Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I move opposition amendments (1) and (2) on sheet 5239:

(1)    Schedule 1, item 2, page 3 (line 17), before “the Tribunal”, insert “if the applicant consents,”.

(2)    Schedule 1, item 18, page 6 (line 5), before “the Tribunal”, insert “if the applicant consents,”.

I have already spoken in part on these amendments. The bill seeks to ameliorate the anomaly caused by the High Court and Federal Court decisions that have imposed a rigid requirement. That is what we are debating today. There is an overly onerous administrative burden on the MRT and RRT in order to satisfy statutory due process requirements and hence the bill confers a discretion on the tribunals to the effect that they can only orally communicate the particulars of any information that would be the reason, or part of the reason, for affirming the decision under review and invite the applicant to comment on the information. These amendments, which seek to give effect to the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee recommendation, recommend that sections 359AA and 424AA be amended so that the discretion to communicate orally can only be enlivened when the applicant has given permission.

It would be a far better position for the government to adopt. I understand that the government has, then, at least listened in part to the debate in respect of the Greens amendment and provided some undertakings. As I said, in the event that our amendments are unsuccessful, we will nevertheless support the bill because it does go to at least ameliorating the anomaly that has been thrown up.

Question negatived.

Bill agreed to.

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Bill—by leave—taken as a whole.