Page 5106 - Week 16 - Wednesday, 27 November 1991
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application for membership. It then talks about the terms and conditions on which the organisation is prepared to admit the person to membership. So, you cannot discriminate against someone joining an organisation.
Similarly, once someone is a member of an organisation, they cannot be denied access or be given limited access to any benefit provided by the organisation. They cannot be deprived of membership by varying the terms of membership or be subjected to any other detriment on the basis of what is currently in clause 7.
But it says nothing about a person who might not want to join an organisation being given that fundamental human right to say, "No, I do not want to be a member of that trade union" or, "No, I do not want to be a member of CARD or any other business organisation". That is a fundamental human right. It is a fundamental right of a democracy and, if that is not put in this legislation, then this legislation is sadly lacking; this legislation is not human rights legislation.
There is room in this legislation for substantial discrimination if that is not put in there, because there will be nothing to stop a closed shop arrangement whereby someone has to join a trade union, otherwise they will not get a job, or someone has to join a body of employers, otherwise they are going to be ostracised and blackballed as well. Those things happen, and they have happened in the past all too often in Australia.
In the industrial area in Australia there are restrictions being placed on a person's ability to exercise freedom of choice. Freedom of choice is a fundamental aspect of democracy. Accordingly, Mr Speaker, I think it is absolutely essential that this be put in clause 7, along with the other most sensible grounds such as sex, sexuality, pregnancy, race, religion and politics. If this is not put in, this legislation is very sadly lacking. I would commend the Liberal Party amendment to members.
MR BERRY (Minister for Health and Minister for Sport) (4.54): You heard Mr Stefaniak's speech; it is more about ideology than good sense. Mr Stefaniak obviously has not taken the time to examine this issue properly and to research the extent to which his amendment would affect us. The Australian Capital Territory (Self-Government) Act, section 28, which is headed "Inconsistency with other laws", says this:
(1) A provision of an enactment has no effect to the extent that it is inconsistent with a law defined by subsection (2), but such a provision shall be taken to be consistent with such a law to the extent that it is capable of operating concurrently with that law.
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