Philip Ruddock (Berowra, Liberal Party, Attorney-General) Share this | Hansard source

in reply—I thank the member for Wills, who spoke before, and the member for Blaxland. I particularly commend the member for Blaxland for his very thoughtful speech. I was listening very closely to it and I was very conscious, as I will demonstrate when I respond, of the points that he was making. The Classification (Publications, Films and Computer Games) Amendment Bill 2006 has two important purposes: to implement the administrative arrangements consistent with our accountability framework and to make changes to classification practices to recognise the changes in technology.

I will speak briefly about the administrative changes. These changes simply ensure that the Classification Board and the Classification Review Board remain the bodies that determine classification issues. They are absolutely independent, and their functions will remain unchanged. But the role of receiving advice and implementing decisions are not matters that ought to be in the hands of an independent agency, otherwise you would only need to replicate that within a department to ensure that you were appropriately supported. I came to a view, particularly after the Commonwealth had reviewed the issues of functions of boards and their primary responsibilities in a broader context, that we should make the transfer of the support function and put the federal minister or the national minister in the same position that, I might say, all of the other partner ministers are in where they receive advice from their department on issues relating to the administration of the classification scheme. The bill does transfer the power to make legislative instruments from the board to the minister. That is consistent with the sorts of arrangements about which I am speaking, but given the cooperative nature of the scheme, these powers will be exercised in consultation with state and territory ministers.

We are responsive to the needs of industry in the changing technological environment. The bill contains amendments to respond to those changes, particularly in the context of the widespread use of DVDs and even higher capacity disks coming onto the market. These were not envisaged when the bill or the act was originally drafted. The act contains safeguards to prevent modifications to films after classification. These remain, but industry often add descriptors or translations—they subtitle, they caption, they dub. There are a whole lot of audio descriptions and navigation functions, there are interactive menus and currently this means that films must be resubmitted. Descriptions, translations and menu functions to facilitate navigation generally do not provide new content as such. Requiring new classification is very disruptive.

The bill provides for an additional content assessment scheme based upon the current approach to classification of games. The scheme will facilitate the practice of value-adding when it is an already classified film, by including new material such as interviews, bloopers and the making of features.

The member for Blaxland spoke very eruditely about these matters from his expertise and knowledge of film. I must say I do not have that same experience. I do not know whether that is good or bad for a minister who is dealing with classification issues. Perhaps it means I have no conflicts of interest from the basis of views that I form, but I did see one DVD at home. I think it was on the day that shook the world, which was in relation to the Cuban missile crisis. I can see that members have actually seen this so I will have to be careful what I say. I did see the director’s cuts in relation to an F111 flying scene, viewing the deployment of these missiles. You saw the various overflights and they took you through the reasons why particular shots did not give you the appropriate insight and why the one that was used was more appropriate. I thought it was useful, interesting information. It was not likely to lead to any different classification. Yet you need to be able to deal with those matters in a sensible way. Obviously if people are using that to introduce material that would not be permitted of classification generally and would have to be restricted, there is a basis upon which that can be oversighted, but where it is not going to lead to significant changes, one should not have to go through the whole classification task again. Those measures seemed eminently sensible to me and the bill achieves that purpose.

The bill also contains several other minor amendments relating to technology and I welcome the support that has been foreshadowed by the shadow attorney and the member for Blaxland. I might say in relation to the member for Blaxland’s final comments that we are very conscious of these issues relating to the internet. I thought you raised them very sensitively and well. There is a review being undertaken that involves me and the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts as to how we can deal with these issues. They are complex and while it might be nice to have a harmonised system of classification for the world, I think we are a long way off that. It may well be of course that community standards in different societies differ in any event. It would be very difficult to put together that sort of arrangement. The extent to which people can transmit information that is downloaded here, which would normally require classification but avoids that, is something that we are very conscious of. That review is still being pursued. I thank honourable members for their support for the bill and I look forward to a speedy passage in another place.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Ordered that the bill be reported to the House without amendment.

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