Steve Irons (Swan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Australian government has many dozens of websites. Each department has its own website, and all of these websites are designed to provide services and information on matters of interest to the Australian people. But there is one website in particular that massively outperforms others in the number of hits it gets—that is, the Bureau of Meteorology's website. Commonly known as the BOM, the bureau's website racks up in excess of 471 million visits per year. It would seem then that Australians are certainly enthusiastic followers and observers of the weather and this House often reflects this interest in the weather with all our discussions on climate—not only daily, but annually and decade wise.

There are certainly good reasons for this. Australia's climate is unlike the climates of Europe and indeed most other settled parts of the world. It is, and has been, distinguished by its great unpredictability and experience of extremes. We know from the detailed records available that Australia's climate has always been unpredictable. This unpredictability was encountered by European settlers in Western Australia, who struggled in the early years with arable agriculture, due in part to the difficulty of predicting the first rains of winter. And we see this unpredictability today with years of great rains and floods in Queensland, for example, prompting motions in this House, followed by drought just a few short months later, prompting the drought relief package put forward by the Minister for Agriculture. So in its unpredictability, Australia's weather has largely defied modelling and made longer term predictions more difficult.

We also know from the records that Australia's climate has been characterised by extremes. Throughout history we have not only had long painful droughts but also devastatingly prolonged floods. We have had major fires whipped up by strong winds and heatwaves as well as cold snaps and avalanches in the same state. And, again, you do not have to look too far back through the record books to see this pattern. Just a couple of years, or indeed a couple of months, will do. I know that during the bushfires in Victoria in 2009, my sister, who lives in Healesville, had about 10 fire trucks out there and they had six helicopters drop enormous amounts of water on their property just to save the property. The 173 fatalities in that particular bushfire is a great example of what extreme weather conditions can do in Australia.

These characteristics of Australia's weather tend not to be limited geographically but to apply right across Australia. In fact, as much as they apply in Western Australia, they are perhaps accentuated even further in the eastern states with the polarising impact of the El Nino and La Nina climate events of the Pacific impacting particularly on that region. However, that being said, researchers did in recent years link the La Nina effect to a local issue in my electorate of Swan. A major mosquito plague in 2010-11 spurred calls for action from many of my constituents, some of whom formed the Waterford action group. Michael Hopkin at the West Australianreported at the time, on 6 April 2011:

Perth is enduring a mosquito plague as a by-product of the La Nina weather pattern that has blighted Australia …

Populations of mosquitoes throughout the city have been boosted by the high tides triggered by La Nina, bringing misery to many.

The extreme tidal conditions have increased the inundation of tidal salt marshes where the insects breed …

Mr Deputy Speaker Randall, you were probably one of those people who experienced those mosquito plagues due to the location of where you live. Another of my constituents, a Mr Wilson Tuckey of Ascot, was also concerned about this issue and felt prompted to write to me in 2011 and seek some help. There was even the trouble of getting mosquito traps and baits put in place as they were being used over in the east for the mosquito activity associated with the Queensland floods of that year. Fortunately, we were able to get some action at the local council level at the time for some emergency mosquito control.

Flooding has affected the people of Perth in the past, and I have mentioned the challenges faced in the early days of settlement in Perth, but there has been very little major flooding of the Swan River since the 1960s. The walling of the river and reclamation of land has somewhat mitigated the flood risk as the Swan becomes a wide estuarine channel as it passes the City of Perth before it meets the Indian Ocean at Fremantle. Also the dredging of channels that has taken place to allow navigation and prevent algal blooms has acted to reduce the risk of flooding. But this does not mean that the risk is not still there as a high rainfall winter and a combination of tides could again see a flooding event.

The last 100-year flood in Perth was recorded in 1872. A 10-year flood was recorded as far back as 1983. So you could say that Perth is due a major flooding event. And my electorate of Swan, with river frontage on three sides, would certainly once again be impacted. Many people in the Waterford area, as well as in Como and in South Perth, would also be impacted. The state should be prepared for such an event, and we can only hope that complacency has not slipped in following a number of years without flooding.

The 1872 flood is the most significant on record and caused considerable property damage in Perth. The Parliamentary Library has stated that The Perth GazetteandWestern Australian Journal on 26 July 1872 reported:

In and about Perth, the water owing to the force of the incoming seas at the mouth of the river presented a scene of a great lake, all the jetties were submerged, the high roads to Fremantle covered, and passage traffic rendered impossible quantities of sandalwood lying along the banks of river were washed away, and the inhabitants of the suburban villas on the slopes of Mount Eliza obliged to scramble up the hill sides to get into Perth.

The 1926 flood was also considered extremely damaging and is still distinguished as one of the highest rainfall events in Perth's history. The event caused the collapse of the Fremantle rail bridge.

In my electorate of Swan, there was extensive damage as well. The member for Swan at the time was Mr Henry Gregory of the Country Party who served a long stint as the member for Swan, from 1922 to 1940. No doubt he had his work cut out helping the residents with the clean-up. I know that in your time as the member for Swan, Mr Deputy Speaker Randall, you would have helped many residents in the clean-up of issues and items in the electorate of Swan as well.

The Parliamentary Library quotes an article in the Western Mail of 29 July 1926 which notes:

The people of the Mill Point area [South Perth] were in dire need of practical assistance ... During the night no fewer than fourteen houses situated in Suburban Road between Scott Street and the Point, were invaded by the rising waters Two houses in Stone Street and one in Melville Terrace were also flooded ... Along the whole road to Mill Point, from the Scott Street intersection as far as eye could see, water flowed not dully and placidly, but actively, in high surging currents flecked with foam and breaking here and there into waves. A yacht in full sail went up Suburban road ...

Perth is subject to frequent severe storms that roll in off the Indian Ocean during winter. Perhaps one of the most severe storms in recent times was the famous hailstorm in March 2010, when golf ball sized hailstones up to six centimetres in diameter pelted the city and caused great damage.

The Premier, Colin Barnett, declared the storm a natural disaster, but it was also an economic disaster for the insurance industry, with many cars written off. In fact, at the time, as WA Today reported in an article on 22 March 2010, the Insurance Council of Australia declared the storms to be a general insurance catastrophe. To this day, if you visit Perth you will see cars with golf ball dents still driving around in the city and in all the suburbs. At the time, the Premier was reported as saying the storm was an extreme and freak event. On my own property, there was about $3,000 worth of damage to windows, patio roofs and things like that. It took 18 months for a lot of people to get their places repaired.

I also mention the work we have been doing in the House of Representatives centred on the subject of skin cancer. We know that in summer UV levels can rise, and this is another element that people of Australia do face and have to monitor. Skin cancer has been called Australia's national cancer. We have found that it is certainly an issue which affects people right across Australia, in some places more than others. Australians have always had to not only follow the weather but also predict it. Thankfully, this is slightly easier today than in the past, thanks to our meteorologists and our Bureau of Meteorology website. As the parliamentary secretary noted during his contribution, the Bureau of Meteorology is relied upon every day by the Australian community to deliver accurate and timely information, particularly during events where life and property are at risk.

In 2012-13, a trial of advertising took place on the BOM website. This followed the 2011 Munro review of the bureau's capacity to respond to future extreme weather and natural disaster events and to provide seasonal forecasting services. It recommended that options be explored to obtain revenue from advertising on the bureau's website. The trial was considered a success and was introduced permanently on 1 July 2013.

However, the Australian Government Solicitor recommended in August 2012 and June 2013 that, while the trial could be supported, there was a real risk that once the bureau officially commenced advertising it would not be supported by any statutory power or by the executive power of the Commonwealth. The Solicitor-General specifically advised that it would be advisable as soon as possible to put the position beyond doubt by legislating to expressly amend the Meteorology Act to empower the director of the bureau to accept paid advertising. In fact, these concerns were later borne out to be correct when Fairfax Media challenged the bureau's ability to disallow some of its advertising of its own weather provider. Why the previous government did not act on this advice from the Solicitor-General, I do not know. Perhaps it was something to do with all the chaos in the Labor Party at the time and the changes in the ministers associated with the changes from prime ministers Rudd to Gillard and back to Rudd again. Whatever the reason, we are acting today to put this matter beyond doubt. I am encouraged by the enthusiasm displayed by coalition members on the speakers list who are the only ones talking on this bill. The government brings forward today the Meteorology Amendment (Online Advertising) Bill to confirm the powers of the Director of Meteorology to accept paid advertising on the bureau's website. At the same time, it will also require the director to develop and publish guidelines determining the types of advertising that may be accepted on the bureau's website. I pay credit to the bureau for proceeding with these measures, which will not only enable them to advance the services that they provide but also save the taxpayers some money at a time when the country is in a significant amount of debt. It is a testament to the successes of websites which include short-term forecasts, including UV index information, a system of warnings for information on long-term weather trends and also long-term record collection and trends. The media also takes information from the Bureau of Meteorology, especially when there are extreme events and weather warnings in place. It is an essential website and a source of information that can save lives.

I would like to make a few brief comments on the government websites in general. In June, the Minister for Communications held a briefing on the UK government's digital strategy with Liam Maxwell, Chief Technology Officer of Her Majesty's Government. The UK government had a similar issue to the one Australia experiences now: a multitude of different government websites across departments and tiers of government, all costing the taxpayers millions of dollars in waste. The UK government project centralised IT and it has saved the UK taxpayer billions of pounds while delivering better services to constituents and focused on delivering what the people actually need to do when they visit a government website. The Bureau of Meteorology's website is a great example of a government service widely used and valued and, thanks to this legislation, largely paying its way. It is clearly well used because there is a demand for advertising.

In conclusion, I would like to make the point that there will clearly be many benefits to taxpayers from following the approach that the UK have commenced. I am sure that this is a path that the Minister for Communications will be considering. In the advice to the coalition party room, they said that by outsourcing and changing the way they put their IT and everything together they saved the UK £16 billion. It is something that I am sure we as a government should be able to look at as well. I commend the bill to the House.

David Coleman (Banks, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is a good piece of legislation which does something very sensible, which is to allow the very popular website of the Bureau of Meteorology to take advertising. It is good that the previous government intended for this to occur and it is good that the now opposition is supporting it. It is of course unfortunate that the previous government did not dot the i's and cross the t's on this process, leading to the advice from the government Solicitor-General of the need for this specific piece of legislation.

It is important to reflect on the Bureau of Meteorology and the important role that it plays in our society. It is one of the most respected institutions in the nation. It means a lot of things to Australians and it is something that we are all very pleased to support in this place. In the cities the Bureau of Meteorology provides you with information that might be more about whether you need to water the garden, or what to wear, or something relatively trivial like that. But in rural and regional Australia the information provided by the bureau is central to the economic livelihood of literally millions of people around the country. If you are growing crops, running a farm, the weather is one of the biggest factors in determining what is going to happen in your business and you need a robust source of information.

One of the great things about the internet is its immediacy—the fact that information can be updated in real time. Whereas previously people would have relied on the bureau's daily forecasts, now they can go on the bureau's website and there is real-time information about what is happening right around the country. If you are in rural areas that is particularly important because you need to know what to do with your crops on a daily basis and you need to be able to track weather conditions as they change. This is relevant not only from an economic perspective but also from a community safety perspective. We have seen a number of extreme weather events in recent years that have led to floods and fires. The information that the bureau provides about the likelihood of those events is literally critical to the operation of our emergency services.

Emergency services need to know the likelihood of various weather factors combining to produce a bushfire or flash flooding. It is the integrity and reliability of the bureau that is so critical. In my electorate of Banks we have the Georges River, which is one of the great waterways of our nation and the beating heart of the electorate. In times of extreme rain, that river can flood and lead to problems in the sewerage and water systems. The advice provided by the bureau about the likelihood of those events is critical to the Water Board and others in managing potential overflows.

It is good that the previous government moved to put in place what is a sensible economic measure. Those of us on this side of the House are very strongly in favour of sensible economic management. That is not something that we saw frequently from the previous government, so you could sort of say, when it came to economic management from the previous government: online advertising for the Bureau of Meteorology, good; most other matters, bad. It is a sorry tale, a litany of mistakes and errors in the area of economic management. But clearly when it came to this issue of online advertising on the Bureau of Meteorology website, narrow though it is, the previous government made a sensible decision, although they then failed to execute it correctly.

It is an important contrast. Economic management is at the heart of our nation and the government has moved to make important changes to our financial situation to get the budget back on track. Measures like this one, small though it is, do assist in that overall effort. We did see a situation where Labor spending went up by 50 per cent in six years and the budget position went from $50 billion in the bank to $200 billion of debt, with a trajectory of $667 billion of debt—which is two-thirds of a trillion—in the next decade unless this government acts. That is precisely what we are going to do.

The Bureau of Meteorology website is one of the top 50 most popular sites in Australia. In fact, according to Alexa, which is a web statistics company owned by Amazon, it is the No. 46 website in Australia, so it is right up there. This underscores the opportunity here for the bureau to make a sensible effort to get advertising on that site. Some big-name websites are actually smaller than the Bureau of Meteorology's website. Telstra, SBS and The Australian newspaper have less traffic than the Bureau of Meteorology, as indeed does Australia Post and a business that I used to have some involvement with, carsales.com, which is a very large business. The Bureau of Meteorology website is bigger than all of them. The bureau has also done a really good job of providing information in mobile formats. The internet is changing very rapidly, and the consumption of internet content is changing rapidly. Whereas a few years ago the vast majority of internet consumption was at PCs—sitting at a desk—or maybe at laptops, that is changing very fast, and it is all about tablets and mobile devices. Online advertisers are moving to develop products that work well in those mobile environments. That is the opportunity that the bureau will have here.

The online advertising market in Australia has grown at a phenomenal rate in recent years. Prior to coming to this House I spent the majority of my career working in that industry, so I have some understanding of the space. It is now a $4 billion industry. More than a quarter of all advertising in Australia is now on line. That is the opportunity which the bureau can now access. Of that $4 billion, $2 billion is in search advertising. Then there are classifieds—like car sales, which I mentioned before—and over $1 billion in what the industry calls 'general display advertising'. Those are graphic ads that you see on web sites and other display formats.

The bureau is very well placed, not only because of the amount of traffic but also because of the quality and the specificity of that traffic. Advertisers are reluctant, generally, to put their names against brands which are not well known or well trusted, or where there is uncertainty about what might appear. There are some environments on the internet where a corporate brand would not necessarily want its name to appear, but the bureau is the exact opposite environment, because it is an extremely well respected name and it offers a very high-quality, well-respected service.

The other thing the bureau does is provide information on a geographical basis. If an advertiser sees that somebody is looking into the weather conditions in rural WA there is a good chance that they live in rural WA. If they live in rural WA there is a good chance that they are involved in pastoral or mining activities so there is a good chance that advertising of that nature might be of interest. That is why the bureau represents such a potentially attractive opportunity for advertisers.

The task that the bureau and its advisers will now need to address is how to access that market and how to ensure that taxpayers are well served in that process. The general display market—$1.1 billion was spent there in 2013—is the obvious market for the bureau. As the No. 46 web site in the entire nation the bureau should be able to access a reasonable proportion of that advertising. This should not be a trivial source of revenue; it should be fairly meaningful.

More than 470 million people visited the bureau web site last year. The Munro report, back in 2011, which did the initial work in this area, recommended that advertising be taken. In a bipartisan fashion, it was good to see that trial process begin in 2012-13. But we need to talk a little bit about why we are in this position of needing to legislate. The Australian Government Solicitor had to advise the previous government that express legislation was required, because it was not entirely clear that the past enabling legislation was sufficient. That is what led to the litigation that my colleague the member for Swan referred to previously, involving another media outlet.

It will be important that this advertising is done in a sensitive manner. The advertising must be consistent with the interests of the bureau and that that there is no inappropriate content. It will be important that, whilst the bureau does seek the commercial opportunity of this capacity to advertise, it also is sensible about the nature of the advertising that it undertakes.

Under this law, the director of meteorology will have the express power to accept paid advertising and will also have the express power to prohibit advertising that is not in the bureau's interest. So there will not be any uncertainty anymore. It is important, of course, that senior public servants are given the tools they need to act, and that is what this legislation will do.

The bureau does a fantastic job. It is one of the most respected names in Australia. It is good to see a sensible bipartisan approach to this issue. It is a big opportunity for the Bureau of Meteorology. I am sure it is an opportunity that it will pursue in a professional fashion. I commend the bill to the House.

Proceedings suspended from 12:56 to 15:59

Ewen Jones (Herbert, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question is that this bill be now read a second time.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Meteorology Amendment (Online Advertising) Bill 2014. This amendment confirms the power of the director of meteorology to accept paid advertising and will require that the director develop and publish guidelines on the type of advertising that the bureau will display, allowing the director to prohibit advertising that is considered not to be in the Commonwealth or the bureau's interest.

The bureau actually first trialled advertising on their website for 12 months in 2012-13. It became a permanent measure in 2013. So this is not something new; it is just confirming the director's powers. It also should be noted that there was a challenge by Fairfax Media to the ACCC, and the Government Solicitor advised the bureau that refusal to carry any online advertising of the Weather Company did not contravene section 86 of the Competition and Consumer Act.

When it comes to our Bureau of Meteorology, we should think of the father of meteorology in Australia. A gentleman named Watkin Tench came to Australia on the First Fleet and with him he brought some thermometers. With Lieutenant William Dawes, he set up an observatory right under what are today the pylons of Sydney Harbour Bridge. You think back to that year of 1788, when they came out to the unknown Australian continent. The concern for the science that these great men had in accurately recording the weather and all the meteorological observations of the time was truly amazing and we owe great credit to them.

One thing that Dawes and Watkin Tench noticed was the extreme heat of February 1791. One of the hottest days ever recorded in Sydney was back in 1791. In fact, on that day the temperature hit 109 degrees Fahrenheit, or 42.8 degrees Celsius. Tench wrote in his journal, over 200 years ago:

It felt like the blast of a heated oven.

He also wrote:

But even this heat was judged far to be exceeded in the latter end of the following February, when the north-west wind again set in, and blew with great violence for three days. At Sydney, [the temperature] fell short by one degree of what I have just recorded—

which was 109 degrees Fahrenheit—

but at Rosehill—

modern-day Parramatta—

it was allowed, by every person, to surpass all that they had before felt, either there or in any other part of the world. Unluckily they had no thermometer to ascertain its precise height.

They also noticed the effect of the heat at that time on the wildlife. He wrote in his diary, in February 1791:

An immense flight of bats driven before the wind, covered all the trees around the settlement, whence they every moment dropped dead or in a dying state, unable longer to endure the burning state of the atmosphere. Nor did the perroquettes

which is the old term for parrots—

though tropical birds, bear it better. The ground was strewn with them in the same condition as the bats.

Governor Philip also noted the heat on an extreme day. He said:

… from the numbers [of dead bats] that fell into the brook at Rose Hill—

modern-day Parramatta—

the water was tainted for several days, and it was supposed that more than twenty thousand of them were seen within the space of one mile.

We have the work of the great settlers of this country to help us understand some of our climatic history, and our modern-day weather bureau follows in their footsteps and in their great traditions.

It would be very nice not to have to worry about the government raising a few dollars from advertising, but the fact is that we in this country now need every single cent of government revenue that we can get. Our challenge that we have ahead of us is that we need to come with $1 billion—which is $1,000 million—every single month of the year just to pay the interest on the debt that the previous Labor government ran up in six years. Seventy per cent of that actually flows out of the country, because we borrowed that money from overseas. We have got a pay that interest overseas. That is $12 billion a year.

Right now in the House, they are debating the cost of the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. That is one of the most generous schemes in the world, which enables all Australians to have access to life-saving medicines. That scheme will cost $9.3 billion this year. We are spending more on the interest of the debt than we actually spend to subsidise pharmaceuticals in this country. That is the position we have ourselves in. You know what? We are still borrowing money to pay that interest. One day, sometime in the future, we are going to have to pay that debt back. We as government simply cannot turn our backs on one single cent of revenue, otherwise that is going to harm the most vulnerable people in Australia.

The bureau's website is rather popular. Last year, it had 471 million visits to its website. With the issue of climate change and global warming as one of the most prominent issues in our media, especially as we lead up to the next election, it looks like the issue of the carbon tax will again be the major issue running up to the next election. The next election again looks like it will be a referendum on carbon tax. There will be a lot of interest in what actually happens on the climate and the weather. Where most people go for that information is to our Bureau of Meteorology.

One thing we hear from many people in this House is about how cyclones are increasing and cyclones are getting worse. If they were actually able to inform themselves and go to the bureau's website, they would find that that is a complete furphy. In fact, on the bureau's website, it says:

Trends in tropical cyclone activity in the Australian region (south of the equator; 90–160°E) show that the total number of cyclones appears to have decreased…

This is completely contrary to what we continually hear from members of the opposition and from members of the Greens, which is that cyclones are increasing all the time. Here we have it on the bureau's own website, confirming that the number of cyclones has decreased. That actually print a very neat little graph, although I know the bureau has been rather tardy at keeping the graph up-to-date, and just a quick glance of the eye clearly tells you that cyclones have been on the decrease.

The other issue is global sea ice, which also has information on the bureau's website. We are continually told that the sea ice is melting. Yes, while it may be true that there is a declining trend of sea ice in the Arctic, it is the exact opposite in the Antarctic. In fact, if you add the two together and if you look at the decrease in the Arctic and the increase of sea ice in the Antarctic, the actual global sea ice at the end of June was actually higher than what it has been on average for the last 30 years. On a lot of the myths and furphies that we are hearing, if people like you go to that bureau's website, they can actually find the truth, find the details and not be taken in by the scaremongering.

The other issue is also what will happen with global temperatures. The IPCC have made certain predictions in their computer modelling. We often hear members of this parliament coming in and saying, 'I believe in climate change.' What they are actually saying is that they believe in the IPCC's computer modelling. The test is to measure that theoretical computer modelling against the actual empirical measurements. That is the test. It is not whether you believe in this or you believe in that. We can actually do that test with the Bureau of Meteorology. What that actually shows—even though, yes, there has been warming from around the mid-1970s up until the year 2000—from the year 2000 or from 1997-8 onwards, for the last 16 or 17 years, is that those temperatures have plateaued. That is completely contrary to what the IPCC's computer predictions tell us should happen.

I think no-one can accurately forecast where those temperatures will go in the next 10, 20 or 30 years. There are many respected scientists in the world today that actually predict, due to low sunspot activity, that we will be in for a significant period of global cooling over the next century. I hope they are desperately wrong, just as I hope that those that predict runaway global warming are also desperately wrong. But we need to make sure we are monitoring it accurately. We are looking at the empirical measurements against these predictions so we can make the correct policy decisions in this house. Therefore, I commend this bill to the house.

The other reason I commend it to the house is because of the precedent it sets. If we are able to run effective online advertising and gain government revenue from the Bureau of Meteorology's website, it is a principle that we can extend elsewhere. I would suggest that perhaps the first place we could look is the ABC. We know the ABC at the moment is taking over $1 billion of taxpayers' money net without any revenue coming back to government. Surely if it is good enough for the Bureau of Meteorology to run some online advertising, we should be looking at the success of this and extend that principle to the ABC.

As I said, in the years to come we are going to need every single cent that we can get. We want to finance the NDIS. We want to make sure that we have enough money in the PBS scheme to be able to ensure all Australians have access, as quickly as possible, to the new and wonderful drugs that are coming on stream—drugs to treat all types of cancers and blindness and diabetes. But the only way we can do it is if we run a lean and efficient government. That is why this parliament simply cannot pass up opportunities like this. We need to make sure that every cent that we can get goes into government coffers—firstly, to pay the interest repayments and, secondly, to start paying down the debt so that our kids, our grandkids and our great-grandkids are not inheriting this and are not going to have that debt and those interest repayments strung around their neck in decades to come. I commend the bill to the house.

Dennis Jensen (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

At the outset I commend the member for Hughes on his speech. It was not planned that we would be playing a bit of a tag team. I will get onto the issue of data integrity a little later on, which the member for Hughes spoke a bit about. This amendment to allow commercial advertising on the Bureau of Meteorology website is, in the main, something that should be welcomed, as the member for Hughes has pointed out. The previous government saddled us with a massive debt that needs to be repaid. The interest on that debt is $2,000 for a family of four every single year—just interest repayments. So finding new sources of sustainable revenue for government and creative ways of monetising long-run sunk investment is something that I specially welcome.

However, I do have concerns with respect to the specific text of the bill. I am principally concerned about the level of safeguards and oversight in the bill. I feel that, while it is undoubtedly a good thing to get more money into the bureau, this bill gives too much power to the director of the bureau of met. This is not to say that the current director of the bureau of met would use this legislation as something like an enabling piece of legislation or as a tool for nefarious purposes. But, in simple terms, this bill gives the director the final call when it comes to what advertising gets up on the Bureau of Meteorology website. On the face of it, that seems to be fair enough.

However, there is some quite insidious wording in the bill. Indeed, when looking over the parliamentary secretary's second reading speech on the issue, and the honourable member for Riverina confirmed my fears, there is the phrase 'in the bureau's interest'. Regulatory capture, rent-seeking behaviours and soft-touch self-regulation are things that do not serve the community interest. I put it to members of this place that, instead of reading 'the bureau's interest', the bill should make it explicitly clear that it needs to be in the community interest.

Community interest may, and could, include groups of companies sceptical of climate change, which could be fairly described as a position that is not necessarily in the bureau's interest. For example, there are specific issues relating to data manipulation conducted by the Bureau of Meteorology that may be questioned by a body that chooses to advertise on the website. To explain: the data gathered from what are known as the ACORN-SAT sites, which are the designated sites from around Australia from which temperature and other data is collected—and these feed into Australian and global statistics—are processed using a term known as 'homogenisation'. It is these homogenised data, and not the raw data, that are then used for compiling the temperature data statistics. But is homogenised data a more correct representation of what is real than the raw data?

I went to the Bureau of Met in Melbourne to discuss this and some other issues. Based on this discussion, some interesting things came to light. These issues are very important when the Bureau of Meteorology starts talking about differences in records in mere hundredths of a degree as being significant. Take the case of thermometers. When an ACORN-SAT site is checked, the thermometer that is at that site is checked against a calibrated thermometer. If it is out by 0.3 degrees Centigrade it is still designated as fit for purpose—an error which is much greater than the Bureau of Meteorology is claiming as significant.

The homogenisation itself has a trend. I asked the Bureau of Meteorology for the homogenised and raw data trends for each ACORN-SAT site. I also asked for the physical area that they covered to be able to apply a weighting factor for each site. I got the former, but not the latter. So assuming equal weighting, which was the only thing that I could do, the homogenisation trend would be about 0.3 degrees Centigrade for the last 100 years. In other words, if the raw data showed no warming whatsoever over the last century, the homogenised data would indicate that Australia is 0.3 degrees hotter today than it was 100 years ago. This homogenised data is generated using an algorithm comparing data from the ACORN-SAT site with sites that may be 1,000 kilometres away.

I looked at the specific case of Bourke and questioned them on the homogenisation used there. In particular, in the early and the mid-1950s there was a homogenisation in the temperature data increasing the temperature by around half a degree. In a very short space of time it is almost a straight line vertical of approximately half a degree. The problem is the Bureau of Met was unable to explain physically why this adjustment was made; it was just that the algorithm had done its thing. As a scientist, I would say that the first thing that should be asked is: 'What physical factor caused this?' If none can be found, the raw data should be used in preference to the processed data. The lack of curiosity—for want of other terminology—is very concerning. This indicates a predisposition to simply trust the computer models rather than accept the data. This is a problem because, after all, there are assumptions built into the computer models.

On a slight tangent, this is why I have called for an audit of the Bureau of Meteorology by the Bureau of Statistics. I was very concerned to find that there is only one formally trained statistician in the Bureau of Meteorology. The data and the statistical handling of that data is critical. An audit of the Bureau of Met's handling of the data and the methodologies that they use is very important. How would the Director of the Bureau of Met respond to advertising by a group that sought to point out and contest or contradict the Bureau of Meteorology's data and data handling?

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Sitting suspended from 16:20 to 16:39

I have no doubt that they would determine that the advertising would be considered not in the bureau's interest. They could also determine that said advertising was misleading or deceptive. The problem with this is that the definitions, as spelled out in the explanatory memorandum, are too broad. What may not be in the Bureau of Meteorology's interest may very much be in the Commonwealth or national interest. The problem with the definitions as they stand is there appears to be an implicit assumption that what is in the Bureau of Meteorology's interest is also in the Commonwealth's interest and vice versa. This is not necessarily the case and this aspect needs some rethinking to ensure that it does not, by default of the potential bias of the organisation, become the antithesis of another point, which is advertising of a political nature. In other words, the decision not to allow some advertising may, in effect, become political in itself.

This bill originates from the 2011 Munro review whose modus operandi was to find new ways for the bureau to respond to extreme weather events in the future. New revenue sources could go a long way to address that goal. New money could be put to greater investments in IT and data collection systems. Moreover, new money could go a long way if invested in communications infrastructure. As with most things in government, finding a home for new money is never much of a problem. So, yes, I agree that with the move to give clarity to the Bureau of Meteorology regarding advertising on its website. This move is overdue and should be replicated by other government agencies and departments. Information, viewer attention, brand recognition and click loyalty are all very valuable resources that many government departments and agencies own but do not currently utilise.

In the current economic situation, it is welcome and necessary to see greater innovation and utilisation of capital. I am gravely concerned regarding the provision that is given to the director of the Bureau of Meteorology to reject advertising that causes offence.

This bill is in many ways too prescriptive as to what cannot be included on the website or what groups can advertise on the Bureau of Meteorology's website. I am of the belief that we should open this opportunity up to as wide a potential pool as possible. The one caveat that I would have is around protecting the integrity and good name of the bureau and, consequently, the Australian government. The same belief goes for protecting scientific integrity. Scientific integrity, to my mind, means recognising other and all credible scientific voices in the community. This means recognising the legitimate concerns many in the community have regarding the Bureau of Meteorology's upward homogenisation of its datasets.

Perhaps one improvement to this bill would be a community interest charter that could inform how a director makes his or her call on what advertising gets up. In turn, if done correctly—in other words, through wide-ranging consultation with community stakeholders—this charter could then be rolled out to other government websites. This would save a great deal of time, money and energy in the long run as well as give certainty to future direction.

Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

May I thank all of the speakers who have contributed to this debate. May I particularly acknowledge the work of the parliamentary counsel and the departmental officers as well as my own staff and, most especially, the Parliamentary Secretary for the Environment, Senator Birmingham.

Recently, during the federal budget process, we were successful in securing for the Bureau of Meteorology funding support for a new super computer. The public might rightly ask what the purpose of this is. It massively expands the capacity of the bureau to deliver early warnings in the case of floods, fires, cyclones—the events which have been such a part of Australia's lived experience over the last thousands and thousands of years but events which will continue, on all the advice we have received from our own scientific agency, to be at risk of worsening either in frequency or intensity.

Against that background, this bill attempts to provide the Bureau of Meteorology with additional resources. It does so by tapping the public's desire to engage with the Bureau of Meteorology. It boosts the capacity of the Bureau of Meteorology and it boosts the capacity of the public to engage with the bureau.

In particular, the Bureau of Meteorology's website is one of Australia's most popular websites. It has over 470 million visits a year, and that continues to grow dramatically each year. It is a website trusted by Australians. It provides vital information to Australians on a daily basis, as I said at the start. Whether it is in relation to weather forecasts or warnings or assisting industries whose operations are reliant on, or impacted by, weather, it is a website that is used by a large proportion of Australians at some time, as they go about their daily business.

I am certain that for rural communities, the boating community, the transport and aviation community, holiday makers and those who are involved in weather dependent industries, the Bureau of Meteorology website is an almost daily source of vital information. Against that background the bureau and its brand are of paramount importance. The maintenance of high-quality services is essential to the bureau and to the government. That is why we have invested in a super computer. That is why we are also taking steps to introduce the Meteorology Amendment (Online Advertising) Bill 2014—this bill—to amend the Meteorology Act 1955.

The government wants to provide certainty to ensure the Director of Meteorology's powers include advertising in connection with the Bureau of Meteorology services, and determine the types of advertising that the bureau displays. This particular bill ensures that the director has the power to prohibit advertising considered to be not in the Commonwealth's or the bureau's interests—advertising of things such as tobacco, alcohol, gambling, violence, weapons and advertising that has a sexual content as examples.

The bill ensures that any challenges from companies who wish to advertise wares that are not in line with the bureau's standards and the national interest are void. This bill will also remove any doubt and make it explicitly clear that the BoM can accept paid advertising. This allows the bureau to further diversify its sources of funding as was set out in the Munro review—as has been the consistent goal of governments of both persuasions. The bill therefore requires the Director of Meteorology to develop and publish guidelines on the types of advertising that the bureau will display. I am happy to guarantee that we will consult with members of this House, as has been requested by some during the course of this debate.

The parliamentary secretary, I am certain—I will speak to him to this effect—will so do. The Meteorology Amendment (Online Advertising) Bill 2014, amends the Meteorology Act. It will ensure that the bureau can act with surety in the decisions made in relation to advertising on its web site without compromising its standards or its services. I commend the bill to the House.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Ordered that this bill be reported to the House without amendment.

Federation Chamber adjourned at 16:4