De-Anne Kelly (Dawson, National Party, Parliamentary Secretary Trade) Share this | Hansard source

Let me get to personal aspects of this vote in a moment. The member for Lalor did not mind discussing the Minister for Health and Ageing, so personal elements have already come into this debate and I expect that I can talk about what the Labor Party have said in this debate. For the last few weeks the Australian Labor Party have been calling loudly for ministerial responsibility, of which there is a great deal in the question of selling wheat, yet they do not want ministerial responsibility in the issue of a drug that causes the death of a foetus. The reality is that it is all right to have ministerial responsibility for selling wheat, which this government does, but you do not want to have the minister or the parliament having a look at drug manufacturers. Is anyone going to be accountable to parliament? Absolutely—they should be—and that is what is at the core of this amendment put forward by the member for Lindsay.

The member for Lalor then went on in quite a contradictory way. On the one hand, she said that no drug manufacturer would submit themselves to the parliament, but then she said that the parliamentary process would be swamped by applications and debate. You cannot have it both ways: either they are not going to come here because they do not want to be accountable or they are going to swamp the parliament. If that were the process, and manufacturers believed their drugs to be safe, the reality is that manufacturers would bring their drugs to the parliament, and the parliament would deal with that. We would not be swamped as a parliament; people would not come back repetitively.

There is demonstrable Australia-wide community interest both for and against this issue. We accept that this is an issue that arouses passions and concerns, but the Labor Party want to run and hide from this. They want it kept to a group, albeit a group of expert, though not infallible, public servants. They do not want it brought for the scrutiny of the parliament and the Australian people, and that causes me a great deal of concern. I urge other members in this House to set aside the emotional aspect of this debate; it is about an approval process. There are going to be a great number of drugs coming forward, not only drugs that cause abortion but drugs that will change genetics and change personality—drugs that we cannot even imagine at this point in time. It is proper that the Australian people are, and the Australian people would expect to be, a part of that debate and that process.

They would also expect that drug manufacturers would be accountable to a minister, accountable to a government, and that all aspects of this debate would be open and transparent for them in the parliament. I commend the amendment by the member for Lindsay to the House and ask my colleagues in this House to think very carefully about the way in which they vote, because this is not going to be the only drug. There are going to be many more with many other social, economic and ethical aspects for their approval, and the Australian people will not thank those who do not allow them to be part of such a debate.

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