Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Abbott, yes, indeed. Madam Acting Deputy President, you are indeed right to correct me. Mr Abbott has placed on record his desire to repeal racial vilification laws in this country. Now there is a very clear limit on free speech in this country and it is indeed a just and right limit that Mr Abbott wants to withdraw. But when does the coalition say, 'Yes, we will put limits on free speech?' When do they do it? They do it when it suits them politically. They do it when they want to gag non-government organisations—when they want to gag criticism. They did it to the peak Youth Affairs Council under the Howard government. They gagged them and said: 'You cannot criticise the government. You cannot be the voice of young people in this country. You can advise and you can consult with us, but we will not let you be the independent voice of young people in this country.' They did that to so many non-government organisations in this country. So it is no surprise, I guess, that the Newman government is treading down the path of putting gag clauses in the contracts of organisations in Queensland.

So the Gillard government, very importantly, has looked to introducing legislation to ban gag clauses in federal government contracts with the not-for-profit sector. This is going to cause a really interesting conundrum in Queensland. I am not entirely across how this is going to be resolved, because the Queensland government is insisting that any organisation that has 50 per cent or more of its funding coming through the Queensland government will be gagged. But many organisations, as we know, have funding from both Commonwealth and state levels. They will have a combination of funding, so the Gillard government can uphold the right of these organisations to speak freely. Nevertheless, while we give them that right, I dare say they are going to be constrained anyway because they are still going to have to look to those gag clauses in Queensland because their incomes will depend on it. We are not necessarily going to be able to save them from this.

We do not believe, like the Liberals, in silencing those who advocate on behalf of the community and those most in need. Of all things to silence, when we talk about free speech in this country, it should not be the organisations that stand up for the most vulnerable and the most in need. Who are you, on the other side of this chamber, to lecture us on free speech when these dreadful gag clauses were promulgated by the Howard government and are now being promulgated in Queensland? They certainly also existed in Western Australia under the Court government. These are severe impingements on free speech in this nation.

I support the Gillard government's call on all the state premiers and territory chief ministers also to ban the use of gag clauses in their government contracts. Why would they need these gag clauses? They are simply for political purposes, because they want to silence organisations from criticising their savage cuts to health and education. They simply want to silence those who want to speak out. These are draconian measures that Queensland has put in place, and it is right that the Gillard government should want to respond and protect these organisations; to protect their right to freely express their views, to protect their right to stand up for vulnerable Australians who need a fair go.

Unfortunately, though, I really think that gag clauses are a fundamental part of Liberal Party DNA. So much for free speech. They do not respect the independent voices of people in Australia's not-for-profit sector. They have proven that over and over and over again, government by government around the country that have put these clauses in. We see them in Queensland. I have seen them in WA and we saw them under the Howard government. There were wide uses of these gag clauses by John Howard. I have every expectation—despite all the protests over on the other side of the chamber about free speech—that you would reintroduce those in the future should you ever be given the chance to rule this country again. It would be a crying shame to see those voices silenced. That is why we will fight tooth and nail to stop you from doing that. Gag clauses silence those who most need to be heard.

Senator Ian Macdonald interjecting—

So I am very, very happy that the Gillard government has introduced a bill to prevent the application of gag clauses. If those opposite want to introduce gag clauses again and make not-for-profit organisations vulnerable to those gag clauses then you will have to repeal that legislation. You will have to justify your desire to gag organisations that disagree with you, to gag organisations that stand up for the vulnerable and for the needy.

Senator Ian Macdonald interjecting—

I wish I could gag you from interjecting on this, Senator Macdonald. I want the prevention of gag clauses enshrined in law, so that those opposite, if they ever want to undo this, will have to stand up in here and justify themselves. I would like to see you try, but I have every expectation that you will.

I am dismayed that the Queensland Minister for Health defended the idea of a gag clause, saying the tighter grant rules are about 'stopping abuses that occurred under the previous Labor government'. That is a nonsensical statement. These are some of the things that are included in the gag contracts:

The Organisation must also not include links on their website to other organisations' websites that advocate for State or Federal legislative change.

That is what a copy of one of the agreements stated.

Queensland Health have a really proud history of funding organisations proactively to advocate on public health measures. It is their job to advocate. It should be in their DNA to advocate. We rely on these organisations to create community and cultural change over time, to drive change in our community, so that we in parliament can listen and respond to the things that need to be changed. Yes, sometimes it is hard to be criticised; sometimes we do not like it. But that is how change happens in this country. That is how good emerges. It is how we amend and change our laws to advocate for better things in the future. Imagine these kinds of gag clauses on a state disability service. What would that actually mean? What would that mean when it comes to something like advocating for the NDIS or for better results for people with disability? I do not think the coalition have any respect for freedom of speech in this country; otherwise they could not possibly entertain the idea of gagging organisations like this.

The Newman government has argued it wants to fund outcomes and not advocacy. I am here to tell you outcomes and advocacy are intrinsically linked. You do not get the outcomes without public debate, public engagement and public understanding of the issues that are being discussed. You can raise awareness about issues and advocate along those lines. With raising awareness comes the need to be critical, the need to criticise and the need to sometimes object. The importance of advocacy cannot be understated.

It is the groups on the front line delivering these services who most often know what changes need to be made in our public policy or in legislation. The idea of gagging these organisations is a complete corruption of free speech in this country. We want to partner with not-for-profit organisations to develop policy reforms and this means we need critical public debate in this country. It means that the government needs to vocalise its views and the not-for-profit sector also needs to vocalise its views, and we may not always agree. The Howard government gagged non-government organisations for many, many years. They were very dark, dark days under the last coalition government when Mr John Howard attacked the legitimate right of the not-for-profit sector to represent and advocate for its members and for vulnerable people. When those opposite try to lecture us on this side of the chamber about free speech, it is really very rich.

But let us look to some of the other things that are shocking about the coalition's position on free speech in this country. Let us take, for example, the shadow communications minister. Yesterday, on his Facebook page, he was found to be encouraging Senator Conroy to sue News Ltd for defamation. He also used a defamation writ to stop the Sydney Morning Herald reporting allegations about an ex-girlfriend's cat. Talk about taking your opposition to free speech a little far! I do not want to be lectured on free speech by all of those opposite. The shadow communications minister even used a defamation writ to stop his political opponents questioning whether he was fit for public office. The shadow communications minister has a deep desire to limit free speech when it is critical of him. It is utter hypocrisy for the coalition to be expressing these views.

Freedom of speech in this country is something that I think will be well served by greater diversity laws in the media. These laws are currently vulnerable. They currently do not go far enough. They need strengthening. Indeed, a public interest test is an important addition to media regulation in this country. Diversity in media is in fact an important principle in the promotion of free speech. It is consistent and an enhancement of free speech, but it is not surprising to me that vested interests in this space might seek to speak up against it and it is not surprising to me that those opposite should be captured by those vested interests.

We know that the Howard government watered down cross-media laws in the country. We also know that today there are economic pressures on a great many media outlets—economic pressures that are seeing some smaller outlets quite vulnerable to being gobbled up by larger entities. The idea that we should seek to strive for some balance in an environment like that and the idea that you could argue that that was a threat to free speech to me seems quite ridiculous and it seems to me to simply be an illustration of those opposite being captured by vested interests.

This government want to stand up for free speech. I will give you a very clear example of that—that is, our commitment to journalist shield laws. This is a very important provision. Just this week in parliament we have seen an inquiry into allegations of a breach of parliamentary privilege in relation to a committee report. We know the importance of shield laws and what protection a journalist may or may not have. I am not going to get into an in-depth debate about whether privilege was or was not breached in this circumstance because I do not have a view about it, but what this illustrates is that the desire for journalists to protect their sources is a very live issue.

Under Labor, journalist shield laws were introduced to protect journalists and the confidentiality of their sources. We decided to introduce shield laws because we were motivated by what I think was disgraceful conduct by the Howard government towards News Ltd journalists. They were Michael Harvey and Gerard McManus. Those journalists faced contempt of court proceedings when they did not reveal the identity of whistleblowers that sought to expose the gross maladministration of veterans' entitlements by the Howard government. There you go—an example of those opposite clearly abrogating a responsibility towards free speech in this country. And why were they trying to avoid free speech? Why were they trying to oppress the rights of these journalists to protect a whistleblower? Because it was in their narrow sectional political interests to do so. We get nothing but hypocrisy from the coalition on this question of free speech. Indeed, even Malcolm Turnbull has been using—