The Labor Government is running scared of scrutiny. Their atrocious bill to establish an Australian Centre for Disease Control (CDC) is significant legislation—and I’ll go so far as to say it’s the worst I’ve seen in my nine years in the Senate. It’s dangerous.

There were countless amendments that required answers, and many speakers were denied the opportunity to contribute. Serious questions remain unresolved.

The Albanese Government manipulated the speaking list to push One Nation Senators to the bottom. Just before it was my turn to speak, Labor guillotined the bill, preventing any further speeches from being delivered. I managed to use the debate on the guillotine to deliver part of my speech, which is the video you see here.

This marks a new low for the unscrupulous and arrogant Labor Government. The Greens should be ashamed for supporting the guillotine on such an important bill.

The CDC will provide the government of the day with cover to do whatever it wants. It’s expensive, it will control dangerous research, and the reporting and scrutiny provided in this bill are virtually non-existent. This is unacceptable.

One Nation will repeal this bill.

Transcript

Yet again, a guillotine stops debate immediately before I was scheduled to speak against this bill, and after pushing all three One Nation senators, who were going to speak, to the bottom of the list. One Nation opposed the guillotine. We want to know why the coalition and the Greens join with Labor in supporting big pharma.  

Senator Canavan interjecting— 

Senator ROBERTS: Except Senator Canavan. Thank you, Senator Canavan. This is significant legislation, and I’ll go so far as to say that it’s the worst legislation I’ve seen in nine years in the Senate. It’s dangerous. There are many, many amendments that need answers, and there are many speakers that missed out. There are many questions.  

The first question I have for you is: why are you avoiding scrutiny? This is half a bill! The bill establishes what the CDC director can do. It does not, though, establish what the director cannot do. There’s nothing in this legislation to establish rules around the following, so can you please clarify. What is the process for determining where the CDC will be located and what the site features should be—what protections for the community? What research will be conducted at the CDC, if any? Will that research include gain-of-function research, which was the cause of the COVID outbreak in 2019, which killed millions of people? Who will own the taxpayer funded CDC research? There are no answers to these questions. These are fundamental. What research will be conducted in cooperation with research facilities overseas, and what countries should be excluded on national security grounds? Start with the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and exclude Anthony Fauci’s haunts, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and America’s National Institutes of Health, and Fauci’s colleagues including Ralph Baric and Peter Daszak. 

Will live animal testing be conducted, and, if so, on what animals and how? Will research be conducted on behalf of commercial corporations, and, if so, who owns the taxpayer funded research. What annual reporting will be produced to alert the parliament and the Australian people about the risks to which they’re being exposed? If the CDC facility handles sensitive material, what level of containment will be used, and what will be the process for investigating and rectifying breaches? And what is the purpose of and limit to research? Is it just ego—’Look at what we can do!’—or is there a genuine medical outcome they’re working towards? 

We know the CSIRO at its Geelong facility is already conducting risky experiments on deadly viruses such as Ebola, and they’re experimenting on animals. Those are my questions. Additionally, what’s happening with taxpayer funds? We know the CSIRO monetises its research, or used to, and we know lately the CSIRO has been publishing the results of their research allowing corporations to piggyback off that research free of charge, saving them years in developing new drugs from which the Australian taxpayers will have no commercial benefit. The taxpayers pay and get no benefit. This is the state of medical research in Australia. What impact will the CDC have on the CSIRO? We don’t know. The bill doesn’t set out these matters. It’s a glaring omission. 

The minister says the Australian CDC will undertake technical and advisory functions based on its public health expertise and knowledge and access to relevant information. What expertise? It hasn’t started yet. You’re assuming bureaucrats and health officials actually have the expertise and knowledge to perform these studies, yet there’s nothing in this bill to say they must have that knowledge—nothing. This is a pretence to give ‘thank you’ jobs to COVID era health officials who have a track record of very dangerous, dishonest and inhuman decisions. These bureaucrats will be given powers. The Chief Medical Officer, for example, must be a doctor, but the director of the CDC does not. What could possibly go wrong? 

Continuing cover ups from the government and freedom of information—an issue which One Nation senator for Western Australia Senator Whitten has raised is the changes the bill makes to the Freedom of Information Act. The bill amends the Freedom of Information Act 1982 to exempt the CDC from freedom of information applications to which the same documents are currently open. I wonder if this is to cover up information from the COVID years or just to get ahead of the next lab leak. 

Finally, I’ve already discussed sensitive biological agents with regard to Ebola. The CDC bill transfers responsibility for the Security Sensitive Biological Agents Regulatory Scheme from the department to the Australian CDC. This scheme regulates certain biological agents that are considered dangerous. Now, let’s take a closer look at this one. Who would decide if a biological agent is sensitive and subject to extra checks? The CDC. Who would be most likely to be importing sensitive biological agents like Ebola and heaven knows what else? The CDC. Who would now be their own regulator? You guessed it, the CDC. This is a recipe for no accountability, a recipe for disaster, a recipe for rampant, unbridled control over the people. 

Officially, this bill simply brings together powers spread across several departments into one place. If that’s really the case, why does the bill have a price tag of $250 million for the first three years and $73 million per year after that? Shouldn’t the cost of the CDC be offset through savings in other departments? If that’s all they intend, then that would be true. Clearly the Australian CDC will be doing much, much more. You’re given them the money to do it, and they’ll be doing it away from prying eyes and protected with freedom-of-information blocks and negligible reporting criteria, regulating itself and sending the bill to the taxpayers. In nine years in the Senate, this is one of the worst bills I’ve dealt with. Minister, I’ve given you many questions. I’d like some answers.