Stephen Jones (Throsby, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is a good thing that this debate is occurring in Canberra, a town where firecrackers are still legal. We have had all the pomp and ceremony of cracker night. The previous speaker went off like a catherine-wheel. Occasionally, that diatribe was relevant to the legislation before the House—very, very rarely, though. I have to say that it strikes people on this side of the House as passing strange that we have been subjected to a 15-minute tirade on freedom of speech from the only political party in this country which has sought to outlaw another political party because it did not like what they stood for. The only political party in this country which has ever sought to ban the existence of another political party is the Liberal Party of Australia. Their great hero, Robert Menzies, was the only Prime Minister of this country to have taken a bill into this House and had it pass through this House which had the effect of banning another political party because the government did not like what that political party stood for. And yet we hear this 15-minute diatribe, this hypocritical diatribe, from the member for Sturt. They may well say, 'Well, that was almost 60 years ago, and we have reformed. We've got a new love of freedom of speech.'

You might accept that if you did not have a memory of the absolute disgrace of members on that side of the House, many of them still on the front bench, who sat in cabinet under the former Prime Minister John Howard and issued gag order after gag order, suppression after suppression, when members of the media sought access to government documents under the freedom of information laws. Where was the member for Sturt? We know he was not in cabinet because he was not a favourite of the then Prime Minister John Howard, so he cannot be personally held liable for sticking his hand up for the gag orders and the suppression of freedom of information requests from members of the media. But where were they when members of the press and members of the public were seeking to exercise their rights under the freedom of information laws? Where were the speeches? Where was the great tirade in defence of freedom of speech? It was nowhere to be seen. That exposes the member for Sturt's confected outrage for what it is.

The freedom of information laws were modernised, brought up to date and reformed under this government because this government has a commitment to openness. This government has a commitment to ensuring that members of the public, including members of the press gallery, have access to those documents, as they should under our freedom of information laws. That those poor people who are sitting in their living rooms tonight had to listen to the hypocritical tirade from the member for Sturt, the member who stands in the shoes of the people who sought to outlaw another political party because they did not agree with its views, is nothing short of a disgrace.

In the 15 minutes that we heard from the member for Sturt on the issue of media reform in this country, not once did we hear a defence of people who may have been victims of misreporting by the media. I am a great defender of the freedom of press in this country, and with my last breath I will defend us having a free and independent news media in this country. It is absolutely essential to the fabric of our democracy in this country that we have a free and independent press. I know that every member in the Labor Party, every member on this side of the House, has a fundamental conviction to that principle. There must be a voice in the parliament for the people who have been victims of misreporting. Those people have had their lives ruined because a journalist got it wrong, a media outlet got it wrong or somebody was not able to adequately check their facts before publishing something in one of our news outlets. The victims of misreporting have had their lives turned upside down. In other countries we have seen absolutely tragic consequences of that.

Where are the voices from members on the other side of the House for the little people, for the victims? We have heard plenty of voices on the other side of the House for the media bosses, but where are the voices for the victims? We stand for the victims. We say that there should be somebody standing up and saying that, if someone is a victim of misreporting, they should have a remedy available for them and not just for the millionaires. One of the best clients of defamation barristers in this country is the member for Wentworth. The thing that sets the member for Wentworth aside from the majority of other Australian citizens is that he has the means available to him. If he believes that he has been defamed by the media, he has the means available to him to pursue action, but the ordinary Australian who feels that they have been defamed or they have been a victim of misreporting does not have that access. They cannot put $10,000 on the table and hire the best QC in Sydney, Melbourne or any other capital city around this country. They cannot put $10,000 on the table and seek to have their rights exercised. Even if they could, what remedy is there? The average defamation case in this country takes two years to conclude.

Mr Frydenberg interjecting—

The member for Wentworth and the member for Kooyong over there say to the little person in this country who seeks a remedy, 'It's okay. You can take action in defamation.' For the vast majority of Australians, that is no remedy at all. All we seek through this part of the legislation is to ensure that we have a robust press council in this country that lives by its codes and implements its codes and that the media proprietors in this country cannot stand over that press council.

Talking about standing over an independent body, what do members on the other side of the House have to say about the circumstance where, in a media outlet—and I do not say that every journalist in that media outlet would agree with this course of events, because I am sure that most of them would be appalled by it—a rogue media proprietor said, 'I will withdraw from the press council if you have adverse findings against me'? That is not a fair and independent system. That is a system where Caesar judges Caesar. That is a situation where the average punter has no redress whatsoever. I stand here as a voice for the average punter who believes they should have redress if they are the victim of misreporting.

I go to something else about the bills and the debate before the House. One of the provisions within this package of legislation goes to the issue of convergence within the media. It should be a matter of concern to all Australians that we do not have a diminution of voices in the media landscape. If you are a defender of a free press, then you must also be a defender of a diverse press.

They go hand in hand. And if you are a defender of a free press and a diverse press, then you must, in the next breath, also be defender of ensuring that we have a plentiful number of journalists in this country who are working for a free press and a diverse press. I ask you: when was the last time we saw a merger of two media operations, the takeover of one media company by another media company, that led to the employment of more journalists? When have we seen the takeover of one newspaper by another newspaper and the employment of more journalists or more subeditors or more editorial staff? The answer, quite simply, is never, because the second victim of a takeover by one media company of another media outlet is the journalists. We know that because, as the media landscape is rapidly converging and as we are seeing a rationalisation in the media landscape, we are seeing journalists losing their jobs—not in their tens, not in their dozens but in their thousands.

Mr Frydenberg interjecting—

I expect to see the member for Kooyong stand up and defend the good men and women who are journalists in this country, and the job security they deserve, because he has had a lot to say during my speech. I expect to hear a full-throated defence of the journalists of this country and a proposition that will see that there are more job opportunities for journalists in this country, not fewer, because we have never seen an example where one newspaper has been bought out by another newspaper or one TV station has been bought out by another TV station and more journalists have been employed. What we have seen is a sacking of journalists, a sacking of editorial staff, a sacking of employees and a diminution in the number of people who are employed in the free media.

So, if the member for Sturt is fair dinkum in his passionate defence of a free media in this country and of freedom of the press, he will also be passionate in his defence of a proposition that says we need a public interest test. We need to ensure that if one company is taken over by another company we will not see a diminution in the vibrancy of voices, in the number of journalists that are employed. Somebody has to stick up for the journalists, because we have seen not dozens, not hundreds but thousands of journalistic jobs lost. Over 500 editorial staff have been lost from News Limited in 2012 alone.

See this speech in context