Dave Sharma (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

What a gross distortion of priorities this piece of legislation has been. With all the challenges facing our country, from the cost-of-living crisis to anaemic economic performance, 12 consecutive interest rate rises, declining real GDP per capita and increased prices in fuel, electricity and gas, the government has spent countless hours and wasted thousands of hours of Australian citizens' time pursuing this ill-conceived piece of legislation.

The warning signs were there from the very beginning.

This government, in June 2023, almost 18 months ago now, announced the intent to pursue this legislation. In response to the exposure draft that they released, they received 20,000 submissions, an overwhelming number of which were highly critical. The legislation was withdrawn, but then the government decided to come back and have another go. They introduced a second exposure draft, which generated even more hostile submissions, some 28,000—far more than the committee could read, far more than the secretariat could process, far more that could ever be published and, again, overwhelmingly hostile.

This isn't a case of the opposition playing politics. This is a case of widespread public discontent and mistrust in what the purpose of this legislation was. Senator Grogan in her comments, ironically or otherwise, highlighted this. In her remarks just then, she talked about 'constant misinformation from my colleagues across the room', referring to us. Now, if our opinions disagreeing with hers are characterised as misinformation, then of course, under the terms of this piece of legislation, it would fall within the scope of the mis- and disinformation act. We have seen far too much willingness by people to characterise opinions with which they disagree as misinformation. Senator Grogan, the chair of the committee who looked into this, did just this.

Senator Grogan also said, 'We're not talking about opinions.' She said we're not talking about opinions. The explanatory memorandum attached to this bill makes very clear that the definition of misinformation includes opinions, claims, commentary and invective, again undermining what Senator Grogan, the chair of the committee, just asserted about this.

We have seen countless Australians express their opposition to and mistrust of this piece of legislation. The Victorian Bar Council, for instance, said:

… the Bill's interference with the self-fulfilment of free expression will occur primarily by the chilling self-censorship it will inevitably bring about in the individual users of the relevant services …

The Human Rights Commission said:

… it … needs to be recognised that information may be opportunistically labelled as 'misinformation' or 'disinformation'—

I wonder who's guilty of that here!—

to delegitimise alternative opinions, and limit open discussion about issues of public importance.

Professor Nick Coatsworth said, 'The terms "misinformation" and "disinformation" have become overused in public discourse,' often employed 'as a way to dismiss opposing viewpoints without engaging in debate'. Well, this is what this legislation was about. It was about shutting down opposing viewpoints by introducing a system of incentives and punishments for the modern marketplace of ideas—global tech platforms—and not only encouraging them but coercing them to take down opinion that flies in the face of conventional wisdom. And this, I think, really gets to the heart of why this bill is so problematic.

As a free and liberal society since the Enlightenment, the way our society has progressed is through the open contestation of ideas and opinions. Scientific breakthroughs come about because conventional wisdom can be challenged openly, but even society advances in its own values by permitting challenges to the prevailing orthodoxy. As I said in the committee's hearing, if you were Copernicus or Galileo and this legislation existed back in the 16th or 17th century, what you said would be misinformation. If you were arguing against slavery in the 18th century or for extending the franchise to women in the 19th century, again you would be outside the realm of conventional wisdom and orthodoxy and, more than likely—it being opinion, commentary or invective—you would have fallen foul of this misinformation legislation.

This legislation's most pernicious threat to our society was its stifling of free debate, its imposition of orthodoxy and the removal of our ability to progress as a society. I'm glad this bill has been withdrawn; it should never return.