19.3.13 Broadcasting Legislation Amendment (Convergence Review and Other Measures) Bill 2013, Television Licence Fees Amendment Bill 2013
Mr HAWKE (Mitchell) (17:14): I also rise to speak on the two bills, the Broadcasting Legislation Amendment (Convergence Review and Other Measures) Bill 2013 and the Television Licence Fees Amendment Bill 2013, which the government has separated from its package of six bills.
I start by saying that there is a certain reluctance on the part of government members at the moment to speak on these bills. I certainly think the member for Reid was hardly compelling in his support for these bills as they have been presented. I am certainly looking forward to hearing his remarks later on, because, as I see it now, I can understand why government members are so reluctant to put themselves on the record as being behind the Prime Minister's package of media reforms. I understand completely that there is a fear amongst Labor members that they ought not to say what they really think about the government's approach to media reform in Australia, because it is so chaotic and so haphazard.
When I look at the detail of the legislation that is before us, I do think there are some concerns with various elements of it, and these have been raised by the member for Wentworth. I correct the member for Reid on one thing that he said about this, which is that the member for member for Wentworth did not say that he did not support the ABC having the tender for the Australia Network. The member for Wentworth was making a very sensible point about the legislation in front of us, which is that, on the Australia Network—and why we are proposing an amendment—the question is: why would we seek to bind a future government to not tendering for the Australia Network to provide that service? The member for Wentworth was very clear in saying that he supported the ABC having the tender. In fact, the Howard government gave the tender to the ABC. But there is no reason to put through legislation that would bind us to not having a tender process in the future. There may well be good arguments for having a tender process.
Certainly the way this government has handled the tender process is not a good argument for a tender. Why have a tender for the delivery of the Australia Network and award it to Sky when you have no intention of going through with your tender? In fact, you have this ugly, unedifying approach from an incompetent government to issue a tender, to vary the tender, to abandon the process and then to award it to the people who had the tender in the first place. Of course that is not a compelling argument for having a tender—I understand that. The argument there is that we have an incompetent government run by people who do not understand the realities of commercial broadcasting, the realities of tender processes or the realities of how you conduct a proper approach to government. This does not necessarily mean that we need to bind governments in the future to not having tender processes; there are valid reasons, and the member for Wentworth outlined some in relation to the ABC. We may want to sharpen the focus of the ABC at some point and make it compete with various carriers for the Australia Network. There are valid reasons that we might seek to do that. So it is not right for the member for Reid to say that we do not support the ABC tendering for the Australia Network.
These two bills have been separated from the other four bills, and there is a sense that the government is doing this on the fly. So we are all here at the last minute hearing arguments about Finkelstein and convergence reviews. The member for Reid said that the media are crying out for all of this. Certainly there has been a broad public discussion about the role of the media and media reforms and regulations. These proposals, including the bills before us, were introduced into this place on 14 March, so we have not had time to review these processes thoroughly and neither have all of the relevant media associations. The proposals do not match the realities of what the discussions have been about, and that is of great concern. Even in recent days we have heard from the CEO of Fairfax—never mind the member for Reid's lament about Mr Murdoch—telling us that he is not aware of the problem that the government is trying to solve. So it would be good to ask government members what the problem is that they are trying to address with all these packages of legislation.
The simple bills that we see before us right now—the member for Reid flagged that we are going to be here all night debating the rest of them—do have some non-controversial elements that the coalition is prepared to support. There are the Australian content provisions, including prescribing the Australian content requirements, which already exist in the 55 per cent range, and amending the charter of the ABC and the SBS. The ABC and SBS charters are really non-controversial in terms of the proposals in the bill, including the addition of non-executive directors and one of them being Indigenous, with the establishment of the national Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander free-to-air television channel. But the Australia Network tender section 31AA makes no sense. We are amending this part of the bill to ensure that we do not bind a future government.
Similarly, the Television Licence Fees Amendment Bill 2013 has elements which are non-controversial. Of course, the reach rule has been sent to the joint select committee for discussion. We support the deferring of any decision on the abolition of the reach rule, because the reach rule prevents any one commercial television network from broadcasting to more than 75 per cent of the population. It seems to me that, if you are going to take the opportunity to reform media and media regulation in Australia, these sorts of issues go to the core of what is good and effective regulation in Australia. Is it really relevant to have a 75 per cent reach rule in Australia today? It is an argument that I would be interested in hearing about, because there is a revolution going on in internet service providers and the availability of the internet and television. I can now watch every rugby league game live on my iPad at any point, no matter where I am in the country.
The serious contestability issues about media and binding television broadcasters are, I think, valid for us to consider.
Yet we have not yet heard all of the regional implications of abolishing the 75 per cent reach rule.
The member for Wentworth mentioned Game of Thrones. It is a great series, and I happily paid for it. But people are illegally downloading material—which is wrong—because of restrictions that do not allow Australian customers to pay for materials. There are many issues like that in Australia that we are not addressing in this legislation. There is other legislation that may well be out of date, such as that dealing with parallel importation laws which prevent Australians from paying for the goods and services that they are seeking to pay for, including books, downloads of books, and downloads of media broadcasts of things like popular series such as Game of Thrones. Well-considered legislation with well-considered proposals might well have had great relevance and support from the opposition.
The Prime Minister today has been keen to lecture this chamber about the conservatives in the UK and the proposals that are being put forward on media reform there. I say to the Prime Minister that that is exactly the point. There is a huge difference in approach. They have a cross-parliamentary working group working to ensure that both sides have input into the reforms which have arisen out of the problems that they have had in the United Kingdom so that there is genuine bipartisan support for them. We have not seen anything like that here. We have seen unreasonable haste.
The member for Reid said that there has never been a better time. What does he mean by that? We have had no explanation of that. We have had no substantiation of that statement. I cannot see it being a good time after listening to all of the media proprietors in this country and all of the executives that came before the committee explaining their horror at the proposals that have been put forward. What is meant by 'there has never been a better time'?
The Labor Party could take a leaf out of the book of those in the UK by making genuine proposals through well-thought-out public policy proposals put into quality legislation that can get the support of opposition parties. There is a lesson in there for Julia Gillard, the Prime Minister, and this government. It certainly is not that we are foolish to oppose this.
We have concerns about many elements of the other four bills that will come before us later tonight. I will not address them now except to say that we have a minister for communications who I am highly sceptical of. This is a minister who wanted to introduce mandatory internet filtering into Australia—he wanted to filter the entire internet. This minister put in a proposal for mandatory retention of the data of individual citizens. This minister told an international audience that he could make executives wear red underwear on their head. I am not making things up; this is a government minister lording his power over the media and trumpeting in the public domain proposals to severely regulate and restrict perhaps the greatest tool of individual progress and freedom that is available to human beings today—the internet. That is the attitude at the heart of the proposals that we see here today.
The government has put up these first two bills as a way of shoving something out there while they work out what to do. Many of the things in these bills are completely non-controversial. On limiting the number of commercial networks to three: there has long been concern in the commercial industry about the idea of an additional commercial network. Maintaining that restriction is non-controversial. We have been through many of the issues. The member for Wentworth outlined our position on the non-controversial sections.
I clearly highlight that on the Australia Network it is untenable for Labor and the government members to come in here and argue that our amendment is anything but reasonable after the absolute debacle that we saw in recent years. You can add that debacle to the long list of debacles that have arisen out of the absolutely incompetent approach of this government to managing any type of tender process. It was probably one of the most embarrassing episodes in the history of the Gillard government, which is certainly saying something. The Sky tender variation was very unedifying to see a government involved in. It is emblematic of why this government is so poorly regarded by so many industries and sectors.
I will reserve my comments on the appalling proposals which are coming before us later on and which go to the heart of freedom of speech in Australia today and freedom of the press. We will certainly be having a vigorous and lively debate on those proposals. These two bills are a package that the government has thrown together as a bit of stop-gap while they try to work out what to do, considering that the minister for communications has said that he will not negotiate and will not barter. He certainly will not be bartering, because the principle of bartering relies on two parties having something of equal worth. We know that the minister's proposals are not of any worth, so he will not be bartering with anybody—but not by his own choice.
With all those comments in mind, this is fairly non-controversial legislation. I look forward to the very serious debate that will happen in this Australian parliament later tonight. I particularly note the reluctance—the fear—of Labor members to come into this chamber and put themselves on the record in support of Minister Conroy and the Prime Minister's package of reforms.