Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Aged Care) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I move amendments (1), (2) and (3) on sheet 7945 together:

(1) Clause 26, page 26 (line 16), omit "The Minister ", substitute "(1) The Minister ".

(2) Clause 26, page 26 (lines 16 and 17), omit "a person ", substitute "a permitted entity ".

(3) Clause 26, page 26 (after line 20), at the end of the clause, add:

(3) In this section: permitted entity means:

(a) a Department of the Commonwealth, a State or a Territory; or

(b) a body (whether incorporated or unincorporated) established for a public purpose by a law of the Commonwealth, a State or a Territory; or

(c) a person in the service or employment of a Department mentioned in paragraph (a) or a body mentioned in paragraph (b); or

(d) a person who holds or performs the duties of an office or position established by or under a law of the Commonwealth, a State or a Territory; or

(e) an entity (whether incorporated or unincorporated) established for a charitable purpose.

(4) This section has no effect to the extent (if any) to which its operation would result in the acquisition of property (within the meaning of paragraph 51(xxxi) of the Constitution) otherwise than on just terms (within the meaning of that paragraph).

These are critical amendments being proposed by Labor. The amendments will go to the heart of the government's action to hand this sensitive information to a for-profit operator.

As I have outlined, there are clearly concerns with the shambolic way the government has approached this important legislation—in particular, their rush to sign the contract with Telstra before the legislation was even seen by the parliament. This is unprecedented. The existing cancer-screening registers are managed by governments and not-for-profit organisations with expertise in managing the registers. For example, the Victorian psychology service operates Victorian and South Australian registers for the National Cervical Screening Program, and yet the government signed a $220 million contract with Telstra only four days before the election was called.

Let's be clear: Telstra is a for-profit company, whereas the intention of the register is to save lives. Telstra has never operated a register like this. In fact, the Senate inquiry heard that a for-profit corporation has never managed a cancer-screening register anywhere in the world.

As I have mentioned, the register will hold extremely sensitive information about our health: human papillomavirus vaccination status, screening test results and cancer diagnoses. Certainly, this is not information that most Australians would be comfortable disclosing to a telecommunications provider. There is a clear question for this parliament: do we think that outsourcing this private and sensitive health information to a for-profit company is a good step for the future of our health system?

As the Royal College of General Practitioners, which represents 33,000 GPs, said at the inquiry into the legislation:

RACGP would be far more comfortable with it being operated by a government, tertiary institution or a not-for-profit entity that has little interest in how the data in the registry might otherwise be used for pecuniary reasons.

So let's be clear: there is no question about the value of the register. Labor strongly supports the register and the improvements to the bowel and cervical cancer screening programs it will enable. But as we have heard time and time again during the inquiry there was a question about the government's decision to outsource operations to Telstra.

The government knows it is a substantial change. This is why they rushed into signing a contract but could not bring themselves to mention it in the parliamentary debate. They rushed to sign the contract before caretaker kicked in and before the legislation had been introduced to parliament. The repercussions are clear: it has been a bungle.

These amendments would restrict the operation of a register to a government agency or to a not-for-profit organisation. Our amendments would allow the register to be operated by one of the organisations that actually have experience and expertise in this area, like the Commonwealth Department of Human Services or the Victorian psychology service. I commend Labor's amendments to the Senate.