Lyn Allison (Victoria, Australian Democrats) Share this | Hansard source

The Democrats also prefer our amendment to the Greens amendment, as might be expected. We might as well have the debate on both amendments and I will move mine later. It seems extraordinary to me that you can have an objective, which is the protection of public health and safety, and not be prepared to provide a definition of what that might mean. I can understand that you would wish to have maximum consultation, but presumably this bill had consultation and it must have been an oversight—surely you can assure us of that—that at the same time you did not consider defining that. I would also argue that you could put this definition into the bill and that it could be adjusted at some later stage should it be found to be totally inappropriate. However, I think the definition that we have put forward is a pretty straightforward one that few would find reason to argue against. I would be interested in the advice that you would take in this consultation you are having with New Zealand, even if you can indicate whether there are items on either Senator Siewert’s or the Democrats’ amendment which you would not want to pursue in such a consultation.

The problem with not having definitions is that that opens the way for interpretations, which might be at odds with what was intended. There could, for instance, be cases where the definition is interpreted as pertaining only to food safety and food borne illness. That would be a very limited view of public health and safety which would only address the short-term health impact of food regulation rather than the long-term impact on the health and nutrition of individuals and populations. I am sure there would be many other examples that one could give of how interpretations of a nondefinition might occur. It would be useful if you could advise us about what approach the government is going to take. Surely you have got some draft somewhere that you would take into such consultations. It is hard to believe that you would not have thought about this at all.