Senator BARTLETT (7:54 PM) —The Senate is addressing the Migration Legislation Amendment Bill (No. 1) 1998 which follows through on the government's decision of early 1997 to merge the Immigration Review Tribunal and the Migration Internal Review Office, within the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs, to form a new tribunal. This legislation is, as Senator McKiernan said, a slightly improved version of what was known as the Migration Legislation Amendment Bill (No. 4) from the previous parliament. It is probably worth noting, from my perspective, that that bill has actually been around in this chamber longer than I have. That gives some indication of how long it has languished.

A Senate committee reported on the bill on 20 October last year, a few days before my entry into this chamber. It is probably worth mentioning the frequent problem that Senate legislation committees have with the very tight time frames that they have to operate within. If we are having to rush through inquiries into legislation and then those bills hang around for 12 months or more, that does make one wonder whether or not it might be appropriate to enable the Senate committees to have a little bit more time to look into legislation. This is particularly so, given that this case is an example where some of the suggestions from the minority report and some of the evidence that came forth during the course of the inquiry have been taken on board by the government and have produced improved legislation, which—as Senator McKiernan quite rightly said—is one of the major benefits of the Senate performing its role as a mechanism for parliamentary scrutiny of legislation proposed by the government.

The Democrats recognise the improvements made to this bill compared with the original version. The concerns that we had with the original, the then No. 4 amendment bill, were outlined in the minority report from the Senate Legal and Constitutional Legislation Committee, which was done by my colleague Senator Andrew Murray on behalf of the Democrats. One of the concerns which we highlighted in that minority report is an ongoing issue. It does not impact one way or the other, in a sense, on the content of this bill but it impacts on the implementation of, and the operation of, the new tribunal in the same way as it is a concern in relation to existing tribunals and courts.

I refer to the ongoing attacks and expressions of concern by the government and the minister, which can certainly be perceived as trying to influence the independence of these tribunals. There was another piece in the Australian today, by Fiona Carruthers and Bernard Lane, reporting an attack by the immigration minister on judges for `allowing their personal views to interfere with legal decisions on migration matters'. I know that similar concerns and annoyance have been expressed by the immigration minister in relation to the actions and the decisions of various tribunal members.

There have been concerns from the point of view of people dealing with tribunals—from the consumer end—that the independence of those tribunal members who are appointed through the minister can be impacted if they feel that they need to bring down decisions that are more in favour with what the minister believes is appropriate. That is an ongoing concern which applies to all tribunals and to the courts, to a lesser extent in general, and the Democrats will be keeping an eye on it. We highlighted that concern in the minority report.

The crucial aspect of tribunals such as these is their ability to deliver justice and a fair outcome to the Australian public and to the people that appeal to these tribunals. Other issues involved are accessibility, which is another concern that was raised by Senator McKiernan, particularly in terms of whether people outside the major capital cities will be able to access tribunal services readily. There are also the cost of appealing to tribunals, which is another ongoing concern, and the speediness of decisions.

For elaboration, I will highlight a little of the actual work of the existing Immigration Review Tribunal which will be merged with the MIRO into the new Migration Review Tribunal. Its most recent annual report highlights the importance of the work of the tribunal. The amount of government appropriations that went into the tribunal last year was over $6 million. Nearly 2,700 separate cases were lodged in the last financial year.

The major issue, which is one that needs ongoing examination, is the age of the various cases and the amount of time that it takes for cases to be finalised. The annual report from last year highlights 16 per cent of cases that were more than one year old. There are a range of other statistics in there, which I will not go into in detail, but certainly getting those times down is an issue of great importance whether you are speaking from the point of view of the people who are applying to the tribunal or who are appealing, or from the point of view of the government in terms of ensuring that determinations are made one way or the other as speedily as possible.

Whilst it is not specifically in this bill, it is also worth mentioning, as the previous speaker outlined, that in the early stages of the initial No. 4 legislation the government's proposal was to restrict access of people to appeal to the courts via a privative clause. This was also considered by the Senate legislation committee over 12 months ago in what was known as the Migration Legislation Amendment Bill (No. 5). Thankfully that was not brought on by the government, although in some ways it might have been better if it had because they would have seen it voted down and given the fate it deserved.

It is a matter of great concern to the Democrats that the Prime Minister has again raised his intention to reintroduce this legislation. I cannot understand why the government seems to want to continue to pursue that measure. The Senate committee of inquiry not only showed that this was an unfair measure, which may or may not be of concern to the government, but it also showed it was quite clearly unworkable and quite probably unconstitutional. It seems a strange thing for the government to put any effort at all into trying to reintroduce such completely unacceptable legislation on all of those grounds. Whilst I guess it is always a very dangerous practice to predict Senate decisions on particular legislation, I would be extremely surprised if that one were to be passed by this chamber. I would suggest it would be highly irresponsible of the Senate to do so.

I note the Prime Minister's remarks when he did formally announce that he was planning to reintroduce legislation to restrict access to the judicial review in all but `exceptional circumstances', which was part of his keynote address to the Federation of Ethnic Community Councils of Australia, held in Brisbane on 20 November this year. It does seem puzzling why the Prime Minister (1) is still going down this path and (2) why he seemed to think it would be helpful to announce that at a Federation of Ethnic Community Councils conference, given the outcome of the federal election and the clear rejection by the Australian electorate of the unfair and discriminatory policies put forward by parties such as One Nation. Why the Prime Minister still feels the need to highlight legislation which can really only be seen as an unfair attack on potential migrants is puzzling to me. I do wonder what the motivation is behind it.

I also note that, when the Prime Minister made those remarks, he talked about reintroducing this legislation and said that it had been `delayed in the Senate'. I think this is part of an ongoing campaign, and quite a dishonest one, on the part of at least some in the government to try to paint the Senate as a house of obstruction—as something that holds up legislation and that unnecessarily obstructs and obfuscates just for the hell of it. Clearly, in this case, this is a piece of legislation that was not delayed by the Senate; it was delayed by the government, for what reasons I do not know. It was clearly most misleading on the part of the Prime Minister in that speech to accuse the Senate of being the body responsible for this legislation taking so long to pass.

As we can see from the speeches already made, this legislation will not be opposed by this chamber. It will not be opposed by the ALP and it will not be opposed by the Democrats. When there is such a widespread degree of support or at least a willingness to pass this legislation, it is completely unacceptable to try to blame the Senate for holding up this legislation.

In conclusion I would like to reinforce the remarks of the previous speaker by indicating how pleasing it is to see a minister who is willing to take on board concerns that arise from Senate inquiry processes and concerns expressed by various parties when they are considering legislation. I hope it is something that is taken on board by a larger number of ministers. Nonetheless, the Democrats will be watching the operations of the new Migration Review Tribunal with interest to make sure that it does deliver more fully on those key issues of providing a fair mechanism to people who are appealing to the tribunal, as well as an inexpensive, an accessible and a quick mechanism for providing determinations. It is on those key issues that the success or otherwise of this particular government initiative will be judged.