Alan Eggleston (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

While it may not be embodied in a bill of rights, freedom of speech is the foundation upon which the many liberties we enjoy in this country are based. Freedom of association, freedom of religion and freedom of speech are all the hallmarks of a true democracy. Sadly, as I have said, freedom of speech is the very ideal this piece of legislation seeks to inhibit by threatening to impose a mechanism for government control of content on the historically free Australian media.

We can all cite examples of countries where freedom of the press and, therefore, freedom of speech is not afforded. We generally associate such societies with at least some degree of oppression where the state has undue influence and unfairly impedes the lives of its citizens. In this regard I read with interest the front-page article in the Weekend Australian last weekend. It quoted journalist Joseph Fernandez, who was the editor in chief of Malaysia's Daily Express for 14 years until 1992. Alarmingly, Mr Fernandez said that a reading of this legislation had him recalling his days as a journalist in Malaysia, where he lived under the threat of arrest and newspapers had to apply annually to have their licences renewed. Now the head of journalism at Curtin University, Mr Fernandez was quite clear in his views of these proposals, saying:

This legislation represents a raft of regulations with very serious consequences for the free exchange of ideas …

He added that parts of the legislation:

… potentially limit basic human rights to freedom of expression.

It is interesting to reflect on the fact that Australia is the only one of the five old Commonwealth countries which does not have some sort of formal legislated protection of basic freedoms including freedom of expression. The UK has the protection of the European Convention on Human Rights and the US has constitutional protection of freedom of expression, which in Canada and New Zealand is protected by a charter of rights. So, when we are faced with an attack on freedom of speech by an elected government in the form of legislation such as that which we are considering now, one has to wonder whether or not this legislation would even be up for discussion if Australia and the media had some sort of legal protection of freedom of speech, because this legislation would have run foul of that legal protection long ago.

The Gillard government has been threatening retaliation against its critics in the media for several years now. One has the feeling that perhaps this legislation might be renamed the 'News control legislation'—with a little bit of a reference to News Ltd, whose views on the Gillard government are perhaps not appreciated by the government but which are the views of cold, realistic analysis of the programs this government has sought to implement and the failure of its many policies.

In conclusion, any attempt to further regulate or circumscribe the media must be viewed with the greatest of suspicion. To paraphrase Seven West Media owner Kerry Stokes, we are sending free speech to the vet to be castrated. This legislation must be defeated or withdrawn in the interests of protecting the freedom of the press in Australia.