Kate Lundy (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Local Government) Share this | Hansard source

I will foreshadow moving it in speaking to Senator Ludwig’s amendment. In foreshadowing this amendment I make the same points as Senator Ludwig. We are dealing here with a process that is completely absurd if the opposition and cross-benches are to have any hope of making a considered determination about the reference of a bill to a committee. What appears to be happening is that the government are exploiting the fact that they know very well they have the numbers in this place and are trying to limit the extent to which their legislation is scrutinised by referring it, before it has even been seen, to a very limited inquiry. That really sits at the heart of Labor’s complaint on this matter and why we are raising it in the chamber today.

We are not in a position to be able to assess the type of committee hearing or the type of inquiry that is warranted without having seen the bill and having had the opportunity to absorb what is in the bill. To try to force this chamber to refer a bill to a very limited inquiry—as has been done before—completely ignores any concerns that the opposition or cross benches may have.

Senator Ludwig’s amendment refers to dates. My amendment relates to the terms of reference. Our concerns extend to the analysis of the viability of the registration process, in particular whether there are adequate proof of identity checks. We would like to see that as part of the terms of reference, as well as adequate time to allow this bill to be considered in committee.

This is not the first time this has been done by the coalition government. It seems to be some sort of exercise in ensuring that the committee system is being used, albeit, I and the Labor Party say, not used effectively. In fact it is being abused. That is not in the spirit of the processes that the Senate committee system affords. It does not allow us as an opposition to be able to investigate the bill and address all of the concerns that we are aware of and any additional concerns that may be and should be drawn out through the committee process. The committee inquiry is so truncated that we are not even able to garner the witnesses before the committee to draw out those issues, so inevitably we are going to end up with untested or unscrutinised legislation. That is not good enough in a modern democracy like Australia and I think that it does constitute a form of abuse.

The concept of an access card has been around for quite some time. Because of the amount of community debate that has already been had on this issue, one would have expected that quite a lengthy inquiry was indeed warranted. If this issue is as profound and as important and as groundbreaking an issue as the minister claims—and I heard him yesterday say that it is a substantial renewal of this type of identity mechanism—then why would the government be hiding it? Why wouldn’t they want the utmost scrutiny of this bill? Why wouldn’t they want to test it with all of the constituencies and stakeholders that have an opinion about it? Why wouldn’t they want it tested in this forum both with the cross bench and, particularly, the Labor opposition that has been exploring these issues and participating in the public debate about the access card for some time?

It runs against the rhetoric that we have heard from the minister in this place and, again, just points to a form of abuse by the Howard government of the Senate committee system. Like my colleagues, I certainly urge the government to support our amendments and not to be pigheaded about this, to understand that it is about appropriate processes and scrutiny of these bills. I urge them not only to support these amendments but to allow a suitable date for reporting that will permit the committee to organise a series of decent and reasonable hearings so that all witnesses and stakeholders who want to appear have the opportunity.