Amanda Vanstone (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I table a supplementary explanatory memorandum relating to government amendments to be moved to this bill. The memorandum was circulated in the chamber on 28 November. I move government amendments on sheet QJ314:

(1)    Clause 2, page 2 (table item 3), omit the table item.

(2)    Schedule 2, page 26 (line 1) to page 83 (line 26), to be opposed.

Michael Forshaw (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question is that government amendment (1) on sheet QJ314 be agreed to.

Question agreed to.

The Temporary Chairman:

With respect to government amendment (2) on that sheet, the question is that schedule 2 stand as printed.

Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I understand that schedule 2 will be opposed by the government. I just want to be clear on this, Mr Temporary Chairman: you will put that schedule 2 stands as printed, the government will oppose it and Labor will join them in opposing it for the reasons outlined earlier in the debate.

The Temporary Chairman:

I am glad that you are clear on that, Senator Evans. I cannot say precisely what the government will do, but I understand that is the course of events that will occur. The question is that schedule 2 stand as printed.

Question negatived.

Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move opposition amendment (1) on sheet 5094:

(1)    Schedule 1, page 9 (after line 3), after item 14, insert:

14A  After subsection 1118(2A)

Insert:

      (2B)    If:

             (a)    a person sells the person’s principal home; and

             (b)    the person is unable within 12 months to acquire another residence that is to be the person’s principal home; and

             (c)    in the Secretary’s opinion the delay in acquiring another residence that is to be the person’s principal home is because of circumstances beyond the person’s control; and

             (d)    the person is likely, within 24 months, to apply the whole or a part of the proceeds of the sale in acquiring another residence that is to be the person’s principal home;

In moving these amendments I indicate, as I did in my second reading debate contribution, that there is a particular issue that has been raised with me in Western Australia by constituents regarding the current 12-month limit that is placed upon people from when they sell their own home until they acquire a new one if they want to remain eligible for a pension. As I indicated earlier, with the economic buoyancy in Western Australia—and, I believe, in some of the other states—getting a new home completed inside that 12-month period has proved very difficult for a number of people. There are skill shortages and long delays in getting homes completed.

A number of people have come to me raising their concerns about this because they have been brought into the assets test when in fact they are just seeking to move into a new home. Often they are downsizing into something more appropriate, but the delay in finishing the home has meant that they have fallen into assets test problems with the funds that they have reserved to pay for the new home. A number of Commonwealth officers, when confronted with this issue, have been sympathetic to the constituents but have said that they have been unable to do anything because there is no discretion. I seek, in moving this amendment, to provide for the secretary to have that discretion—to provide the flexibility that would allow for people in genuine circumstances to seek to have a discretion exercised for a period of 24 months.

The point is to allow the discretion to be exercised by the secretary or their delegate to deal with those people who have very real problems in complying with the current provisions. I do not think it is a particularly political issue; I think it is about providing a solution for people who are getting caught in an unintended way. I gather the minister has indicated she has some sympathy for the amendment. We have raised with the government previously the need to do something about this. I would hope that the minister, if she has a problem with my amendment, will come back with her own constructive proposal to fix it.

Amanda Vanstone (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Evans is right: this is not seen as a particularly political issue. There is some merit in the proposal. The government has been considering issues in relation to other situations in which people might not be able to build within 12 months—for example, following Cyclone Larry where people on income support are unable to rebuild their homes within 12 months. I do not think Perth is necessarily the only place where it happens. I know some people who sold their house three years ago in order to build their dream home—it was not a downsize but an upsize—but, three years later, they have not moved in. Were they people who were in need of welfare, that would be a difficult situation. It relates to the capacity to get builders and a whole range of other matters.

In any event, while we agree that something might need to be done, you nonetheless have to get it right. We understand the principle of the amendment. It is our view that it is not comprehensive. It does not address all the issues. I have been told there are some consequential amendments. I have not been told what they are, just to save you asking me, but they are inevitable. I am further advised that, while your proposal addresses the impact of the assets test on sale proceeds, it does not align the homeowner definition, to ensure the person continues to be assessed as a homeowner until their home is finished. That is just one issue that has been raised. So, while the government are sympathetic to this proposal, we will not be supporting this amendment. But we will ensure that Senator Evans is personally apprised of our future consideration in relation to this matter.

I make the point that this government, which was described by Senator Bartlett, who is now back in the chamber, as being arrogant and taking its numbers for granted, recognises that someone is putting forward an idea that might be reasonable and is committing to having a look at it and getting it right. Senator Bartlett, I take the opportunity now that you are back in the chamber to point out just one aspect of your speech that I did not quite get. There was a portion which said that we are an arrogant government who do not listen to anybody, but it was within the context of the bill being debated, as a consequence of a range of opinions put to the government that a whole schedule has been removed. So I sort of got lost in that part of your speech. I am not inviting argument about it. I am just making the point that I think the conduct on this bill—in the removal of the schedule and in the agreement that Senator Evans has something that he wants to raise and which we will get back to him on—is an indication of quite the opposite; that is all.

Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the minister for her response. I do not want to be churlish, but looking at it and getting back to me does not quite provide the level of satisfaction that I would like. I know that may not concern the minister, but I really would like to get a sense of what we are going to do about it. The problem has been around for a while. It has been raised with the government. The government is aware of it. Its own officers are aware of it. If there are inadequacies in my amendment, I am happy to accept that. It is not quite clear to me what they are, and I am always a bit wary of being told that when there is not a satisfactory explanation. But I am happy to concede that there may be inadequacies—I do not want to argue about that. If we can do it better, we should do it better.

But the question is: why don’t we fix it now? Why don’t we provide relief for those people now? Why don’t we delay the bill until tomorrow so that you can bring in the amendment and we can fix it? It seems to me that, if you can see there is a problem, this is an opportunity for us to fix it. As I understand it, we have the time to fix it, so let us fix it. I think that in this situation people do not want to be told that the government concede there is a problem but that they will look into it and will apprise them of their view later on. This is an opportunity inside the relevant piece of legislation to fix it. I was not aware of the Cyclone Larry issues, but that obviously makes a lot of sense. As I said, officers of the department told constituents of mine that they were sympathetic to their plight and that they would like to get the situation fixed but they cannot, so I would like some reassurance about when we are going to fix it. I would also like to know why we cannot just fix the problem now.

Amanda Vanstone (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The reason we cannot ‘just’ fix it now is that it is apparently an amendment that requires policy approval. From what I have been told, I infer that that means probably either prime ministerial tick-off or cabinet approval—probably the latter. The other point I make is about a remark made to me once by Dame Margaret Guilfoyle, who used to hold the portfolio that this legislation comes out of. She described it as ‘pick-up sticks’ in that every time you touched one bit, all the other sticks in the pile moved. From my own experience in this portfolio, while we can look at individual things and say, ‘I think we ought to do this,’ the process of deciding that is perhaps not difficult. The work involved in ensuring what other flow-on effects there might be—and I do not mean just consequential amendments—as a consequence of what you do, needs to be considered.

As you know, this is not my portfolio, so the best I can do is to give you the advice I have been given by the minister: that the government is looking at it and you will be kept informed. I can and will ask the minister to give you in the next couple of weeks an indication of the timetable for consideration of this. I cannot give you that because I am not the minister, but I can ask the minister for it.

Andrew Bartlett (Queensland, Australian Democrats) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The proposal put forward by Senator Evans is, as I said in my speech in the second reading debate, one that has merit. It seeks to address a genuine problem and I think he deserves credit for raising it, as does the minister for making a commitment to pursue the issue. It is one of those issues where there is merit in what both sides are saying. I can understand Senator Evans being less than satisfied as to whether we will get back the minister’s approach, but I can also understand the minister saying that she does not really have much of an option at the moment. But I do think it is one that needs to be followed up.

The complexity of this area of legislation is certainly a problem and means that any time something is changed you always have to look at the flow-on effects, but that is not a reason in itself for not doing something. This government makes monumentally major changes to this area of legislation—sometimes within very short time frames—with a lot of unintended consequences. I think that when groups in the community are clearly being disadvantaged through no fault of their own we should not drag the chain indefinitely. However, I appreciate that the minister is not in a position to do anything about that in the current situation.

Let me assist the minister with her previous comments, because she did indicate that she was a bit lost in the intent of what I was saying. I should indicate that one of the reasons I was out of the chamber is that at the time the Senate was debating this legislation, a Senate committee was also holding public hearings. That is a continual problem, particularly if you are on the crossbench, where you have a range of different responsibilities. Frankly, I think it is a problem—if I could take the opportunity to mention it on the side—that we need to look at again, because a significant number of committees hold hearings during sittings of the Senate. That not only makes it difficult for senators to be in two places at once but also means that the public who provide evidence to and appear before Senate committees can get short-changed by not having the full focus and attention of the senators that they would otherwise get. That is a separate point.

With regard to my comments, I attempted to make it reasonably clear in my speech in the second reading debate that I thought Minister Hockey deserved to be congratulated for acknowledging that this is a problem and removing it. I thought I made that point more than once; I am quite happy to repeat it again. In the current circumstances, it is quite easy for ministers to just persevere regardless and insist on pushing things through and slagging off anybody who criticises them for being soft on welfare cheats and the like. Senator Hockey deserves credit for that. I have said that, and I am quite happy to say it again. It inevitably means that he will cop a bit of a comment or two about backdowns, backflips and the like, but it is certainly much better to acknowledge that there is a problem and to take it out and to look at it again rather than persevering regardless because you do not want to admit a mistake.

The point I was making is that that attitude is not universal amongst government ministers. The fact that it happened on this occasion and that it stood out perhaps shows that it is rarer than one would like. I am not going to go through and give a scorecard on every individual minister, but it is appropriate to draw attention to the fact that, while it is good that the minister recognised a problem and withdrew it from the legislation, it is bad that it got in there in the first place and was so quickly found to be unjustified once it came under some scrutiny. That, I think, is an indication of a culture that can develop. Again, it is not a personal attack on any one individual or anything particularly partisan about the coalition; it is human nature—it is a mindset that develops when you are used to being able to get things through when the levels of scrutiny diminish and you do not do your homework as much because you assume you do not need to. That is the problem I am drawing attention to—whether you want to call it arrogance, hubris or whatever. I think it is appropriate to give the bouquet but that it is also appropriate to point to the flaw being put in there in the first place. There are two different concepts in there. Hopefully, they can be conceptualised at the same time without too much difficulty. That is the point I was trying to get across.

Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

After listening to Senator Bartlett trying to straddle the competing interests, I want to make the point that I can count and that I appreciate that the minister has been as frank as she can given her responsibilities, but the arguments about complexity are a bit thin given that we are asking to extend the secretary’s discretion. We are not asking for major amendments to the act; we are asking why, among the many discretions of the secretary, we cannot provide the discretion for this matter.

We ought to focus again on the impact on the individual. This is about people losing their pension as a result of a provision we all agree is not fair in this circumstance. The department is telling people that it cannot help them, that it would like to help them but it cannot. I think we ought to focus on that rather than on the needs of bureaucracy and policy advice. It is interesting that a major provision to do with search and seizure powers—a quite major part of this legislation—was able to be dropped within 11 days of the committee hearing. Policy advice was sought and obtained, a ministerial decision was made and a whole schedule of the bill disappeared. It shows that bureaucracy and policy decision processes can move quickly when it suits. I fail to understand why we cannot move more quickly on this occasion.

As I say, I do not think there is anything in the bill that would prevent us from deferring it for a few days to fix this problem. I really do think it would be preferable to fix it now because, while we say, ‘People will get back to me and we’ll get a policy decision et cetera,’ somebody will lose their pension in the meantime through no fault of their own in the application of the assets test rules. If we can save one person from that, it will be a good thing. Given that we are all in agreement, I urge that we find a way to fix it rather than to allow it to disappear back into the bureaucratic decision-making processes that may not reach fruition for some time.

Question negatived.

Bill, as amended, agreed to.

Bill reported with amendments; report adopted.