Senator KEMP (Assistant Treasurer)(1.09 p.m.) —Senator, I think I did answer your questions. I shall have another shot at it if I did not satisfy you.

Senator Harradine —No, just yes or no.

Senator KEMP —Senator, I will answer the questions the way I wish to answer them. You will be able to respond. I do not know if it gives you any comfort—I hope it does—but clause 1-3 is identical to the rule that applies for all rewrites of Commonwealth acts, I am advised. This includes the corporations law rewrite.

Your proposal, I believe, goes far further than the meaning that can be given to 1-3 because there will be times when deliberate changes are made to the act. Under your proposal—and I think Senator Kernot picked this one up quite well—you could say, `We don't like that change to the act, so we will go back to the 1936 law.' That is the effect. That is why yours goes far further.

Senator Harradine —Oh, rubbish!

Senator KEMP —If it does not go far further you had better stand up and explain to the Senate why it does not. If in the budget session we make an amendment to this act, what will happen is that someone will say, `We don't like that amendment, so thanks to Senator Harradine we can go back to the 1936 law.' If that is a wrong interpretation, Senator, you had better tell me because that is my understanding of what you are saying.

I think you have raised what I can only describe as a furphy. Clause 1-3, as it is currently worded, is a general note of guidance on how the courts and others interpreting the law should proceed and, to repeat, it tells them that they should put aside a presumption that there is a difference in meaning because the idea is expressed in simpler terms. That is not setting up a parallel act; that is just commonsense. I think your amendment would cause huge problems. The government certainly will not be supporting the proposal you put forward.