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

When I was making my remarks earlier today on this bill, I drew attention to the continuous questioning by Senator Joyce of witnesses during the inquiry, where he was seeking to lead them to make a statement that they should all go out and support the National Party or the Liberal Party in the next federal election in Queensland. I was endeavouring to find a quote and I have found it during the break. I quote from the Hansard of Friday, 31 August. Senator Joyce asked a question of Councillor Brown:

Can you see any pressure points coming up on the horizon that may be exerted that may encourage people to be a bit more active in trying to support your cause, and where might those political pressure points be?

Councillor BrownI dare say that there probably would be. What you want me to say is that it is probably the federal election.

Senator Moore interjected and said:

That is what he wants you to say.

Senator Joyce said:

I have never suggested anything.

We had a speech here for 20 minutes today in which Senator Joyce stated quite clearly that this is all about trying to get Queenslanders who are upset with the state Labor government over forced local council amalgamations to vote for the coalition in the federal election. Yet he said during the inquiry, on the record, that he had never suggested anything of the sort! That is the nonsense that went on during this inquiry. The other point I was drawing attention to was the duplicitous position—and I use that word ‘duplicitous’ because it has been thrown around here a lot, as it was during the inquiry—of government senators attacking the Labor Party members in Queensland because, apparently, people in the Labor Party at the federal level have a different view from those at the state level. Shock! Horror! Fancy that ever occurring in the history of politics in this country!

When the committee was considering issues dealing with amending the federal Constitution to include recognition of local government, Senator Joyce stated:

I think the inclusion of local government in the Constitution is a great idea. I am all for that.

We pointed out to Senator Joyce at that time during the inquiry that he had actually voted against a proposition to that very effect last year. He could not remember it. When he finally had a look at the Hansard during the inquiry hearing he came back later and made a statement to the effect of: ‘I would like to clarify something, Mr Chairman. I have changed my mind, and it is a healthy thing to change your mind.’ Then we had the situation where I asked Mr Bruce Scott, when he appeared in Emerald:

What is your position and the National Party’s position on supporting a constitutional change to give recognition to local government in the federal Constitution? That would be a head of power that could be relied upon to put this legislation through and potentially to then enforce the results of plebiscites.

Mr Bruce Scott replied:

What you are talking about is recognising local government as a legitimate third tier of government in this country. Personally, my position is that I would support that.

Then, after a few more comments by Mr Scott, Senator Ian Macdonald interjected and said:

It is a view you have long held, if I remember correctly.

Mr Bruce Scott said:

It is indeed.

I said:

Is that true? You have long held that view?

Mr Scott said:

Yes.

I then said:

Why did you vote against that very proposition in the House of Representatives last year, on 17 October?

Mr Bruce Scott replied:

What did I vote against?

He did not have a clue; he could not remember what his position was. Let us return to the bill before us, which deals with a specific situation that has arisen in Queensland as a result of state government legislation that would have prevented councillors and councils from holding local plebiscites on forced amalgamations. If they had done so, if they had supported those plebiscites, they would have been subject to serious penalties.

I do not support the actions of the Queensland government. The then Premier himself, Mr Beattie, acknowledged that it was an overreaction to the interference by the federal government. Mr Howard is on the record on at least two occasions as saying, ‘This legislation is not about amalgamations.’ He was not seeking to impose a view or make a statement about whether he supported amalgamations in Queensland.

Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Fifield interjecting—

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

He said this was about responding to the Queensland government’s actions. What we need to remember is that the Australian Electoral Commission already has the authority, on the basis of a fee for service, to run local plebiscites. That is understood. During the inquiry some constitutional issues were raised, and the government treated the expert witnesses with contempt— (Time expired)

Trish Crossin (NT, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Fifield, I want to remind you that it is expected you would interject from your chair, not as you come in the doors or walk in the corridors of the Senate.

Russell Trood (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am sure Senator Fifield is usually a well-behaved member of the chamber. I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Commonwealth Electoral Amendment (Democratic Plebiscites) Bill 2007. It is a bill of wide scope but it pays particular attention to the circumstances that have arisen in Queensland in recent times. In that context, as a Queensland senator I think it is a matter that deserves my attention and, as indeed has become the case, the attention of the Senate.

The now not-much-lamented, in my case, Beattie government proposal to amalgamate local councils in Queensland is one of the more disgraceful exercises in local government reform in Australia, from my perspective, and is certainly one of the more disgraceful exercises in local government reform in Queensland. It will almost certainly fail to achieve its objectives, in my view, as well as having dire consequences for the rights of Queenslanders, which they have been able to take for granted since the beginning of responsible government in Queensland.

At every turn the Beattie government has acted in a high-handed and dictatorial way to deny the democratic rights of Queenslanders. This dictatorial manner of acting reached its height, surely, when the final bill was rammed through the single chamber of the Queensland legislature early one Thursday morning, at a time when few Queenslanders were able to pay attention. All they could do was wake up to the consequences of the denial of their democratic rights greeting them early in the morning.

I am of the view that there was probably a case for reform of local government in Queensland. The existing system has certainly been in place for a long time. But the tragedy of this particular reform proposal is that it is a completely wasted opportunity. It proposed and achieved a simplistic solution to what are very complex problems of local government reform. The tragedy of it is that, with greater creativity and with more attention to the possibilities, the Beattie government, as it then was, could perhaps have claimed the reform as a matter of some credit. The result is that the Beattie government at the time deserved and received a wide degree of public opprobrium for its actions, and what we have now is a bastardised system of local government in Queensland.

This saga began with the proposal for reform in 2005. The Local Government Association of Queensland began the size, shape and sustainability initiative, and 118 councils across the state participated in this program. I visited various councils throughout the state during this period. They were reassuring about the progress that was being made, and they were pleased to have had the opportunity to participate in the process. Shortly thereafter, there began a concerted campaign of violence against democracy by the Beattie government. The Premier decided to override the SSS initiative to impose his own agenda for reform on local government and to create his own Local Government Reform Commission. Then, something that could be regarded as the most outrageous foray into totalitarianism occurred: the government passed new legislation to bypass the Local Government Act 1993. In that act there was a right of individuals and councils to express an opinion about changes that might occur to council boundaries and a longstanding right to approve any changes to the local government boundaries in Queensland. The loss of that right is addressed very directly by the bill that is currently before the chamber. After the Beattie government had passed the act that took away these rights, it proceeded to the next stage of ‘de-democratisation’ when it rammed these provisions through the Queensland parliament in the face of widespread concern, expressed throughout the state, about these changes.

The question before us, and one that has been before Queenslanders all of this time, is why a government would do this: what is the rationale for trying to reform government in this way, and why would you incur such massive public opprobrium? Further, what public purpose is being served by these local government reforms? The answer—which, in my view, is not a particularly compelling one—that was given to the Queensland councils was that the purpose of the reforms was to provide a more efficient local government system. More particularly, they would provide the opportunity for these councils to meet the challenges of economic growth being experienced by my state. This is a challenge that is certainly true in the south-east corner of Queensland, but it is being reflected right throughout the state. So the argument before us was that local government amalgamations were necessary so that local government authorities could meet the challenges of economic growth that were before them. To that end, there was supposed to be an examination of the economic integrity of some of these councils.

The Queensland Treasury Corporation undertook an examination and produced a report, in which it rated 43 per cent of these councils as being in a weak or very weak financial position. This was a very curious report indeed, because it did not evaluate all 156 local government authorities in Queensland. It did not purport to go through the financial circumstances of every council—in fact, it dealt with only 94 of the 156 councils, so less than three-quarters of them. Thus we had an incomplete process of examination. There was never any attempt to examine each council’s circumstances and then to propose public reforms based on the circumstances of councils right across the state. This was a half-baked effort to try to understand the alleged problems of local governments and councils.

But then the process of reform became even more bizarre. After the proposals were examined and the report was released with the names of the councils that were alleged to be in various states of financial distress, the government proceeded with its program of reform. It set up the Local Government Reform Commission and, in due course, the commission produced a report. Peculiarly, the report failed to carry through the concerns that were reflected in the Treasury Corporation’s assessment and at least four of the so-called financially unstable councils were left alone by the amalgamations. Councils such as Carpentaria, Diamantina and Boulia were said to be very distressed, yet no attempt was made to reform those councils in the context of these changes. Even more peculiar is that some councils which were not thought to be financially distressed have been reformed and have been amalgamated with adjacent councils, such as Caboolture, Pine Rivers and Redcliffe.

So we have had a very peculiar process of the public examination of an argument for change, and it has produced some very peculiar outcomes. In the context of these very peculiar changes, it is hardly surprising that Queenslanders right across the state are offended by the consequences of these changes. They are offended by the speed and the determination with which the then Beattie government rammed through these changes and deprived them of their right to express an opinion about those changes, including the impact those changes would have on their lives, on the economic sustainability of their councils and on the sustainability of their democratic communities, which were well established across the state.

We now have a very peculiar situation where Queensland will have fewer councils than either Victoria or New South Wales. Queensland, a state several dimensions larger than Victoria and larger than New South Wales, will have fewer councils—73. I think the figure is 79 in Victoria and 152 in New South Wales. Here we have a huge state, growing rapidly and economically vibrant, and yet we now have fewer councils representing people across the state than exist in other states of the Commonwealth on the east coast.

What has been particularly disturbing and distressing to Queenslanders throughout this process has been the ripping away of the fabric of community and the way in which these reforms have been rammed through the commission and rammed through the parliament, with contempt—and that is the only word that can be used—for the concerns of the local government community and the consequences that this will have for democratic representation at local government level in Queensland. In places like Noosa, Redcliffe and Port Douglas, the anxiety, distress and annoyance is certainly overt. It will mean that people will now have to travel vast distances to meet their elected local government representatives. There are consequences that will follow from these reckless reforms.

I take you, Madam Acting Deputy President, to one example of the way in which democratic representation will be changed by these reforms. Take what will be the new Toowoomba Regional Council. The new council will have an area in the vicinity of 13,000 square kilometres. It amalgamates eight councils into one and brings together a population of 302,000 people whose representation prior to these reforms, on the collective eight councils, was 82 councillors. As a result of these reforms, there will be 11 councillors for these 302,000 people. In some of those old councils—the Millmerran council, for example—there was one councillor for every 223 people. That is, admittedly, an excellent council representation to population. But it varied across these councils. In some places—Toowoomba, for example—there was one councillor to 7,000 constituents. The consequence of these changes is that these 11 councillors will now each represent something in the vicinity of 19,000 people. So in places like Millmerran, where there has been an intimate relationship between the councillor and his constituents, it will now blow out to one councillor to 19,000 constituents.

What is going to happen with the Toowoomba Regional Council, in all probability, because these are now undivided councils, which means that each place will not be represented by its own individual councillor, is that many people in these small communities—Millmerran, Pittsworth and places like that—will be unlikely, because they do not have the population size, to gain representation in the council. Having gone from a position of great intimacy with their local councillor, they will essentially be deprived of the right to be represented in local council. How that will advance democracy and expand economic sustainability in Queensland I have no idea, and I suspect that the Queensland government has no idea either. It is one of the serious consequences and one of the reasons why this bill is necessary and why the Beattie government stands condemned for the way in which it has behaved on this matter. It is a shameful deprivation of representation, and it defies, from my perspective, any particular logic—certainly in relation to building sustainable communities, which I presume is part of the intent here.

We know that these kinds of reforms do not work. We know that in Victoria, for example, where amalgamation took place and there was an expectation of substantial costs savings, the result was that, instead of 20 per cent in cost savings, savings came down to something in the vicinity of 8.5 per cent. We know that, in South Australia, amalgamation reforms which were supposed to produce cost savings in the vicinity of 17 per cent produced savings in the vicinity of 2.3 per cent. Sensibly, the New South Wales government, having examined the consequences of reforms elsewhere, realised that this was a pretty dumb way to reform councils and that there must be a better way of trying to address the problem of economic weakness at a local government level, so they decided to avoid that course of action. From my perspective, that was a sensible action in public policy.

We should be asking ourselves whether there is anything in this barren landscape that can retrieve these proposals in relation to the proclaimed public objective, which is to provide sustainability. I looked at the various proposals and the documents which were produced at the time and I found there is a thing called a ‘local transition committee’ being set up. In the documents which were provided at the time, there is a statement about the composition of these transition committees. One would have thought that if these committees are about economics—producing economic sustainability and preparing local government for the challenges of economic growth—when you create them you might provide for someone to be on them who might know something about economics. Perhaps that would be a financial adviser, a local businessperson who has some experience in the field or someone with some economic experience. What do we find when we look at the composition of the local transition committees? We find a representative from the affected local governments, an interim CEO and, astonishingly, up to three union representatives. There will be up to three union representatives on these transition committees!

Where is the person who will make a contribution to improving the economic sustainability of these councils? Where is the person who will carry through, in some constructive, intelligent way, the kinds of aims that lie behind these proposals? The only conclusion one is justified in reaching is that this is not a reform that has anything to do with local government. This is not a reform that addresses itself to Queensland’s future economic needs. This is a reform which talks about the future of trade unionism in Queensland. All Australians, whether or not they happen to be Queenslanders, ought to reflect on that particular point when they are addressing their attention to the election later in the year. (Time expired)

Ursula Stephens (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Opposition (Social and Community Affairs)) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to make a brief contribution to this debate on the Commonwealth Electoral Amendment (Democratic Plebiscites) Bill 2007. Listening to the debate today, I am not surprised one bit that we so often hear people talking about Australians being cynical and switched off from politics. You do not have to think too long before you realise that what has been discussed in the chamber today, under the guise of debate on this bill, has been extraordinary nonsense. More importantly, under this government we have seen every attempt to keep the public out of politics and to stop them from even wanting to be involved.

This bill is one step in the right direction. We support any means to improve the quality of our democracy. That means making it easier for people to find out what is happening in politics so that they can make informed decisions and communicate with their elected representatives. People should have a say in decisions that involve them, their local communities or the broader Australian community.

I will get back to what this bill is all about. The bill amends the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 to authorise the AEC’s use and disclosure of any information held by the AEC, including information contained in an electoral roll, for the purpose of conducting an activity such as a plebiscite. I should note, as several other senators have noted today, that this is a very short piece of legislation which contains no detail about what form such a plebiscite might take, so we need to be careful about not overstating the impact that it might have.

The bill has been introduced in the context of the proposed forced council amalgamations in Queensland. Labor believes that these communities should have the ability to express their views on these proposals and that they should not be fined or sacked for doing so. For this reason we support this bill. We have been suggesting the use of plebiscites for some months now. They are just one example of measures that can be taken to get people involved in democratic processes. They are measures which can support politicians’ decision making.

The bill is about more than just Queensland councils. This legislation could pave the way for citizen initiated plebiscites on other issues, which we welcome in principle. When matters are deeply controversial in a local community, people should be able to have a mechanism to make their views on the matter heard. This is not to replace our system of representative democracy but rather is an important complement to it. Just last week, the Prime Minister of Britain, Gordon Brown, announced that he would be instituting citizens’ juries in the UK. We should be thinking about innovative ways to inform people and involve them in decision making, not engaging in the smoke-and-mirror obfuscation that characterises the way this government treats its citizens and electors.

It has become commonplace to say that Australians are cynical about politics and politicians. In the annual Roy Morgan poll, politics usually comes pretty low down on the list of trustworthy occupations—usually just above journalists and the car salesmen. People want politicians to represent their interests honestly, and they want to know what is going on. And these have not been features of the Howard government.

It would be wonderful if this legislation were an indication of some commitment on the part of the government towards improving democratic process in this country. I doubt that it is—not least because the government does not have much of a track record in this respect. Under the Howard government, the quality of our democracy has been significantly downgraded. The coalition have used their control of the Senate to diminish the role of the Senate committees—one of the most constructive, bilateral processes of our parliament, which is admired worldwide. The committee system allows ordinary people the right to have their say on issues that affect them.

The reality of our parliamentary system as it is working at the moment has been commented on by the Clerk of the Senate at a recent forum. He said:

Legislation framed by the executive alone is rammed through lower houses with the least possible delay and examination, scrutiny of government is severely limited lest it disclose matters embarrassing to government, and inquiries are limited to matters which cannot cause the executive any difficulty or embarrassment.

The role of the Senate in scrutinising legislation and allowing Australians to have some input into the process is important but the government has used its control of the Senate to hamstring the capacity of the Senate to provide scrutiny and transparency wherever possible.

This is a government that has shown little respect for the committee process and the effort that thousands of Australians put into making submissions and appearing before committee inquiries. The Democratic Audit of Australia pointed out that the latest six-monthly report on government responses to committee reports, presented to parliament in June this year, showed:

... the government had failed to respond to a single report within the required three-month period. Indeed, some are still waiting for a response after several years. Whilst in a few cases the government claims a response is pending, subject to developments, in the case of the report on A Certain Maritime Incident (tabled in 2002), the government is still deciding whether it is going to respond at all.

This shows a manifest lack of respect for the democratic processes of our parliament and for the ordinary Australians who put their neck out to be involved in it. The Howard government’s control of the Senate also enabled the government to put in place some radical, disturbing and worrying changes to the Commonwealth Electoral Act last year. That has to be the most brazen example of this government’s lack of commitment to improving Australia’s democratic processes. Under these laws, first time voters or those who are re-enrolling or updating enrolment details are required to comply with new proof of identity requirements. Voters will have to either provide drivers licence details, having prescribed documents witnessed by authorised persons according to the act, or have two enrolled people, whom they have known for at least a month, confirm their identity. With data showing that between 10 and 20 per cent of adults do not have a drivers licence, that will be a real problem for some Australians. We should be encouraging people to enrol to vote, not making it increasingly difficult for them to do so.

But more worrying than this, at this point in the electoral cycle, is the early closure of the electoral rolls instituted by the Howard government in that same piece of legislation. These changes close the rolls for new voters on the day the writs are issued or a minimum of 33 days before polling day. So existing enrollees are only given three days to correct their details. The rationale for this was to prevent electoral fraud, but the ANAO found no evidence that fraud was even taking place.

Australia has long been at the vanguard of democratic process and reform. But these changes actually put it behind developments in countries such as Canada and New Zealand, which have changed their legislation in the opposite way to make it easier to enrol and vote. Of course the early closing of the electoral rolls most seriously affects young people who are not yet on the roll. The Special Minister of State, Mr Nairn, admitted in July that, as of March, more than 400,000 eligible people were not enrolled to vote. These are the real people being defrauded by these measures. I should not need to point out that young people are so important to our country’s future. They should be given every opportunity to have their say and we should be encouraging them, rather than discouraging them, to be involved. But it is no great surprise that the coalition do not want more young people on the rolls. Young people who do not have mortgages are not key targets for the government’s endless and deeply monotonous scare campaigns on interest rates. Young people are those most vulnerable to losing conditions under Work Choices. Young people see the overcrowded lecture theatres in their universities and carry debts from their university days through to their working lives. Of course the coalition wants to prevent as many of these people as possible from getting on the electoral roll.

Last month the High Court struck down the amendment in the Commonwealth Electoral Act preventing prisoners who are serving a sentence of less than three years from voting in elections. That is important because, effectively, it led to the potential disenfranchisement of a great swathe of, in particular, Indigenous Australians. In addition, just to make this antidemocratic cocktail all the more potent, the 2006 legislation made it easier for corporations to make secret donations to political parties. Professor Marian Sawer pointed out:

Australia seems unique in legislating to make it easier for private money to influence the policies of elected governments, by removing many corporate donations from public scrutiny.

That is outrageous, but of course we should not be surprised. This piece of legislation which we are debating today is a welcome but entirely uncharacteristic development on the part of this government. I now leave it to my colleague Senator McLucas to reflect on Labor’s final position on the bill.

Jan McLucas (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing, Disabilities and Carers) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There has been a lot of bluster in both the conduct of the inquiry into the Commonwealth Electoral Amendment (Democratic Plebiscites) Bill 2007 and in the debate that we have had today. It is a lot of feigned anger and a feigned defence of this thing that we call democracy. It has been interesting for those of us in Queensland to watch the behaviour of some of the coalition senators, first of all, in the conduct of the inquiry—I think Senator Moore very eloquently put that on the record—but also during the debate that we have had today. Can I say, as every other Labor senator in this debate has said, that we support this legislation. We announced that support for this legislation when the legislation was proposed, because it actually reflects Labor’s position on the issue of forced amalgamations.

We need to go back over the history that brings us to this point. Late in 2004 the Local Government Association of Queensland adopted a policy to promote discussion on the need to consider reform to local government in our state to ensure long-term sustainability of Queensland’s local government. That resulted in what is called the Size, Shape and Sustainability process, which was agreed to by the Local Government Association of Queensland, supported by the state government and actually funded by the state government—funding of, I think, $25 million over five years. That was strongly supported by local government itself and also by constituents who live in those various local government areas. The reason for that support was that that process allowed for analysis of the financial situation of each council, it looked at opportunities for boundary realignments and for cooperative arrangements that would cross local government boundaries in order to save much-needed ratepayers’ funds. But, most importantly, there was strong community engagement at each step in the Size, Shape and Sustainability process. That process then progressed.

It is extremely unfortunate in my view that, on 17 April of this year, the government of Queensland abandoned what is called the SSS process. That engendered real concern in the community and real concern from local government that the process they had originally embarked upon was being shelved. Then, as we know, the Queensland government established the Local Government Reform Commission which was made up of a range of individuals from all walks of political life—people who had been in the state government from the National Party, the Liberal Party and the Labor Party—all of whom had some interest in local government. They brought down their report and recommended a considerable number of amalgamations in Queensland. The Queensland government, as we know, then adopted almost all of those recommendations and the process of forced amalgamations began.

On 17 May of this year, Mr Rudd, the leader of the federal Labor Party, made it clear that he did not support the process as adopted by the Queensland Labor government. He went to Townsville and spoke very clearly and very openly about why federal Labor was not supporting forced amalgamations in our state. Mr Rudd said, ‘I said to Mr Beattie it would be good if he reviewed his approach to this amalgamations process and put forward other ways in which economic and financial efficiencies can be achieved. My view broadly is that local voice and local choice is critical when it comes to the future of local government across of Australia as well as here in Queensland. My other view is this,’ he said:

If we are going to come up with any amalgamation proposals, the important way forward is then to test them through the democratic process of a local referendum. I think that is a further second test which should be applied.

I remind the Senate that that statement was made on 17 May of this year. So, federal Labor has been consistent in its position in opposition to forced amalgamations. We then had, I think, a very unfortunate position where the Queensland government actually did bring in legislation to say that if any local government undertook a plebiscite, their tenure as a local government would cease and they would then not be involved in any of the preliminary and pre-amalgamation discussions, clearly to the detriment of their local government constituents.

So that is why we are here. The federal government said that they would bring in legislation that would ensure that plebiscites could be held and that they would be funded by the Commonwealth government so that a local voice would be known. We reiterated our support at that time for that process to go forward. We also supported the establishment of the inquiry that was undertaken, and that was a useful thing to do. But I found it somewhat intriguing that this piece of legislation—a piece of legislation which is very simple, clear and not complex at all—warranted a three-day inquiry, whereas the intervention in the Northern Territory, which was a hugely expensive and life-changing proposal, warranted a one-day inquiry. We understand and support the need for the intervention in the Northern Territory to be quick and to happen quickly, but it is intriguing to note that the intervention in the Northern Territory, for example, warranted one day of inquiry, whereas this legislation of three full pages warranted a full three-day inquiry. But, having said that, I support the fact that we did it. I was pleased that the inquiry was able to travel to my home town of Cairns and we were able to hear evidence, particularly from people in the Douglas Shire, and people from the Northern Peninsula Area and the Torres Strait.

I was somewhat disappointed, though, that we only had a very short time to question the Australian Electoral Commission and the Department of Finance and Administration. Because other witnesses went over time, and that is fine, we did not have very long at all to speak with the AEC and to get an understanding of what their processes were, and would be, once this legislation has been passed. I was concerned in the short time that we did have to question the AEC that they indicated that the previously announced date for the plebiscite of 20 October was, to paraphrase the AEC, not achievable—essentially Mr Dacey said that that was certainly not going to be achieved. He indicated that, subsequent to the passage of this legislation through the parliament and royal assent being given, they would then wait for requests for ballots from various local authorities in the state of Queensland. Mr Dacey said very clearly that his priority was going to be the conduct of the federal election—that the federal election had priority. Whilst we are all very comforted by that, and we would not want to see the federal election processes compromised in any way, I am a bit concerned that people who live in the affected local government areas have an absolute expectation that this plebiscite will be conducted in a reasonable amount of time. There is no clarity—maybe Senator Fifield might be able to provide us with some—about when these ballots will be conducted. Mr Dacey did indicate that he expected, and it was his preference, that the most economical way and the way that he would like to conduct the ballot is through a postal ballot rather than an attendance ballot.

The other concern that I have is that I am unsure of what the process is going to be for the writing of the yes/no cases. Who is going to be asked to undertake that piece of work and how will they be vetted? We had some very good evidence from a past president of the Australian Local Government Association about the work they did for an amalgamation in his area. I hope that the AEC takes that advice on board.

I will now go to the effects of amalgamation and my concerns for my communities about what they might be. I will first turn to the Douglas Shire and quote from Councillor Mike Berwick, who is the Mayor of the Douglas Shire. He said to the committee:

Part of Australia’s heritage is regional and rural communities. Let’s look after them. Let’s keep them empowered. They have their own character; they are all different. Once you start joining us all together into big governments we start to lose our identity—and we are upset about it.

I concur with Councillor Berwick when it comes to the question of the Douglas Shire, but I need to place on the record that I am not opposed per se to amalgamations of local government. In fact, in February and March of 1995 I stood for local government and was elected to the amalgamated Cairns City Council. The reason that I stood for that election was that I live in the former Cairns City Council area but the concerns I had about development and the impacts of development in my community were in fact happening in the old Mulgrave Shire. Once those two councils were amalgamated, there was an opportunity to influence the direction of development in my region. I supported the amalgamation of Cairns City and Mulgrave shire, stood for election and was in fact elected. So I am not opposed per se to amalgamations, but I think we have to be careful about what we do and the areas that we do pull together in amalgamations of councils.

When the Local Government Reform Commission looked at the Douglas Shire I think they made a mistake. In every principle, every respect and every one of the terms of reference that the Local Government Reform Commission was given, the answer should have been that Douglas Shire should not be amalgamated with the Cairns City Council. It is geographically isolated. I think many of us have driven the road from Cairns to the Douglas Shire. It is not connected and never will be—I hope—connected by an urbanised area. It has a completely different catchment area. It has pressures on potential development not experienced by the Cairns City Council.

I was so concerned, once the Local Government Reform Commission brought down its findings, that I wrote on 3 August this year to the Premier of our state—and I am happy to table the document. I gave a number of reasons that supported my position that the Local Government Reform Commission had erred in recommending the amalgamation of Cairns with the Douglas Shire. I reminded the Premier that the Douglas Shire’s planning instrument and the processes used to achieve it won the Planning Institute of Australia’s Queensland planning award. I reminded the Premier that the shire is home to a number of land uses which, if not treated appropriately, could be seen as conflicting. ‘It is a credit’, I said, ‘to the councils and its officers that the planning instrument has received the support of the community and the recognition of the institute.’ I made the point that the Douglas Shire has successfully promoted community engagement with its constituency.

The residents of the Douglas Shire are a very diverse group of people. We have a very important sugarcane industry and we have an extraordinarily important tourism industry. We also have the reality that the Wet Tropics World Heritage area of both the Daintree township region—which is the Daintree National Park—and the area north of the Daintree River, which is listed as a World Heritage area, require consistent and vigilant planning instruments to ensure that we do not lose the goose that laid the golden egg. The Douglas Shire, with all those seemingly conflicted constituencies, has been able to come up with a planning instrument which everyone agrees with—and that is no mean feat.

The final point I made to the Premier was that, if the ratepayers of the Douglas Shire were paying more for their basic services—for their roads, their rubbish collection and their water supply—it would diminish my argument. But the ratepayers of the Douglas Shire pay less than similar land users in the Cairns City Council area. I was concerned and I wrote to the Premier about it and I am still of the view that the Local Government Reform Commission erred when it came to the Douglas Shire.

I was pleased to see Queensland respond to the pressure from both the Noosa Shire and the Douglas Shire and to the concerns in their communities about the loss of their iconic status. The Queensland government has spoken with Mayor Berwick and Mayor Abbot of Noosa Shire requesting them to input into what is going to be, as I understand it, legislation that will protect the iconic nature of both of those areas. But I can also say that I was fairly disappointed to read in the Port Douglas and Mossman Gazette last week that four of the councillors of the Douglas Shire have decided not to support involvement in this so-called iconic legislation. That is very disappointing, but it is interesting to note—given Senator Joyce’s very welcome defence of the environmental values of the Douglas Shire—that most of those four councillors who voted against involvement in the iconic legislation are aligned with the conservative side of politics, particularly the Liberal Party.

In the short time I have left I want to go to issues affecting the outer islands of the Torres Strait and the Northern Peninsula Area. There is strong opposition to amalgamation in that area, and I acknowledge that. I say, though, that there is a piece of work that has to be undertaken and undertaken quite quickly before amalgamations will occur, and that is to deal with the question of the ownership of enterprise. I am concerned with the loss of CDEP in the northern peninsula area that we have got two processes running in tandem that could end up in a disaster. Currently the five local government shires based in the Northern Peninsula Area all own enterprises and those enterprises are essentially staffed by CDEP workers. CDEP, as you know, is going to be taken away from those communities, and there is a real concern that those enterprises, viable only because of CDEP, will fold.

Finally, I commend Senator Kate Lundy for her work on constitutional recognition. In my first speech in this place I called on the government to recognise local government in the Constitution. I might see it happen if we get a Labor government, and I think that would be good for local government in Australia. I also commend Jim Turnour, who took the trouble to write a submission to the inquiry. I compare him to the Liberal Party candidate for Leichardt, who came along and grandstanded at the end without identifying herself as the candidate, rather than doing the right and proper thing and writing a submission to the inquiry. (Time expired)

Mitch Fifield (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Commonwealth Commonwealth Electoral Amendment (Democratic Plebiscites) Bill 2007. The bill amends the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 to allow the Australian Electoral Commission to use and disclose information for the purpose of conducting an activity such as a plebiscite. The bill also addresses any state and territory law that seeks to prevent or punish any person or entity from taking part in such an activity and causes such laws to have no effect. In other words, the bill seeks to restore a right which Queensland legislation had removed.

I am pleased to have the opportunity to address some remarks to this bill, having chaired the Senate’s Standing Committee on Finance and Public Administration’s inquiry into this legislation. The legislation was referred to the committee by the Senate on 16 August. Submissions were called for and three days of public hearings were held, on 30 and 31 August and 3 September, in Noosa, Emerald and Cairns respectively, and the committee presented its final report on 7 September.

The catalyst for this bill was the extraordinary actions of the Labor government in Queensland. It is worth running through the chain of events that led to the necessity for this legislation. The local government sector in Queensland until April of this year had been undertaking a voluntary process to examine its structure, operations and boundaries. The Size, Shape and Sustainability, or SSS, initiative was a collaborative approach between Queensland local governments and the Queensland state government and it had bipartisan support in the Queensland state parliament. It was supported by legislation and had a clear and agreed time line for progress. In its submission to the Senate inquiry, the Local Government Association of Queensland noted that 27 review groups and 117 councils were fully engaged in this process.

But then, suddenly, without warning, the Beattie government decided to scrap that process and unilaterally dictate forced amalgamations. The SSS initiative was abandoned. What was the rationale for Peter Beattie in abandoning this process? On the Insiders program on 19 August he said:

We just threw our hands up and said, ‘Look, after two years if you can only get four, you’ve got to be kidding.’

That is, only four councils agreeing to amalgamate. It sounds fair enough at face value: after two years you can only get four councils to amalgamate. One thing he left out was that it was actually a five-year process that the Queensland state government had signed up to, that local governments had signed up to, and that the Queensland state opposition had signed up to. So it is hardly surprising when you are barely 18 months through a five-year process that you do not actually have the end result that the process was designed to achieve. In the same interview, when Peter Beattie was talking about what would happen if that process were allowed to go the full distance, he said:

And the end of that process would have been a referendum by the way.

So initially, he entertained the very prospect of a referendum. He saw referendums as a necessary part of giving voice to the people and the wishes of people in Queensland, but he abandoned that.

On 17 April the Queensland government established a seven-member Queensland Local Government Reform Commission, getting rid of the SSS process. Only one month was allowed for submissions from stakeholders as part of that process. The commission brought down its report on 27 July. Amongst its 25 recommendations was the most controversial one: that the number of Queensland councils be reduced from 156 to 72.

In moving to implement these changes the Beattie government expressly removed any right of appeal against the reform commission’s recommendations. It is worth noting what the Queensland legislation actually said in relation to reviews. It said:

(1)

A designated decision

(a)

is final and conclusive; and

(b)

cannot be challenged, appealed against, reviewed, quashed, set aside, or called into question in another way, under the Judicial Review Act 1991 or otherwise (whether by the Supreme Court, another court, a tribunal or another entity); and

(c)

is not subject to any writ or order of the Supreme Court, another court, a tribunal or another entity on any ground.

(2)

Without limiting subsection (1), a person may not bring a proceeding for an injunction or any other order to stop or otherwise restrain the performance of a designated act, or for a declaration about the validity of a designated act.

And so on it goes. You get the feeling that they did not want anyone to have any avenue of appeal against their decision.

This leads us to the Commonwealth’s action. Without any avenue at all for appeal or redress, the Commonwealth thought that it was only fair and reasonable to offer some assistance to the people of Queensland to have their say. Already there is, in the Commonwealth Electoral Act, provision for local governments to hold plebiscites. That is something that was already there. The Commonwealth said it would fund local governments to conduct those plebiscites. The act already exists for those plebiscites to happen; all we were offering was to fund them. No legislation was required.

In response, Premier Beattie amended his own legislation so that any council that took advantage of the Commonwealth’s offer would be sacked. Any councillor who was involved in seeking to have a referendum would be fined. One can only presume that if they were fined, and did not pay, they would then go to jail. The ALP was saying, ‘We are going to force these amalgamations on you; we are not going to let you have a say and, if you try, we are going to whack you.’ So, on 10 August 2007, the Beattie government passed the Local Government Reform Implementation Act 2007, which banned local councils from conducting these polls. That was the action which prompted the Prime Minister to announce the legislation we are discussing today. Premier Beattie then announced that Queensland would challenge this legislation in the High Court. But, eventually, the absurdity of Premier Beattie’s position was clear even to him and he announced that the Queensland parliament would repeal the offending provisions.

Although Mr Beattie admitted that he had stuffed up, his appearance on the ABC Insiders program on 19 August had his and the government’s arrogance on full display. Whilst he would no longer stand in the way of plebiscites being conducted, Mr Beattie was forced to admit that he did not care what the people had to say. This is what Mr Beattie had to say:

If people want to have a protest and the Prime Minister wants to pay for that protest vote, then that’s fine by us; we’re not going to fine councils. But one thing everyone needs to understand is that amalgamations will go ahead, there will be no changes.

In other words, ‘you can have your say, but we’re not going to listen. We don’t care what you think.’

Despite Mr Beattie apparently withdrawing his threat to punish those who want to have a say, who want to hold a plebiscite, we still seek to pass this legislation, for two reasons. Firstly, and bizarrely, rather than seeking to amend the primary legislation in the Queensland parliament, the Queensland government has opted to seek to override the primary legislation by regulation. It is a pretty bizarre thing to do, and of dubious legal efficacy. This is despite the fact that the Queensland government has already introduced into their parliament amending legislation, which is sitting there waiting to be debated. They just cannot bring themselves to pass legislation to actually withdraw those punitive provisions.

Secondly, and most importantly, we are going to pass our legislation to protect against any future rush of blood to the head of any Queensland premier. This legislation is insurance against the Queensland government not removing those offending provisions or seeking to reintroduce them in the future.

One of the most poignant moments in our public hearings took place in Emerald, where we had a witness, Mr Robert Hayward, Chief Executive Officer of the Tambo Shire Council. While Mr Hayward was giving his evidence he very casually mentioned that he had paid for the Tambo Shire to have a plebiscite out of his own pocket. This is what the Queensland government’s legislation led to: situations where you had a council chief executive paying the $4,000—it was a fairly small shire—out of his own pocket in order to protect his councillors so that they could not be sacked and so that they could not be fined. That is the absurdity of the situation, where you have council chief executive officers putting their own hands in their pockets to fund plebiscites.

That instance so took the committee that we have recommended in our report that the Queensland state government reimburse Mr Hayward for the expenses he incurred and that, failing that, the Commonwealth government should give consideration to reimbursing Mr Hayward. But I would hope that the Queensland government would have the decency to reimburse him.

The committee also heard how important small local councils are in Queensland communities. I have to say: if you had asked me a year ago, I would have said that if you have local government areas with only 1,200 people in central western Queensland, of course they should be merged. If you had asked me, I would have said that a year ago. But listening to the evidence of these people was inspiring. Some of these local council employees in these shires staff the local SES, the fire brigade and the ambulance services purely in a voluntary capacity. If you merge these councils, you lose these councils’ staff in these towns, you will lose their SES, fire brigade and ambulance services. Although the government does not have a position on council amalgamations, I have to say that personally I would hate to see a council such as Tambo forcibly merged. These services are critical and may well be put at risk if forced council amalgamations take place.

Many witnesses before the committee testified on the various unique aspects of their councils, whether it be differences in maintenance standards, approaches to urban planning or simply the preservation of local identity. It was clear to the committee that local councils across Queensland are each representing their individual communities in their own ways—which is as it should be. Each council reflects the different priorities of their communities, and what is clear is that these amalgamations, conducted as they have been without proper consultation, will damage the ability of individual communities to determine their own priorities.

The forced amalgamations have also had significant implications for Indigenous communities. The Chair of the Torres Strait Regional Authority and Chair of the St Paul’s Island Council, Mr Toshie Kris, highlighted in his evidence, in Cairns, the challenge of having responsibilities arising from being partly bound by an international border. He told the committee:

There was no proper consultation throughout our region. It really distresses me. We are talking about a region that looks after more services than any other shire in the region, because we also deal with an international treaty right throughout our region. I would love to see how the Mayor of Cook Shire or the Mayor of Douglas Shire would deal with 10 canoes sitting on the beach with people with diseases ranging from TB and dengue to HIV. These are real issues that are happening throughout our region. It has been stated that our region is the eyes and ears of Australia. With the amalgamation process, the only thing left is the bare skull. There is a passage through that skull to Australia that no-one has really given any answers to.

Mr Joseph Elu, Chair of the Seisia Island Council, added that the amalgamations threaten their cultural heritage. ‘We feel we will lose our identity,’ he said.

The disgraceful handling of this process by the Queensland Labor government leaves that government condemned. It is what led to Dr Michael Taylor, President of the Noosa Shire Residents and Ratepayers Association, to declare, ‘I’m a lifelong Labor voter and I will never vote Labor again.’ But the incompetence and arrogance of the Queensland state Labor government pales in comparison to the rank hypocrisy of the federal Labor Party. Labor say that they support this bill, and I guess Senator McLucas came the closest to seeming vaguely enthusiastic about this bill—but, given her office is in Cairns, she would be practically lynched if she did not evidence some enthusiasm. Labor senators will soon file in here with the government to vote for and pass this bill. But if Labor support this bill, why didn’t one single Labor MP front the inquiry? The Nationals member for Maranoa, Bruce Scott, fronted up and gave evidence. The Liberal candidate for Leichhardt, Charlie McKillop, fronted up and gave evidence.

If Labor support this bill, why didn’t their MPs appear before the inquiry and give evidence to that effect? Why have Labor senators submitted a dissenting a report which amounts to nothing more than a partisan rant? Why are Labor senators attacking the inquiry process and carping at the conduct of the hearings? And why are Labor senators saying that this bill is a stunt? Most of all, why hasn’t anyone in the Labor Party publicly and forcefully called on the Queensland Labor government to pull their head in? Even during the debate on this bill in the House this week, Labor members were running the line that the bill was really unnecessary. If it is so unnecessary, why are Labor recommending that the bill be passed? If it is so unnecessary, why don’t Labor have the courage to vote against it?

It is also noteworthy that not a single Labor member from Queensland had the mettle to speak in support of the bill in the House. They have left the task to their interstate colleagues to tackle an issue of fundamental importance to their constituents and their state. What weak and spineless representation the Labor Party provide for their constituents in Queensland. The truth is that Labor are again trying to walk both sides of the street. They are trying to be seen to be supportive of local communities in Queensland, for reasons of political self-interest, but at the same time they are scared of confronting their party colleagues in Queensland in a meaningful way—in a way that will get results. It is yet another exhibit in a growing catalogue of evidence that demonstrates how federal Labor would merely be a patsy for the state Labor governments. They are not willing to stand up to them, and you can bet your house that, if Labor had been in government federally, they never would have introduced legislation like this and they never would have stood up for the democratic rights of communities in Queensland.

Senators Forshaw and Moore drew to the attention of witnesses over and over again—as Senator McLucas did a moment ago—that Mr Rudd is on the record criticising the amalgamation process before Mr Howard was on the record. My response to that is: so what? Did Mr Rudd’s comments have any effect on the Queensland government? No. Did Mr Rudd introduce legislation into the parliament to override the Queensland legislation? No. What matters to the people of Queensland is not what people said but what they did and who took action. This government is taking action, initiated by us—not initiated by senators on the other side.

Maybe the Labor candidates and members in Queensland were taking their orders from a union boss. In this case, they may well have been following the directive of Bill Ludwig. The Australian helpfully exposed Mr Ludwig’s intervention on 16 August. That article said:

Mr Ludwig said yesterday he had told his Right faction federal candidates in Queensland to ‘pull their heads in’ and not to support Coalition attacks on Mr Beattie over the amalgamations. ‘I’ve sent the word out to the candidates. What the state Government has done is fair,’ he said.

These unions have a funny sense of fairness. On the one hand they say that our workplace relations policies that have delivered higher wages and hundreds of thousands of new jobs are unfair. Yet abandoning a functioning process, ramming through a flawed amalgamations process without consultation, and then threatening to sack and fine those who dare to ask their communities what they think is ‘fair’ according to people like Bill Ludwig. What a joke. When are we going to hear Labor senators opposite rebuke the likes of Bill Ludwig? I am tipping the answer is ‘never’. We will just hear silence.

No wonder the unions are happy with what is occurring. The Labor government in Queensland has stipulated that local transition committees be formed to guide shires through their amalgamation process. I guess that sounds fair enough, but those committees can contain up to three union officials. The committee heard evidence that, unlike the other members of these committees, these union officials are rarely locals. Unions win; local communities lose. On this side of the chamber, we are proud of this legislation. We are actually enthusiastic about this legislation. We are not dragging our heels in here to vote for it reluctantly. We are keen and eager to do it and cannot wait. We are pleased that, through our Senate inquiry, the people of Queensland were able to have a voice, and we look forward to seeing them expressing their views via plebiscites.

But not everyone was so enthusiastic about the Senate committee process. In a letter dripping with vitriol, addressed to the Special Minister of State, Queensland local government minister Andrew Fraser wrote:

… there is absolutely no public benefit in the course of inquiry being undertaken by the committee. It represents an abuse of the majority the Howard government holds in the Senate ...

This inquiry is exposed for what it, in reality, always was: a sham, taxpayer-funded touring circus for Howard government mouthpieces to peddle unconstitutional false hope.

‘Howard government mouthpieces’ is a little offensive to the Labor senators on the committee, I would think. He goes on:

Port Douglas and Noosa are, granted, nice places to visit; especially when compared to Canberra’s wintry August. But the inquiry, like the bill itself, is just a cruel hoax.

I can assure Mr Fraser that this bill is not a cruel hoax. It is intended to give a voice and a say back to the people of Queensland. We are determined to pass this legislation. We think it is important legislation. Never before have many of us on this side of the chamber seen the democratic right of people to have their say stomped on the way we have seen it in Queensland. Local communities need this bill to ensure that they are never again denied their say.

Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance and Administration) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The government firmly believes—

Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Come on! You don’t believe that at all!

Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance and Administration) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I certainly do, and you might hang around for some comments in committee, Senator. The government firmly believes that it is important for people to have a democratic say in matters that will affect them. The Commonwealth Electoral Amendment (Democratic Plebiscites) Bill 2007 will achieve this for all Australians, not just for the people of Queensland. I welcome the support of my fellow senators for this bill and I welcome the unanimous recommendation by the Senate Standing Committee on Finance and Public Administration in its report on its recent inquiry into this bill, namely that the bill should be passed. I note that the committee made three other recommendations. I will return to these at a later stage.

I would like to thank the committee for their comprehensive inquiry into the matters associated with the bill. As senators are aware, this bill gives effect to the Prime Minister’s announcement on 7 August 2007 to allow the Australian Electoral Commission to undertake any plebiscite on the amalgamation of any local governing body in any part of Australia. This was in response to the Queensland parliament passing a law on 10 August 2007 which would have prevented councillors in that state from having any involvement with a plebiscite on local government matters. We welcome the Queensland government’s backdown over its threat to penalise councillors for conducting or taking part in any plebiscites on local government matters. This was in direct response to this government’s sustained pressure to allow Queenslanders to express their views on the amalgamations without penalty.

This government did not intend to stand by idly while the Queensland government prevented councillors in that state from having any involvement with a plebiscite on local government matters. This government was, and is, prepared to have Commonwealth legislation override any draconian laws such as those passed in Queensland. As the Prime Minister has reiterated on a number of occasions, this government is not expressing a view on whether or not an individual amalgamation should occur. Rather, the Commonwealth believes that people should have the right to express a view on the actions of a government without threat of penalty. This bill achieves this outcome.

Since 1992, the Australian Electoral Commission has had the ability to enter into arrangements to supply goods and services to a person or body. The Australian Electoral Commission presently conducts elections for trade unions, for employer and other organisations, and for other foreign countries. This bill does not propose that the Australian Electoral Commission perform different functions. Rather, what it does is clarify that the use and disclosure of information by the Australian Electoral Commission is authorised for the purpose of conducting an activity such as a plebiscite.

Contrary to some media reports and commentary on this bill, the government is not directing the AEC to undertake any particular plebiscite activity. The AEC retains its independence under this bill. The bill does not contain a power for anyone to direct the AEC to undertake a plebiscite or similar activity. Clarifying that the Australian Electoral Commission has the authority to use and disclose information it holds will ensure that people are able to express their views on proposals that may affect their democratic rights. Because this government is committed to ensuring that people are able to express their views on proposals that may affect their democratic rights, the bill also contains provisions that override state or territory laws if those laws seek to prohibit, penalise or discriminate against anyone for entering into, or proposing to enter into, an arrangement with the Australian Electoral Commission. The timing for any activity, such as a plebiscite, as part of an arrangement entered into following the passage of this bill, will be determined by the Australian Electoral Commission.

Turning to the Senate committee’s recommendations in its report, the government notes the recommendation relating to the reimbursement of expenses incurred by Mr Hayward, the Chief Executive Officer of the Tambo Shire Council, in recognition of the expenses he incurred in funding its plebiscite in an effort to give the community a say and to protect its councillors from punitive fines and dismissal. Failing that, the committee recommended that the Commonwealth government, consistent with its policy of funding local government plebiscites in Queensland, consider reimbursing Mr Hayward. The Australian government considers that Mr Hayward should be reimbursed for the expenses he incurred in funding a plebiscite on the proposed amalgamation of the council. He made his arrangements in the light of the Queensland approach which removed a previous right to hold such plebiscites. The Australian government believes that either the Tambo shire or the Queensland government should be responsible for making the reimbursement.

In relation to the recommendation for continuing dialogue with local government on constitutional recognition, the government supports this in principle. The Australian government has an ongoing dialogue with individual local governments as well as local government representative organisations. The issue of constitutional recognition of local government has been unsuccessful in two previous referenda and the Australian government is not convinced at this stage that another referendum would have a different result. The Australian government is open to further consultation with local government representative organisations regarding the objectives and form of the sector’s proposals for constitutional recognition.

Debate interrupted.