Anne Urquhart (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I present the 12th report of 2024 of the Selection of Bills Committee and I seek leave to have the report incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The report read as follows—

Selection of Bills Committee

Report no. 12 of 2024

MEMBERS OF THE COMMITTEE

Senator Anne Urquhart (Government Whip, Chair)

Senator Wendy Askew (Opposition Whip)

Senator Ross Cadell (The Nationals Whip)

Senator Pauline Hanson (Pauline Hanson's One Nation Whip)

Senator Jacqui Lambie (Jacqui Lambie Network Whip)

Senator Nick McKim (Australian Greens Whip)

Senator Ralph Babet

Senator the Hon. Anthony Chisholm

Senator the Hon. Katy Gallagher

Senator Maria Kovacic

Senator Matt O'Sullivan

Senator Fatima Payman

Senator David Pocock

Senator Gerard Rennick

Senator Lidia Thorpe

Senator Tammy Tyrrell

Senator David Van

Secretary: Tim Bryant 02 6277 3020

1. The committee met in private session on Wednesday, 9 October 2024 at 7.13 pm.

2. The committee recommends that—

(a) the provisions of the Better and Fairer Schools (Funding and Reform) Bill 2024 be referred immediately to the Education and Employment Legislation Committee for inquiry and report by 18 November 2024 (see appendix 1 for a statement of reasons for referral).

(b) the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Reconsideration of Decisions) Bill 2024 be referred immediately to the Environment and Communications Legislation Committee for inquiry and report by 14 November 2024 (see appendix 2 for a statement of reasons for referral); and

3. The committee deferred consideration of the following bills to its next meeting:

Intelligence Services and Other Legislation Amendment (Cyber Security) Bill 2024

Security of Critical Infrastructure and Other Legislation Amendment (Enhanced Response and Prevention) Bill 2024

Help to Buy (Consequential Provisions) Bill 2023 [No. 2]

4. The committee considered the following bills but was unable to reach agreement:

(Anne Urquhart)

Chair

10 October 2024

Appendix 1

S ELECTION OF BILLS COMMITTEE

Proposal to refer a bill to a committee

Name of bill:

Better and Fairer Schools (Funding and Reform) Bill

Reasons for referra1/principal issues for consideration:

Hear from education stakeholders

Possible submissions or evidence from:

Education experts, approved authorities, unions, state/ territories, parents and carers groups.

Committee to which bill is to be referred:

Education and Employment Legislation Committee

Possible hearing date(s):

Week of 28 Oct, week of 11 Nov

Possible reporting date:

14 November

(signed)

Nick McKim

Appendix 2

S ELECTION OF BILLS COMMITTEE

Proposal to refer a bill to a committee

Name of bill:

Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Reconsideration of Decisions) Bill 2024

Reasons for referral/principal issues for consideration:

To allow the Committee to scrutinise this legislation.

Possible submissions or evidence from:

Stakeholders and interested parties.

Committee to which bill is to be referred:

Environment and Communications Legislation Committee

Possible hearing date(s):

October

Possible reporting date:

14 November 2024

(signed)

Wendy Askew

I move:

That the report be adopted.

Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

At the end of the motion, add: "and:

(a) in respect of the Cyber Security Bill 2024, the Intelligence Services and Other Legislation Amendment (Cyber Security) Bill 2024 and the Security of Critical Infrastructure and Other Legislation Amendment (Enhanced Response and Prevention) Bill 2024, the bills not be referred to a committee;

(b) the provisions of the Sydney Airport Demand Management Amendment Bill 2024 be referred immediately to the Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport Legislation Committee for inquiry and report by 14 November 2024; and

(c) the provisions of the Treasury Laws Amendment (Mergers and Acquisitions Reform) Bill 2024 be referred immediately to the Economics Legislation Committee for inquiry and report by 13 November 2024".

I will speak briefly to this amendment, particularly in relation to the Sydney Airport Demand Management Amendment Bill. We would like that to report by 14 November. I understand there is some disagreement about that. I would just point out to the chamber that there has been extensive consultation. The Harris review was handed to the former government in 2021, but its recommendations were not implemented.

Since coming to government there's been a further range of consultations with community groups and industry. The response to these recommendations was released in February this year, with drafting having been completed in the intervening period. The reforms have been open to scrutiny for a number of years now. Pushing consideration off to next year will only delay these much-needed reforms. It's also noted that Senator McKenzie has been calling for these reforms to be implemented as soon as possible. So we would urge the Senate to allow for the inquiry into this amendment bill to report by 14 November 2024, rather than seeking to delay it until next year.

Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

To Senator Gallagher's amendment, I move:

At the end of the motion, add:

"but, in respect of the Cyber Security Bill 2024, the Intelligence Services and Other Legislation Amendment (Cyber Security) Bill 2024, and the Security of Critical Infrastructure and Other Legislation Amendment (Enhanced Response and Prevention) Bill 2024, the provisions of the bills be referred immediately to the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee for inquiry and report by 4 February 2025".

Briefly, I want to say that we all understand, or at least all of us in the Greens understand, what is going on here. This is where the establishment parties, the so-called parties of government in this place, get together and effectively collude to refer really critical pieces of legislation to the closed shop of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, which, of course, has no crossbench members on it and—barring a brief period of time when Mr Wilkie had the balance of power in the House of Representatives—hasn't had any crossbench members on it for many decades.

We all know how this goes. The bills disappear into the smoky back room of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security. There might be the odd rough edge rasped off those bills through negotiations between the major parties, but they effectively come out unchanged because the intelligence and security apparatus in this country always gets what it wants out of the major parties. Then, those bills, having possibly had one or two of the roughest edges rasped off them, if we are lucky, come into this Senate and, once again, the establishment parties collude to ram them through. So rights and liberties continue to get eroded because we remain really the only so-called liberal democracy in the world that doesn't have a charter of rights or a bill of rights. The ongoing series of well over 200 pieces of legislation that have passed through state, territory and Commonwealth parliaments in the last 20 years continue to get watered down and erode the fundamental rights and freedoms that many Australians, including ancestors of mine, fought and died to protect and enhance. That's because the major parties are not prepared to stand up to the intelligence and security apparatus in this country.

We want this legislation to be examined in public by the legal and constitutional affairs committee, which does have a crossbench member—and a very capable one, I might add—in the form of Senator Shoebridge. That is what we should be doing with legislation like this that erodes fundamental rights and freedoms, and that is why the Greens are moving this amendment.

Sue Lines (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

For the benefit of all of us, I understand that's an amendment to (a).

David Shoebridge (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank Senator McKim for moving the motion. We're in the third-last sitting week of parliament, and Minister Burke suddenly pulls out of nowhere three bills, one of which is 100 pages long, another of which is 56 pages long and another of which is 20-odd pages long. Without any prior consultation, without any prior notice, he pulls out these three bills three weeks out from the end of the sitting calendar this year and now wants to send them off to another secret committee, a secret committee dominated by the war and security parties, who have never seen a war they haven't wanted to join or a secret they haven't wanted to hide or a whistleblower they haven't wanted to put in jail. That's the committee that's going to look at these three bills, almost 200 pages of super-secret legislation making it harder and nastier for anyone who wants to actually tell the truth about what's going on in this place. That's what we're seeing.

We've got a rudderless government which can't seem to bring in any effective measure to deal with what people actually want addressed—cost of living, housing and trying to pay grocery bills. And what have they been spending their time doing? Working up some secret deal with the coalition to whack 300 pages of pro-security, pro-ASIO, pro-secrecy legislation to a secret committee populated by the war parties. Nothing changes in this place. People don't want to see another secret hatchet job between Labor and the coalition trying to give increased secrecy powers to the security agencies in this country. They'd like a government that is open and honest about how they're actually going to fix the real problems Australians are facing, problems about being able to pay the grocery bills, to afford unreasonable rents and to sort out housing, but there's nothing like that from the government. Instead, Minister Burke has been working in some dark, smoky room to produce hundreds of pages of super-secret legislation that he now wants to send to a secret committee.

If you wanted to have proof positive about how out of touch this Albanese government is with what people want this parliament to be doing, here it is. They have no serious solution to housing, no serious solution to the cost of living and no serious solution to things that millions of Australians want this government to address. Instead, they've been working on hundreds of pages of secret legislation with a secret deal with the coalition to go to a secret committee to do another job on Australians. That's the Albanese government 2024.

Sue Lines (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question is that the amendment as moved by Senator McKim to Senator Gallagher's amendment to the Selection of Bills Committee report be agreed to.

Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move an amendment to part (b) of the motion:

Omit "14 November 2024", substitute "31 January 2025".

The Sydney Airport Demand Management Amendment Bill 2024—53 pages of legislation—which was handed to the parliament at midday yesterday, makes the biggest change in three decades to the slot-management system, the access, into Sydney airport, our busiest airport in this country.

I want to take this opportunity to thank the crossbenchers, who last year worked with me to set up an inquiry into the Qatar Airways decision, which unmasked the government's lack of action around competition in the aviation sector and around these very longstanding, protected relationships, which, the Prime Minister and Alan Joyce notwithstanding, go back a long time and have had a significant impact on the reliability and price of aviation for everyday Australians.

I believe the significance of this change requires a longer inquiry. I appreciate that the government wants to get this through before going to an election and I don't want to stand in the way of changing a regulatory environment that is costing Australians each and every day, but I do believe that it is this chamber's responsibility to give the committee and stakeholders a chance to have an authentic and genuine engagement with the material, with the bill, and to provide, once again, the Senate and the government with sensible recommendations, as we did with the Senate bilateral air services agreements inquiry last year.

I'm not seeking an endless inquiry. This is a Labor government-controlled legislation inquiry. I know that right now senators and committees are very pressed for time. This will require more than two hearings to do it justice and to get it written and reported on in time for our next sitting date. If there are more submissions than we expect or there are more complexities than we've already uncovered in the brief time we've had the legislation before us, it won't allow us the opportunity to extend the inquiry. That is why I've set the reporting date at 31 January: it's so that the report can be delivered in time for the legislation to appear before the Senate and be debated and moved prior to heading to an election.

I know that the crossbench and the Greens supported the setting up of that bilateral air services agreements committee. It handed down an incredibly sensible array of recommendations. The Harris review has been around for a while. My initial reading of this bill is that it doesn't implement the Harris review recommendations, as the government is running around and saying. It actually only implements a couple of them. So there is some sensible work that can be done by senators, in conjunction with stakeholders, to ensure that the problems with getting access into Sydney, from right around the country, can actually be addressed. So I implore the crossbench and I implore the Greens to reconsider their position on extending the date. It's great to see the chamber has realised this is an issue Australians care about and that we're prepared to now have an inquiry, but let's make it an inquiry that doesn't hold the bill up unnecessarily prior to an election and that actually allows us to do our job and provide sensible recommendations, as this Senate and this particular committee have done in the past. I commend my amendment.

David Pocock (ACT, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'd like to thank Senator McKenzie for all her work in shining a light on the shambles that is the slot system at Sydney Airport. This was a focus of her airlines inquiry. Clearly, it's not working. It's disappointing that it's taken the government this long, given the impact that it has—particularly here in the ACT, where we're getting absolutely price gouged to fly 45 minutes to Sydney, which, I'm told, comes down largely to the slot hoarding system. Clearly, there's a need for reform. I thank the government for bringing this forward.

My view is that this can be dealt with in the time that has been proposed, given the urgency of it. This is only one very small part of a broader package of reform that needs to happen, and I'm comfortable that the Senate can deal with those stakeholders and work to have something in place, should the Senate like the legislation that's being proposed this year. I'll be supporting the shorter reporting date, but I do thank Senator McKenzie for all her work.

Sue Lines (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question is the amendment moved by Senator McKenzie to Senator Gallagher's amendment of the Selection of Bills Committee report be agreed to.

Sue Lines (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'll now move to Senator Gallagher's amendment. The question is that Senator Gallagher's amendment to the Selection of Bills Committee report be agreed to.

Question agreed to.

The question now is that the Selection of Bills Committee report, as amended, be adopted.

Question agreed to.