as the government calls it, we do not trust this government. We do expect that you would come back here and put that political blackmail to us, saying, `This is the regulation you will cop or no payment will be made.' We are put in Hobson's choice—between the frying pan and the fire. That is why, Minister, we are going to stick with this amendment. I would still ask Senator Murray, in view of what the minister has just said, to support us, even in amendment (4).11:19:004225Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—I would not use exactly the same language as Senator Schacht, but I share his lack of trust and his concern and the very real anxiety we all have arising from this situation. I will not change my mind on amendment (4) because I do think there is a danger some employees could be excluded.Dealing with (1) and (3): Senator Schacht has discussed political blackmail. I have not been subjected to it; I have been rung by Minister Reith—4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—So have I.3M6Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY—I am sure you have. He is by all means an assiduous worker in these matters. His message to me was the same message as he has put out publicly, and that is simply that he wants his bill urgently and he does not want it changed. That puts me and the Democrats over a barrel. I am capable of staring down the government when the issue so arises, but on this issue I find myself in a real difficulty. At stake is a major agreement that has finally been brokered, a cessation of legal actions which could have enormous consequences for the participants—8O6O'BRIENSenator O'Brien—Don't you think the government wants it stopped?3M6Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY—I am sure they do. Nevertheless, as Senator O'Brien knows, in any action there are always the dangers to both sides of costs and troubles. And at stake, primarily for me, are the workers and their families. In public I have been consistently asked, `What would be your approach?' I have said that it is impossible for me as a person to look into the baby blues of workers and their families and say, `I will put at risk their funds.'My only approach, given the government's response and the lifeline that is there in their amendments, however circumscribed that lifeline is, is to recommend to my party room that we abstain on this. I do not want to be in a situation where we vote with you—and we agree with your amendments, let me tell you that; as you know we have put up the same amendments—and this bill goes back to the House of Representatives and they reject the amendments and we are left with a real problem. I advise you that, if it came back here, I would not insist on it—on the basis of my belief that those workers and their families have to be secured as urgently as possible.I know it is probably not good tactics to say here and now how I would behave, but I want you to fully understand the dilemma I face. I am deeply concerned about the accountability problems you have outlined. I agree with the problems you have outlined in terms of trust. I think the way in which the Lang Corporation and Patrick's have behaved is utterly reprehensible and is utterly to be deplored. I think it is immoral in the extreme. But I cannot put at risk in any shape or form payments to those workers and families and I do not want to indulge here, in this kind of pressure cooker that we are in now, in any brinkmanship on those grounds. I am sorry if that sounds a little open and honest for these kinds of proceedings—4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—It is called being between a rock and a hard place. So are we.3M6Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY—That is exactly it. I am being as open and honest as I can about it. I regret that it gives the government the whip hand. On the other hand, this is there for the workers. So I advise the Senate formally that I will vote against amendment (4) and I will advise my party room to abstain on Nos (1) and (3). I will be withdrawing my own amendment No. (1) on sheet 1054.10000TEMPORARY CHAIRMANThe TEMPORARY CHAIRMAN (Senator Murphy)—We will separate the amendments. The question is that amendments Nos (1) and (3) moved by the opposition be agreed to.3M6MURRAYSenator Murray—The Democrats formally record an abstention. Question put.11:28:00The committee divided. (The Chairman—Senator S.M. West)21Brown, B. Campbell, G.Carr, K. Collins, J. M. A.Cooney, B. Denman, K. J. *Evans, C. V. Forshaw, M. G.Gibbs, B. Hogg, J.Lundy, K. Mackay, S.Margetts, D. McKiernan, J. P.Murphy, S. M. Neal, B. J.O'Brien, K. W. K. Quirke, J. A.Reynolds, M. Schacht, C. C.West, S. M.27Abetz, E. Alston, R. K. R.Boswell, R. L. D. Calvert, P. H.Campbell, I. G. Chapman, H. G. P.Coonan, H. Eggleston, A.Ellison, C. Gibson, B. F.Heffernan, W. Herron, J.Kemp, R. Knowles, S. C.Lightfoot, P. R. Macdonald, S.McGauran, J. J. J. Minchin, N. H.Newman, J. M. O'Chee, W. G. *Parer, W. R. Patterson, K. C. L.Payne, M. A.Reid, M. E.Tierney, J. Vanstone, A. E.Watson, J. O. W.Bishop, M. MacGibbon, D. J.Bolkus, N. Ferguson, A. B.Conroy, S. Hill, R. M.Cook, P. F. S. Troeth, J.Crossin, P. M. Crane, W.Crowley, R. A. Brownhill, D. G. C.Faulkner, J. P. Synon, K. M.Ray, R. F. Tambling, G. E. J.Sherry, N. Macdonald, I.* denotes tellerQuestion so resolved in the negative.11:31:004226Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—I move:(4) Clause 18, page 12 (after line 4), after subclause (1), insert:(1A) The Minister must not authorise payments for the purpose of paragraph (1)(a) except in relation to persons employed by stevedoring companies that were employers of stevedoring labour on 30 June 1997.Because of time constraints and because the Democrats have indicated that they will vote with the government against opposition amendment No. 4, we will not call a division—but only for the sake of time and because of the pressure of government business. We make it quite clear that this is a very important opposition amendment. Normally we would call a division, even though we know we would have been defeated. But, for the sake of time and because of pressure in the government's program, we will not call a division.11:32:004226Brown, Sen BobSenator BROWNQD4TASAG00—The Greens support the opposition's amendment.Amendment not agreed to.10000CHAIRMANThe CHAIRMAN—Senator Murray, do you intend to move Democrat amendments 1 and 2 on sheet 1054?4226Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—Madam Chair, I suspect you were not in the chair at the time, but I did formally withdraw amendment No. 1, because the opposition amendment No. 1 was exactly the same. I move:(2) Clause 8, page 5 (after line 28), after subclause (2), insert: (2A) Levy is not payable unless the responsible person makes an election in the prescribed form to utilise payments in connection with this Act. (2B) An election under subsection (2A) cannot be amended or revoked.The previous vote really did cause me a great deal of anxiety as I had to abstain on my own motion while being thoroughly supportive of both the opposition's arguments and its approach. It was a very difficult decision—it will not be the last one, I am sure. Anyway, that is what we are in here for. This amendment says that the levy should not be payable `unless the responsible person makes an election in the prescribed form to utilise payments in connection with this Act'. Essentially, it derives from our view that those who do not wish to take advantage of the fund should not have to pay the levy. We are concerned about this on the grounds of competitiveness and on the grounds of the nature of the industry. We were advised at the hearing, at which both Senator O'Brien and I were present, that there are two national suppliers, P&O and Patrick, which have between them some 90 per cent to 95 per cent of the market. The Sea-Land regional stevedore is a substantial player in the Adelaide market, and then there are between five and six small business stevedores, if I may describe them in that way. They would obviously be small business stevedores if, between them and Sea-Land, they share five per cent of the market. So a duopoly is pretty well running the whole thing.Both P&O and Patrick unequivocally advised the hearing that they would take advantage of the fund, that they would be charging the levy, and that they would absorb the levy charges. Sea-Land, in evidence to the committee, was strongly of the opinion that they should not be subject to the levy and should not have to bear those costs. Whilst P&O and Patrick might voluntarily absorb the costs, if you are in competition and you have the levy imposed, you are going to be left with no option but to absorb it, otherwise you become uncompetitive in cost terms. That may not be entirely true in the ports, in that you have a geographical separation between, say, Adelaide and Melbourne and a cost differentiation may, to some extent, be feasible. Nevertheless, the point stands.With regard to the five or six small business stevedores, the minister advised me, as he has probably advised the opposition, that one of the small business stevedores have told him that they will be using the fund, so obviously they should pay the levy. I was concerned that at the hearings there were no submissions that I can recall from the small business stevedores. Fortunately a stevedore called Strang Stevedoring Australia saw a comment from me in the newspaper and wrote to me yesterday. This is what they had to say:Dear Senator MurrayThis morning we received a copy of the Daily Commercial News which quoted that `you were inclined to support the above mentioned bill as it was a vital part of ensuring the deal between Patrick and the MUA'. It went on to say that your major concern was that the levy would be imposed on all stevedores including those with no desire to access the funds, like Sea-Land.Our company commenced stevedoring operations in August 1996 and in order to commence operations it was necessary to recruit all new labour and to train them at our expense to become multi skilled in all categories.The proposed Stevedoring Levy will be funding both P & O ports and Patrick Stevedores redundant labour and associated costs which are not general industry costs. Therefore the levy should not be used for this purpose and the user pay principle must apply.The proposed imposition of costs on those stevedoring companies not drawing on the funds provided would directly benefit our competitors and at the same time impose commercial restraints and unacceptable costs and financial burden on our company for which we get no benefits whatsoever.We trust that the legislation will protect ongoing competition and fairness within the stevedoring industry and that the user pay principle should apply.ROBERT W.A. STRANGMANAGING DIRECTORI indicate for the record that my office did check that we could use this letter in debate, so I do that with their permission.This means that not everyone is going to be happy to be incurring the levy. Minister, the question that exercises my mind since the principle in the case is quite clear, is: is there anything in either the bills or the amendments you have moved which would justify or compensate stevedores who do not intend to access the funds to make workers redundant? Would there be any means by which they would be able to be relieved or in some way compensated or have some kind of adjust ment, not necessarily monetary, which would assist them in this problem?11:39:004228Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—The amendment moved by Senator Murray, amendment No. 2 on sheet 1054, is exactly the same as amendments we have on sheet 1041, amendments Nos 2 and 5. Therefore, since Senator Murray's amendment was moved before ours, we will be supporting his.This amendment is again one of the major areas of our concern with these bills in that a company like Sea-Land, a very successful stevedoring company in Adelaide in my own state of South Australia, which have not been involved in all the shenanigans and the conspiracies with the government and Patrick have to pay the levy or the tax on their business to pay the redundancies of Patrick and maybe even P&O. They pay for someone else's redundancy package even though they indicate that they do not have any plans for redundancy and they are able to operate a profitable and productive port in South Australia that is competitive with all the other ports.During the dispute a few weeks ago when Patrick closed down their operation in South Australia and not only sacked their workers but actually went out of business, it was Sea-Land which offered employment to all of those former Patrick employees so that they had continued employment. Sea-Land is not very popular with this present government because all through the dispute it publicly disagreed with the government's strategy of confrontation, of abuse and of sacking employees. Therefore, it seems to us that this company in particular is being punished by having to pay the levy for policies of which they have no brook with and of which they have publicly opposed.As a senator from South Australia and on behalf of the opposition I have to say that this really is picking on a company for all the wrong reasons. That is why our own amendments achieve the same purpose as this amendment of Senator Murray from the Democrats. We find it extraordinary that a company is clearly being politically punished because it would not go along with the divisive and underhanded policies of Mr Reith, the Prime Minister and this government for waterfront reform.Sea-Land has shown that, with consultation and cooperation and by treating your employees decently, you can get good outcomes. That is the Labor Party's way for industrial relations, which has overwhelmingly proved successful in this country and our social fabric for over nearly 100 years. The government's attitude is extremely disappointing. Therefore, this is a very important amendment. We will certainly be calling a division on this amendment because we believe that, for the record, the votes ought to be counted.I also want to mention one other area of the competition structure of the stevedoring companies. It is interesting to note that, as soon as this dispute got under way and when there were picket lines being formed, et cetera, Mr Fels from the ACCC enthusiastically and with very rapid energy started making public statements and taking action against the waterside workers for breaches of the Trade Practices Act.I have to say in a number other areas of competition policy, such as the area of my own shadow ministerial responsibility in the last nine months, telecommunications, he has not been anywhere as near as active in looking at competition issues where the power of particularly Telstra often affects the ability of smaller telecommunication companies to prosper. No, as soon as it was an attack on workers on picket lines, he could not wait to launch an attack.But where has he been when the duopoly of the two major companies on the waterfront has been at work? Has he been investigating price fixing and the arrangements on the waterfront with these companies that basically form a duopoly right across Australia? Sea-Land, the one company that is providing some competition and that is not in the duopoly is now being attacked by this government. Why doesn't he investigate what the other companies are doing? Why shouldn't he investigate why this company has to pay a levy for the duopoly to pay its redundancies? Isn't that anti-competitive? Isn't that restricting competition? This government is supposed to be a devotee of competition. No, Mr Fels is very silent about that. If Mr Fels wanted to have any credibility in dealing with secondary boycotts, you would have thought that at the same time and at the very least he would have launched an investigation into the duopoly practices of Patrick and P&O.I wanted to put on the record on behalf of the opposition the political activities and the political processes of the ACCC in this area which we find astonishing compared with the lack of activity in many other areas. The opposition will be supporting this amendment because it is the same as our amendments and, if necessary, we will call a division.11:45:004229Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—I acknowledge Senator Murray's genuine concerns in these areas, particularly in relation to the very hard decision he took quite recently. If it is any consolation, I would be quite happy to support his application for the Guinness Book of Records , because I doubt that there would have been any other occasion on which someone has had to abstain on their own motion.As far as this one is concerned, we are not wanting to single Sea-Land out for special punishment. What we are really doing is what has been done on other occasions under the WIRA legislation, for example, where it is much fairer to have an across-the-board approach. You do not have hypothecation in these areas; you give yourself the ability to address particular areas of need. If Sea-Land were, for example, to come up with a proposal that did result in increased productivity and efficiencies within their organisation, then they would certainly be eligible and that would be addressed under our amendment.As far as the government is concerned, the levy is an equitable way of funding a major cost of restructuring associated with redundancies. In the Senate inquiry, the MUA did not oppose industry funding arrangements to allow redundancies under the current reform program to occur. The approach taken in the bill is similar to that previously taken by Labor. Sea-Land will have access to funding for the same purposes as any other stevedore. This may be for redundancies or improvements in training, occupational health and safety, new technology or improved facilities. Sea-Land needs only to commit itself to achieving the government's seven benchmark objectives to have access to the fund and, contrary to the opposition claims, the improvements on the waterfront will benefit the industry and the economy as a whole.These levy arrangements are an essential part of the total package. I think we have to again make it clear that Senator Murray is acting very responsibly in putting the interests of workers and their families ahead of even strongly held views to the contrary but, as far as the government is concerned, the package that has been signed off on is conditional upon the bill's going forward in the form I have outlined and, therefore, we simply cannot accept either of the two sets of amendments, which are identical.11:47:004229Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—I am then forced to the very same decision I had to make earlier. That means I am required to seek leave to withdraw my amendment and I will have to abstain from voting on the same basis. If the government is going to reject this in the lower house, where am I left?Leave granted.11:48:004229Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—by leave—I move:(2) Clause 8, page 5 (after line 28), after subclause (2), insert:(2A) Levy is not payable unless the responsible person makes an election in the prescribed form to utilise payments in connection with this Act.(2B) An election under subsection (2A) cannot be amended or revoked.(5) Clause 18, page 12 (after line 6), after subclause (2), insert:(2A) No payment in connection with this Act may be made in respect of persons employed in the stevedoring industry unless the responsible person has made an election under subsection 8(2A) to utilise such payments and the person has paid, or will pay, levy.Note: For responsible person , see section 8. As Senator Murray has withdrawn his amendment, we have had to proceed with ours. We want these amendments to proceed. We support the amendments and we will want to vote on them even though, by the Democrat's withdrawing, we know what the numbers will be. We think this is a very important issue. I respect the agony which Senator Murray has found himself in. This is not a pleasant time for any of us, I can assure Senator Murray. I respect the fact that he is being bludgeoned. As he said, he has been put over a barrel on this and we have had to move the amendments ourselves. We have already had the debate on this and will put it to the vote immediately.11:49:004230Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—I formally advise the Senate that I will be advising my party room to abstain on that. Question put: That the amendments (Senator Schacht's ) be agreed to.11:54:00The committee divided. (The Chairman—Senator S.M. West)21Brown, B. Carr, K.Collins, J. M. A. Conroy, S.Cooney, B. Crossin, P. M.Denman, K. J. Evans, C. V. *Forshaw, M. G. Gibbs, B.Hogg, J. Lundy, K.Mackay, S. Margetts, D.McKiernan, J. P. Murphy, S. M.Neal, B. J. O'Brien, K. W. K.Quirke, J. A. Schacht, C. C.West, S. M.27Abetz, E. Alston, R. K. R.Boswell, R. L. D. Calvert, P. H.Campbell, I. G. Chapman, H. G. P.Coonan, H. Eggleston, A.Ellison, C. Gibson, B. F.Heffernan, W. Herron, J.Kemp, R. Knowles, S. C.Lightfoot, P. R. Macdonald, S.McGauran, J. J. J. Minchin, N. H.Newman, J. M. O'Chee, W. G. *Parer, W. R. Patterson, K. C. L.Payne, M. A.Reid, M. E.Tierney, J. Vanstone, A. E.Watson, J. O. W.Bishop, M. MacGibbon, D. J.Bolkus, N. Ferguson, A. B.Campbell, G. Hill, R. M.Cook, P. F. S. Brownhill, D. G. C.Crowley, R. A. Crane, W.Faulkner, J. P. Synon, K. M.Ray, R. F. Macdonald, I.Reynolds, M. Troeth, J.Sherry, N. Tambling, G. E. J.* denotes tellerQuestion so resolved in the negative.11:56:004230Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—by leave—I move:(1) Clause l8, page 12 (lines 2 to 4), omit subclause (1), substitute:The Minister may authorise the following payments: (a) payments in connection with qualifying redundancies. including: (i) payments to a Commonwealth company (within the meaning of the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act 1997) for the purpose of helping the company to meet payment obligations in respect of money borrowed for the purpose of making payments in connection with qualifying redundancies; and (ii) payments by the Commonwealth under a guarantee given by a Minister on behalf of the Commonwealth in connection with a borrowing referred to in subparagraph (i); (b) payments in connection with the following activities that are undertaken after the commencement of this Act in connection with the reform or restructuring of the stevedoring industry: (i) occupational health and safety programs; (ii) training programs to improve the performance of work, (iii) the introduction of new technology or the improvement of wharf facilities; (c) payments in respect of activities that are prescribed by the regulations, being activities in connection with the reform or restructuring of the stevedoring industry; (d) payments in respect of administrative costs that are in connection with the matters in respect of which payments may be authorised under paragraph (a), (b) or (c); (e) administrative costs incurred by the Commonwealth in connection with the collection or administration of the levy.(2) Clause 18, page 12 (after line 8), at the end of the clause, add:(4) The Minister cannot authorise payments under paragraph (I)(c) or (l)(d) in respect an activity prescribed by the regulations until after the end of the period within which those regulations can be disallowed by the Parliament.(5) in this section:qualifying redundancy means the termination (either before or after the commencement of this Act), on the ground of redundancy, of the employment of a person doing stevedoring work.I do not think I need to speak to these amendments because I essentially canvassed them previously in relation to other less acceptable alternatives.11:57:004231Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—We are now dealing with government amendments Nos 1 and 2. It is true, Minister, that a number of these issues were canvassed when the opposition and the Democrats moved their amendments to subsections (i) and (ii). I have already raised our concern about the definitions that are in these clauses. Because of the importance of these definitions and the importance of this bill, I want to emphasise again that, in normal times, we would accept in goodwill and in good faith that what is here would be carried out in good faith. But I have to say that good faith is not available to us now; we just do not trust the government. The ordinary workers of Australia do not trust the government, let alone the Maritime Union workers. I turn to amendment 1, section (b). It says:(b) payments in connection with the following activities that are undertaken after the commencement of this Act in connection with the reform or restructuring of the stevedoring industry. In view of your own remarks, Minister, that you are now looking at a flexible approach—you used the word `flexible' when debating a previous amendment—can you indicate to us whether you have any idea how much money or what percentage would be provided for occupational health and safety programs in the restructuring of the stevedoring industry? Will the occupational health and safety programs only be conducted by Patrick and P&O or will they be provided to all stevedoring companies? Will the money be provided by a state government instrumentality which has some constitutional coverage in this area?May we have some indication from you as to how the money would be provided for what appears in this amendment to be a very commendable process of improving occupational health and safety programs? I presume it is put in the positive—that the money is to be spent to improve occupational health and safety. But, with the performance of this government in this area, you never know. The money might be used to reduce occupational health and safety measures. Will the money for occupational health and safety be provided under the Commonwealth legislation in the existing act? This is so open.In (b)(ii) you then say `training programs to improve the performance of work'. Do we have any idea yet how much of this money would go to which companies, and will it only be to the remaining workers of those companies providing redundancies that allocations of funds for retraining will be given? Are the funds to go to the company for the company then to decide how they are to be spent on retraining? I may be mistaken, but I cannot find either the answers to those questions or any definition in the legislation. In view of your earlier remarks about looking at a more flexible approach to reform, what are we faced with concerning expenditure in that area?Finally, (b)(iii) reads `the introduction of new technology or the improvement of wharf facilities'. I have mentioned before that Mr Corrigan has speculated publicly that he would like to have a robotic wharf operating. I have to say that is new technology. But, if that new technology were to be implemented, I imagine a pretty substantial redundancy impact would be brought about in getting rid of all the remaining workers.3M6MURRAYSenator Murray—We'd like to have a robotic Corrigan.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—Yes, and put him in a space capsule and send him out beyond Mars for a couple of hundred years. Then there is the second part of (b)(iii) `or the improvement of wharf facilities'. Does this mean that the levy on the stevedoring companies could be used to provide money to rebuild wharves and equipment which, in a number of areas, are either the private assets of the companies themselves or state government owned and being leased to companies? Who ends up with the assets, with this levy money perhaps being used to improve the asset base of private companies to the advantage of the shareholders, whoever they might be, or being provided to state governments who own some of these facilities being leased? What control do we have over the way in which this money is to be spent?This amendment is so open and so vague. Even though it apparently is a disallowable instrument, again it will be put to us at a later stage, `You either accept the amendment, or no payment will be paid.' You will create a political campaign stating it is the Senate that, by rejecting a disallowable instrument, is at fault, rather than it being the fault of this government's own policy in general.So there are those three areas, Minister. I think, if you are asking us to support this amendment, we ought to get a bit more definition—just a little more would be nice—on how this money would be spent. Basically, they were apparently to be a disallowable instrument. Clause 1(b)(i), (ii) and (iii) basically means that you can allocate this money in almost any manner you like, when you like, for whom you like. That is not acceptable.Senator O'Brien suggests that this is not to be done by regulation. I want that clarified, Minister. If it is not by regulation, this is just an open chequebook for you to pay money to your mates.12:03:004232Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—I have already indicated at length that (b) has to be in connection with reform or restructuring of the stevedoring industry. We have only had one proposal to date, and that is the package that is in the public arena. That is the basis on which the first round of payments will be made. Any subsequent proposals that would result in improvements in the areas of occupational health and safety, training programs and new technology that lead to reform or restructuring of the industry would obviously get very sympathetic consideration.The extraordinary thing is that Senator Schacht seems to have no idea how you could possibly have any improvements in those areas. We are not here and now nominating what they might be. But we are quite prepared to examine any proposals that are brought forward in the context of reform or restructuring; in other words, any changes in those areas that lead to significant improvements would clearly qualify for payment. That is what it is all about. We cannot tell you in advance.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—Oh!LD4Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTON—It is up to those who have schemes and ways in which they can make improvements along those lines. But it will be constrained by the requirements of the act in every respect.12:04:004232Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—Minister, I did not expect any better, and I was not disappointed, in that you cannot give us any of these details. We have privately agreed that these two amendments can be put together. We oppose them. I gave you one last chance perhaps to put before us enough information to show that there is some merit in what you are proposing. But the amendments are so wide open; I have no doubt how the government would use these in the future. Therefore, to save the time of the Senate, we would be happy to have both 1 and 2 put together but we are not happy about their content, I must say. But, for process, we are happy for them to be voted together, and we will call for a division. Question put: That the amendments (Senator Alston's ) be agreed to.12:10:00The committee divided. (The Chairman—Senator S.M. West)34Abetz, E. Allison, L.Alston, R. K. R. Bartlett, A. J. J.Boswell, R. L. D. Bourne, V.Calvert, P. H. Campbell, I. G.Chapman, H. G. P. Coonan, H.Eggleston, A. Ellison, C.Gibson, B. F. Heffernan, W.Herron, J. Kemp, R.Knowles, S. C. Lees, M. H.Lightfoot, P. R. Macdonald, S.McGauran, J. J. J. Minchin, N. H.Murray, A. Newman, J. M.O'Chee, W. G. *Parer, W. R.Patterson, K. C. L. Payne, M. A.Reid, M. E. Stott Despoja, N.Tierney, J. Vanstone, A. E.Watson, J. O. W. Woodley, J.21Brown, B. Campbell, G.Carr, K. Cook, P. F. S.Cooney, B. Crossin, P. M.Denman, K. J. Evans, C. V. *Forshaw, M. G. Gibbs, B.Hogg, J. Lundy, K.Mackay, S. Margetts, D.Murphy, S. M. Neal, B. J.O'Brien, K. W. K. Quirke, J. A.Reynolds, M. Schacht, C. C.West, S. M.Brownhill, D. G. C. Bishop, M.Crane, W. Faulkner, J. P.Ferguson, A. B. Bolkus, N.Hill, R. M. Collins, J. M. A.Macdonald, I. Ray, R. F.MacGibbon, D. J. Crowley, R. A.Synon, K. M. McKiernan, J. P.Tambling, G. E. J. Sherry, N.Troeth, J. Conroy, S.* denotes tellerQuestion so resolved in the affirmative.12:12:004233Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—I move:(6) Page 12 (after line 16), after clause 19, insert:19A Reports by the MinisterReports during first year of operation(1) As soon as practicable after the end of each period of 3 months (beginning at the commencement of this Act) within the first year of operation of this Act, the Minister must prepare a report that sets out details of the following matters: (a) the payments that were authorised by the Minister under section 18 during the period; (b) the activities during the period of any Commonwealth authority or Commonwealth company (within the meaning of the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act 1997 ) that were activities in respect of which the authority or company received payments under section 18 in any 3 month period during the first year of operation of this Act; (c) details of any directions given by the Minister during the period, including to any Commonwealth authority or company mentioned in paragraph (b), in connection with the administration of the scheme; (d) distributions under section 19 during the period.Annual reports after the first year of operation(2) As soon as practicable after the end of each financial year that begins after the end of the first year of operation of this Act, the Minister must prepare a report that sets out details of the following matters: (a) the payments that were authorised by the Minister under section 18 during the financial year; (b) the activities during the financial year of any Commonwealth authority or Commonwealth company (within the meaning of the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act 1997 ) that were activities in respect of which the authority or company received payments under section 18 in any financial year; (c) details of any directions given by the Minister during the financial year, including to any Commonwealth authority or company mentioned in paragraph (b), in connection with the administration of the scheme; (d) distributions under section 19 during the financial year. Reports to be tabled(3) The Minister must cause a copy of each report mentioned in subsection (1) and (2) to be tabled in each House of the Parliament as soon as practicable after the report has been prepared.As I understand it from my running sheet, we have now dealt with all amendments except opposition amendment 6 on sheet 1004 and the Democrat amendment on sheet 1059. They are both to come, and they both deal with an issue of accountability and reporting by the minister.I would like to summarise the difference between the opposition and the Democrat amendment. We do not have any objection to the Democrat amendment; we just do not think it goes far enough in laying down the reporting timetable by the minister and the government to the parliament after the commencement of this act.I draw to the attention of the Senate that without opposition, without a division, the second reading amendment moved by the opposition which in part dealt with accountability and reporting was carried by the senators. Therefore, there seems to be a majority view of the Senate that accountability and reporting are important issues. Why the opposition believes this is so important gets back to the point I have already made on several occasions: there is an atmosphere of absolute mistrust with this government over the issue of waterfront reform and the way the workers were dismissed; the way the minister, the Prime Minister and the government told parliament one thing and then did something quite different behind the scenes in a number of ways with Mr Corrigan's company; the way Mr Corrigan initially denied doing certain things publicly and then admitted he was publicly lying to preserve his interests and to develop what he called waterfront reform and changes.Therefore, it is absolutely essential that strict reporting requirements be placed on this minister, Minister Reith, and this government to ensure that the parliament and the people above all else know what they are up to. You would not trust this lot with anything, let alone an important issue of waterfront reform.As I said in my speech in the second reading debate last night, earlier this week there was tabled in the House of Representatives the letter that the Prime Minister wrote in April of last year to the then minister for transport, Mr Sharp, before he hit the fence over the travel rorts affair and had to resign, showing that the Prime Minister was fully aware of and supported the interventionist policy of the government. Associated documents at that time showed that meant sacking without warning all the workers in the Patrick companies by a device involving dubious company restructuring practices, to say the least—though they may be technically correct, they are ethically and morally corrupt in the way this was gone about.Therefore, with that background, that history, of duplicity, misleading the parliament, misleading the people, we very strongly support these reporting procedures. Normally, you might say that the reporting arrangements in our amendment might seem rather onerous. We are asking for reports initially on a three-monthly basis. We think that, unless this government is held to account within that sort of period, they will get up to `hanky panky'—to use that phrase. They will have access to several hundred million dollars through this tax, this levy, on all the stevedoring companies—even those which do not support their policy. Unfortunately opposition amendments have just been rejected. Also, the government's amendments will give it and the minister a large discretionary capacity in respect of how that money will be used. In view of this, we think it is now absolutely imperative that the tough reporting procedures in our amendment be adopted so that, on a regular basis, the people of Australia can see how the $200 million to $300 million that will be raised is being spent.This minister will not deny, and has not denied here, that they are now looking for a more flexible approach to the way that this money and this reform process will go forward. When they use the word `reform', I take it in a very negative way. When they talk about `waterfront reform', that means sacking workers, that means creating division in Australian society. That is not how we use the word `reform'. When we use the term `reform' we are talking about working in a cooperative way to get all sides of the parties together to agree to make the necessary changes to have a productive waterfront. Therefore, we again insist that this amendment be supported. If it is opposed by the government, we will call for a division.Senator Murray, on behalf of the Democrats, has an amendment which contains similar reporting provisions. However, the way I read them and see them, they are not as strict as ours in respect of the timetable, et cetera. If our amendment is defeated, we will certainly support Senator Murray's amendment on the basis that it is better than having no reporting requirements or weak reporting requirements of the kind that the government has. But we will call for a division on our own amendment. If our amendment is defeated, we will support Senator Murray's amendment and, hopefully, at the very least, we can get his amendment passed.I hope on this occasion, Senator Murray, that you will not be held over a barrel too much and that you will not abstain from voting or vote with the government. I really do appeal to you on this occasion. We should really insist that the House of Representatives accepts the reporting procedures. Let them come back and say that they will not accept the amendments, whether it is the Democrats' or whether it is ours. You cannot be held over a barrel on this issue because an expenditure of $300 million or $400 million is at stake. On this occasion, I am sure you will see the wisdom of the opposition's position that this is a matter that ought to go to the House of Representatives. If they do not like it, they can send it back and we will have a further debate. This will be exposed to the Australian people. If this government does not want full and decent accountability on an issue on which they have created enormous mistrust in the Australian community, then that will be on their head.12:19:004235Alston, Sen RichardSenator ALSTONLD4VICLPCommunications, the Information Economy and the Arts10—The government accepts the principle reflected in both the opposition and the Democrat amendments—that is, accountability. Our starting point would be to say that we have done our very best to ensure that adequate scrutiny and accountability is built into the current arrangements. But, nonetheless, if we have to choose between those two, we would certainly prefer the Democrat amendment. The opposition amendment does have a reference to `directions' to Commonwealth companies, and I simply point out that no such power exists under the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act. Under that act, there is a proper accountability regime for MIFCo in any event. I indicate that the government will be supporting the Democrat amendment and opposing the opposition amendment.12:20:004235Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—Those of you who have observed me during this debate would know that I have found it fairly wearing; there has not been much to amuse me or to divert me. However, I did have one amusing thought, Senator Schacht, and that is just how amused you would be if, after the election, you are in fact the government and you are presenting the first report in three months' time.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—That'll be a joy to behold.3M6Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY—I think that, at least, would give you pleasure.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—And we'll give a few free kicks along the way when we present that report.3M6Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY—Yes, I am sure you will. There is that possibility.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—That is a real possibility now.3M6Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY—Accordingly, of course, you would be mindful that the legislation that we are dealing with will affect, will bind, any future government, including yourselves.I think it is appropriate to speak on my amendment at the same time as yours, Senator Schacht, if you are happy with that, since the two are in the same direction. We are both in agreement that there needs to be accountability of this kind. We are both in agreement that there needs to be three-month reporting periods. The difference between us is that it is our belief that the principal expenditure of these moneys will occur in very short periods and that it is the first two three-month periods which are critical for the reporting.I am delighted that the government is prepared to accept the intent of both the opposition's and my amendments. My amendment does say that the first report is due within three months and that the next report is due on 31 December. I understand this will be law on 1 July, and that would mean the two reports would, indeed, be due within two three-month periods. Thereafter, it will be 12 months.Personally, I think that is a better way to go, but I am persuaded to go for my amendment rather than yours, Senator Schacht, by the fact that the government are likely to support ours and we must go where the numbers are. I am surprised you want to call a division on this yet again but, if you do, so be it. We will not be opposing your amendment. I guess we will have to abstain on your amendment and support our own, because it would be a bit foolish to oppose something that we actually do believe in. You might like to consider that.12:23:004236Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—Senator Murray, at least you have had some success with the government in getting an amendment accepted. I congratulate you on that. I suspect that it is Hobson's choice for them. Nevertheless, I understand that, because of the support they are giving your own amendment, you will abstain on ours. For the record, this is an issue that you understand has been of importance to the people we represent—not just the MUA but workers everywhere. It is important that we make the point very strongly here in the parliament that these are important issues, so we will have to call a division.10000TEMPORARY CHAIRMANThe TEMPORARY CHAIRMAN (Senator Knowles)—The question is that Senator Schacht's amendment be agreed to.12:24:004236Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—I formally advise the Senate that the Australian Democrats will be abstaining on this vote. Question put.12:29:00The committee divided. (The Chairman—Senator S.M. West)21Brown, B. Campbell, G.Carr, K. Collins, J. M. A.Cook, P. F. S. Cooney, B.Crossin, P. M. Denman, K. J.Evans, C. V. *Gibbs, B.Hogg, J. Lundy, K.Mackay, S. Margetts, D.Murphy, S. M. Neal, B. J.O'Brien, K. W. K. Quirke, J. A.Reynolds, M. Schacht, C. C.West, S. M.27Abetz, E. Alston, R. K. R.Boswell, R. L. D. Calvert, P. H. *Campbell, I. G. Chapman, H. G. P.Coonan, H. Eggleston, A.Ellison, C. Gibson, B. F.Heffernan, W. Herron, J.Kemp, R. Knowles, S. C.Lightfoot, P. R. Macdonald, S.McGauran, J. J. J. Minchin, N. H.Newman, J. M. O'Chee, W. G.Parer, W. R. Patterson, K. C. L.Payne, M. A.Reid, M. E.Tierney, J. Vanstone, A. E.Watson, J. O. W.Bishop, M. Brownhill, D. G. C.Bolkus, N. Ferguson, A. B.Conroy, S. Troeth, J.Crowley, R. A. Crane, W.Faulkner, J. P. MacGibbon, D. J.Forshaw, M. G. Hill, R. M.McKiernan, J. P. Synon, K. M.Ray, R. F. Macdonald, I.Sherry, N. Tambling, G. E. J.* denotes tellerQuestion so resolved in the negative.Amendment (by Senator Murray) agreed to:(1) Page 12 (after line 16), after clause 19, insert:19A Reports by Minister (1) As soon as practicable after the end of each reporting period, the Minister must prepare a report that sets out details of the following matters: (a) the payments that were authorised by the Minister under section 18 during the reporting period; (b) the activities during the reporting period of any Commonwealth authority or Commonwealth company (within the meaning of the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act 1997 ) that were activities in respect of which the authority or company received payments under section 18 in any reporting period; (c) distributions under section 19 during the reporting period. (2) The Minister must cause a copy of the report to be tabled in each House of the Parliament. (3) For the purposes of this section, each of the following is a reporting period : (a) the period from the commencement of this Act to the end of the third month after the month in which this Act commences; (b) the period commencing at the end of that third month and ending at the end of the next 31 December; (c) each subsequent period of 12 months.Bill, as amended, agreed to.STEVEDORING LEVY (IMPOSITION) BILL 1998Bill agreed to.Stevedoring Levy (Collection) Bill 1998 reported with amendments; Stevedoring Levy (Imposition) Bill 1998 reported without requests; report adopted.4237Motion (by Senator Alston) proposed:That these bills be now read a third time.12:33:004237Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—On behalf of the opposition, I want to make some brief comments, although I normally accept the practice that at the third reading stage comments are not necessary. This bill is important, not so much in itself but for the circumstances which led to it and for the circumstances the parliament has faced in dealing with it.I spoke on the bill in the second reading stage, as have my colleague Mr Tanner in the House of Representatives and other people from the opposition here, particularly Senator O'Brien. First of all I congratulate him, Senator Mackay and others on the assiduous way they worked through many estimates hearings to get out the information which the government attempted to hide about the underhand way they tried to enforce their policy of destroying the Maritime Union of Australia and its role on the Australian waterfront. If it were not for their work and that of other opposition senators at the estimates hearings, much of the material that is now before us which has exposed the duplicity and the underhanded way the government have acted on waterfront reform would not have been available to us as we have dealt with this bill. On behalf of the opposition and also the broad labour movement, I congratulate them on their work.I also want to point out that it is extraordinary that Minister Reith, who consistently made statements to the parliament that he knew nothing about the Dubai exercise and knew nothing about Corrigan's plans to sack 1,400 of his own workers, is still holding his position today as minister for industrial relations and waterfront reform in this parliament, in this government. Documents have been tabled and not refuted in any way which indicate that Mr Reith, the Prime Minister, and former minister, Mr Sharp, were fully aware and were part of the planning with their departments—the departments acted under their instructions—to destroy the Maritime Union of Australia and the role of workers who protect themselves through collective bargaining.It is extraordinary that this government, this Prime Minister, should allow Mr Reith still to be in that position. He should have called for his resignation months ago. He should have called for it earlier this week when the final documents were tabled. But of course the reason he will not call for Mr Reith's resignation is that, if he were honest, he himself would have to resign, because he has misled the parliament. This government's ethical position in relation to ministerial accountability and responsibility to the parliament is the lowest in living memory. It is absurd for this government to say they have a moral trust with the Australian people. We still call for the minister's resignation because he has clearly misled the Australian parliament. That is a sackable offence under the Westminster system as it has developed in Australia. There is no evidence now that can defend the minister. If he continues to say that he knew nothing about these arrangements, he is clearly misleading parliament and the Australian people.This bill was introduced into the House of Representatives as a way of recompensing Corrigan's companies for sacking 1,400 workers. That was the only way, Corrigan told the government, that he could meet his obligations under the existing law in terms of redundancies and payment of people who are sacked. That is how this legislation started off. Today, the minister's representative, Senator Alston, is talking about waterfront reform and saying that this is an expansive way we can get into training and new technology, et cetera. Normally, we would probably agree with him, but we know that those descriptions are an excuse for a different way to further attack the workers on the waterfront of Australia, because this government has no form of telling the truth about what they are aiming to do on the waterfront.We know that their bottom line, their ideological obsession, is to destroy a particular trade union, the Maritime Union of Australia. It is like the holy grail. It is an ideological commitment that goes back a decade or more to the founding of the H.R. Nicholls Society, which wanted to destroy a deregulated labour market and the ability of workers to collectively negotiate and protect their conditions. John Howard has been leading that ideological charge in the Liberal Party for over a decade now. Now that he is Prime Minister, he has encouraged his minister for industrial relations and waterfront reform, Mr Reith, to do everything possible to achieve his ideological obsessions.It is a disgusting performance by this government. I certainly look forward to the election campaign—whenever this Prime Minister can work out when he can call it. This issue of the right of ordinary workers to have protection under industrial law, to be able to collectively bargain, to protect and negotiate decent outcomes for themselves and their families, will be a central plank of Labor Party policy at that election. We look forward to fighting the election campaign on this issue, amongst others, because we know ordinary working Australians will support our position.John Howard and Mr Reith want each individual worker to go cap in hand—as they had to do 100 years ago—to talk to the boss and say, `Please, sir, give me something.' We all know that on that basis all the power is with the boss and not with the employee. The labour movement in this country and elsewhere in the Western world has accepted that workers can only protect themselves when they can work together and get an outcome on behalf of all. That is not in the theory and the ideology of this government. They do not want it. They want to destroy that and say that we will thereby have a more efficient economy.We may have some marginal efficiencies somewhere—I doubt it—but we will have unbelievable social stress in this country where ordinary workers feel that they are put upon and are going backwards. When that occurs, what happens? The Pauline Hansons emerge to offer a populist view of `Elect me and, above all else, blame somebody else. Blame an Aborigine. Blame an Asian. Blame a coloured person. Blame overseas foreigners'—become xenophobic and turn inwards. That is the result of following the industrial relations policy, the ideological zealotry and the leadership of the Prime Minister and the minister for industrial relations. We in the Labor Party strongly oppose it. We will fight to the very end—as we have for 107 years now—on this issue, and we will never stop fighting. That is why the Labor Party kept calling for divisions on this bill before us today—because, there is no compromise when you are defending the right of ordinary Australians to get a decent go in what we hope is an egalitarian society.12:41:004238Cooney, Sen BarneySenator COONEYSF4VICALP00—Following on from what Senator Schacht has said—LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—You've just wasted 20 minutes on the second reading with absolute waffle.SF4Cooney, Sen BarneySenator COONEY—I was about to make a remark when the minister raised an objection. It is a proper objection, because what has happened today is against the trend and the philosophy that his party represents. Senator Alston has fought against the struggle for the workers of this country to get decent conditions. Senator Murray said before that it would be interesting if parts of this bill, when they come into operation, are administered by the Labor Party. I say to Senator Murray, who has conducted himself most honourably throughout this debate, that that might well happen.That would be a very interesting historical position, because it was the activities that took place on the waterfront over 100 years ago that were largely responsible for the formation of the Labor Party—the Labor Party which is the oldest and most venerable party in Australia, a political party that has persisted for over 100 years. It happened because of the experiences of the then Waterfront Workers' Federation of Australia.It is interesting to note that the union movement and the waterside workers in particular have persisted for over a century now and have added much to the history of this country but, more importantly, they have made Australia the worthwhile place it is to live in where workers get a reasonable deal from the system. Unless the union movement continues and unless the Labor Party continues as it does now, those great conditions will be prejudiced.12:43:004239O'Brien, Sen KerrySenator O'BRIEN8O6TASALP00—I want to make some brief comments after having restrained myself considerably in the committee stage of this bill. In summary, when I spoke on the second reading I said that this bill was hastily cobbled together as part of the deal between this government and Patrick's to rid the waterfront of the MUA. Having been through the second reading stage and the committee stage of this bill, I can now say that the amendments such as they are to this bill have not sufficiently changed my view of the outcome of so far as this bill is concerned—that is, it is basically a package cobbled together to assist Patrick's to get their hand into their competitors' pockets to get some money for their reform exercise.As I said during the second reading debate, when you look at what Mr Corrigan said last night and, as I said in the committee stage, when you look at what is reported in the Financial Review today, the outcome of this process will not be as the National Farmers Federation has suggested—some magnificent saving to the users of the waterfront by halving, for example, the cost of container handling. What will happen is that a significant amount of any saving, such as it might be, will be placed in the coffers of the Lang Corporation and perhaps later P&O.If there is a claim that this process has been successful, then the only people who may make that claim will be Patrick's because they may get a financial windfall out of it by being able to use the millions of dollars that this government has put into this exercise, and I am not talking about under this bill but in terms of consultancies, legal advice and the time of the department that has been put into this exercise. We now have a measure which will be put in place which will allow Patrick's to put their hand into the pocket of their competitors to fund this exercise. At the end of the day, they can pay the cost of this exercise, which of course the government would want them to do being co-conspirators, and they can boost their profitability.We know that that money will go into the pockets of the shareholders of Lang Corporation and not to the farmers, the manufacturers and the importers of this country who were alleged to have been the potential beneficiaries of this process. This is a rather tawdry exercise. If the irony is, as I expect it will be when the election is called, that the Labor Party is elected, the Labor Party will be looking again at this legislation and this whole package. There is inherent unfairness in the whole package because of the requirement that Sea-Land and any new competitors which enter the industry will have to make payments to fund this exercise.In relation to the Democrats position on this matter, I understand that difficult decisions have to be made. They have made decisions on this matter which have surprised many of us, not least me. I was not aware until very late in the piece that they had taken the attitude that they have. I only hope that, at some stage, if this matter does come back to bite us all, someone within the Democrats is not scapegoated for a decision of their party room on the matter.12:47:004240Murray, Sen AndrewSenator MURRAY3M6WAAD00—I want to acknowledge the difficulties of this debate. There are times when both the major parties will make the point to the minor parties that we will never be in government and we will not know what it is like to make tough decisions. I assure you that, today, in terms of having the balance of power on this issue, we certainly felt the pain of how difficult it is to make tough decisions. I want to repeat that the entire time we have made these decisions we have had one objective and one objective alone in our mind—that is, to deliver those fees and those funds to the workers and families who are being made redundant through this process.I want to particularly acknowledge from the opposition party Senator O'Brien who has indeed pursued this matter with great diligence, in great detail, with great care and, quite frankly, with great objectivity. Sometimes it is the case that people pursue something with passion without the appropriate balance. I have felt that he has pursued this in entirely the right manner. The other thing I would like to say to the Senate is this: if there is anyone to be bitten on this thing in future, it will be me and I will carry the responsibility for it because I have had to make these decisions on the floor today.Question resolved in the affirmative.Bills read a third time.Notices424042404240Brown, Sen BobSenator BROWNQD4TASAG00—by leave—I give notice that, on the next day of sitting, I shall move:That the Senate calls on the Government to ensure the continued staffing of the Maatsuyker Island lighthouse in Tasmania's Wilderness World Heritage area.Sitting suspended from 12.50 p.m. to 1.20 p.m.Bills4240r513Billsr5144240Debate resumed from 23 June, on motion by Senator Ian Campbell:That these bills be now read a second time.13:20:004240Carr, Sen KimSenator CARRAW5VICALP00—by leave—I seek clarification from the Manager of Government Business in the Senate (Senator Ian Campbell). Earlier today and last night we were given to understand that it was the government's priority to get the appropriation bills on this afternoon, and undertakings were given on behalf of the opposition that we would facilitate those bills being carried this afternoon. I ask the manager: can he indicate to us now what is the government's priority?13:21:004240Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELLH15WALP10—by leave—The coalition wants to proceed with the program indicated on today's program and to complete consideration of the bill that is before the chamber and then move on to the appropriations and have those passed as quickly as possible.13:21:004240Carr, Sen KimSenator CARRAW5VICALP00—by leave—Last night it was put to the opposition that if the appropriation bills were not carried today then the employment of public servants would be brought into question next Wednesday. It was put to us that it was important for the chamber to carry those bills, that there would be a requirement for the Department of Finance, for some reason or other, to have time to process those bills. As a consequence, it was absolutely imperative that those bills be carried today.On that basis, we offered to the government our every cooperation to see that those bills were carried today. Now we are told that the priority for the government is digital TV. This I find an extraordinary proposition, given that there have been other opportunities during the week to consider the appropriation bills.H15CAMPBELLSenator Ian Campbell—When were they?AW5Carr, Sen KimSenator CARR—There were other opportunities—any time from when the reports of the estimates committees were brought into this chamber. We hear a great deal about the capacity of the opposition, as the government sees it, to frustrate this government's legislative program. It ought be understood that the reason we do not have the appropriations being debated and carried here this afternoon is that the government does not wish to give priority to those bills. We hear a great deal about the way in which the Senate treats the legislative program. I think it is important to get on the public record that so far this parliament 393 bills have been carried by this chamber. So far this year 84 bills have been carried. So far this week 22 bills have been carried.H15CAMPBELLSenator Ian Campbell—Madam Acting Deputy President, on a point of order: Senator Carr sought leave to make a short statement in response to mine. Leave was granted—and we do not want to stop him from making a short statement—but he is now going into a general rave about the program. I would ask Senator Carr to indicate how long he intends speaking for.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—It is not a point of order.H15CAMPBELLSenator Ian Campbell—It is a point of order. Leave was granted on the basis that he was going to make a brief statement.10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Patterson)—Order! Senator Carr, you did seek leave to make a short statement. I would ask you to keep it as short as possible in the best interests of the Senate.AW5Carr, Sen KimSenator CARR—I appreciate your advice, Madam Acting Deputy President. This week we have carried 22 bills. As I say, we have carried 84 bills this year compared with 85 bills throughout the entire year of 1996, which was also an election year. This Senate has been working extraordinarily hard. In fact, the government has sought from the opposition, through discussions with the opposition, an additional 303 hours and 56 minutes of extra government business time in this chamber. If we take into account the normal calculation of the average hours given for government business in any one week, which is about 15—H15CAMPBELLSenator Ian Campbell—Madam Acting Deputy President, on a point of order: the Senate granted leave to Senator Carr to make a brief response to my statement. He is not responding to my statement. He is clearly not being brief. If Senator Carr wants to make a short statement he should do so and allow the Senate to get on with the consideration of the next bill. He should bring his remarks to a conclusion and allow the Senate chamber to get on with the next item of business, which we expected to get to at 10.30 this morning. It is now 1.30 in the afternoon.10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT—Senator Campbell, you are beginning to debate the point of order now.H15CAMPBELLSenator Ian Campbell—I would like Senator Carr to undertake to bring his remarks to a conclusion, as he has committed to all of his colleagues in the Senate when he asked leave from them and as he undertook to you less than a few minutes ago.10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT—Senator Carr, I have asked you to be brief. I would ask you to conclude your remarks.3L6CONROYSenator Conroy—Madam Acting Deputy President, on a point of order: I seek clarification of new definition that the Senate appears to have introduced for the word `brief'.10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT—When the Senate gives leave for a senator to make a brief statement it is in a situation of trust that the person gives a brief statement. Senator Carr gave a brief statement. Senator Campbell gave a brief statement. It is now getting a little long, and I think it is testing the patience of the Senate. Senator Carr, I would ask you to rise and finish your statement as quickly as possible in the best interests of the Senate.AW5Carr, Sen KimSenator CARR—Thank you very much for your advice. As I have indicated, I have been speaking for about three minutes. I have asked for leave to give a brief statement. I intend to be brief, and the longer you take in terms of spurious points of order—10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT—Senator Carr, do not speak directly at Senator Campbell across the chamber. Refer your comments through the chair and speak on the topic that you have asked leave to speak on.AW5Carr, Sen KimSenator CARR—The longer senators take spurious points of order to try to detract from the fact that this government has so badly managed its legislative program—10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT—Senator Carr, resume your seat. Speak on the issue that you sought leave to speak on or I will ask you to sit down.AW5Carr, Sen KimSenator CARR—The government has badly managed its legislative program. It has sought our cooperation, which has been granted to the tune of the equivalent of an additional 20 sitting weeks in this parliament for government business. We are happy to discuss the legislative program, as the government determines it. The priorities are set by government. It is no good for the government to argue in the press gallery or in the public arena generally that the legislative program has been frustrated by the opposition and that we do not have the appropriation bills before the parliament because of the actions of the opposition.10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT—Senator Carr, you are testing my patience.AW5Carr, Sen KimSenator CARR—It must be clearly understood: the reason we do not have the appropriation bills before this parliament is the government.13:28:004242Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—I seek leave to make a very short statement in the way of a question to the Manager of Government Business about the program.LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—Is it less than a minute?4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—It will take about two minutes at the most.LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—A question takes two minutes?4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—I would have finished it by now if you had not interjected on me.10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT—Is leave granted for two minutes?Leave granted.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—My question is to the Manager of Government Business in the Senate because he was not clear in his comments in response to Senator Carr. Is it clear that the government gives a higher priority today and next Monday to the passage of the digital television bill, as it is commonly called, than the passage of the appropriation bill? Will the digital bill, in all its stages, have to be completed before the appropriation bill is brought back?13:29:004242Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELLH15WALP10—by leave—I thank my colleagues in the Senate. I thank Senator Schacht for that very sensible question. The reality is that we sought a series of agreements from the Labor Party, which were given with caveats in relation to concluding the stevedoring bill by last night. One of those undertakings involved reducing the speakers list from four to three. It was reduced from four to three, but then all of a sudden it went up to four again. We were told that the bill should be finished by about 10.30 this morning, but we finished it at about 12.50 p.m.We have always indicated that we would like to have the appropriation bills finished by this afternoon. By 1 o'clock, it became clear that that would be impossible to deliver. We would now like the so-called digital package to be considered and voted on by the Senate this afternoon. On the best advice from the government's advisers and the Attorney-General's office, we understand that if we can have the appropriation bills finished by early on Monday the government's requirements will be met. Our priorities are to conclude the digital package this afternoon and to conclude the appropriation bills on Monday.13:30:004242Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—Again, I seek leave to ask a very short question about the same matter.H15CAMPBELLSenator Ian Campbell—This is time wasting.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—It is not.10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Patterson)—Is leave granted for Senator Schacht to ask a very short question that will take no more than one minute?Leave granted.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—I ask the Manager of Government Business the simple question: will you insist on the whole digital bill being voted on in all its stages through to the third reading before the appropriation bills are brought back on?13:31:004243Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELLH15WALP10—by leave—The government would like to see the digital package finished before we leave here this afternoon. We cannot insist on anything in this place. We would then like to deal with the appropriation bills on Monday. That is the government's clear intention, and that is what we would like the Senate to do. If the Senate would like to continue dealing with the legislative program and pass more than the three bills it has passed this week other than the non-controversial legislation, the best it can do is respect the taxpayers who fund this place and deal with some legislation. That is what the taxpayers of Australia expect us to do, not to play little games.13:32:004243Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—I seek leave to make a short one-minute statement.Leave not granted.13:32:004243Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT4J4SAALP00—Before I get to the merits of the Television Broadcasting Services (Digital Conversion) Bill 1998 , I want to make a comment about the process.LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—Take as long as you like. You have 20 minute to rabbit on about the process. If you want to show your policy inadequacies, that's fine.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—Here we go; here is the dopey minister.10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT—Senator Schacht, that is not appropriate. Withdraw it.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—That he is dopey?10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT—That is not appropriate.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—I withdraw it. I was seeking leave to ask some questions. Though I am shadow minister and believe that the digital conversion bill is extremely important to the future of broadcasting in Australia, I find it extraordinary that the government would put it ahead of the passage of the appropriation bills, which supply money for all government activities in Australia. The government now says that that is the process. They will not indicate to us whether the full bill has to be carried.This digital bill cannot be dealt with in all its stages in the just over two hours we have before us in the Senate this afternoon. There are a number of speakers on the second reading debate. I would be surprised if there were not a large number of senators on all sides who would like to express a few views about the future of broadcasting in Australia as it relates not only to the next year or so but to the next decade and a half. There are provisions in this bill that apply well into the end of the next decade. This is not an inconsequential matter.When the Senate committee was considering the bill, the government dumped on the opposition something like 70 technical amendments without warning. That was fine; we always accept that governments have to refine things. However, they were dumped without warning. The Senate committee tabled its report last Tuesday. Madam Acting Deputy President Patterson, you were the chair of that committee, which made a number of recommendations in a majority report, and the Labor Party made some recommendations in a minority report. But we are still to hear from the minister whether any of these suggested amendments, even those from his government colleagues, will be accepted.It is very difficult for the opposition to plan a range of amendments when we do not yet know what the government responses to even its own Liberal senators' recommendations are. If the minister believes that without that information we can deal with the committee stage today, let alone the second reading stage, I inform him that it is impossible. I want to know at some stage when the minister will respond to the report tabled on Tuesday this week. He is making a mockery of his own Senate committee chaired by you, Madam Deputy President. We will go ahead with the debate, which I am more than happy to, but I place on the record the opposition's attitude towards the treatment of this bill.LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—Madam Acting Deputy President, I raise a point of order. For Senator Schacht's benefit, I have advice that there is no obligation on the government to respond to a report of a legislation committee before the legislation on which it is reported is debated in the Senate. It is also not a common practice.10000ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENTThe ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT—Senator Alston, it is not a point of order to interrupt a speaker. You have an appropriate place to say that.4J4Schacht, Sen ChrisSenator SCHACHT—I knew that that would be the response of the minister. This is a bill full of technicalities. If the minister really is genuine about trying to get agreement so that the bill gets through the parliament quickly, he would have taken the cooperative approach of informing other parties in the Senate what his view is on the recommendations contained in this report, including those from government members, who have made sensible recommendations which we in the Labor Party support.I will turn now to the bill itself. The Labor Party has complained strongly and loudly about how this issue was dealt with by the government. In July of last year the Australian Broadcasting Authority issued a discussion paper about the issues related to the introduction of digital television in Australia. It was a very reasonable discussion paper but not a totally comprehensive paper; they never imagined it would be. One of the things they pointed out in their recommendations was that the legislation to establish digital television broadcasting in Australia did not have to be introduced in the parliament until October this year for a start-up date in metropolitan Australia beginning 1 January 2000. That was their recommendation; that was their considered time scale.But what does the minister's legislation do? It says it has to be dealt with before the end of this parliamentary session—the end of next week—for a start-up date a year later, 1 January 2001, in the metropolitan area. So even the ABA in a discussion paper some 11 months ago gave a quite different timetable for the handling and introduction of digital television. The minister has brought into the parliament a completely different timetable from that of the independent authority.When that discussion paper came out, there was nothing more done by the government—except, obviously, for internal discussion with the minister, with various media players and with parliamentary colleagues on his side of politics—until a couple of months ago when the legislation was tabled in the parliament. It went through the House of Representatives and was referred to the Senate Environment, Recreation, Communications and the Arts Legislation Committee. We had no objection to the ERCA committee handling it, and we accept that the government has a majority on the committee.We pointed out at the time that the issues contained in the bill are so important, so detailed and so technical that a more convenient reporting date would be the beginning of the next session in late August-early September. The various interest groups, of which there are quite a few with very strong views on all aspects of the bill, could then look at the legislation, consider their responses, and there could be decent hearings with no rushed timetable. We could then have the report available and the legislation could be dealt with in the Senate at the beginning of the next session. But that was rejected by the government. They convinced Senator Harradine to vote with them on the basis that there was enough time.During the hearings we heard plenty of complaints from people who felt they had had to rush submissions in. They complained that they could not handle all the detail and that they had had to put in supplementary comments. I might say that everyone was given every opportunity to put material before the committee. Senator Patterson, the chair of the committee, and all members of the committee were cooperative in giving everyone the opportunity to put in supplementary comments and to respond to other submissions. But I still say it was a very rushed process and that a number of issues we are now dealing with have been affected as a consequence.I think there is a strong perception now abroad amongst the public that the government was more interested in reaching an internal political agreement with certain free to air television stations for their own political purposes than they were in trying to get a well-established bipartisan approach to the introduction of digital television.The opposition has never opposed the introduction of digital television. We made it clear from the beginning that we support the introduction of digital television in Australia. We agreed from the beginning with the timetable of the government. We may have changed a date here or there, but there had to be some certainty given.We support the government's start-up date of 1 January 2001. We support the simulcast period for both analog and digital up to 2008. We support the general definition and comments the government has made, though the devil is in the detail, regarding the descriptions of multi-channelling and that the free to air commercials will not be able to multi-channel and will not be able to provide digital television to get into subscription television or pay TV. As we made clear from the beginning, we support the general thrust of the government's legislation.As the evidence mounted and the hearings progressed, there was a lot of disagreement about how the technical description will actually work. The way in which the government have drafted this legislation covers the fact that, in their rush to get this through, they have not drafted legislation in enough detail to provide that certainty. On last count they have established, I think, four committees of review that will report to the minister on technical and standards issues, et cetera, and the minister will then either accept or reject their recommendations. In most cases it appears they will introduce the rules for the introduction of digital television by way of disallowable instrument.During the hearings it became clear that there is significant disagreement between the various interest groups and media about what the government definitions might or might not be, on such things as datacasting, enhancement and multi-channelling. If we get this legislation wrong—by accident, not by deliberate means—because we make a mistake in the technicalities, we could actually give a big economic gift to one side of the media compared with another. I have to say that is one reason alone why the rush with this legislation is unfortunate.For example, the definition of multi-channelling given by the potential datacasters is that digital datacasting means they would be moving into some form of broadcasting. That is what they think datacasting means. To listen to Mr Branigan's evidence to the committee, his definition of enhancement of the digital signal I thought described multi-channelling, but he believed it was a legitimate description of enhancing that was not multi-channelling. I thought his description described multi-channelling.These are issues that have not yet been clarified in the government's bill. They say, `Trust us; we will go off and have reviews, and those reviews will make recommendations to me, the minister, and, therefore, in a number of cases we will come back with a disallowable instrument.'In a number of these areas I do not think it is a satisfactory process to rely on a disallowable instrument because at that stage of the debate the government will say, `You do not support our regulation and you are delaying it; therefore you are creating uncertainty et cetera.' That position will be put upon those in the Senate who disagree. That is not the way to make good public policy and for the parliament to get the outline correct of how digital television should operate in Australia.We believe, therefore, that the amendments that we will be moving will actually establish the principles upon which the free to airs will know they can move into digital television and start preparing with certainty. We will be moving amendments to take out of the act, and leave for further discussion and review by the minister, certain matters. When he completes those reviews, he comes back to the parliament with further amendments to the legislation. They include definitions of datacasting, multi-channelling and enhancement. He also comes back to the parliament with information about the system: whether we will use the European or the American system for broadcasting the digital signal, and what the industry arrangements are that we will have to encourage as much as possible, with the introduction of the digital system into Australia, the manufacture of both the hardware and the software in Australia to create Australian jobs.If the digital uptake is successful, billions of dollars will be spent by Australian consumers over the next decade or more as they buy the equipment. If that is all imported, it will be a significant further addition to the current account deficit. Why don't we see how much of this can be done in Australia to create jobs in Australia? Those issues ought to be reported back and ought to be in the legislation so that clear guidelines are given by the parliament about the development of this industry.In a number of these areas we will move amendments to the government's position on these technical standards and industry development procedures, because too much is left wide open in this bill and accordingly there is too much uncertainty. We do not believe that is the best way in which to proceed with what should be a very exciting development, not only in Australian broadcasting but in Australian communications. If done properly and achieved properly—and I am sure the opposition and the government have a bipartisan view on this—this will be an exciting opportunity for Australia to establish itself as one of the countries in the forefront of the new communication and information distribution systems of the 21st century. That would not only be of major entertainment value but, above all, an economic advantage for our country.The most controversial issue in this bill before the parliament is the ban on any new commercial television free to air broadcast licences being issued until 2008. The minister has been broadly and roundly condemned by some media interests for providing this ban for such a long period. The opposition's view, which has already been publicly announced, is that we believe a ban is justified to a reasonable extent, because the free to air television stations will be up for a significant investment in new equipment and it will be costly, during that period of simulcast, to run both analog and digital signals. Those are reasonable and genuine issues. We do not deny, and have never denied, that there should be an appropriate period for not only the simulcast but also the ban, and our amendment will be to reduce it from 2008 to 2006.I notice in editorials in some newspapers we are still being criticised in that this is supposedly too generous to the free to airs; other people say we should have supported the government, but that is a matter for genuine debate. We believe the balance is about right in this area. But one thing we will make clear is that the ban ends in 2006 under our amendment and there will be no review in the legislation, from our point of view, to allow any consideration for further review to extend the ban beyond that date. We believe that is fair warning to all the free to airs: they get the ban out to 2006 and plan accordingly. Before that time the government of the day may wish to have a review of whether it is possible to have further commercial free to air broadcasting licences issued in Australia. As a normal, open, public process we would support that. That is a decision of the government of the day.In conclusion, we believe the real opportunity in this bill is to provide Australians with a new form of enhanced entertainment: bigger and better screens with high definition; more attractive viewing—particularly in the reproduction quality of what are now normal cinemascope screens—of films, sporting and nature programs et cetera. We believe that will all be welcomed by consumers, but we also see that the digital revolution will enable Australians to have better access to all the new forms of information distribution. The new digital television receivers—whether they are HDTV, high definition television, or standard digital—will also be able to be used to receive all the other ranges of information that the digital system can provide.This is where we get convergence or crossover between broadcasting and communication. That will be an ongoing debate, not confined just to the time of this bill. Those are issues which will be raised here in the debate on the amendments, but I do not think conclusions will be reached. We want an open system because, from time to time, legislation will have to be revisited as technology changes the regulatory structure, whether we like it or not.We support the belief that digital television is a major step forward. We also accept that it will be one of the few times in the history of this country at the national level that parliament will carry legislation that will ultimately say, `Your existing television analog set at a certain date will go off air. It will go blank, and you will have to buy a new television set or a device to convert your existing set.' We accept—and we support this happening for the wider national interest—that consumers will be forced to pay money in that regard. Consumers have not yet quite woken up to this because these issues are still years out. We accept that this is a very important consumer issue. The evidence we received from the consumers association dealing with this issue was very thoughtful and well put together.So this is an important bill. Not only must it handle the introduction of digital television but also it must ensure that it is done in an orderly way and in the broad national interest. Because the government have rushed this legislation for their own political purposes they will not achieve the best outcome and we will move our amendments accordingly. (Time expired)13:53:004247Bourne, Sen VickiSenator BOURNETW4NSWAD00—The Democrats accept that the shift from an analog terrestrial digital broadcasting environment to a digital one is inevitable. The conversion to digital television broadcasting represents the greatest change in broadcasting technology since the commencement of television, not only in Australia but also throughout the world. Further, the conversion from analog to digital broadcasting provides the government with a unique opportunity to reassess broadcasting and telecommunications policy without obviously proscribed outcomes. The government has prepared this legislation, principally the Television Broadcasting Services (Digital Conversion) Bill 1998 , to set the parameters for discussion and the substantial technical and policy work and economic investment in broadcasting that must inevitably follow.But the Democrats believe the legislation raises many more questions about digital terrestrial television broadcasting than it answers. By the very nature of the technology it is not unexpected. The debate is complicated because in many ways it is a technical debate. The way the digital images and text are transmitted makes digital technology very special. Digital transmissions can be compressed and manipulated and the possibilities arising in a digital broadcasting environment mean that we should be very circumspect in the way we deal with the policy issues and any accompanying legislation such as this.This bill has been given quite remarkable priority by the government, with no good explanation why. Theories abound, of course, but it comes down to this: the government should allow the parliament proper time to consider all of the extremely complex issues. I will spell out the main elements of the government's decision. The five free to air networks will be lent seven megahertz of spectrum free of up-front charges. In return they will be required to simulcast analog and digital television for eight years from the commencement of digital broadcasting in 2001. After that period the networks have to return the equivalent of the loaned spectrum back to the Commonwealth. The free to air broadcasters will be required to commence digital broadcasts in 1 January 2001 and in regional areas from 1 January 2004.Free to airs will be required to broadcast minimum levels of high definition television with these levels increasing over time. If the free to airs do not comply with these requirements, they will forfeit their loaned digital spectrum. They will be permitted to use the part of their loaned spectrum not required for digital broadcasts to provide datacasting services. They will have to pay a fee for these services, which are the subject of the Datacasting Charge (Imposition) Bill 1998. Available broadcasting spectrum will be auctioned to other datacasting service providers. Datacasting services will also commence in 2001.Free to airs will not be able to provide multi-channel services or subscription services, although they will be permitted to provide enhanced services, so long as they are directly linked to the program being simulcast on the analog channel. A prohibition on new commercial free to air entrants will apply until December 2008.Local content requirements will continue to apply. In addition, free to air broadcasters will have to provide closed captioning for all prime time programs as well as for news and current affairs programs broadcast outside prime time. The government is considering allowing the national broadcasters the ABC and SBS—to multi-channel in line with their charter obligations. I agree with that. The government will also undertake several statutory reviews between now and 2005 on technical and policy issues arising from this conversion.Digital broadcasting systems have been designed to operate using the same channel bandwidth as analog systems to enable integration with the current use of the spectrum. A single digital transmitter provides the capacity to send about 20 million bits per second—20 megabits—of data to the home. This signal is sufficient to provide one high definition television broadcast of a sporting event, or possibly two high definition movie channels. The signal is also capable of providing three or four live sports programs equivalent to current broadcasting quality. It might also be enough to provide up to six `talking heads' programs. The capacity to replace a single analog channel with several other channels is called `multi-channelling'.The spare capacity created by digital transmission can also be used to provide captioning, news and market information and other data services. These services, no matter what form they are in, are referred to as `datacasting'. So, the possibilities of new forms of broadcasting services that we already know about are vastly different from those we currently receive.The government should remain mindful of the cost to the consumer of the equipment and the ability of either system to achieve well-constructed spectrum use. It is extremely difficult to estimate the costs of conversion from analog to digital terrestrial television broadcasting. The commercial networks estimate the costs of conversion for the three commercial networks to be somewhere between $500 million and $740 million. They also claim the conversion will add $30 million to $40 million to their annual operating costs. These costs have been taken for granted in the government's policy.In his personal message, the minister stated:The government is loaning the free to air networks . . . the spectrum required to provide HDTV during their simulcast period . . . because the networks will effectively have to pay twice their normal transmission costs in addition to the estimated $500 million for new digital transmitters, studios and production facilities.To receive digital television, consumers will require either a new digital television set or a set top box to convert the digital signal back to analog. The set top box will not improve the picture quality but it will eliminate interference such as ghosting and will provide CD quality sound. To receive HDTV, consumers will have to purchase a wide screen, high definition television set.At this stage it is impossible to determine the costs of either the set top box or HDTV set. I have heard estimates of about $1,500 for a set top box, and HDTV sets may cost up to $15,000 each. With that kind of cost, can we be guaranteed that the majority of Australians will want to purchase high definition television sets? The government thinks so, because their policy relies on it. The commercial stations argue that they need the spectrum at no cost because it would enable them to broadcast in high definition and that is what consumers will want to view. But will we? Who has asked us? We might prefer to keep our old televisions, purchase a set top box and receive more channels and more services.The ABC estimates digital conversion will cost under $200 million for them—of course they are metropolitan and regional. The ABC has offered to partially self-fund its conversion by `rationalising property holdings' in line with recommendations in the Mansfield review. However, the minister mistrusted the ABC's estimates and referred their funding submission to Arthur Andersen Corporate Finance for an independent assessment.It is interesting to note that the minister once accused former Prime Minister Paul Keating of conducting a personal vendetta against the ABC. So who is the ABC supposed to be biased in favour of? Arthur Andersen Corporate Finance found in favour of the ABC's estimates. Despite this, the government has provided the ABC with only $20.8 million over the next five years, and this figure does not include transmission costs. If it is going to cost the commercial broadcasters up to $740 million, and they operate in five major capital cities, and the ABC is national, why would the minister not trust their estimate?Some estimates suggest that the real cost of digital conversion is likely to be a small proportion of the estimated $1 billion, including regional commercial broadcasters, identified by the networks themselves; possibly even half. One estimate that appears reasonable is that conversion costs will be in the range of $60 million to $80 million for all three networks on a five capital city basis, and the regionals at approximately $100 million to $130 million, making a total of no more than $210 million maximum. That is one-fifth of their own costings. The purchase of digital equipment is already under way, and has been for some time, under normal studio equipment replacement cycles. Much remains unclear about the real costs to broadcasters of digital conversion. We do not doubt that digital conversion will be expensive, but, if these costings are wrong, or inaccurate in any way, it calls into question the whole basis on which the government has predicated much of its digital policy and this legislation.An essential element of the digital package is the moratorium on new commercial entrants until 2008. The commercial networks will tell you, as the minister has done, that this is crucial because of the investment required for the maintenance of the quality and diversity of services available to consumers. Is a moratorium on new entrants until 2008 logical? Given the potential for new services to emerge in digital technology, new entrants could add to the diversity of product and services rather than detract from them. Furthermore, it appears likely that new entrants would face the same infrastructure costs as their established counterparts, because they are not granted free spectrum space and they would incur fees, taxes and other liabilities. Surely, too, the advertising industry would welcome a new and different market.The Democrats question the need to rush this decision on the introduction of digital broadcasting, because there are too many unknowns in this policy—legal, technical and economic unknowns. Regional broadcasters are, of course, quite different from their metropolitan counterparts, and they are worthy of separate consideration. Regional broadcasters are defined in two groups: multistation regional broadcasters and solus station—only station—regional broadcasters. Regional broadcasters have higher transmission costs per viewer than metropolitan broadcasters and require more relay stations and more transmission towers to cover a wider area. This results in higher infrastructure and operating costs. Most do not have the resources to produce their own programs, apart from local news and current affairs, so they purchase their product from Australian networks or from overseas broadcasters. In aggregated markets, licensees have an affiliation agreement with one of the major networks to provide most of their programming. Licence fees are lower for regional broadcasters, reflecting the lower advertising revenues they receive.Regional commercial broadcasters have requested the same assistance in the transition to digital that they received in the equalisation process of the late 1980s, with special attention afforded to solus markets. While they may have some good arguments, we would like to give this issue further consideration. Naturally, we will remain open to the possibility that the most appropriate and cost-efficient technical way to offer digital televi sion services to regional and remote Australia might not be the same as that for metropolitan Australia.The committee heard evidence that mandating high definition broadcasting is neither desirable nor sustainable. The Australian Consumers Association predicted that HDTV will fail because the equipment will be too expensive and consumers will opt for increased services rather than enhanced picture quality. This is a distinct possibility. But, rather than being able to debate the merits of the government's model through scrutiny of an exposure draft, consideration of other models, including more flexible licensing and revenue raising mechanisms, cannot be explored because we are going through this right now. The minister will say that this is impossible under the bill because, if the commercials do not broadcast in high definition, they will lose their spectrum allocation. Yes indeed, that is what the legislation says. But I must say I would be surprised if that actually happened. I would be interested to see if anybody actually wanted to do that or if they were prepared to try to amend the legislation.In terms of provision of service, should broadcasters be treated any differently to telecommunications carriers? Convergence may make the distinction increasingly murky. In fact, I think it will. Both are, as I said earlier, essential services. I would like to quote here the United States regulator, the FCC, as food for thought. They are talking about their own plans. They say:The FCC's plan was developed . . . promoting high definition television. . . . The idea was that broadcasters would use the new spectrum to transmit just one signal that would be simultaneous and identical to the analogue signal, except for its high resolution, or so called high definition. This high resolution would be so attractive that Americans would naturally elect to purchase the new high definition televisions. Then standard TVs would be abandoned and today's analogue spectrum would be returned to the public and used for other purposes. Therefore, the scheme was labelled a transition, and the new spectrum was called a second channel . . . After the spectrum was awarded in the US, broadcast executives admitted that despite all the talk about high definition, they were not sure that's what they were going to do. So the terms constrain our imaginations about what really may be possible in the digital environment. We assume the system will be similar to analog, because that is our experience so far. We would be wise to watch developments overseas to learn from their mistakes, rather than making our own.The bill applies current local content standards to the digital environment, but the recent High Court decision in the Project Blue Sky case disallows the Australian Broadcasting Authority's right to give preference to Australian programs. The committee heard that the Broadcasting Services Act should be amended in order to preserve the integrity of and the government's commitment to the Australian content standard. The committee noted that the government is awaiting the findings of the ABA's inquiry into the High Court's decision. However, the ABA's powers in relation to its review of content standards are limited. The ABA cannot determine if the legislation should be changed, but must create a standard which complies with the High Court's ruling. One of the most important aspects of this debate is that Australian content standards do not fall. They must not fall. This issue is therefore integral to the bill.Datacasting is a new service which digital technology makes possible. Datacasting delivers information in the form of data, text, speech, images, or in any other form. While not wanting to limit new technologies or the advent of new services within a digital broadcasting environment, the Democrats do not believe it is appropriate to wait for the review in 2001 to determine the adequacy of the definition of datacasting. The number of unclear areas in the definitions of both datacasting and broadcasting are problematic. This is another section of the bill which requires further investigation.Commercial free to air networks are not allowed to provide multi-channel services, but they are permitted to provide enhanced services, which must be incidental and directly linked to a program that is simulcast in analog and digital. The explanatory memorandum states that different visual representations of the same event, like viewing the event from different camera angles, will be permit ted. The committee heard that there is a difference of opinion between the department and the commercial networks about this because the department believes that this may amount to multi-channelling. So the definitions may be too broad.The term `event' also implicitly defines a program type—like live sports—but the actual program may not be live, may not be a sports program or may not even be an event. A lifestyle program, for example, might provide an enhanced service in the form of a shopping guide or other linked video content. Although not intended by this definition, in practical terms, this may be multi-channelling. Further review of this issue is obviously required.We support the national broadcasters providing multi-channel services so long as those services are within their charter obligations. But since the government has not finalised its decision in this regard, how can the provision be legislated? Such an important broadcasting service should not be subject to ministerial discretion, subject to disallowance under subordinate legislation.The Democrats have serious concerns regarding the policy environment in which the decisions about digital broadcasting are currently being made. The government's policy framework for the conversion from analog to digital is based on assumptions derived from analog broadcasting. The decision to mandate HDTV and not allow new entrants until 2008 exemplifies this. The ban on the entry of new broadcasters may have the effect of further concentrating media power, limiting the diversity of content and the possibility of the introduction of new and innovative services. This requires further and ongoing investigation.Despite the vital importance digital broadcasting has for the broadcasting future, there has been very little public debate. It is incumbent upon this government to ensure that all consumers are made aware of the importance of the introduction of digital broadcasting, with the policy objectives clearly stated and open to critique. This process should occur before the introduction of legislation, as we understand will be the case with digital radio.Because digital technology allows for the compression of data, current single-service providers can become multi-service providers. This in itself is a matter of great public interest, with important consequences for consumers in terms of how these services are offered, accessed and regulated. So while these bills add to a legislative framework covering analog technology, they in no way deal with digital technology and the other possibilities that that creates.The implementation of digital television requires some crucial safeguards including: clear and unambiguous definitions; an open access regime; application of universal standards and a universal service guarantee; a use it or lose it approach to the spectrum; clear benchmarks for digital conversion, with public reporting by the regulator, subject to parliamentary scrutiny prior to implementation and/or legislative amendment; and new entrants should be given access to the spectrum if the benchmarks are not met.It is crucial that the parliament pass legislation reflecting its importance and which benefits Australia's consumers. We do not support this legislation in its current form and recommend that the government allow the parliament time to further investigate. We can do this now, report back and probably pass the legislation in the next session. That would mean that the legislation could be passed before Christmas.I would like conclude by reminding the current minister of a statement he made on 16 September 1992, when the report of the Senate Select Committee on Subscription Television Broadcasting Services was tabled. He said that the committee report was presented in `an impossibly tight deadline, one that quite clearly was entirely politically motivated. It ought to be apparent that with issues of such complexity it is highly desirable that as much time as possible is allowed to explore these issues. This is yet another graphic illustration of the moral and intellectual bankruptcy of those who are not interested in getting policy right, but simply obsessed with getting politics right'. I think the minister was talking about a 12-week period for the committee to look into the introduc tion of pay TV in Australia. So what is another 16 weeks when legislation as important as this is being debated?14:11:004252Lundy, Sen KateSenator LUNDY7G6ACTALP00—I rise to speak to these broadcasting and datacasting bills and to indicate that we will be moving a second reading amendment. The issue of high definition television goes far deeper and far further than the issues that are present within the body of these bills. I believe we are dealing with the guidelines and the parameters within which digital content and the means by which it will be delivered to Australian people for at least the next two decades is being determined.The degree of technological specificity contained within these bills is absolutely ludicrous. I believe that these bills will constrain the opportunities of many new and existing suppliers of digital content. From a social perspective, the means by which Australians receive information into their homes and into their workplaces is absolutely critical and it is a genuine issue for government consideration. This interface between information and the general public is something that warrants far more than a rushed, flawed process of consideration.The Television Broadcasting Services (Digital Conversion) Bill 1998 and the Datacasting Charge (Imposition) Bill 1998 television broadcasting services digital convention data charge imposition bill 1998 both represent policy expressing limited scope and no acknowledgment of the convergence of digital content and the convergence of technologies generally. The bills and the mechanisms that they describe in the introduction of high definition TV do more to divert attention from the issues that are at stake than draw attention to what the government needs to do.The importance of how governments manage television content generally and how it is delivered can probably be best described in the language they know best. Revenues derived from the presentation of that content through advertising and other means lends some weight to understanding the powers that are at play when parliaments are asked to consider such matters. The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development's working party on the information economy recently provided a report entitled Content as a new growth industry provides statistical information about the distribution of advertising spending in the OECD across the various media. Television, not surprisingly, significantly leads the pack.Convergence has been completely ignored in this debate, at a time when there is so much evidence around us about the bringing together of digitised content and technological developments that do not even lend themselves towards a passion for taking up high definition television, but indeed trend towards another direction.I would like to turn to that other direction now. Currently there is a trend away from broadcast TV, and the Internet and Web TV are eating away at traditional television markets. High definition TV is very much about trying to restore these markets. It is an attempt very much to try to halt this decline in audience.To highlight this shift we can turn to the USA, where over 400,000 Americans already access Web TV and, because these users do not necessarily require a separate PC to access the World Wide Web, many consumers are showing a preference for Web TV over both traditional broadcast services or traditional PC-based Internet access.They are dissatisfied with this trend away and, to make my point further, Web TV or the Internet access through a television set—not necessarily Web TV, which is a Microsoft product—is here. I refer to an article from the Australian from earlier this year which says you can purchase a Web TV set top box for some $800 and have access rates that are hugely competitive on current Internet access rates on a PC based system. So we are not talking about technology that is still around the corner; we are talking about technology that is present now.If this government were to look at convergence in a holistic way, we would not be looking at a bill that deals with high definition television—we would be looking at a bill which addresses converging technologies, which addresses digital content and digital content delivery mechanisms holistically, and that embraces other legislation that currently cover these matters. Instead, in fine and typical form, this government did not look beyond their short-sighted vision, they did not look to where technology was taking us and put in place an outline or provide for a mechanism so we could move towards some sort of broadly convergence based legislation that addresses these issues. They have stuck to a narrow definition.The free to airs have played a significant role in this and it seems that Minister Alston has once again been very content to dance to the tune of the corporate players who have a stake in the particular sector with which he is working. As a result, there are many unanswered questions about the actual value of the spectrum and the forgone revenue that this government is proposing under this legislation draws into stark contrast how this government intends, first, to provide for the transition to digital TV; second, to utilise what is a public resource in the most effective way possible; and, third, to decide what is fair for a sector that is competing in the new technological environment.Some of the media players argue that in giving away spectrum new participants and, therefore, greater consumer choice, have not been considered. The point of whether or not this spectrum could be auctioned, and hence deliver perhaps billions of dollars in revenue, is one that must be considered in the context of this bill.The government proposes to loan the commercial and national free to airs seven megahertz of spectrum without any up-front charges. They also propose to prevent any new free-to-air entrants from operating before December 2008. The trade-off is that the FTAs must simulcast their existing broadcast for eight years. They will be allowed to use parts of these loaned spectrum that are not used for digital terrestrial television broadcasting for datacasting services. But, as you have already heard, there is no definition of these additional services. SBS and the ABC in particular are being allowed multichannelling. I think this is an appropriate means as they are in the best position to provide a better service for all Australians, not just those in the metropolitan or densely populated areas. Regional broadcasters too have a strong argument for financial assistance and they too will need to be provided for.I would like now to turn back to the issue of convergence. In Australia there are many corporate alliances that point to the folly behind this legislation. They point to issues that, as a parliament, we must be mindful of. A $50 million on-line joint venture between PBL, Microsoft and Telstra is an example of on-line print and television convergence. This arrangement will channel more than 180,000 Internet users through Telstra's big pond Internet product towards 9MSN.It will give 9MSN a significant competitive advantage while securing for Telstra a vital edge over Internet service providers. Because of this deal, Telstra's big pond subscribers get automatic access to 9MSN's content service. In return, Telstra will conduct all the billing for 9MSN.There are serious implications for the non-free to air players with respect to this arrangement: 9MSN's Internet data centre, with a combined disk space of 1,819 gigabytes and 8.7 gigabytes of RAM will be able to provide the largest bandwidth capacity in Australia. Therefore, video and audio streaming and the transmission of digital TV will be available not through the spectrum but through Telstra's copper and local loop networks. Looking at the leverage that these arrangements provide, does that mean that 9MSN, the Nine Network and Microsoft will become the main providers of Internet content on television sets?With respect to web TV, there are already many hundreds of users of the Microsoft product in the US. It is an established product. Not only has the government given the three commercial networks a huge presence at present in the seven megahertz spectrum but also they are allowing them to gain an advantage in the context of convergence and Internet based TV. Other Internet content deliverers—such as the services that Fairfax, OzEmail and others provide—will perhaps have fewer opportunities to purchase spectrum left over after the usage of each seven mega hertz of grouping within the spectrum allocation.Where do the consumers come in? To highlight the dangers of converging technologies to consumers in the context of these corporate alignments, I turn to a recent announcement by AT&T, the largest telecommunications carrier in the US. They have just announced a deal that sees them taking over a service in the US called TCI, which currently supplies 14 million cable customers in the US. The relationships between the providers of Internet content, Internet service providers, broadcaster service providers and telecommunications carriers have a serious relevance to and implication for this debate.The resulting product in people's homes is a digital web based blend on their TV sets. At this point in time, with this legislation, Australia can look forward to a Bill Gates entry point to the Internet. I do not believe this is a desirable outcome for digital content and digital services delivery. We know the Microsoft Corporation buys satellites and enters partnerships with telecommunications carriers around the world. They understand there is a direct transfer of technologies for consumers who perhaps do not require the full capabilities of a PC to access the Internet; consumers who want to get onto the World Wide Web as consumers of other products, as seekers of information and as people who like decent, comprehensive, good quality and, more than likely, interactive entertainment.The convergence of technologies in this way must be considered now. It must be considered in the context of these bills because, if it is not, government will once again be significantly marginalised in the decision making process around these issues. Mind you, it is only important to have the government in any position of usefulness if, in fact, they have shown their competence in addressing the issues.In concluding my comments today I would like to make a couple of points. This particular piece of legislation cannot be considered in isolation from other events that have both occurred in this place legislatively within the agenda of the government and are occurring with corporate realignments in Australia and throughout the world. The privatisation of Telstra means that the physical infrastructure, our telecommunications network, will become the conduit for much more than just our telephone calls, our faxes and our emails. Potentially, that network will deliver a digital TV service that will be controlled and managed by ninemsn. That is Bill Gates, and that is Kerry Packer.The arrangements confined within this legislation close off opportunities for digital content to be presented and provided by other content providers. In the context of what has happened to the ABC, who currently lead the world in the provision of digital content, we start to see a very disturbing picture. (Time expired)14:31:004254Margetts, Sen DeeSenator MARGETTSDX5WAG(WA)00—This package of legislation, the Television Broadcasting Services (Digital Conversion) Bill 1998 and the Datacasting Charge (Imposition) Bill 1998 , is being pushed through the Senate under the guise of urgency. One argument coming from the government and the commercial networks seems to go along the lines that the free to air commercial stations require legislative certainty in order to make their investment. Another argument bandied around is that Australia is behind the rest of the world and consumers deserve to catch up. A final argument is that the three commercial television networks need the carrot of free access to continue to invest in, and broadcast, Australian content to the levels currently required. These arguments do not particularly impress the Greens.Let us start with the requirement for legislative certainty to make investment. The argument for legislative certainty for such a significant investment goes beyond that basic tenet; the argument goes beyond mere legislative certainty for investment and includes substantive certainty as well. The argument proceeds as follows: without free spectrum and without a ban on competition—those two things would be provided by the legislative certainty—the whole thing could send the free to air operators to the wall.The argument raises two questions. First of all, is the choice right? If the technology is so expensive that the free to airs just cannot go it alone, perhaps we should question whether it is the right choice. If consumer demand is so uncertain, why is the government hell-bent on ensuring that digital TV becomes a reality as soon as possible?We are not talking about equity issues. We are not talking about a social good. We are not talking about essential services that make substantive differences to the quality of lives. We are not talking about bread-and-butter issues. We are talking about a situation that gives people who can afford it access to a high definition television set, better quality vision and sound. The issue before us requiring this level of urgency is not one of social justice.The Greens appreciate the potential of digital terrestrial television broadcasting. We think the opportunities of enhanced programming, datacasting services, advanced information services and direct terrestrial television access to material provided by the Internet are all positive and important things for Australia. That is not what the urgency for this bill is about, though. If these conditions were really held in high esteem, there would not be this push to fast-track. There would be a commitment to ensuring that the legislation gets these important information services right the first time. There would be a commitment to ensuring that there was equal access to these important new information services.This is such an ironic piece of legislation: we have a government pulling money left, right and centre out of essential services such as welfare, labour market programs, education, legal aid, and so on; yet it is prepared to give up millions in potential revenue gained by charging for the use of high digital TV spectrum so that the TV set quality is increased. Mind you, it is not every TV. It has to be a new high digital TV set or a TV with a set top box.This government forces mobile phone operators to bid hundreds of millions of dollars in an auction for mobile spectrum. This money goes into the public kitty and could be spent on socially worthwhile programs—programs that could help to lessen the increasing gap in Australia between the haves and have-nots; programs that could provide access to dental care for people with constant oral pain and suffering; programs that could increase the quality of our education system; programs that could accurately target the problems faced by unemployed people of today.Certainly there is a definite case to be made for at least investigating options here. Perhaps, after proper consultation and scrutiny, there may be significant evidence that providing free to air networks with free access to the spectrum and a closed shop for a decade is the right way to go. This is not a legitimate option until the proper processes have been undertaken.Where is the detriment? If the commercial networks are hesitant to make the investment without all these guarantees wrapped up in a legislative framework, where is the detriment? What is this huge urgency? Why is the government so desperate for these networks to invest in high definition digital TV—so desperate, of course, that we are not dealing with appropriations now but with television networks—while believing that consumer demand is so uncertain? Why is there not plenty of time for a full review of our digital TV options? Wouldn't it be wiser to make an informed decision where this much money is at risk?The next argument is that consumers need choice of technology—an interesting argument, considering that some people will have their choices removed. This argument is based on the claim that Australia is behind the rest of the world and consumers deserve to catch up. This claim, we believe, is overstated. Digital TV is only starting to come onto the market overseas. We have no idea of what the competing systems will end up offering and which of those offers will end up being the best deal for consumers.The US and the UK are now in the process of migrating to digital TV, and a number of other countries are in exactly the same position as Australia of currently developing digital TV strategies. Without proper investigation, this legislative package makes the choice for consumers and locks it in for 10 years. In any case, the arguments are circular. The government says that it is crucial to fast- track the legislation to ensure that Australians can fulfil every desire to keep up with the Joneses but, on the other hand, it argues that it is so uncertain whether Australians even want to keep up with the Joneses—that is, that there is enough consumer demand to make an investment viable—that the government has to fund the FTAs.On trade and everything else, human rights are abolished in favour of the free market, but when the free market limits the decision, the government steps in. If consumer demand is not there, we must consider where the real detriment is to customers. Does the government think there is such a huge detriment to consumers and to the Australian lifestyle that consumers would prefer the government to sacrifice revenue—our revenue, not the government's—rather than reducing the queues in public hospitals, providing access to banking services, or ensuring access to the Internet and phone services? If you were to ask people, I think you would find that that is not the case.If this were really a consumer focused initiative, some of the following opportunities for consumers may have been considered: pay TV for people who do not have access or cannot traditionally afford it; lots of Internet news, education and shopping services linked with popular programming; or more companies involved in delivering mainstream digital V services, including newspapers, phone companies, Internet companies and new broadcasters. The government has not been committed to discussing consumer needs in a genuine fashion. Rather, the deal was struck in the absence of thorough consultation, so maybe it is not about the consumer at all.Moreover, the government's position is incredibly hypocritical. Whatever happened to the fail-safe concept of competition? How does this fit in with the beloved competition policy? What would the National Competition Council say about this arrangement? What will it say once it has had a chance to look at it? The Greens have never been big fans of the ad nauseam approach to competition, as everybody well knows. The Greens believe that each issue should be judged on its merits, and that competition is not an intrinsically good or bad thing in principle.The Greens approach is that, once all the impacts of competition policy have been assessed, it is possible to judge whether competition policy is appropriate and, if so, how far competition will go to achieving outcomes that are desirable for Australia as whole. A subsidy or other government assistance may be necessary to ensure that a diverse range of networks is available, but this has not been assessed.Let us look at the domestic content argument. The argument is that the three commercial television networks need the carrot of free access to continue to invest in Australian content and broadcast Australian content to the levels currently required. We believe that this is a fallacious argument because the commercial networks do not invest in domestic content out of love of Australia or a desire to be a good Australian television station. They do not continue to broadcast Australian content to certain levels because they think it would be in the public interest to do so. The reality is that commercial networks invest in domestic content and maintain content requirements because there is a legislative requirement for them to do so. Legislative measures are needed, as commercial TV networks are primarily guided by their bottom line. However, this might be a thing of the past if we sign up to the Multilateral Agreement on Investment—but I digress.This is why it is crucial to address the ineffective regulation of Australian content. The recent High Court decision in Project Blue Sky v. Australian Broadcasting Authority has explicitly exposed the deficiencies in our regulation of Australian content. The CER trade agreement with New Zealand takes precedence over the Broadcasting Services Act, and that puts the future of Australian content directly under threat.The government has referred this issue to the Australian Broadcasting Authority, but the ABA has been given the task to reconcile the irreconcilable divide between trade and cultural obligations. I just remind you that cultural obligations are not part of our current negotiating stance on the Multilateral Agreement on Investment. The only real solution to maintaining the integrity of Australian content is to provide a clear legislative statement that culture prevails over trade obligations. Wouldn't that be a first!Let us look at the real reasons for urgency. Now that I have established why the overt arguments for urgency are unconvincing, I shall outline what I think is the more accurate scenario behind the push to rush this legislative safety blanket through the Senate. Firstly, there is the advantage to free to air TV stations. The commercial TV stations want their closed deal sewn up before an election and before there is time for a proper review of the deal. The commercial TV stations are concerned that the deal done behind closed doors, the deal done with exceptionally limited public consultation, would be in jeopardy if a thorough investigation occurred. Such an investigation may reveal that the closed shop arrangements are not the way to go.An investigation may reveal that Australians can enjoy the fruits of digital TV through another method of introduction. The Packers and the Murdochs want to lock this arrangement in lest it be judged to be less than perfect. We must add to this political cocktail the axing of Channel 10's high rating Sex/Life show. The agenda behind the urgency is becoming more and more transparent. This kind of tactic indicates explicitly what a good deal this is for the free to air networks. What a convenient time to put the sweeteners out. What a convenient time to court the short-term favour needed to gain a massive windfall. What a convenient time to get favourable coverage in the media.Let us look at the advantages to the government. The government wants to deliver its part of the closed shop deal to the TV stations in time for an election. It would be fortuitous timing if the major TV moguls were feeling generous towards the coalition in the lead-up to the election. Those same free to air TV stations can be exceptionally critical or exceptionally supportive of a political party, depending on the directions from the top. The whole deal absolutely stinks of self-interest. There is no intrinsic justice in the argument for urgency. This is a very expensive `you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours' kind of deal.The effect of this legislation is that the digital television spectrum worth billions of dollars is being handed over to the commercial TV stations for nothing. That is the kind of goings-on that ordinary Australians are rebelling against. Ordinary Australians are sick of the government doing deals with the top end of town without a moment's thought for the citizens of Australia and the public interest as a whole. Ordinary Australians are sick of the government acting without integrity. Ordinary Australians are sick of the government having a blinkered view and seeing everything through `power coloured' glasses.The Greens have not been persuaded by the argument for urgency. I do not appreciate being asked to rush through legislation without time for proper scrutiny and proper consultation. As I said, we had to stop today, putting off the appropriation bills that we are told are absolutely necessary otherwise people will not get paid, in order to push through the television bills.The Greens are not happy to put aside proper parliamentary process for narrow, profit-oriented interests of a chosen group of commercial television operators for political gain. I guess this means I will never get any more coverage—if I ever did—on those commercial networks. Indeed, the committee report highlights the mass array of uncertainties to be dealt with. There are too many unknowns in policy, legal, technical and economic areas. We are not persuaded by the fears of delay if an election is called. Operating on the speculation of an election is not a good way to conduct the legislative process. Such speculation should not draw the focus away from considering every bill on its merits.These privileged TV networks already enjoy tight control over our limited airways. Why has such an important decision been made over a few short months? Even though the Greens accept that the conversion to digital television is inevitable, we will not be sup porting the bills, on the basis that proper and thorough consultation has not occurred. To push them through now would amount to a subversion of the parliamentary process.I sincerely hope that the ALP share my views in relation to proper process and consultation, and, so far, from the contributions, that appears to be so. I sincerely hope that the ALP are on the side of procedure and transparency and not beholden to the implicit threats of the media—and we know how powerful they can be. The ALP certainly have been making noises along these lines, suggesting that there are issues in relation to digital conversion that need extended consideration. These bills clearly need thorough consideration, and this cannot, and should not, happen in the pressure cooker of a threatened election.14:47:004258Quirke, Sen JohnSenator QUIRKEZS6SAALP00—I rise to speak in the second reading debate on the Television Broadcasting Services (Digital Conversion) Bill 1998 and the Datacasting Charge (Imposition) Bill 1998 . It has been appropriate, at least since I have been here, to declare sectional interests at the beginning of a speech. I am a `teleoholic'; I have spent quite a bit of my life in front of a television screen.I look forward to the new digital television because I am sure that I will be able to see the same old programs repeated, only in a much clearer format. The new digital television will greatly enhance the picture quality. From what I understand of what is happening, we have not as yet got all of the precise details tidied down—and I will come back to that in a moment. We do not know yet all of the standards that will apply in this whole new area, but a person capable of picking up a digital signal stream will pick up an almost perfect, if not perfect, replication of what is being transmitted.This new technology that is coming in will do a number of things. The householder with the new television set, or whatever it is to be called—and, again, I will come to that in a short while—or the old converted television set with the deciphering box, or the decoding box, on top will replay a signal with quality the likes of which you would have to go down to a television station to see now. This is particularly important in a lot of areas where television transmission is subject to ghosting and a range of things like that. As I understand it, a lot of that is to do with the broad spectrum that is required for analog TV and the fact that the signal can distort as it is going through the air. On the other hand, because the amount of band that is currently required for analog will no longer be required, at least four digital channels will be able to replace each analog channel, which makes it possible for television stations to multi-channel or to bring those signals together and broadcast what is to be known as `high definition television'.There are a lot of issues associated with this. We are only going to be able to deal with a few of these here today. There are some that I am going to be dealing with which will effect my state—and yours, Mr Acting Deputy President McKiernan—of Western Australia. But, before I do that, I want to say that the opposition is somewhat concerned about some of these issues. There are a number of technical matters which we believe need to be ironed out before we go any further in this particular debate.A number of senators here this afternoon have talked about an `undue haste' in respect of these bills. From the Labor Party point of view, we need to ascertain a couple of things. Firstly, we support the introduction of digital television. We understand the necessity for the networks that will be operating this system to get up and running as quickly as possible. The start-up date is not that far into the future. The investment required is very substantial indeed.The main issues before us here today—which I will canvass in my speech—make essential the provision of this sort of legislation as the basic vehicle by which the free to air networks can go out there and invest their money and be prepared for a start-up date in the not so distant future—although there is no doubt that this is being hastily pushed through. Really, we do have a little bit of time to sort out a lot of these issues and to solve a lot of other problems which are quite vexing with respect to digital television, but we understand the necessity for a legislative certainty so that that necessary investment that is going to be made by the digital TV operators in the future can be countenanced. Senator Lundy made reference to an amendment, which I now move:At the end of the motion, add: "and that the Senate is of the opinion that: (a) the Government has provided insufficient time and opportunity for a wide public consultation process to examine the impact of the introduction of digital broadcasting into Australia; (b) the Government introduced this Bill with undue haste which is reflected by the fact that it was necessary to circulate substantial amendments even before the resumption of the second reading debate in the House of Representatives; (c) the Australian Broadcasting Authority provided advice that indicated that legislation could be tabled in Parliament in October 1998 providing for a digital broadcasting commencement date of 1 January 2000, and the Government has given no reasons for ignoring this advice; (d) given that the Government received the digital broadcasting report of the Australian Broadcasting Authority in July 1997 and then took over eight months to make a public announcement on its proposed framework for digital broadcasting, its claim that the legislation needs to be dealt with as a matter of urgency is disingenuous; (e) the Government's legislation does not address the enormous potential that is presented for industry development in Australia through the migration into a digital broadcasting environment—opportunities will exist for Australian manufacturing and software development industries and the contribution this can make to Australian employment and export earnings should be recognised and supported in the legislation; (f) the Government's legislation does not provide sufficient recognition for the particular infrastructure issues faced throughout regional areas, and just as digital broadcasting provides special opportunities for access to new services in rural and regional Australia, disproportionate expenditure will be required to ensure that the capacity exists for the development of appropriate infrastructure; (g) the Parliament's consideration of this Bill must place paramount importance on the interests of the broader Australian community and consumers, and given the impact that digital broadcasting will have on the delivery and reception of television and other broadband and online services, any attempt to hasten the legislative process without proper parliamentary scrutiny, public debate and discussion, could jeopardise those interests".This amendment seeks a longer period in which we can have a discussion about these and other related issues. The opposition is not at all happy with the time frame, from March this year when the government made its announcement to the debate here today, to sort out all of the issues that are necessary to build a firm foundation for digital television transmission in Australia. As a consequence, the opposition will be arguing very strongly for a greater community period of consultation in which some of the problems that we have already unearthed in respect of digital television can be properly addressed and we can deal with a large number of the technical issues which are going to have to be sorted out by the end of this year anyway, as I understand it, particularly for the purchase of much of the broadcast and transmission equipment.I want to come back to my own state of South Australia and your home state, Mr Acting Deputy President McKiernan, Western Australia. In South Australia there are two what are known as solus broadcasters. As I understand it, there is another one in Western Australia. The one in Western Australia, I understand, covers the Goldfields. It is called Golden West. I have not had any discussions with them, but I have had discussions with the two solus operators in South Australia.The Spencer Gulf television network broadcasts from Pirie, Whyalla and Port Augusta and has a small penetration—small by metropolitan standards—but a very important television penetration for the people in those areas. The other solus operator in South Australia centres around Channel 8 in Mount Gambier. In fact, that is on relay through the various transmissions into the Riverland, into the whole south-east of South Australia.They, too, have many concerns about which way this bill is going. I think it would be fair to tell the Senate and the listeners out there that their concerns are pretty well those of the opposition, that we do not want to rush into something that we are going to make a dreadful mistake about. I think the Senate should be under no illusion whatsoever that this will be at least as important as the introduction of television in 1956. As the introduction of television in Australia in that year and then colour television in April 1975 set the tone for a generation, this, I believe, will be at least as important as those events and possibly more so, particularly with those people who are more au fait with the types of technology that will be available to the households in Australia and will be able to use this technology to do all sorts of things that we would never have dreamt of in the days of either the old black and white televisions or the colour televisions post-1975.The two solus operators in South Australia did not aggregate. For those people listening to the broadcast today, what that means is that in 1988 a number of the country television stations in Australia, including the one here in Canberra, went through a process of aggregation. Those processes of aggregation are such that a person travelling to some of the country networks would not know the difference between a metropolitan area where there are the three commercial free to airs and the ABC network. That is not the case in the two solus regions in South Australia. Indeed, the Spencer Gulf television station and SES Channel 8 in the south-east pick up a feed from all three commercial networks. They broadcast either direct or sometimes by delay certain programs that come from the metropolitan networks.They broadcast on the one channel. I want to make that point because there are a couple of things that need to be said about it. Firstly, they will convert to digital television. As I understand it, there will be amendments moved to secure a longer time line for them to come on-line with digital television. There is also a necessity, and, as I understand it, the opposition will be moving amendments, to protect not only the investment that these people already have in their television operations but also the investment that will be made.I want to tell the Senate that it is going to be, in the case of these two particular solus operators, a very extensive investment. It is going to be something of the order of $31 million for the two of them in South Australia. For every household that they hope to reach that represents an investment of something like $364 as opposed to something in the region of $60 for each of the metropolitan networks that will convert to digital television.So, as a consequence of this, the opposition will be hoping that, through this bill when we finally determine it, which I guess will be some time next week, we can give those solus operators the same protection as the metropolitans are going to have. In other words, the bill seeks to ensure that there will be a period of exclusivity where other licences will not be granted in the metropolitan or aggregated areas.This approach flies in the face of competition. It has to be understood—certainly it is understood by me—that this period of exclusivity is absolutely essential. We need to not only get digital television up and working in Australia but give a limited period of protection—in the scheme of things, it is only a limited period—to those who will be putting a very large amount of money into this digital conversion. As I understand it, they will put at least half a billion dollars into it, although someone gave me a figure of over $700 million. I want to see—I hope the Senate agrees with me on this—that this protection, which is that there will be no new licences in the metropolitan areas, will be extended to the solus operators so that their very considerable investment will be protected for the same period.Another issue is multi-channelling. One of the great things for people such as me who are into television is the cable television revolution. Indeed, the cable television revolution has been a welcome development for several hundred thousand households. I can understand the investment that has been made in that area and how it also needs to be protected. I can understand the arguments about multi-channelling. The solus operators have an argument, at least for part of the time, that they need to have a parallel channel that they can broadcast on.As I understand it, the argument by the pay TV operators is that, if this much band is given during the digital television conversion, it will be possible for the large metropolitan stations to broadcast at least four separate signals containing four channels in each one. It may well be that that technology can be refined so that there will be more in the future. As a consequence, the argument of the pay TV people, which I support, is that their investment is pretty marginal—we know that it is—in a number of areas and that it will be destroyed by the free to air broadcasters having the ability to broadcast multiple channels.However, there is an argument in communities such as the south-east and in the Spencer Gulf area that at least one additional channel should be given to the particular networks there. I say that because they do not have the same free to air choice that most other Australians have. They do not have the three commercial networks or the aggregated commercial networks that are in other states. They simply have the choice between the national broadcaster and themselves. Being pretty parochial about this, if you have a Port Power match and a Crows match in South Australia, it can be pretty hard to work out exactly which one you ought to send out over the airwaves.What I am arguing here today—I understand that we will be moving amendments to achieve it—is that we really ought to treat the solus networks much more differently from how we treat the metropolitan networks. It will allow some more competition and a freer choice for households in those areas that do not have the advantages of the metropolitan networks. What we will see in this new world is very exciting. I have not talked about the possibilities of data transmission. As I understand it, the television sets of the future, if they can be called that, will be capable of performing a number of very important tasks. A central one will be dealing with data in the same way that today we connect up to the Internet through computer and modem services.The exciting thing about all this to me and everyone else in Australia is that we will have in our homes in the not too far distant future a technology which at this stage is still not proven anywhere else. We will be at the cutting edge of it, unlike our adoption of colour TV, where we moved to a Pal system 10 years after many of the European countries. Black and white television transmission occurred 20 years before we got it in Australia. That will not be the case now. In the future, we will be giving people an opportunity to do much more in their households and to be able to receive much more. They will receive a far greater quality of television program and be able to access data services the likes of which we can only now guess. This will particularly assist people like me, who do not necessarily know too much about the way the various digital receivers will go in the period up to the year 2008.The important thing to say here today is that we had better not mess up this new revolution. We had better get it right. I suspect that dragging the bill on here on a Friday afternoon with only a few days of sittings left is probably not the best way of setting the whole thing in train. I can understand the anxiety of those free to air networks which say that they want to get on with the job and that they do not have an awful lot of time in which to get on with it. Those networks have argued to government and, I guess, the opposition that they need the legislative supports so that they can move forward and set things in train.In finishing my address here this afternoon, I take this opportunity to say to the free to air networks and the media that, whilst I can understand the haste with which they want to deal with this, our approach on this side of politics is to ensure that we get it right and to do it as quickly as we can. It is overboard to have this bill before us this afternoon and to have to race it through at speed. There is an argument that we need to get this sorted out before the looming federal election, albeit that it may well be a double dissolution election. However, that does not necessarily mean that future governments of whatever persuasion run by minorities will not have all sorts of other interests at stake and will not be able to unpick what is done here in the next few days. The message in this is for them to ensure that they understand that as well as we certainly do. Again, I welcome the digital television revolution. Basically we support the government's bill. We want to see a number of issues sorted out. We also want to make sure that the community is happy with the way we go.Finally, the argument has been put forward that the free to airs are getting a great hand-out. I do not agree with that assessment because I think, particularly for the size of the market in Australia, there is a great deal of investment, a very large amount of money, that will have to go into this particular conversion. I can understand the argument for exclusivity. (Time expired)15:08:004262Conroy, Sen StephenSenator CONROY3L6VICALP00—I rise today to speak on the Television Broadcasting Services (Digital Conversion) Bill 1998 with a degree of frustration—a frustration that has been caused by this government's determination to ram this bill through the parliament and down the throats and phone lines of Australian consumers.We have a situation where the Senate Environment, Recreation, Communications and the Arts Legislation Committee was only allowed one month to look at this bill, one of the single largest issues before this parliament. The government indicated at the beginning of this debate that it would like the Senate to complete the third reading by 3.45 p.m. today, which will allow a maximum of 2½ hours debate on an issue with the ramifications that this has. It is very depressing that the government feels that the public has so little right to know the issues involved in this bill.The priorities of this government have been exposed today in a way that few on our side of the chamber can believe. Hundreds of thousands of ordinary working Australians are relying on the Senate to debate and pass the appropriation bills. That is right: next week the money to pay Australia's public servants and people who work in associated entities runs out. And the government said they wanted to debate appropriations.But what have we seen? We have seen the government putting that off till next week. It is saying that the single most important piece of legislation that has to be dealt with by this government deals with digital TV. That is the government's priority—giving billions of dollars to three or four media magnates rather than making sure that ordinary working Australians get paid next week. And this is only one month or maybe six weeks before an election is called. What a coincidence! Is it any wonder that Australians rate politicians just above used car salesmen.This evidence of the government's priorities will further alienate ordinary Australians, and their cynicism displayed today will drive them further towards One Nation. This is a craven performance by the government. They caved in to Kerry Packer; they caved in to Channel 9, Stokes and 7, and they want to rush it through with no serious scrutiny. The issues involved, for the doormat of a minister over on the other side of the chamber, are serious. There are very serious implications in this bill.What we are seeing is an attack on regional Australia. One would have thought by now this government had given up beating up on regional Australia. One would have thought the Queensland election had sent them a big enough signal. They have been closing down railway stations, Telecom offices and CESs; they have been encouraging banks through the Wallis reforms to pull out of regional banking; tax offices have closed, Medicare offices have closed, and now we have another attack on regional Australians.We are seeing a gift to Packer and Stokes and the free to airs that will allow them to unfairly compete against the little regional TV networks, just to add salt to their wounds. The metro stations, the big ones in the cities, only have to duplicate one analog transmitter and translator to reach their existing audiences. The regionals have hundreds of transmitters and translators. The expense for them to replace and upgrade is significantly greater proportionately than it is for the large mag nates. How is this even-handed? Where the majors in the metros compete with the regionals, there will be a huge advantage to the metros over the regionals. Again, there will be costs to be borne in regional areas because of this process.This comes to the whole question of competition. Competition is something this government is keen on. Graham Samuels, a stooge of the Liberal Party down in Melbourne, is out there saying, `National competition policy is all incredibly important.' But where are we not going to be allowed to have any competition? Where will ordinary Australians not have any choice? We have choice of fund and we have all sorts of hyperbole about choice for consumers in this country, but no competition will be allowed here—none at all.The media magnates—Packer, Stokes and others—have argued that the cost of moving to digital means that they will need protection. Yet, when all the departments, including I think Treasury, caught wind of the deal that had been cut between the Prime Minister, Mr Howard, and the doormat over there with the major media magnates, we saw quite extraordinary submissions saying, `You can't possibly be serious. You can't possibly give away up to $2 billion worth of revenue to some of those poorer sections in the community—Kerry and Kerry, the two Kerrys. We will give them this gift. We will charge pensioners 10 per cent for food and 10 per cent for clothing, and we will give $2 billion to the two Kerrys.' It is extraordinary!That is what this debate is really about. It is a gift by this government to some of the richest people in this country weeks before it launches an advertising blitz talking about secret taxes. And it refuses to go out and collect revenue which it could get, quite simply, through the auction process. Australians would get choice, governments would get revenue and maybe they would only have to charge eight per cent for the GST instead of 10 per cent if they are prepared to look at $2 billion in this field.Some of the issues are very technical in this debate. I make absolutely no claim to be an expert on the technical issues.5F4CALVERTSenator Calvert—Or any other.3L6Conroy, Sen StephenSenator CONROY—I can guarantee you are not, Senator Calvert. This is about datacasting, about what else can be broadcast at the same time as the TV signal. As I have already indicated, I will not be using a great deal of technical jargon, mainly because I do not make any claim to understand of some of the jargon.You have a give-away of high definition TV with the potential give-away, if the government gets it way, of datacasting—data services. That means that it is not just a gift that has a one-off cost; there is an ongoing greater cost if they get the dataservicing free as well. It is outrageous that this government is prepared to cave in to the vested interests. It has an election coming so it is prepared to just roll over and do their bidding because it does not want to put the major media players offside just before an election.We have the question of access to the Internet. That is critically involved in this debate. It barely got a mention. We have the question of multi-channelling—which can compete with pay television—and whether or not that is going to be freely given away as well: whether or not pay TV can be done over to protect the two Kerrys, those impoverished two Australians!6L6GIBBSSenator Gibbs—Struggling!3L6Conroy, Sen StephenSenator CONROY—They are struggling! That is right, Senator Gibbs: the strugglers, the battlers—that's who they are—in this debate. The two Kerrys are battling.The government's legislation is potentially excluding other Internet providers. We have a convergence of technologies. You have this thing—again, I do not claim any great understanding of this—of Web TV. We have an alliance between Microsoft and Telstra. We have just recently seen a commercial arrangement between ninemsn and Telstra. Ninemsn is already an arrangement between Channel 9 and Microsoft. There is an irony about this debate. Channel 9 is saying, `We can live with banning multi-channelling'—they have given that indication—`we don't have to have multi-channelling.' But that is because this legislation is going to create a de facto mo nopoly on datacasting services through the commercial arrangements that Telstra, Microsoft, ninemsn and Channel 9 have created. That is actually going to be the outcome.Kerry Packer does not need multi-channelling; that is the irony. He will actually be better off if the legislation goes through in the form that has been suggested. Not enough is understood of how that monopoly is being created. You would see that if you were to ask 99.999 per cent of ordinary Australians, `Do you understand that you are going to have a monopoly for Kerry Packer and Telstra created out of this bill which will give them extraordinary power and influence beyond what they already have in this country?'This is almost a back door way to get past the cross-media ownership laws. We know the government has tried the front door way, and fortunately the Senate has absolutely no intention of letting the government cave in on cross-media ownership. But this is an insidious back door way to further concentrate the information that will be flowing because—and I do not even have a personal computer—the flow of information is changing from just the ordinary TV and just the ordinary newspaper. What we are seeing today is an insidious attempt to further concentrate future media information services into fewer and fewer hands. It is not as if this country has enough diversity and outlets at the moment, but this bill—and the implications and outcomes that are likely to flow from this bill—will see a further concentration.How can you tell whether or not some of the things that have been said today on our side of the chamber are right? What happened when the government announced its package? What happened in the marketplace? You saw the price of the TV stations' shares jump. The market understood that this was a gift, that there was an awful lot of money suddenly being handed over to the TV stations, so their prices on the share market jumped.We have seen recently a buy-out in America with AT&T. It bought a cable TV station for a substantial amount of money. What happened on that announcement? Telstra shares jumped. The market has some under standing of the value of the product that this government wants to give away. But have we heard much about it? We have had an advertising campaign, if I can call it that, run by the free to air TV stations. They had Bruce Gyngell telling all Australians it would be free to air and affordable. It is anything but affordable.We have seen overseas the prospect of between $US6,000 and $US10,000 to buy one of these new TVs. That is what it is going to cost in the foreseeable future. You may say, `That is a function of the market and there will be mass production and prices will go down.' Yes, there will be some of that.But look at what happened in the Japanese market. Japanese consumers are some of the best informed on these developments because they have had the debates in Japan for a while. What has been the take-up of purchases in the choice between the traditional analog TV and the digital TV? Almost nobody in the Japanese market has actually bought the digital TVs. They have stuck with the analog because of the cost. And that is what will happen in this country. There is no need to exclude competitors from access to the digital market. There should be an auction of this good. This is a very valuable commodity. We should have an auction.5F4CALVERTSenator Calvert—They said the same thing about colour TV.3L6Conroy, Sen StephenSenator CONROY—It took a little while for colour TVs to come—a couple of years. I predict that it will be a couple of years, maybe five years, before there is anything like a reasonable take-up of digital TV. Given the lack of access and penetration in the foreseeable future, you will see a natural barrier to entry by competitors because no-one has a high density TV. What advertiser is going to suddenly leap on board a new entrant to the market in the short term when it knows that it is only going to be advertising to the tiniest proportion of Australian consumers. There is a natural barrier created by this technology that will take some time. But not content with that, the media magnates have come running to Canberra saying, `We want protection for 10 years. We want to exclude competitors for 10 years.' And the doormats over there have rolled over.We have seen a number of hastily prepared submissions. As other speakers have said, when the Senate set this timetable there was a lack of time for genuine debate. It required a vote on the floor—it was not an agreement. It required the government to come in here and crunch the numbers through to limit the time for debate. It was not something that was agreed to on this side; in fact, it was fought hard. We did not agree with the timing. We did not agree with the process and we objected to it. But, the numbers are the numbers in this chamber and the government had them that day and they forced this process on us.Amongst those hastily prepared submissions there was one from Mr Milne from OzEmail. He got to the heart of the subject. He said that the issue at the heart of digital spectrum and datacasting had been missed by much of the discussion so far. He states:We have to ask ourselves what is the most important for the next generation of Australians—sharper TV images or increased access to data?Digital TV could improve TV viewing but, in addition, it could bring a whole new stream of datacasters, leveraging the capacity of TV sets to connect to each other.Datacasting will be responsible for turning TV sets into devices that connect people to the rest of the world.That is the impact that these decisions here in the next few days are going to skate right past. We are not going to hear about those sorts of things. We will get a glossy little ad on TV that tells us that it is all nice, pretty, sharper TV that is affordable. It will be free to air. There are going to be no great problems.The Australian Consumers Association also put in a submission and I would like to mention a couple of their points. They were concerned, and said:The market power of free-to-air broadcasters under the proposed Australian regime has several important dimensions:. Excessive market power results from the free allocation of spectrum which serves to minimise cost to income ratios for the beneficiaries— that is a fancy way of saying that Kerry and Kerry are going to get richer quicker—especially if multi-channel is extended once HDTV fails to take off.. The absence of an open access regime and an open and uniform standard development framework will limit further effective competition.. Free-to-air broadcasters have massive audiences enabling more highly leveraged entry into data and Internet services compared to the other aspiring entrants into converging information markets.That is the key point I was making earlier. Kerry Packer can live with the outcome of this bill because he has already just about got information services wrapped up. He does not mind. He is getting a bit of cake both ways in this debate. He has already stitched up the alternative and he is closing down access for others. There is an effective monopoly being created in information markets. They continue:. Participants in a multiplexing environment could range from existing broadcasters to telecommunications companies and financial institutions entering the vast on-line payments system environment.. The proposed policy framework entrenches existing broadcasting players for the coming decade . . .(Time expired)15:28:004265Carr, Sen KimSenator CARRAW5VICALP00—While the opposition broadly supports the need for a legislative framework announced by the government, we take the view that this process has been corroded by the government's obsession with seeking favour from the television networks. Attempts are being made to secure favourable reception by those television networks to the government's proposals. The price has been proper process and the Australian public has been short changed by the government's rush to fast track this legislation through the parliament.The opposition has already indicated its broad endorsement of the legislative framework proposed by the government, and did so as early as March of this year. Our concern, however, is that it is irresponsible for the government to not give adequate consideration to the public debate and to proper public review of its actions, given the significance of these measures and the complex nature of the issues concerned. Our view is that it would have been more appropriate for the government to release and table an exposure draft of proposed legislation to allow public discussion on those matters for a three-month period, for there to be a proper legislative inquiry to ensure effective communication with the public and an opportunity for the public to comment on the provisions of any exposure draft, and for the debate to then proceed in an orderly fashion through the parliamentary processes.What have we seen? What we have seen from this government is an obsession to appease the powerful media interests in this country, an obsession by this minister to do favours for the media barons of this country in such a manner that one has to raise serious questions about what the government is actually getting out of these arrangements. Quite clearly, it is not getting good policy outcomes for the Australian public. There must be some other interests involved for the government to proceed with such obsessive haste.What we have heard this afternoon is that the government has put aside its appropriation bills. It has put aside securing the money required to run government to bring on these particular bills. It seeks to have these bills pushed through this chamber this afternoon without effective scrutiny. We were told throughout the week that we would address the appropriation bills in due course. We were told last night that the appropriation bills had to be considered today because, if they were not, public servants were not going to be paid next Wednesday. We were told that the finance department required time to process the bills passed by this parliament. An extraordinary proposition was advanced to us that that time was something in the order of three days. That was clearly the inference that one could draw from any proposition that said that the appropriation bills had to be passed today.Last night the Minister for Workplace Relations and Small Business told us that the electoral legislation that we were debating had to be put aside because urgent attention had to be given to the stevedoring legislation. We complied with that. We are a very cooperative group here, as the minister knows only too well. I am only too happy to assist the government with its ill-conceived legislative program. I do not necessarily say we will vote for it, but we do say we will give it proper consideration. Accordingly, we gave proper consideration to the stevedoring legislation, on the basis that we were told that, come 12 o'clock today, we would be dealing with the appropriation bills. After all, public servants were going to be sacked or could not be paid if we did not get the legislation carried!LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—You weren't told that at all.AW5Carr, Sen KimSenator CARR—We were told that the legislation had to be carried today to make sure that the budget was in line for next Wednesday. What happens? The Acting Leader of the Government decides to stand over the Manager of Government Business and say, `Oh no, we must have my bills brought on before consideration of the appropriation bills. Hang the expense. After all, we only talking about the budget and the wages and conditions of ordinary public servants. We are not talking that anything significant.' We were told that, if we do not get the bills, passed the public servants will not be able to be paid.We now find that there is another agenda being pursued by this minister and these bills must be considered come hell or high water. We have already indicated that we have given an extra 20 weeks across the life of this parliament for additional government business time. Those 20 additional sitting weeks have not been used well by this government, because we find a situation now where we have to rush through these pieces of legislation without proper consideration of their implications. If I recall rightly, we have passed 393 bills in this parliamentary session.LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—Run out of things to say about digital, have you?AW5Carr, Sen KimSenator CARR—I have got a lot to say about digital, and you will know a lot more about it by the time I have finished here today. This week we have carried 22 bills and this year some 84 bills. So it cannot be said that we have been doing nothing in this place. What can be said is that the government has not been able to manage its time effectively, and we now have this rush on to consider these particular measures in a manner which I think is quite inappropriate and irresponsible and totally unseemly.What the opposition says is that we think there ought to be proper consideration of these matters, given their importance. There ought to be further debate on these matters. There ought to be an opportunity for this parliament to actually consider this issue in a timely manner. We are saying that there needs to be further information provided and further consideration given by this parliament to basic questions such as the implications these measures will have for assistance to regional broadcasters. I know the government does not seem to care too much about the regional parts of Australia. It is quite clear it does not care too much about the impact of these particular measures on regional broadcasters. We are concerned about whether there should be financial assistance provided to regional broadcasters in recognition of the disproportionate costs they will have to face in migrating to the digital environment.We believe that the government needs to provide a great deal more information about the costings of any proposals to move to digital TV in relation to the impact on regional broadcasters. We are concerned about the implications for additional licences in regional areas and whether regional broadcasters ought to be able to have access to broadcasting licences or whether there should be an absolute ban rather than a cap on the number of licences. We believe that capping the licences at no more than three effectively prevents new licences being issued in the metropolitan and most regional territories, and that in those areas where there have been fewer than three licences new licences could still be issued. The opposition has argued that there is an anomaly and that the legislation should provide for a blanket moratorium on the issuing of new licences irrespective of the number of existing licences in particular markets.We are also concerned about the impact of these measures will have on national broad casters, particularly the ABC and SBS. We think that the whole question of the digital broadcasting environment needs to be considered in terms of the access to the funds available to those agencies, given their importance in terms of public provision of broadcasting. The ABC and SBS provide unique services to Australians in terms of access to high quality broadcasting and provide a real break on the concentration of media ownership in this country. As a consequence, they ought to be properly supported. They are not supported by this government. In fact, what we have seen from this government is hundreds of millions of dollars being taken away from our public broadcasters, from their capacity to provide a universal high quality service to Australians. It strikes me that this is yet another issue that arises from the government attempting to shackle our public broadcasters and hinder their obligations to meet high community expectations on the quality of services that they are providing.In terms of various concepts such as multi-channelling, datacasting and enhanced services, the minority report of the Senate's examination of this issue suggests that there needs to be a great deal more consideration given to what these terms actually mean in terms of the effect on the future shape of any broadcasting industry in this country. These terms seem to me to be open to a range of definitions. In terms of the submissions that I understand the Senate committee received, it is quite clear that there is a great deal of confusion within the industry as to the implications for any legislative framework that this government is proposing, particularly this legislative framework that is being considered.We think it would be irresponsible for the parliament to rush into these matters without due consideration of the implications of such measures. We need to have a clear understanding of the precise scope of the services that are being proposed and will be allowed under this new legislative framework.There is a whole series of other issues which the minister is only too well aware of, and I think that is in part why he wants to rush this legislation through and wants to ensure that there is not adequate scrutiny of the legislative framework that he is proposing. Questions arise as to the technical standards, the services to underserviced areas, the enhancement of opportunities for viewers with disabilities, industry policy strategies, the implications for support for manufacturing industry in the telecommunications broadcasting area, consumer education and Australian content provisions.I think it is appropriate that the parliament does satisfy itself that assistance to regional broadcasters, additional licences in regional areas, national broadcasting and definitions of basic concepts such as multi-channelling, datacasting and enhanced services are given adequate attention and that we do not move towards a legislative framework without doing that simple task. It seems to me that the legislation brought before the parliament has been done with extraordinary and undue haste. There has been a grave injustice to proper process because of the manner in which the government has sought to rush this matter before this chamber and has sought to amend even its own proposals in the course of the very limited committee processes that were undertaken by the Senate.As I understand it, over 70 amendments were introduced by the government during the legislation committee's consideration of these bills. Those 70 amendments were put on the table without explanation and without proper consideration. As a consequence one sees that the government itself is very confused about the likely consequences of any measure.The opposition believe it is inappropriate to fast-track these measures. It is inappropriate for us to be forced into a position where we must deal with very complicated matters and quite complex issues in terms of convergence without addressing the full context of these measures both in social and economic terms. I think it is inappropriate that we should be required to undertake such a decision making process without fully understanding its implications and, given the importance of these measures, without examining the possible flaws that such measures will involve.I notice that Senator Brown has just come in, but I have been obliged to jump the queue a bit because I understand he was involved in other matters. The opposition, while generally supportive of the government's proposed time frame for simulcasting as well as the general issues in regards to the start-up dates for digital television and the mandating of high definition content levels, and while generally supportive of the general thrust of the financial assistance packages available, we—and I in particular—are concerned about the paragraph the government have identified in their own report of the legislation committee. I emphasise that that legislation committee examination was in itself grossly inadequate, owing to the very limited time that was available for this matter. The government say in paragraph 1.3:The Minister's announcement stressed that the provision of HDTV services to Australian consumers would be a major element of the introduction of DTTB in Australia but that a simulcast period of at least 8 years (to 2008) would ensure that `Australians who retain their analog television sets will not be disadvantaged.' A review, before the end of 2005 would determine whether that simulcast period of eight years should be extended.In one sense this simple measure sums up the government's whole approach. They do not really know what the implications are, but they will have a review just in case there is any complaint about the measures being undertaken. They say, `We do not really appreciate the consequences, but we will have a review later on'—after the damage is done—`to make sure that we have had some process by which to complain.'They do not tell you that these newfangled high definition TV sets will cost $15,000 a shot. I do not know about Senator Alston, but the sorts of families I mix with do not have $15,000 to buy a new TV. They rely upon the analog TV and they will do so for some time to come. They are unlikely to have $15,000 for a new TV set for some time to come and eight years is not nearly enough. Eight years to me is a bit of a problem. I do not know how many families that live in the great city of Moreland in Melbourne have disposable incomes which allow them to spend $15,000 on a new TV set. The minister's friends might be able to provide advice on those sorts of matters. These new, flash TVs with the wide screens will provide much higher quality reception.Debate interrupted.Adjournment426910000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—Order! It being 3.45 p.m., I propose the question:That the Senate do now adjourn.426915:45:004269Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELLH15WALP10—I usually do not speak in the adjournment debate, but I have just received a copy of a press release put out by Senator Kim Carr, who has just been on his feet. I think it is important that, for the record, people understand that Senator Carr's press release, which relates to the management of the government's business program in the Senate, contains what can only be described—WW4KEMPSenator Kemp—I am awe-struck.H15Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELL—Senator Kemp is awe-struck. He knows Senator Carr and he knows Senator Carr's record, and he knows his record in relation to telling the truth. Senator Kemp, coming from Victoria, you know what the former Premier of Victoria John Cain said about Kim Carr—LD4ALSTONSenator Alston—I had to sue him for defamation.AW5CARRSenator Carr—Who paid for your legal fees?10000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—Order! Senator Carr and Senator Alston. This shouting across the chamber is disorderly. You have your opportunity to speak.3L6CONROYSenator Conroy—What is Senator Alston doing?10000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—You are warned for your behaviour, Senator. I spoke to both Senator Carr and Senator Alston. If you had not been shouting, you might have heard.H15Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELL—I think John Cain, the former Premier of Victoria, had Kim Carr right. He knew what a wrecker he was. I think former Premier Cain knew what incredible problems—4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—Madam President, I take a point of order. I realise that you have a very difficult job keeping order in the Senate, but when you have, in the adjournment debate after a very long week, intemperate remarks made by the Manager of Government Business—H15Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELL—What is your point of order?4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—My point of order is that, if you want to keep reasonable order in this place, the Manager of Government Business should be given advice to temper his remarks so that people are not provoked into having to defend themselves against his extraordinary attack. That is why the place is often disorderly.10000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—So far, the interruptions have been so great that I have not had the faintest idea what the manager is speaking about. I am attempting to listen to find out. If he is behaving not in accordance with the standing orders, I will draw his attention to it, but I need to be able to hear what he is saying.H15Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELL—Thank you, Madam President. I was saying that the former Premier of Victoria's views about Senator Carr are well known and that the former Premier understood very clearly—as you will see if you read memoirs written by him and by people about him—what trouble Senator Carr had when it came to dealing with the truth. I want to stick to the facts today—3L6CONROYSenator Conroy—Madam President, I take a point of order. He cannot cast imputations on fellow senators. I request he be asked to withdraw.WW4KEMPSenator Kemp—On the point of order, Madam President: I think one always has to be careful what one says about fellow senators and I would have thought that the person who should be most careful is the senator from Victoria who has just spoken.10000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—Order! I think we are taking up a lot of time on this. I want to listen carefully to what is being said. There is no point of order at this stage. But, Senator Campbell, you certainly should not cast aspersions.H15Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELL—I would not. It was actually the former Premier of Victoria who cast the aspersion—and I would not want to repeat it. I just recommend to anyone who wants to understand Senator Kim Carr to talk to John Cain. I know that Senator Kemp, who comes from Victoria and has watched the machinations of the Labor Party in Victoria, knows all about Senator Carr. Even Senator Kemp, I know, is shocked by what lengths Senator Carr has gone to in this press release that he has issued today.I want to just put some facts down about the Labor Party's organised disruption of the program in the Senate in the past two days. Can I say that one of the aspersions, one of the falsities, if not abject lies, that has been put forward in the document I would seek to table in a minute is that Senator Carr has said that the Minister for Workplace Relations and Small Business, Mr Reith, personally came into the Senate chamber last night and asked government advisers that the Electoral and Referendum Amendment Bill (No. 2) 1998 be shelved to prioritise stevedoring levy bills. Can I say that that is absolutely incorrect, a total distortion and an abject lie.10000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—Senator, I do not think you should use that last description. The first two are adequate.H15Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELL—I withdraw that it was a lie and say it was an absolute misrepresentation of the fact. In fact, the Senate should now know what the truth is. Senator Carr, at about 8.30, spoke to me and I said, `Look, this electoral bill is bogging down. Why don't we have a look at putting the stevedoring bill on?' Senator Carr said, `Let's have a look at it at about a quarter to nine.' I said, `Okay, that's a good idea.' At a quarter to nine it looked like the bill was going along quite nicely, but by nine o'clock it had become bogged down again. I got a call from Senator Carr—and I do not usually reveal these sorts of discussions because they are the normal sorts of discussions that take place when one is trying to manage the Senate's program but when Senator Carr wants to go into writing and publish lies to the gallery then I will reveal these conversations.4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—Madam President, I take a point of order. I have always been in favour of robust exchanges, but it has been the understanding of the Senate for so long that the word `lie'—and Senator Campbell is clearly saying that Senator Carr lied to the Senate—is out of order.10000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—I think he said `publish lies to the gallery' but I would ask that that be withdrawn and rephrased.H15Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELL—I will rephrase it. He published something that is an abject, total, organised, premeditated distortion of the truth.10000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—Senator, just watch the way you express yourself.H15Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELL—I will. The truth of the matter is that Peter Reith did not suggest pulling the electoral bill; Senator Kimberley Carr rang me up at about 9 o'clock last night, and said—4J4SCHACHTSenator Schacht—Madam President, my point of order is that Senator Carr has to be addressed in the correct terminology. In using other phrases Senator Ian Campbell may think he is being smart and humorous. But I do not think the standing orders allow a senator to be incorrectly addressed in this place, as Senator Ian Campbell is now doing.10000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—I do not know whether Senator Carr's name is `Kimberley' or not.AW5CARRSenator Carr—It is not.10000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—In that case, you should use his correct name.H15Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELL—I called him `Comrade Carr' this morning, and he thought that was quite nice.10000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—Senator, you are fast running out of time. If you just refer to him as Senator Carr we will know who you are taking about.H15Campbell, Sen IanSenator IAN CAMPBELL—Madam President, you are quite right. I want to go out to the airport and jump on a plane to Perth. The fact is that Senator Kim Carr rang me at about 9 p.m. last night and said, `Ian'— Senator Ian Campbell, he probably should have said—`pull the stevedoring bill and we'll see what we can do to get it through by 10.30. Senator Carr said, `You pull the stevedoring bill.'So it was not Peter Reith who came in here and said it; it was actually the Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate who said, `Senator Campbell, can you pull your bill and we'll put stevedoring on.' He then said, `We'll get it through by 10.30.' When it did not look like it was going to get through by 10.30, I said to Senator Kim Carr, `Could you please agree with us to extend the sitting so we can go through to midnight?' He said, `No way. Our guys are tired and we want to go home.' I said, `Just another hour to get it through,' and he said, `No, we want to go home.'They then said, `We'll get it through in half an hour or an hour in the morning.' I said, `Great. We need the appropriations. We'll bring them on by midday and that should get them out by 3.45 p.m. We'll get the digital debate going in the meantime. We should have an hour and a half in between and we'll fill that in with the digital television package debate so we are using the time of the Senate effectively.' They agreed. They said, `Yes, an hour or so.' Senator Calvert was at the meeting. The agreement was that we would finish stevedoring in an hour, do a little bit of digital and get on to the appropriations by midday so we would have the appropriations bills finished.Senator Carr seems to be following on from the track record he had when he was a Labor Party operative in Victoria. The former Premier of Victoria, John Cain, has very strong views about how Senator Carr's words should be taken.Madam President, I say to you that Senator Carr should, at the earliest occasion, put out a release apologising to the Minister for Workplace Relations and Small Business, Mr Peter Reith, and he should tell the truth about who wanted to pull the electoral bill last night and bring on stevedoring. He should tell the truth about the fact that the Labor Party had agreed that we should be able to get stevedoring finished in an hour this morning. He should tell the truth about the fact that the Labor Party will do anything and say anything to look cooperative but, when it comes to delivering on their agreements, they will not do so.The Liberal Party and the government in this place reached an informal agreement with the Australian Labor Party that we would recall an estimates committee to allow Senator Peter Cook to ask questions of Treasury officials. Part of the informal agreement—as there can always be—was that we would get an agreement from the Australian Labor Party to assist in speeding up the program with the passage of the electoral bill and the stevedoring bill last night.The coalition delivered its side of a sensible arrangement in full, on time and for the entire time. We had the Secretary to the Department of the Treasury sitting upstairs in committee room 2S1. Senator Cook wanted to drag Treasury back and subject them and you, Senator Kemp, to probing questions. I went up there to see Senator Cook tearing the Treasury officials and the Assistant Treasurer to bits with his probing questions. I have got to say that a Senate committee room was not the right place to have that estimates hearing. The right thing, Senator Kemp, I would have thought, would be to have Senator Cook, the Secretary to the Department of the Treasury and the Assistant Treasurer sitting around a lounge room with a nice fire going and a couple of glasses of brandy on the side. Senator Cook was trying to overcome his relevance deprivation syndrome in trying to talk to the head of one of the big departments in this government. He wanted to share notes with Ted Evans and Senator Kemp about the state of the world economy and try to play games.It was a very nice three hours, Senator Kemp, I think. In fact, I think, Madam President, you could suggest to the Joint House Committee that we investigate having fireplaces installed in some committee rooms so that we can ensure that estimates committees proceed in a friendly, pleasant `fireside chat' manner so that Senator Cook, Mr Evans and Senator Kemp can chat about the world economy. The point is, of course, that the government delivered on its commitments and the Australian Labor Party, as usual, failed to deliver on their side of the bargain. They said that stevedoring would be half an hour to an hour maximum. That means it would have been finished by 10.30. It finished at about ten to one. Senator Alston, I guess the point is that their promises in relation to the hours it takes to do a piece of legislation are very similar to their promises on delivering balanced budgets. They said, `We'll deliver surpluses,' and they deliver deficits. They say, `We've delivered a surplus,' and their deficit is $12 billion, year on year. You cannot trust them with money. You cannot trust them at all. If you want something from the Labor Party, get it in writing. (Time expired)Senator George Campbell interjecting—Senator Kemp interjecting—10000PRESIDENTThe PRESIDENT—Order! Senators on my right! Senator Kemp, stop shouting across the chamber.427215:59:004272Campbell, Sen GeorgeSenator GEORGE CAMPBELLNB5NSWALP00—I want to address some of the issues that arise out of the question I asked the Minister for Social Security, Senator Newman, yesterday. I know some of my colleagues on the other side have had a bit of fun with the ball, but it is about to be returned with some gratuitous comments.WW4KEMPSenator Kemp—Not like you, George.NB5Campbell, Sen GeorgeSenator GEORGE CAMPBELL—Not like me at all, Senator Kemp. The question I asked of Senator Newman yesterday was based on information which had been provided to me by members of my union in New South Wales who had gone to the Centrelink offices in Wollongong and been advised that, as a result of changes that were due and effective from 1 July 1998, construction workers would, in certain circumstances, be deemed as `seasonal workers'. As a result of that, I organised to have a question asked of the minister yesterday which went to the question of whether or not the minister could confirm the advice that was given by Centrelink to construction workers in respect of them being deemed `seasonal workers'—a change in the way in which they had been treated in the past.The minister's response to that question, in my view, was flippant in that she drew my attention to the legislation that had just passed through the Senate a few minutes before question time took place. She did not at any time during that process attempt to answer the substance of my question. I must admit that I was a bit surprised at the minister's response and I did think at the time I had been sold a furphy, so to speak, in the terms of the advice I had received.Since that time I have gone and made some inquiries on the matter and, in particular, on the legislation that was passed by the Senate yesterday just prior to question time. Those on this side of the chamber who were involved in the negotiations around that legislation have advised me that never at any time during the negotiations over that legislation were construction workers discussed in terms of what was defined as `seasonal worker'. In the view of those on this side of the chamber who were involved in those negotiations, it was never intended that construction workers would be caught by the definition of `seasonal worker' in the act.Schedule 4 of the legislation, which refers to the position of seasonal workers, has two definitions. Section 16A sets out those definitions. It states in (1)(a) that seasonal work means:. . . work that, because of its nature or of factors peculiar to the industry in which it is performed, is available, at approximately the same time or times every year, for part or parts only of the year . . . I do not think there is any way anyone could construe that definition as applying to a construction worker. Essentially, a construction worker is employed in the industry for 52 weeks of the year—if he can get 52 weeks work in a year—on a full-time basis. The work construction workers get may well be irregular, but I believe that no-one could define it in any way as being `seasonal' or as coming within the definition of `seasonal work' as covered by section 16A(1)(a). Section 16A(1)((b) states:. . . work that is intermittent and is determined, under subsection (2), to be seasonal work for the purposes of this Act.Subsection (2) requires the making of a disallowable instrument by the secretary in order to specify the type of work that is covered by that section. If the minister is using subsection (2) to define that construction workers are covered by the provisions of that legislation passed yesterday, then it will require an instrument to be tabled in this parliament.I take this opportunity to advise the minister that, if an instrument is sought to be tabled in the parliament to include construction workers in that definition, the opposition will oppose the allowance of that instrument. From talking to my colleagues, it is quite clear that never at any time, in the sorts of examples that were given by the minister or the persons negotiating on her behalf, was a construction worker conceived to fall within either of one of those two definitions.In those circumstances, I think it appropriate for the minister to come into this chamber on the next day of sitting, preferably before question time, and give us an explanation defining which of those sections she was relying on yesterday when she answered my question. If she believes that construction workers were caught by the legislation that was passed yesterday by the Senate—and it is my view that she did not even understand her own legislation, otherwise she would not have answered my question in the way she did—then I would ask her to come into this chamber on Monday prior to question time and give us an explanation, or provide me with an explanation, as to which of the two definitions she believes a construction worker is caught under.If she does not or cannot give an explanation, or if she believes on examination that they are not caught by those provisions, then I think she owes it to construction workers all around the country to advise Centrelink personally that they or the people who have been turned away be advised that in fact they received wrong advice from Centrelink, that they are not caught by the definition and that they do have access to the jobsearch allow ance in the same way as any other unemployed person would have access to that allowance.I think the minister at least owes that to the persons in Wollongong who, in my view, have been misled by the advice given by Centrelink. Centrelink itself obviously have been advised wrongly by the department or by the minister's office as to the application of those definitions and the categories of employment that fall within those two definitions provided for in schedule 4 of the legislation that was passed yesterday. That, I think, is the least that the minister and the department can do in clearing this matter up.I think she owes an apology to construction workers. I do not take kindly to the way in which the minister treated the question. It does not matter how this might affect me—the minister might want to have a bit of fun in the chamber. There are workers out there who are struggling to try to get a week's work. They are struggling to try to get continuity of employment in the same way that it is guaranteed to us. They are trying to use the already discredited job search services that this government put in place from 1 May and are being given wrong advice. When we seek to try to have this corrected, we are treated flippantly and with total disregard by the minister. I think this is totally disrespectful of these workers.In those circumstances, I think the least the minister can do is review the contents of the question she was asked yesterday, examine the question against the legislation, try to understand what her own legislation actually means, work out who will be caught by the seasonal worker provisions and, if she is big enough to admit she was wrong, at least ensure that Centrelink, if not herself personally, offers an apology to those workers who have been turned away under those provisions.427316:09:004273Bartlett, Sen AndrewSenator BARTLETTDT6QLDAD00—There has been a lot of commentary in recent months about the possibility and probability of a race based federal election. A lot of that has focused around the issue of native title, which is obviously an important one. But another component of that which is also crucial to the future direction of our nation is the issue of our immigration policy and our multicultural policy. The future direction of those crucial issues is very much in the balance as we move towards an election, whether it is an earlier one or whether it is held later next year. I think it is important to emphasise to the people of Australia that they will face a crucial choice in that area.As opinion polls have shown, there is quite a strong possibility that the One Nation party, which has a policy, or has made many pronouncements, which are clearly anti-migrant and anti-multiculturalism—and anti-Asian immigration, in particular—is in a position where they may actually have the balance of power in this chamber. Whilst I am sure many Australians have differing views about the effectiveness or otherwise of the Democrats' role in holding the balance of power in the Senate over many years, I think the Australian nation faces a grave danger when it comes down to a choice between the Australian Democrats or One Nation holding that important position of responsibility of the balance of power.We have the prospect of a party that is clearly racially intolerant, that is anti-multiculturalism and that seeks to promote those particular policies, holding the balance of power. Balance that against the approach that the Democrats have taken over many years: promoting tolerance, multiculturalism and the important role that migrants play in our society. It would be a sad day indeed if a party that had policies such as One Nation was able to exercise influence and sway over the government of the day by virtue of their position in the Senate.Recently, there have been a number of quite dishonest attempts by the One Nation party and others to try to create an impression that the immigration policy of the Democrats is the same as that of One Nation. The fact that One Nation is quite happy to peddle this fiction just shows that they are quite happy to tell what are, clearly, untruths whenever it suits their purposes. It seems to me that the defacto leader of the One Nation party, Mr David Oldfield, has a willingness to stretch the truth to such a magnitude that it would even make people such as Graham Richardson blush.With Mr Oldfield's announcement this week in the Australian that he wants to contest a Senate seat in NSW and try to enter this particular chamber, it may well be that the battle for the balance of power in the Senate may come down to the outcome in New South Wales. David Oldfield is a man who attacks multiculturalism, frequently talks about `useless migrants', proudly proclaims himself to be `culturally intolerant', and seems to think that there is no problem about that. Even again today, he was quite happy to complain, threaten and make dark inferences about the `threatening Asianisation of Australia' at the same time as trying to suggest that he does not support racial discrimination.Voters will have a choice between that person and the Democrats' Senate candidate Aden Ridgeway, who is well known to many as head of the New South Wales Aboriginal Land Council. You probably could not get a better representation of the two opposite moral values our two parties represent.As all Australia knows, One Nation are proud to promote intolerance and bigotry—as their frequently repeated comments about the `Asianisation of Australia' make clear. By contrast, the Democrats are proud to support and promote multiculturalism—not because it is a nice feel-good thing, but because it makes Australia stronger, both socially and economically.Australian society is second only to Israel in the number of nations from which its citizens have been drawn. This is clearly one of our strengths. Immigration and multiculturalism has added to our cultural experiences and to our economic ability to explore and to expand trade opportunities. To put that at risk is potentially damaging to all of Australia and to our future economic development. Obviously, it is particularly dangerous and unwelcome for people who are recent migrants to this country, for people wanting to migrate to this country and for people who are wanting to contribute to this country and to be made to feel welcome.The Democrats' policy on immigration and multiculturalism has long been public and clear in its goals and objectives. It is a wide ranging policy which embraces and gives equal treatment to people from all national and cultural backgrounds. We believe that all of us, no matter where we come from, have a part to play in building a strong, safe, harmonious and prosperous Australia. It is counterproductive to try to make it harder for people to be able to contribute fully to our community.The Australian Democrats have consistently and strongly supported the concept of multiculturalism and have taken action on numerous occasions to make it a reality. We will continue to do so, despite the current political fashion and the political correctness against multiculturalism that seems to be gaining pace. People who were born in other countries have made a significant contribution to Australian society and continue to do so. The Democrats believe that a cohesive, multicultural society will be maintained and developed only if people from all backgrounds, including people of non-English speaking backgrounds, from all parts of the world are able to achieve equality in access to the services and the opportunities open to all Australians.That is a principle the Democrats have pursued by many actions over many years, perhaps none more so than trying to fight what I believe is a clear indication of a sign of things to come if we continue down a negative path in this direction: that is, the outrageous, discriminatory and unfair provision that currently exists for people who have migrated to this country having to wait two years before they have the same right as any other legitimate resident of Australia to have access to social security payments in times of need. The Democrats are committed to equal treatment of migrants. We believe this measure reinforces a negative principle, and I believe it will be one of many, many more measures if the current fashionable tide of rhetoric against migrants continues. It is being promoted that migrants are useless or are a drain on society rather than recognising that they are a benefit to Australian society economically and socially. It is crucial that those non-facts are shown for the falsehoods that they are.By contrast with the Democrats' goals, a quick visit to One Nation's web site displays that party's goals. They have only six apparently at the moment. Goal No. 1, the top of their list, is to reduce immigration until unemployment is addressed. It perpetuates the myth that migrants take the jobs of Australians. Time after time studies show that migrants assist in generating employment and generating a healthier economy for Australia. So their top priority is based on a total myth. It once again shows how ill-informed and lacking in economic credibility One Nation is, let alone its socially destructive message.Another of the six One Nation goals repeats a commitment to abolish multiculturalism. How you abolish something that is reality is not actually spelt out. Perhaps it means that One Nation is proposing to send all those Australians who were born in other countries back to the place of their birth or even back to the place of their parents' birth. Anybody who has any cultural traits that do not fit their desired view for monoculturalism is somehow or other meant to be abolished. Exactly how this might be done is a frightening thought when one thinks through what it might actually mean. Again, these sorts of things are hidden behind the new politically correct terminology which people such as Mr Oldfield use; terms such as cultural intolerance, which he is using to replace the word racism. Those sorts of statements need to be shown up for what they are, which is basically a politically correct way of saying racist.By contrast, the Democrats' objectives entrenched and enshrined in our party's constitution include a recognition of the interdependence of all people and a support for further developing a multifaceted national culture with full opportunity for all ethnic groups to contribute. It highlights the crucial choice that this nation faces in many regards as we move towards the next election. I urge all Australians to think carefully about the future direction of our nation, not just as it might affect people from non-English speaking backgrounds and migrant backgrounds but also how it will affect all of us. If our nation's social fabric is torn asunder, decisiveness and derision will be introduced into the community and the economic value that plays such a marvellous role in developing Australia that all migrants and multiculturalism in general have provided for us will be affected. If that risk is not recognised, then I fear we will have perpetual damage made to our nation's future which will take generations to overcome.427616:19:004276O'Brien, Sen KerrySenator O'BRIEN8O6TASALP00—Today I wanted to talk about the Prime Minister (Mr Howard) and his family. You will recall that immediately after the last election there was considerable public debate about where the Prime Minister planned to live. Prime Ministers usually live in the Lodge. The last Prime Minister to live in Sydney was Sir William McMahon. People are increasingly noting the similarities between the prime ministerships of Messrs McMahon and Howard. They can add the fact that both lived in Sydney to that list.The Lodge has always been the official residence, but Mr Howard said he wanted to spend more time in Sydney to minimise disruption to his family. Of course, he did not seem to give any consideration to the disruption caused to many Canberra families by the significant increase in the time public servants would be required to spend in Sydney or the increased burden on the Australian taxpayer of the costs associated with running government out of Sydney rather than the national political capital. Clearly the Prime Minister had the wellbeing of his family very high on his list of priorities, as do many fathers.There was one such father at last night's meeting in the central Queensland town of Wondi attended by Mr Howard. This father said that while his family was going downhill the Prime Minister's family was okay. He told Mr Howard that his sympathy for the plight of people living in rural Australia would not pay the family bills. On the ABC's AM this morning that father told the Prime Minister his sympathy would not help him to `give my family the life I want to give them'. He stated:I feel that my family is going to go downhill while your family is still surviving and getting what you want your family to have.He also said:My family won't have that.There are now hundreds of thousands of families living in regional Australia who are being forced to face the reality that, through government inaction or misguided policies, they cannot properly support their families.Yesterday five more families found themselves out of work because of the failure of this government to support regional Australia. At the close of business yesterday the Tasmanian Pig Cooperative was forced to close its doors. Five workers lost their jobs and, therefore, five families must now face the prospect of getting by without that wage coming in. There are another eight positions that are under review as a result of the cooperative's closure. Mr Howard and his minister Mr Anderson could have acted to support the Australian pork industry last year. They could have put in place assistance packages that might have enabled the industry to get through the crisis that it has faced in the last 30 years. They could have taken action, legal action, to stem the flood of imported meat. If they had, the cooperative might still be trading and five people might be looking forward to the next pay packet, but Mr Anderson, Mr Fischer and now Mr Howard chose to ignore these rural families. So in the name of free trade five jobs go, eight more are under threat and 13 more fathers cannot give their kids the lives that they deserve. Mr Howard has to give as much consideration to the future of these families and their children as he does his own.Mr Howard was not the only person to cop a blast last night. Another speaker at the Wondai meeting said this of the Minister for Primary Industries and Energy, Mr Anderson, and I again quote from the ABC AM program:I think the most unpopular, detested man in Australia is your Minister for primary industries John Anderson.That was on the tape from one of the audience. There was a huge cheer from the 600-strong crowd in response to that statement. On Wednesday I raised the matter of the poor standing that Mr Anderson has in the bush generally and in his electorate of Gwydir in particular. I mentioned the fact that the President of the Manilla branch of the National Party, Mr Jim Maxwell, has stated on the record that Mr Anderson had deserted the people who put him there. The Queensland grain growers have voted in support of a motion of no confidence in Mr Anderson, as have the Queensland pig producers and the national pig body as well.The minister has also been under attack from the grain industry, sections of the wool industry, the beef industry and the chicken industry. The claim last night that Mr Anderson is the most detested and unpopular man in Australia appears well placed. It seems there is one thing that Mr Howard could do that will cost nothing but would get a big tick from across rural Australia, and that is to replace Mr Anderson with someone who can relate to the needs of people in the bush.16:24:004277Senate adjourned at 4.24 p.m.Documents42774277The following documents were tabled by the Clerk on 25 June 1998:Child Care Act— Child Care (Eligible Child Care Centres) Amendment Guidelines (No. 1) 1998. Child Care (New Allocations) Guidelines 1998. Child Care (Other Places—Allocations) Guidelines 1998. Childcare Assistance (Fee Relief) Guidelines—Section 12A—Amendment guidelines—CA/12A/98/1. Childcare Assistance Immunisation Requirements Direction 1998—IMCA/12G/98/1. Childcare Assistance Immunisation Requirements Direction 1998—Amendment direction—IMCA/12G/98/2.Child Care Payments Act—Vaccination Schedules Guidelines—VS/18/98/1.Childcare Rebate Act— Childcare Rebate (Exempt Persons) Amendment Determination (No. 1) 1998. Childcare Rebate Immunisation Requirements Direction 1998—IMCR/39A/98/1. Childcare Rebate Immunisation Requirements Direction 1998—Amendment direction—IMCR/39A/98/2.Financial Management and Accountability Act—Determination under section 20—Commonwealth Parliamentary Association Conference and Seminar Contributions Reserve—Determination 1998/6.Fisheries Management Act—South East Trawl Fishery Management Plan 1998—SET 01.National Health Act—Declarations Nos PB 10-12 of 1998.National Parks and Wildlife Conservation Act—Pulu Keeling National Park— Comments on representations received by Parks Australia on the proposed plan of management. Plan of management.Superannuation Act 1976 —Determination—Superannuation (CSS) Employer Component Payment (Telstra Superannuation Scheme) Determination No. 4.Taxation Rulings TR 98/10 and TR 98/11.Answers to Questions on Notice4278The following answers to questions were circulated:4278(Question No. 1199)11994278Brown, Sen BobSenator BrownQD4TASAG00 asked the Minister representing the Minister for Defence Industry, Science and Personnel, upon notice, on 25 May 1998:With reference to an article in the Thai press in December 1997 which reported the Minister as promoting the sale of Australian military equipment in that country, despite the downturn in the economy leading to the cancellation of major weapons contracts:(1) What dates was the Minister out of Australia on that particular trip.(2) Which countries did the Minister visit in that period.(3) (a) Which other Government and industry officials went with the Minister on the trip; and (b) what companies did the industry officials represent.(4) Did the Minister secure any military contracts as a result of the trip.(5) Did the department consider such a trip worthwhile in view of the economic crisis in South-East Asia and the widely reported cutbacks in military budgets; if so, why.4278Newman, Sen JocelynSenator NewmanBE4TASLPSocial Security10—In accordance with advice to the Minister for Defence Industry, Science and Personnel the following answer is provided to the honourable senator's question:(1) 29 November 1997 to 14 December 1997.(2) Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand. The Minister also had a one night stopover in Singapore to meet a connecting flight.(3) (a) and (b)The mission comprised representatives from the following:Ministerial staff (1); Department of Defence; Adeline Technology Net; ADI; Aerospace Technical Services; Airshows Downunder; Australian Submarine Corporation; Baulderstone Hornibrook; British Aerospace Australia; Digital Equipment; Computer Sciences Corp Aust; Compair; Cowan Manufacturing; Edson Hotwater Systems; ElectroMagnetic Compatibility and Systems Integration (EMCSI); Hawker de Havilland; H.I. Fraser; Honeywell; Kel Aerospace; LADS Corporation; MINCOM; Northern Territory Government; Raytheon International; Scientific Management Associates; Siemens Plessey Australia (now part of British Aerospace Australia); South Metropolitan College of TAFE; Spantech; Tenix; Thomson Marconi Sonar; Trimcast.(4) Yes. For example, an electronics company has signed a contract valued at about $A14m as a direct result of participation on the visit (details commercially sensitive).(5) Yes. Although the economic crisis in South East Asia has caused many countries to delay major acquisitions, this has meant that these countries are now seeking to maintain, support and extend the life of current equipment, and seek niche products which can act as force multipliers. These are all areas in which Australian industry has well recognised capabilities. Further, it is important that Australia is not perceived as a `fair weather friend', and therefore, relationships that have been built up over time need to be maintained and nurtured.