Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I concur with our shadow minister, the member for Dunkley, on this in that we support the intent of this legislation, the Broadcasting Legislation Amendment (Digital Television Switch-over) Bill 2008, but we must make this point. We have got an arrogant, out-of-touch Labor government. With one of the most important pieces of communications legislation in this House, they rock it up to us and they say, ‘We’re going to gag you because we want to get this bill through the House; we want to get home.’

The Labor Party continually boast that they hold more seats in rural and regional Australia, where this is going to have a dramatic effect on the people—the working families and those people who live out in rural and remote Australia. They say that they are concerned and that they hold more seats in those areas than this side of the House does. Where are the members for Forde and Blair on this issue? Have they spoken on this? Are they concerned about their constituency in relation to this legislation? What about the member for Leichhardt? He has probably scooted home already. Where are the members for Capricornia, Richmond, Page and Flynn? I see the member for Flynn here. He represents a large constituency that would be concerned about this, but we have not heard a peep out of him. I hope he has been to the Leader of the House and said, ‘I want to speak on this because I am concerned about this legislation.’

They continually say that they hold more seats in rural and regional Australia than this side of the House but they have no concern for them. They are arrogant and they take those votes for granted. Let me assure those members that we on this side of the House are here on this issue and we will debate this as long as we need to, because we cannot take this government and this minister at their word that they are going to provide funding in next year’s federal budget to deal with some of the critical issues in relation to this bill, particularly in relation to black spots.

We have here the members for Farrer, Gippsland, Forrest—who has just spoken—Mayo, Riverina, Grey, Calare, Kalgoorlie, Herbert, Fairfax, Cowper and Hinkler, and the list goes on. These are members from rural and regional Australia who understand this issue. We are all here to debate this because we are concerned about the mismanagement, the ineptitude and the lack of understanding of the importance of this bill to people right across Australia.

As the member for Hinkler said, this is not about those huge towers outside of our capital cities; this is about the 11,000 transponders across regional, rural and outer metropolitan Australia, where that technology has to be changed to digital technology and where you have a very thin advertising market. Do you think that the commercial television channels are going to have the funds to convert these transponders to digital technology? What about the families that have to convert an analog television in these tough economic times? Do you think they have got the money to go out and convert their television? They are not going to be buying huge plasma TVs; they cannot afford it. And yet that is what this government is going to impose on working families and people in rural and remote Australia with the passage of this bill.

The government are saying: ‘Take us on trust. Listen to our words—not what we will do to you; listen to the words. We’ll find money and we’ll have it in next year’s budget.’ I have to say to you, Minister, I am not prepared to take you at your word on this one because we have seen what you have done with the communications trust fund. You have raided that, you insisted on those amendments in the upper house and you have taken that money that was designed to ensure, where markets fail in the future, there would be earnings from a fund that would deliver upgrades in rural communications into the future. So we are just not prepared to take you at your word; and we will make sure we keep you honest on it, I can assure you, Leader of House.

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