Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I move opposition amendments (1) and (2) on sheet 2250 together:

(1) Schedule 1, Part 2, page 7 (line 1) to page 9 (line 10), to be opposed.

(2) Schedule 1, item 20, page 18 (lines 17 to 30), omit subsections 210(5) and (6).

The reason the opposition is moving these amendments is to give the government the opportunity to have a rethink about a particularly extraordinary decision that they have made in relation to allowing people who have been charged with serious crimes to get expedited access to this scheme.

It's quite extraordinary that the government would seek to classify various serious offences into different categories. Basically, the government is saying that some crimes that are serious are not worthy of consideration, whereas other crimes are. That means, as we're standing here today, the government is saying to Australia that those who have committed crimes that would be eligible for this expedited process to access the Redress Scheme without having to go through the current special assessment process are crimes like extortion, distribution of child abuse material, possession and accessing of child abuse material, kidnapping, robbery, burglary, home invasion, car-jacking and the aggravation of those above crimes. The National Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse Amendment Bill 2023 shows Labor is soft on crime. It shows their leniency on crime, benefiting individuals who have got serious criminal offences and convictions by offering them a fast-tracked approach to this scheme.

Under the government's legislation that's before us today, those who have received a custodial sentence of five years or more would be eligible to apply for redress without having to go through the current special assessment process—a process that was put in place when the scheme was established in the first place with very good reason. Under Labor's scheme, only those people who are sentenced to five years imprisonment or more for offences such as unlawful killing, sexual offences or terrorism would actually be required to go through the special assessment process. So the government's bill also allows those in jail to apply for redress without having to go through this particular provision. The coalition believes that the current process, which requires a special assessment process, is absolutely appropriate, and these current arrangements actually maintain the integrity and the public confidence in this scheme.

I think it is quite galling that there are people who will be serving custodial sentences for crimes on the list that I just read out a minute ago who will necessarily be given preferential treatment over others on a first-in basis. I'm quite shocked that the minister and the government don't agree that crimes such as unlawful killings, sexual offences, and terrorism are somehow not as equally serious in terms of things like distributing child abuse material, extortion, kidnap or robbery. We're talking about a group of very, very serious crimes. To be jailed for five years or more for one of these offences—we're talking about some pretty egregious conduct. These are evil, evil crimes, and we've got the Labor Party here saying, 'Let's open up the scheme to these people unfettered,' and, in the process, slow down the application for everybody else.

When you consider that one of the key criticisms of survivors is timely access to justice, we are putting in place with this legislation a sort of slowdown provision to enable people who have been convicted of some pretty serious crimes—I don't think anybody in this place or, I certainly hope, the government wouldn't think that some of the crimes that I have outlined are not very, very serious crimes—to get an expedited process. When some of the most serious criticisms of the scheme to date have been timely access to justice, compensation and restorative measures, it seems quite extraordinary that the government is continuing to go down this path.

The amendment that has been put forward by the opposition gives the government the opportunity to reconsider this, because we believe that it would reflect the integrity and the public confidence in the scheme and, at the same time, actually address one of the key criticisms of survivors. So I move the amendment in the opposition's name.