Crimes and Other Legislation Amendment (Omnibus No. 1) Bill 2026

Senator McKIM (Tasmania—Australian Greens Whip) (13:10): Of course it's part of government's job to keep people safe. Let's be very clear about this, Minister: the biggest threat in the medium term to the safety of Australians is climate change. That's the biggest threat.

And your government, the Labor political party's government, is opening new coal and gas mines just as fast as you possibly can. Through public subsidies, you are enabling the destruction of native forests in this country hand over fist— The TEMPORARY CHAIR ( Senator Cox ): Minister? Senator Green: On a point of order, although I do love to debate Senator McKim on real action on climate change, which is what the Labor Party delivers, it's not relevant to this bill.

I think he knows that, and he can make a contribution at a later time today. We need to focus on this bill, at least for the next 15 minutes. The TEMPORARY CHAIR: Senator McKim, I will remind you that relevance is pertinent to this debate, so could we keep it to the containments of what's in the bill.

Senator McKIM: I will attempt to do that. The minister did crack the door open a fraction there and I was attempting to gently wander through it, but I will confine my remarks to the provisions of the legislation. The Law Council's submission to the inquiry into this legislation made it clear that their view is that the sunset extension shouldn't proceed without substantive implementation of recommendations 6, 7 and 8 of the INSLM review and that, if it does proceed, the committee should extract a clear assurance from government that those safeguard improvements are prioritised as part of the broader reform and not left to drift further.

I wonder if I could just ask you to respond to that, Minister. That seems, on the face of it, to be a quite reasonable request from the Law Council. Of course, the INSLM review is itself a very reasonable proposal, and I note that it would be quite reasonable to suggest that the government has by no means accepted all of the recommendations in that review.

So could I ask you, please, to explain, in terms as detailed as you're able, why the government has ignored so many of those recommendations and, critically, why it is the view of the government that the sunset extension should proceed in the absence of the substantive implementation of recommendations 6, 7 and 8 of the INSLM review.