Senator MILNE (9:57 AM) —I rise to support the suspension of standing orders so that there can be a full debate on this matter. I sit here somewhat frustrated that I hear the niceties of discussion about parliamentary process as being something that stands in the way of a full debate on this issue, because while we sit here talking about whether this is the most appropriate mechanism there are house-to-house searches in Tibet for people who have been involved in fighting for the aspirations of the Tibetan people.

The Chinese government has made it quite clear that if people give themselves up now they will be considered for some sort of lesser penalty than otherwise would apply. It is very clear that people will die—will be put to death—because they stood up in Tibet. We in this parliament are saying, ‘No, we cannot discuss this now; it has complex foreign affairs ramifications.’ I do not know how many times we have stood in this parliament and talked about the proposed free trade agreement with China, and said we should do what the European Union does—make sure any free trade agreements have human rights agreements associated with them, with a caveat saying that you can pull out of those agreements if there are abuses of human rights. But Australia does not do that because we would not want to jeopardise our trade arrangements by consideration of human rights. That is the position to this day.

We are quite happy to sell uranium to China without any consideration about human rights. We are quite happy to have a Prime Minister going for a four-day visit to China and leaving the discussion of these matters until he gets there. We have the Prime Minister of Britain ringing overnight to speak to the Chinese about engaging in a dialogue and stopping the violence, expressing concern about what is going on. We have the President of the European Union speaking out about what ought to happen in relation to the Olympic Games. We have people around the world protesting outside Chinese embassies, because the reality is we know that people are going to be put to death. That is why this is a matter for the suspension of standing orders. This is not something we can put off to another day.

It is true that a short-notice debate puts some pressure on parliamentarians to get their thoughts together on an issue. But isn’t it better to put the pressure on people to actually get their heads around this quickly than to use that as a mechanism for not having the debate, for not making a decision on an issue like this? Haven’t we got a moral responsibility to tell the Chinese government right now that the Australian parliament does not support the death penalty and does not think it appropriate that China is putting more people to death with the death penalty than any other country in the world today? Don’t we think that is appropriate? Has this parliamentary inquiry on the death sentence met over what is happening in Tibet?

I feel like there needs to be a bit of a rethink about the role of parliaments. We represent the Australian people. This is a democracy and the Australian people would expect us to stand up for human rights around the world. After all, we have agreed to those human rights obligations through the treaties that we have signed, and we should be representing that stand at every opportunity. This is the opportunity to say to the Chinese government that we do not support the use of the death penalty in China or anywhere else.

I would also dispute the notion that Australia has given an unequivocal message around the world, because clearly there were mixed messages sent to the Indonesian government in the not too distant past. We need to have a reaffirmation of our position on the death penalty worldwide, but in this particular instance, because we know that the death penalty is to be meted out to Tibetans because of their stand against China, we have an obligation to have the full debate, to have a vote on this issue and to convey that to the Chinese government as a matter of urgency. If there is one thing we should be doing, it is not only standing up for Australian citizens facing the death penalty around the world; it is standing up for anybody facing the death penalty around the world, and that is why I support the suspension of standing orders.

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