Rex Patrick (SA, Centre Alliance) | Hansard source

I rise to contribute to the debate on the Criminal Code Amendment (Agricultural Protection) Bill 2019. Centre Alliance will be supporting this bill in an amended form. We very much support the idea of lawful protest and we also support whistleblowers who might call out animal cruelty. We support organisations like the RSPCA—and I was just having a look on their website—that have the power to enter properties, seize animals, seize evidence of animal cruelty offences, issue animal welfare directions and notices, issue on-the-spot fines and initiate prosecutions under animal welfare legislation. What we don't support is the conduct of activists that gave rise to this bill which we think is abhorrent and which no-one wants to see a repeat of.

I'll go to the amendments shortly, but first I want to discuss Labor's second reading amendment, and I hope my reading out their amendment doesn't create a procedural problem. Their amendment states:

At the end of the motion, add:

", but the Senate:

(a) notes that the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee inquiry into this bill identified a range of potential unintended consequences that could flow from the operation of new criminal offences contained in this bill; and

(b) calls on the Government to carefully monitor the operation of the new laws to ensure that unintended consequences do not arise, and if they do, urgently introduce any necessary amendments to the new laws."

So the committee has recognised—and Labor has endorsed the idea—that the bill as it was originally proposed had some fairly significant flaws in it. I see that second reading amendment as an advertisement from the Labor Party that they have lost their conviction, because we know that they are going to support the bill. They've signalled that, if the bill is amended and goes back to the House and comes back to this place, they will support the bill.

This is not the first time the Labor Party have done this. During the last parliament, the numbers were in this place to stop the TPP-11 enabling legislation until such time as the ISDS provisions were removed. Labor's policy was to not support trade agreements with ISDS provisions. Senators Hanson and Georgiou and Centre Alliance were willing to back that position in, and Labor capitulated. They have also capitulated twice on personal tax cuts, once in the last parliament and also in this parliament; on encryption laws, where they sought to move amendments but, at the last minute, decided not to put those amendments to the chamber; and just recently with the temporary exclusion orders. Centre Alliance shared their view that the law didn't provide enough protections and sought to amend it. But, a couple of days before the vote, Labor signalled that they had given up on it and they were just going to let that one go through. And they lodged a motion for an inquiry into China and then quickly withdrew.

In relation to journalists, Labor have made fairly strong statements about protecting journalists in the wake of the media raids. This bill has some concerning elements in relation to journalists. For example, as it originally was tabled, it had a provision that required the journalist to prove that they were a journalist. These things are, in my view, further restrictions on journalists and they are making journalists feel uncomfortable. The government has agreed to change that, and I'm grateful for that, but the Labor Party, having stated a very strong commitment to media freedom, were prepared to let that through. I know that the Labor Party say they're picking their battles, but actually this is not about politics; this is legislation, and you have a duty to make sure that the laws we pass in this chamber are good laws. When you see a bad law coming through, you have to stand up and say, 'Stop, we need to rethink that.'

We are not the House of Representatives. Over there, when the bells ring everyone knows what the vote's going to be. So, they play a lot of theatre over there. Of course, we know that the real work is done in this place, where the amendments are looked at, where we do all the committee work. I've got everyone shaking their heads—all the senators around the room agreeing with this principle. We do all the work here. So, you've got to get away from this idea that you're playing theatre in here. If you want to do that, switch and go to the lower house, to the other place. This is where we do very serious work, and we must take that role very seriously.

To help the Labor Party—because we do want to work with the Labor Party—I'm just going to give them this hint. Legislation in this place is a team sport. The Liberal-National coalition have worked this out. When legislation comes to this place they talk to the crossbench, they engage us, they talk to us in confidence and frankly, and we have a bit of argy-bargy. They are in regular contact with us, and they manage to work with the crossbench to get legislation through. If they're having any trouble, then of course they call in the 'crossbench whisperer'—that is, Senator Cormann—and he does his magic somehow.

That's not what the Labor Party are doing. What the Labor Party are doing is spinning around and around in circles. They go to caucus meetings where they make a whole bunch of decisions, drowning in their own disillusionment. The biggest decision they make, it appears, is about the point at which they're going to capitulate, at which they're going to show that they have no conviction. Probably what they need to do most of all is learn what a poker face is—learn that you don't, two or three days out from a bill being put to the Senate, declare your hand. If you're working with the crossbench—and I'd love to see you work with us better—we can work together, we can hold out, we can do all those things that the Liberal Party have worked out how to do to work with the crossbench, to get better outcomes. That's really what I'd like to see.

I've said some perhaps confronting things here, but I'm doing so with a view that I want to be able to work with Labor, because there are times when we don't like what the government puts up. In this instance, what we have done—because of the state of play on this side of the chamber—is work with the government, constructively. We've had a bit of argy-bargy going to and from Senator McKenzie's office. Her office has been very open and willing to consider different things, and we've managed to get a couple of things that were of great concern to us included as government amendments. They include adding wood processing and wood fibre processing to the definition of a primary production business so that these businesses will be protected from abhorrent conduct. And something close to my heart: we've switched the burden of proof in relation to journalists, and I think that's a really important thing to do—recognising the important role that investigative journalists play in assisting people who don't like animal cruelty, which is most of us. Having investigative journalists go in and engage and report and provide the truth is a good thing.

There are a couple of other subtleties, which I won't go into. But we've landed in a good place, and I thank the minister for the constructive negotiations we have had. As I said, Centre Alliance will be supporting the bill in its amended form.