Ruth Webber (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I would like to commence my remarks on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006. I believe this bill demonstrates this federal government’s complete inability to deal with independence of thought and action. It would seem that this is a government, and this is a minister, that is afraid of any form of dissent, so it has to legislate it out of being. This is a government that cannot handle alternative points of view or independence of action—a government so drunk with power, some would say, so overwhelmed by its own importance and so arrogant about the power given to it by its numbers in this place that it believes it can do what it likes without recourse to what is fair, what is decent or what is honourable.

This bill, as has been said by my colleagues earlier, will remove the position of the staff-elected director from the board of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation Act at the moment states that the board of the ABC will consist of the managing director, the staff-elected director and no fewer than five and no more than seven other directors. This amendment will remove the staff-elected director from the board of the ABC.

What reasons has the government put forward to justify this action? The Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, Senator Coonan, claimed on 24 March this year:

As the staff-elected Director has been elected by staff rather than appointed, there have been claims that the position creates uncertainty about accountability.

To quote a television presenter from another network—using a well-known saying in the Australian vernacular these days—‘What the?’ The minister’s suggestion that, because a director is elected by staff as opposed to appointed by the minister, it makes their accountability uncertain is surely one that should make the annals of Australia’s most ridiculous assertions. The minister’s suggestion that a person appointed by the minister is more accountable than a person elected by the employees of an organisation is farcical. How does the method of a director’s appointment to a board determine their accountability? The method of a director’s appointment to a board does not determine that person’s accountability to the minister, the staff or the good of the corporation.

It is clear from all sides of this argument that there are clearly defined legal responsibilities, as alluded to earlier in this debate, that a director must undertake. In fact, the minister also said on 24 March this year:

However, there is a clear legal requirement on the staff-elected Director that means he or she has the same rights, duties and obligations as the other Directors, including to act in the interests of the ABC as a whole.

Surely that statement alone makes it clear that the means by which a director is appointed have absolutely nothing to do with the rights, duties and obligations that a person must discharge as a director. It is a fact that is enshrined in law, no matter how a director is appointed. If you are a director, no matter how you come to be appointed, you must act in the same prescribed manner as all other directors.

Debate interrupted.