Jane Hume (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak to the Parliamentary Workplace Support Service Amendment (Independent Parliamentary Standards Commission) Bill 2024. The nuts and bolts of this bill will be traversed by others in their contributions, so I will use my time to discuss aspects of this legislation which I believe are important to us all.

Those in this chamber and those here in years to come, for whatever reason, may look back on this debate and ask, 'How did they get to there?' It was noted in the other place that this bill is not perfect. That's not unusual for any legislative solution to a human problem. Yet, unlike any other bill the chambers debate, this bill is less about our alignment or our party; it has significant implications for us all as individual parliamentarians. It's about how we as parliamentarians carry and conduct ourselves in our roles and go about the business of running the small businesses that are our offices. It's about our staff and our expectations of them. Indeed, it's about the standards of behaviour expected from everyone, from the Prime Minister right through to journalists, security guards, lobbyists and visitors.

Many workplaces have codes of conduct that are expected, and remedial action is taken or sanctions are available if they are breached. You can see there already where the conundrum begins in this unique workplace. The implications of this bill cut through to the core of the chamber to which we have each been elected to represent our constituents. Our privileged elected positions come with significant responsibilities, expectations and consequences. Equally, in the execution of certain duties, these positions are afforded protections that make our democracy work. Those protections are not new. In fact, they were first articulated in a bill of rights that was passed nearly 335 years ago. This parliament inherited the protections, privileges and immunities of previous parliaments. They have endured not because politicians think that they are above the law but because they are fundamental to our parliamentary democracy. That is something that we should seek to protect and uphold. But, while we may have inherited the protections and privileges, this parliament should not inherit the culture of another time. That is something which we are responsible for, that we have to confront and that we have to act to amend, and we all agree on that.

Our workplace should always seek to raise the bar and set the standard. This bill seeks to change the way that parliament adjudicates behaviour. The Set the standard report of the independent review into the parliamentary workplace known as the Jenkins review found that the culture in this place had failed many—staff, parliamentarians and the public. Everyone deserves to have a safe and respectful workplace. All parties, parliamentarians and staff, have a role in improving parliament's culture. We each have a role. It would serve us all well if, when we consider what role we each have in improving the culture of our workplace, our first instinct is to reflection and self-assessment rather than assuming the worst in others. That would be a great step forward.

Since the Jenkins review and before it, the coalition has sought reform through practical and implementable change that respects the institutions of parliament. It's why we implemented the recommendations of the Foster review including creating the first iteration of the Parliamentary Workplace Support Service in 2021. It's why the former government accepted the Jenkins review and committed to working towards all 28 recommendations. There have been concrete changes: new training and education programs and a confidential 24-hour support service. Indeed, it was the coalition that first established the parliamentary independent complaints mechanism under the first iteration of the Parliamentary Workplace Support Service. This bill, which addresses recommendation 22 of the Jenkins review, will further formalise and enhance that mechanism by placing it in the statutory Parliamentary Workplace Support Service. It's worth noting that it was the Foster review's independent complaints mechanism that first had the power to hold parliamentarians as employers accountable for their actions, and it introduced the concept of referring parliamentarians to the relevant privileges committees if they failed to implement the recommendations of workplace reviews.

This bill represents the culmination of a significant amount of work both in the passage of other legislation and consultation around this building. It will establish a new statutory body that will review and consider the conduct in our workplaces, including that of parliamentarians. This is transformative to the extent that this bill provides legislative powers to non-parliamentarians to investigate matters that, before 2021, were conducted by administrative review with few avenues for accountability. This bill fulfils a commitment to apply accountability that has never been given to the many people who have gone through this place and have been subject to conduct that is unacceptable in any workplace at any time. We thank again the people who have contributed to the process since it commenced in 2021 through submissions to the reviews all the way through to the development of this legislation. We are committed to that change and to ensuring that we call out that behaviour when it occurs.

The conduct of parliamentarians and the judgement of them is not just a serious matter, it's also a constitutional one. Regardless of any reductionist interpretation, our workplace is one of three that has some element of protection by our first law. This is important because the independence and ability for an individual in this place to discharge the responsibility bestowed on them by Australians at an election is paramount. We have two protections that allow this: freedom of speech and control over the internal proceedings of parliament.

Parliament should provide the grounds for the fiercest contests, the sharpest arguments and the strongest views. We are chosen and choose to be here specifically for that purpose. Outside of this place, those views are controlled by laws that constrict expression. They provide protection but also prevent and preclude a freer exchange of views. Here, in this chamber, we are entrusted and unencumbered by design. Those outside are not, but they have chosen us in free and fair elections to use this privilege on their behalf.

We are then only burdened and bound by the responsibility to speak on behalf of our fellow Australians, and, when we do, we should be able to give those views their full voice. That's what our parliamentary privilege protects. The fact that it also protects how we go about those debates is also important. Privilege protects our voice and the ability for us and only us to determine how we use that voice.

If Australians who put us here wish to withdraw those privileges from any one of us, they can do so via the ballot box on election day. I warn those who would introduce constraints on those fundamental tenants of parliamentary representative democracy that, when you willingly place limits, they can have far-reaching consequences and they cannot be undone at will. Our conduct is important. Standards of behaviour should be exemplary. But I say to those who seek, often for political benefit, to curtail the voices of others, particularly those that they disagree with—particularly within these privileged chambers—that you may instead be seeking to diminish the democracy that you are trying to protect.

Past members of parliament, from the lion of the Labor Party, Senator Gareth Evans, to the Liberal father of a current independent MP, John Spender, have opined on this very fact, debating Australia's first privileges act. Even if it seems black and white today, conduct is conduct and behaviour is behaviour. Life is never black and white, and we have to legislate for the inevitable grey. Surely being a parliamentarian teaches us that we are not all alike. To that end, the answer does not lie in the removal of privileges that this institution has protected under our Constitution.

The opposition agrees with the government's legislation insofar as it maintains the primacy of the parliament in its own affairs. While an independent body will investigate matters—and so avoid obvious conflicts of interest—it's still up to the parliament to both oversee that body and determine the application of any punitive sanctions on its own members. The process of the development of this legislation has been a cross-party effort, and this is no easy task. It has pushed and pulled each of us from our original positions. We have engaged with respect, not assuming ill intent, we have listened to each other's concerns and we have found agreement after discussion.

It has reminded many, I suspect, of the wisdom that it is better to get 80 per cent of something than to go over a cliff with your colours flying. Make no mistake: the implementation of this reform places both the power and the responsibility for change in our hands. Institutions are only as strong as those who are inside them. It is incumbent on us, then, to police and protect ourselves, the people with whom we work every day and this institution through our conduct, always striving to be our very best selves, even when politics is at its most combative.

I believe that this bill manages to get the balance right. We will no longer decide whether our conduct in our workplaces was a breach of community expectations. That will now be done by an independent commission. That is a very big change for this place. But we will determine what happens when those breaches of the standards occur, and the electorate will expect that we deal with those breaches appropriately.

The coalition would like to thank the many people across this parliament who have worked to develop this significant legislation and, indeed, acknowledge all of the changes to our workplace recommended by the Jenkins and Foster reviews. I want to particularly acknowledge the members of the Parliamentary Leadership Taskforce. I would like to thank Senators Davey, Gallagher, Farrell and Waters, as well as the member for Farrer, the Deputy Speaker Claydon and the member for Warringah, who have served on that body. The opposition would like to thank the PLT's Staff Consultative Group and all staff who have given up their time in order to deliver feedback on behalf of their colleagues.

The opposition would like to thank the officials from the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet who have been very patient in spending their time explaining this legislation. The opposition would also like to thank the Independent Expert Chair of the Parliamentary Leadership Taskforce, Dr Vivienne Thom, and Jenna Parker, who supports her in this role, for their endless patience and commitment to a sometimes thankless but, I hope, still rewarding task. Finally, the opposition would like to thank the minister and her office, in particular her chief of staff, Georgia, and her senior adviser, Sol. I commend this bill to the Senate.