Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Here we have a very important motion on asbestos, an incredibly dangerous and toxic material that has left thousands of people mortally injured and killed thousands—700 Australians are affected every year by asbestos and mesothelioma—and there is not one government member speaking on this motion. It is simply incredible that, with this massive threat, there is not a single government member to speak on this motion. The member for Bendigo should be congratulated for bringing it to the parliament, but you would think that this government could put up at least one speaker on this important subject.

Every year in my electorate of Wakefield the Asbestos Victims Association of South Australia holds a memorial service. It is a touching service. We nearly always have bipartisan representation there, which is why today's no-show by the government is so depressing. We have seen in South Australia the incredible and terrible legacy of asbestos, and I pay tribute to Terry Miller OAM, who runs the Asbestos Victims Association and was on 7.30 on 14 February this year telling his story and reminding everybody about the dangers of this terrible product.

It is amazingly negligent of this government that we have example after example of asbestos being brought into this country. ABC News of 15 February 2016 had the headline 'Dozens of Australian building sites contaminated by illegal Chinese asbestos imports, authorities say'. The story talked about 17 sites in New South Wales, 13 in Queensland, eight in Victoria and 11 in South Australia, including two electrical substations in my state of South Australia. It will be members of the union that I am a member of, the CEPU, who will have to deal with that. Peter Tighe from the Asbestos Safety and Eradication Agency has talked about the perils of young tradespeople, who are led to believe that all of the material they are working with is asbestos-free, finding out that they have been exposed to this terrible, dangerous and deadly product.

Another headline, from 11 September 2015, is: 'Asbestos found in imported children's crayons marked with Dora the Explorer and Peppa Pig'. Bizarrely, this article on the News website says:

The ACCC does not believe that traces of asbestos in crayons presents a safety risk to consumers because the asbestos is fixed within the crayon wax, which removes the risk of inhalation or ingestion.

That is incredible—in children's crayons; in cement products; in the brakes of thousands of Toyota motor vehicles. We have the situation where counterfeit brake parts laced with asbestos have been fitted to a fleet of potentially 400,000 HiLuxes and 100,000 HiAce delivery vans. And what do we get from this government? First of all, we get no speakers in this debate. It is a bit hard to have a debate when the government does not show up. It is an incredible and absolutely shameful display. But when the opposition is out there calling for Border Force—this newly named organisation, which was roaming around the streets of Melbourne checking people's driver's licences last year—it is allowing these imports of asbestos into the country.

We need a tougher approach on this matter. We need a serious government with a serious attitude towards this deadly product. The government has got to do better than not showing up and not dealing with it. Thousands of tradespeople rely on Border Force and rely on this government to adequately monitor the products that are coming in. It does not matter whether it is asbestos laced cement or aluminium cladding, which is a fire risk, or electrical cord, which is dangerous, Border Force and this government have got to start showing up and doing something about what is a serious problem.

Debate adjourned.

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