Rex Patrick (SA, Nick Xenophon Team) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Customs Amendment (Safer Cladding) Bill 2017 responds in part to a recommendation made by the Senate Economics References Committee's inquiry into the effects of non-conforming building products on Australian building and construction. This bill was sponsored by former Senator Xenophon and introduced into the Senate by former Senator Kakoschke-Moore in September last year. I was heavily involved in the Senate inquiry as an adviser to the former Senator Xenophon and I'm pleased that I am in a position to continue advocating on the issue, which affects people right across the country. The bill amends the Customs Act 1901 to expressly ban the importation of polyethylene-core aluminium composite panels.

I will say at the outset that I acknowledge that this bill is not a silver bullet. Banning PE ACP may appear to be a knee-jerk reaction, but the risks are just too high. The use of non-conforming building products in the building and construction industry was the subject of a Senate inquiry which began in June 2015. The Senate Standing Committee on Economics has tabled three interim reports, with this bill responding to recommendation 1 of the second interim report, which was tabled on 6 September last year. At page 10 the report states the following in relation to PE ACP:

The committee understands that under the NCC in its current form, there are compliant uses for PE core ACPs in low-rise buildings, as well as pathways through performance-based solutions to allow the use of PE core ACPs in high-rise buildings. The committee also understands that the signage industry uses PE core ACPs.

In light of the Grenfell Tower fire tragedy, the committee does not consider there to be any legitimate use of PE core ACPs on any building type. The committee believes that as there are safe non-flammable and fire retardant alternatives available there is no place for PE core ACPs in the Australian market. While Australian Border Force and suppliers of ACM are currently unable to determine whether an imported building product will be used in a compliant manner, the committee believes a ban on importation should be placed on all PE core ACPs. In addition, the sale and use of PE core ACPs should be banned domestically.

The cladding issue is a most serious public safety issue that requires urgent attention. The issue was brought to the public's attention in November 2014 when the Lacrosse building in Docklands in Melbourne caught fire. Since that time, governments, both federal and state, have failed to respond adequately. The Lacrosse incident was the trigger for the Senate inquiry. The Lacrosse apartment building in Docklands had aluminium cladding fixed to its exterior. Flames raced up several floors and it was only through sheer luck that no lives were lost. Builders who consciously chose to cut costs by using non-compliant panels saved only about $3 per square metre, putting profit ahead of lives. Australian fire safety engineer Dr Tony Enright stated on an ABC Four Corners program examining PE cladding:

A kilogram of polyethylene will release the same amount of energy as a kilogram of petrol, and it gets worse than that because polyethylene is denser than petrol too, so that's about, a kilogram of polyethylene is like about one and a bit, one and a half litres of petrol. If you look at a one metre by one metre square section [of PE core ACP cladding] that will have about three kilograms, the equivalent of about five litres of petrol.

He talked about, basically, wrapping buildings in petrol.

Unless the states and territories act with a great sense of urgency, the only way is to legislate to stop bringing this potentially lethal product into the country. We cannot, under any circumstances, bear the tragedy that occurred in London with the Grenfell Tower tragedy. We must prevent any risk of that happening here. There needs to be urgent action from the Commonwealth and states to complete audits of all suspect buildings and houses so that remediation can be carried out and people can work and live safely in them.

The Property Council of Australia has publicly supported the ban on PE cladding, stating that although it was a complex issue:

… we share the same desire as government to prioritise public safety in light of valid concerns about the use of PE cladding.

In October last year, as a result of the SA state government's cladding audit, almost 200 buildings in Adelaide's CBD were identified as being of concern and potentially built with composite panels. The Advertiser revealed, through documents obtained under FOI:

… 140 buildings had facades that are possibly clad with ACP cladding, 45 buildings with entry canopies that are possibly clad, and 10 buildings under construction that have indications of ACP cladding.

Just five days ago The Advertiser reported that city buildings greater than 25 metres tall are suspected to contain potentially flammable cladding. Identified buildings that were reported as needing further investigation include the new Royal Adelaide Hospital, the Adelaide Oval, the Adelaide Convention Centre, the Riverside office building and the Colonel Light Centre building.

During phase 1 of the South Australian audit, 20 councils self-reported buildings that warranted further consideration and investigation, including 77 in the city council area, seven in Unley, five in Murray Bridge, three in Campbelltown and one each in Gawler, Port Lincoln and Kangaroo Island.

It is a simple test to identify whether cladding contains the cheap, flammable polyethylene or the slightly more expensive version treated with fire retardant. The Senate inquiry heard disturbing evidence that dangerous and non-compliant goods were coming into the country undetected and, in some cases, with false or forged compliance documents. Whilst the Australian Border Force and suppliers of aluminium composite materials are currently unable to determine whether an imported building product will be used in a compliant manner, a ban on importation is necessary to prevent any disasters such as the Grenfell Tower tragedy occurring in Australia.

I acknowledge the work done by Assistant Minister Craig Laundy and the Building Ministers' Forum. I understand the Building Ministers' Forum has commissioned Professor Peter Shergold AC and Bronwyn Weir to assess problems in compliance and enforcement within the building and construction system across Australia, and that a national cladding audit is underway.

In closing, I would like to quote Adam Dalrymple, Director of Fire Safety of the Melbourne Metropolitan Fire Brigade. In his evidence to the Senate committee, describing the Lacrosse fire in Melbourne as one that alone could have claimed hundreds of lives if things had turned out a little differently, he said:

We were probably really lucky that did not happen on that occasion. What we are saying here is that fire safety really should not be a matter of good luck.

Addressing the risks associated with non-conforming building products is an ongoing issue and this bill represents just one piece of the puzzle. But it is so important we don't leave the issue of fire safety to good luck. I commend the bill to the Senate and urge all of my colleagues in the Senate to support it.

Jane Hume (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on the private senator's bill submitted for consideration to this place by our former colleague and former senator Nick Xenophon, the Customs Amendment (Safer Cladding) Bill 2017. While I know that its intentions are worthy, indeed, this bill seeks to use border controls to restrict the importation of aluminium composite panel. This bill is misguided—it is misguided overreach, ill-considered and knee-jerk politics, with significant unintended consequences. To some extent it does reek of rank populism. This bill seeks to capitalise on the Grenfell Tower tragedy in London in an erroneous attempt to compare that with the Australian situation. This is simply poor legislation without thought to the nuances and complexities of the Australian context. The government therefore cannot support this bill.

The government recognises that there is genuine community concern about non-compliant use of combustible external wall cladding in Australia. The safety of occupants in high-rise buildings, including fire safety, of course, is a priority for the Australian government. But, while the problem that this bill attempts to solve is very important, the solution that is presented in this bill will not actually fix the problem it intends to address.

Aluminium composite panels, or ACPs, including polyethylene-core aluminium composite panels, which are referred to as PE ACPs, are a safe and legitimate building product in Australia, if they are used appropriately and in compliance in the National Construction Code. The introduction of border controls to restrict importation of a legitimate product would neither be effective nor practical to implement.

These products are not just used in high-rise buildings, which are the concern of this bill; in fact, most of these products are imported by Australian businesses for use in signage and in interior design. So we should be managing cladding, not banning it. This is an unnecessary simplification of a policy problem that is, frankly, I think, beneath this place. Banning the importation of ACPs would have unintended consequences for those businesses that use the product correctly, legitimately and legally. We need to ensure that the public has confidence in their built environment, and the coalition takes that responsibility very seriously, but banning a specific product that has legitimate uses outside of high-rise buildings is not the answer.

Like many Australians, the video footage of the Grenfell Tower tragedy in June last year is indelibly seared on my memory, as it is on all of ours. The day of 14 June 2017 was indeed a tragic day: 71 people lost their lives and over 70 people were injured. While more than 220 escaped the inferno, occupants of 23 of the 129 flats there tragically lost their lives that day, and I, like many Australians, express my sincere and heartfelt sympathy for the residents and families affected. However, it really is unreasonable to draw alarmist comparisons between the United Kingdom and the safety of Australia's high-rise buildings. Put simply, an apartment block such as the one that caught fire in Grenfell in London could not comply with Australia's National Construction Code.

The inquiry into the Grenfell Tower is ongoing, and recommendations are yet to be finalised, but we do know that the building was constructed in the 1970s; it lacked many standard fire safety features of modern buildings, like fire sprinklers; and it had only one isolated staircase for evacuation. The combination of these factors seems to have contributed to the spread of the fire and to the unfortunate and tragic loss of life. In Australia, the National Construction Code has very strict fire safety requirements for high-rise apartment buildings. Specifically, while requirements vary with a building's size, the provisions include things like smoke detection and occupant warning systems; fire-isolated exits, such as exit stairs; more than one exit for each storey; exclusion of smoke from exit stairs; fire sprinklers; fire-resistant construction to limit the spread of fire between apartments and storeys; non-combustible external walls resistant to collapse as a result of fire; and features to assist the fire brigade's operation, such as fire hydrants.

Similarly, the Lacrosse building fire in Victoria, in my home town of Melbourne, in November 2014 was extremely frightening, and there were over 300 people evacuated from that building. There was, thankfully, no loss of life. External cladding in that situation was indeed a factor; however, it's important to understand that the Lacrosse fire was caused by a compliance issue, not by an issue with the product itself. ACPs are a legitimate building product in Australia and, if used appropriately and in compliance with the National Construction Code, are perfectly safe. If they are used in a noncompliant manner, as was the case in the Lacrosse fire in Melbourne in 2014, then they can contribute dramatically to the spread of fire.

The National Construction Code does not permit the use of combustible material in the external wall cladding of high-rise buildings, and this has been the case in Australia since the 1990s. The underlying problems at Lacrosse were due to failures in practitioner competency and state government administrative compliance systems. The Melbourne Metropolitan Fire Brigade concluded that the cladding on the building did not comply with the National Construction Code. The Victorian Building Authority has also conducted an investigation and is undertaking disciplinary action against the building surveyors. The Australian Building Codes Board office found also that the underlying problems at Lacrosse were due to failures in two specific things: practitioner competency and state government administrative compliance systems.

So, on 14 December 2016, the Building Ministers' Forum agreed to implement a comprehensive package of measures to address these concerns of noncompliant use of wall cladding and fire safety in high-rise buildings, and that package of measures included such things as referencing a contemporary and rigorous testing standard based on international best practice for full-scale testing of fire performance of external facade systems; providing rigorous, contemporary and clear National Construction Code requirements to improve the application and compliance; enhancing onsite checking, auditing and enforcement; providing practitioners with the tools and supporting materials to support compliance with the national code; and, finally, increasing awareness of the potential risks associated with noncompliance.

What are ACPs? They have multiple uses in building construction. They're a flat-sheet material faced with a thin aluminium sheet on either side of a core material. They're a legitimate product with a multitude of uses, including in advertising, signage, interior design and caravans and trailers, and refrigerators and freezers use them in applications as well. So banning the product itself is not the answer. All building work in Australia must meet certain performance and legal requirements, and this ensures that our buildings are safe, healthy and durable, which means that we can have confidence in their performance.

There is a very big difference, however, between building products that are not legitimate and shouldn't be used at all and building products that are legitimate but are installed in a way that isn't compliant with the National Construction Code. It's critically important to note the difference, as these two issues are often erroneously conflated. Non-conforming products, for instance, are products that claim to be something they're not, don't meet the required standard for their intended use or are marketed and supplied with the intent to deceive the user—for example, windows that are marketed as safety glass that don't actually conform to our glass building standards or insulation that is marketed as having a higher thermal resistance than it actually achieves when it's tested.

A non-compliant product, however, is different. They're legitimate products that are used or installed in a way that doesn't necessarily comply with the National Construction Code—for example, using a wood product in place of a steel structure which isn't capable of meeting the durability requirements of the National Construction Code. In this instance, it would not be a problem with the product, but it would be a problem with compliance with the code.

Banning all ACPs will not fix the problem. The introduction of border controls to restrict the importation of building products is not possible, nor is it practical. The majority of complaints that were made to the Joint Accreditation System of Australia and New Zealand over building products were actually concerned with domestically manufactured, not necessarily imported, building products. The cladding products in this bill are, in fact, legitimate products which, if used in a way that is not compliant with the National Construction Code, can, in fact, pose a threat, but their mere existence doesn't make them a threat. It's their incorrect use that makes them a threat.

The opposition senators recognised in a Senate committee interim report into composite cladding that these products can be legitimately used, yet they still want to ban them. To ban aluminium composite panels at the border is a significant overreaction. It won't fix the actual problem, and it will destroy thousands of small businesses, particularly those in the signage industry, that use this product legitimately and legally. Banning products will not solve the issue.

The proposed introduction of a border control to restrict the importation of aluminium composite panels is, as I said, neither possible nor practical. It's not possible because we live in a global economy with free trade. As we manufacture ACPs domestically, Australia must act in a manner consistent with our international trade obligations. Technical regulations and standards must not be trade restrictive to overseas manufacturers where there is no domestic restriction on the manufacture of the product. The proposed prohibition would also likely breach Australia's commitment to the World Trade Organization's General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, and also our free trade agreements. It's also not practical to restrict importation as most PE ACPs are imported by Australian businesses for use in signage and interior design, and not necessarily used for external cladding. Specifically, the Department of Immigration and Border Protection pointed out, during the Senate Economics References Committee inquiry, that the Australian Border Force has no ability to determine the end use of these particular goods at the point of importation when they actually cross the border, or whether or not these products will be used in a manner which is compliant with the National Construction Code. So, even if a product was imported for a purportedly legitimate purpose, the Australian Border Force has no control over whether that product is then used for the reason it was imported. Screening would, therefore, impose a range of costs on the industry, it would slow down clearance times for imported goods and it would also unnecessarily divert resources from the enforcement of important border controls for products like asbestos, drugs and weapons.

From a governance perspective, a stronger compliance and enforcement framework for the building and construct industry would likely prove a more effective approach than trying to impose an ineffective and expensive series of border controls. The coalition government has already gone a long way to addressing this particular problem. In the wake of the Grenfell Tower fire, there is concern in the community about combustible material in high-rise buildings, so we've been working with state and territory building ministers to implement multiple reforms to prevent the misuse of aluminium composite panels and ensure the safety of Australia's built environment. There have been a number of ways we've gone about doing this.

First of all, the government has reinvigorated the Building Ministers' Forum, which is convened by the Australian government and made up of each of the state and territory building ministers. It is responsible for building and plumbing policy and regulation. The forum is chaired by the federal minister, and Minister Laundy has performed in this role since 2016. We've made it easier to identify these particular products. The government has been cracking down on inappropriate advertising and labelling of ACPs to ensure the correct use of those products and is introducing a new system of permanent labelling on cladding products to prevent product substitution. We've also been tracking the distribution of these products. The government has instigated a pilot program with the cladding industry and the New South Wales government to track the movements of products from the wholesaler to the building site. The pilot program involves several manufacturers and distributors of external wall-cladding products, who have agreed to provide product distribution data to the New South Wales Data Analytics Centre for analysis. The analysed data will assist the New South Wales building regulator to track what and where these products are being used for throughout the state, greatly assisting the regulator's compliance-monitoring capability. We have also improved fire-testing standards, introducing a new fire-testing standard in the National Construction Code for external wall-cladding products.

The government has improved compliance with the National Construction Code. Through the Building Ministers' Forum, the Commonwealth has encouraged states and territories to use their available laws and powers to prevent the use of ACPs on buildings of more than three storeys. The Building Ministers' Forum has also directed the Australian Building Codes Board to expedite the implementation of measures through the National Construction Code which prevent the use of noncompliant cladding. In addition, the Building Ministers' Forum, with the Australian Building Codes Board, has created a website providing information about noncompliant building products which allows members of the public to submit a complaint or an inquiry about a particular product.

We are implementing audits to ensure the compliance of existing buildings. This is particularly important. The Prime Minister has called on the state and territory premiers and chief ministers to undertake a nationwide audit of high-rise buildings to identify the extent to which noncompliant cladding is in fact an issue across Australia. The Building Ministers' Forum is overseeing the cladding audits and reviews that are underway across the states and territories.

Finally, we have established, as Senator Patrick mentioned, an expert assessment of compliance and enforcement systems. On a suggestion from the Commonwealth, the Building Ministers' Forum has commissioned a report by two independent experts, Ms Bronwyn Weir and Professor Peter Shergold AC, on the compliance and enforcement issues affecting the implementation of the National Construction Code. Their assessment is examining a number of elements that form a part of the building and construction regulatory system, including things like licensing and accreditation, certification and inspections, quality controls and assurance processes and, of course, auditing and enforcement practices. The outcome of their report will be to make recommendations for a national best practice model for compliance and enforcement to strengthen the effective implementation of the National Construction Code. Professor Shergold and Ms Weir presented the building ministers with their initial findings in December last year at a special meeting of the Building Ministers' Forum. The ministers were confident that this very important work is on track and that the relevant stakeholders had been providing meaningful input to their considerations. Professor Shergold and Ms Weir are expected to provide their final report to the Building Ministers' Forum very soon.

National Construction Code amendments have been made. The Building Ministers' Forum has also directed the Australian Building Codes Board to expedite the implementation of a comprehensive package of measures to prevent the use of noncompliant wall cladding on high-rise buildings through amendments to the National Construction Code 2016. These will take place from March this year and include things like implementing a far more rigorous testing standard to determine the fire safety of external wall assemblies; a new verification method to demonstrate compliance with performance requirements of the National Construction Code; increased stringency for the sprinkler protection of balconies on residential buildings in particular, through referencing a revised standard for automatic fire-sprinkler systems; clarifying language within the National Construction Code relating to the use of external wall claddings and attachments; and introducing stricter compliance documentation in the National Construction Code's evidence-of-suitability provisions.

You can see that the government has taken the concerns of the Australian people about the safety of our built environment very seriously indeed. Australia already has a National Construction Code that is undoubtedly among the world's best. The issue of aluminium composite panels, ACPs, is very complex and highly sensitive. We should not let the fearmongering espoused by others in the chamber deceive us. There are significant differences between products like asbestos, a genuine non-conforming building product which is illegal to use in Australia; nonconforming products like infinity cables, which cannot be used safely; and ACPs, which in certain contexts are quite appropriate and fit for purpose but, used in the wrong context, can pose significant risks. Let's not forget that ACPs are legitimate products. There are a multitude of safe uses for ACPs, such as advertising signage, interior design features, caravans and trailers, and refrigerators and freezers. There are multiple uses for this product that those opposite would consider banning.

The issue that needs to be addressed in response to concerns about the use of combustible materials in high-rise buildings is not the building products themselves, which are legitimate products when used in compliance with the National Construction Code, but ensuring appropriate compliance and enforcement within Australia's building and construction system. That's why the Australian government, through its Building Ministers' Forum, is taking a leadership role in driving reforms with the states and territories to ensure that Australians continue to have confidence in the safety of our built environment. Implementing a ban on imports of this product would be neither an effective nor a practical restriction on the building industry. Senator Patrick is correct: this bill is not a silver bullet. It is in fact an ill-advised carpet-bombing campaign that will destroy legitimate businesses. The government therefore cannot support this private senator's bill.

Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Labor supports the principles behind this Customs Amendment (Safer Cladding) Bill 2017 of Senator Patrick's—but why wouldn't you? It's clearly an appropriate response to the Senate committee inquiry which, under the very strong leadership of my colleague Senator Ketter here, dealt with the evidence and was able to demonstrate comprehensively just why it was so necessary for the Commonwealth to respond. Senator Hume said that's not necessary, because we have the National Construction Code.

The National Construction Code is grossly inadequate. It is not fit for purpose. Anyone that had heard the evidence or attended the meetings—which Senator Hume, unfortunately, did not—or the department, if it had studied the evidence, would have known that. I presume the department provides advice to the parliamentary secretary, now the minister, in regard to these matters. They would have heard evidence that the National Construction Code has so many holes in it these days that you could fly a squadron of F-18s through it. I say that in deference to Acting Deputy President Fawcett here. There is no question now that the National Construction Code is no longer fit for purpose.

The evidence I cite is from the general manager of the Australian Building Codes Board, Neil Savery, who observed that the industry had changed dramatically in recent decades, with deregulation and globalisation making it harder to ensure that buildings were built to certain standards. Mr Savery noted that a sophisticated performance based code of regulation was introduced in the early 1990s, which needed highly qualified people to understand how it worked. He said that governments had run the building certifications but then they had been privatised; the industry had undergone a process of deregulation; and there had been example after example of reductions in the level of public scrutiny, of public accountability, for the building industry as a result of reductions, for instance, in mandatory inspections.

So we now have a situation under the Building Code—and we call this 'innovation' in some quarters—where this industry is able to unilaterally change the arrangements entered into, where a builder-developer could have alternative standards put forward on the basis that they were deemed to be satisfactory, that they were claimed to be performance based provisions under the code and that they were said to be equivalent to these comprehensive, sophisticated performance based regulations. As a consequence, design features that were allegedly compliant with the code were being implemented and, of course, were not fit for purpose. The persons that were responsible for claiming and certifying that these buildings were in fact compliant were the same people who were being paid by those developers under this privatised deregulated system, to the point where we were not to know whether or not any document signed reflected the true situation of the state of the building.

The Senate committee heard evidence of the systematic failure—systematic failure—of the regulatory regime in this country: widespread document fraud, product substitution, corruption and wilful ignorance. The process of deregulation had led to the inertia of public authorities across this country, and, when the response came in, it was characterised by buck-passing and turning a blind eye to these corrupt practices. This was the hallmark of the new age of deregulation. What a triumph! What a triumph for neoliberalism. The public safety of this country had been put at risk; tens of thousands of buildings have been put up in this country, clad in this highly dangerous material. For what? For profit and greed. What was the evidence put to the committee? The net advantage was $8 per square metre. That was the cost saving.

We were told that people who raised concerns about this were fearmongering. Internationally, we've seen the experience in the United Kingdom. We've seen it in Dubai, where the Torch Tower, as it's called, has actually caught fire twice. It's a modern building, and it caught fire twice. In Australia, we have seen 14 cases of fires. We've seen it with the Lacrosse building in Melbourne—a modern building. We've seen many other buildings that have caught fire. We've seen senior fire officer after senior fire officer draw to our attention that the question of whether or not we'll have a loss of life here is a question of good luck, not good management. So, in the name of deregulation, in the name of innovation, we're now told that public safety can be put at risk, that that is all right and that business as usual should follow.

In fact, what we've got is the government blathering about these circumstances, saying, 'Oh, well, this couldn't happen here.' What was the evidence before the Senate committee? It was not just that there had been fires but, we're told: 'We've got this magnificent Building Code, which, of course, provides us with the security we need.' We've got sprinkler systems in this country, we're told, unlike in the United Kingdom.

The Senate was told by senior fire officers in this country, not by some wide-eyed bolshevik but by senior fire officers, that an audit was undertaken in 2014 of 71 five-star hotels in the city of Brisbane in preparation for the G20—after all, we were only hosting the world leaders, including the President of the United States and the President of the Russian Federation. What was found in those 71 five-star hotels in regard to their sprinkler systems? Sixty-eight of the 71 failed the audit. We were told that under the present Building Code if a proprietor doesn't like the results that he's getting from a surveyor, he gets in another surveyor who'll give him the results that he wants. After all, he's paying for it. He'll get the results he wants or he'll go to another surveyor until he does.

We were told that concerns we were raising in these matters were of no consequence, that we were fearmongering: 'There's no problem here.' It wasn't a question about the use of this product. After all, people use it for signs. How pathetic. There's no other product we can use for signage in this country that's not dangerous? We were told, 'Oh, well, we can't guarantee what it will be used for.' That's exactly the reason why you should ban this material. Is there any doubt about how flammable this material is? The CSIRO, when it undertook its test, had to stop the test because it was destroying their equipment because it was so flammable, so dangerous.

It isn't just a question of a few rogues. When the audits were done—for instance, in the state of Victoria—they found, I think, 1,400 buildings in the state of Victoria with this cladding on them, including the building of the department in Victoria that actually issues the permits, the department of planning, which is covered in this stuff. What did they find among the 1,400 buildings that they've acknowledged? They found the failings:

… weren't merely administrative or paper based problems. There were significant public safety issues, which are symptomatic of broader non-compliance across a range of areas within the industry.

They said there were three factors, predominantly:

… the supply and marketing of inappropriate building materials, a poor culture of compliance … and the failure of the regulatory system to deal with these issues.

The task force said there was:

there were—

and there is—

Hence why I say there are claims that they can find alternatives, such as 'deemed to satisfy' under the Building Code and they can have a so-called performance based model under the Building Code to allow this stuff to be put on buildings, despite the claims that there will be an absolute prohibition on this product being put on buildings. If there is such an absolute prohibition, how is it that there are so many thousands of buildings in this country clad in this material?

The report went on to say that there was:

… substitution of non-compliant products between the approval phase and the construction phase …

As I said, there is widespread fraud and widespread criminal behaviour in the Australian building industry.

Now, that's why we in the Labor Party have said: 'We can't muck around with this stuff. It's too serious. Public safety is a fundamental responsibility of the state.' There is no excuse here, no excuse whatsoever. No number of government committees or senior officers groups, no amount of fudging and no amount of turning a blind eye will take away the fundamental responsibility of the state for public safety. The government's role in public safety is critical. The government has an obligation; after all, it is the National Construction Code. Buck-passing won't cut it anymore. It's no good saying: 'Oh, it's someone else's responsibility. Oh, it's the state's responsibility. Oh, it's the local government's responsibility. Oh, it's the surveyor's responsibility. Oh, it's the architect's responsibility. Oh, it's the builder's responsibility.' That's why we in the Labor Party say that there should be a total ban on the importation, sale and use of aluminium panels with a polyethylene core.

But we also say this: to put accountability back in the system there has to be a national licensing scheme for all building practitioners. We've actually got to make people accountable for what goes into the building on the building site itself and, if people don't comply, they should lose their licences. What do we say to a medical practitioner who commits an offence? We say, 'We'll take away your licence.' Why shouldn't it be the case in the building industry? We say there should be strong penalties—not this tap on the wrist and not yet another example of: 'Oh, dear, dear, dear, you've been a shocking boy or girl. You're in breach of the national code.' We say there should be strong penalties for practitioners or firms who breach the National Construction Code.

We say also, though, that this idea that the junior minister—in this case, Minister Laundy—chairs the Building Ministers' Forum is a joke. What a joke! He actually wrote to the Senate committee and said that the Senate committee should be doing the enforcement of the building code. He has such a poor understanding of his responsibilities that he doesn't understand the difference between the legislative role of government, the responsibilities of government and, of course, the parliament. Of course, what is he? He's the minister for what? I just want to get his title here. Where is his title now? He is the minister for small and family business and he's the minister for workplace relations. Oh, and he's the minister for deregulation. He's the minister who has responsibilities for the very problem that caused this issue: deregulation! He has a huge interest in the re-regulation of the building industry, hasn't he? Given his public statements he's got a real understanding. How pitiful!

This is a government whose reshuffle before Christmas left us with no science minister, no industry minister and, of course, no building minister, because this is not the responsibility for the Minister for Small and Family Business, Workplace Relations and Deregulation. Is there any reason why anyone in the building industry would take this government seriously, given these circumstances?

The real point that does come to mind here, and what we're finding right across the states, is that the Senior Officers' Group has made some interesting recommendations. They've had a mirror, they've looked into it and what have they come up with? Oh, a website! A website: what devastation they will wreak across the building industry with a website!

Just look at their report—'Oh, we'll have another report.' This has all the hallmarks of Yes, Minister. People were burnt to death in England. There are fires all over the world, including in this country. We have a building industry that is rife with corruption, document fraud, product substitution and wilful ignorance, and what does this government do? It comes up with a website. The crooks and the shonks in the building industry will be shaking in their boots at the thought of a website!

According to the senior officers' report, we are going to have another look at the 'legislative roles and responsibilities of the Commonwealth, states and the territories' and we are going to identify 'gaps and weaknesses that impact on actions' in relation to nonconforming building products. Well, well, well, what decisive action! What decisive action from the junior minister.

What we have here is a government that doesn't understand its responsibilities, that doesn't understand that it has a serious problem. We know that the people who actually live in these buildings are demanding action. In the majority of cases it is the owners—not the builders, not the developers, not the surveyors and not the suppliers—are the ones who will now have responsibility for rectifying these unsafe buildings. Buildings that were put up for $8 a square metre are now going to be fitted up at a cost of many billions of dollars.

There has to be a better system put in place to ensure that defective buildings are dealt with swiftly when issues arise. We ought to make sure that as a matter of public safety no more of these buildings are in fact put up. That's our responsibility as a national parliament. There is no excuse for a national government not to act. It is simply pathetic for the government to claim, yet again, 'We're going to have another committee look into this.' In these circumstances, we simply can't tolerate more of this failure. (Time expired)

Lee Rhiannon (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I congratulate Senator Patrick for bringing this legislation, the Customs Amendment (Safer Cladding) Bill, before us today. The Greens strongly support it. It is about saving lives. We've just heard the most extraordinary speech from coalition representative Senator Hume. She set out that the government will refuse to support this bill that is absolutely essential. We have seen the tragedy that can unfold. You feel that we're on the verge of more tragedies happening in this country, where people are burnt to death because of the state of the building industry. We've heard the government set out so clearly that they will not come on board with this legislation, that they in fact reject the need for a ban which has been set out so clearly even by our own Senate committee inquiring into this.

What we've heard from the government today will potentially cost lives. It sounds like it's just a matter of time, if the government will not move on this, because there is overwhelming evidence that it is time that the ban was brought in. We've seen the evidence in such dramatic form, with the tragedy of the Grenfell Tower. We only just escaped a similar tragedy at Docklands in Australia. We know that there are so many buildings with this cladding—highly dangerous and highly flammable, according to so many reports. So this is something that really does need to be taken on.

But we also need to identify what we're talking about here. It's not just about individual buildings and it's not just about the cladding on those buildings; it's why it has come to this point. It's come to this point because the building industry is effectively deregulated now, and, increasingly, we're seeing these products come onto the market. They can often make a building look good, and that was part of the tragedy with Grenfell Tower in London. It was a social housing complex in the middle of what had become a gentrified area, and many of the neighbours wanted the area to look good. The quick way to achieve that was cladding.

Unbeknown to the unfortunate people living in that building, they were living in a firetrap—and what a most terrible firetrap it was, as we saw so dramatically. Again, it's to emphasise that the private market has been deregulated. Again, it is an example of the dangers of neoliberalism and what privatisation means when the regulation system is left up to the private marketplace. It means it's not effective. How does this system work? It benefits the dodgy developers, the private-market speculators—those who are looking to make money. Their job—why they're on this planet—is to increase their profits. How do you increase profits? You do it by cutting corners in terms of labour and the products that are used.

So we have before us a situation that very clearly needs to change, but I did want to speak a little bit more about the British situation because the evidence is so clear about the pressures that are on. In some cases what we see is that the developers are making the decisions themselves to go with this cheap form of cladding. But also, in the case Grenfell Tower, what we saw there is that the contractors themselves were under pressure to go with the cheapest option because of the severe cuts that have been made to social housing in Britain. And so the contractors are forced to cut corners when it comes to quality and safety.

The Grenfell Tower investigation found that the contractor had the option of installing the fire-resistant version of the cladding but did not. The fire-resistant version costs just two pounds per square metre more. Imagine that. Those 71 people would still be alive. Their families would not be suffering, still grieving. All the people injured would still be living productive, happy—you would hope—healthy lives. But there was that terrible cost cutting. How minimal is that? Two pounds per square metre more, and we could have had the safer cladding used.

Social housing in Australia is under similar pressure. Despite record homelessness, rental insecurity and unaffordability, the government has not increased real spending on social housing. And this is where the pressure comes from. When the government is building social housing, there is a real worry that we could have a similar situation to what we saw in Grenfell Tower. Again, let's be clear that the money also for social housing, for public housing across this whole country, is there. It shouldn't have happened in the first place that the benefits were given to those who are wealthy enough to have many homes to increase their own wealth, but now we know it's robbing the public purse of badly needed money for public housing. There were $7.6 billion in capital gains discounts and about $4 billion in negative gearing in one year. That's effectively what the government is giving away to those who already have housing benefits. Surely that's money that should be put into our social and public housing across the country.

Again, it is relevant to what we're talking about here, because so often what happens with this very dangerous cladding is that it's used on public and social housing, with potentially tragic impacts. But we also know that it goes beyond those who are disadvantaged. This is a serious crisis that can affect all of us and our loved ones, depending on where they're living. And the evidence about this issue is now so clear. I do refer you, when you're considering your position on this bill, to the Senate Economics References Committee inquiry into the bill. The evidence was really overwhelming and very clear, and the recommendations and the findings from the report set out a case that very much backs up Senator Patrick's bill that is before us today.

It was the committee's report on aluminium composite panels that came down in September last year, and it recommended that the Australian government—these are the words from the committee; you couldn't have had them clearer—'implement a total ban on the importation, sale and use of polyethylene core aluminium composite panels as a matter of urgency.' That's referring to terminology that we hear quite a bit in this. But, again, it is very clearly a total ban.

Again, what we've just heard from the government ignores the Senate report that sets out the case so strongly. The government, therefore, has rejected the need for an import ban. PE core ACPs can be, and are, used in a way which does not breach the National Construction Code, in addition to being used in a non-compliant manner. That's their argument, but, again, it is a worthless argument. It is an argument that puts lives at risk.

Also from the Senate committee was this additional finding:

In light of the Grenfell Tower fire tragedy, the committee does not consider there to be any legitimate use of PE core ACPs on any building type. The committee believes that as there are safe non-flammable and fire retardant alternatives available there is no place for PE core ACPs in the Australian market.

That is again another emphatic statement from this inquiry.

It is a reminder about what's going on with the government here. Why have they been so blatant in their rejection of this most important bill that we have before us? It has been a responsible action by Senator Patrick, responding to the crisis that we have in the building industry and responding to this most important inquiry. Why has the government gone to this length of protecting the dodgy developers and the property speculators? Because they're the people that they protect. Their interests lie in working with corporate Australia, so that they can maximise their profits, even when it risks lives, and we know that's real because lives have been lost in the tragedy that we have before us.

The CFMEU has come out very clearly with a position of support for the recommendations from the inquiry. This construction union has advised their members to refuse to install PE core ACPs on high-rise buildings. Interestingly, what do we get from the government on the advice, which is about saving the lives of the public, of residents, of homeowners and of people staying in hotels? Again, they don't want to know about it. We saw that very blatantly from the former minister, and that's worth sharing with you, because often there're some very ugly debates in this place about the work of the CFMEU.

Here you have very clear evidence of this union taking a responsible position in support of what we now have heard from the recommendations from the inquiry, but where did the government stand? It wasn't just Senator Hume—she is clearly speaking from the government—let's look back at what former minister for industrial relations, Minister Cash, said, and the former head of the Australian Building and Construction Commission. They've said that they would state the refusal by workers to install would not be considered an illegal industrial action. So no backup there. No backup there from the minister, from the Commissioner of the ABCC, for workers taking the responsible position of refusing to install this material. That would be the responsible position.

We might have our severe fights here about unions, et cetera, but what we're talking about here is about saving lives, about ensuring that buildings don't get burnt down, putting more people at risk. Surely that's where we should have a common position. But, no, the government is always working with corporate Australia to put profits first even when it comes to risking lives. That's simply unacceptable, and it needs to be exposed at every turn.

The Assistant National Secretary for the CFMEU Dave Noonan has said:

Fire authorities, unions, and even property developers support a ban on these combustible cladding products entering Australian ports, which is the most effective way of ensuring they don’t end up in Australian homes and workplaces.

It's good to hear that some property developers are on side, working with the union and working with the fire authorities on this.

There is this growing awareness, and growing building of alliances, and meanwhile the government is refusing to give national leadership on this most important question. And it needs a national response, because, as we heard from Senator Carr earlier, the evidence is well and truly out there. We've seen extensive privatisation in the industry, particularly with regard to the Australian building code, where neoliberalism has ripped through it. The weakness of that code makes it one that doesn't provide protection to residents, to builders or to the workers in this industry. It has become so worthless and the job has become so much harder because of the imports of building materials.

The development of building materials is going ahead in leaps and bounds. It's just changing the whole nature of building construction. You can see that in our cities, where the rate of development is just going ahead so fast, largely driven by the new products on the market. Not all those products are safe. It's going ahead so quickly. I acknowledge it's often hard for the authorities to keep up to speed with it, but something needs to be done, and that particularly means the issue with regard to imports.

That's why I again draw your attention to what Mr Noonan has said about the need to ensure that these products are not entering Australian ports. That's where we need to be giving added attention, because, once these products are in the country, they're often classified in incorrect ways, and they end up on our building sites. I imagine that some developers are not even sure what they're putting into their buildings. Workers have very little information, and certainly the residents—when they buy a new home, or if they are lucky enough to get a public housing place these days—have no idea as to what their building has been constructed with and to what degree it is a fire hazard.

So we're left with a system now where, with the government adopting the position it has, thousands and thousands of lives are at risk in this country because this dangerous form of cladding is being used. It's being used, as we speak, in many of the buildings that are going up, buildings that we might live in or that we might stay in when we're working, let alone the rest of the population of Australia being put at risk on a regular basis.

So this bill needs to be passed, but we need to commit to a much more thorough regulatory system for building in this country. Yes, that is a state matter, but increasingly there is a role for the federal government, largely because of this importation issue, but also we need to get rid of the privatisation aspects that have crept into so much of how building is managed in this country. It's to the detriment of residents. It's to the detriment of what our neighbourhoods look like. It's to the detriment of workers. And now we know that lives are being put at risk.

We need to change how we operate in this country and ensure that people's wellbeing is put first. We've seen, in a most blatant, crude way, with the way the government has rejected this bill, that that's not how the government judges important legislation that comes before this house, like the bill we're considering today. The Greens definitely support it.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I apologise to Senator Ketter for messing him around on the speaking list, but I am here, so I will speak where I was supposed to. This is an interesting debate. I was particularly interested in what Senator Rhiannon said and what I understand Senator Carr said previously. I just want to indicate that the coalition government understands the issues and the problems and is setting about fixing the problem. In the wake of the Grenfell Tower fire there has been concern in the community about combustible material in high-rise buildings, naturally enough and appropriately enough. The Turnbull government has been working with state and territory building ministers to implement multiple reforms to prevent the misuse of aluminium composite panels and to ensure the safety of Australia's built environment.

Some of the things the government is doing include, importantly, the reinvigoration of the Building Ministers' Forum. The Building Ministers' Forum was convened by the Australian government. It is made up of the state and territory building ministers, and it's responsible for building and plumbing policy and regulation, because, as I think has been mentioned previously, those building and plumbing policy regulations are matters for the state and territory governments under the system of government in Australia. People often say the system shouldn't be like that, but unfortunately that's the way it is—that is, over the years and under the Constitution, the authority that has responsibility for making these regulations is the states and the territories.

Typically with the states and territories, particularly these days, if there's good news, they claim it—it doesn't matter where it comes from—and, if it's bad news, it's always the federal government's fault. We know that across Australia, in so many different ways, the Commonwealth government has good policies. It makes election commitments, only to have them negated by recalcitrant state governments. The one that I continue to be annoyed about in my home state of Queensland, up in the North of the state where I come from, is a policy the government went to an election on. It promised to set up a northern Australia infrastructure fund to encourage development of northern Australia—entirely a Commonwealth government initiative and entirely Commonwealth government funded. But unfortunately the legislation setting it up, for constitutional reasons, said that the money had to pass through the states, and the states therefore had a veto authority.

Recently the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility has wanted to look at funding a particular infrastructure development, but the state has said, 'No, we don't like that development, so we're not going to allow the money to pass through us from the Commonwealth to the developer of that infrastructure.' I'll be more specific: it's about the Adani rail line that would join Abbot Point near Bowen, just south of where I live, to the new coalfields in the Galilee Basin. It would create, according to independent estimates, up to 11,000 jobs in the Townsville region, where, unfortunately, there is regrettably high unemployment at the moment. Small business in the Townsville region is struggling, and the Adani proposal was a lifeline almost from heaven. Here was billions and billions of dollars to be spent and huge numbers of jobs to be created, and the Townsville population were ecstatic at the thought of not only the jobs that this would create but the confidence that it would give to that section of northern Australia. But the Labor Party government in Queensland, for no real policy reason but because the Greens political party keeps them in power in Queensland and the Greens don't like mines, vetoed the Commonwealth money going through the infrastructure fund as a loan to Adani—just vetoed it.

Mr Shorten now is having two bob each way as he campaigns in Batman, trying to hold off the onslaught of the Greens political party in that Melbourne latte set electorate. People down there don't give a damn about jobs in North Queensland as they sit around and sip their latte coffees. All they're interested in is this interesting battle between the Labor Party and the Greens over a federal electorate in the Melbourne area. They don't give a stuff about jobs and the unemployed and small business in North Queensland, and they don't have any interest at all in the development of the North of our country. Mr Shorten, after initially supporting the NAIF and what it could do, is now resiling, backing off. This is just an instance of where the states and territories, as in the matter that is the subject of this bill, are trying to say, 'We know it's our responsibility, but we don't want to do that because it's a negative for us politically, so we'll try and blame the federal government.'

The Building Ministers' Forum, which I was talking about, is convened by the Australian government but made up of the territory and state building ministers. The forum is chaired by the federal minister, and the current minister, Minister Laundy, has performed this role since 2016. The Labor Party have been critical of that forum and critical of the Commonwealth government, but their criticism is entirely hypocritical, because the Australian government has at last reconvened that group, since the coalition government has been in power, and is attempting to move forward in a collegiate way with the involvement of state and territory governments. You see, when Labor were in power, for those horrible six years, they failed to convene a building ministers' forum over the 38 months when they were in power between 2010 and 2013. So Labor criticise that meeting, but when they were in power they didn't even bother to call it together and didn't even have the meeting; that's how much they cared about what the states and territories were doing to ensure a safe built environment.

These meetings are not just token meetings. At every meeting that the current federal government, the Turnbull government, have convened they've worked collaboratively with the states and territories and held them to account for their compliance and enforcement issues. If there are issues with combustible material on high-rise buildings, that is something the states and territories should be addressing. This bill, the Customs Amendment (Safer Cladding) Bill 2017, seems to be trying to bring that in as a responsibility of federal government, when the powers to do things about combustible materials are already in place in state and territory legislation. But the states and territories, for some reason—political, I suspect—don't want to do it.

The federal government can't support this bill, although we recognise there is a genuine community concern about the non-compliant use of combustible external wall cladding in Australia. The safety of occupants of high-rise buildings, including fire safety, is and has always been a priority for the Australian government, but the solution presented in this bill will not fix the problem. Aluminium composite panels, including polyethelene core aluminium composite panels, are a safe and legitimate building product in Australia if they are used appropriately and in compliance with the National Construction Code, and it's the responsibility of the states and territories to make sure they are used appropriately and in compliance with the national code. The introduction of border controls to resist the importation of a legitimate product would be neither effective nor practical to implement. These products are not just used in high-rise buildings, which are the cause of this bill's concern. I understand the concern of the bill's mover and appreciate it, but it is misplaced. We should be managing cladding, not banning it. Banning the importation of these aluminium composite panels would have unintended consequences for those businesses that use the product correctly, legitimately and legally.

We need to ensure that the Australian public has confidence in its built environment. The coalition government takes that responsibility very seriously, but banning specific products that may have legitimate uses outside of high-rise buildings is not the answer. Banning imports of this product is equivalent to just treating a symptom. Instead the Commonwealth government is working to solve the actual underlying problem and it's working in that regard with the state and territory governments, which it should do, and is doing. The problem is accountability of all participants across the building supply chain in ensuring that products are installed in a way that is compliant with the National Construction Code.

I understand the inquiry into Grenfell Tower is not yet finalised. I understand that event shocked everyone, and those who saw the video footage of that would well understand that. We do know that that building in London was constructed in 1970 and it appeared to lack many standard fire safety features of modern buildings, even fire sprinklers, and it had only one fire-insulated staircase for evacuation. There are reports that the cladding was retrofitted to the building shortly before the fire without also addressing numerous other fire safety hazard concerns that had been raised by residents. The combination of these factors appears to have contributed to the spread of the fire and to the very unfortunate and regrettable loss of life. I know all parliamentarians and, indeed, all Australians would express their sincere and heartfelt sympathy to the residents and families affected by that fire.

In Australia, the National Construction Code has strict fire safety requirements for high-rise apartment buildings. The National Construction Code contains fire safety requirements that limit the spread of fire, alert occupants to the detection of smoke, facilitate evacuation and enable fire brigade operations in those buildings. Specific requirements vary with the building size. The provision for a typical high-rise apartment building in Australia includes requirements for smoke detection and occupation warning systems; fire isolation of exits such as exit stairs; more than one exit for each storey to allow alternative means of escape should one exit become unusable; exclusion of smoke from exit stairs; fire sprinklers; fire-resistant construction to limit the spread of fire between apartments and between storeys; non-combustible external walls; resistance to collapse as a result of fire; and features to assist fire brigade operations, such as fire hydrants.

Aluminium composite panels are a legitimate building product in Australia—I've said this before, and I emphasise it—if used appropriately and in compliance with the National Construction Code. However, if it's used in a noncompliant manner, as was the case in the Lacrosse apartments in Melbourne and the fire that occurred in November 2014, then it can contribute to the spread of fire. The National Construction Code does not permit the use of combustible material in the external wall cladding of these high-rise buildings. This has been the case since Australia established a national code back in 1990. The problem with the Lacrosse building was that due to the failures in practitioner competency and state government administration compliance systems that building was allowed to exist, and it had that disastrous consequence. The Victorian Building Authority conducted an investigation and is undertaking disciplinary action against the building's surveyors. Of course, it's a bit too late after the event. It is necessary for the state authorities to actually ensure compliance during the construction phrase and at all times thereafter. The Building Ministers' Forum asked the Australian Building Code Board to review the evidence of suitability provisions in clause A2.2 of the National Construction Code, which requires that products must be fit for the intended purpose. The Australian Building Code Board office found that the underlying problem at the Lacrosse building was due to failures, as I say, in the compliance systems and in the practitioners' competency.

In December two years ago the Building Ministers' Forum agreed to implement a comprehensive package of measures to address these concerns of non-compliant use of wall cladding and fire safety in high-rise buildings. The package includes referencing a contemporary and rigorous testing standard based on internal best practice for full-scale testing of fire performance and external facade systems. Also, rigorous, contemporary and clear National Construction Code requirements need to be provided to improve application and compliance. We need to enhance on-site checking, auditing and enforcement and provide practitioners with tools and supporting materials to support compliance with the National Construction Code.

While I appreciate the concern, the thought and the goodwill behind this proposed bill, for the reasons I and other speakers from the government have mentioned it's not appropriate at this stage because the panels that the promoters of this bill want to ban from importation do have a perfectly useful and legitimate use if used appropriately.

I conclude by returning to Senator Carr's attempt in some way to blame this all on the federal government. I repeat that the federal government is at least at last reactivating the Building Ministers' Forum, something that Labor let lapse over 38 months. They did absolutely nothing. We hear about that all the time. I congratulate the current minister on his work in getting the Building Ministers' Forum together so that these things can be talked about between the states and territories so the states and territories can discharge their obligations in compliance and approvals for buildings being built in Australia. Whilst I appreciate the thoughts behind the bill, for the reasons I've mentioned it's not one that the government can support.

Chris Ketter (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to make a contribution in respect of this debate. As the Chair of the Senate Economics References Committee, this particular inquiry was probably one of the more harrowing experiences that I've participated in, with understanding of the horrors of what befell the residents of Grenfell Tower and how lucky we are in this country that we were able to escape that eventuality in Melbourne a few years ago.

Unfortunately, this is an area where I would have liked to have seen a more bipartisan approach from those opposite when we have an issue in which the public is rightly very interested. When we see such a huge failure in our system of regulation, it really behoves all of us to come together to try to address this issue. For that reason, I do indicate to the NXT party that in principle we support the approach that is being put forward. We support a ban on this polyethylene core ACP product, and I support Senator Patrick's comments in relation to the fact that this is not a silver bullet and that this is only a part of the overhaul that needs to occur in respect of this terrible issue. Unfortunately, from the opposite side we see more of the same.

If there's one thing I've learnt in the course of this inquiry it is that our system of building construction regulation and enforcement is broken and business as usual is not sufficient. We need to have a root-and-branch approach. An incremental type of approach—getting people together and talking to the states—is not going to cut it. The Commonwealth does need to take a lead in this area, and there are a number of things that the Commonwealth can do. It's unfortunate to hear government senators basically giving up on this issue.

I do want to say though that some credit is due to former Senator Xenophon for instigating this inquiry. I do need to say though that Senator Xenophon is known for liking the headlines but, when it comes to a policy result, he comes up a bit short on the actual detail. In contrast, on our side we have a comprehensive plan to improve the fire safety of Australian buildings. We would not only introduce a ban on combustible cladding but also establish a national licensing system for all building practitioners, requiring continued professional development, and a penalties regime for all building practitioners and companies who knowingly use non-compliant material. Labor would also re-establish a minister for industry as the chair of the Building Ministers' Forum. I find it somewhat amazing that we do not have a minister for industry, nor a minister for science. We certainly seem to have a minister for regulation in place at the moment.

As Chair of the Senate Economics References Committee I do have the benefit of the knowledge we acquired through that inquiry into non-conforming building products more generally. This inquiry has done its job in helping to inform Labor policy. One of the submitters to our inquiry I think hit the nail on the head when he identified the root cause of this problem. It was Mr Savery of the Australian Building Codes Board. The ABCB is the body responsible for the development of the National Construction Code. He said during our inquiry that the performance based code is a highly sophisticated regulation and it needs properly qualified and trained individual assessors. He tracked the evolution of this system. I think it was very enlightening. He said:

In the early 1990s, we introduced a performance based code which is highly sophisticated regulation; it is not something that the average individual can necessarily understand. You need qualified, trained people to understand how a performance based code works. At the same time as that, private certification was incrementally introduced around the country. At the same time as that, we had a process around the country of deregulation or reduction in regulatory requirements around things like mandatory inspections. At the same time as all of that is happening, the world is changing around us. We have global supply chains. We have multinational companies operating.

So we've come to a situation where there is an almost universal lack of compliance in the system. There is an erosion of confidence, which has resulted in this reduction in mandatory testing that's occurred around the country. I think this has been a tragic outcome.

In September last year the committee released its interim report into aluminium composite cladding and through that inquiry we shone a spotlight onto problems in the building and construction industry, an industry where too often choices are being made to cut costs regardless of the consequences—consequences that, sadly, include the loss of life. The Labor led committee put forward eight recommendations on the issue of flammable and combustible cladding. Recommendation 1 was:

The committee recommends the Australian government implement a total ban on the importation, sale and use of Polyethylene core aluminium composite panels as a matter of urgency.

So it should therefore come as no surprise that we do, in principle, support the Customs Amendment (Safer Cladding) Bill 2017. I would like to take some time now to outline the committee's findings through our inquiry—the findings that led us to recommend a ban at the border and a number of other measures, including a whole-of-government response to achieve a nationally consistent approach to the sector, better industry access to building standards and codes, clearer enforcement powers, and more substantive prosecution outcomes. A ban is the most obvious solution that could potentially save lives, but so far the current government has refused to support it, even in the face of evidence overseas and at home that combustible cladding is a matter of life or death.

The 2014 Lacrosse apartment building fire in Melbourne forced Australia to switch on to the issue of building standards and cladding. It's only through sheer luck—some might say a miracle—that no lives were lost in the Lacrosse tower when a fire broke out in a lower level air conditioner and rapidly spread up 20 storeys of the Docklands apartment building. Early speculation that aluminium composite material was to blame proved correct, despite Australia having building codes that restricted the use of this material on high-rise buildings. The Lacrosse fire served as a wake-up call and begged the questions: what's gone wrong that's allowed this to happen, and how many inhabitants of other major buildings might be at risk?

In 2015 we commenced the Senate inquiry into non-conforming building products. The committee, which former Senator Xenophon sat on, invited submissions and commenced public hearings. Then last year the terrible catastrophe took place in London where 80 residents of the Grenfell Tower lost their lives in a fire. Tragically, we learned later, the scale of this fire could have been preventable. Lives could have been saved if the building standards applicable to Grenfell Tower were tougher. This tragedy, through the issue of flammable and combustible cladding under an international spotlight, heightened the urgency for Australia to know whether this type of catastrophe could occur in our country. To our horror, we found that the shorter answer was, and is: yes, it could.

Through a number of state and territory audits it has emerged that the use of aluminium composite cladding has compromised safety in tens of thousands of Australian buildings. In evidence to the Senate inquiry, experts told us that homes and businesses were effectively being wrapped in a product akin to petrol. In remarks to the parliament upon tabling the committee's report last year, I said that it's not acceptable that people are injured and killed in their own homes. In 2018, we can do better and we must do better.

Over the course of the inquiry the committee has held five public hearings about cladding and received over 162 submissions. I would like to thank all of those individuals again—experts in the fields of fire safety, architecture, engineering and building, and union groups and manufacturers—for working with the committee and for their advocacy to me outside of the inquiry processes as well. I want to particularly commend the CFMEU for their responsible approach in the course of this inquiry and for the information that they provided to us. They had come to the conclusion, over a period of some years, that it was necessary for us to have an import ban. Some of the points that led to them forming that view are quite salient. The reasons for PE-cored ACP to remain available to buyers who utilise it compliantly, instead of using a fire-resistant core, are not compelling, so there is no reason why we shouldn't substitute for it. The price differences are fairly marginal. The saving that's involved is something in the order of $2 per square metre. Currently, PE-cored ACP is allowed to be used in public buildings of two storeys and below—that is, combustible external walls are allowed. We say that that shouldn't be allowed to occur. We say that it's not safe to use that particular material.

We have seen a lot of finger-pointing and attribution of blame throughout the course of this journey. A couple of key themes have emerged: the chain of supply operates with little or no regard for the end user; regulations are confusing, with a wide range of loopholes; and regulators lack the powers they need to identify, prosecute and deter wrongdoing. Further, we found current testing standards to be vastly inadequate. This was an issue rightly exposed in the Four Corners report in August last year. That program aired evidence given to the committee that it was, in effect, impossible for any material to comply with the key fire safety testing standard AS 1530.1, because of flaws in the testing process itself. I'm happy to say that, since this time, a new standard has been developed, AS 5113, which incorporates international best practice where practicable.

Safety audit processes also prove tricky because materials that conform to building standards appear much the same as non-conforming products, particularly once installed. This, I think, goes to reinforce the argument that this is a product that should be stopped at the border.

The committee also exposed conflicts of interests that occur when the pay cheques of building surveyors and inspectors are written by the same entities those surveyors and inspectors are supposed to police, and also those from whom repeat business is desired. On this matter, in hearings I also asked question about the clerk of works role which once existed. I note the Victorian Cladding Taskforce interim report recommended the restoration of this role. I think this is worthy of consideration. If there are ways that we can make oversight roles financially independent of builders, I'm sure we can see better outcomes.

I also want to point to some positive developments in my home state of Queensland, in the form of the non-conforming building product laws which were passed by the Queensland government in August last year. The new laws place accountability on everyone in the building product supply chain to make sure products are fit for intended purpose and enable enforcement action for breaches. The legislation requires a person in the supply chain who becomes aware, or reasonably suspects, that a building product is non-conforming to notify the Queensland Building and Construction Commission. Importantly, the new laws also empower the QBCC to direct a person to take remedial action where the law has been breached.

Additionally, in the state of Queensland, back in 2003, the Beattie government brought in five prescribed licence classes which can install cladding under the Queensland Building and Construction Commission Regulation 2003. The committee determined that this requirement for licensing and, therefore, training of installers is very likely the reason for the significantly reduced prevalence of flammable cladding in Queensland relative to other states.

I also note the release of the Victorian Cladding Taskforce chair's interim report on 1 December. That's leading the Victorian government to take action on cladding by restricting the use of aluminium composite products with a PE core, as well as expanded polystyrene on buildings over two storeys. It's empowering the VBA to conduct further building audits with new annual quotas and ordering rectification on buildings found to be non-compliant.

I am relieved to hear about these steps being taken in my home state and in Victoria. I think we need to follow their lead at a national level. Unfortunately, I do hold reservations that action by the states on this issue will be one more justification the current government uses to pass responsibility back to the states and territories.

As I've already said, we are talking about a matter of life and death here. It's not enough anymore for us at the national level to just make the rules. We need to take real action. The simple fact that aluminium composite cladding, with its flammable polyethylene core, is legal in Australia means it will end up on buildings. The government will probably vote against this bill and say that the National Construction Code restricts the use of flammable products, as government senators have already said, but we know they're being used outside of the code's stipulations. There are a number of reasons for this. First, the regulations are confusing. The National Construction Code has been described to the committee as being contradictory, containing competing clauses and having no hierarchy of control. One submitter, Mr Hughes-Brown, of Ignis Solutions, pointed out that the ABCB had to write a nine-page document just to clarify the competing clauses. And the Victorian Building Authority submitted that 'code requirements were inconsistently applied and poorly understood'.

Additionally, the NCC contains options for performance based and 'deemed to satisfy' pathways. In other words, if you do this then don't worry about that, or, if you want to do this, then just make sure you do that. This essentially provides legal loopholes for people to do the wrong thing, even through claiming ignorance, plausible deniability or through genuine confusion, misunderstanding and mistakes.

Secondly, the system of regulation in Australia is confusing in itself. Whilst the NCC sits at a national level, responsibility for enforcement lies with individual states and territories, each with their own state based development codes and enforcement agency and each agency needing to be resourced.

At the national level we have the national Building Ministers' Forum; the Australian Building Codes Board, which has also set-up its own senior officers group; and the Federal Safety Commissioner. Each of these federal bodies has responsibility for oversight but no powers of enforcement. In fact, total responsibility for licensing and regulation is spread over eight jurisdictions and 19 regulators, all of which have different requirements and standards for building practitioners.

The issue of licensing is what I wanted to touch on. Despite the number of regulatory bodies we have, there is a distinct lack of comprehensive, consistent licensing requirements across the country. Across our country, penalties and prosecutions for wrongdoing are paltry or non-existent. This is probably due in part to the difficulties in discovering faulty work and product substitution. The Queensland legislation is a sign that state regulators don't have the inspection powers they need to identify and prosecute breaches.

When it comes to the federal level, the committee heard evidence from the Federal Safety Commissioner that they do not have the resources or expertise to carry out the function of auditing and compliance with National Construction Code performance requirements in relation to building materials. A better licensing system with required education and training components should lead to better product knowledge and another intercept point for non-conforming and non-compliant products. But it needs to be accompanied by appropriate and enforceable penalties for criminal activity and negligence. At the moment, there are two few prosecutions and too many loopholes. Because of this it continues to be too easy for product substitution to occur. That is another issue. We have blatant fraudulence going on there. A second type of substitution occurs where someone in the supply chain makes a decision to use flammable cladding, rather than the properly fire-rated product, because it is cheaper. These decisions are made to save money or to maximise profits, but these decisions are risking lives. This can go undetected until a tragedy strikes.

Senator Carr has talked about the little action that the government has taken in relation to this, despite the fact that we have buildings effectively wrapped in petrol, so I won't elaborate on that. We've also heard that firefighters are still concerned about being put in situations where they must decide who lives and dies, because our system of building regulation has failed. This is exactly what happened at Grenfell Tower. The industry could have regulated itself, as other industries have done in a number of areas where we've expressed concern, but it has not. Now we must respond to community pressure for change. That is why we need an immediate total ban at the border, combined with stronger licensing and compliance measures throughout the building industry. The government must act to restore public safety and community confidence. Labor has a plan. The Nick Xenophon Team is already following our lead. I urge the government to do the same.

Stirling Griff (SA, Nick Xenophon Team) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the Customs Amendment (Safer Cladding) Bill 2017. For most Australians, our home is the one place where we can seek respite from the troubles of the world, where we can shut the door behind us and rely on those four walls to wrap us around our loved ones and keep them safe. It is a sickening thought that for some people the same place of refuge can be very much a disaster in waiting. Right now there are potentially hundreds and hundreds of buildings around Australia that are at real risk of becoming the next Grenfell Tower or Lacrosse building. But it doesn't have to be. I urge all in this place to support this bill, which responds in part to key recommendations in the interim report on aluminium composite cladding, or ACPs, from the inquiry of the Economic References Committee into non-conforming building products.

This bill seeks to ban the importation of polyethylene-core aluminium composite panels. While there are legitimate uses for PEs and ACPs, such as signage, for instance, the report highlighted the ease with which these products can be used inappropriately, through either inadvertent error or deliberate design. Part of the problem lies with the National Construction Code, which regulates this space. Even those who are familiar with the code struggle to navigate the labyrinth of sometimes contradictory regulations. We know that as a result of this confusion PEs and ACPs are regularly used inappropriately. The code therefore offers little comfort or protection to the Australian public.

There is currently on the market safe flame-retardant cladding that is readily available for use in Australia. This non-combustible honeycomb product costs around $2 to $3 per square metre more than highly combustible PEs and ACPs. This has led some opportunistic and unscrupulous individuals to substitute for the safe cladding the unsafe, flammable cladding in an attempt to shore up their bottom line. These people have made a conscious decision to place profits above people.

Even more worryingly, the committee heard evidence that this sort of substitution is widespread. PEs and ACPs may appear unremarkable and innocuous, and, frankly, as a consumer, it is pretty much impossible to tell the difference between a safe product and one which can set your home alight in mere minutes. You place your trust in the people who build your home or your office block, and yet these products pose a high risk to life and property.

An audit conducted in South Australia found that 77 buildings in the Adelaide CBD alone are suspected to contain the combustible cladding. These buildings are over 25 metres tall and, incredibly, include the Adelaide Oval and the convention centre. The audit also identified the newly built Royal Adelaide Hospital, but the cladding used there appears to be safe and compliant. I hope that the same is true for other buildings, but it does give you pause for thought. When filled to capacity, these buildings hold hundreds, if not thousands, of people. I don't need to spell out the consequences if the worst happened.

When used incorrectly, PEs and ACPs are an enormous fire hazard. Evidence was given during the course of the inquiry that, in the event of a fire, one kilogram of polyethylene will release the same amount of energy as 1½ litres of burning petrol.

We now know too well what this type of combustible cladding can do. We have all seen the images of the Grenfell Tower in London. We know the damage that these products cause, and none of us will forget the haunting image of a lone, smouldering, blackened column rising out of the London suburbs. Six months on, the community there is still struggling to cope with both the economic and the emotional losses of that disaster.

It was only through good fortune and the professionalism of firefighters that we did not have a similar catastrophe when Melbourne's Lacrosse building was set ablaze in 2014 after a cigarette butt was left on a balcony. There were 400 people inside, and that inferno spread up 23 storeys in just 11 minutes.

The availability and appropriate use of this cladding are an urgent problem that requires an urgent response, and this bill plays one part in that. There may be those who see a total ban on importation as overkill, but, frankly, there are many safer alternatives to this product. The industry's hands will not be tied; it will just be required to make safer choices. We need to do what we can to safeguard the community against the inappropriate use of flammable ACP cladding by unscrupulous and ignorant builders. One way to do that is to make the product more difficult to access through an importation ban. I urge all senators to back this bill.

Jonathon Duniam (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too am pleased to be making a contribution to the debate on this particular piece of legislation proposed by the Nick Xenophon Team, the Customs Amendment (Safer Cladding) Bill 2017, a debate kicked off today by Senator Patrick. However, can I put on record my pleasure at seeing the return of Senator Colbeck today, and I also welcome into this place Senator Martin. I'm sure all Tasmanians who are here at the moment feel much better knowing that we have a full complement of Tasmanians representing them here, and I know you'd agree with that, Mr Acting Deputy President Whish-Wilson!

This a very important debate to be having, relating to the safety of both the materials and how they are used when it comes to building and construction. Over time, we've seen many, many changes to the technology that is used in buildings and in the manufacture of the materials that we use in construction. The safety standards which are applied to them also have evolved significantly over time. So no-one can dispute the importance of what is being debated here. The safety of occupants is paramount when it comes to the design, planning and construction of these buildings. We need to make sure that whatever laws and rules are in place are those best suited to ensure that prime goal of protecting the occupants is adhered to, or at least achieved.

As for myself, I've had a number of experiences with building over the years. The most recent project I had involvement with was a building that had a life which spanned well in excess of a century, and it was difficult to traverse the regulation and the red tape relating to bringing a building which dates from convict times to something that satisfies today's standards when it comes to occupancy and commercial use—noting the different materials that have been used over time. In the olden days, sandstone or other types of stone, along with timbers and plaster-type materials—a pretty basic array of materials—were used. Fast forward to the next iteration of that building's life, in the 1940s and 1950s, when the building took on an industrial role as a paint manufacturing facility, and completely different materials were used. A huge amount of asbestos was used. It was a new material. It was something they hadn't been using when the building was originally constructed and it was something that, over time, proved, as we know, to be harmful to human health, if not dealt with properly. And then fast forward again to today, and we have a completely new set of materials which are designed with the health and safety of the occupants in mind. So it is a difficult thing to do in places where you are retrofitting buildings to meet current standards.

Also, it is not just the materials that are used but the way in which we plan construction. Approvals have to be sought with regard to the use of materials: where those materials are placed, the amount of materials used and the standards they should adhere to. All of those things are very, very different from times gone by. That, of course, becomes complicated again when you look at retrofitting buildings, as was the case with the one I was talking about. Nowadays, we see buildings, whether they are retrofitted older buildings or new constructions, which have a much higher safety standard. All of this is important when considering the intent of this bill—which is to ban at the border a particular construction material—because the context of how buildings are constructed and the safety features they now have as opposed to the ones they had a number of years ago are very different. An automated fire detection and sprinkler system is one of them. There is also a layout in the design for easy evacuation in the event of an emergency, be it fire or some other type of unfortunate event. These things are all taken into account to ensure that, when the worst happens, the occupants have the best chance of protecting their health, wellbeing and, most importantly, their lives. Making sure that buildings are built that way, with materials, design and planning to meet the standards that we set out, is incredibly important.

The intent of the bill, as I said just a little while ago, no-one can disagree with. Its intent is to ensure that whatever we do in this place ensures that the health and welfare of the occupants of buildings are paramount, that we prevent where possible harm being done to those who occupy a building which experiences something like a fire, as has been discussed with reference to the Grenfell Tower and the Lacrosse building. That is not in contention at all. It really comes down to the how: how you achieve that outcome, how you achieve that end result.

The bill, as has been canvassed in this debate by a number of people, does propose a ban at the border as a means of preventing the importation of these aluminium composite panels with polyethylene cores. The point is: is that the best way to do it, or is there a better mechanism?

I didn't have the good fortune of participating in the Senate committee but, having done some research on this, having had a look at what is going on in the regulatory space around building and construction, particularly with reference to materials, I have been able to see what is going on across the country, particularly in Tasmania. So that's where we do differ. Everyone agrees that we need to do what we can to ensure that building materials are the safest materials possible, that people's health and welfare aren't impacted by incidents like the ones we've already talked about, but it's a case of how you get there. A legislated ban on a particular material is something which requires, as we know, a great degree of work. There's a committee inquiry, there's the debate in this place, there's the drafting process before all of that, it has to go to the other place—there are all sorts of stages. If we're going to do that for one particular material and not leave it to the experts in the field who have done the work, who have done the research and who are at the coalface when it comes to regulatory approaches to building and construction then I think we're getting into a difficult patch of work which is really not the role of the Senate but the role of the regulators on the ground in their individual jurisdictions. It would result in a great deal more red tape, another layer of regulation over the top of what exists in each state and territory, and I just don't think that's something we need to be doing here.

As I say, with regard to the problem that the bill is trying solve, absolutely we're on board. It's about ensuring that we protect human life. But I did hear previous speakers, even those in favour of the bill, talking about the aluminium composite panels with polyethylene cores having an appropriate use, which relates to signage and similar matters, provided they are used in compliance with the National Construction Code. You have to question the effectiveness of imposing a ban on the importation of a product like this; you have to see whether it would be practical to implement. I'm not sure what work has been done to consult with our Border Force officials, our people who sit at the borders and monitor what's coming through on ships and other types of freight into the country. I'm not sure what process has been undertaken there. But those sorts of things need to be taken into account, and it could be suggested that the practicality of policing such a ban would be exceptionally difficult.

We should be looking to manage the use of materials, not to ban them, not to create a specific ban on a specific material in response to certain instances. We need to ensure that the legislative framework we provide officials to work within enables a dynamic and quick response to things like this so that they can manage the use of materials. If there is a discretionary desire within a jurisdiction to restrict or even ban a particular type of material then we should make sure the framework has that in there. In a moment, I will be talking about the Tasmanian legislative framework, which indeed does just that.

We also want to think about the unintended consequences that may flow from a decision to ban a material with particular characteristics. I'm not sure what work has been done in relation to what flow-on consequences there would be. As I said before, there are appropriate uses for this material, provided they do comply with the National Construction Code, but the material can't be used even legitimately, appropriately and safely if a ban is put in place. What alternative is there for those who are currently using it appropriately? I don't know the answer to that question and I think such questions do need to be answered, particularly when materials are being used appropriately, legally and legitimately. We have to look at the underlying problem, which is about the participants in the building and construction sector being accountable for how they use materials and exactly what steps they take to satisfy themselves that the materials are being used in accordance with Australian standards and best practice. That will ensure that we don't have a repeat of the disastrous, heartbreaking events that we've had in the past.

So there has been a national approach taken, and it was in October of last year. I'm sure other speakers have mentioned this as well. The Building Ministers' Forum issued a communique on 6 October last year, when they met in Brisbane and talked about an approach which would provide each state and territory the capacity to deal with matters relating to aluminium composite panels with polyethylene cores. I will quote from the communique which was issued last October:

BMF Ministers recognise the public safety concern and clear risk arising around the use of cladding that does not comply with the National Construction Code (NCC). All Ministers agreed that they will use their available laws and powers—

that is, the laws and powers available to each state and territory, jurisdictions which primarily have responsibility for governance of these sorts of issues—

to prevent the use of aluminium composite cladding with a polyethylene (PE) core for class 2, 3, or 9 buildings of two or more storeys, and class 5, 6, 7 or 8 of three or more storeys, until such time as they are satisfied that manufacturers, importers, and installers, working in collaboration with building practitioners, will reliably comply with:

In October last year, we had the ministers responsible for the execution and upholding of the law relating to building and construction in each of their states and territories agreeing on a way forward, agreeing that the problem was there and that it needed to be dealt with.

The communique doesn't call for national legislation. The communique talks about state and territory ministers of all political persuasions using the laws available to them to deal with the problems faced when dealing with this material. It's pretty specific with regard to the use of aluminium composite cladding with polyethylene. It talks about certain classes when it comes to two or more storeys and another group of classes when it's three or more storeys. So it isn't talking about a blanket ban; it's talking about use in certain settings, which I think is an important distinction. The ministers are the people who are being advised by officials from around the country who have been dealing with all sorts of people from different sectors related to this—they talked, as we discussed before, with building practitioners, installers, importers and manufacturers. People who deal with those representatives have been given this advice and they've created this communique as a result.

But it also says 'until such time as they are satisfied' that certain things will happen—that the manufacturers, the installers and the building practitioners will comply with those two elements, which are that the materials satisfy a newly established test with regard to being fire-retardant and, of course, also a new regime around labelling. So there are two practical measures coming out of the Building Ministers' Forum dealing with this problem. It is that framework I was talking about before, where states and territories, who have responsibility for this area of regulation, are being given the scope to go and use their own laws in response to these terrible problems.

In Tasmania we have a set of laws that relate to building and construction which enable the state of Tasmania to deal with it in line with the communique from the Building Ministers' Forum. Senator Polley will recall the situation in her home town relating to the Launceston General Hospital and the cladding that was on that building. The state government undertook an audit with regard to a number of sites around the state and it revealed potentially flammable panels on a building like a hospital, which of course was something that caused a great deal of concern. I'm sure Senator Polley shared that concern for her local community. The audit that was undertaken by the state government did reveal 24 buildings across the state where these aluminium composite panels had been used. All of this was in response, of course, to the Building Ministers' Forum, ensuring that the state government had a handle on exactly what the size of the problem in Tasmania was. The government, represented by Michael Ferguson, the Minister for Health, responded by wanting to ensure that the materials were safe in nature and, if they were not, to immediately look into replacing them with a safer version of the materials so that we don't compromise patient safety or public safety at all.

In response to the Building Ministers' Forum recommendations, the Tasmanian minister, Guy Barnett, outlined specifically what they were going to do across the board, not just with regard to one example—being the Launceston General Hospital, although that is an important and significant example. Minister Barnett, who looks after building and construction, responded by saying that those recommendations from the communique did need to be implemented locally. He said:

The power to approve or not approve products was built into the Government's recent building reform package so that we could respond quickly to emerging issues.

That is the point I was making right at the beginning: the need to have dynamic legislation, not something that's going to require every step of a federal parliamentary process every time we have a problem with a building material. We need to make sure that the laws in place in our states and territories—and, where it is relevant, in Tasmania—are dynamic, so that each jurisdiction can deal with it in the same way, so that they can respond quickly and so that they can put in place measures that will prevent the use of materials, full stop or illegitimately, as has been described with the Grenfell Tower and other places.

Guy Barnett went on to say that the government will move to apply the restriction on the material to class 2, 3 and 9 buildings with more than two storeys and class 5, 6, 7 and 8 buildings with three or more storeys. Class 2 buildings contain two or more sole-occupancy units, class 3 covers hotels, hostels and school boarding houses, and class 9 covers public buildings. It related, again, to specific uses, specific sizes, and specific preconditions set with regard to whether this material is safe or not. This makes me question whether or not this is actually necessary—the need to introduce another layer of legislation to deal with a specific material, and going through the entire federal parliamentary process, as opposed to allowing states and territories—who are already working on this—to ensure that these materials are not used and that public safety is not put at risk. That's what we're seeing here, and I'm sure that other states and territories are doing exactly the same thing.

With regard to the response to the Launceston General Hospital, the Director of Building Control from the Department of Justice in Tasmania, Mr Dale Webster, had these recommendations—these are flowing out of the Tasmanian aluminium composite panel audit summary report which was released on 19 January this year. Point No. 1 says:

Ensure rectification of non-compliance at LGH by replacement of the ACP PE.

So these changes are already taking place. There is no need to add in further regulation with this bill.

Kimberley Kitching (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm pleased to rise to have the opportunity to speak on the Customs Amendment (Safer Cladding) Bill 2017. This bill was introduced in September last year by the then Senator Skye Kakoschke-Moore, representing her leader, the then Senator Xenophon. Whatever position the various parties in the Senate take on this bill, the Nick Xenophon Team senators deserve credit for bringing this issue before us.

I'd like to talk about the history behind this bill. In November 2014, there was a fire in the Lacrosse building, a 23-storey apartment block in Melbourne's Docklands. Fortunately, all 450 people resident in the building were safely evacuated, but the building was severely damaged. In their report on the fire, the Metropolitan Fire Brigade noted that the external cladding on the Lacrosse building did not comply with the Building Code of Australia. The MFB noted:

The MFB obtained a sample of wall cladding material from the Lacrosse building for testing. The MFB report also noted:

The findings of the testing have determined that the material and wall cladding system is not non-combustible when tested in accordance with the Australian Standard AS1530.1.

The aluminium cladding system and material—

Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Kitching, I'm sorry to interrupt. It being 12.20, we will now proceed to the consideration of government business.