Page 1200 - Week 04 - Thursday, 21 March 1991
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One of the greatest anomalies of this whole suggestion is: Where is the public right to have a say? Where is the public consultation, the public comment on these things? Once again it is politicians saying, "Our will be done"; this godlike right that they take upon themselves to decide how the rest of the people in Australia, the vast majority of people, will act.
One of the very important points, and there is some confusion in this area, is whether the proposal would ban only paid advertising deemed to be political or whether it would ban unpaid advertising deemed to be political. I am sure everyone will have an opinion on this, but let us have a look at the tremendous problems on both sides. First of all, if only paid advertising is going to be banned, we have a situation where the government, the party in control of the Federal Parliament, will have a tremendous opportunity. As was stated in the Sydney Morning Herald this morning:
Senator Bolkus has conceded, for example, that if the Government released a major statement during an election campaign, such a statement might be advertised on television as an "explanation".
Others, of course, would be denied the possibility of giving their thoughts on the government explanation.
Would political comment be prohibited on ABC radio or the television station, the news at night, if it was not paid for? This is unpaid advertising. Someone might say, "What an absurdity. How could you say that the news was unpaid advertising?". Very simply. We already have a situation where governments wield enormous power, in some areas, over the electronic media. Even if that were not the case, if this legislation is passed will there not be a mad rush to buy electronic media stations, radio and television? Indeed, I think one political party has already done that. It is called Radio 2KY. If unpaid advertising was not banned, lo, one would find some interesting things being said in the news and in various political commentaries on 2KY or any other station, radio or television, that political parties cared to buy up, be it directly or through some other source.
If it does include unpaid advertising, the ramifications of that would take a full week to debate in parliament. Either way, the suggestion of preventing the right to - - -
Mr Connolly: You really have no idea what the proposal is.
MR STEVENSON: Mr Connolly says that I have no idea of what the proposal is. I have read just about every editorial in every paper in Australia today. I do agree that there are differences of opinion, as I mentioned just a moment ago; but Mr Connolly had to make the point that I have no idea.
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