Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Hansard source

I move One Nation amendment (1) on sheet 1216 revised:

(1) Schedule 1, page 3 (after line 12), after item 3, insert:

3A At the end of Subdivision 19-G

Add:

19-120 Provider's enterprise agreement to uphold freedom of speech and academic freedom

A higher education provider that is a *Table A provider or a *Table B provider must take reasonable steps to ensure that:

(a) any enterprise agreement under which academic staff of the higher education provider are employed includes provisions to uphold the freedom of speech and academic freedom of the provider's academic staff, consistent with the provider's policy under section 19-115; and

(b) no other provisions of such an enterprise agreement, or other policies or codes of conduct of the higher education provider, restrict or burden those freedoms of the provider's academic staff otherwise than in accordance with the provider's policy under section 19-115.

I acknowledge that universities are required to enshrine in their policy statement clear messages around freedom of speech and academic freedom. While we can't intrude upon the enterprise agreements between universities and their employees, the amendment I put forward today requests that higher education providers take reasonable steps to ensure that enterprise agreements include provisions to uphold freedom of speech and academic freedom. This commitment to academic freedom needs, wherever possible, to move beyond the policy statement that sits on the shelf gathering dust into the enterprise agreements, where it drives behaviour, since that is where cultural change will be brought about. It is not just policies but actions and behaviours that need to be changed.