Senator BOLKUS(1.21 p.m.) —I am concerned to hear that. As Senator Spindler said as well, we are concerned that the agreement may be a bit more fluid now than it might have been and, as you say, all these questions are still being discussed between the Commonwealth Attorney and the states. Obviously, the ambit of guns that will be bought back will depend on the exemptions, for instance. What I was going to do today was refer you to all the newspapers and ask about the situation, which I think was reflected very well in a couple of paragraphs in the Australian this morning, where, unfortunately, it stated:

Queensland maintains that it is not breaking away from the police ministers' resolutions, saying its plans to allow farmers access to the high-powered centrefire rifles—Category D weapons—was `totally consistent' with the spirit of the resolutions.

However, the agreement provided farmers who could show `genuine need' could have access to semi-automatic rimfire rifles, semi-automatic shotguns and pump action shotguns—Category C weapons.

Category D weapons were banned except for official purposes such as the military and police.

It is going to be important, in terms of the buyback scheme, to know which interpretation of the agreement the government is going to settle on. Is it going to settle on the Queensland government's interpretation, or is it going to settle on the interpretation that the Prime Minister has quite strenuously been putting over recent weeks—an interpretation which the opposition is fully in support of? As I say, Senator Short, the range of guns to be bought back depends on that interpretation. Can you give us an assurance, for instance, that it will be the Prime Minister's interpretation, when he said on Tuesday that any suggestion that people could have the centre-fire semi-automatic rifle would be clearly outside the agreement? I think that sort of assurance would underpin the buyback scheme to our satisfaction.