Karen Grogan (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I present the report of the Environment and Communications Legislation Committee on the provisions of the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024, together with the accompanying documents, and I seek leave to move a motion relating to the recommendation in the report.

Leave granted.

I move:

That the Senate adopt the recommendation in the report, and that the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024 be withdrawn and immediately discharged from the Notice Paper.

Jenny McAllister (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Emergency Management) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on this motion, concerning the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024, as the Minister representing the Minister for Communications. The way Australians and, indeed, the world consumes information is changing. More and more, we access information online and we access it through social media platforms. To call this a revolution is actually to understate it; this is a profound change in the way we work and our world works. Governments have a responsibility to respond both to the opportunities and the challenges presented by this change.

There are benefits that arise from these changes, but there are challenges too: ensuring equality of digital access for the information online that people want; the exposure of some of the most vulnerable people in our community to scams and exploitation; the use of platforms to bully and harass; young people's access to a range of inappropriate and sometimes addictive material; how best to fund the news that is the pillar of our democratic arrangements; and the spread of misinformation and disinformation that is often deliberately designed to disrupt our democracy and to damage social cohesion.

The responsibility to deal with all these challenges does not just lie with the executive; the responsibility to deal with these challenges lies with this parliament. To quote the minister in a speech she gave a few weeks ago:

For policy makers to take an elevated view of how technology can shape our future for the better, we need to deal with the excesses of social media, and other emerging technologies like AI, otherwise, they will continue to disproportionately dominate public debate.

We must get to a place where public trust in technology and innovation are in a virtuous circle.

I am confident in our ability to do this.

The truth is there is no consensus on the governance of digital platforms and how to keep children safe and healthy in the digital age.

Yes, the task of change is hard and the road is not straight—but what is clear is that doing nothing is not an option.

Those are the minister's words.

The Albanese government's approach is not to pretend this isn't happening or to pretend, as others do, that the answers to these challenges are simple. We have sought to work with the community, stakeholders, media old and new, and the parliament to deal with this, to devise solutions that mitigate harms while allowing every Australian to enjoy the benefits. The community is rightly concerned. The community is looking to all of us for solutions, and our government is putting forward solutions: passing legislation to create new penalties for privacy violations like doxxing and creating and distributing deepfake pornography; quadrupling base funding for the eSafety Commissioner; backing in the News Media Bargaining Code; working to combat scams; and seeking to legislate age limits on access to social media. And we intend to complement this by establishing a digital duty of care.

As everyone in this place knows, we have also sought to regulate the spread of seriously harmful misinformation and disinformation. The first role, the first responsibility, of this parliament should be to make laws that keep Australia safe, and the combating misinformation and disinformation bill was an opportunity for the parliament to do this. Doing nothing in the face of growing problems of mis and disinformation means doing nothing about the concerns of 80 per cent of Australians and a number of statutory agencies. Our regulators and agencies, who are at the front line when it comes to keeping us safe, have identified the threat posed by misinformation and disinformation; the ACCC, the Australian Communications and Media Authority, the AEC, ASIO and NEMA have all spoken about this. We're talking about content that is verifiably false, misleading or deceptive, that is amplified by algorithms and that can cause serious harm—including content spread by malicious actors via bots and troll farms.

Failure to support this bill means this bill will not be legislated, and it means that we will not be in a position to help keep Australians safe with laws that address 21st-century challenges that we and other democracies face. Our best chance for finding good answers to the questions that confront our nation is in our collective capacity to have a well-informed and inclusive public discussion. The spread of serious disinformation in digital public squares often by people who intend to sew discord and distrust makes that task all the more difficult. And it's incumbent on democracies to grapple with these challenges, to do so in a way that puts citizens first. Misinformation and disinformation are an evolving threat. No single action is a perfect solution, but we must continue to improve safeguards to ensure that digital platforms offer better protections for Australians. These are challenging questions. They are not assisted by three-word slogans or simplistic responses to complex problems. They are not assisted by inconsistent approaches, with some in this place supporting certain regulatory tools in some contexts and bitterly opposing them in others, and they are not assisted by cynically ramping up fear before backflipping on a previous commitment. The coalition committed to legislating safeguards when they were in government, but they have since chosen another path. The Australian Greens don't want self-regulation, but that is exactly what they get by opposing this bill. It is another example in the growing list of examples where the Greens would rather vote with the coalition than work with Labor to advance reform on an issue that they say is important.

Some senators thought this bill went too far; others thought it did not go far enough. But it's clear that the bill as introduced—on this case, the Senate was not prepared to find common ground or support it as a step in the right direction when it comes to holding big tech to account. It's for that reason that the government does not seek to proceed with the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024. The government invites all parliamentarians to work with us on other proposals, to strengthen democratic institutions, to keep Australians safe online, while safeguarding values like freedom of expression. It is incumbent on democracies to grapple with these challenges in a way that puts the interests of citizens first and protects our society against those that would use our openness against us.

Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This could well be a bill that ought be renamed the 'chaos and contempt bill' from the Albanese Labor government. 'Chaos and contempt' is what has been shown throughout this whole very long and drawn out process, which ultimately has led to what we've just seen, which is the Albanese government taking the highly unusual step of moving to withdraw their own bill. Having been listed as the first bill of the day, with them having only a few days ago thought this was going to be what they'd prioritise and charge ahead, it's now to be dismissed and discharged instead. It's a chaotic process that didn't just have its start a few days ago; this is effectively two whole years of chaos from the Albanese government on this topic. All the way back to January last year, in 2023—that was when Minister Rowland and the Prime Minister were waxing lyrical about what it was they were going to do to address what indeed are serious issues in terms of the threats that misinformation and disinformation pose. We don't for a second deny that there are significant challenges there.

It's why as a government we put in place a range of different steps in terms of the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme and the Foreign Arrangements Scheme—we made sure that we were on the front foot in those areas. But what we didn't do, Senator Ayres, was decide that the big-brother hand of government was the way to try to regulate what was or wasn't correct for people to say. Our concerns on this are hardly concerns that are isolated to the coalition.

So do the 24,000 people who responded to your public consultation process. Do you know how hard it is to get people to respond to a government consultation process?

Usually, when people respond to a government consultation process, you will get a few of the different organisations that will put their views in. Maybe you'll get a few dozen. If it's really big, you might get a few hundred. This bill had 24,000 people make submissions, overwhelmingly stating their objections to the bill and highlighting the flaws in the bill. Before Senator Ayres continues by trying to besmirch all those who oppose as being One Nation supporters or otherwise, let's understand that the opposition to this bill united everyone from the Australian Human Rights Commission through to religious leaders, civil liberties bodies, the Law Council, academics and others. Right across the ideological and political spectrum, the opposition to this bill was clear-cut, widespread and demonstrated the just how wrong the government had got it.

Having got it so wrong, having had the message through that consultation period with thousands upon thousands of people making submissions, you would have thought the government would have gone back to the drawing board at some stage. You would have thought they would have listened to those criticisms. You would have thought they would have tried to bring a different proposal forward. But no—not this government. They just kept digging deeper and deeper and deeper into the hole and into the trench until, ultimately, they were forced into this humiliating backdown today where they withdraw their legislation and they are left with no clear agenda in terms of the way forward.

There are questions unanswered. Having heard Senator McAllister's contribution, I don't know whether this legislation is still the government's policy or not. Will they come back with the same proposal all over again, or is this legislative retreat also a policy retreat by the Labor Party? Can we have some clarity around that from the government? Who knows what their policy is today as a result of this chaotic process. Having ignored the views of the people who made submissions, having failed to write the bill through its journey, they then got to the point of last week, clearly somehow thought they were going to do a grand deal and ram it through here, only to discover that from the Greens through the crossbench to the coalition, nobody supported it, just as in the public domain. It was a friendless bill right across the spectrum.

So what is Labor 's policy? What is their direction here? What is the alternative that they are going to develop in terms of how to tackle these issues without creating a situation where a minister or a bureaucracy is given some type of monopoly on the truth and assessment of how political debate and discourse is undertaken? That's the fundamental challenge that requires reconciliation in relation to this issue. Yes, you have misinformation and disinformation driven by state and nonstate actors in and outside of our country that do pose genuine threat. Equally, you have the need—as has always been the case in a robust democracy like ours—to enable free speech, free expression and the contest of free ideas to occur.

I don't know whether or not the government are going to proceed with it—I don't know—but they have debated and discussed 'truth in political advertising' laws with the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters. Their proposal is for something based on South Australia—my home state, the only state to have 'truth in political advertising' laws. I would love to stand here and tell the Senate that, as a result of those laws, state election campaigns in SA, with the Electoral Commission, are able to arbitrate over whether something is accurate or not, and that our election campaigns have a higher standard and loftier ambitions. But you can't tell the difference, aside from the fact that each political party has teams of lawyers who sit there and fire complaints against one another, and the poor Electoral Commissioner is caught and wedged in the middle, having to somehow try to navigate the terrain of whether or not these are honest, accurate statements and to judge these things.

Bureaucrats, public servants, shouldn't be put in those positions. They shouldn't be put in a situation where they are having to judge the political debate of our country, and yet that was what this government was headed towards. So we welcome their withdrawal of this bill.

In terms of chaos, it came on the weekend, when the same minister also had a big policy retreat when it came to action in relation to gambling harms. I understand that the government has now abandoned any hope or ambition of responding this year to parliamentary reports in relation to problem gambling and online gambling. The coalition know where we stand. Indeed, the Leader of the Opposition, 18 months ago, announced our position in relation to a ban on gambling advertising during live sport, and we brought legislation to the Senate as well, which the Greens and the Labor Party combined to defeat. What do we have 18 months later? A government without a policy on mis- and disinformation and without a policy in relation to gambling bans and harms, and no action having been taken in relation to any of these issues because of the chaos that we see from those opposite.

Whilst we welcome this progress, the government stands condemned for its mishandling of this process and its failure to advance the types of reforms that could generate support because they would sensibly balance the competing interests at play here and would actually progress the public policy of our nation. Instead, we're left with a government with no policy, with no idea and, clearly, with nothing but a chaotic process and contemptuous policy ideas.

Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Birmingham said chaos and confusion. This government is trying to get through 76 bills this week. They list the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024 as their first item on the agenda, and then they have to do a backflip and pull it. But I think, Senator Birmingham, the one word that was missing from the chaos and confusion was the cost—the cost that this bill would have had to the Australian people had the government secured the numbers to put it through. Let's face it—misinformation and disinformation? You've got to be kidding me. This bill was nothing more and nothing less than Mr Albanese and the Australian Labor Party—shame on them—seeking to censor free speech of the Australian people in this nation.

This bill has no friends. When the Australian Human Rights Commission is siding on the side of the coalition and calling out this government for censoring free speech, Australians need to wake up. Let's look at what leading constitutional lawyer Professor Anne Twomey told the Senate inquiry. Again, if you don't want to believe what the coalition and most other Australians are saying, let's listen to what a leading constitutional expert is saying. She said the government's bill, if passed, would 'create worse problems through large-scale censorship of contested views and the undermining of democracy in the name of cleansing it of misinformation'.

I have to say, colleagues, I've been in this place for 16 years. Senator Birmingham has been here longer than me, at 17 years, and, if you ever said to me as a member of the Australian parliament that a government would seek to bring in a bill that seeks to censor the Australian people from having an opinion and that seeks to effectively gag them from having free speech, I would have said to you that you've got to be kidding.

But I'm glad this government's done this. I actually am, because, in a few months time, the Australian people will have to make a decision.

The decision is going to be for a government—and all commentators are now saying Australia's heading to minority—that's in minority with the Australian Greens. Let's be very clear. The Australian Greens have withdrawn support for this bill and are not providing support for it not because they believe in free speech but because, worse, they think the bill doesn't go far enough. You can be guaranteed that, after the next election, if the Australian people vote for this government with the Australian Greens, you will be silenced. Why do I say that? You have a bill currently on the Notice Paper that seeks to silence you.

This is possibly, as Professor Anne Twomey has said, 'large-scale censorship of contested views' and, worse, 'the undermining of democracy in the name of cleansing it from misinformation.' You read about this, quite frankly, in the books of history. I don't know too many Western democracies that have sought to cleanse their community from misinformation. If the Australian people don't think this is serious, be very, very careful. The people who will be judging whether what you say is indeed true are going to be a bunch of bureaucrats. Nobody gets to judge whether or not what you say is true. Free speech is something that we all hold dear. It is the fundamental principle—that you have the right to say what you believe and that I contest that right with my ideas if I don't agree with it. For a government to come into this place and to seek to censor the Australian people, to seek to censor their right to free speech, shame on them. I would encourage all Australians to have their say at the ballot box.

Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

To the people of Australia, congratulations—you've won. You put so much pressure on the 'uniparty' that you won; they folded. Four years ago I came out against the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024, and it's been a slog ever since. That's when the Morrison-Joyce Liberal-National government introduced it. I'll just make some comments there. This is a part of five components—the mis- and disinformation bill; the Digital ID Act; identity verification bill; under-16s banned from social media; Reserve Bank of Australia working on a digital currency that'll be connected to a global digital currency—of a package towards social credit. The second point is that that package is being put by the major parties—Liberals, Nationals and Labor. The third point is that it's connected to implementation of a similar package around the world in many other nations right now. It's led to the arrest of 150 people in the United Kingdom, with jail for some, simply for making comments dissenting against the British government.

This misinformation and disinformation bill had some worthy sections on regulating the tech giants, but it was primarily about censorship and censoring the Australian people. One Nation supports a referendum to enshrine freedom of speech in our Constitution. One Nation supports legislation to mandate and enable free speech and to make free speech sacrosanct so that no state can trump it. One Nation wants to appeal 18C. This has come out of 18C, which is scandalous. They're some of the basics.

I will read part of my dissenting report on the Senate's inquiry into this bill. It began:

1.1 I thank the witnesses for their submissions and for attending the hearings.

There were many, many witnesses. Thank you, Australia.

1.2 The committee report—

as it was originally drafted—

into the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024 flies in the face of the expert evidence the committee has received across three days of hearings into the bill.

That evidence just completely smashed it and reversed it. But, with the tidal wave of views from across Australia, the committee changed its view—wonderful.

1.3 A committee inquiry should not perform the function of gift wrapping a decision which has already been taken. A committee inquiry should have the role of deciding if the decisions taken in the bill are correct.

The first report did not do that fundamental thing.

1.4 For three days, the committee heard from human rights advocates and stakeholders who all criticised this bill on human rights grounds, and added warnings the bill would backfire.

That's what the committee heard almost unanimously.

1.5 It is extraordinary the committee would choose to ignore the recommendations of the very people who they invited to attend to advise them on this matter.

Only when the public turned savagely against the government was the committee report changed at the last minute to reflect today's motion. The action of the committee to that point would have made it harder:

… for any Senate inquiry in the future to attract the quality of witnesses this inquiry attracted.

Censorship was the purpose of this bill. Censorship was the purpose of the committee report. The criticism of the bill was well placed. My comments continued:

1.7 The Australian Human Rights Commission questioned a basic foundation of the bill—the definition of 'information'. In the Explanatory Memorandum the term 'is intended to include opinions, claims, commentary and invective'.

1.8 The Australian Human Rights Commission stated 'considerable caution should be exercised before including opinions and commentary within the scope of "information" as this significantly broadens the potential reach of this legislation and increases the risk of it being used to censor legitimate debate about matters of public importance.

That is profound. That is the bedrock of a democracy.

1.9 One Nation agrees with this concern. The bill misconstrues human rights as relative, indeed as subordinate to the need of government to suppress opinions they don't like.

That's what you tried to do.

1.10 The Human Rights Law Centre recommended Clause 11(e) should be amended to reflect a broader commitment to human rights in the bill's objectives. It also recommended the Australian Human Rights Commission should be consulted on the development of codes.

'Consultation'—that'd be nice.

1.11 Several submissions related to the specific areas of misinformation. The Australian Medical Professional Society submitted:

By centralising control over what constitutes medical 'truth' in the hands of government regulators, we risk creating an even more Orwellian twist in a system that is already subject to manipulation by powerful interests, to further suppress inconvenient facts and legitimate debate. This would be disastrous not only for free speech and democracy, but for public health as well.

People's lives depend on this. And you wanted to stop it.

1.12 The report failed to address a critical failing in the debate around COVID. Namely that information presented as medical truth at the time has been proven to be wrong—

not only wrong but completely contradicting the truth—

and information banned as misinformation has now been proven to be true.

Repeatedly, repeatedly and repeatedly.

1.13 On the issue of COVID messaging, One Nation has maintained a contrary position to the Government of the day since 2020. This followed expert testimony from multiple specialists, research doctors and whistle blowers which contradicted the official narrative.

1.14 The implication is simple—what is misinformation one day is truth the next. This is the danger in the Government deciding what is and is not misinformation. The bias will always be in favour of the government's 'truth'.

I asked every witness a fundamental question on the last day of the hearing: who is the arbiter of truth? No-one could say who is specified as the arbiter of truth in the bill. They all said that it would default to ACMA. Other provisions in my additional comments included: religious freedom, inauthentic behaviour and media literacy. But the fundamental thing is this was an attempt by the Labor Party to build on the Liberal Party's previous attempts at censorship by corralling misinformation under their definition, and then driving the social media organisations, the big tech companies, to ram it down people's throats. That was what you were doing. I'm pleased to see that the people of Australia have put the brake on you.

Now I appeal to the people of Australia to keep a foot on their throat because we must stop the banning of under-16-year-old people from social media.

Matt O'Sullivan (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator McKenzie, you have 10 seconds.

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

Ten seconds! How embarrassing it is for the Labor government to have to withdraw the misinformation and disinformation bill on the first day of the last sitting week. You've silenced the Senate this week, and you're trying to silence Australians.

Matt O'Sullivan (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator McKenzie. Unfortunately, the time has expired for this debate. The question is that the motion moved by Senator Grogan be agreed to.

Question agreed to.