COMMITTEES

Senator DAVID POCOCK (Australian Capital Territory—Independent ACT Whip) (11:42): The red lines package that was introduced by crossbenchers comes out of civil society. It comes from Australians who want our parliament to say that we are going to make a very firm commitment in domestic law to actually uphold the commitments we make to the international community.

When there is a plausible case of crimes against humanity, of genocide, we will act here, and we will actually ensure that we are not party to those crimes and that we are not enabling them in any way. To me, it seems like a very sensible package of reforms. There's nothing radical in this proposal.

We've signed up to all of these things as a country. We've signed international treaties. I fear that as a species and as a civilisation, we're not learning the lessons of the past.

We saw, after the great wars, the world come together and set up the United Nations and sign treaties, international agreements, that every member state would ensure that it is doing what it can to prevent genocide, to prevent crimes against humanity. And that requires us, as a participating member—as a middle power, which we hear so much about from the government—to actually step up and do that and to say we're going to hold ourselves to that standard that we signed up to, to that standard that we would probably expect of other nations.

I think it's a great tragedy that, when a bill is put forward in good faith—as I said, this should not be a radical proposition; these are all things we've signed up to as a country—the major parties won't even allow it to proceed to an inquiry; won't even allow scrutiny of that bill; won't allow Australians to submit their views, whatever they may be, to a Senate inquiry; won't allow academics and experts to submit; and won't allow for the bill to, potentially, be amended or debated in this place.

On behalf of the many thousands of Canberrans I've heard from about this issue, I want to put on the record their concerns that Australia is not doing enough. One of my heroes, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, talked about how being neutral in the face of injustice is choosing the side of the oppressor. As a country, we need to face up to the fact that we need to hold ourselves to a higher and more consistent standard.

It shouldn't matter where these crimes are being perpetrated, where these wars are being waged or whether they involve allies or not. We should be stepping up. Here we are at the reference of bills, and the major parties do not want scrutiny of a bill that simply enables the parliament to uphold international obligations we've signed up to.