Senator SCHACHT (4:06 PM) —Senator Margetts, you are withdrawing your amendment in view of supporting Senator Murray's amendment. Is that correct?

Senator Margetts —My amendment is incorporated into his amendment.

Senator SCHACHT —Into his amendment, okay. Could I just ask a couple of questions to either Senator Murray or to the parliamentary secretary. Do we know whether the Reid report made similar recommendations about this mediation process?

Senator Ian Campbell —We actually picked it up in the franchising debate. We will check.

Senator SCHACHT —Thank you. Secondly, I take it that the point of Senator Murray's and Senator Margetts's concern is that, if there are lengthy legal proceedings, et cetera, small business does not have the resources to fight the big end of town. Back in 1995, we reached agreement with the ACCC and announced that we would provide resources to the small business unit or office of the Trade Practices Commission, as it then was, now the ACCC. That enabled the TPC itself, if it thought a case good enough, to take that case on against the big end of town. I want to know whether that provision is still there and resources available so that, where a case is appropriate, the ACCC can do that.

Senator Margetts —Is that more of a test case?

Senator SCHACHT —No, not a test case. It is just a matter of the ACCC from time to time taking a case because small business cannot afford to. As I am advised, once the ACCC has established a test case, if it is a good test case and the ACCC wins it, they then get the precedent established. The big end of town may then well drop off trying to hold people out, knowing that the precedent has been established. I wonder whether the parliamentary secretary can give us any information in that area?

I would raise one final issue. From my own involvement years ago on the cost of justice inquiry, I was very strongly in favour of alternate dispute resolution procedures in an attempt to get the cost of justice down—and this is a relevant area here. But one thing I do not want to do, in one sense, is implement a delaying process whereby, if it is a tenancy matter, the landlord can start going through a mediation process and use it to delay an outcome.

After sitting through estimates hearings on these dreaded CoT cases for Telstra, even though there has been a mediation process now in place for several years, where Telstra—or, for that matter, either side—wants to, it can still delay endlessly and keep on going around and around, if it thinks it might lose the mediation. I am not sure that I want to vote for something whereby the mediation process can be used as a delaying device rather than for there to be a quick outcome, a decision from the court saying, `This is it.'