Paul Scarr (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Multicultural Engagement) Share this | Hansard source

I'd like to summarise some of the arguments that I made in my first contribution in this debate. They are these. First, this bill, the Administrative Review Tribunal (Miscellaneous Measures) Bill 2024, is only necessary because of the abbreviated, shambolic process which was adopted by the Albanese Labor government in terms of consideration of this legislation. Indeed, as Deputy Chair of the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee, I know we were originally given a deadline of July last year to report on this bill, and it was brought forward by two months. I had the opportunity to look at the government members' report on the Administrative Review Tribunal bill for only about one clear day. It was completely unsatisfactory.

I don't blame the chair of that committee, Senator Nita Green, who does a very good job as chair of that committee. I don't blame the government members of that committee for that abbreviated process. This was executive action. The Attorney decided to bring forward the report on the bill by more than two months. That is completely unsatisfactory when you're dealing with a piece of legislation which has more than 500 pages. Now we're reaping what was sown by that shambolic process—amendment bills that are trying to fix the mistakes that were included in the Administrative Review Tribunal Act.

I want to quote, again, from the Law Council of Australia. These are not my words but the words of the Law Council of Australia in relation to the shambolic process, and I included this quote on page 43 of the committee's report. They said:

Whilst the Law Council is pleased to have obtained an extension to 2 February 2024 to lodge its submission, it remains very concerned that the Committee's truncated inquiry period will undermine or diminish the democratic and proper scrutiny of the Bills.

The Law Council's concerns are exacerbated by the sheer level of scrutiny required, given that the Bills comprise more than 550 pages, excluding more than 500 pages of explanatory materials.

And now what we are seeing is the need to fix the act that was passed by this Senate with that abbreviated scrutiny process. At least one of those provisions which has to be fixed is absolutely time critical. This shouldn't have had to be fixed; this should have been picked up. This relates in particular to item 2 of schedule 4 of the amendment of the Administrative Review Tribunal Act, where a provision has to be inserted such that the decision-maker, especially with respect to matters involving child support, doesn't have to continually lodge documents after documents after documents in order to comply with the Administrative Review Tribunal Act and is having to redact documents because they potentially pose a threat to the safety of people going through that process. It's completely unacceptable that that should occur in the context of this legislation.

From my perspective, as I reiterated in my additional comments on this bill, whilst I acknowledge the need for this bill, I do not acknowledge or accept that there was any real policy need for the Administrative Appeals Tribunal to be abolished holus-bolus and replaced by the Administrative Review Tribunal. It has led to costs, dysfunction and mistakes. The AAT could have been the subject of some positive reforms without its being abolished. There was a vindictive streak running through the soul of this piece of legislation, and that was reflected in the compensation paid to those tribunal members who weren't reappointed.