Kylea Tink (North Sydney, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to the Parliamentary Workplace Support Service Bill 2023 and the consequential amendments. As an outspoken advocate for positive cultural change in this parliamentary workplace and a key participant in the creation of a parliamentarian code of conduct, I welcome this bill. While there is still a long way to go, this is a significant moment in parliamentary reckoning to lift the standards in this place. This bill would give effect to the recommendations the Australian Human Rights Commission Set the standard report, an instrumental review of the Commonwealth parliamentary workplace culture. It would do so by establishing the Parliamentary Workplace Support Service as an independent statutory agency which will work to support positive cultural change across Commonwealth parliamentary workplaces.

This comes at a time when behaviour in this place has been bruising and far from meeting the expectations of our communities. In recent weeks, I stood up in parliament to call out what I have seen as completely inappropriate, disorderly conduct and to remind everyone in this place that not only do ordinary Australians join us every day in the galleries but thousands more watch from home and many are dismayed by the actions and behaviour they witness in this place. Too many debates between members in this place have been driven by party politicking, and I believe Australians expect better of us. As leaders of our communities, we must be able to deal with difficult issues respectfully, sensitively and, ultimately, productively. To reduce these conversations to bombastic cross-chamber yelling reduces us all.

The establishment of a specialist parliamentary human resources agency charged with preventing workplace issues and resolving problems earlier is a positive step in dealing with misconduct in Parliament House and addressing the elements of toxic culture that obviously still have a hold in this place. This legislation comes nearly two years after the Set the standard report was released. The report provides a road map to drive the cultural and practical change necessary to make our parliamentary workplaces safe. The report found that over three-quarters of people currently working in these workplaces have experienced, witnessed or heard about bullying, sexual harassment or an actual or attempted sexual assault in Commonwealth workplaces. That doesn't include the intimidation that takes place both in this place and outside this chamber on a daily basis. It presents findings of unacceptable experiences driven by power imbalances, gender inequality and exclusion, and a lack of accountability. I know those elements are still prevalent in this place today.

We must consider the over 4,000 people working in Parliament House on any given sitting day and the thousands more working across the country in electorate offices and the impact our behaviour is having on them. All people in all Commonwealth parliamentary workplaces deserve protection, and we need to have systems and structures in place to keep them safe. The Set the standard report found that human resources systems to support parliamentarians and MOPS employees were fragmented, unclear and inadequate, with few standardised policies and processes, including to prevent and manage misconduct. It found that there was an absence of clear expectations or guidance for Commonwealth parliamentary workplace participants.

Recognising these as contributing risk factors for misconduct, the Set the standard report made a number of recommendations, with the aim that people working in Commonwealth parliamentary workplaces are clear about their roles and responsibilities and that consistent and standardised systems, processes and advice exist to support performance. The report made 28 recommendations related to leadership, diversity, equality, inclusion and systems to support performance, standards, reporting, accountability, safety and wellbeing. In summary, the report was incredibly thorough.

Recommendation 11 of the Set the standard report recommended that the Australian government establish an office of parliamentarian staffing and culture to provide human resources support to parliamentarians and MOPS employees that is centralised and accountable to parliament, with enforcement of standards, and designed to provide human resources support and administrative functions in the areas of policy development, training, advice and support, and education. Recommendations 12 to 16 go to the functions of the office of parliamentarian staffing and culture, once established.

This bill will give effect to these recommendations by establishing the PWSS and providing the statutory functions commensurate with those recommended in the Set the standard report. In more practical terms, the function of the PWSS include providing centralised human resources support to parliamentarians and MOP employees; support and complaint resolution services and education; and training to Commonwealth parliamentary workplace participants, as well as determining key workplace policies and procedures. It will also review complaints about certain misconduct and will make recommendations. It will promote transparency and accountability by regularly reporting on key indicators of cultural change across Commonwealth parliamentary workplaces, and it will support and provide resources for professionalised management practice in offices. Trading and guidance for MPs for the implementation for the code of conduct and behavioural standards will be central.

It's important to dig deep into what these reforms actually mean. It is valuable to see the direct translation of the Set the standard report recommendations into this legislation. To have an independent human resources entity for staff and parliamentarians with these functions enshrined in legislation is a good step in the right direction. It plays a part in ensuring that, as the highest office holders in the land, we hold ourselves to the highest standards. But in discussing this legislation, it's important that we reflect on how we got here and how far we have to go. It was the courage of victims that resulted in the Jenkins review, whose recommendations led to the Parliamentary Leadership Taskforce and the Joint Select Committee on Parliamentary Standards.

The Respect@Work report completed by the Australian Human Rights Commission in March 2020 was a milestone moment, not just for our country but for this place. It has very much paved the way for the 2021 Set the standard report on which this legislation is based. It particularly identified and called out the weaknesses in this place, a place which should be consistently modelling the highest standards of behaviour, and the role that the Set the standard report has subsequently played in moving this place's culture in a new direction should not be understated. But it is simply gently nudging rather than taking a sledge hammer to it.

I've said this before, and I will say this again: I want to sincerely thank the far too many courageous people, the victims-survivors and everyone who bravely shared their stories to inform this important work. I want to thank the commissioner at the time, Kate Jenkins, for her fearlessness. The Respect@Work and Set the standardreports were both developed following a long and thorough process, finally bringing to light what many women have known to be true for decades. We need to do better in workplaces right around the country, including this one. That ultimately led to the development and endorsement of the first-ever code of conduct for parliamentarians and their staff, and the findings and recommendations followed.

For me, watching the appalling treatment of our first female Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, was heart-wrenching. To then see Brittany Higgins's brave expression of her experience as she stood in the face of a barrage, to hear Julia Banks's accounting of her time in parliament, to read reports of Bridget Archer's treatment within parliament and then to watch Annabel Crabb's series Ms Represented were all instrumental moments in me then agreeing to run as an independent candidate.

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