Kevin Hogan (Page, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am very happy to speak to this Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority Amendment Bill 2014.

I know, as a lover of sport—as most of us are—that this issue is a very important one. Australia has been very clear on its position on doping in sport for many years. People in Australia, sports lovers in Australia and participants in Australia demand clean sports in this country, and the government will do whatever we can to stamp out drug cheats, including in our continued support for the WADA code.

We were a supporter of the establishment of the World Anti-Doping Code and an early signatory to the UNESCO International Convention against Doping in Sport. This government strongly supports a fair, safe and healthy competitive environment for all athletes, importantly, as sport is an international thing from all nations. Besides doping being a serious risk to an athlete's health and their wellbeing, it is also cheating. We all know many famous stories that involve international sports stars from decades ago. We all know the story about Raelene Boyle; she would certainly have been a gold medallist had it not been for other people taking substances that improved their performance.

I remember one Christmas reading Lance Armstrong's biography. At the time it was an inspirational story. From memory, I think it was called It's not about the bikeunfortunately, that came to be proven to be true! So not only is it a damage to their health but it is also, as we know, cheating.

The Howard government introduced requirements that doping must be addressed by sports in Australia, and this government will continue that policy. All individual Australian sports have anti-doping policies in place which recognise upholding the World Anti-Doping Code. We continue to work in partnership with all sports in administering that code.

The World Anti-Doping Code is administered by sports and governments around the world and ensures that athletes are treated the same and abide by the same rules everywhere, regardless of nationality or sport. Almost all the major international competitions require national sporting teams to be World Anti-Doping Code compliant.

Australia cannot, on the one hand, demand that our athletes compete on a fair playing field in international competition, with the same rules and sanctions applying to all and, on the other hand, support sporting organisations by deciding independently: if to test, what to test for, when to investigate and whether or not to penalise doping athletes. This is not going to work. In my view, professional sports and athletes benefit from demonstrating a commitment to comply with the World Anti-Doping Code—the integrity of sport requires it.

What is the gist of this whole bill? We know the health benefits of including children in sport. It has many intangible benefits for a person's whole character when they are growing up. There is an economic impact and the sheer joy of participating or coming together to support a local team. This plays a very integral role in so many parts of our community and the cohesion it brings. It is fun, it should be safe, it should be fair and it should be egalitarian. For sport to retain these values it must be about the pursuit of competition in a fair contest, free from doping. The anti-doping regulations are a key part of the approach to maintaining sport integrity, and the WADA code is the global standard for 170 governments and 300 international sporting bodies.

The aim of this bill is to amend the ASADA Act so it is in alignment with the revised World Anti-Doping Code that comes into effect on 1 January 2015. These are necessary changes to ensure we remain code compliant and uphold our commitment to drug-free sport. In making these changes, it is appropriate to streamline and simplify a few aspects of the ASADA Act at the same time. These changes will not impact on current anti-doping matters and it would be inappropriate to comment on these while these issues are ongoing. The ASADA legislation before the House ensures that the Australian government remains committed to the WADA code.

The key changes through the code and additional administrative changes will be: the prohibition of athletes and support persons from associating with convicted drug cheats—this is designed to protect athletes from knowing doping facilitators, such as unscrupulous doctors or support staff currently outside anti-doping regulations; complicity—aiding and abetting or covering up a doping violation is now a violation in its own right; increasing the sanction under the code from two years to four years for deliberate doping infractions, such as taking anabolic steroids—this is an important one because, if you ban an athlete for four years, it is almost writing their career off in their chosen sport; smarter target testing—by testing for specific substances for particular sports—for example, steroids for strength sports and blood doping for endurance sports—and making testing more efficient and targeted; establishing a violations list that formalises a requirement to publish a list of people who have received an anti-doping sanction for the period of that sanction; provision of a review panel in the Australian Sports Drug Medical Advisory Committee, which is separate to ASADA, to provide a mechanism for athletes who apply unsuccessfully for a therapeutic use exemption; removing unnecessary distinctions in types of information received by ASADA by clarifying content as protected information, regardless of the source and ensuring that the same provisions apply for all information to protect the unlawful use of that content—this will enable ASADA to comment publicly in response to incorrect statements by an athlete or their representative to correct the record; and the removal of the register of findings—the register is currently confusing to athletes and to the public, as the Anti-Doping Violation Panel does not in fact make a 'finding', rather, they make an 'assertion' that it is possible that a violation has occurred. This information is provided to ASADA and to the sport to consider through the normal tribunal process. Importantly, whilst this register is removed, safeguards to appeal a decision to the ADRVP by athletes are retained.

So the major purpose of all this is that we want the WADA code to protect the fundamental rights of athletes to participate in doping-free sport. It is going to promote fairness, health and equality for athletes worldwide. It ensures that sport will be played in a harmonised and consistent set of anti-doping rules across the globe. The code provides civil sanctions for those caught doping, not criminal penalties. The application of sanctions by sport is a proportionate response for individuals involved in doping. Sanctions generally involve periods of ineligibility to participate in that sport.

The code has been revised through an extensive two-year consultation process and signatories, including international sporting federations, must amend their individual antidoping arrangements by, as I said earlier, 1 January 2015. Given our commitment to the code under the UNESCO convention, the Australian government, along with 175 other governments which ratified the convention, is also obliged to update its antidoping arrangements to align with the revised code. The Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority Amendment Bill 2014 seeks to ensure that Australia's arrangements are compliant with that revised code.

The vast majority of athletes are not linked to doping. For those athletes—and I think this is very important—the amendments have very little impact other than supporting their efforts to compete in a safe and drug-free environment. The amendments seek to continue to protect the clean athlete and to harden sporting environments against doping. The amendments also include some streamlining of existing processes.

It is very important that this bill be passed because, if these amendments are not enacted, Australia's antidoping arrangements will be non-compliant from 1 January 2015. As a consequence, our antidoping legislation risks falling out of step with the arrangements of national sporting organisations. If the legislation is not passed, it will do significant damage to Australia's sporting reputation and Australian athletes will face a highly complex system of differing rules and regulations from elsewhere. The code is the guiding document that provides the harmonisation. It will give effect to international obligations.

The review I just mentioned culminated in the endorsement of the revisions of the code and the international standards at the World Conference on Doping in Sport in Johannesburg on 15 November. Organised into themes, the significant changes that we have seen between 2009 and 2015 are longer bans from sport for people involved in doping; more flexibility in sanctioning specific circumstances; elevating the importance of investigations and the use of intelligence in the fight against doping; increasing the focus on athlete support personnel who are involved in doping; placing more emphasis on smart test distribution planning and smart menus for sample analysis; and balancing the interests of international federations and national antidoping organisations. I commend the bill to the House.

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