Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I welcome the Greens' support for this measure, although I will make one comment on Senator Whish-Wilson's contribution. I know numbers are not the Greens strong suit, and they might not have noticed, but before the election the coalition—the Liberal and National parties—did not have the numbers. We did not have the numbers either here in the Senate or in the other place. As well-intentioned as I am sure Senator Whish-Wilson's private senator's bill was, at the time, and I was not a member of the Senate then so I cannot recall it, it would not have been able to be implemented by the government at the time. The only way we could have got to the place we are today, to do something like this, was for the Liberal and National parties to be elected at the last election, which fortunately we were. We were elected on a platform to introduce an ombudsman, and it is with great pleasure that I rise today to share my support for this initiative and welcome the fact that the government has brought it forward as an important way to help small businesses receive appropriate access to justice and redress through our competition system.

To start my comments today, I want to go back to when we did have an ombudsman. We actually had an ombudsman for some areas of our economy that will be impacted by this bill. A grocery ombudsman was established back in 2000, I believe. He was around for about five or six years. Last year I was fortunate enough to meet Mr Robert Gaussen, who was the Produce and Grocery Industry Ombudsman at the time. He also subsequently came and provided evidence to the economics committee about his work and what the effect of it was. I thought he gave very compelling evidence. He gave very compelling evidence to show why an ombudsman is an important tool in the competition workshop and an important way of providing a low-cost means for small businesses to access justice and bring matters to a head. At the time, Mr Gaussen told the Senate Standing Committee on Economics:

...any code of conduct that has no adequate enforcement regime will not be a successful code of conduct. The words that appear in this code—

which is the grocery code—

are good words. The content and intention of what is being described in this code are great, and they are needed and are long overdue. But there is no obligation on anyone to do anything, even if they sign up to it, because of the system under which there is no enforcement.

Mr Gaussen goes on to say:

The average cost for the ACCC to investigate, inquire into and manage disputes is massive, so there is no way in the world that they can provide, through their systems and the laws under which they have to operate, an effective enforcement regime. They are not resourced to do that. An ombudsman service, with referral capacity to the ACCC, provides that filter and at a much reduced price—and quickly. The key to disputes is speed.

I think that is a very important point. To resolve disputes—whether with my wife or with your contracting business—the key is speed. When I have a fight with my wife I try to resolve it as quickly as possible, because if you let matters fester that is when people start—