Lisa Singh (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak to the Amending Acts 1901 to 1969 Repeal Bill 2014. This bill repeals the 1,120 acts from 1901 to 1969 which amended or repealed other legislation. As these amendments or repeals have already taken place, these acts are no longer required.

We do not argue though—and have never argued and never will argue—that getting rid of regulations that are redundant, no longer enforced and are not relevant. It is an attitude we have always had that we take a look at our record when we are in government. But over nearly six years in office we repealed 16,794 spent and redundant acts, regulations and legislative instruments from the statute books. The Amending Acts 1901 to 1969 Repeal Bill 2014 repeals just 1,120 acts spanning from 1901 to 1969, which is much less than the number of repealed acts, regulations and legislative instruments that we went through in nearly six years. As these amendments or repeals have already occurred there is no need, I think, for these pieces of legislation.

It is interesting to note that the explanatory memorandum to this bill claims that repeal of these 1,120 acts is desirable because 'it will reduce the regulatory burden'. That is a fine principle and it is one that the opposition strongly supports. However, when you have a look through the list of the acts, you begin to realise what sort of regulatory burden these acts could possibly have. After all, the explanatory memorandum itself says:

… the repeal of the Acts will not substantially alter existing arrangements or make any change to the substance of the law.

And:

This Bill will have no financial impact.

So there is no change to the law and there is no financial impact. So let us not pretend that the regulatory burden will be reduced by these acts being repealed.

Without going through every single item, there are a few examples here which will illustrate the point that these acts have had no effect for some years—no effect to business, to government or to ordinary Australians—and yet the government want to make a political point that they have caused some kind of regulatory burden. So let us have a look. There is the Spirits Act 1915, which amended the Spirits Act 1906—an act that ceased to have effect on 1 July 2006. There is the Judiciary Act 1914, which made the High Court of Australia a colonial court of admiralty. The Admiralty Act 1988 repealed this imperial act.

Then there is the Passport Act 1948, which redefined the meaning of an Australian citizen for the purposes of obtaining a passport as per the Nationality and Citizenship Act 1948, an act that was repealed in 2007. Then there is the Flags Act 1954, which redefined the outer diameter of the Commonwealth star on the Australian flag, from three-eighths of the width of the flag to three-tenths of the width of the flag.

There are countless more examples, so aside from the fact that these actions occurred in the first half of the last century, they changed acts which are all no longer in force and have not been in force for a number of years. So quite simply they would have had no effect at all on the everyday lives of Australians. That is in complete contrast to the budget that has been handed down this week by the Treasurer, which will have an incredible, terrible effect on the lives of ordinary Australians. So you do have to wonder what regulatory burden all of these could possibly have had. As I said before, we never stand in the way of removing redundant, expired and irrelevant legislation from the statute books. In fact, our record of our time in office shows that we did remove some 16,000 acts, regulations and legislative instruments.

The Prime Minister spoke last week about saving the Australian people money, time and trusting their common-sense to make more choices about their lives. He also spoke about how this 'bonfire'—I think he called it—of regulations would save individuals and organisations more than $70 million every year. We have always believed in the importance of increasing productivity. However, it is difficult to see how the repeal of over 1,000 pieces of legislation that have not affected Australians for many years would do anything to save anybody any money anytime or allow them to make more choices about their lives let alone save more than $70 million a year. I raise this because I believe that the government are trying to create a political point with this piece of legislation. They are trying to say that there is some regulatory burden out there that they have inherited when in fact that is far from the case. What is clear is the due diligence that was carried out by the former Labor government, where we actually did look at the regulatory burden and we actually did remove many acts, regulations and legislative instruments.

Rather than allowing Australians to focus on the very essence of the issues that are going to affect them from this week's budget, the government would prefer that they focused on a furphy, that they got off the political agenda the effects of the budget—the effects of a fuel increase on every day Australian families, the effects of dismantling Medicare and the effects of the co-payment when visiting the GP and the impact of that on the bottom line for families. They certainly do not want to have the focus on the number of older Australians who will be affected by the increase in the pension age to 70. Instead, they want people to focus on this furphy about regulatory burden. As I have highlighted through some of the examples I have given, some of the regulation is already not in place or has not been a part of any kind of regulation for some time. I want to make it clear that we have a number of issues that are important at the moment to the people of Australia and this is simply not one of them. Not one of the items are important. In fact, the items in this legislation are probably something you would laugh about if it was not so sad.

However, what we do want to focus on is what is very sad and worrying to the Australian people, and they are the things that are in Mr Hockey's budget. They are the things that really do matter to the Australian people. That is what they want debated and discussed in this place. They want to ensure that we are doing our job as their representatives to ensure that ordinary Australians have the opportunity to live a decent life. There is little decency in this budget. There is little decency when we look at, for example, the legal assistance cuts that will strip away the protections for a number of vulnerable Australians—which do represent, I think, the sum total of the Attorney-General's first months in his job: cuts to legal assistance, cuts to access to justice and cuts to environmental defenders' offices, to community legal centres and to Aboriginal legal services. These are real concerns to ordinary Australians who will need that access to justice as they face the cuts that have been put forward, firstly through MYEFO and then through this budget.

We know that bills that correct punctuation, spelling and grammar mistakes are just a distraction from the real issues that Australians today are despairing over, following the cuts that have been put forward in the budget. We know also where we sit as an OECD country. We know that the countries of Europe are looking at us and asking, 'What is your problem? You are not in a budget crisis.' Australia has performed so well. Australia has a AAA credit rating—the envy of so many Western countries. That is the legacy of former Treasurer Wayne Swan, who made sure that Australia was protected throughout the global financial crisis that did affect so much of the Northern Hemisphere and that Australian jobs were protected.

This current budget does little for Australian jobs. In fact, it penalises people who may end up out of work. Instead of looking at how we can encourage and create investment in jobs, especially for our young people, this budget says, 'If you're under the age of 30, you will have to wait six months before you can apply for any welfare support through the Newstart allowance.' That is so punitive. What kind of message does that put out to young people, the future generation of this country? It says: 'We don't trust you. We think that you do not want to work, so we are going to make sure we push you into work, even if you lose your job and even if there is no job for you right there and then.' Then what? They will be without any income and potentially homeless, creating more of a downward spiral to other issues that affect those young people who have just lost their job. That is an appalling way to treat the young people of this nation. That is not giving them any incentive to be a part of the job market again. It is treating them with contempt. I would have hoped that, despite the ideological differences between the government and those on this side of the chamber, they would see the common decency and need to have a safety net through a welfare system that did support all the people in need. Through this budget, they have actually punished young people under the age of 30 and that is a very shameful thing.

On top of that, we are here debating the Amending Acts 1901 to 1969 Repeal Bill. Most people who may be tuned in and listening right now to the Senate might think: 'What is all this? Is this really the most important issue facing our nation today?' Why is the Senate spending all this time debating these bills?

Why are they not getting on with the things that really matter to the Australian people? Why are they not getting on with looking at the detrimental effects this week's budget is going to have on so many people?

Every single family that has a car is going to be affected. Every single family or individual that goes to a GP is going to be affected, especially those on low incomes. This Medicare co-payment will particularly hurt those with a disability, those who need to attend a GP more than once because they have complex health needs and those with chronic disease. Medicare is a hallmark of our nation. It is the envy of other nations. Yet this government wants to dismantle Medicare and ruin Australia's long legacy of universal health care. These are the things that matter.

We have an ageing population. I come from Tasmania, the state with, I think, Australia's oldest population—I think it overtook South Australia in that regard not that long ago. To raise the pension age and to effectively cut into the pension through changes to indexation arrangements is simply shameful. It will hurt elderly people who have worked most of their life. They should not be penalised in this way. We should show them much more respect than that.

The government wants to create a big medical research fund. That is fantastic. Medical research is really important. But to fund it off the back of sick Australians going to the doctor, off the back of elderly people wanting to access the age pension—is that really the right way? Is it really fair and just to fund medical research that way?

Everyone gets sick; let's face it—I have a cold at the moment myself. Everyone gets sick. But there are a number of people in our nation who have more complex health needs than others. They will need to pay that co-payment more often than others and many of them are on low incomes. The government is deliberately punishing those people so that it can pay for its medical research fund. There are other ways to fund medical research—it should not be done off the back of sick Australians. That is a shameful thing to do, just as it is a shameful thing to dismantle our Medicare—and it is 'our' Medicare. Everyone feels some ownership of Medicare. We pay a Medicare levy. It is a hallmark of our health system and it is absolutely shameful that this government is starting to dismantle it.

We know that this attack on Medicare is all based on ideology. Ever since John Howard was Prime Minister there have been attempts to dismantle Medicare. We know that there are a number of more conservative members of the government who simply do not believe in Medicare. They want more of a US-style health system. The irony is that the President of the United States has held up the Australian health system as a model towards which he would like to move the US system—to make it fairer. Yet here we have our own government trying to make our system more like that of the US, trying to make it more of a user-pays system.

If you cannot afford to go to the doctor, it should not matter—because your visit should be bulk-billed. That is what Medicare was all about. I am proud that Medicare is a Labor legacy and I will stand with my colleagues in this place to defend Medicare as long as we are here. That is what the Australian people expect of us. That is what they expect us to stand in this place and do. They do not expect us to prattle on about the repeal of some 1,120 irrelevant acts from 1904 to 1969.

As I said, the opposition does support ensuring that Australian law is straightforward and transparent and we support reducing regulatory burdens. When we were in government, we pursued this in a serious way—without grandstanding and carrying on about it the way this government has, as though that is what is important to the Australian people. I think the government needs to wake up and recognise that this is not important to the Australian people. What is important to the Australian people is their everyday cost of living, their health and the education system. I think the government needs to recognise that they are wasting time trying to highlight furphies rather than highlighting the things that are important to Australians.

Scott Ryan (Victoria, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Singh alluded to 'people listening to this debate'. I venture to say that if there were people listening at the start there are probably fewer now. Senator Singh mentioned this bill on—I think I counted—seven or eight occasions during that 20-minute speech on the budget. I am not going to address any of the budgetary issues that Senator Singh raised. This is, after all, the time for noncontroversial legislation, as agreed by people in this chamber. There will be plenty of other opportunities for the Labor Party, at the appropriate time, to put forward its views on the budget—and the government will not shy away from that debate. On three occasions Senator Singh asked why the Senate was wasting its time on this bill. Senator Singh's has been the only speech on this bill—and it went for 20 minutes and only mentioned the bill before the chamber on seven occasions.

Senator Singh alluded to the previous government's record on regulation, but she did not tell the full story. When I was a shadow spokesperson for small business we asked the Parliamentary Library to count up the number of legislative instruments that had been introduced and repealed by the previous government. There were over 200 new ones for every single one that had been repealed. In addition, large pieces of legislation, with huge and complex regulations, were given the Prime Minister's exemption so that they did not even have to go through the regulatory impact statement process. This bill is the first step towards this government delivering on the commitments it made to reduce the burden of red tape on business.

I will add one final example where the previous Labor government's lack of commitment to this matter was illustrated time and time again. Despite pleas from small business people around Australia, when the Labor government introduced its PPL scheme it ensured that small businesses had to do a pointless amount of paperwork. While the payment was made by Centrelink, the small business person had to fill out the paperwork for their employee, had to fill out the paperwork for Centrelink and then had to actually make the payment. This was rather than doing what the then opposition requested, and what small businesses around Australia requested, which was to take small businesses out of the loop. In fact the number of problems created for small businesses illustrates the lack of understanding in the Labor Party of what it is like to run a small business. Most of the payroll systems that small businesses use, which are approved and work with the GST and the Tax Office, could not cope with the Labor government's PPL policy, because they did not include superannuation and payroll tax. So, a whole separate payment mechanism had to be set up by every small business so that they could balance their books. This is the first step in the government's commitment to delivering on its promise to the Australian people to reduce the burden of red tape.

I will conclude my remarks there, and state again that the government will have plenty of opportunities to defend itself from the accusations levied by Senator Singh, which have no basis in fact. I thank honourable senators for their contribution to the debate on the bill.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.