Senator BROWN (3:51 PM) —I want to concur with what Senator Harradine has had to say. We have more than 50 amendments here from the government, more than 50 from the opposition, and more than 50 from the Democrats. It is not easy legislation that we are dealing with: it is very complex conceptually. If we are properly going to review the matter, before we debate it here there ought to be an opportunity for community consultation. There are a lot of stakeholders in this—19 million of them. There are quite a few stakeholders out there who are quite concerned about how this legislation is going to affect them. One cannot but be concerned that, the closer we get to the community as far as those stakeholders are concerned, the less they are able to have any input into a debate as complex as this one, when they have not got the basic information on which the debate is being founded. It is a totally unsatisfactory situation.

I would suggest that the bigger parties take stock. I think this legislation ought to be held over until our August sitting. That would be a sensible thing to do. There is no compelling reason we should have to deal with that before we rise at the end of this week; least of all is there any reason that it could be upheld by the government when it brings amendments so late into the place. We will function a lot better if we have had time to get some feedback from the community. In fact, I think we are doing the wrong thing by the community if we do not. I would suggest that the government in particular again look at the circumstances in which this debate has been listed, and do the right thing and hold it off until we have had a break and we have had proper input from all the stakeholders.