Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Hansard source

As Senator Brown should also know, the Australian Electoral Commission is a statutory authority. When it undertakes investigations, I would hope everybody—other than the Greens—would be of the mind that the minister should not be involved in those investigations and should not know what stage they are at other than whether one is under way and then when one is completed. That is the proper role of an independent statutory authority. I would not even seek to ask the Australian Electoral Commission what stage a particular ongoing investigation was at. The independent Australian Electoral Commission will determine those matters in due course.

In relation to whether it is passing strange for a group to believe that you should not vote but you can get involved in political advertising, that is not for me to determine. The great thing in a free and democratic society is that we can be as kooky as we like. There are even environmental parties that oppose renewable recyclable biodegradable resource management, namely tree plantations. It is absolutely passing strange, but it is not for the Minister for the Environment and Heritage to pass comment on that in a legal situation—but, sure, we can have a political debate about it.

The thing about the Australian Greens is that, if you agree with them or do not oppose them, you are okay. The Greens would even seek to have—and Senator Brown has put up a press release on this—every Exclusive Brethren business publicly registered and wearing a star. It really is a very sad reflection that that is the view of a political party. But why a certain religious group believes in a certain thing is not for the minister to answer. I am not the minister for religion. The great thing in this country is that we have freedom of religion. No matter how silly, good, bad or indifferent, we allow them as long as they are within the rule of law.