David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I won't respond to every one of those amendments but what I will say is the Greens' approach to this package of opposition amendments is that we don't support them because, by and large, they put in place a whole lot of trip wires for the commission's jurisdiction, which would allow empowered and wealthy individuals, and empowered and wealthy corporations, to bring a series of unmeritorious legal challenges which would ultimately delay the NACC's work by sometimes months or, as we've seen in Victoria, sometimes years through legal challenge after legal challenge.

We want ensure that the National Anti-Corruption Commission can get on and do its job and, if they were accepted, these amendments would prejudice the capacity of the NACC to do its work. We note as well that there are some other amendments here seeking to overtly rope in registered industrial officials by definition. We're firmly of the view that if any member of a union is exercising any federal power and acts in a potentially corrupt way then that conduct would already be the subject of review by the NACC. We don't see any merit in the proposed amendments being put forward. When I say that, I know the unions collectively are also perfectly comfortable with that position.

This bill will provide the appropriate level of accountability, and we won't be supporting these kinds of amendments that, I think, would by and large tie the commission down in endless legal challenges and prevent it from reviewing, amongst other things, what's happened in the last nine years in this place.