Peter Garrett (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Reconciliation and the Arts) Share this | Hansard source

I want to support the comments made by my colleague the member for Richmond and other members who have spoken in this every important debate on the Broadcasting Legislation Amendment (Digital Television) Bill 2006 and the Broadcasting Services Amendment (Media Ownership) Bill 2006. As we speak about the diversity of opinions and views in the parliament, we cannot help but notice the lack of government voices on this issue. I must say that I am astonished that we have a very one-sided speakers list on a piece of legislation as significant as this. Perhaps that reflects the complacency that comes with incumbency. Perhaps that reflects the fault line in the different ideologies and approaches of the Liberal-National Party and us when it comes to the question of the public interest.

Without any shadow of a doubt the media is important to us in this place as politicians, whether in opposition or in government. In government, media management would be one of the most important tools a modern political party could have. Ministerial offices in this building are full of media advisers. We sit and read our media clippings, sometimes without much joy; nevertheless, we concentrate on the media very strongly, because we recognise its signal importance in the lifeblood of the democracy and in our prospects of securing government or otherwise. Very simply, media serves as a conduit of ideas, a conduit sometimes of policies. It is one of the main means by which the country engages in a conversation about itself and about what is going on in the world around it. So I am particularly disappointed that so few government members have seen fit to stand up and defend these changes and to take on and respond to some of the arguments that have been made by Labor members speaking on the legislation.

There is no doubt that the media landscape is changing rapidly. The technology driving media is digital in origination and in delivery through the web, through the possible, and definitely coming, different sets of delivery devices for information. This means that the media landscape we look at now will be vastly different in the future, and these changes will happen very quickly. So the challenge to the parliament when it comes to considering legislation of this kind, and to the minister when it comes to drafting it, is not only to secure what it sees to be the best position at this time for guaranteeing diversity and competition in the media but also to try to get some sense of the shape of where the media will be in years to come. There is no doubt that by the test of the public interest or by the test of exploring what the situation is now and identifying any deficiencies that it may or may not have and, finally, by the test of trying to ascertain where we are going to be in 10 or 15 years time in relation to media, this legislation fails on all counts of having considered that seriously.

But we still cannot underestimate the significance of what has been described as the ‘media reform package’. It was rushed through the Senate last week, and I think it represents the most significant alteration to the media landscape that we have seen in the last two decades and its ramifications will undoubtedly be profound. The government says that the changes or reforms will help to strengthen the industry and improve service delivery to the public. But we argue very strongly here that in fact it is the community and the public that will be the losers, not the beneficiaries, because on the issue of diversity of choice there is no doubt whatsoever that this legislation delivers not only a reduction in diversity of choice but also a reduction in diversity of opinion.

The centrepiece of the government’s media laws is the Broadcasting Services Amendment (Media Ownership) Bill 2006, which repeals the cross-media laws that have been in place since the late 1980s and abolishes foreign ownership and control provisions. Labor believe that a liberalisation of the foreign ownership rules has the potential to increase media diversity. We accept that there is the prospect for an increase in diversity if you allow other than Australian entities to have an ownership role in the media. But by removing the cross-media rules—those rules which limit owners to one newspaper, radio station or television licence in any one market—the government is doing something altogether different. It is threatening the very diversity it wants to encourage. It is nothing less than an insult to the intelligence of the Australian people for the government to say that it wants to achieve real reform by getting rid of both the foreign ownership laws and the cross-media laws at once, thereby tying the two together in some kind of sell-off which can really only satisfy larger media interests—and we have already seen significant activity on the share register of PBL in anticipation of this legislation passing through the parliament.

The members who have spoken previously, including the member for Richmond and the member for Lowe, have remarked that by allowing only three weeks for the Senate Standing Committee on Environment, Communications, Information Technology and the Arts to conduct its inquiry into these proposed changes; by allowing only about a one-week window of opportunity for the public to make submissions, with two days for public hearings and very little time for questions from opposition senators; and by having the final coup de grace, the gag applied last Thursday in the Senate, the guillotine—all wheeled out on cue—on the very issue we are here to discuss in the most thorough and robust way we can, the issue about the expression of ideas, media diversity and an examination of legislation of this kind, the Senate process has been truncated and brought to a close prematurely. I think that is a very great pity.

Debate interrupted.

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