Jim Chalmers (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I acknowledge the member for Higgins and before her the member for Greenway. I especially acknowledge all of the work that the member for Greenway has done on behalf of the Labor opposition not just over the last few days or the last few weeks but for the full 18 months or so that this saga has dragged on. I acknowledge the member for Greenway's experience and judgement, as well as the consultation and all of the work that she has put into landing a position for us to support the Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2020 which is before us in the House. I also acknowledge the members of the Labor Party on the Senate inquiry—Senator Gallacher and Senator McAllister—for the work that they did in examining the details in that short inquiry that the Senate undertook in order to hold up to the light what the government was proposing before this most recent set of amendments. I acknowledge them, too.

The ACCC and Rod Sims, in particular, made themselves available too so that we could educate ourselves and satisfy ourselves that some of the recommendations that the ACCC was making were consistent with what we saw as the relevant and appropriate objectives of the bill. I acknowledge as well, in the same way that the member for Greenway did, that there's been a lot of work from officials in the Treasury, the communications department, the ACCC and elsewhere, who would have also spent a lot of their time over the last 18 months working on this code and this legislation. And, finally, there are the stakeholders. The member for Greenway, in particular, but also I and my office have met with many, if not all, of the relevant stakeholders over the last little while, and we convey our thanks to the stakeholders for the way that they have engaged with the Labor opposition to help us come to a view. Our view is that we support the bill as amended by the government and before us today.

We have, since the very beginning, as you know, Deputy Speaker Georganas, offered our in-principle support for the objective that journalists should be paid for the content that they generate or create. That has been more or less our in-principle position for the duration of the long road that has led to this legislation. We've been quite responsible about it, and we've been constructive about it. Let's take, for example, what was a glaring omission in one of the original versions of what the government was proposing—that it wasn't proposing to pay the ABC or SBS for their content. That was a glaring omission, but the member for Greenway, the Leader of the Opposition and others fought very hard in the public discussion of these matters to ensure that the ABC and SBS were included. We were pleased when the government had a change of heart and included them. We didn't rub the government's nose in it that they'd got it wrong. They had got it wrong, and it's good to see those public broadcasters included. That, I think, is an illustration of the constructive role that we've played in the conversation about this bill. The code is an outcome from, really, a key recommendation of the ACCC, following their 18-months-long Digital Platforms Inquiry.

I think it also needs to be said that this was one of those instances where we had a yawning gap between what was being announced—what we were reading about the government on the front pages of our papers—and what was actually being delivered. I think it does need to be remembered that the Treasurer, in particular, was doing a lot of overpromising and underdelivering when it came to this legislation and this outcome. Many of us here have read, time and time again, the Treasurer say, over and over again, that this would all be done and dusted in 2020—that it would all be fixed, last year. Clearly, the fact that we are here in the middle of February and still debating this legislation shows, once again, what has been a serial problem with the government of those opposite, which is that there's a lot of announcement but not quite enough delivery. I think the delay in getting to this point is another illustration of that.

The issue around the delay is not just a point about the politics of this bill, but I know, from talking to stakeholders—and the member for Greenway knows, from speaking with stakeholders—that that delay created a heap of uncertainty in the business community and the wider community about where this was all headed. We all saw the various threats made and other things in more recent times. But the truth is: for some months now, the fact that this had not been landed didn't just create uncertainty for the big players here, though it did do that; it also created uncertainty for small business, who weren't quite sure what the landscape that they would be operating in was going to look like.

Also, of course, the delay has meant a delay in revenue to some of these media organisations. That's in addition to the concerns raised by small businesses, small media outlets, citizens and consumers about the impact of the bill. The Senate inquiry went to some of those, but there's been a public discussion of them as well. I think that one of the reasons why there's that 12 month review built into the legislation we're talking about today is that, in many cases, there are still questions to be answered about the operation of this—about what's happening here. There are still legitimate concerns that people have. There's a review there in 12 months, but I think it's also incumbent on the government not just to think that, when this bill goes through the House of Representatives—as it will this week, I'm assuming—that's the end of it. There are still concerns that need to be addressed. There are still questions that need to be answered. That will be a role for the review in 12 months time but before then as well, because we want people to have confidence in the operation of the code and the legislation that sits behind it as a backstop to all of these deals that are being struck between media organisations and the platforms.

More broadly, if we take a step back from the detail of this legislation, what we're really trying to do here is to make sure that Australians get the best kind of media that's possible. The media and the digital economy are obviously absolutely crucial components of a modern, functioning economy but also of a modern functioning society. We want to get it as right as we can, and we want that to mean a strong and diverse media sector. We want a really diverse, forward-looking and innovative digital technology sector. Clearly, those two things are linked in obvious ways in this area, but, more broadly, if you think about the future of this economy, and you think about digitisation and the digital economy, the news media and all of the ways that those have been changing at such a rapid rate, then we need to get this bang-on. We need to get this as right as we can.

Part of that is recognising that, even with the passage of this legislation, there is still a lot of work to be done when it comes to improving the media landscape. It's still not diverse enough; we've got issues there. We've still got issues around empowering and resourcing smaller outlets. We still have issues around the ABC and its funding. All of these sorts of things are not necessarily entirely fixed by what the government is proposing here with the code and the legislation. We do need to recognise that. That's one of the reasons why the second reading amendment moved by the member for Greenway and seconded by the member for Chifley is so important, because another thing which is not addressed here, but is a real issue in our media landscape, is the resourcing of the AAP Newswire, for example. So the amendment goes to some of those issues, and that's an example of the sort of thing that is unaddressed by what we're doing here. If we care about diversity and care about giving people access to quality, impartial journalism, we need to care about things like the AAP Newswire.

The decline of public interest journalism in recent years is of great concern to us on this side of the House and also, I believe, to the community more broadly. There are worrying stats about what is happening in our media environment, and that's why we want to be sure that, when the government passes this legislation and when the media organisations and the tech platforms are doing their deals, we recognise that there is more that needs to be done. There are still questions to be answered. But, in the interim, our vote in this place will give effect to the in-principle position we've had since the beginning, which is that journalists should be paid for their content. Ideally, there will be arrangements between the platforms and the media organisations, and there is a role for legislation sitting behind that, in the event that those deals prove unsatisfactory or unworkable.

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