Lucy Wicks (Robertson, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Petitions continue to be a popular way in which citizens can engage with the parliament on various topics and from all walks of life. The petitions that I present today have a combined total of over 5,000 signatures collected from all over the country.

The committee receives petitions that are as diverse in content as they are in size and origin. We receive petitions with as few as one single signature and many that have signatures numbering in the hundreds and thousands.

The topics of the petitions that I present today also encapsulate this diversity, ranging from the closure of a post office to a petition concerning taxation on alcoholic beverages. Two petitions presented today express concern over climate change, and five more on the same topic are being reviewed by the committee later this week with possibly more to come.

Petitioning the parliament is a longstanding democratic right, and we want to know how we can improve our petitioning system for all Australian citizens. It’s all about making it easier for people across Australia to connect with their community, build up a voice, and present it to their political representatives.

But until recently, the only way you could do that was by physically getting each individual to sign on a piece of paper. That’s why we want to make it easier to petition the parliament online and, since the e-petitions system has been launched last year, e-petitions have been flooding in. To date, we’ve received around 340 e-petitions this parliament.

But it’s time for a review, which is why there’s an inquiry into how e-petitions are working and to let more Australians know about how easy it can be. The committee is launching a survey this week as part of the inquiry, aimed at finding out what people think of the e-petitions system and how it can be improved. The responses we receive from the survey will inform the committee’s recommendations for future enhancements to the system.

Thank you, Mr Speaker, and I will continue to provide updates to the House on the work of the Petitions Committee and the inquiry into e-petitions.