Dick Adams (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is a pleasure to be here today to speak again on this report of the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties, Report 78: Treaty Scrutiny: a ten year review and the treaty-making process of the parliament. The 78th report deals with the seminar which the parliament and the treaties committee held on 30 and 31 March this year to mark 10 years of operation of the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties, which has become known as JSCOT.

Under the Australian Constitution, treaty making is the formal responsibility of the executive government. The Constitution does not confer on the parliament any formal role in treaty making. Nevertheless, through the work of JSCOT, the parliament plays an important role in examining all proposed treaty actions tabled in the parliament. The resolution of appointment of the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties allows it to inquire into and report upon: matters arising from treaties and related national interest analyses and proposed treaty action presented or deemed to be presented to the parliament; any questions relating to a treaty or other international instrument, whether or not negotiated or completed, referred to the committee by either House of the parliament or by a minister; and such other matters that may be referred to the committee by the Minister for Foreign Affairs and on such conditions as the minister may prescribe.

Prior to the establishment of JSCOT, during the 1970s treaties were tabled in parliament but often in a manner which prevented meaningful parliamentary scrutiny or input. Treaties were tabled in bulk approximately every six months and often after they had entered into force. By the 1990s Australia had entered into a period of negotiating a broader range of treaties, some of them quite controversial. There was also a growing awareness that international obligations affected domestic legal regimes and policy responses to a wide range of national issues, and a recognition that parliament ought to be able to scrutinise Australia’s international treaty obligations. JSCOT was established in May 1996. I was one of the original members of that committee.

After 10 years of JSCOT it was fitting that a seminar be conducted to assess the 1996 reforms and to look more broadly at the role of the legislation in the treaty-making process both here and overseas. Over the last 10 years significant steps have been taken to improve the openness and transparency of treaty making in Australia. Proposed treaty actions are tabled in parliament before they enter into force, and treaty texts and the rationale for entering into them are made readily accessible to the people of Australia. There are also mechanisms in place to ensure that the states and territories are consulted on actions which may affect them.

Although the mechanisms have existed for some time, few of the states have taken advantage of them and this may be because they are unaware of the significance some treaties have, particularly those that relate to trade. The Treaties Council has only met once and this was a mechanism set up to allow states to have input; however, this may not be the appropriate way to consult. In the view of Mrs Twomey, who wrote the original report for the Senate that facilitated the coming into being of JSCOT:

In some ways JSCOT seems to have taken over the functions of the Treaties Council to the extent that it is a public forum at which the states can make representations and matters can become public and discussed.

To some degree she is totally right.

It would be useful to have more information when we probe the reasons why such a treaty came to pass. But the resources of the committee are limited and really need some boosting. We are imposing costs on the Public Service, knowing that they are answerable to a parliamentary process and scrutiny and are a bit more inclined to make sure that they have the reason for why they are doing something. Members and senators should lobby for more resources for the committee to assist committee members to understand more clearly the impact that treaties can have.

A joint house committee is a very good idea and is of course a good mechanism for probing the public servants that come before it. It allows the analysis of why the treaties are being discussed and ratified. There is usually a year’s notice before they are finalised or changed and finished with. Some of the new treaties include many things that have appeared in need of a treaty since 9-11 and the increase in terrorism, with most of those areas dealing with things such as plastic explosives, money laundering, port security and giving a focus to national security in many ways. That committee has dealt with many of those treaties in that time. I am sure many more will be developed in coming years.

One of the suggestions I made to improve scrutiny was to allow members to speak to reports in this chamber, as I am doing now on this report. Many members do not get the opportunity to speak on treaties issues now. They only get time if the treaty becomes controversial and more time is allocated to it. Normally only the chair and the deputy chair get to speak on tabled reports. I remember the one on the WTO, which a lot of people had genuine concerns about and we needed plenty of information about. I think the committee played a very good role in taking public submissions and opening that up as a public debate. I think that was a very good one.

The Australia-US Free Trade Agreement was another one which was taken on. I get concerned about whether the resources of the parliament and the committee system are able to gather enough information or all the information that is received by this committee from the public. I think that is a weakness in the process. I think all the evidence in the submissions received by this committee when you get to a substantial matter like the US free trade agreement is just too much for a committee secretariat or the parliament to deal with. We need to have resources for that.

Being a member of the Publications Committee and someone who gave a tick to the closing of the government shops in our capital cities because we were going to put everything on the web, I think we are lacking in the process and we need to lift our game in that area so that the huge amounts of evidence and the matters that come before this parliament in the committee process can be put on websites so that the general public can have the transparency that I think we are all striving for. Australian citizens have a right to have that information and need an open committee system of the parliament to do that. As I said, the closure of the bookshops put some pressure on that.

There should be more public hearings on controversial issues. It is essential that the committee and JSCOT do so. The chair of that committee is in the chamber today. He is probably the least travelled chair of JSCOT we have had. I have often said to him that I think opening up and taking the committee out to the public to take submissions and evidence from right around Australia is an important part of this committee’s work—although he may have got caught up in a lot of treaties that have not had or needed to have public involvement or that the public have not wanted to be that much involved in. I am pleased to be able to continue here today and, as I said, I really think it is important that we have discussions here about the reports that come down from the treaties committee.

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