Question—That the House take note of the report—proposed.

Mr ALLAN SHEARAN (Londonderry) [11.36 a.m.]: I am pleased to speak on "Legislation Review Digest No. 3 of 2010", dated 16 March 2010, which was tabled in session. Legislation Review Digest No. 3 examined three bills in total: the Carers Recognition Bill 2010, the Crimes Amendment (Child Pornography and Abuse Material) Bill 2010, and the Waste Recycling and Processing Corporation (Authorised Transaction) Bill 2010. With regard to the Crimes Amendment (Child Pornography and Abuse Material) Bill 2010, the committee is concerned where legislation impacts on artistic pursuits and freedom of expression generally. However, after discussions with the National Association for the Visual Arts and the Arts Law Centre of Australia, the committee is of the understanding that stakeholders appear satisfied that the bill will not adversely impact on the work of artists. Therefore, in this instance, the retention of the classified material defence and the incorporation of "artistic merit" as a factor that must be taken into account when determining if material constitutes "child abuse material" appear to ensure that appropriate safeguards have been put in place so that artists and their work are not unintentionally caught by the offence provisions of the bill.

This digest also examined the Energy and Utilities Administration Amendment (Fees) Regulation 2010. The object of this regulation is to amend the Energy and Utilities Administration Regulation 2006 by increasing from $150 to $205 the fee that is required to accompany an application for the registration of electrical equipment in the register of electrical equipment kept by the Energy Corporation of New South Wales. From 1999 until 2008 registration fees in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland were set at $150. However, the committee noted that Victoria and Queensland have increased their registration fees. The committee also noted the reasons with regard to the increase in the registration fee to $205 as reasonable, as it reflected the level of inflation between 1999 and 2009. I conclude by referring Legislation Review Digest No. 3 to members to assist them in any contributions to the debates on the bills presented, and to inform them of any issues of concern about trespasses on individual rights and liberties.

Mrs JUDY HOPWOOD (Hornsby) [11.40 a.m.]: I will make a brief contribution to the debate on the report of the Legislation Review Committee entitled "Legislation Review Digest No. 3 of 2010", dated 16 March 2010. Although the committee had only three bills on which to deliberate at the last meeting, those bills are extremely important: the Carers Recognition Bill 2010, the Crimes Amendment (Child Pornography and Abuse Material) Bill 2010 and the Waste Recycling and Processing (Authorised Transaction) Bill 2010. It is with some disappointment that I feel compelled to make a comment about the Carers Recognition Bill 2010. It is an indictment on this place that debate on that legislation could not be commenced yesterday. All members have hundreds, if not thousands, of carers in their electorates. It is a travesty of justice that we could not debate that bill at a time dedicated to private members' business. Indeed, it has now been waylaid for at least a month. New South Wales carers can only question why that happened given that they carry a huge burden and save the Government and taxpayers a great deal of money.

Objects of the bill are to recognise the valuable contribution of carers to our society and to the people they care for; to recognise the benefit, including the social and economic benefit, provided by carers to the community; to ensure the provision of services necessary to enable carers to achieve their maximum potential as members of the community; to provide through carer's assessments for the interests, needs and choices of carers to be considered in decisions about the provision of services that impact on their role; to identify and address the specific needs of families with children and young people who are carers; and to deliver culturally appropriate services for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander carers and carers from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. The committee did not identify any difficulties with the legislation, so it is a mystery why it could not be debated yesterday given that carers make such a valuable contribution to our community.

ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Frank Terenzini): Order! I take this opportunity to welcome to the public gallery students from government schools in the North Coast and Riverina regions attending the Secondary Schools Leadership Program for School Captains conducted by the parliamentary education section. Welcome to the New South Wales Parliament. The Legislative Assembly is debating committee reports prepared by committees that operate within the Parliament.

Mr ANDREW CONSTANCE (Bega) [11.43 a.m.]: I thank the Legislation Review Committee for this important report. I note that the committee has not identified any difficulties with the Carers Recognition Bill 2010 in respect of section 8A of the Legislation Review Act 1987, which provides:

(1) The functions of the Committee with respect to Bills are:

(a) to consider any Bill introduced into Parliament, and

(b) to report to both Houses of Parliament as to whether any such Bill, by express words or otherwise:

(i) trespasses unduly on personal rights and liberties, or

(ii) makes rights, liberties or obligations unduly dependent upon insufficiently defined administrative powers, or

(iii) makes rights, liberties or obligations unduly dependent upon non-reviewable decisions, or

(iv) inappropriately delegates legislative powers, or

(v) insufficiently subjects the exercise of legislative power to parliamentary scrutiny.

It is pleasing that the committee has seen fit to hand down that finding, particularly in light of the fact that we have a State Labor Government that is not prepared to indicate its position on this legislation. It was disappointing that the debate did not proceed yesterday. It appears that the Government is not willing to support Coalition legislation to recognise the valuable contribution that carers—

Mr Gerard Martin: That is not right. You are playing tawdry politics.

Mr ANDREW CONSTANCE: The Minister responsible could have publicly indicated the Government's position at any time in the past three months since I gave notice of the introduction of this legislation. That has not happened. I note that on Wednesday the Rudd Government introduced into the Federal Parliament carers recognition legislation that mirrors, and in some places is exactly the same as, the legislation that the Coalition has introduced into the New South Wales Parliament.

Mr Gerard Martin: So you have been plagiarising.

Mr ANDREW CONSTANCE: How can you say I have been plagiarising, you dill? The member for Bathurst is plain stupid.

ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Frank Terenzini): Order! Government members will remain silent.

Mr ANDREW CONSTANCE: We introduced our legislation on Friday last week and Rudd's legislation was introduced on Wednesday.

Mr Gerard Martin: It didn't just happen. It was with Cabinet for consideration.

Mr ANDREW CONSTANCE: The bill was tabled, you moron. The bottom line is that the State Labor Government is refusing to support carers and the Rudd Labor Government is willing to support them. Members opposite are not willing to debate legislation recognising carers. They had the opportunity to do that yesterday and I am letting the people of Bathurst know that their member voted against bringing on the debate on the Carers Recognition Bill 2010. The Government has delayed this legislation—

Mr Matthew Morris: Point of order: My point of order relates to relevance. I appreciate that the member for Bega is excited today. However, he should confine his remarks to the report of the Legislation Review Committee. He should not be debating what has happened in this place at other times or what is happening at the Federal level.

ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Frank Terenzini): Order! The House is debating the committee report. I will hear further from the member for Bega.

Mr ANDREW CONSTANCE: That is a good ruling. The committee has stated that the Carers Recognition Bill 2010 does not in any way affect the rights of carers. That is unlike this Government, which yesterday voted against bringing on the debate. It has delayed that debate for another five weeks, until 20 April. Members opposite are denying the Coalition the opportunity to debate its important legislation that recognises the valuable contribution made by carers in this State. Carers are being denied opportunities by this State Labor Government. It amazes me that the member for Bathurst is not willing to support carers and that his Federal counterparts have introduced a bill that plagiarises the State Coalition's legislation.

Mr Gerard Martin: Point of order: Mr Acting-Speaker, loath as I am to take a point of order while we are debating committee reports, I must draw your attention to the fact that the member for Bega is straying far from the topic of the debate. He is also relaying incorrect information to the Parliament. The Government deferred debate on his legislation; the Government has no intention of avoiding debate on the legislation.

ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Frank Terenzini): Order! I uphold the point of order. The debate is about the committee report.

[Time expired.]

Mr DARYL MAGUIRE (Wagga Wagga) [11.48 a.m.]: I again thank the chairman of the Legislation Review Committee for producing this report. As I have said previously, these digests are very valuable to members when debating legislation. The fact that Legislation Review Digest No. 3 deals with only three bills is an indictment on this Government. It is a very flimsy document. Two of the bills are Government bills and the other is the Coalition's Carers Recognition Bill 2010. That tells us that the Government has very little to do. In fact, it has had very little do for the past few weeks and the Parliament has risen early. If this very light workload continues, the Premier and others should seriously consider the remuneration provided to the chairman and others. The taxpayers are not getting value for their money.

Mr Matthew Morris: Point of order: Unfortunately, the member for Wagga Wagga's comments are in no way relevant to the debate. He has made no reference to the content of the Legislation Review Digest and I ask you bring him back to that rather than straying onto other issues.

ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Frank Terenzini): Order! The member for Wagga Wagga is well aware of the standing orders. I remind the member that the House is debating a committee report. I will hear further from the member for Wagga Wagga.

Mr DARYL MAGUIRE: In my opening remarks I mentioned that the report of the Legislation Review Committee reviews three bills. I join the member for Bega in expressing disappointment that debate on the Carers Recognition Bill 2010 has been delayed.

Mr Kerry Hickey: Point of order: Mr Acting-Speaker, earlier you ruled on relevance and said that members should not stray from the business before the House.

ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Frank Terenzini): Order! I have not heard enough from the member for Wagga Wagga to rule on that point of order at this stage. I will hear further from the member for Wagga Wagga.

Mr DARYL MAGUIRE: That is a good ruling, Mr Acting-Speaker. If the member for Cessnock cares to look he will find that the Carers Recognition Bill 2010 is the first bill that is referred to in the Legislation Review Digest. As I said earlier, I am disappointed that we could not debate the bill in this House as the Legislation Review Committee put a lot of time and effort into determining what effect the bill would have. Recommendation 8 states:

The Committee has not identified any issues under s 8A (1 (b) of the Legislation Review Act 1987.

The Committee makes no further comment on the bill.

The committee determined that the bill is entirely appropriate—an observation with which I agree. As I said, I am disappointed that members were prevented from continuing the dialogue. The Government should have enabled Opposition members to speak in debate on the bill. If the Government did not have a response to the legislation introduced by the member for Bega—I understand that the Government has been briefed on this matter—it should have enabled Opposition members to make a contribution to debate on the bill. The Government's failure to do so resulted in a newspaper headline that the Government did not need—an issue that could have been avoided.

Mr Kerry Hickey: Point of order: My point of order relates to relevance. The member for Wagga Wagga should be brought back to the leave of the question.

ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Frank Terenzini): Order! The question is: That the House take note of the report. This debate does not provide members with an opportunity to discuss the process and procedures related to bills.

Mr DARYL MAGUIRE: The objects of the Carers Recognition Bill 2010 are as follows:

(a) to recognise the valuable contribution of carers to our society and to the people they care for.

(b) to recognise the benefit, including the social and economic benefit, provided by carers to the community.

(c) to ensure the provision of services necessary to enable carers to achieve their maximum potential as members of the community.

(d) to provide, through carers' assessments, for the interests, needs and choices of carers to be considered in decisions about the provision of services that impact on their role.

(e) to identify and address specific needs of families with children and young people who are carers.

(f) to deliver culturally appropriate services for Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander carers and carers from culturally linguistically diverse backgrounds.

As a result of what I just read out, I will be encouraging Government members to vote for this good bill when it comes before us for debate.

Mr THOMAS GEORGE (Lismore) [11.53 a.m.]: Mr Acting-Speaker, I know that you have already welcomed the school captains who are present in the public gallery today. However, when you made that statement captains from the Lismore, Clarence and Murray-Darling electorates were not in the House; they were still having their photographs taken. I welcome them to the Parliament; it is great to have them here. I congratulate the chairman and the Legislation Review Committee on producing this week's Legislation Review Digest, which makes reference to only three bills. This week the Parliament was busy as one of those bills was amended and it had to be debated on a second occasion. If that bill had not been debated a second time the Parliament would have risen on Wednesday as opposed to Friday.

Like other members, I was disappointed that we were not given an opportunity to debate the Carers Recognition Bill 2010. The member for Bega and the Legislation Review Committee put a lot of effort into compiling and reviewing this bill—a worthwhile bill that provides for and recognises carers in this State; something for which every member should be advocating. I have not yet met a carer who is not experiencing problems. I am disappointed—and I am sure that all the carers in the Lismore electorate are disappointed—that the Government did not believe the legislation was urgent enough to warrant being debated in this Chamber.

Mr JONATHAN O'DEA (Davidson) [11.55 a.m.]: As the member for Wagga Wagga and other members have pointed out, only three bills were reviewed by the Legislation Review Committee and included in "Legislation Review Digest No. 3 of 2010", which reflects the fact that not a lot of business is before the House at the moment and the Government's agenda is running very thin—as thin as this report. It is also worth noting that the Government introduced two of the three bills that are covered in this report, and the Opposition introduced one bill. The Opposition did not oppose the bills that were introduced by the Government. I am sure that the students who are present in the public gallery today would be interested to know that the Opposition did not oppose those two bills. Sometimes the Government tries to paint the Opposition as being interested only in opposing. But that is not the case.

We expressed concern about some aspects of those bills. In the case of the Waste Recycling and Processing Corporation (Authorised Transaction) Bill 2010 (No 2), or the WSN Environmental Solutions bill, we worked constructively with the Government. There was a cooperative approach and some meaningful engagement, resulting in better legislation and a better approach, which was a good thing. The handling of the Carers Recognition Bill 2010 disturbs me, as it disturbs my colleagues. The bill is dealt with in the report of the Legislation Review Committee, and is clearly fine. The report raises no problems relating to that bill. The fact that an Opposition member—the hardworking and diligent member for Bega, and shadow Minister—introduced the bill appears to have been an obstacle for this Government. Rather than adopting the constructive, engaged and positive approach that is shown by Opposition members, the Government chose not to engage and discuss but to reject what on any reasonable and objective basis is an eminently sensible and positive initiative from the Opposition. I again note that this report—

Mr Kerry Hickey: Point of order: Three Opposition members have canvassed your ruling and have been disrespectful of it. The member should be brought back to the leave of the motion.

ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Frank Terenzini): Order! I remind the member for Davidson that the House is debating the committee report. This debate does not provide members with an opportunity to discuss a bill that has been introduced.

Mr JONATHAN O'DEA: Clearly, this report refers to the objects of the bill, which I reiterate as being admirable and positive objects supporting carers in our community. The objects of the bill are as follows:

(a) to recognise the valuable contribution of carers to our society and to the people they care for,

(b) to recognise the benefit, including the social and economic benefit, provided by carers to the community,

(c) to ensure the provision of services necessary to enable carers to achieve their maximum potential as members of the community,

(d) to provide, through carers' assessments, for the interests, needs and choices of carers to be considered in decisions about the provision of services that impact on their role,

(e) to identify and address specific needs of families with children and young people who are carers.

(f) to deliver culturally appropriate services for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander carers and carers from culturally linguistically diverse backgrounds.

I quoted directly from the report of the Legislation Review Committee, which sets out all those objectives. As has already been pointed out, in light of the fact that the committee could not identify any issues of concern, it is disappointing that the Government has chosen not to debate this bill—a positive Opposition initiative. I place on the record, as have my colleagues, my disappointment that I was not able to speak in debate on the bill, as I spoke in debate on the other two bills that are covered in this week's report.

Mr PAUL PEARCE (Coogee) [11.59 a.m.]: I was not going to speak on the report. The committee works extremely well and takes into account the functions of the committee. It is quite clear the member for Davidson is unaware—or purposely unaware—of the functions of the Legislation Review Committee. It is not to pass judgement on any piece of legislation, its merits or demerits, whether it should be dealt with immediately or whether it should be dealt with in the future. The functions of the committee are clearly laid out in the Legislation Review Act of 1987. Part 8A of that Act states:

(1) The functions of the Committee with respect to Bills are:
(a) to consider any Bill introduced into Parliament, and
(b) to report to both Houses of Parliament as to whether any such Bill, by express words or otherwise:
(i) trespasses unduly on personal rights and liberties, or
(ii) makes rights, liberties or obligations unduly dependent upon insufficiently defined administrative powers, or
(iii) makes rights, liberties or obligations unduly dependent upon non-reviewable decisions, or
(iv) inappropriately delegates legislative powers, or
(v) insufficiently subjects the exercise of legislative power to parliamentary scrutiny.

Several provisions follow from that—section 8A (2) and section 9—in relation to regulations. The bill, which was introduced on 12 March, was considered by the committee on Tuesday 16 March 2010—very promptly—and reported on to the Parliament. This is significant legislation. I do not think anyone is debating its underlying merits, but it is necessary for Parliament to properly consider it. Essentially the member for Davidson's argument seems to be that legislation introduced on 12 March and considered by the committee last Tuesday should have been shovelled through by now. It is simply inappropriate to do that. We will end up with half-baked legislation that has to be untangled in the future.

Mr Thomas George: Point of order: I do not know where the member for Coogee has been, but many a time plenty of bills are introduced into this House and proceeded with through all stages in the one debate.

ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Frank Terenzini): Order! That is not a point of order. The member for Coogee has the call.

Mr PAUL PEARCE: That point of order has as much credibility as my speaking on the bill in the same manner as the member for Davidson did. I was merely following the lead of the member for Davidson. The committee did consider the bill and considered it within the terms of reference. Quite correctly, within the terms of reference, the committee resolved that it has not identified any issues under section 8A (1) (b) of the Legislation Review Act. That is our role. Although there is no reference to it in the report, I make reference to a draft—

Mr Thomas George: Remember that you are speaking to the report.

Mr PAUL PEARCE: It was on the agenda the other day. I do not need the assistance of the member for Lismore in this matter. Some very good work is being done by the parliamentary assistants to the committee in developing issues papers and I am sure members will be very interested when the said paper in relation to public interest arrives. It is very broadly considered, and I encourage members to read it. It is good to see members reading these reports, because the committee works hard and the officers assisting work extremely hard. They are challenging reports. I am a government member and quite often I am dealing with reports that contain recommendations that are highly critical of the Government's approach to legislation under section 8A.

That is as it should be because the committee has an obligation to bring these matters to the attention of the Parliament. The committee having done so, it is then up to the Parliament as to what weight is given to those recommendations. Certainly the analysis of the Crimes Amendment (Child Pornography and Abuse Material) Bill demonstrates this very well. I refer members to clause 17 of the report, which talks about artistic freedom, artistic pursuits and freedom of expression generally. That is what the committee is about, bringing those matters to the attention of the Parliament. It should not be used as an excuse or exercise, as the member for Davidson did, to simply bash the Government about the head on something he feels aggrieved about.

Question—That the House take note of the report—put and resolved in the affirmative.Question—That the House take note of the report—put and resolved in the affirmative.

Report noted.