Senator BROWN (8:53 PM) —When the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs gets it wrong, she really does get it sensationally wrong. The Ombudsman is a concept from Scandinavia to help deal with ministerial and bureaucratic bungling. It is not to be toothless but to be empowered so that its findings can be utilised through the court system to bring that bungler—whoever it might be—to justice. What we have here, however, are a minister and a government who do not accept that that is the way ombudsmen work. She is saying: ‘Well, on this occasion, to make it look good in public’—and Prime Minister Howard signed off on this, and I pity the minister because she has to try to argue his outcome—‘there will be a judgment made by the Ombudsman.’ However, on this occasion there is no action that can be taken on the judgment when it arrives, except a political debate.

So, having had a go at the judiciary and the parliament, we now have the government devaluing the office of the Ombudsman in this country. The minister would know that the Ombudsman does not report to the minister as such, and was never meant to, but reports to the parliament because it is not a position to be politicised. Its position is to defend the public interest against politicians, particularly ministers and bureaucracies. But on this occasion the government is legislating differently so that does not occur. What happens is that you get an Ombudsman’s report and that is where it ends. You can have a political debate, but no empowerment beyond that. In particular, you do not give the parliament the power to act on that report.

If this were genuine and the Ombudsman made an adverse finding, it would be regulated in this parliament and then it would be up to the parliament to allow or disallow that finding—but not this government, because they do not trust parliament, and they particularly do not trust a parliament in which they are going to have a one-seat majority in the forthcoming Senate. Do you know why? Because they do not trust each other. So there is not going to be a disallowable instrument, as it is called, companioning the Ombudsman’s finding. The minister says, ‘There will be a political debate.’ What a failure to understand the office of the Ombudsman, to understand its relationship with parliament and, above all, to understand that the parliament is elected. Not the executive, not the ministers, not even the Prime Minister; the parliament is elected. This government have shied away from the idea that parliament is supreme because they believe the executive should reign supreme. That is what this legislation does: it says the executive can accept or reject a report of the Ombudsman and parliament will be sidelined with no power to act. That is why the amendments are here and that is the point that the minister either does not understand or does not want to confront.