Lyn Allison (Victoria, Australian Democrats) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

I seek leave to have the second reading speech incorporated in Hansard and to table an explanatory memorandum relating to the bill.

Leave granted.

The speech read as follows—

The purpose of the Cluster Munitions (Prohibition) Bill 2006 is to ensure that innocent civilians in conflict zones are not maimed, killed or put at risk as a result of Australians possessing, using or manufacturing cluster munitions. Its introduction into the Senate comes three months after more than one million cluster sub-munitions were dropped in the south of Lebanon and one month after a landmark report revealed that 98 per cent of people killed from unexploded cluster sub-munitions are civilians.

I recently visited schools, hospitals and homes in southern Lebanon to add my voice to an international campaign seeking to place a ban on cluster munitions. Those that are dropped in populated areas almost invariably kill and maim civilians because of the imprecision of their dispersal and because anywhere between two and 30 per cent of the sub-munitions are left unexploded to terrorise populations for years to come.

Around the world, roughly 30 per cent of cluster munition casualties are young children who mistake the sub-munitions for toys. Some of the sub-munitions dropped in Lebanon three months ago look like tennis balls, butterflies and torch batteries with ribbons attached to them. They are generally difficult to detect, especially in long grass and the rubble of bombed-out buildings. The process for clearing them is expensive and painstakingly slow.

The international community must unite in an effort to ensure that these horrific weapons are never used again. We have a moral imperative to act. Earlier in the year—even before the war in Lebanon broke out—Belgium legislated to ban the weapons and Norway declared a moratorium on their use. Several countries, including Austria, Ireland, Mexico, New Zealand and Switzerland, have called for a treaty to be drafted and put into force. I believe that the Cluster Munitions (Prohibition) Bill 2006, if enacted, would be a positive step towards achieving that end.

The problem of cluster munition use is not limited to Lebanon. It is widespread. The coalition of the willing dropped more than 1.9 million sub-munitions on Iraq in 2003 and 248,000 on Afghanistan in 2001 to 2002. In recent times, large quantities have also been dropped on Chechnya, the Sudan, Kosovo, Eritrea and Ethiopia. The BLU97 cluster munitions dropped by the United States Air Force on Afghanistan had the same yellow packaging as the food rations it had dropped earlier. The implications of their use are still being lived out today.

I would like to refer now to the particulars of the bill before this parliament. Its specific objective is to prevent members of the Australian Defence Force, whether serving in Australia or elsewhere, and whether serving with the Australian Defence Force or any other defence force, from deploying cluster munitions.

Under the bill, a person must not intentionally develop, produce, acquire, stockpile, retain, transfer, use or engage in military preparations to use cluster munitions, container units or sub-munitions. Further, a member of the Australian Defence Force must not engage in military preparations for a member of the defence force of another country to use cluster munitions, container units or sub-munitions. The bill extends to acts by an Australian citizen outside Australia and to acts done on board Australian ships and aircraft. The offences set out in the bill do not apply in relation to the clearing of unexploded sub-munitions, education in relation to cluster munitions, or decommissioning.

Under the bill, the Defence Minister must, within three months of the date of commencement, table in both houses of this parliament a report on stockpiles and a decommissioning plan. Further, he or she must, within one year, decommission all cluster munitions in the possession of the Australian Defence Force. Any Australian citizen and resident of Australia or an external territory may seek a writ of mandamus, prohibition or certiorari, or an injunction or declaration in relation to this bill.

If, as a result of an offence under the Act, a cluster munition is deployed, then that munition must be cleared, removed or destroyed in accordance with Australia’s obligations under the Protocol on Explosive Remnants of War to the Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons which may be deemed to be Excessively Injurious or to have Indiscriminate Effects, to which Australia recently added its signature.

I urge my parliamentary colleagues to support this important bill, and I commend the bill to the Senate.

I table the explanatory memorandum and seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.