Don Farrell (SA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for the Centenary of ANZAC) Share this | Hansard source

I was going to make a comment on the previous Chair and his actions last night in this chamber. He made it very clear what he was proposing to do, which was—as I understand it—to introduce into this legislation those aspects of the agreement that the government has made with the One Nation party. I fundamentally disagree with what Senator Bernardi proposed in his legislation, but you've got to give him credit for raising those issues and giving the parliament the opportunity to vote on them. We were disappointed, Senator Hanson, that you did not come in and support the agreement that you had reached with the government. I think that was a surprise to everybody.

You just indicated that you have changed your view—that your original position had been that you supported the two-out-of-three rule but that you have now changed your mind. The reality is, Senator, that you do have the opportunity to change your mind again, and I would ask you to reconsider your support. You can see from the vote last night—even though you and your team were not in the chamber—that your agreement with the government will not pass this parliament. My recollection of the vote was that something like 55 senators voted against what would in due course become–

The TEMPORARY CHAIR: Senator Farrell, sorry to interrupt you, but you should make your remarks through the Chair.

Thank you for that observation; I will make sure that all of my observations are through the Chair henceforth. We can see from last night that there is no support for those aspects of your agreement with the government that require legislative implementation. As that's the case, Chair—through you to Senator Hanson—as it's clear that this parliament will not support those aspects of your agreement with the government, why do it? Why vote with the government? Why support a proposition that is not going to get through this parliament? Why have an agreement with the government, when, plainly, as you saw last night—I assume you were watching it in your room, since you weren't in the chamber—this parliament is not going to pass that legislation? If you have an agreement with the government about this matter, that requires you and the government to agree to the matter and bring it to the parliament to be passed. Well, it isn't going to pass. That's now very clear.

That's the first point I'd make, Senator Hanson—you can now reconsider your position in light of what happened last night. If you think this government intends to honour that part of the agreement that you've reached with it to support this legislation, the reality was very clear last night that the Senate will not pass that legislation. Whatever you thought you were going to get out of this deal, it's now very transparent that you're not going to get it. So I would ask you, Senator Hanson, to reconsider your position. If you do, you can stop this legislation passing. As you've said, you've done that once before.

Maybe in light of last night's events, it's time to do it again. You were right the first time that you considered this legislation. You were right the first time because the purpose of the two-out-of-three rule in this country is to protect media diversity. As you say, there are lots of media that organisations that, from time to time, have a go at you. But you also get support from a variety. If you remove the two-out-of-three rule, that diversity goes out the window—we don't get the diversity. Of course, what we have seen is that Senator Xenophon from South Australia has also gone along with this. We saw what happened to your agreement with the government; it cannot be implemented, but I think we need to look at what Senator Xenophon has done as part of his agreement with the government to support this legislation.

As far as we can see, there is an innovation fund of $50 million over three years for regional and small publishers. I'm a big supporter of regional and local newspapers and other media, but what is a $50 million deal worth? Well, if it is split evenly across the states and territories, it works out to about $2 million a year. Of course, when you share that out over the totality of media in the region, frankly, Senator, it's not very much money. Some of those media organisations that you might have thought would benefit by this have, of course, come out in the last 24 hours and made it very clear—but I will refer to them in a moment.

It would seem that part of this $2 million that goes to the states will go to scholarships to support students who are studying journalism, with an emphasis on the regions. But, if you take away media diversity in this country by the removal of the two-out-of-three rule, they might get a scholarship to study, but the reality is there will be fewer jobs. So you are giving people a scholarship to study journalism, only to find that by taking away the two-out-of-three rule there are fewer jobs. So what's the point, Senator Xenophon? What's the point of the agreement to give young students scholarships if—