Michael Danby's recent appearances (OpenAustralia.org)
type: channel
language: en-gb
creator: OpenAustralia.org, mprss.php script
date: 2019-07-02T23:05:24+00:00
items: Valedictory | Parliamentary Representation | House debates
items: 70th Anniversary of Australia's Formal Diplomatic Relationship with the State of Israel | Statements | House debates
items: Australian Greens | Constituency Statements | House debates
items: Human Rights | Adjournment | House debates
items: Cooney, Mr Bernard Cornelius 'Barney' | Condolences | House debates
items: Electoral Legislation Amendment (Modernisation and Other Measures) Bill 2018; Second Reading | Bills | House debates
items: Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide: 70th Anniversary | Private Members' Business | House debates
items: Spinak, Mr Jeremy Mark | Private Members' Business | House debates
items: International Human Rights and Corruption (Magnitsky Sanctions) Bill 2018; Second Reading | Bills | House debates
items: Melbourne: Attacks | Statements on Indulgence | House debates
items: Australian Parliamentary Delegation to the United Kingdom, France and Ireland | Delegation Reports | House debates
items: Defence Amendment (Call Out of the Australian Defence Force) Bill 2018; Second Reading | Bills | House debates
items: Treaties Committee; Report | Committees | House debates
items: China | Constituency Statements | House debates
items: Joint Standing Committee on Treaties; Report | Committees | House debates
items: Treaties Committee | Committees | House debates
items: Telecommunications | Constituency Statements | House debates
items: Melbourne Ports Electorate | Adjournment | House debates

Valedictory | Parliamentary Representation | House debates
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description: Walking into this chamber representing the people of Melbourne Ports to serve the Commonwealth of Australia has been the greatest honour of my life, other than when my beloved Amanda, who's...
encoded: Walking into this chamber representing the people of Melbourne Ports to serve the Commonwealth of Australia has been the greatest honour of my life, other than when my beloved Amanda, who's sitting up there in the gallery, agreed to become my wife. We're a bit eccentric. We were married in this building just after Labor was last elected. After 100 years, I'll be the last member for Melbourne Ports. For two decades, Australian Labor gave me this privilege. I owe it and the people of my electorate everything. I gave the job my all. People sometimes disagree with me—well, not just sometimes—but few have doubted my sincerity or diligence to Melbourne Ports. I hope it was enough. I couldn't have done more. For two decades, my precious wife, Amanda, my kids, Byron and Laura, who I am so proud of, who are sitting in the gallery, my brother Simon and his wife, Miriam, our wider family, led by David and Peppy Sherr, my friends and staff, and party workers and volunteers have been there for me. Could I have persevered without the Pinskiers, Kimberley Kitching, Sylvia and Maurie Freeman, Moishe Gordon, Ari Suss, the Zajacs and Nathan Shafir or my dear mate the late Con Sciacca? Could I have persevered without the friendship of Bunna Walsh the former member for Albert Park, lately Martin Foley, and Andrew Landeryou—a blood brother from university days who has always been there for me? Without all of them, without their support, their love, their belief in me and most importantly in the cause of Labor, or at least the Australian variety of it, I would not have been preselected four times or seven times re-elected. My name's on the office door, but I've always been conscious of who put me there. I'm deeply, almost spiritually, satisfied to feel that I've repaid the opportunity I've been given by my loved ones, my comrades, my local community and my country. There are so many young people who've started their political life in my office, something I'm particularly proud of. I'm pl…
date: 2019-04-02T12:09:00+00:00

70th Anniversary of Australia's Formal Diplomatic Relationship with the State of Israel | Statements | House debates
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description: What a momentous 70 years it's been, particularly with the Australia-Israel relationship. As the Leader of the Opposition noted yesterday, it was the first foreign policy decision of Australia in...
encoded: What a momentous 70 years it's been, particularly with the Australia-Israel relationship. As the Leader of the Opposition noted yesterday, it was the first foreign policy decision of Australia in the post World War II world where Australia struck out independently from Britain in foreign policy. Of course, the British abstained on the partition of Palestine and Australia strongly supported it. In fact, Dr Evatt and the then foreign spokesman of the Labor Party led the charge internationally. We in Australia supported, as we do now—both political parties—a two-state solution to the Middle East. Dr Evatt was very far-sighted back then and his policy was endorsed by the Leader of the Opposition in his speech in the House the other day. There were some correct points made by the Prime Minister, too, on the obsession there seems to be with this situation at the UN General Assembly and the UN Human Rights Council. It is incredible that the UN has resolution after resolution—tens of resolutions—dealing with issues in the Israel-Palestinian conflict, but the 300,000 people in concentration camps in North Korea, the million people in prison camps in Xinjiang and East Turkestan, the Muslim people of Darfur in Sudan and the many much worse situations around the world get little mention. It is interesting, too, that the very day the Leader of the Opposition moves that supportive resolution recognising Australia's longstanding relationship with Israel is the very day that the British Labour Party splits over this issue. Some of the people in the British Labour Party—including my friend Luciana Berger—as correctly characterised in The Times of London today, were driven out of the Labour Party by anti-Semitism because, unfortunately, the leadership of the British Labour Party can't distinguish between legitimate criticisms of a state and obsessive criticisms of a people in a state. That led the British Jewish community and great Labour MPs like Luciana Berger to say that their par…
date: 2019-02-20T11:12:00+00:00

Australian Greens | Constituency Statements | House debates
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description: Following meticulous research by the Parliamentary Library, I published a series of advertisements throughout Victoria on the record of the Greens political party in voting against every piece of...
encoded: Following meticulous research by the Parliamentary Library, I published a series of advertisements throughout Victoria on the record of the Greens political party in voting against every piece of national security legislation since 9/11. Not criticism and not amendments; every piece of legislation and every bill since 9/11. They have voted and spoken against every bill. Recently, Bob Brown, the former leader of the Green political party, was in Sydney talking about splitting that political party in New South Wales because of its undying extremism, even in terms of the Greens political party. But I rise to speak on another, sadder matter with regard to the attitude of that political party, which was raised in a column by Janet Albrechtsen. I don't always agree with her, but she made some very valuable points following a conversation with my friend, Mr Vic Alhadeff, who heads the New South Wales Jewish Board of Deputies. The New South Wales Jewish Board of Deputies, being good Australian citizens, have outreach Shabbat dinners. Shabbat is the Friday night meal that Jewish families traditionally have. As outreach, the New South Wales Jewish Board of Deputies has had a wonderful program of Shabbat dinners for Liberal Party leaders, the LGBTI community, the Young Labor union, the Chinese community and the Indian community. The only group who will not accept invitations is the Greens political party. It's really disgraceful. As Mr Alhadeff says, the purpose of these dinners is simple yet important: … engaging as Australians … and using the opportunity to explore our commonalities, beliefs and shared values. Mr Alhadeff said it was not to command agreement or to proselytise; just to speak to one another as respectful human beings. Many Jewish Australians might be drawn to genuinely green policies about the environment, but the extremist attitude of the Greens precludes engagement. It's not tolerance; it's prejudice. The bigotry of the Greens has no place in Australia. The …
date: 2019-02-18T10:30:00+00:00

Human Rights | Adjournment | House debates
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description: Government officials connected with authoritarian governments have gotten away with their abuses of power without sanction. These abusers use their ill-gotten gains and status to travel abroad...
encoded: Government officials connected with authoritarian governments have gotten away with their abuses of power without sanction. These abusers use their ill-gotten gains and status to travel abroad and bask in the affluence of the West, purchasing and investing in assets overseas, sending their children to expensive private schools and hiding their ill-gotten gains in offshore bank accounts for the benefit of themselves, their families and their cronies. In the late 1980s, the US Senate passed the Jackson-Vanik amendment, which pressured the then Soviet Union on the issue of human rights. Jackson-Vanik was emblematic of our Western willingness to use foreign policy to free the great Andrei Sakharov or Anatoly Sharansky. Since the fall of the Berlin Wall and the apparent end of communism, Russia and China were admitted to the World Trade Organization. Francis Fukuyama, in his End of History and the Last Man, said that this would 'inevitably lead to democratisation'. With China and Russia's admittance to the World Trade Organization, we lost most of our human rights leverage over these authoritarian states. Last year, Beijing contemptuously and unilaterally cancelled our already ineffectual human rights dialogue with them. The International Human Rights and Corruption (Magnitsky Sanctions) Bill 2018, which I introduced to the House the week before parliament rose last year, attempts to rebalance and reinvigorate democratic pushback, to give us, again, some instrument that will enable democracies to respond to authoritarian outrages without going to war. The Russian Federation general in the 53rd anti-aircraft brigade who shot down MH17 and the official in Khartoum who sent the Janjaweed militia to murder the Muslim people of Western Sahara won't like this legislation. At Labor's national conference in Adelaide I named Beijing's viceroy in Xinjiang, or East Turkestan, Chen Quanguo, who set up concentration camps for millions of Uygurs in East Turkestan. He won't like this l…
date: 2019-02-18T19:48:00+00:00

Cooney, Mr Bernard Cornelius 'Barney' | Condolences | House debates
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description: Senator Barney Cooney and I became fast friends in the four years we served here together in the federal parliament. I would often meet him in the most unlikely place, in the gym, and I would...
encoded: Senator Barney Cooney and I became fast friends in the four years we served here together in the federal parliament. I would often meet him in the most unlikely place, in the gym, and I would receive long lectures and long advices about what Labor's policy ought to be. These long lectures and advices repeated what he told the caucus, being probably the most inveterate question asker in the Labor caucus between 1998 and his retirement in 2002 that I can remember. Barney lived in my electorate, in Shoobra Road in Elsternwick. His son Justin I know well, and Lillian as well. After his retirement, we remained fast friends on the telephone and sometimes meeting for coffee. He was, as the member for Sydney described him, a very kind, warm person, with never a nasty word, even if you had political disagreements. I think the story that Amanda Vanstone told in the Fairfax press in an obituary for him was very typical of the kind of gentle but persistent Melbourne barrister that he was. There was a hearing where the Law Society appeared. He gently got them to commit themselves to how great they were and their commitments to this and that. He had a witness who he saw sitting at the back of the room who had been badly treated by them. After drawing them out fully, as a smart barrister would, he then got this witness to come up to the head table and asked them questions about what they'd really done to her. It was very, very effective, and it obviously impressed former Attorney-General Vanstone very much. The commonality that Barney and I had was a very strong commitment to international human rights. The more I pushed that, the more he liked it. As I said, we became close friends. He was a strong supporter. I was very grateful for his advice. I was grateful for, as the member for Isaacs said, his counsel—his wisdom, his knowledge and, sometimes, his attempts to redirect you away from a certain course towards another in order to achieve the same end in a different way. I will gr…
date: 2019-02-13T12:08:00+00:00

Electoral Legislation Amendment (Modernisation and Other Measures) Bill 2018; Second Reading | Bills | House debates
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description: The members for Scullin and Rankin have very ably explained why section 44(i) of the Constitution needed to be considered very carefully in this Electoral Legislation Amendment (Modernisation and...
encoded: The members for Scullin and Rankin have very ably explained why section 44(i) of the Constitution needed to be considered very carefully in this Electoral Legislation Amendment (Modernisation and Other Measures) Bill 2018—so that it restores the trust of the Australian people in candidates for parliament. They've also explained, as I'm sure the shadow minister for electoral matters has very capably dealt with in the Senate, the areas of the bill that we are going to agree on with the government. They include applying six-metre exclusion zones, forwarding and processing of declaration votes, removal of the requirement to conduct divisional returning officer Senate counts, allowing earlier commencement of preliminary scrutiny of declaration votes, removing the requirement to produce postal vote applications for preliminary scrutiny, allowing the early recheck of declaration votes and streamlining the process for counting and packaging House of Representatives ballot papers. These are all parts of the micromanagement of our electoral system that are very important. One of the reasons we do this is that constant revision of the electoral system for the maximum participation by Australian citizens in our compulsory attendance system is vital for ongoing democracy. We don't want to see in Australia, as we've seen in the United States, elections decided by hanging chads—that is, different electoral systems in different states. We don't want boundaries decided by state legislatures on the basis of political preferences or how it suits certain candidates from different political parties. We don't want to exclude people because of language or residential criteria, as happens in our great sister democracy, the United States. Our aim with all electoral legislation, including these micromanagement aims, is to include as many people as possible. I think one of the things that the opposition is most pleased about is the fundamental change that has taken place over the last few yea…
date: 2019-02-12T13:17:00+00:00

Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide: 70th Anniversary | Private Members' Business | House debates
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description: I want to pay tribute, also, to the Armenian National Committee for their involvement with the member for Goldstein and organising this debate this afternoon. It's a very important anniversary,...
encoded: I want to pay tribute, also, to the Armenian National Committee for their involvement with the member for Goldstein and organising this debate this afternoon. It's a very important anniversary, the 70th anniversary of the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, and I'm proud to be involved in recalling its passage. It was Raphael Lemkin, a Jewish lawyer from Poland, who coined the term 'genocide' in response to the extent of the atrocities inflicted on the Armenian people—1½ million people, as the member for Berowra said. Apparently it wasn't understood or known before that. Of course, in that conflict with Turkey, many Greek and Assyrian people of the Ottoman Empire were equally badly affected. But the non-remembrance of it had a specific effect. As the member for Berowra said, Adolf Hitler told a leading group of Nazi generals, meeting in the days before the commencement of the Second World War, words to the effect, 'Who remembers the Armenians?' He said this phrase because it presaged what his aggressive plans in eastern Europe were. They were issued at Obersalzberg on the eve of the Second World War to say that Germany was going to launch a racial war in eastern Europe. It was not a war of nation against nation. He was assuring his generals and gauleiters that they could get away with it because of what had happened to the Armenians. It's so important to go back to the beginning and, as we recall what happened in the Second World War, to remember this genocide that happened in the First World War. If we don't remember these kinds of things, it leads to situations that we've seen to a lesser extent all around the world since—in Darfur, Myanmar, Syria, North Korea and now in East Kazakhstan and Xinjiang in China. For Labor members of parliament, it's great that our then President of the UN General Assembly, Herbert Vere Evatt, who was foreign minister of Australia through the passage of the genocide convention, urged al…
date: 2018-12-03T18:36:00+00:00

Spinak, Mr Jeremy Mark | Private Members' Business | House debates
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description: I second the motion. First of all, I want to thank the member for Berowra for raising this important condolence and acknowledge in the gallery the presence of Jeremy Spinak's widow, Rhiannon,...
encoded: I second the motion. First of all, I want to thank the member for Berowra for raising this important condolence and acknowledge in the gallery the presence of Jeremy Spinak's widow, Rhiannon, with whom he spent the last six, and best, years of his life. He was, as the member for Berowra said, one of the most important and influential leaders of the Jewish community in Sydney. To die of cancer at such a young age, 36, is a terrible tragedy for his family and friends but also for the Australian Jewish community and the people of Australia in general. I had a telephone connection with Jeremy, being a Victorian, and he impressed me very much, as the member for Berowra said, as a person who, in the younger generation, was able to look to a wider future, wider engagements, and to reconcile and deal with people of all different backgrounds that perhaps an older generation of leadership had lost the touch for. Jeremy's passion for the Australian Jewish community is well known. The president of the board, his successor and friend Lesli Berger, and Vic Alhadeff said: His influence on our approach to representing the community, coalition-building, legislative reform, child protection and supporting marriage equality were among the numerous achievements which will be his lasting legacy both to our organisation and the entire community. Such skills are rare. Such skills in a young man are even rarer. To have been taken at such a young age is a terrible tragedy, and we're all poorer for his passing. It's very interesting that the Premier of New South Wales actually had the cabinet—normally something that would only be done for a member of parliament—stand for a minute's silence. Gladys Berejiklian said: Jeremy was an outstanding community advocate and an amazing human being. He had a huge impact on everyone he met, including myself, and will be sorely missed. Jeremy was dedicated to forging links between our multicultural and religious communities and was a champion of an inclusi…
date: 2018-12-03T11:36:00+00:00

International Human Rights and Corruption (Magnitsky Sanctions) Bill 2018; Second Reading | Bills | House debates
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description: I move: That this bill be now read a second time. If you're the general who sent the military hooligans to shoot down MH17 or you're the official in Khartoum who sends the Janjaweed militia to...
encoded: I move: That this bill be now read a second time. If you're the general who sent the military hooligans to shoot down MH17 or you're the official in Khartoum who sends the Janjaweed militia to murder the Muslim people of Western Sudan or you're the Beijing official who has set up concentration camps for a million Uygur people in East Kazakhstan, you will not like this bill. For too long, government officials and others connected with authoritarian governments and kleptocracies around the world have gotten away with their abuses of power without sanction. Rubbing salt into the wounds of those they exploit—the ordinary law-abiding citizens of their countries—these abusers use their ill-gotten gains and status to travel abroad and bask in the affluence of the West, purchasing and investing in assets overseas, sending their children to expensive overseas private schools, hiding their ill-gotten gains in offshore bank accounts, and generally using such money offshore for the benefit of themselves, their families and their cronies. The aims of this bill—the International Human Rights and Corruption (Magnitsky Sanctions) Bill 2018—are threefold: Sergei Magnitsky, whose name appears in the title of this bill, was a Russian lawyer who acted for Mr Bill Browder and his Hermitage Capital in Russia. Magnitsky discovered that some $230 million paid by Browder's company in taxes to the Russian government had been fraudulently misappropriated by officials working together with organised criminals. Magnitsky, naively, testified against these Russian officials. What happened then was an outrage. In testimony before the US House of Representatives, it was explained that Magnitsky: … thought that the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, was someone who was acting in the national interest, and if this $230 million theft— of Russian people's money— was exposed … the good guys would get the bad guys and that would be the end of the story. Instead, after Sergei— Magnitsky— testified again…
date: 2018-12-03T10:04:00+00:00

Melbourne: Attacks | Statements on Indulgence | House debates
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description: As it happens, the Thursday before Mr Malaspina was killed in the streets of Melbourne, I had a hearing of the Treaties Committee in the city. I don't go into the city much these days and I...
encoded: As it happens, the Thursday before Mr Malaspina was killed in the streets of Melbourne, I had a hearing of the Treaties Committee in the city. I don't go into the city much these days and I decided to flake off from the hearing and go to Pellegrini's for a bit of comfort food at lunchtime, as I have for 40 years. My late mother, Margaret, had an art gallery in Exhibition St. It's also around 40 years since her passing. As her assistant, I was paid in lasagne and would be sent up to Pellegrini's as a very sophisticated 14-year-old to have lunch there—to have, as someone said, a mocha in a glass and to have one of the wonderful apple strudels that Pellegrini's provided. Always sitting at the end of the counter was Mr Malaspina, with his signature cravat, the paper and a black coffee. Pellegrini's, symbolically, gave free black coffees to all of their longstanding customers the day they reopened after his tragic death. I can't imagine a person who's more iconic to Melbourne who is not in show business or in politics or well known on TV and who so many people had an affection for and who embodied that great postwar immigration that Australia has benefited from. It's hard to imagine Melbourne without the Italians or the Italian contribution. Mr Malaspina always had a good word for people. He was always encouraging. He was always interested in sports. He was a strong Essendon supporter, and you'd always have a conversation with him there. One of the things about Pellegrini's that's burned into the memories of Melburnians is that it has been the same since it opened. You sit at the bar there. You go there after the theatre for a gelato. You take a break during the day and have a coffee there. It was the first place in Melbourne that had a mocha coffee. I thought I was so sophisticated, at 14 or 15, having something like that there. And it was all made possible by Mr Malaspina and his partner. It's a great institution. People who don't go there for many years and then come …
date: 2018-11-27T17:34:00+00:00

Australian Parliamentary Delegation to the United Kingdom, France and Ireland | Delegation Reports | House debates
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description: I present the report of the Australian Parliamentary Delegation to the United Kingdom, France and Ireland, 3 to 14 June 2018. I ask leave of the House to make a short statement in connection with...
encoded: I present the report of the Australian Parliamentary Delegation to the United Kingdom, France and Ireland, 3 to 14 June 2018. I ask leave of the House to make a short statement in connection with the report. Leave granted. I was part of a very illustrious delegation led by the President of the Senate, Senator Scott Ryan. The other members included myself; my colleague and friend Mr Steve Georganas, who happily returned many times; the member for Hindmarsh; Senator Pauline Hanson, who I had my first opportunity to get to speak to in detail; Mr Tim Wilson, the member for Goldstein; and Jason Wood, the very active local member for La Trobe. The delegation was ably supported by Duncan Pearse, advisor to the President; and David Sullivan, the delegation secretary. We went to the United Kingdom, France and Ireland, and had many focuses of our visit, including trade and investment policy, particularly the UK's future trade relationship with Australia after it leaves—it is still trying to—the European Union; counterterrorism and security policy, including the security of parliamentary precincts; LGBTI policies and program; approaches to healthcare administration; youth and gang violence; energy policy; and policies to address foreign interference and the spread of misinformation and fake news via new and emerging social media platforms. Our visit to the United Kingdom was, for Australians, as usual, very engaging. We, of course, remain an enormous economic partner with what many Australians used to call the motherland. The UK is Australia's fourth-largest inbound market by arrivals and third-largest by tourism expenditure. The UK is also Australia's fourth-largest short-term destination, with 632,000 short-term resident departures from Australia to the UK for the year ending 2018. The strength of the bilateral relationship is difficult to comment on. We were received very graciously by all kinds of people. Of course, there were many visits by prime ministers and foreign min…
date: 2018-11-27T16:15:00+00:00

Defence Amendment (Call Out of the Australian Defence Force) Bill 2018; Second Reading | Bills | House debates
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description: and their others are important. The safety of all Australians is important. While the member for Melbourne calls me a grub, I'm proud to stand up for the 95 per cent of Australians, in my seat...
encoded: and their others are important. The safety of all Australians is important. While the member for Melbourne calls me a grub, I'm proud to stand up for the 95 per cent of Australians, in my seat and in all the rest of Australia, who think antiterrorist legislation, including this bill, is important.
date: 2018-10-22T15:39:00+00:00

Defence Amendment (Call Out of the Australian Defence Force) Bill 2018; Second Reading | Bills | House debates
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description: I rise to continue the opposition's responsible support for the Defence Amendment (Call Out of the Australian Defence Force) Bill 2018. I was particularly interested in the very specific...
encoded: I rise to continue the opposition's responsible support for the Defence Amendment (Call Out of the Australian Defence Force) Bill 2018. I was particularly interested in the very specific suggestion from the member for Canberra that this bill should actually be wider and take into consideration other critical infrastructure, apart from the four mentioned in the bill. I thought it was very wise of her, having concentrated so much on the effect of cybersecurity attacks in Australia and cybersecurity warfare generally, to mention the electoral systems as being critical infrastructure. We have seen claims from many countries that their electoral systems have been interfered with various hostile non-democratic powers. I was recently in France and had the great pleasure of introducing Senator Pauline Hanson to a young Muslim member of the National Assembly who was moving responsible legislation to restrict the Russian Federation from interfering in the French elections in the future as they had done recently to try and influence the candidacy of Mr Macron. It was a sort of piquant moment to point out to someone who was 'so uncritical' of all Muslims that here was a young responsible member of the National Assembly doing her bit for the security of democracy in France. Other countries have similar systems to that that is being legislated at the moment in relation to the ability to call out members of the defence forces in specific circumstances. There are countries in Europe which, regrettably for them, have to access the power of the military more often because they've had terrible terrorist attacks on their citizenry. Other countries that have similar legislation to this that I have been able to discover at short notice are Canada, Italy, Denmark and the United Kingdom. The United States has very longstanding laws against the US military which serves overseas being called out onto US streets. But, of course, the US has the National Guard, which can be, and indeed has been…
date: 2018-10-22T15:39:00+00:00

Treaties Committee; Report | Committees | House debates
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description: by leave—I want to join the Chief Government Whip in expressing my appreciation of this important visit by JSCOT to India and Indonesia. Unfortunately, I was only able to participate in the...
encoded: by leave—I want to join the Chief Government Whip in expressing my appreciation of this important visit by JSCOT to India and Indonesia. Unfortunately, I was only able to participate in the Indian section of the visit. I think that as Australian MPs we learnt a great deal of important things, particularly from my point of view, about India. We observed the Indian parliament in action, and it was a particularly interesting session that we attended. There was a debate on a proposed amendment to their constitution, with a 123-amendment bill. The bill sought to grant constitutional status to the National Commission on Backward Classes. That sounds a pretty arcane term in this parliament, but it refers to castes which are socially, educationally and economically disadvantaged. It is very interesting to see, as part of India's progress, that the disadvantaged castes are being legally addressed by the Lok Sabha and are being brought into equality—a very, very good thing from India's point of view. We had a chance, as the Chief Government Whip said, to observe economic reform in that great country and to look at the possibility of a free trade agreement with Australia. I have to report—I think it was the view of the delegation—that that FTA is going to take a great deal of further work, because most of the Indian economic policymakers were interested in focusing on their huge economy rather than even trade with the outside world or the importance of FTAs with Australia or, indeed, other countries. I would say, however, from our meetings with Australian businesspeople operating in India, that the abolition of different GSTs by states and the consolidation of them by the Lok Sabha has had an amazingly productive effect—just like the change in the Indian currency. The Indian government is to be congratulated on doing this, and it's made the doing of business between states in India—some of which, of course, are bigger than Australia, certainly in population size—a great deal e…
date: 2018-10-18T10:13:00+00:00

China | Constituency Statements | House debates
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description: On Monday in the business section of The Australian the Chairman of Anglo American mining denigrated democratic systems in Australia and around the world by saying that leadership in Australia...
encoded: On Monday in the business section of The Australian the Chairman of Anglo American mining denigrated democratic systems in Australia and around the world by saying that leadership in Australia was incompetent compared to the leadership that he has seen in China. That's a very unfortunate remark, no matter how badly behaved people here were a couple of weeks ago. It does not reflect well on a major Australian businessman, born in Wollongong, to prefer the authoritarian system in China to the system here. I'm sure it doesn't reflect the views of most people in Australian business. It has brought to mind yesterday's well-written column by the international editor of The Sydney Morning Herald, Mr Peter Hartcher. He pointed out that former Treasurer of Australia Mr Hockey had been importuned by a very arrogant Beijing-based businessman, who lit up a cigarette in his presence without permission, put his feet on the chair and demanded the right to buy Rio Tinto and a number of other leading Australian companies. The theme of Mr Hartcher's column was that there is an atmosphere in the Australian political sphere and in the Pacific and East Asia of arrogance from the regime in Beijing. Of course, we've seen the incredibly cruel crackdown on a million Muslim people in East Kazakhstan. They are virtually living in concentration camps. They are forced to eat products and drink alcohol that are not au fait with their religion. That's extremely regrettable. Mr Hartcher pointed out that, at the Pacific Islands Forum, the Prime Minister of Nauru had to actively sit down an official of Beijing who wanted to interpose himself and demanded to speak before ministers of the Pacific Islands Forum who were there on an invited basis. I and Mr Hartcher have noted that a leading Chinese academic in Beijing has said that Beijing's diplomacy needs to be improved. We in Australia have a good commercial trading and economic relationship with the People's Republic of China. We've had in the last …
date: 2018-09-12T11:50:00+00:00

China | Constituency Statements | House debates
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description: I want to renew my appeal today for Australia not to allow the Huawei company to bid for the 5G network. I remind people that some months ago I said to the House: I'm talking about Huawei and...
encoded: I want to renew my appeal today for Australia not to allow the Huawei company to bid for the 5G network. I remind people that some months ago I said to the House: I'm talking about Huawei and ZTE. Both these telcos are subject to government … dictates. In Beijing. I went on: Both Huawei and ZTE must report to a Communist Party cell at the top of their organisations. Let me issue a clarion call to this parliament … Australia's 5G network must not be sold to these telcos. Whatever instructions might be issued for Australian sovereignty— if they were to get the bid— … they will be compromised if we sell the construction of our new central communications 5G network to companies effectively controlled by an authoritarian government whose leader has recently been made dictator for life. The Beijing lobby have been very active in the meantime, with full-page ads. It's been a great shame to read on the front page of the Financial Review that some of the other bidders, Nokia and Ericsson, are now fully produced in China and are also subject to having this cell of the ruling party at the top of their organisations. It is a clear example of corporate irresponsibility and greed, thinking that producing some telecommunications equipment for a dollar lower than you might be able to produce it in your own country is some reason for producing it in China. Companies really need to consider the national interest of their own countries before just going for the lowest dollar value. When I talk about the Beijing lobby, I notice that Jennifer Hewett and Glenda Korporaal have said that the Huawei ruling will be a test of bilateral relations. Jennifer Hewett even highlights some of Huawei's laughable investigation of itself as a suitable company for the 5G network. The July 2018 report to the National Security Adviser of the United Kingdom says that the Huawei's Cyber Security Evaluation Centre Oversight Board said: … identification of shortcomings in Huawei's engineering processes have e…
date: 2018-08-23T10:27:00+00:00

Joint Standing Committee on Treaties; Report | Committees | House debates
type: item
description: by leave—I welcome the tabling of this report and I join the member for Cowan in welcoming the excellencies from the Ibero-American bloc, who are so much a part of this proposed treaty....
encoded: by leave—I welcome the tabling of this report and I join the member for Cowan in welcoming the excellencies from the Ibero-American bloc, who are so much a part of this proposed treaty. Negotiations on the original Trans-Pacific Partnership, as we know, began under Labor in 2010. As we're all aware, the United States withdrew from the agreement, which was signed in March this year. This is a new agreement and against the tide of opposition to free trade around the world. That's why it's so important. There are modest economic benefits for Australia in this agreement, and it will remove 98 per cent of tariffs in the region. According to independent economic modelling, of which the member for Cowan spoke so fondly and which was commissioned by the Victorian government, Australia gains market access and eliminates tariffs on Australian goods, including nickel, iron ore, copper, steel, auto parts and machinery. Open markets lift people out of poverty and create higher-paid, more secure jobs. There is also a strategic benefit to Australia in being involved in this regional agreement after the US withdrawal. It just shows that all of the countries who participate in this do understand that democratic cooperation, including in economic areas, is very important. Multilateral agreements like the CPTPP or, as it's better known, the TPP-11 establish the rules of the road for trade within our region. Deeper engagement in our region is key to securing Australia's economic future. Tying the economies of the region together also makes us more secure in this country. The opposition has long recognised that it is in Australia's national interest to engage more and play a bigger role in our region. That is why Labor has announced a suite of policies under the Future Asia banner in recognition that it is in Australia's economic and strategic interests to deepen engagement in the region. There are issues with the agreement that Labor members raised in our additional comments presented …
date: 2018-08-22T10:00:00+00:00

Treaties Committee | Committees | House debates
type: item
description: by leave—The member for Fadden, the chair of the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties, of which I'm deputy chair, has this morning tabled additional information about extraterritorial...
encoded: by leave—The member for Fadden, the chair of the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties, of which I'm deputy chair, has this morning tabled additional information about extraterritorial jurisdiction. This document, now public, entails the following: Jordan's antiterrorism law is subject to its own Penal Code No. 16 of 1960. Article 10 of the Penal Code No. 16 applies extraterritorial jurisdiction to all acts that are considered as felonies under Jordanian law, including acts under the antiterrorism law, where such acts are committed by a Jordanian citizen or foreigners residing in Jordan, even if they take place outside Jordan. So apparently, thanks to the Attorney-General's diligence in questioning his own department's advice, Australia would not have difficulty in extraditing foreign terrorists to Australia. Through the making of this clarification and the member for Fadden adding this erratum in parliament, we are making it clear that Australia and Jordan can address such difficult extraditions. This is particularly relevant for me, as any fair-minded interpretation of article 3 of Jordan's own laws on antiterrorism would see the arrest of Ahlam al-Tamimi. The member for Fadden read article 3 out, I will just read it out again: Joining or attempting to join any armed groups or terrorist organizations, recruiting or attempting to recruit people to join such groups or organizations or training such persons for the said purpose, whether inside or outside the kingdom— That would see, in my view, the arrest of Ahlam al-Tamimi, a Jordanian national convicted—but released in a prisoner swap—of assisting a particularly obscene act of terrorism at a pizza shop in downtown Jerusalem on 9 August 2001, in which 15 civilians were murdered, including seven children and a pregnant woman, and 130 people wounded. Tamimi has publicly admitted that she planned this attack and that she drove the suicide bomber to the target. One of the people killed, I regret to advise this parliament…
date: 2018-06-28T11:37:00+00:00

Telecommunications | Constituency Statements | House debates
type: item
description: A few days ago 'Big China' were up in parliament, like big tobacco, whingeing and whining about how they'd been misunderstood. One of their particular whinges was about the 5G network and the...
encoded: A few days ago 'Big China' were up in parliament, like big tobacco, whingeing and whining about how they'd been misunderstood. One of their particular whinges was about the 5G network and the concerns about their company Huawei, which were first raised in The Economist, in the legendary article 'Huawei: the company that spooked the world'. Some years ago, under pressure from Labor, which demanded a security briefing, the then communications minister, now Prime Minister, was forced to bar Huawei from bidding for the new core of the Australian telecommunications network, the NBN. Now we have that situation again, with 5G. Since my previous remarks, the chairman of Huawei Technologies, Admiral Lord, has denied Beijing's influence over the company, stating to the ABC: There is no ownership by the Government whatsoever— basically implying that they are a workers collective. This directly contradicts the testimony that he and his company gave to a public hearing of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security on 14 September 2012. In it, Admiral Lord and his associate admitted that Huawei, like other large Beijing enterprises, has a legally mandated Communist Party committee at the top and stated that, yes, all the big organisations have a party committee. There's nothing unusual with all of these Beijing companies having to report to the Communist Party committee, but don't tell the Australian public that you don't have to.
date: 2018-06-25T16:03:00+00:00

Melbourne Ports Electorate | Adjournment | House debates
type: item
description: I notice that the Australia Institute reports that my electorate is the fifth-ranking electorate to benefit from the government's proposed 2018 tax cuts. I suppose that ranks Melbourne Ports as...
encoded: I notice that the Australia Institute reports that my electorate is the fifth-ranking electorate to benefit from the government's proposed 2018 tax cuts. I suppose that ranks Melbourne Ports as one of the high-income seats in Australia. It's no surprise to me that it's the fifth-ranking electorate by per-capita income according to the Australia Institute. In 20 years of standing up for Melbourne Ports, I've made sure, when we were in government and when we were out of government, that I was a fierce representative and remain a fierce representative for that seat. Many people complained about Building the Education Revolution in other electorates; they didn't in mine. I was there when the programs were set up, halfway through to supervise them and right at the end when we delivered them to 32 schools in the electorate. It's a great pleasure to go through the Catholic school system, the Jewish school system and the government school system, including two high schools, Elwood College and Glen Eira College, which have absolutely boomed because of some of the infrastructure that we put in in those days. Also when Labor were in power, Melbourne Ports was very unusual in that we secured two childcare centres. Every other electorate only got one tranche of funding. We got two, one in Port Melbourne and one in St Kilda, both of which are an adornment to the work of the previous Labor government. I was also pleased to work with a colleague of the member for Dawson, Mr Larry Anthony, when he was minister, to secure the existence of Centrelink in South Melbourne so that the 11,000 social security holders who live in that area were able to continue to access—particularly, close to the housing commission—the important facilities and assistance that Centrelink provides. We also got, during the Labor period, $2.3 million for the Salvation Army crisis centre and opened a St Kilda Community Housing project which enabled 34 units of special emergency shelter for homeless people to be …
date: 2018-06-25T19:50:00+00:00