With the botched religious discrimination bill dominating headlines, it would be easy to think that’s all that happened in Parliament this week. Far from it, actually — plenty of other legislation has been put forward, debated and passed. Here are a few other bills.
Anti-trolling bill
The bill reforms defamation laws around comments posted online and will force social media platforms to take down posts featuring online harassment, and potentially provide identities of anonymous posters. A person who administers or maintains a social media page will not be deemed to be a publisher of third party material, making them immune from liability.
The bill was presented to the House of Representatives on Thursday, before being sent to the Senate and a committee for review, which will report on February 15.
Set the standard bill
The first steps have been made to legislate the recommendations made in sex discrimination commissioner Kate Jenkins’ report into parliamentary workplaces. Two recommendations have been implemented — the first was an acknowledgement to those who experienced bullying and harassment while working in Parliament, and the second prevents staff from being arbitrarily fired and makes clear the obligations parliamentarians have under the Work Health and Safety Act to provide a safe workplace.
Agriculture biodiversity stewardship market bill
With koalas now listed as endangered in Queensland and NSW, the agriculture biodiversity stewardship market bill will create a national framework to describe and measure biodiversity, enable biodiversity certificates for projects, and help track these projects. It seeks to reward farmers for increasing biodiversity on their farms, making it easier for landholders to restore and manage projects that deliver carbon and biodiversity benefits. The bill was read a second time this week with no current proposed amendments.
Cyclone and flood damage reinsurance bill
As massive floods wreak havoc on outback South Australia, causing disruptions to transport systems to the Northern Territory, the cyclone and flood damage reinsurance bill will make insurance affordable and accessible for households and small businesses in cyclone-prone areas, mostly in the NT.
The reinsurance pool will be backed by a $10 billion government guarantee from the middle of this year. The bill was presented this week.
Pension loan scheme enhancements bill
The bill makes the Pensions Loans Scheme more flexible, allowing advanced payments and introducing a no negative equity guarantee, meaning people won’t owe more on their reverse mortgage than their home is worth. An awareness campaign will be launched to update the public on the changes.
Critical infrastructure protection bill
Under the bill, the government will be able to label critical infrastructure assets of “national significance” and impose cyber security measures. These could include mandatory real-time cyber incident reporting, critical infrastructure asset register reporting to identify hazards and, in some instances, the installation and maintenance of a specified computer program.
It aims to address the increased cyber security risk following COVID-19 to limit disruptions on industries such as food, medical supplies, water and sanitation and traffic management systems.
Enhancing tax integrity and supporting business investment bill
This bill was introduced this week and does a few things: It allows the commissioner to make companies that have failed to comply with record-keeping laws to undergo an education course; will allow people to self-assess the life of some intangible depreciating assets; gives tax exemptions for the FIFA Women’s World Cup; and makes certain grants given to small businesses in response to Cyclone Seroja non-exempt income.
Next week, Parliament is set to turn its attention to the mitochondrial donation law reform bill, COVID electoral reforms and funding for RATs.
I hadn’t seen anything about the reinsurance bill but what a cluster of moral hazard and loss-socialising that is. Idiotic in the extreme. There’s very good reasons why certain risks are uninsurable, and having tax payers underwrite them is scandalous, not to mention financially runinous especially as climate change wreaks accelerating havoc.
morrison’s reinsurance pool will be a little gold mine for insurers looking to fleece the taxpayer.
We need a government insurer back!
Until the Territory Country-Liberal Party Government suddenly flogged-off the TIO (Territory Insurance Office) in 2014, TIO was a Government Business Enterprise model for Australia according to the then head of the federal parliamentary committee on the development of Northern Australia, Warren Entsch. He said the NT was the only place in Northern Australia his committee visited where insurance was consistently available and affordable.
“Everywhere else it was absolute crisis and market failure, and when you could actually get it you couldn’t afford it … When you compare house and contents prices, there was about a $400 or $500 difference between places in Melbourne and Sydney and Darwin. Using the same comparison with North Queensland, if you could get insurance the difference was $3,000-$5,000 more”.
Katherine residents expected flood insurance premiums to more than double after the TIO flog-off – were it available at all. Yes, they were wrong – new owner Allianz increased premiums by up to six times.
Same in the other states when their GIOs were off – each neolib flak claimed the same thing, that costs fall.
In NSW the GIO was the main supplier of compulsory Third Party insurance for rego. and Kermit assured punters that commercial green slips would be cheaper.
Within weeks the cost had doubled and has continued to climb ever since.
Hands up anyone who is surprised.
Well done, Amber. From the dominant headlines in the media, one could be forgiven for thinking nothing else was discussed in parliament this week, other than the “religious discrimination bill”.
Appreciate your efforts in advising of other “bills”. Informative info as always.
Contrast this pitiful collection of irrelevant bills with Gillard Labor’s successes.
Minority government during Gillard Labor’s 43rd Parliament may not have been working for the Laberals, but it was working for Australia – no doubt why so many Laberals were anxious to change such a novel and unwelcome situation. abbott himself grossly underrated Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s skill in holding a minority government together, just as abbott demonstrated his own gross incompetence in that job.
Minority government allowed the 43rd Parliament to have some of the best policy discussion of any parliament in recent memory. As retiring independent MP Tony Windsor said at his farewell press conference: “The committee process has been the best in any parliament because the executive did not have control. … My philosophy in working with both sides of the political spectrum has been that political competition delivers. Things happened under the Coalition because they could no longer take the New England for granted as being theirs, while Labor couldn’t ignore it because it was one less seat for the Coalition if things got tight.”
Twenty-three private member’s bills were presented in 2011 and 2012, compared to the average of just 4 per year since Federation. By the end of January ‘13, 136 bills had been amended, or about 30% of all legislation that was introduced. Crossbenchers directly altered 27 bills, and demanded the Government make changes to many others.
It is Rupert’s media that created the contrary mythology of inadequacy and failure that is today’s official narrative of Gillard Labor.
Sorry I can only give you one vote . The days of majority governments I hope are coming to an end . The current government’s use of the public purse to reward “mates” must not be allowed to continue.
The last election win was not the result of a miracle it was paid for by the public purse .
Bring on a minority government that hears the voice of women and brings in an ICAC with teeth and guts
Thanks for that.
FYI the “anti-trolling bill” would really seem to be about protecting “The Australian” from defamation claims in material posted on social media. ScuMo couldn’t help that all such media would be protected too.
Three Turnbull Misgovernment ministers chose not to apologise to the Victorian court of appeal for comments printed in “The Australian” in June ’17 describing judges as “hard-left activists”, “divorced from reality,” and conducting an “ideological experiment”. Health Minister Greg Hunt, human services Minister Alan Tudge and assistant treasurer Michael Sukkar were asked to explain their comments to the court three days later.
At their contempt hearing, Commonwealth solicitor-general Stephen Donaghue QC (replacement for the constructively dismissed Justin Gleeson) read a statement on behalf of the three ministers, which stressed that the remarks had been made in response to the ABC report of the June 9 appeal hearings and it had been made clear during the June 16 hearing that “our understanding of what occurred during that (appeal) was inaccurate”.
All three Ministers acknowledged that their comments were based on what amounted to bias, ignorance, pre-judgement, preconceived ideas, negligence, failure to make elementary enquiry, and focus on exploiting politics.
In a typical rightist example of courage, “The Australian” (which appeared to have orchestrated their efforts) pleaded that it was only the messenger.