Jacinta Collins (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Hansard source

Senator Wong commenced the second reading debate for the opposition on the Human Rights Legislation Amendment Bill 2017, highlighted the status of our concerns in this area and outlined our ongoing concerns with changes to section 18C that are represented in schedule 1 of the bill. When I was representing the shadow Attorney-General I spoke on this issue on several occasions in a former parliament. The Labor Party's position has not changed and I do not intend to occupy the Senate's time outlining those matters again—certainly several of my colleagues have gone into the detail of our concerns there—but I do want to spend a little time talking about our concerns in relation to schedule 2 of the bill, the amendments that are proposed there and the further amendments proposed by the government there.

We have serious concerns regarding these procedural amendments and also concerns with the process undertaken to address these matters. We have already had a debate in this chamber about the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee's inquiry and the limited time involved in addressing these matters. I will indeed rely on my colleagues who have outlined those concerns in the Senate committee report. Unfortunately, a result of those concerns leads us to where we are today. So here we are at 8.10 on Thursday night failing to understand what the rush is here, apart from the fact that the government have a caucus decision and they want to stem the tide of pain that they have had over this issue and the mismanagement of this issue now over many years.

It is very clear, as my colleagues have outlined, that there is no popular support for these changes. Polling suggests that 80 per cent of Australians are opposed to these changes. But that does not stop the ideological agenda, despite people's early thoughts about Malcolm Turnbull as a Prime Minister. It does not stop this government seeking to progress this issue.

The concern I think is best highlighted—and this is the process concern, the concern with the limited time involved—by two things in the matters before us. We have on this occasion Senator Brandis, perhaps because of the status attracting to the second reading speeches of government ministers, painting a picture quite accurately and quite clearly. It is a rare compliment from me to Senator Brandis. In his second reading speech he said:

The PJCHR's majority report made 22 recommendations; most concerned the Commission's complaints-handling processes. The Committee did not reach a concluded view on the appropriate wording of section 18C. Rather, it put forward a range of proposals that had the support of at least one committee member.

That is an accurate description of recommendation No. 3. Let me compare that to the majority report of the Senate committee that looked into that bill. It certainly puzzled me with my understanding of how these matters proceeded, but I did not participate in the Senate inquiry as I now no longer represent the shadow Attorney-General. Page 8 of the report claims:

Recommendation 3 of the PJCHR recommended the removal of 'offend, insult, humiliate' from section 18C of the RDA.

Even Senator Brandis concedes that that is not the case. So we have listened to hour upon hour of government senators contributing to the second reading debate and it seems from their own committee report that they do not understand what the PJCHR majority found. This is a quite concerning matter.

There was another concerning matter, but the Attorney-General has clarified this issue for me. At one stage it was suggested that the government would tonight have further government amendments to the ones circulated in relation to schedule 2. I now understand that not to be the case.

That now denies what I understand could have been a new award for the Attorney-General, which would have meant we would now have a 'supplementary, supplementary, supplementary explanatory memorandum'. This would have been because there are significant concerns from the opposition, from the Greens and from the crossbench; even with the further government amendments to schedule 2 there are concerns with things proceeding this way.

So why the rush—apart from, as I said, to stem the tide of pain for the coalition in relation to its ideological campaign around section 18C. Let me paint another element to this picture. Commissioner Triggs is due to conclude her term at the end of June this year. The committee has had a number of recommendations from the Human Rights Commission about concerns—and the opposition and, I think, others still have concerns about how well they are represented in the bill despite the government's further amendments. But if we are going to be changing the head of the Human Rights Commission, and if we want in the future to have an institution that can stand the test of time with confidence and with political support with a new government appointment, then why wouldn't you let these issues wait until we have determined a new head—especially given that the Human Rights Commission are still saying they have concerns with the committee inquiry in relation to how the government has addressed these procedural issues.

Going back to the PJCHR, we have consensus that procedural changes should occur. But now, in part from the Attorney-General's contribution in terms of how those recommendations have been progressed on behalf of the government, that consensus is fading and falling away. I have genuine concerns that if we are to have a Human Rights Commission that can attract public confidence, carry the test of time and address the issues that concern all of us, we need to maintain this consensus.

So why rush this issue through now? Why not take more time to carefully consider these procedural changes? I know that all parties in this chamber have accepted that there is some level of consensus that procedural changes should occur. So why not represent that in the amendments before the chamber? This is our concern now because the government amendments that are before us do not well represent that consensus. There are still also technical and other problems that need to be addressed in a better way than a discussion at 8.20 pm when we have not understood exactly what was going to be the situation before us and where there have been suggestions that there might even be further government amendments. Why not take the time to get this right?

I can indicate that, because of our well stated and long held concerns—clearly articulated by Labor senators in the debate again today and indeed foreshadowed by our amendments, the Greens amendments and the Nick Xenophon Team amendments to remove schedule 1 from the bill—we are adamantly opposed to the changes proposed to 18C. But because of our concerns in relation to schedule 2, we think this whole process has been compromised. For those reasons, we will be opposing the second reading of the bill. We believe the government should go away and get the schedule 2 issues right—take the time necessary, come back in May or indeed even later when we have a new head of the Human Rights Commission—and we should all work towards building a consensus and public support and confidence in a Human Rights Commission to move forward.

For those reasons, we will be opposing the second reading. We understand that that opposition may not gain sufficient support in the Senate. If that is the case, we will then be moving to further amendments to ensure that what goes forward, if anything, is at an appropriate standard rather than our preferred position that the government go away and take the time to try and get this right.