Peta Murphy (Dunkley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is almost beyond comment that today we have an Attorney-General supporting an inquiry into class actions with an argument that is somehow about parliamentary scrutiny and integrity, when the Manager of Opposition Business had to stand up and correct the record because the same Attorney-General misrepresented him in the parliament. It's galling. If it hadn't happened in front of all of us today, I'm not sure any of us would believe that anyone would have the gall to act in that manner.

If the Australian people want to know why class actions matter, I'll give them one word: asbestos. How many Australians had to suffer with mesothelioma? How many Australians didn't have anywhere near the financial resources, on their own, to take on the giant legal firms, let alone the manufacturers of asbestos, and couldn't have done it without a class action?

I'm proud to be on this side of the parliament in a party of people who stand up for, and have a history of standing up for, those people who need to be represented. If the government actually cared about reforms to the legal sector, if they cared about having a legal sector that looked after vulnerable people the most, then instead of taking up time today with this ridiculous motion and a pretence of caring about parliamentary scrutiny they'd spend a lot more time working out how to give greater systemic support to community legal centres and Legal Aid centres across Australia. It's not enough, in a time of a pandemic, to say, 'At the moment we'll give you some more money,' but then leave a sector that looks after the most vulnerable Australians scratching day to day for enough resources to do what it does.

In my professional career before coming to this place and now as the member for Dunkley, I have seen over and over again what community legal centres do for the most vulnerable in our community, for the people who are most in need. If we want to talk about doing something really important during this pandemic, something that would contribute to an Australia that is better at looking after the most vulnerable once we're through it, we should look at how we can give long-term support to community legal centres like the Peninsula Community Legal Centre. It has continued to work outstandingly long hours to support people in Frankston and the broader Bayside and peninsula area when they've been stuck at home with partners who are violent, with little to no opportunity to get out and get advice about their legal rights, because of the social restrictions. It has supported people when they've lost their jobs and haven't been able to pay the rent, month to month, and they don't know what to do and they need legal advice. It has been there when people's businesses, which they've built up over 25 to 30 years and which have been the heart of themselves and their families, have been destroyed in the blink of an eye. Those people have never thought before that they would need to access government support and have nowhere to go. The Peninsula Community Legal Centre were there for them.

When people who have been homeless long term on our streets, with mental health issues and other health issues, and they have had to work out how to protect themselves from coronavirus—when they're told to socially distance and that the best thing they can do is stay at home, but they have no home to go to—who have they turned to for help? The Peninsula Community Legal Centre. When people have had to go to court during this time, and they can't leave home to go and meet with a lawyer to get advice, who have they turned to for advice and representation? The Peninsula Community Legal Centre.

If the government wanted to do something to address the fact that in our communities too many young people go straight from the residential childcare system to the juvenile justice system and the criminal justice system, we'd be looking into that. We wouldn't be having motions for referrals to inquire into class actions where battling Australians are able to band together to take on the big giants that they couldn't do on their own. If we had an Attorney-General that really cared about parliamentary scrutiny then he wouldn't have shut down the Leader of the Opposition every time he moved a motion to discuss something that the Prime Minister doesn't like. If we had an Attorney-General that really cared about parliamentary scrutiny then he'd make sure that his government responds to recommendations of royal commissions and responds to recommendations of parliamentary committees when they hand down reports and implements them. But instead we have a culture warrior who wants to stir up controversy, who thinks that perhaps this is a good way to have a whack at those law firms who stand up for people that need someone in their corner when they need it and it does a disservice. It does a disservice to our democracy, it does a disservice to this parliament and it does a disservice to this government.

We should be here talking about the parts of the legal system and the justice system that don't that work for the people who need them. We should be here talking about long-term systemic reforms, which include proper funding to legal aid commissions, to community legal centres, to all of those pro bono services out there that are helping domestic violence victims, people who can't find affordable housing, people who at the moment can't work out how they're going to feed their children, people who need to go to VCAT to challenge a government decision that was ultra vires—to challenge a government decision which has caused them deep and ongoing pain—but they can't afford to do so. That's what this place should be talking about. That's what our responsibility is.

It should be to the never-ending shame of the current Attorney-General that that's not what his focus is all the time, let alone now when all of those issues aren't bubbling below the surface. They're on top of the surface. All of these issues aren't just the sort of communities that Labor people represent, who have long-term and systemic disadvantage, all of those issues are being faced by people who never thought that they would face them in their lifetimes.

Everyone should be equal before the law, but we know that the law doesn't always treat people equally. We cannot have a system where people who have money and resources get the benefits of a legal system and people who don't have money and don't have resources don't. That's why we have class actions, that's why we have community legal centres, that's why we have legal aid commissions and that's what we in this place should be looking to support.

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