Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for the Environment) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Madam Acting Deputy President. I will return to the legislation. If I were going to undertake a critique of Senator Farrell's political history, I would have mentioned Mr Rudd, Ms Gillard and many other factors in Senator Farrell's political history. But I shall refrain from doing so.

However, I do want to come back to the fact that this is very important legislation. And when we have important legislation it is even more important that we get it right. That is what this government is committed to doing. I am happy, as other speakers have been, to have a look at some of the issues and particular concerns in this legislation as to why it is not proceeding at present and why it is that we are bringing a new package of legislation into this chamber. For example, as my colleague Senator Fawcett highlighted during earlier debates, recommendation 24 of the Hawke review stated:

The Defence Minister should have discretion to suspend all non-Defence access to the WPA—

Woomera prohibited area—

when there is an urgent national Defence requirement.

That flows on through, as he said, to the information paper, which, at paragraph 49, said:

In addition to suspension due to the accumulation of demerit points—

that is, if other parties have done the wrong thing—

it is proposed that the Minister for Defence would have the discretion to suspend all non-Defence access to the WPA—

Woomera prohibited area—

for the defence of Australia.

However, various economic stakeholders—people who, you would hope, would take advantage of this legislation—have questioned exactly what the definitional terms are of 'for the defence of Australia'. They have questioned what the compensation opportunities are under the legislation, should there be a suspension of their economic activities within the Woomera prohibited area. A range of unanswered questions exist in this legislation because it was so shoddily done by the previous government. They just did not go through it, dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s and do the job the right way.

We are doing that. Senator Johnston will shortly bring this legislation to the Senate—I am assured, very soon—and we will make it happen. What is more, we will make the economic climate right so that this legislation can and will be of benefit and so that we genuinely do see economic activity and development in the Woomera prohibited area for the benefit of South Australia into the future.