Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Hansard source

The Aviation Transport Security Amendment (2009 Measures No. 2) Bill 2009 deals with reforms to the air cargo sector. It proposes a series of amendments to the Aviation Transport Security Act 2004 that is aimed at improving the security of the air cargo supply chain. The bill will expand the definition of cargo to mean an article that is reasonably likely to be transported by aircraft and will also expand the definition of industry participants who can certify cargo to include regulated air cargo agents and accredited air cargo agents. The circumstances under which cargo can be certified by these groups or by aircraft operators will be prescribed under the regulations.

When thinking about exports, most Australians think of coal or iron ore exported through our sea ports. But many Australian exporters depend on the air cargo service to reach their overseas customers. There are other options for sending goods to overseas markets, but there is no quicker way to get exports to their destinations than by air. Many Australian businesses and their customers are prepared to pay a premium to ship goods by air. It is interesting to note that in the year 2007-08 international airfreight traffic totalled 780,000 tonnes. Both inbound and outbound international aircraft air freight have shown increases in recent years. Outbound international airfreight, that is Australia’s exports by air, totalled some 300,000 tonnes in the year ended 30 June 2008. Nearly 70,000 tonnes of this airfreight was carried by Qantas jets, but many other airlines were involved in the carriage of the airfreight. Singapore Airlines, Emirates, Cathay Pacific and Air New Zealand each carried over 20,000 tonnes of outbound air cargo. Over 40 per cent of outbound air cargo in 2008 was sent through Sydney Airport. The most common destinations for outbound air cargo sent from Australia were Singapore, Hong Kong and Auckland. In many of these cases Australian air cargo would have been forwarded on from these intermediate destinations to reach customers elsewhere around the globe. Clearly air cargo is an important part of domestic freight.

The coalition always supports any legislation or action that will improve the security of air travel, be it for freight or for passengers. Accordingly, we will be supporting this bill. The shadow minister for transport, the Hon Warren Truss, who is in the lower house, spoke on this bill when it was introduced and gave some details of the actual amendments and what they actually involve. The coalition, and indeed Australia, is fortunate in having someone with the expertise that Mr Truss has in dealing with transport matters. As senators will recall, Mr Truss was the Minister for Transport and Regional Services before the change of government and, in that role, made a magnificent contribution to the advancement of transport in all of its forms in Australia. He has taken a very close interest in the air transport industry and, indeed, in transport safety.

That brings me to another issue relating to air transport, and that is a notice of motion from the Special Minister of State that has been on the Notice Paper all week. No-one on our side of the parliament can quite understand what it means and what it is about. Indeed, Mr Truss and his office have had difficulty in finding out from the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, Mr Albanese, just what this notice of motion is about. We see on the Notice Paper that it is said to be a rescission of a resolution of the Senate disallowing the Aviation Transport Security Amendment Regulations.

Senators might well recall that last year the coalition, in conjunction with the Independents and, I think, the Greens—I am not quite sure about that—disallowed a regulation made by the minister which dealt with a number of things. In short, it put strict liability onto pilots if the door of the aircraft should be left open, as opposed to the company that owned and operated the aircraft being held liable. Quite rightly, the pilots were incensed by the strict liability being theirs when such an event might occur through absolutely no fault of their own. Safety requires that the pilots go into the cockpit, shut the door and then concentrate on flying the aircraft. But this regulation meant that even if someone else opened the aircraft door the pilots were strictly liable—that is, before the coalition and the Independents assured the disallowance of that regulation. Now, that was 5½ months ago. If the government want to reintroduce a regulation, they have to wait at least six months to do so and then it can be debated again. But for some strange reason that nobody can quite understand the government have, at the 5½-month mark, introduced this motion to rescind the regulation’s disallowance. If they waited until some time in March, our next sitting week—when we next come back after today—they could introduce that regulation again if they wanted to. However, as I said, for a reason that escapes any interested observer, this motion has been put before the Senate now.