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

I rise to express support for the Parliamentary Workplace Support Service Bill 2023 in the context of the point made by the lead speaker for the opposition that we want to see this move through the parliament. We know the start date of 1 October is one that's important, and he did note that there are some ongoing discussions between the opposition and the government that might see some changes or adjustments to the bill in the Senate. As the lead speaker, the member for Hume, said, we really want to make sure that legislation of this kind is bipartisan and in fact unanimous throughout the parliament and we want this to be an opportunity for an enduring reform that does contribute to dramatic improvements to the way in which staff are supported in the workplace. I'm very confident that this bill will achieve those objectives, but we hope that a couple of those discussions with the government yield good, sensible, minor adjustments that will be in the best interests of some observations that we've got from experience.

We completely support the principle of what's happening here, of course, and I thank Kate Jenkins, as I've done in the past in some other contributions on matters on this topic. We appreciate the very hard work that she undertook in her report and we acknowledge how sobering and concerning it was to hear some of the experiences that were reflected on, without identifying people, in the body of work that she has done and in the commentary that she has provided on that process as well.

None of us want to be in a workplace where our staff are anything but respected, supported and proud to be here and to work for those of us that have the honour of serving in the Commonwealth parliament. Whilst, first and foremost, it's important that the reality of that respect is in place, it's also important, equally, that that is the perception in the community. I've felt at times in the last few years, when there were revelations about experiences that people had had in this building, a sense of great shame that, in a workplace that should be setting the highest standard of any, there were clearly people that were having the exact opposite experience and being treated in the exact opposite way.

We are in a different era from some of the awful stories from decades gone by about the treatment of people in any workplace. We've got to be the most progressive on these matters, and I think having these statutory provisions in place for the Parliamentary Workplace Support Service are going to ensure that it is an agency that holds parliamentarians to the highest of standards and makes sure that we have an awareness of our obligations in the workplace and that we are held to those obligations and standards—equally, staff, who in many circumstances would feel that they are employed in a situation where there can be significant power imbalances and a whole range of other complexities in working in politics.

We all know that staff tend to have a fairly heavy engagement in the fortunes of the political side of the person that they work for, and that at times they've got networks within the political parties, or the political movements in the case of Independents et cetera, where there are broader and further consequences for staff around their relationship and perhaps their future prospects in other things relating to the person that they work for. Those things create their own complexities, but certainly, when I reflect on the situation prior to where we find ourselves now with this new workplace support service, I also think it hasn't been in the interest of parliamentarians to have a Rafferty's rules-type situation where no-one really knows where to turn. With the greatest of respect to the excellent support that we have had from the departments and public servants, it has been very difficult in the frameworks that were in place in the past to manage the sorts of standard issues that come up in any workplace, let alone the additional issues that come up in one that's unique, as is working in the Australian Parliament House.

I commend the work of Kate Jenkins and the excellent work of all of the members of this place and the Senate who have served on the working group that has been progressing to this legislation and other elements of the workplace support structures. I thank everyone for that, and I do have great sense of hope that this will be seen as somewhat of an epochal moment in the culture of this building. No-one has disputed in any debate that I have heard that we need culture change. Regrettably, it has taken some fairly specific instances that have come to light to make everyone aware of a broader cultural issue, although these instances have had a different level of awareness to different members of parliament, depending on what your experiences have been. But the process that Kate Jenkins undertook has certainly made sure that we have a definitive and comprehensive body of work that we can reference to drive the cultural change we need, such as this legislation that is coming through the parliament now.

I commend the work of everyone in this process. It hopefully will be part of drawing a line under a dark chapter in the discourse of the way in which the parliament operates, and I express sincere regret and apologise as a member of parliament to all and any staff that have had the bad experiences that have led to us doing what we are doing here. I hope the action that we are taking means that people that have had bad experiences in the past and everyone in this building into the future will not have anything like those sorts of experiences again. On that basis, I commend these bills to the House.

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