James Stevens (Sturt, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

On behalf of opposition members of the committee I make a few comments on the tabling of the report. There is a dissenting report. The previous speaker has just foreshadowed the government's position regarding the formal pamphlet. There was a lot of hot debate and a proposition of potentially removing that tradition. It seems the government's position has changed on that, which we welcome.

This was an inquiry into the machinery of referenda perpetually into the future; this could be a statute that applies to many referenda into the future, and it shouldn't be narrowly viewed specifically towards an eminent referendum related to the constitutional amendment for the Voice to Parliament. Regardless I don't think the fundamental principles of how we conduct referenda in this country should differ, no matter what the question is. It's highly concerning to those of us in the opposition to see propositions—and we, in our dissenting report, indicate we don't support the proposition of not having a proper, formal case protected through legislation for each side of the proposition to change the Constitution in any case in which we are looking to change the Constitution. That is proposed in this legislation, and we are very much opposed both to not having a formal 'yes' and 'no' case and to not properly financially resourcing each of those cases. Obviously that principle must include equal financial resourcing to each case. Of course, the particular legislative instrument to hold any particular referendum tends to encapsulate how the government intends to resource those cases, but we believe that should always involve equal funding.

I am really concerned, frankly—we all have political experience in this chamber—that any attempt to rig the system and to suggest or make changes that some people might believe are designed to facilitate a certain outcome is actually going to achieve the complete opposite political objective. We understand that the public funding of 'yes' and 'no' cases is always going to be a small proportion of the total amount of resources deployed into a campaign. That's the case in our actual elections, as we know. So there is going to be a 'yes' campaign and a 'no' campaign in any referendum, including for the Voice to Parliament. If it becomes the position of the parliament to change the law to remove the tradition of providing taxpayer resources equally to each of the cases, I think the damage to any effort to change the Constitution will far outweigh whatever resourcing and argument against changing the Constitution would have provided in the court of public opinion through the expenditure of those funds.

So we are opposed to the principle but also quite surprised that anyone who thinks they are helping an outcome to be achieved by starving it of taxpayer resources—it's going to achieve the opposite result. It is very difficult to change the Constitution. We know that. We've got a lot of evidence. We try, but it rarely occurs. At the most recent time, the republic referendum in 1999, we had formal, official 'yes' and 'no' cases, and appropriate financing was provided towards that. I think that any kind of trickery or rigging of in the system and effectively trying to advantage one side of a debate over the other will only increase scepticism amongst the people of the country and will only contribute to the defeat of whatever proposition is put to them.

It will be difficult to change the Constitution any time we try, no matter what the proposition is. Why you would want to add and be saddled with the additional challenge of having made a legislative change that unwinds the precedent of supporting proper debate on changing our Constitution in this nation is absolutely mystifying to those of us in the coalition. We urge the government to dramatically reconsider the message it will send and the damage it would inflict on attempts to change the Constitution by saying we don't want to have properly resourced arguments for and against that change. I think the people will react quite strongly against that change, and it will dramatically doom future attempts to change the Constitution that may or may not have credibility, because the politicians have rigged the system against it. (Time expired)

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