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42 <strong>SENATE</strong> Thursday, 13 October 2016 Similar to other Commonwealth statutory bodies, the board will develop a Statement of Intent in response to the Government's Statement of Expectations. It is government practice for Ministers to issue a Statement of Expectations to a statutory body to provide greater clarity about the government policies and priorities it is expected to observe in conducting its operations. The Statement of Expectations and the Statement of Intent recognise the independence of Innovation and Science Australia's statutory functions. This Bill will mean that Innovation and Science Australia will have the flexibility, capability and capacity to provide strategic advice on all industry, innovation, science and research matters. It will improve the outcomes of the Australian Government's substantial investment in science, research and innovation. All Australians stand to benefit if we can deliver on our potential. Aside from establishing Innovation and Science Australia, the Bill also provides a transparent and accountable mechanism for implementing Commonwealth spending decisions on industry, innovation, science and research activities through legislative instruments. This mechanism has been structured to support collaboration across the whole of government on these activities, which is a key concern being addressed by the National Innovation and Science Agenda. The ability for the Commonwealth to prescribe programs and identify operational elements of spending activities in subordinate legislation in this way provides a level of flexibility for the government to be agile and meet changing demands whilst ensuring its activities and programs are effective, robust , sustainable, and subject to parliamentary oversight. To conclude, the story of Australia has been a story of innovation. We've shown we're a nation that can harness its ingenuity to create opportunity and prosperity. Our future prosperity depends on our ability to innovate. The Government will continue to play its part, getting the settings right to encourage existing firms to grow and new firms to start, creating new opportunities and driving jobs and prosperity. We can boost Australia's innovation capacity by better coordinating our investment in innovation, science and research activities. This Bill lets us bring Australia's leading minds to bear—from business, commercialisation and research—to make our investments perform better for all Australians. It will point the way for turning today's investments to tomorrow's innovations, to the jobs of the future. I commend the Bill to the Chamber. Senator GALLAGHER (Australian Capital Territory—Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) (12:53): Labor support this bill, which essentially implements policies we announced before the election. The bill facilitates the transition of the Innovation Australia board to a new body, Innovation and Science Australia, and provides legislative authority for Commonwealth spending on science, research and innovation programs. Innovation and Science Australia mirrors the agency announced in our policy, Innovate Australia, and is intended to provide independent advice to the government on innovation policy. We are pleased that the Turnbull government has taken this approach, and we look forward to working with the new agency in the future. As senators would be aware, 'innovation' became a buzzword after Mr Turnbull replaced Mr Abbott as Prime Minister in September last year. The word had been all but banned under Mr Abbott, but under Mr Turnbull its use suddenly seemed to become almost compulsory. It is a good thing that the government now accepts that a modern economy must be an innovative economy. That said, however, there is much more to fostering a genuine culture of innovation than talking about start-ups, disruption and gee-whiz technology, as the newly installed Mr Turnbull liked to do. The government has yet to show that it can get past its obsession with gee-whizzery. A comprehensive innovation policy should aim at transforming the economy, industry by industry and firm by firm. That is the approach needed to make Australia more globally competitive and to create the high-skill, highwage jobs of the future. It is an approach that proceeds incrementally, but an incremental approach is not a piecemeal approach. Yet, piecemeal tinkering is all the government has offered since it announced its National Innovation and Science Agenda in December last year. The Abbott government ripped more than $3 billion from science, research and innovation programs. NISA has restored only $1 billion of that investment in the nation's future. This is innovation-lite, and it is not enough to create the culture of innovation that Australia needs in the wake of the mining boom. Labor is firmly committed to building that culture. It is why during the election campaign we announced investment of more than a billion dollars in science and research, on top of our commitments in schools, TAFE and universities. For Labor, fostering innovation is bound up with our commitment to social democracy. It is about building an Australia that not only creates wealth but where all have the opportunity to share in that wealth and realise their full human potential. We will support any measure that contributes to achieving this goal. In that spirit, we support this bill. Senator RYAN (Victoria—Special Minister of State and Minister Assisting the Cabinet Secretary) (12:56): I commend the bill to the Senate. Question agreed to. Bill read a second time. CHAMBER
Thursday, 13 October 2016 <strong>SENATE</strong> 43 Third Reading The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Reynolds) (12:56): As no amendments to the bill have been circulated, I shall call the minister to move the third reading unless any senator requires that the bill be considered in Committee of the Whole. Senator RYAN (Victoria—Special Minister of State and Minister Assisting the Cabinet Secretary) (12:56): I move: That this bill be now read a third time. Question agreed to. Bill read a third time. Statute Law Revision (Spring 2016) Bill 2016 Second Reading Consideration resumed of the motion: That this bill be now read a second time. Senator GALLAGHER (Australian Capital Territory—Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) (12:57): This statute law revision bill is known as the Statute Law Revision (Spring 2016) Bill. The parliament has introduced these sorts of bills regularly since 1934. They deal with uncontroversial, technical matters which will not in substance change the operation of the law. They all correct drafting errors, remove spent and obsolete provisions, and update cross-references. This bill is called the Statute Law Revision (Spring 2016) Bill even though an identical bill to this was introduced into the last parliament on 17 March—during autumn. The only difference between this bill and the one introduced in autumn is the addition of one extra amendment in schedule 2. It corrects an amendment to the Customs Act by the Indirect Tax Laws Amendment (Assessment) Act 2012 which, due to a numbering error, referred to a non-existent provision of the Customs Act. Now, the bill has reappeared as part of the Prime Minister's '25 point battle plan', supposedly to be expedited through the parliament. We were told that they needed to be rushed through as a matter of priority. Labor is happy to support this bill, which makes a number of technical changes to the law. Among other things, this bill: corrects drafting, clerical and typographical errors, including correcting the numbering of the Excise Act or replacing the words 'a item' with 'an item' in the Customs Act; amends the Public Lending Right Act, replacing references to the Attorney-General with the more flexible 'Minister administering the Copyright Act'; and repeals spent and obsolete provisions. None of this is groundbreaking; it is just part of the government's routine work. Far from being about 'deregulation', this bill does nothing that has not been done regularly by governments since 1934. This bill does not reduce the regulatory burden on Australian business, nor does it remove or streamline any operative regulation. The Prime Minister should be embarrassed that his stocks have sunk so low that his government is so adrift, that he has to truss up routine legislative work like this as some kind of policy masterstroke. Nonetheless, this is a worthy bill. I thank the Office of Parliamentary Counsel for their hard work in maintaining the Commonwealth statute book and for their work on this bill, as with all other statute law reform bills. I commend the bill to the Senate. Senator RYAN (Victoria—Special Minister of State and Minister Assisting the Cabinet Secretary) (12:59): I commend the bill to the Senate. Question agreed to. Bill read a second time. Third Reading The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Reynolds) (13:00): As no amendments to the bill have been circulated, I shall call the minister to move the third reading unless any senator requires that the bill be considered in Committee of the Whole. Senator RYAN (Victoria—Special Minister of State and Minister Assisting the Cabinet Secretary) (13:00): I move: That this bill be now read a third time. Question agreed to. Bill read a third time. CHAMBER
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