Regulatory Reform Omnibus Bill 2026

Senator ROBERTS (Queensland) (19:08): The Regulatory Reform Omnibus Bill 2026—what a mouthful!— introduces a series of mostly minor changes to administrative rules across multiple areas of government, which will supposedly reduce red tape, simplify government administration, streamline regulatory processes, repeal outdated legislation and make technical corrections—meaning 'fix their earlier mistakes'.

There are a lot of earlier mistakes from this government. I'll start with the provisions in this bill which One Nation does support. On business regulation, the bill supposedly simplifies regulations affecting businesses, claiming to reduce reporting duplication, simplify intellectual property administration, make patent and trademark disciplinary processes stronger, simplify plant breeders' rights renewals, speed up antidumping refunds and simplify broadcasting reporting requirements.

Then, on social security, several amendments supposedly include clarifying de facto relationship assessments, simplifying foreign currency calculations and allowing more flexibility for proof-of-life requirements for pensioners overseas. Then there's the Human Rights Commission. The bill removes the requirement for the Human Rights Commission to notify third parties when mentioned in discrimination complaints yet are not respondents.

The government argues this removes unnecessary administration. Defence superannuation: former Australian Defence Force members gain access to Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation account based retirement products, which turn super into a tax-free regular income. This is probably one of the more tangible benefits in the bill.

Customs and antidumping supposedly speeds up refunds, streamlines tariff concessions, fixes technical errors then again fixes technical errors, and aligns antidumping rules with World Trade Organization arrangements. Now the One Nation objections commence. The bill ties Australian law to two international treaties, the Madrid protocol and the agreement of Nice, which together regulate international patents and trademarks.

The bill provides that where the international community changes the rules in those agreements, Australian law is changed automatically—no local scrutiny, no parliamentary scrutiny, just an immediate change of our law. Now, I accept the law around international trademarks and patents is working well, and this measure does not threaten Australian sovereignty in a material way.

In fact, the measures act in the best interests of Australians. For this reason, One Nation will support this measure; although we will keep a close eye on this government's reach, and each and every attempt to compromise Australian sovereignty through international treaties over which Australia has no control. Workplace gender equality: the bill introduces a 12-month gap between reporting cycles, aligns with Commonwealth reporting dates and changes target timing.

These are constructive measures to reduce the burden of reporting on workplace gender equality and will be supported. Nonetheless, let's just take a moment here. I have some questions.

How can there be a workplace gender act drafted to encourage employment of women while this government can't define what is a woman? In fact, it appears we're back to a binary choice. Take note of that.

I'll say it again. In fact, it appears we're back to a binary choice: men and women. Men and women—let that sink in.

Even worse, the provision entrenches discrimination. The Australian Public Service is 60 per cent female. 'Great', say the feminists, 'nothing wrong with that'. Journalists are 58 per cent female, so of course that story doesn't get a run.

Dentists are 57 per cent female, doctors are 48 per cent female and, with 67 per cent of students being female, health will be a female-dominated industry in the next five years. University students—68 per cent. Not only is the workplace gender act sexist, it's discriminatory.

It highlights any incidence of men outnumbering women while looking the other way when women outnumber men. Fact: it is a feminist attack on men, on families and on the very foundation of our society. You'll hear more from One Nation about this.

You can bet on it. Moving on, Tell us once: the government wants agencies to share more information internally so Australians do not continually provide the same information. Examples include healthcare identifiers, nominee arrangements, social security administration, proof-of-life certificates, customs processes.

The government claims this will cause less paperwork, faster services, and reduce duplication. It reminds me of President Reagan saying, 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help,' and it's a massive problem waiting to happen. Just listen to this: in case there is any doubt as to the intent of the bill, the explanatory memorandum is clear.

The bill, 'enables the government to use any of a person's information it already holds to speed up and simplify administrative provisions'. We've seen this before, with tragic consequences. It was only a few years ago the government used the data it had in the Department of Social Security to match with the data it had in the taxation department to catch social security fraudsters, and made tens of thousands of wrong matches, sent debt notifications out to people who didn't owe anything—not a thing—cut off social security with no due process, and, as a result, people committed suicide.

Today? Welcome to robodebt 2.0. The provisions in this bill could be used to justify a repeat of that process—except in this case it isn't a simple one-to-one match.

They'll be matching people across multiple departments and multiple computer systems and really praying and hoping they make the right matches this time. What's changed since robodebt to suggest the government could get the process right this time? Nothing has changed.

In 2019, after the failure of robodebt, the government commenced a technology uplift to get the computer systems in use in each government department talking to each other. This was to allow data sharing and improved audit—so we were told. Fair enough.

The program was called GovERP, the government Enterprise Resource Planning initiative, which was known as the Shared Services Transformation Program. Sounds great, doesn't it? One after another, member departments pulled out.

No progress was made, and the initiative was shuttered in 2024. Even worse, the platform that was created to sit between departments to hook them up was deemed unfit for future use and trashed. Our bureaucrats managed to spend five years authoring a complete failure.

How much did this learning exercise cost taxpayers? It was $2.2 billion. The government has already spent $2.2 billion trying to get departments to talk to each other and failed miserably—failed comprehensively—yet here we are with a bill to share information between departments.

It appears irrelevant that their computers are not technically capable of talking to each other to share the data. The last time we tried this, people died. There may be progress in data sharing that has not been documented, but One Nation has submitted a second reading amendment to stand this bill in the list for a month while the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee examines the technical feasibility of the proposal.

There's nothing urgent in this bill. It has not been to a committee. Our amendment is a modest referral that seeks to clear up a simple question.

The question is this: will the passing of this bill as written cause, or enable, robodebt 2.0? Let's find out before the Senate makes a horrible mistake. In concluding, I foreshadow second reading amendment 3939 standing in my name.