Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

At one level this is a very simple proposition that seeks to refer to the economics committee a proposal on how we can improve the scientific advice to this parliament. So I was somewhat surprised when I was advised that the government is going to vote against this proposition. I was surprised because I have represented the Labor Party on scientific matters for many, many years, and it's a matter of deep concern to me that we have not had an adequate level of investment and understanding of the importance of scientific advice to this parliament. As a consequence I've long held the view that the British model—followed by the American model, in terms of their advice to their Congress—is a model that we could adopt in this country. As a consequence we did look at this issue in the Senate inquiry into nationhood, national identity and democracy. That committee 'recommended that the Australian Government establish a Parliamentary Office of Science, modelled on the United Kingdom Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, to provide independent, impartial scientific advice, evidence and data to the Parliament, and all members and senators'. It was recommendation 14, and I chaired that inquiry. It was a recommendation that was bipartisan. So I'm particularly concerned that the government now finds this proposition dangerous, that it says that there's adequate advice and we don't need to have this reference. Somehow or other, this has suddenly become a contentious issue.

If members and senators are going to debate and pass laws that govern Australians, they do need access to reliable and impartial information. They don't need to have ideologically loaded information. I acknowledge there will be differences of opinion about the nature of that information, but they do need access to the very best information. You simply can't rely upon the department to provide that on their own. It's possible that even fine organisations like our scientific agencies are able to present information which is contestable. We hear, on a regular basis, 'It is contestable.' I take the view that it is important that the institutions and processes of parliamentary democracy would not be possible without that debate or access. The proposed science office would in fact enhance democracy in this country. It would enhance our understanding of how this country is actually faring and of the fact, for instance, that the IPCC report has highlighted the challenges this country faces. The arguments about how we deal with those challenges are inherent in the political process. We don't have to agree about the mechanism by which we address those challenges, but we do have to address those challenges, and the pursuit of that advice through proper scientific analysis is critical to that solution.

What we've got is an example of the government opposing this motion because inherent within this government is a fundamental hostility to scientific inquiry. A war on science has been the hallmark of this government throughout its life.

We are now debating whether or not an office would be useful and whether or not creating such an office would enhance our work as members of parliament. That's an extraordinary proposition. The debate is about whether or not it would enable us to better serve the people of this country, who actually pay our wages, who, of course, we are supposed to serve and who look to us to provide advice. What's the argument about the establishment of a parliamentary office of science? They say there's sufficient advice already available through the Office of the Chief Scientist and other advisory bodies to the government. No-one's disputing the fact that we do have quality advice available, but is anyone realistically going to say that that's adequate? Is anyone realistically going to be able to argue a case that it's sufficient? Is anyone really going to be able to maintain a proposition that it's appropriate and that we have enough advice in terms of the way in which the challenges facing this country are being addressed?

There's already an available model for the provision of independent advice: the Parliamentary Budget Office. Is anyone going to say suddenly that the Treasury is being usurped because there's an independent Parliamentary Budget Office? Does anyone suggest that the authority of the Treasury is now so fundamentally challenged that we can't function? It's a complete nonsense. Public servants in the Treasury department and the Department of Finance do provide advice to the government of the day, but there needs to be an independent source of advice to the parliament. That's why a proposition such as this provides us with a vehicle to ensure that that can happen. It's important that the parliament has its own source of advice on fiscal questions. We've accepted that, but we don't accept it in regard to scientific questions.

The parliamentary office of science would be able to provide that same level of advice that the Parliamentary Budget Office does. It would provide the information we need to be able to do our jobs properly as members of parliament. It's about our job to hold governments to account and, above all, to serve the people who send us here. That's what I find quite extraordinary.

It's not the first time that we've heard this argument from the government: 'Just trust us.' By taking that attitude, the government is really saying: 'We want to maintain control. We want to maintain access. We want to be able to provide that vital resource, the information that allows us to tell you what's good for you.' Well, that's not satisfactory. That's no way to exercise parliamentary accountability. What we have to have is access to independent, reliable information on matters that require scientific expertise.

The message running throughout the recommendations in the nationhood inquiry was that we build trust within the public, within the nation, if we can provide the proper levels of communication about these questions and if we can debate these questions on the basis of sound knowledge, not just prejudice. If this parliament is to do its job properly, we have to restore public confidence in the work we undertake. It's a fundamental principle of the way in which democracy ought to function.

The lesson of the pandemic is that the public is wide open to the proposition that you can trust scientific advice, but it needs to be presented properly. It needs to be presented on the basis that it is contestable. There's no magic formula; there are no Ten Commandments. There has to be a debate about these things based on sound advice. That's the way citizens respond positively to medical emergencies and fundamental questions of public health. Unfortunately, ill-informed comments have all too often been heard throughout our political system.

Former Chief Scientist Professor Ian Chubb proposed that the Australian government set up a formal relationship between parliament and the scientific community. The formal relationship would define what it means to provide scientific advice to the parliament and the government. That relationship does exist within the United Kingdom, where the parliament has signed an agreement setting out the roles and responsibilities of the two parties. I have advanced before the proposition of a charter between the parliament and the scientific community. Professor Chubb argued the case that we need to have an agreement that includes such things as scientists having an obligation to provide free, frank advice that is as good as they could possibly offer, given the advice that was available to them in their own expertise and their own work, and, on the other side, the parliament having a commitment to make that advice public.

This process of course led to the creation of POST, the UK Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, which the nationhood inquiry, as I've indicated, recommended as a model for this country. POST works well because both houses of the UK parliament are involved and describe the job as 'helping to bridge the gap between research and policy by providing parliamentarians with up-to-date research evidence and expertise to inform legislation and scrutiny'. This gets captured by scientists. POST—and I've read its material for many years—is balanced, is actually in plain English and acknowledges the importance of social considerations as well as the purely scientific. It has proved its worth.

It has existed since 1989. It was established under the Thatcher government—that great radical Margaret Thatcher. For this reactionary mob here it's far too dangerous to be able to undertake something like that. No-one in the United Kingdom argued that somehow or other it usurped the role of the government's own advisers. POST is jointly funded by the houses of parliament in the United Kingdom. It's overseen by a board made up of 10 members of the House of Commons and four members of the House of Lords. They are chosen on the basis that they reflect the balance of the parties in the parliament. Researchers are chosen by learned academies, representing the breadth of scientific disciplines, and representatives of the research and information committees of the parliament.

There's no reason why a similar model couldn't apply here. This reference would provide us with a vehicle to check all of those things out. We should be conscious of how damage has been done in terms of democracies with uninformed opinion and the breakdown of trust in public institutions. The establishment of a formal relationship between a nation's scientists and the parliament is important to restore trust and is important to re-establish confidence in the parliamentary system itself. It would also work to overcome the toxic effect of the scurrilous attacks on science and scientists—attacks promoted by members of this parliament, who should know better. Of course they've done it for very partisan reasons. They think there's a vote in it. They think that building on prejudice and building upon popular reactionary nationalist emotions is going to somehow or other produce a political dividend for them.

We've heard various elements suggest that this is somehow or other about defending Western civilisation. Strangely, these are the same people who don't usually have any science in mind when they talk about Western civilisation being under threat. Modern science is one of the finest achievements of Western civilisation. It is the flowering of the enlightenment values of organised rational inquiry—inquiry into the nature of the world around us and inquiry into humanity's place in the world. Science has transformed life for the better for people all over the world, yet in our time we have come to witness attacks on science by people who want to spread mistrust. This is a time of anxiety. People are inciting fear about the consequences of new developments in science and technology because of the impact of these developments on the future of work, because of concern about changes in the climate, because of the threat of the spread of disease and because of fears for our international strategic situation.

Since the government's election in 2013, it's allowed the fearmongers in its ranks to influence public policy to an extent way beyond their intellectual capacities. We've seen cuts to the public science agencies, we've seen the failure to fund our university research agencies and we've seen a war on science which has undermined our capacity to deal with the really big problems facing our society. We simply can't turn our backs on the enlightenment. This is a big problem for this government. They have yet to come to terms with the enlightenment. We should be standing with science and we should take advice from the scientific community. We should defend those who elect us, rebuild public confidence and rebuild confidence in parliamentary democracies by ensuring that people understand that we are acting for the future of humanity and we should be trying to build hope rather than extinguishing it. By investing in science, by demonstrating our trust in science, we are in fact strengthening democracy. Democracy only thrives when we have a respect for the truth. (Time expired)