Chris Ellison (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Justice and Customs) Share this | Hansard source

Whilst we turn up the report recommendations, can I say that at the very outset we made it clear that the amendments and this bill were the result of work done since 2004; I said that repeatedly. It was a result of the telecommunications bill which went through at that time and the result of recommendations by a parliamentary committee, and consequently we commissioned the Blunn report. There are aspects of this bill that are not covered by the Blunn report and we make no apology for that, because you do not commission a report and then slavishly say, ‘That’s all we’ll deal with—what the report dealt with.’ The government are being consistent in our approach to Blunn and we reject any allegation that we have not been. Recommendation xvi of the Blunn report says:

as a matter of priority a unique and indelible identifier of the source of telecommunications be developed as the basis for access …

We believe what Blunn is referring to there is the IMEI, an equipment identifier. I think that covers that aspect. There is no inconsistency in the way we have put forward this bill and the way we commissioned the Blunn report and had regard to it.