Senator PATRICK (South Australia) (09:31): I intend to move an amendment to the motion to omit paragraphs (b) and (c). The Centre Alliance is no stranger to standing order 142. I was here in the chamber on 20 June and listened to how people were absolutely disgusted that the government would deploy such a tactic. I'm not walking away from the fact that we supported that at the time, but I point out it was a tactic that basically sought to guillotine the committee stage of a bill. In this instance, we have a couple of bills that are going to be debated and put through the chamber this morning, and there's a risk that one of them won't even get a second reading debate. Something that the Centre Alliance doesn't support at all—in any way, shape or form—is the gagging of second reading debates. I move as an amendment: Omit paragraphs (b) and (c). I do this without the theatrics and without any histrionic contribution. I just simply want to make it very clear that to allow only two hours for these two important bills is extremely problematic. Let's talk about the Government Procurement (Judicial Review) Bill 2017. That bill is, of course, enabling legislation for the TPP. The TPP is a significant agreement that has been worked on for a decade. The only opportunity the parliament gets to deal with this particular bill—and I know that people on the Labor side of the Senate support me in saying this, because our treaty process is so broken and there have been so many recommendations about how to change it—and the only chance this parliament really gets to have a say in any of the treaties that we sign up to is when it comes to enabling legislation. That's what we're dealing with here. Yesterday and the day before we dealt with customs bills. Today we are being asked to consider at the committee stage the judicial review bill. I tell the minister that I have a number of very detailed questions that go absolutely to the bill and an understanding of how the bill is written, how it would affect Australian companies and how it would affect the procurement process. I'd like the opportunity to ask those in a calm, civilised, unpressured environment. I know that Senator Whish-Wilson has some questions, as does Senator Hanson-Young, relating to other elements of the TPP, understanding that a consequence of passing that bill is that the TPP will come into force. I've made the chamber well aware of our concerns with that—the first concern being that there are ISDS provisions in that bill. On ISDS provisions: I understand the argument from the government. They say that they protect Australian companies. But, unfortunately, the bill has an adverse effect here in Australia. We've seen the case of Philip Morris. Philip Morris brought an action against Australia in relation to tobacco plain packaging. They did so after the tobacco companies challenged this parliament in our High Court as to whether the legislation that enabled the tobacco plain packaging to come into effect was lawful. They challenged that in our High Court, and they lost—they lost. They then set up a company in Hong Kong and sought to use the ISDS provisions in that arrangement that we had between Hong Kong and Australia. Just so the chamber is clear, Centre Alliance supported Australia in opposing that particular ISDS claim. Indeed the Commonwealth, rightly, argued that the tribunal was without jurisdiction, because Philip Morris had set up the company in Hong Kong specifically for the purposes of initiating ISDS, and the tribunal found that it did not have jurisdiction in that case. So Australia was successful in that. But the taxpayer, unfortunately, was made to bear the cost of that case. The government, for well over two years, tried to keep the cost of that case secret. They were asked at estimates, and they made claims about cabinet in confidence. I note that there are a lot of cabinet-in-confidence claims being made around this chamber and, indeed, across the Senate committee rooms. Most of them are very flawed and most of them undermine the doctrine. Nonetheless, former Senator Xenophon and I beat down that claim until the department recognised that they were on a loser. They then switched to international relations and said, 'Well, we can't do this because it will damage international relations.' Finally, when the Information Commissioner ruled in favour of former Senator Xenophon, the department took it to the AAT, spending more taxpayers' money to try and prevent us finding out how much that cost. The Productivity Commission had, somehow, guessed $50 million but we now know the truth. It was $39 million—$39 million in legal fees as a result of an action raised under ISDS. What the ISDS provisions seek to do is take the sovereign risk that is borne by corporations and pass that risk to the taxpayer. I understand why the Liberal Party might want to do that; because they don't want their corporate donors to have any sovereign risk. They'd rather that that risk sit with the taxpayer; the taxpayer who has to pay for it out of some budget that would otherwise go to support the social structure of this country. We are highly offended by the ISDS. I know the government once again says, 'No, it's good,' but even the Europeans are walking away from it. President Trump has removed it from the NAFTA. Other very solid jurisdictions that don't have crazy leaders or do strange things are walking away from ISDS. It's actually part of the Labor Party national platform not to support trade deals with ISDS, yet we've seen at least six occasions over the last couple of days where Labor have voted against their own national platform. The other area of concern is labour market testing. We have traversed this topic in the past few days, but it applies also to the Government Procurement (Judicial Review) Bill 2017, because it now is the last thing that stands in the way of the TPP-11 agreement coming into force for this country. The waiving of that labour market testing will allow foreign companies to bring workers into Australia without having to test to find out whether or not there is some Australian worker who can do that job. We may have electricians come in from overseas who don't even understand some of our wiring rules, so it's not just about workers; it's also about safety. I know this because I've listened to what the unions have had to say, through the media and through submissions that they've made. Once again, I find it totally disturbing that the Labor Party, who have a fundamental objection to the waiving of labour market testing, yesterday on numerous occasions voted to allow that to occur. One Nation were against it. The Greens were against it. Centre Alliance had pronounced that it would not support it. That left it to Labor. Labor had the choice. They could have rejected this. We are not saying: walk away from the TPP. We just need to cut the cancer out. In fact, we even put up a motion yesterday that would allow the TPP to enter into effect but sunset, so that we would make it very clear to foreign nations that indeed the Labor Party were committed to removing this, and the enabling legislation would expire on 1 January 2020. But they didn't want to vote for that. They've done a deal with the coalition, just as they've done a deal here to try to shut down discussion. So we do need to have a solid committee stage for the judicial review bill. The other bill that we are being asked to consider is the Treasury Laws Amendment (Lower Taxes for Small and Medium Businesses) Bill 2018. I want to put on the record that Centre Alliance supports this bill. However, we have to ask: what's the urgency? Why do we have to get it through the parliament today? Senator Whish-Wilson: By-election! Senator PATRICK: I've got an interjection from Senator Whish-Wilson. He's suggesting it might be because there's a by-election in Wentworth on Saturday. We must absolutely recognise that that is what this is about. This is not measured policy. I have great respect for Senator Cormann. He always works through legislation carefully. He negotiates well with the crossbench. He is very honourable in his representations to us. He does what he says he will do. So I'm very surprised that, in this instance, you are now seeking to guillotine the committee stage and almost completely gag the second reading stage of a bill. You know that that is not the way democracies are supposed to work. It surprises me that you would support this motion to guillotine and gag, particularly in the circumstances where there is no hurry. The TPP negotiations have been going on for over a decade. We don't have to rush this today. The tax cuts aren't going to come in the moment we pass the legislation. What is the urgency? I get it that sometimes there are urgent bills that pass through the parliament—the legislation on strawberries, for example—when we are dealing with an urgent issue, and the parliament works extremely well. I don't understand why it is that they are seeking to do this. When the personal tax cuts were being dealt with, Senator Wong said: I would say this to the crossbench: regardless of your position on tax, what a discourtesy to the chamber. We gave this government 3½ hours of debate last night, because we do understand that it is important to get on with this debate. We have amendments from Senator Storer … She went on and on, saying how bad this was. That was an instance where we had allowed debate. I hope I get to ask some questions; I do have some genuine questions to ask on the judicial review bill. We're actually going into a situation where, presumably, no-one gets to speak during the second reading of the tax bill. Through you, Madam Deputy President, do people really find that acceptable? Does Senator Cormann find that acceptable? Does Senator Fifield find that acceptable? Does Senator Wong find that acceptable that there will possibly be no debate? I just want to point out something: I think there are about three sitting weeks left where there will be legislation that passes through this chamber and, when it passes through this chamber, there are going to be moments where the Labor Party are very opposed to it. The message you're going to send us today is, 'When that occurs, Centre Alliance, what you should do is support the government and either gag or guillotine the debate.' Is that really what you want us to do? Senator Cormann said: 'We respect that the government controls the Senate. We do that all the time. We work with you to make sure that you are managing carefully the legislation that passes through this place and we support you.' But in doing this sort of stuff, where you know it's not the right thing to do, you put that great relationship that we have in jeopardy, and that may affect you moving forward. I urge you to really think carefully about what it is that you're doing today. One of the funny things is, whenever you try and time manage debate—I know that's what you call it, but it's actually a guillotine and a gag—inevitably what happens is someone stands up and moves a motion or seeks to suspend standing orders. What that ends up doing—and I understand this—is shortening the debate time even more. That's a pattern; we know how that pattern works. People move these sorts of motions and say, 'Look, we're going to give you 2½ hours or two hours,' or whatever time frame, but you know that gets shortened by all the procedural stuff that goes on because people rightly get up and say: 'I don't like this. This is not the way the Senate is supposed to work. We're supposed to allow people to stand up and have a say.' What is the plan for second readings for the tax bill? Is it a case that we're simply going to allocate one speaker from each party? Is that how it's going to work? Senator Patrick doesn't get to have a say. Senator Storer doesn't get to have his say. Senator Ruston doesn't get to have her say. Senator Hanson doesn't get to have her say. Is this how this works? How are you going to do that? How are you going to manage simply not allowing anyone to speak on an important bill? I know Labor have had a bit of trouble with this bill. They might not want to talk about it because they've flipped and they've flopped and they've flipped. They may need some time to actually clarify what their position is, because some of us struggle to work out what it is. Some of us simply don't know. We would like to hear from everyone, particularly as a crossbencher who doesn't have the great resources that the government or the Labor Party have. Sometimes we sit in this chamber and listen to what people are saying, and it actually changes our minds. It actually brings in the thought, 'Maybe we haven't considered this properly,' or, 'Maybe we have to use our influence positively to get an amendment across the line to fix something that gets raised in the speeches in the second reading debate that might be wrong.' This is very, very unfortunate territory that we are marching through. I'm extremely disappointed with the government. I will give you credit because you did give advance warning of the motion, but that doesn't change the outcome. You haven't ambushed anyone here, which is good, but it still doesn't change what the outcome is, and that is that this is a guillotine. I want to ask some questions on the judicial review bill, which may have some significance. They're genuine questions. I'll stand to be criticised if I ask these questions and you find that they're filibustering. They're genuine questions about the operation of the bill that might assist a court in interpreting what the parliamentary will was when a litigation is commenced. There are some details in the bill—and I know quite a lot about procurement; I've been involved in it for a long time. I know some of the loopholes that are employed by departments to get around some of the rules. That might be a little bit disingenuous, but the reality is I've been on the other side of the fence, dealing in environments trying to win contracts. I know that a lot of companies get to the end of a procurement and are rather upset by the outcome. Some of that could be emotional. Some of it is simply because the company has invested a lot of time and money. But there are some uncertainties in the bill that is being put to the parliament. I'd like to have those clarified in the committee stage, and that's going to take me a little bit of time. Unfortunately, Senator Cormann, you're not allowing me any time. That's extremely disappointing. We would like to have a say to support the bill that you are bringing into the parliament on the small to medium business tax cuts. We have some good things to say about that. We want to let our constituents know why we are supporting that, but you are, unfortunately, going to deny us that opportunity. I think that's sad.