Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for the Murray Darling Basin) Share this | Hansard source

As Senator Fifield has just made extremely clear, it is an outrageous abuse of process in this place for this legislation to be rammed through the parliament, as is proposed by the government, by the end of next week and for the scrutiny of this legislation through the usual processes of a Senate committee to be curtailed in the way that is proposed. Just four business days, as Senator Fifield said, stand between now and 20 March, when the government expects the Senate committee to report on this package of bills.

Senator Conroy comes into this place and proclaims, 'There's been plenty of time for debate and everybody knows what we were proposing to do.' Well, we realised today that cabinet did not even have any written paperwork before it when it considered these matters on Tuesday, so they did not even know what was being proposed. We understand today that caucus had to have rules changed to allow for the consideration of the matters, so the Labor caucus did not even know what was being proposed.

The reality is that these bills deserve far more scrutiny than the government is proposing. Six bills were dropped this morning in the House of Representatives that have never been seen before outside of the inner workings of this government. Six bills totalling 133 pages of new regulation of Australia's media are going to be, if the government gets its way, rammed through this parliament with minimal debate in less than a week and with the scrutiny of the Senate committee for less than four working days. Accompanying the 133 pages of new legislation in these six bills are 123 pages across five explanatory memoranda.

Significant and sweeping changes to Australia's laws and to the governance of our media are being undertaken for the first time in Australia's peacetime history. It will be an outrage if the government gets its way on these reforms. It will be an outrage if this Senate allows the government to get its way on curtailing the consideration of these reforms. It is critically important that the minister's assertions that these in no way impede freedom of the media be tested, and tested properly. It is critically important that the minister's assertions that these in no way change existing self-regulatory standards be tested, and tested properly. It is critically important that the stakeholders in the media sector and those who care about matters of free speech, and, indeed, those who have concerns about the operation of the media in Australia, all have their chance to properly have their say. If the Selection of Bills Committee report is adopted in its current form today, with a 20 March reporting date for these significant reforms, then stakeholders will have virtually no chance to properly assess these matters or properly have their say as to the impact or adequacy, depending on your perspective in this debate. Stakeholders will be given perhaps just a day to put in any written submissions. There will be just a few hours, perhaps, of hearings, with witnesses given, if they are lucky, a few hours or a day or two's notice to appear. There will be minimal time for anybody—senators or those outside this place—to seriously scrutinise what is proposed here, and we should not forget that what is proposed here is government incursion into the operation of the newspaper industry for the first time in Australia's peacetime history.

These are very significant reforms. I know there are those on the crossbenches who believe they are inadequate. They deserve the chance to have their views heard as well, and to scrutinise these reforms around their arguments, just as much as those of us on this side of the chamber should have the chance to go through the detail of whether or not these reforms do, in fact, pose the threat to the freedom of the media and speech that many of us are so concerned by.

I urge the Senate to support Senator Fifield's amendment to the motion on these reports and to ensure that we actually get the scrutiny of these media reforms that they deserve, rather than the curtailed debate that the government wants to enforce.