Mark Furner (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Geez, you're a knucklehead. The changes to clause 4 in this amendment indicate that wild rivers rangers jobs will be lost and the Australian govern­ment must somehow replace those jobs. This is a matter that I have never seen in any bill whatsoever; a situation where a state piece of legislation relies upon a federal piece of legislation to assume and pick up the loss of any jobs. In fact, in inquiry, the questions were asked: what are these jobs we are talking about; are they rangers' jobs; are they jobs of people involved in development in the cape? This issue and proposal was clearly a matter of confusion during the inquiry. So it is really difficult to know whether this clause was intended to confer an entitlement or not in regard to compensation of the loss of a job.

A number of other questions—which can­not be answered—were also raised by this clause: what kind of work is being promised? If you lose your employment as a ranger—if that is what the bill intends—what is the sort of work that is going to be applied in terms of the loss of that employment as a ranger? Where will the work be? Will rangers be employed in the cape? Will they be relocated to other parts of the state or somewhere else within the nation? These are the issues that have been raised and considered during the inquiry stage, in the legal and constitutional committee and also in the House of Repre­sentatives economics committee when it was before them.

Additionally, it is unclear what the pay and conditions would be, because currently employment is under Queensland statute and no doubt would be under a specific award. No-one is of a view or has an understanding of what their entitlements would be beyond that, given that they are currently employed under state legislation.

Additionally, it will be a question of who will be required to employ these people, because the bill implies or suggests that the federal government should pick up the employment or the protection of these employees, should the bill result in their un­employment. These are the issues associated with clause 4: the constitutional basis and the objective of the bill. The potential for that to lead to lengthy litigation under this bill is very real.

So, when it comes to this fallacy portrayed by those opposite of wanting to protect Indigenous rights, wanting to have some involvement in native title, I think people need to put it in the right context. We need to remind ourselves who opposed the Native Title Act, when a Labor government intro­duced it. It was those opposite who opposed that act, so it is not a case of them going round the cape indicating they are there representing Indigenous rights and wanting to be at the forefront of protection of their lands and their entitlements. I am sure Senator Heffernan would have been there and would remember that they opposed the Native Title Act, so do not come into this chamber saying that you are here to protect Indigenous rights for Queenslanders, let alone for Australians, because you were in opposition on that particular bill.