Senator CARR (11:34 PM) —The majority—

Senator Knowles —This will be good!

Senator CARR —Even you, despite the fact that you obviously had far too much to drink tonight. In fact, what you have here—

Senator Patterson —That is appalling.

Senator Knowles —Withdraw!

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Calvert) —Senator Carr, would you withdraw that reflection.

Senator CARR —I withdraw. Mr Acting Deputy President, you would be only too well aware of the drunken party that is occurring out in the lobby while we are supposed to be discussing—

Senator Patterson —I rise on a point of order. Senator Carr is casting aspersions on all senators on this side. I find it totally inappropriate, and I ask you to ask him to withdraw it.

Senator CARR —Withdraw what? There is a drunken party going on outside.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Senator Carr, I think we can do without those sorts of comments.

Senator CARR —It is absolutely true.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —I think it is fair to both sides that you withdraw.

Senator CARR —Thank you very much for your advice, Mr Acting Deputy President. The big question that has to be asked is: why do a majority of Australians so strenuously oppose the full privatisation of Telstra? Why is it that they have such deep concerns?

Senator Knowles —He did not withdraw, did he?

Senator Patterson —I rise on a point of order. Senator Carr did not withdraw. He cast aspersions on all senators on this side.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —I think he withdrew that reflection on the other side. Is that correct?

Senator CARR —Yes, I did. Why is it that a majority of Australians so deeply resent the actions of this government to try to plunder their assets when it comes to the privatisation of Telstra? Why is it that they are so concerned about the dishonest and deceitful way in which this government operates? Why is it that they are so concerned about the way in which a government goes to the public, says that it will privatise one-third of Telstra, then sneaks back in here in the middle of the night to put forward a motion to present to this parliament a proposition to fully privatise Telstra? Why is it?

The reasons are very straightforward. There is deep concern right across this country, but particularly in regional and rural Australia, about the impact that such measures are going to have on the access to advanced telecommunications services. There is very deep concern about the already evident decline in services that have been provided as a result of the partial privatisation of Telstra in regard to the availability, the quality and the price of services. There is very deep concern about the impact such proposals are going to have on the public finances of this country. There is enormous concern about the impact such proposals will have on the foreign ownership levels of the privatised Telstra. There is enormous concern—huge concern—already being expressed by many hundreds of thousands of Australians about the impact such proposals are going to have on employment levels, particularly in regional Australia. There is huge concern about the impact the privatisation of Telstra will have on local manufacturing.

What do we hear from cockies corner down here? Not one word. In fact, the real question being asked right across Australia these days is: when will Tim Fischer and the National Party actually get off their knees to the Liberal Party and Mr John Howard? Why is it that so many Australians understand that Mr Howard is obviously the weakest Prime Minister this country has seen since perhaps Billy Hughes? What they do not understand is that Tim Fischer is the weakest Deputy Prime Minister since Earl Page. The fact remains that what we have seen in recent days is a desperate attempt by this government to patch up a sordid arrangement to try to lock in some support from some senators in this chamber who, quite clearly, do not have the gumption to defend their constituents, to defend the philosophical position they ought to be defending and to defend the commitments they have made in public too.

We have seen, for instance, the statements made by De-Anne Kelly, the federal member for Dawson, who has blown the whistle on you lot. She makes it perfectly clear that she is not going to be supporting the full privatisation of Telstra. Recently, in the last 24 hours, she has indicated the enormous price that is going to be paid by those sena tors who are willing to go along with these sordid arrangements with regard to the deal recently patched up by Tim Fischer, the Minister for Communications, the Information Economy and the Arts (Senator Alston) and this Prime Minister.

We have seen all of this before. We saw it last time when the partial privatisation was considered and various attempts were made to secure support of particular interests within this Senate. They were told at that time that commitments were undertaken—in fact on 11 December 1996 Senator Colston for one indicated that there was a commitment from Minister Alston and, of course, the chief executive of Telstra that there would be no reduction in the employment of Telstra workers below 3.4 per cent, and that was supposed to be before 1999.

From the results of the surveys and the positions put to this Senate by Telstra itself, we have seen already in the case of Queensland that there has been a reduction in jobs of some 11.96 per cent, particularly in rural parts of Queensland. From a figure of 3,260, 390 employees have been removed from Telstra. In the case of Tasmania where the commitment was given that there would be 170 extra jobs, if we look at the figures, there are in fact 147 fewer jobs. In fact, in the country areas of Tasmania there has been a reduction in employment of some 30.49 per cent.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Calvert) —Order! Would those senators standing in the chamber please resume their seats.

Senator CARR —We see that there has been a reduction in the country regions of Victoria of 15.9 per cent. There has been a removal of some 573 positions from 3,601 positions. In Western Australia we see a reduction of 14.3 per cent, and Senator Lightfoot blithely goes on and says, `What a great proposal this is.' There has not been one word out of conservative senators about defending jobs in the provincial parts of their states. In South Australian rural areas the number of jobs lost has now reached 19.8 per cent, but there has not been one word from that lot over there.

This sort of weak, snivelling approach, crawling in here in the middle of the night to try to get this sort of proposition up, is now par for the course. What we have to understand is that this is a government that is actually committed to a reduction in the standard of living of ordinary Australians. But then it does not care what the cost is of these privatisations; there is no interest expressed about the consequences of its actions, particularly in terms of the reductions of job opportunities for workers of Telstra. There is not the slightest hint of concern about the implications for the loss of service quality to consumers as a result of the removal of what appear to be 17,722 jobs up to February this year. That is a 23 per cent cut in the number of jobs right across Telstra in 20 months. But there has not been one whisper from over there about the effects that might have on particular regions of this country.

I ask you: why is it that Tim Fischer will not get off his knees? Why is it that the National Party are so determined to grovel before the Liberal Party? Why is it that they are so committed to get on their knees when it comes to questions of such fundamental importance to the people of rural and provincial Australia?

The integral part of this privatisation proposal is to actually undermine the economic capacity of Telstra to provide the broad based community service that it has done for many a generation. One of our strongest companies has undergone one of the biggest corporate restructures we have ever seen in this country. Why is that? It is because there is a particular ideological drive by this government to actually produce what they see is a result for the benefit of shareholders—not the 18 million Australians that currently own Telstra, not the 18 million citizens of this country that draw benefit from the ownership of what is a highly successful public enterprise. No, it is for the benefit of the few.

This is demonstrated very clearly in terms of the approach taken to employment. As I said, these actions have a direct impact in terms of the service quality for consumers. Five weeks after the last federal election a project team known as Project Mercury was established by Telstra management, which established, among other things, a particular drive to remove, as they said in their papers at the time, papers which are all canvassed in the Senate committee report entitled Telstra: to sell or not to sell?, some 24,000 Telstra jobs by July 1998. We see in retrospect that that is precisely what they have achieved.

The aim of Project Mercury was:

(a) reducing labour costs by employing contractors at lower wage rates than those of Telstra award workers;

(b) taking other labour costs of balance sheet through other mechanisms such as joint ventures;

(c) disposal of assets in areas considered `non-core'; and

(d) releasing millions of dollars of investment funds

The main purpose of this was to increase the value of the company, as measured by the Stock Exchange, by reducing the cost of labour employed by Telstra. Outsourcing, of course, was the main means by which this was to be achieved. The Project Mercury documents, which we were able to secure through various means and provide to the Senate references committee, demonstrated that the Project Mercury steering group on 28 May 1996 discussed and resolved:

. . . that outsourcing will be [the] preferred outcome when the cost benefit of outsourcing is equal or marginal to retaining inhouse. This will assist in bridging the gap between Telstra and best practice in relation to headcount benchmarking.

A device was demonstrated in regard to objectives that they said were consistent with privatisation. Those who argue that job losses are really all about a device whereby we respond to the pressures of competition ought to read the papers presented by the Project Mercury team. That team quite clearly demonstrated that the real issue here is privatisation. That is the imperative in terms of driving down employment numbers in Telstra. Recently, Telstra announced that their intention was to shed a total of 25,500 jobs over a four-year period and they then upped that by another 2,000 jobs, so they are intending to remove 27,500 positions over a four-year period. This whole debate, I repeat, is really driven by the desire to secure privatisation, to increase the share value of Telstra and to ensure that, through that prac tice, there is a higher return to shareholders, irrespective of the impact on the quality of service delivery and the economic activity in any particular region, particularly in regional Australia.

Of the submissions that we did receive—given that very limited time was available to the Senate legislation committee to consider this matter on this occasion—we again saw very considerable concern being expressed right around Australia in the opinions of various community groups and state governments, even conservative state governments. There was great concern about the impact of what Frank Blount has been reported as saying—that is, of Telstra's need to focus on what he calls `the delivery of increased shareholder value'. In that process, as we have seen by the ACA reports, for two consecutive quarters there has actually been a decline in the level of service provided by Telstra to customers across Australia.

To this, the minister says, `We've had a lot of bad weather. We've had floods in the middle of Australia. We've had droughts and all sorts of other pestilence that have arrived and undermined us.' That is not the situation in Victoria, where quite clearly the reports demonstrate substantial drops in the very levels that we say Telstra use as their key benchmark to establish their measure of customer satisfaction. That includes telephone connections, telephone repairs and a whole range of other services, such as the capacity to answer the telephone when you ring up for directory assistance.

All those measures have absolutely nothing to do with the weather, particularly in the case of Victoria. For that matter, in the case of Victoria, they have absolutely nothing to do with the issue of remoteness, which is the other great excuse that Telstra have used for the decline in the quality of service provided. It has everything to do with the fact that there has been such a massive drop in the number of workers employed by Telstra to undertake those fundamental and simple tasks, such as making sure the phone is actually connected or making sure the phone services are repaired. You simply cannot do those tasks when you remove the number of employees who have been removed by Telstra management.

I might note that the real beneficiaries of the Telstra privatisation have been management, who have been able to demand market salaries. They are always the great advocates for privatisation in all of these debates about public enterprise. It is always pushed by the management, who are the first beneficiaries of market competitiveness.

When government senators go back to their home towns and look the people who actually elected them in the eye, they need to ask them whether they have been able to provide a service to their constituents in terms of this miserable sell-out that has been presented as a fait accompli by the Prime Minister over the last 24 hours. We were told that there will be an incentive for people to support this proposition. We were told 24 hours ago by Senator O'Chee, if I recall correctly, that when we get this deal on the table it will be a revolutionary proposition. There is nothing revolutionary about the National Party being bought off. That has been an integral part of their history. It has been absolutely critical to their history. There is no revolutionary new discovery there.

The National Party also say, `When we get the deal out in the open, we'll be able to vote with a clear conscience.' Since when has a clear conscience—or a conscience even—been an integral part of the way in which the National Party behave in these issues? What we have seen throughout their history is generally a commitment to defend regional and rural areas. That has gone out the window under this new regime, under the leadership of the current Leader of the National Party, Tim Fischer. The real criterion here is how low one can grovel to the Liberal Party. That is why the National Party are being cut to pieces throughout regional and rural Australia, because fundamentally they do not have the backbone to stand up and defend the interests of the people who actually elected them.

We have seen substantial job losses in recent times in Victoria, with 3,000 positions having been lost there. Victoria has suffered disproportionately as a consequence of the actions of this government to strip out the resources of this once great Australian company as part of the miserable arrangements entered into last time to secure support for the partial privatisation of Telstra. National Party MPs in Queensland and New South Wales have said absolutely nothing about those job losses. But in Victoria, where there are areas which still do not even have a mobile phone service—and I note that this is particularly the case in Gippsland—we have heard absolutely nothing from some federal senators. The Melbourne Herald Sun states:

In the 12 months to March, more jobs were axed in Victoria than any other state. Senator McGauran stayed silent, despite the loss of more than 3000 Victorian jobs, including 573 regional posts.

His brother, Peter McGauran, said nothing as Sale lost almost 20 per cent of its Telstra workers in his seat of Gippsland. And fellow National John Forrest in Mallee kept quiet, along with a host of Liberals in regional seats.

As the Senate debates the Telstra sale, Queensland senators such as Ron Boswell and Bill O'Chee and NSW senator Sandy Macdonald can say they did their part for the bush.

We have not heard anything about them doing their part for the bush here, and I do not expect we will. The truth remains that Jeff Kennett—and in fact I am sorry I have to confess this here—was right. I say that the Premier of Victoria, Jeff Kennett, was right. He was right about this: Senator McGauran just was not up to it, is not up to it. I noticed he is No. 2 on the ticket for the coalition in Victoria, and I look forward to Jeff Kennett endorsing that ticket, since he has paid such particular attention to removing what was once the third person on that ticket, Senator Synon.

It demonstrates the deep crisis that exists within the coalition. A very deep crisis exists between the National Party and the Liberal Party but, quite clearly, it has been resolved in favour of the Liberal Party because the National Party just does not have what it takes. As I say, Tim Fischer is clearly the weakest Deputy Prime Minister, the weakest Leader of the National Party we have seen since Earl Page. We have also seen the deep crisis that is now emerging about the leadership of the Liberal Party. For instance, the Australian Business Review Weekly today highlights that:

. . . among 150 top executives surveyed, John Howard is only narrowly ahead now of Peter Costello as the preferred Prime Minister—that is, 35 per cent to 33 per cent . . .

What you have is a very deep concern within the power base of the Liberal Party itself about the failure of this Prime Minister, his weak and sneaky efforts, to actually represent what have been regarded as traditional Liberal values, which he no longer can do, to the effect where we see now that, on the issue of One Nation:

. . . 83 per cent of the 150 CEO's polled indicating that they felt that the Prime Minister handled One Nation unsatisfactorily.

(Time expired)