John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Constitution Alteration (Local Government) 2013, which seeks to amend section 96 of the Australian constitution to make a specific provision which would allow the granting of financial assistance to local councils. We know that there are varying opinions in the coalition on this matter. My colleague Senator Ryan and my close colleague Senator McKenzie and I have a difference of opinion, but on our side of the chamber you are allowed to have a difference of opinion. We are a democracy and we are allowed to vote how we like, and I certainly welcome that. No doubt this will be a controversial issue when it comes to a vote. That is what fairness and democracy is about.

The real problem I have is the way in which this legislation has been rushed. I will be supporting this legislation. I support the change to the Constitution. But I am with Senator McKenzie: I do not think the referendum has any hope of passing on 14 September, when the people of Australia will have their say. To pass a referendum, first of all you need everyone in both houses of parliament, along with the state governments and local councils, onside. As the Electoral Commission says, we need at least six months.

I think this is a distraction by the government so that, on 14 September, when people go to vote, they will have their House of Representatives selection, their Senate vote and their vote on the referendum on the financial recognition of local government. Why did the government rush it? It is a distraction to try to take the minds of many voting Australians off the real issue on 14 September, which is whether the Australian people want a return of the Gillard government—or will it be the Rudd government or the Shorten government? Only time will tell, as we read in today's media about all the disruption, division and so on. I think this referendum has little or no chance of passing, of being accepted by the Australian people, on 14 September.

Philip Davis, an MLC in the Victorian parliament, says in today's Herald Sun:

The Commonwealth is giving $10.5 million in funding for the Yes campaign, but the No camp will get only $500,000.

I will be supporting the yes campaign, but I realise that the funding is very unfair. If you go back and look at the referendum on the republic, you see that the Howard government gave equal funding to both sides. The government should be giving fair funding to both sides, not $10.5 million to one side and $500,000 to the other side. Does that have a smell of bias? Of course it does. It is biased to the side I will be voting for. But it is unfair. As I often say, life is about fairness.

I want to start off by quoting the General-Manager of Glen Innes Severn Council in northern New South Wales, Hein Basson. This is what local government faces:

Rates only account for approximately 28 per cent of council's revenue. Grants from other tiers of government are by far our largest source of income. The ability of local government to meet the needs of its communities will always be dependent on its ability to receive adequate funding from the federal government, through the Financial Assistance Grants, distributed by the state governments. Without it our community cannot be served by sustainable council into the future.

That pretty much sums up what many councils in rural and regional areas think about the funding—but, of course, the FAG grants are going through the state governments.

I want to take you to the Roads to Recovery program, a very important and successful program—initiated under the Howard government, of course. The former member for New England, Stuart St Clair said in his speech:

I rise in this House today to again bring to the House's attention the importance of the Roads to Recovery program to local councils, particularly local councils in my electorate of New England. There has been quite considerable discussion of the Roads to Recovery program and the fact that it is delivering for our road networks in regional Australia a much-needed and long-overdue level of service that we have been unable to provide through local government for a long time.

It is interesting, when I see audit reports on local councils in many areas. When they add in the depreciation of their road networks, those councils are going backwards financially in a serious way. Mr St Clair went on to say:

Last week I went out with the mayor of one of my local councils, the Gowrie Shire Council, together with some of its councillors and engineers, to have a look at the work being done on many of the roads. They were pinpointed years ago as desperately needing a gravel re-sheeting program. To stand there on the side of these roads while the trucks were rolling was incredible, because you are physically seeing, for the first time, substantial works being done that will bring direct benefits to people who live in those areas.

Of course, two High Court challenges—the Williams case and the Pape case—are probably the whole reason we are talking about this legislation now. I think the federal government giving direct funding to local councils is a good idea. Look at the mess of the Building the Education Revolution, where the federal government gave the funding to the state governments to control. Go back a few years, to that disgraceful Labor government in New South Wales, who then had contractors distribute Building the Education Revolution funds. In the north and north-west of New South Wales, and on the coastal regions, they appointed a contractor called Reed Constructions. I was at the meeting when they called the meeting in Tamworth, with about 200 trades men and women, plumbers, electricians and builders. Reed Constructions said, 'Of course, there's nothing in this for us.' Well, there was nothing in it for many, because Reed Constructions went broke. One builder in Moree who carried out one of the Building the Education Revolution programs lost in excess of $600,000—I think it was $642,000—carrying out a government job, building the school buildings. It would have been good, in my opinion, if the federal government had run that program and just given it to the schools and said to the schools, 'Here's your stimulus package; you spend it how you like'—as they did with the Catholic system and some of the private schools, where they got some real benefit. But, no, it was a mess—it was rushed through, like many things this government does. You only have to look back to the Prime Minister's decision on the banning of live cattle exports to Indonesia. No-one supported what the Four Cornersprogram showed, with the abuse of the cattle, and the coalition actually supported the government to ban the export of live cattle to those abattoirs that were not doing the right thing. Of course, the emails came in and then the decision by Prime Minister Gillard to ban the whole export industry. When you talk to the beef producers of the Top End or to those further south—cattle are now being transported further south because we have lost that export market—they tell you that 750,000 head of cattle a year were exported but now it is down to about 200,000. The financial damage and ruin that this has caused to so many is simply unforgivable.

Here we have this referendum bill before us. I will be supporting it, but I know some—I am not too sure how many—on my side will not be supporting it. Responsibility for local governments is not mentioned anywhere in the Constitution. State constitutions have provisions to maintain a system of local government, but these provisions do not guarantee appropriate funding of local government. We are all aware that local government is under the total control of state governments—and certainly that is the way it should be. What I am saying is that many regional councils are concerned about High Court challenges to the Commonwealth's powers to make direct payments for programs such as Roads to Recovery, which includes bridges, which are the lifeblood of local government. This legislation will give the Commonwealth power to grant financial assistance to local government bodies formed by a law of the state. The coalition has expressed in principle support for the financial recognition of local government but, as I said, some in the coalition disagree with it and they will vote accordingly. We actually have a democracy on this side of the parliament, whereas I realise that, if those on the other side of the parliament vote against Australian Labor Party lines, unless it is a conscience vote, they get kicked out. Good night, Irene.

While there has been a query about the Commonwealth's powers to fund local government directly, in the past it has been done under the appropriation powers under sections 81 of the Constitution or its executive powers under section 61 of the Constitution. One of the most successful programs, as I said, is the Roads to Recovery program. It has been a real benefit to the roads in country areas which carry so many of our exports, such as wheat as wheat, livestock, cotton—you name it. All up, direct payments to local government amount to about $500 million a year—an enormous amount of money. As I said, this has been a lifesaver, a breath of fresh air, to local governments, who simply cannot fund the their maintenance programs throughout many of the regional areas. In fact, I would say there would not be a local government or council in regional New South Wales that would have enough money to fund the upkeep, the maintenance and the improvements of the local road projects.

Over the past few years, more than 6,000 projects have been funded through direct payments from the Commonwealth to local government. About $2 billion in stimulus spending was granted to local government to spend on local community infrastructure. This money was spent without the waste and scandal that occurred in the states with the Commonwealth's Building the Education Revolution. Of course, there are various views among the state governments on this referendum, but the overwhelming majority of councils want financial recognition. A poll conducted for the Australian Local Government Association found that 61 per cent of Australians support the recognition of local government. This was most pronounced in rural and regional areas. But the government have made a mess of the whole process. They have ignored much of what the expert panel had to say. The expert panel recommended that the Commonwealth negotiate with the states to get their support. I think that is vital, but the Labor government have made little attempt to do this. As I said earlier, this is another example of the government's inability to communicate and that they must rush things, which have been features of the Gillard government and also of the Rudd government prior to it. It is three years from today that the political disposal of Mr Rudd occurred.

Not only does this government not communicate with the Australian people; it also does not communicate with the states. As I said at the start, we know the history of referendums in Australia and so if a referendum is to pass then the support of all governments—local, state and federal—is needed. We need time to sell that message. With the attempt by the government to fund one side of the debate to the tune of $10.5 million and the other side to the tune of $500,000, then no doubt here, in Canberra, the government is trying to influence the result. But many of the states are not on board—and, as I said, if you do not have the states on board, I think the chances of getting a yes vote up on 14 September are probably one in a million.

The coalition MPs on the Joint Select Committee on the Constitutional Recognition of Local Government, whose report was handed down on 7 March, made some interesting additional comments. The report was signed off by the Nationals member for Parkes, Mr Mark Coulton, and also the member for Ryan, Mrs Jane Prentice. Mr Coulton has a strong background in local government. His father, the late Jack Coulton, who was a decent man, was Shire President of the Yallaroi Shire Council for over 15 years and a councillor for over 25 years. Mark Coulton himself was the inaugural mayor of the amalgamated Gwydir Shire Council, involving mainly the towns of Bingara and Warialda, for three years, and it was during his term that the council won the AR Bluett award for excellence in local government. The current mayor of Gwydir Shire Council, Mr John Coulton, is the brother of Mark Coulton and the son of the late Jack Coulton. So the Coultons have had a lot to do with local government for many, many years.

The coalition MPs made it clear that the Labor government has mismanaged this whole process—and that sounds familiar around here. I quote from their report:

Evidence received at the hearing suggested that the Government position was that negotiation could not occur with the States until a proposal was developed. Coalition members of the Committee reject this position and consider that the government has failed to make best use of the time since December 2011 by failing to undertake such negotiations and that this delay has potentially undermined the prospect of a full and informed referendum proposition being put in 2013.

They then went on to question whether the public will be properly informed of this whole question and whether they will receive sufficient information. Again I quote from their additional comments:

The second pre-condition which has not been met is that a viable educational campaign be conducted by the Federal government. The prospect of a referendum held in conjunction with this year's federal election raises a serious risk where the opportunity to fully inform the voting public through public education and other avenues has not been fully realised. Where a proposed change is worthy of support, a well-informed public will be more likely to support it and, if a proposed change has potential pitfalls, a well informed public will be more likely to identify those problems and vote accordingly.

Those members of the committee are correct in saying that past experience and referenda in Australia has shown that Australians tend to vote no if they do not fully understand the issues behind the question.

Let us look at the funding arrangements for the yes case and the no case. As I said, the government has given $10.5 million for one side and only $500,000 for the other side. As I said, life is about fairness, and that to me sounds very unfair. I repeat that, during the Howard government, when we had the 1999 referendum on Australia becoming a republic, both sides were allocated $7 million to present their case. It is interesting to read the comments of Greg Craven, who is the Vice-Chancellor of the Australian Catholic University and a constitutional lawyer. He is quoted as saying 'this lopsided funding for the yes and no campaigns this time round would not pass the smell test'. The coalition believe the cases should be equally funded and have written to the Prime Minister in this regard.

This whole matter is just as the coalition feared: it is another mess, it is another rushed policy, it is another rushed piece of legislation. This week we face the prospect of having debate gagged on 53 pieces of legislation, and I see this piece of legislation being no different. There are 53 bills demanding proper scrutiny, and senators who wish to speak on the various piece of legislation will be denied the chance. The government set the agenda in conjunction with their colleagues the Greens. They control what comes in for this chamber. Again, they have made a total mess of it. The government are far too busy focusing on who will be the leader, and today they are running around the corridors doing the numbers because former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has said, 'I've had this knife in my back for three years; it is about time someone else wore it.'

There will be many on our side who support this legislation—no doubt, the legislation will pass the Senate. But I think it has been rushed, ill-prepared legislation; that the public have been ill-informed; and that it is very wrongly financed, and very biased, with respect to support for both sides. The referendum, as I said, will more than likely go down. My only concern is that, if the referendum goes down, those fundings for local government, direct from the federal government, and we have another challenge to the High Court—what will be the result of that? I want to see that funding continue. As a former Deputy Prime Minister, John Anderson, said to us at a meeting prior to the introduction of the Roads to Recovery program: if it goes through the states, how much will be taken off for administration? We need to get the best bang for our buck, if I can put it that way, when it comes to financing projects, and the Roads to Recovery program is a classic example. I hope those projects continue, but I have little confidence in this referendum being accepted by the Australian people, because it is rushed, ill-prepared—and, if people do not understand it, they will simply vote no. I will be supporting this legislation. I will be voting yes for it on 14 September, but I think I will be on the losing team.