Already and this is the Daily This is the Daily OS.
Oh, now it makes sense.
Good morning and welcome to the Daily OS. It's Thursday, the thirteenth of February. I'm Zara, I'm Billy. This week an independent MP introduced a new bill, and that bill would require the government to consider the economic, social, environmental and cultural wellbeing of future generations when deciding national laws. It's just the latest in a broader push to consider the rights and well being of young people here in Australia.
Now, this is a bill that is obviously specifically designed for young people in Australia, which is why when The Daily Oz posted it to our Instagram, there was a whole lot of interest about it. Yeah.
The cross section of like a TDA audience caring about something and politics. This is where it happens.
Yes, so do you want to just take us through first what exactactly is in this bill?
Yeah? Absolutely, So. First of all, I just want to start by talking about who introduced the bill, and the reason I want to talk about that is because it makes quite a bit of a difference as to whether or not this bill will actually become law. So it was introduced by Independent MP doctor Sophie Scomps. She's the independent member for Mkeller, she's one of the teals. It is really important to flag that because of her role as an independent, it is highly unlikely that this bill
will pass and become law. That said, don't lose me here. It is still a really interesting topic to discuss. And you know, pieces of legislation are introduced all the time as private member's bill and it prompts conversation both in Parliament and broader Australian community as to the contents of that bill. So I think definitely worth talking through.
So just to be clear, we're saying it's very unlikely that this legislation will go through, but it's the idea behind this bill that is a broader discussion in politics, which is what we want to talk about today.
Yeah, and so I'll go through what to actually in the legislations. So under the proposal, there would be a positive duty for the government and other public bodies to consider the well being of future generations. Now decision makers, so politicians, bureaucrats whoever, would be legally bound to consider the well being of younger people when they were drafting laws and policies. They'd also need to release their well being objectives and to report on their progress every six months.
This whole process of protecting the well being of future generations, this would be overseen by a Future Generations Commissioner and that person would be appointed through a competitive panel selection if, of course, this bill were to come into force.
That phrase, or positive duty, is a phrase that we've seen across a lot of different legislation. We've seen it on legislation about workplaces and it's basically just about taking proactive action rather than.
Reactive reaction exactly.
Okay, so you mentioned the commissioner. Now that will be a new role.
Right, Yeah, so we don't currently have that role. We do, you have advocates for children and young people at statain territory levels, but not this position explicitly. So the key responsibility of this Commissioner would be to advocate for the long term interests of Australia and current and future generations. It would also oversee what it called a national conversation public forum, and it would invite young people, first nations, people and people with disabilities to partake in this forum.
After that process took place, the Commissioner would then be tasked with publishing a report observing what they would see as the medium and long term trends, risks and opportunities that could impact the future well being of Australians.
And so what was the reasoning behind why doctor Scomps introduced this legislation.
Well, essentially, she's arguing that there is a problem in Australia with short sightedness when it comes to policymakings. So here in Australia we go to a federal election every three years, and what she's saying is that that's led to futile policy solutions to some of the country's biggest problems.
So when we're talking about this bill and the policies that it would affect, think about things like the housing crisis, like climate change, these kind of really big, multi generational ideas and issues that aren't going to be solved in a day. They're going to take that long term thinking. And what doctor Scomps is saying is that we don't have that long term thinking currently. We're not thinking about
the future generations. When, for example, the government or the opposition is coming up with its policy on housing ahead of the next election. Now obviously the government would disagree with that they would suggest that, you know, they are thinking ahead when it comes to creating and designing this policy. But we'll get to that in a moment. I want to just go back to what doctor Scomp said was
her justification. She said Australians want long term solutions, and she was citing research from Griffith University that said that nearly all Australians, so ninety seven percent of those who responded, support policies that take future generations into account. She said, they want pollies to think beyond their own re election prospects every thirty years and to put some serious effort into turning the ship around for future generations.
You know you're a politics nord when you refer to them as.
Honestly, I'm surprised that you let me do that. I was just trying to shorten the sentience.
Okay, so I think I understand the policy, but I wanted to turn to the actual politics of a bill like this, which you briefly touched on before. Yeah, because as we said at the top, it is unlikely to pass yes.
So any bill that's introduced to Parliament by a non government politician is called a private member's bill. So you know Sophie Scomp's is an independent member and so she introduced this piece of legislation as a private member's bill into the Parliament. For this piece of legislation to pass, to become law, to become you know what we have here in Australia, it would need the support of the government and also other people on the cross bench in
order to pass. And getting that sort of support when you don't come from inside the government but instead outside, that's really really rare. And the only time that that really happens is when the government doesn't have a majority, and so we obviously have to go to the government then and try to understand what they think about this.
Is this something that they would support. Prime Minister Anthony Abernezi did say earlier this week that he would have a look at the ideas in the legislation, but they have ruled out on a number of occasions supporting this sort of legislation. I do want to add really quickly though, that the bill was backed by Liberal MP Bridget Archer. Now she is a moderate Liberal who has crossed the floor on a couple of occasions, so she's voted against
her party. This doesn't really change the success or the possible success of this bill. But I do think it's interesting to look at this kind of cross party or independent liberal coalition that has emerged on this issue.
And just before we finished, some people might be listening to this episode and thinking they've heard a cinema. Yeah, thinking that they have heard us explain a similar or proposed legislation before. Yeah, because there was one that was specific about climate change that was called the Duty of Care campaign. Yeah. Do you want to take us through that?
Yes? So that campaign was run by and Shama, a young person who I believe we've had on this podcast before, and she was, as you said, running this duty of Care campaign that essentially, if it had been successful, would have meant that the government had to protect the next generation with this duty of care when it came to climate change policy specifically. Now, the government did reject that proposal.
It went to a Senate committee which was chaired by a Labor member, which suggested the bill was too broad, there would be too many difficulties in protecting areas like health and cultural and spiritual wellbeing, and so with that lack of definition, there wasn't support for that. But Billy, you have asked on a number of occasions to a number of politicians this very question of why they don't support something like this, why there isn't something explicit in
our national Parliament to protect future generations. Can you talk me through what we've heard from the government on this topic.
Yeah, So over the past couple of years, I've spoken to the Youth Minister Ann Ali and also the Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen about this, and to be honest, they haven't really said a whole lot. But what they did say was consistent with each other, which is that the government does consider future generations when it's making decisions about its policies and its legislation. But what they are against is making it a legal requirement for them to
consider future generations. So they say they're already doing it, but we don't need this to become law. And the other thing that they said is that whilst they do consider future generations, it's also really important to consider the needs of today, and so it's a constant balancing act between the two of them.
I mean, I think, just to close this conversation, when you asked Anthony Albinezi a couple of weeks ago what he thought the big issue facing young Australians was he did answer intergenerational inequality, so I know, and.
It didn't come to me at the time to bring this up, and I wish it did well.
The Prime Minister will just have to return and I'm real hymn fair that Billy. Thank you so much and thank you for joining us for another episode of The Daily os.
If you learn something from today's episode, it would really help us if you could press follow on Spotify or Apple. It helps us climb up the podcast charts and helps other people find us. Thank you so much and we'll be back this evening with your afternoon headlines.
My name is Lily Maddon and I'm a proud Arunda Bungelung Kalkutin woman from Gadighl Country. The Daily oz acknowledges that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the Gadighl people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island and nations. We pay our respects to the first peoples of these countries, both past and present.