MARK DREYFUS MP

Hamas rejects democratic methods and rejects human rights. It rejects the rights of trade unions. It rejects the rights of women as those rights are understood and cherished by Western countries such as ours. What appears in the report of the parliamentary joint committee is but a small sample of the acts in which the Hamas brigades have engaged in recent years.

The report confirms that those seeking asylum in Australia are part of a worldwide trend which is driven by insecurity, persecution and conflict.

The brigades are the armed element of the military wing of Hamas. While the brigades are an integral part of Hamas, they also operate independently from, and at time at odds with, Hamass stated aims. Hamas, through the brigades, seeks to destroy the state of Israel and establish an Islamist Palestinian state in the existing Gaza Strip, West Bank and Israel. It will not enter into peace talks with Israel, and its leaders have stated Hamas cannot live with an Israeli state.

The Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, which is contained in Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme Bill 2009 [No. 2] and related bills, is a means to a low-carbon-emissions future; it is a means to a low-carbon-growth trajectory for Australia.

The report deals at considerable length with the science that underlies observations of climate change that have occurred around the world and the science that underlies the now accepted means that are going to have to be employed to reduce carbon emissions.

It's the people of Noble Park who have made it what it is. Buildings and facilities mean nothing without good people. And Noble Park has been blessed with the best. Thats what keeps shining through.

We need to move away from the continual ill-informed questioning of the science and false and confrontational representations of the debate as between those for and those against. We need to close the gap between the available scientific knowledge and the debates in this parliament. The visit of the climate scientists has helped to close that gap. The best quality science information is always to be welcomed.

All of these measures show that this government - unlike the former government, which in its 11 years was unable to come to grips with the need for firm government action in respect of climate change - is committed to reducing Australia's greenhouse gas emissions and to engaging with dangerous climate change.

It is a fact that the increased rate of chronic illness in the Australian community has a significant and detrimental impact on the quality and span of life for individual Australians.

The Liberal and National parties have an obsessive hatred of all things union, and that obsessive hatred drove them to inflict major damage on student services in higher education.