2nd Dec 2020, 12:07 PM – Senate Australia's Foreign Relations (State and Territory Arrangements) Bill 2020 and another bill - in Committee - Annual report

The majority voted in favour of an amendment that will include a requirement for the Minister to prepare an annual report in the bill. The amendment was introduced by South Australian Senator Penny Wong (Labor).

Amendment text

(1) Page 66 (after line 19), after Division 4, insert:

Division 4A—Annual report

53A Annual report

(1) The Minister must cause to be prepared, as soon as practicable after the end of each calendar year, an annual report on the exercise of the Minister's decision-making powers under this Act during the year.

(2) Without limiting subsection (1), the report must include the following:

(a) statistical information about the decisions made by the Minister under the Act during the year, including the total number of decisions, the total number of decisions in each class of decision, and the outcomes of the decisions;

(b) a summary of the details of each of the decisions made by the Minister under the Act during the year;

(c) an outline of the engagement that has occurred during the year with entities covered by the Act to articulate and explain to those entities Australia's foreign policy and how they should engage with foreign entities in Australia's national interest.

(3) A copy of the report must be given to the Leader of the Opposition in the House of Representatives, but it is the duty of the Leader of the Opposition to treat as secret any part of the report that is not tabled in a House of the Parliament.

(4) The Minister must cause a copy of the report to be tabled in each House of the Parliament within 15 sitting days of that House after the end of the year to which the report relates.

(5) However, before tabling the report the Minister may make such redactions to the report as the Minister considers necessary in order to avoid prejudice to security, the defence of Australia, Australia's relations with other countries, law enforcement operations or the privacy of individuals.

What do these bills do?

According to the bill homepage, the Australia’s Foreign Relations (State and Territory Arrangements) Bill 2020 was:

Introduced with the Australia’s Foreign Relations (State and Territory Arrangements) (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2020, the bill establishes a legislative scheme for Commonwealth engagement with arrangements between State or Territory governments and foreign governments, and their associated entities.