Senator BROWN (2:39 AM) —I am not supportive of this bill. Even though it moves to give a regulatory framework for the spread of gene technology in Australia, it is weak and therefore it is dangerous. Not only is it dangerous to the Australian environment and potentially to the health of Australians but also it is dangerous to commerce in this country, including the organic farming sector of rural Australia. I said earlier that organic farming is a gilt-edged component of rural industries these days. It is concentrated in family farms, which are big employers in the bush. It also produces high premium produce for Australians and for the overseas market. That market is growing more rapidly than the rest of the export market for primary produce in Australia.

Put simply, if genetic contamination goes into farmlands that are registered as organic, they will be finished. That will be the end of the livelihood of those farms. We do not yet know about the long-term hazards of genetic technology to health, but I do not believe it is adequately regulated in this legislation. What we do know is that, largely because of the failure of the opposition to take a strong stand in the matter, this legislation does not require insurance for those people who get licences for GM products, unless the Gene Technology Regulator requires it. It does not protect the natural environment—Australia's flora and fauna—from the spread of genetic contamination. It does not give a clear, comprehensive opt-out clause for the states. That has become a very much more difficult matter—a state becoming GMO free—under this legislation. Local government is denied altogether the power to declare itself as having GE free status.

The requirement of licensing so-called low-risk dealings, which we did not define in the debate, is gone. That leaves a raft of GE dealings which are not going to be either licensed or available for public scrutiny in the one-stop shop that we hoped to get but are not getting under this legislation. It could have been the standard bearer for GE legislation around the world. It should have been. Basic to that is public confidence that everything is aboveboard and obvious, that risk management is at the fore and that the precautionary principle would be there and would be strong, but the legislation fails to do that. Time and time again those aims have been eroded by either the failure of amendments moved by the Greens, the Democrats and One Nation or by the substitution of weak amendments by the opposition and the government. It failed to set up even a compensation fund for this industry to ensure that if people are injured, they will have at least a dollar recompense. That practice applies with doctors and lawyers, but it does not apply to the purveyors of GMOs in this country.

The bill falls far short of where it should have been. It even falls short of the standards set by the report of the Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee. It is a pity that at the end of the year, we are not celebrating breakthrough legislation on one of the great issues of the age not just for our country but right around the world. I believe we are not celebrating because the big parties are failing to heed public concern about this. They do not have their ears to the ground; they do not understand the rising tide of public concern. We are going to be another country where consumer revolt is going to wake up the body politic to the fact that, while gene technology does have scintillating prospects and great advantages for the human community, it also has its worries as far as our society is concerned. Those worries have not been adequately addressed on this occasion.