Marise Payne (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I'm not sure that I understand your question, Senator. But if your question is in relation to how the process occurs then, obviously, the minister takes advice and works with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, with the task force which has been announced and which will be established within the department. We would definitely have carefully considered reasons in the process of this decision-making.

What I would say is that one of the reasons for the stocktake process is to enable government to make an assessment. I think I said publicly at the time of the announcement of the legislation that a public, open-source review had indicated that there were over 130 arrangements with more than 30 different countries just for the states and territories. As that material is returned to the department as part of the stocktake process I think that the nature of the sorts of arrangements which are made, and those which fall on either side of the provisions of the legislation, will become clear. So there will be carefully considered reasons.