Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy) Share this | Hansard source

I indicate that the government rejects this amendment. The effect of the proposed amendment is to make a substantive amendment to the FOI Act: to change the application of the FOI Act to include the parliamentary departments. The application of the FOI Act to the parliamentary departments has been considered by Dr Hawke's FOI review. It is premature for the government to take action to amend the FOI Act before it has had an opportunity to consider and respond to recommendations in the review. The government understands that Dr Hawke has completed his review and is in the process of preparing a report on that review. The Attorney-General expects to receive Dr Hawke's report in coming weeks. In the meantime, the government has agreed to the request of the Presiding Officers to amend the Parliamentary Service Act as an interim measure to ensure that parliamentary departments are not exposed to requests they are not currently in a position to handle.

The bill as drafted takes into account the views expressed by the President of the Senate, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, the Department of the House of Representatives, the Department of the Senate, the Department of Parliamentary Services, the Joint Standing Committee on the Parliamentary Library, and the Parliamentary Library. Consequently, the government does not support the Greens amendment at this time. Once the government has received and has had an opportunity to consider a response to Dr Hawke's report, the government will make a fully considered decision on the application of the FOI Act to the parliamentary departments.