Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

Being told to grow up by Senator Rennick is one of the highlights of my career, I reckon! Look, I think that whatever people's views are on the BRI—and I've made my views clear—if we're serious about safeguarding Australia's sovereignty in the context of the sort of strategic and geopolitical environment that Australia is in, then there actually has to be a degree of unity and a degree of working together. My criticism of the federal government is that they have chosen to play this through the media for political purposes rather than actually trying to resolve it. As I said, at the same time they refuse to release their own secret BRI deals—and it's a pity Senator Rennick wasn't here to hear that—which Mr Ciobo entered into. The minister can exercise powers under this regime to cancel an arrangement without the need to provide reasons, without any notice and without the capacity for review, and people wouldn't even know what factors the minister took into account; only the minister would know that. So we've taken a responsible approach in drafting the amendments to ensure that the government's concerns are dealt with, including the need for sensitivity in publishing details of Australia's foreign policy.

I say to the government, if you want to deliver on what Mr Morrison promised in announcing this regime—transparency, leadership and alignment—you would accept these arrangements. The statement of reasons that we have drafted would include, whether, if in making the decisions, the minister is satisfied or not satisfied of a foreign relations matter or had ceased to be satisfied of a foreign relations matter, an explanation for the basis on which the minister reached that position and, in particular, foreign relations, foreign policy or other considerations involved and an explanation of how matters have been taken into account.

The minister raised earlier, as a justification for non-inclusion of national security sensitivities, I again make this point, that in recognition of national security sensitivities, this amendment does not—I repeat does not—require information to be included in a statement of reasons if disclosure of that information is, or is likely to be, protected by public interest immunity of which obviously national security grounds aren't a ground. The opposition has provided that the threshold for withholding information on the basis of a PII, public interest immunity, claim is that the minister believes on reasonable grounds that the information is subject to public interest immunity. I outline that because that is a very substantial protection of national security or other information that a minister reasonably believes should be excluded on the basis of public interest immunity.

The minister has said a number of times that she has put judicial review into the legislation. I make this point: judicial review of ministerial decisions has limited utility without a requirement for a minister to provide reasons for decision. It also limits the ability of Australian entities to comply with the legislation. These amendments establish a right of review of decisions under the act by the AAT. They require the minister to provide reasons to affected entities and for entities to have the capacity to appeal them. They insert a new clause in the bill, itemising decisions that would be reviewable. We have specified that the review function should be conferred on the security division of the AAT so that the procedural requirements for classified evidence apply. For the purposes of this clause, a foreign relations matter means a matter that relates to whether or not a particular action would or would not adversely affect, or would be likely or unlikely to adversely affect, Australian foreign relations, or be inconsistent with Australian foreign policy amongst other things, to summarise.

The minister has not been interested in engaging on this. These are very sensible amendments. It is a very substantial power. The Labor Party doesn't believe the minister should have this kind of untrammelled power to veto agreements that sovereign state governments and territory governments have entered into without at least providing reasons for the decisions and having some capacity to be accountable for them.