Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Road Safety) Share this | Hansard source

I'll make this my last one. Minister Cash, I come back to this: drugs are flooding into this nation on ships or via shipping. What I've just said clearly and passed on to you and everyone listening is that the majority of this rubbish is sitting in containers. It may be in foreign languages. It may have a waybill that lies. It may be smuggled in tomato cans or it may be smuggled in car parts; I don't know. We're making it tougher and tougher for Australian waterside workers—wharfies, stevedores or anyone else that goes on a port—to get their MSIC, but we're not lifting one finger to make it any more rigid or harder for the captains and the crews who are bringing these ships in or to benefit our ability to know about them. There's nothing that's going to happen on the port. The containers will still be going out not scanned, and it goes to another part of the drug syndicates.

How does this bill tap that? How does this bill appease the Australian people, who are saying: 'You know what? The Morrison government's not all announcement and no follow-up; they're actually doing something'? How does this bill appease the majority of decent, hardworking men and women in this nation who hate illicit drugs? How can you con them into thinking, 'We're going to make it harder for an Aussie to get an MSIC, but we're not going to do anything to make it easier to know who is coming to our nation, and while they're here they can exploit the temporary voyage permit and cart between Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Perth; they can do three runs, and if they do more than three runs, we'll make sure they pay Aussie wages, but we won't police it'? And, by the way, they've taken off after three. We're absolutely crucifying our rail industry because of this exploitation of the temporary voyage permits and maritime crew visas. Please tell Mr and Mrs Citizen how this bill will make them feel a lot safer with illicit drugs coming out of wherever they're coming from, going to warehouses and other points and being unloaded by crooks. How is this bill going to stop that?