Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you. I'd just like to draw the committee's attention to the fact that I have circulated a new amendment on sheet 8432. This is a tweaked version of the amendments that were previously circulated on sheet 8373. The amendment goes to the fact that we are extremely concerned that the government has just made a blind and ideological attack on news agencies that don't fit their political agenda. We know that this government, particular members of its frontbench and particular members of its backbench don't like media organisations like The Guardian, BuzzFeed or, let's face it, all the ABC or SBS. This government has a problem within its ranks—thinking that just because it's in government it should be able to pick and choose which journalists and which media outlets it supports, based on whether these agencies give it a good run or not, based on whether they ask tough questions or not and based on whether they're just prepared to swallow the government spin day in, day out.

I concur with many of the things raised by Senator O'Neill in relation to how this bill was constructed and put together as part of a pretty shabby deal with former Senator Nick Xenophon and the Centre Alliance team. It's the whole reason we're even discussing this piece of legislation. The legislation itself is just one of these ridiculous, slap-it-together, 'She'll be right, mate' kinds of legislation that's come out of a deal negotiated by former Senator Nick Xenophon. Despite all of the hoo-ha, he's never been a really good negotiator, has he?

He spends a lot of time putting himself in the kingmaker position. But, when it comes to the crunch, what does he actually ever get? It ends up being pieces of legislation, or amendments, with unintended consequences or, indeed, not much more than a handshake and a promised word. At the end of the day, that is a bit disappointing when he is not even here now to have responsibility for it and be accountable.

The whole point of this package was to support small and regional publishers and help them to continue to have a role and to do a good job in underpinning public interest journalism in Australia. We have one of the most highly concentrated media markets in the world. Here we have a bill that is meant to do something to help support those smaller players, but it is just so ideologically bound and blinded by this government. The amendments on sheet 8432 that I have had circulated—