Mr KERR (8:42 PM) —I move:

After clause 2, page 3 (after line 2) insert:

2A Minister to ensure that new provisions are publicised

(1) As soon as practicable after this Act receives the Royal Assent, the Minister administering the Migration Act 1958 must take reasonable steps to ensure that persons involved in commercial boat or ship charter are aware of the changes made by this Act to the Customs Act 1991, the Fisheries Management Act 1991 and the Migration Act 1958.

(2) Despite subsection (1), a person's ignorance of an amendment made by this Act does not affect the operation, in relation to that person, of a provision of the Customs Act 1991, the Fisheries Management Act 1991 and the Migration Act 1958 enacted or amended by this Act.

2B Reports to Parliament on actions under section 2A

(1) The Minister referred to in section 2A must report to the Parliament on the steps the Minister has taken under that section.

(2) The report must be laid before each House of the Parliament within the period of 12 months after the day on which this Act receives the Royal Assent.

The debate has concluded on the second reading and it would be profitless at this stage to try to re-enter a debate which has concluded. But I will take the liberty during this course to make a couple of comments in relation to the remarks of the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs. The minister did say that the opposition had barely put forward any constructive ideas in relation to these matters. I find that slightly awkward for me to comprehend given that the dialogue between myself and the minister led to the series of amendments which the minister is to move shortly and which were agreed as a result of those discussions. Absent of those amendments, this legislation would have been significantly less well constructed and would have given rise to significant difficulties in administration. I will return to those matters when we get to the amendments to be moved by the minister.

The minister has indicated that the government has been putting forward only a range of contributions which have gone to the edges of these debates. Far from it. It has been over a year since the opposition first raised the prospect of significant difficulties in our capacity to deal with border protection and since we first raised the issue of the adequacy of our coastal surveillance. If the minister is content with five or more instances where boats have landed and where the first point of apprehension has been through the surveillance of civilians—screen keepers or roo shooters and the like—I take the minister at his words but say that he is very easily satisfied.

The specific amendment that we are moving at this point incorporates an obligation on the minister to work to ensure that there is widespread dissemination of the information about these legislative changes and to report to each house of parliament on the steps which have been taken to do so. This reflects recommendations from the Australian Law Reform Commission report Confiscation that counts: a review of the Proceeds of Crime Act 1987, which recommended that the business sector should be provided with information which would allow it to develop effective risk management strategies for chattels which could be rendered forfeit.

The government has not seen fit to take up this recommendation, but we believe it is a fundamental point that those who are most at risk of being affected by the intended changes should be made aware of the changes. These are very far-reaching provisions and they do have the support of the opposition, but we should not diminish what is involved here. I think this is the furthest reach ever put forward by a government of any country of a capacity to apprehend and detain vessels on the high seas and allow for their forfeiture. The range of vessels that can be forfeited and the circumstances in which they can be forfeited, as provided for in this bill, include circumstances where there is no actual fault of the owner—where, for example, the boat has been borrowed or leased or other arrangements of that kind have been entered into and the boat has been used in a manner which is not known to those who have possession or management of the boat.

There are not only domestic interests but also international investors that will be concerned about this. The insurance industry will also naturally be very concerned about it, because it will for the first time mean that there are new risk factors that have to be taken into account. I would have thought that it was a minimal requirement to ask of this government that, in promulgating changes of this nature which are so different from anything that has been applied in this country hitherto and different from anything that applies in any jurisdiction anywhere in the world, they be communicated to the publics that may be affected. (Extension of time granted)

I understand that, when the minister responds, he will indicate that the government does intend to give widespread publicity to these changes. Of course, I do not wish to make any suggestion contrary to the minister's undertaking that he will not do so. But there is a public responsibility on this parliament that I believe should be discharged by saying that we accept our responsibility as the law makers to see the evidence of that through a report to this parliament. The dissemination of the information will serve two purposes. It will ensure that all people, particularly those who are involved with commercial boat or ship charter and those in the shipping industry, are given the opportunity to review their business practices so as to ensure their vessels are not subject to forfeiture because of the actions of their clients or business associates. Further, it will increase the deterrence element of the new scheme, because if this scheme is not widely known then obviously it has limited impact in its deterrence.

The government has stated that one of the intended outcomes of introducing this new scheme is to deter people-smuggling. It only stands to reason that the more people that know about the legislation the greater its deterrence effects will be. So the amendments that the opposition proposes give effect to the view that I have put forward that there should be an explicit obligation on ministers who have the carriage of this legislation to ensure that the information is widely disseminated. In discussions with the minister, we went through the sorts of bodies to which that information should be disseminated. It is not a particularly onerous responsibility, and I do not understand why there is a reluctance to incorporate this in the legislation. Might I say, for information and to give a colourful example, that every time those people engaged in bareboat charters around the Whitsundays charter a boat to somebody they now risk the forfeiture of that vessel, should it be utilised for a scheme that is caught by this act, irrespective of whatever—

Mrs De-Anne Kelly —I come from the Whitsundays. It is a lot of baloney.

Mr KERR —There is an idiot who has just joined the front bench and who is making an absolutely puerile and indefensible comment because she plainly does not understand the nature of this legislation. I am certain that the minister when he stands up will make clear that it does apply in those circumstances. It is precisely because it applies in those circumstances, and in circumstances where most people in the ordinary course of events would not have thought it would have applied, that we need to get that information out, because those engaged in those commercial practices will now need to take out special insurance because they are—

Mrs De-Anne Kelly interjecting—

Mr KERR —They are. Minister, there is a dopey person behind you making dopey comments. It would assist if you would dissuade her from doing so. These are issues that we have discussed together and, as I have indicated, the minister has not indicated any disinclination to undertake that course of public education but has indicated that it would be a new precedent that he is not prepared to enter into in an undertaking of this nature. I understand that that in turn was not a view that he particularly held, but it was a view that was reached for a whole of government reason. I think that is unfortunate because there are very good public reasons why there ought to be no excuses allowed for the failure of that public education campaign.

These are changes of a sweeping nature. They are changes which have exactly the impact that I have described. They are changes which the opposition supports because of the underlying rationale for them, but they do change the nature of the commercial arrangements. It is not just those who are engaged in shipping and other transportation in this country that will be affected but those in other countries. If these provisions come to be applied to those who assert they were unknowing of them, and in fact were unknowing of them, there is obvious potential for considerable conflict and difficulties with our external relations. I commend these proposals to the House. We will be pressing those amendments at a later stage, but we understand that the legislation will not be held up because of disagreement over this particular point, given the minister's undertakings. (Time expired)