Roy Heather: Biosecurity (Status of Specified Ports) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading Procedure Third Reading 
Roy Heather: Biosecurity (Status of Specified Ports) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading Procedure Third Reading 
[Volume:628;Page:858] 
HEATHER ROY (Deputy Leader—ACT) 
: 
 ACT will support the Biosecurity (Status of Specified Ports) Amendment Bill at its first reading as it is obvious that urgent attention is needed for the problems that it seems have only just come to light. I think that that serves as a warning to us and we should take it very seriously as my colleague in the National Party Shane Ardern pointed out. The present Minister for Biosecurity says that we have the best biosecurity in the world as did the previous Minister for Biosecurity but the very fact that we are here in the House today debating this issue under urgency perhaps suggests otherwise. 
This legislation is an amendment to the Biosecurity Act 1993 to correct historical oversights. As the Minister pointed out those consequences were unintended but we must take unintended consequences very seriously. One of the objections we often have to urgency is that bills go through all their stages in the House. They are not open to public scrutiny through the select committee process which is where the public are able to make submissions and therefore things are often missed out. 
As others have pointed out the bill is necessary because of an administrative failure by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. The ministry failed to approve ports of first arrival under the Act before transitional approvals expired. Some of the briefing papers we have had suggest that the issue really only came to light at the beginning of November. But the failures by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry occurred in 1995 and 1998 so those historical failures unintentional though they were in fact go back some way. 
I come back to the reason for the legislation. To fix things we now need to designate ports as approved places of first arrival but more important legislation is also needed retrospectively to deem courts to be approved. ACT has frequently spoken out particularly during periods of urgency about retrospective legislation being put forward in this House. Probably the most famous piece of retrospective legislation was the legislation to save Harry Duynhoven’s bacon. We do object vocally loudly and often to the fact that retrospective legislation comes before this House during urgency when proper scrutiny is not able to be given to it. We might find ourselves less likely to have to go back and amend legislation if that proper scrutiny did in fact occur. 
It is very interesting at this time to look at the Crown Law opinion. The question should really be asked: does Crown Law think we have the best biosecurity in the world? I would suggest from the paper it put forward making comments on this issue that no it does not. The issues arising pending the introduction or passage of this bill have been put forward by Crown Law which says that without this legislation there is no general power to inspect unaccompanied goods outside a transitional facility and that it will be unclear what questions a person must answer after making the initial declaration about the presence of specified goods. Crown Law goes on to say that it will be unclear how long a person must remain at the port while inquiries are being undertaken and lastly that inspectors do not have the power to use reasonable force to require a person to be detained so the power to search people will often be ineffective. Now does that constitute the best biosecurity in the world? I do not think so and neither does Crown Law. 
A little further down in the same document however Crown Law comments that the bill as presently drafted would retrospectively immunise inspectors and the Crown from civil liability in relation to trespass goods false imprisonment etc. So it is important that we have this legislation but the question must be asked particularly of the ministry: how did this situation arise in the first place? Crown Law says that the sooner the bill is introduced the better the chance that there will not be any successful claims of that kind. I guess that in the greater scheme of things that is correct but with such glaring holes in the legislation perhaps concern will not be unfounded. 
The retrospective aspect of the bill does not resolve issues relating to the constitutional principle that Governments should operate under law and Dr Cullen should be very worried about that if he is worried about good law-making. Good laws are enforceable and routinely enforced—I suspect Dr Cullen would probably agree with that statement—and they should be. Perhaps what we need to think about very carefully in light of the fact that this legislation is necessary at all is that all laws should regularly be reviewed to see what loopholes exist and in fact whether they are necessary. We have some very old and outdated laws in this country and it would be a pertinent time to think about whether many of those should be reviewed at regular intervals. So constitutional principles should not be ignored during this debate. I think we have talked a lot about various biosecurity issues but the broader principles should not be ignored either during the debate. 
Crown Law noted that it is also undesirable for international airlines and passengers daily to be committing technical breaches of the Act. I just reinforce my position that law should be enforceable and regularly enforced. 
Although there are many problems there and ACT agrees that they must be attended to very swiftly there are warnings around the whole issue of why it took so long for the matter to be picked up in the first place and the issue of why the previous Minister and this Minister continue to maintain that we have the best biosecurity in the world when in fact our biosecurity measures have such glaring holes in them. ACT will support this bill but we would like some consideration particularly during the Committee stage to discuss the issues further. 
Bill read a first time.