Wednesday, 18 June 2025

SBS headquarters

Evan MULHOLLAND (Northern Metropolitan) (15:52): I move:

That this house:

(1) notes:

(a) the Special Broadcasting Service (SBS) is one of two government-funded national broadcasters, both of which are based in Sydney;

(b) that according to the SBS report, 2023–24, of the 1319 SBS staff, 80 per cent were based in New South Wales, while only 14 per cent were based in Victoria;

(2) recognises:

(a) that Victoria has the highest proportion of population born overseas in Australia;

(b) that Melbourne’s population is increasing faster than Sydney and becoming increasingly more multicultural;

(3) expresses concern that the SBS report, 2021–22, and the federal Minister for Communications news release of 27 April 2023 indicate a feasibility study on the possible relocation of SBS headquarters from Artemon to Western Sydney;

(4) expresses further concern at extraordinary revelations by a senior SBS official at the 12 March 2025 hearing of the Economy and Infrastructure Committee’s inquiry into the cultural and creative industries in Victoria that the decision to base their new production hub in western Sydney was one forced on SBS by the Albanese Labor government, despite the Minister for Communications claiming in a media release on 8 December 2024 that this was an SBS board and management initiative;

(5) condemns the Albanese Labor government for betraying Victoria by denying us the opportunity to host a production hub; and

(6) calls on the Allan Labor government to advocate for a Melbourne-based SBS headquarters and to facilitate the process of setting up in a multicultural Melbourne location like Broadmeadows or Dandenong.

I am delighted to speak on this notice of motion in relation to SBS. We know that SBS is one of our two national broadcasters, both of which are based in Sydney, and this motion is attempting to point out some recent events, some past events and some of the history and really advocate on behalf of the Victorian people, really stand up for Victoria’s multicultural, multifaith and migrant communities across the state and advocate for our fair share of creative funding, of arts funding, of multicultural funding, because our multicultural communities matter too, and when a government just ignores that, it should be, in a bipartisan way, called out.

We have seen this government previously spend millions of dollars of taxpayers money to run ad campaigns during elections about wanting our fair share for Victoria, but this government has been mute on the fact that we had a federal government pick western Sydney over us for not one but both national broadcasters. In the case of SBS, it specifically forced the decision on the SBS board to locate SBS in western Sydney. The Liberals and Nationals are here to say that Victorian multicultural communities matter too. Places like Dandenong and Broadmeadows and other multicultural communities and growth areas across the state should have been considered for these kinds of opportunities. It is our role as a state, and it should be the role of any state government worth its salt, to represent Victorians. The Victorian government should have been in a room with the communications minister putting Victoria’s case forward that SBS should have a physical presence here in Victoria as part of our multicultural communities, in the neighbourhoods that they live in, that rely on SBS.

The SBS charter purposes are uniquely defined, setting it apart from other media organisations in the country. At its core SBS exists to provide multilingual and multicultural broadcasting services that inform, educate and entertain all Australians, reflecting the nation’s diverse society, and the primary function of the SBS is to broadcast programs that cater to Australia’s various linguistic communities. This includes news, current affairs, entertainment and educational content in languages other than English, making vital information accessible to those who may not be proficient in English. This commitment extends to providing news and analysis that offers diverse perspectives on national and international events, often representing or presenting viewpoints that may not be widely covered by the mainstream media. The charter also mandates the SBS to contribute to a sense of national identity while acknowledging and celebrating the country’s multicultural fabric. This involves creating content that reflects the contemporary Australian experience in all its forms. In attempting to meet these commitments it would be far more representative and valuable for the SBS to be headquartered in somewhere like Dandenong, or Broadmeadows in my electorate, where they can be part of our diverse communities here in Melbourne’s outer suburbs. It goes without saying that these are the sorts of commitments that are vital for our multicultural communities to feel connected – connected to each other in a new country and connected to their new country as well and made to feel a part of that country.

So it is not a stretch to say that connection needs to be felt the length and breadth of the country, particularly in areas where these communities are strongly represented. I guess this debate comes before us because of the federal Labor government and because they have demonstrated that they simply do not care about these aims, that political expediency for their own survival is more important. What is worse, I guess, is that they misled Victorians in doing so; they misled Victorians about what they were doing and their intent. The former Minister for Communications, who just happens to have her electorate in western Sydney and is now the Attorney-General, Michelle Rowland, announced in December last year that western Sydney will become home to a new Special Broadcasting Service production hub thanks to an Albanese government investment to commence the expansion of the network’s capacity and reach. The minister said that western Sydney is a diverse and dynamic region – the same could be said of Dandenong or Broadmeadows or Kalkallo or Wyndham; the same could be said of our communities. And this is the key point: the minister is quoted in her statement as saying:

I thank the SBS Board and management for their initiative in proposing this exciting project …

I will repeat it:

I thank the SBS Board and management for their initiative in proposing this exciting project …

But that is not the whole story. I sit on the Economy and Infrastructure Committee, which held its inquiry into the cultural and creative industries in Victoria, and it was revealed in those public hearings that senior SBS executives said that:

The opportunities available to us were within the parameters of western Sydney.

So we know not from the federal government but from SBS themselves that Labor cherrypicked western Sydney for this project – of mythic political fame, western Sydney – as the only place that SBS could set up its production hub, the only place. It provided the investment; it made a direct pitch to the board and said the parameters of this investment need to be in western Sydney.

I think that any Victorian government worth its salt that says it cares about multicultural communities should and would and hopefully will be making a public statement instead of being mute that this is not good enough and Victoria deserves that investment as well. Victoria has a higher proportion of population born overseas than New South Wales does. Yet because western Sydney has a whole lot more marginal seats the government thinks, ‘Okay, this is a great way to sandbag electorates’, rather than thinking, ‘What is the best outcome?’ You have to look at this contextually. The fact is that we have two national broadcasters and one of them, the ABC, has already decided to go to western Sydney. So instead of looking at the whole map of our film production sector and thinking, ‘Okay, ABC’s gone to western Sydney. We’re going to invest in multicultural Victoria with SBS’, the federal Labor government looked at this with a political lens instead and said, ‘We’re going to invest into SBS in western Sydney as well.’ Western Sydney – they get the ABC, they get the SBS, they get an airport, they get everything. Yet the Victorian government is mute. There is no criticism. This government used to make a lot of nicknames about prime ministers being the prime minister for Sydney. Well, in this case we actually do have a prime minister for Sydney and a communications minister for Sydney, because they have chosen Sydney again on this decision, betraying our multicultural communities. And again, the Victorian government need to stick up for this.

Victoria’s population is growing faster than New South Wales. It is becoming more diverse. This is a slap in the face and shows how federal Labor, under Mr Albanese and Ms Rowland, both Sydney MPs, really feel about Victoria. It is meant to be the Special Broadcasting Service, but it may as well be called the Sydney Broadcasting Service with this decision and this investment, which the minister deceptively tried to claim was an initiative of the SBS board. The SBS said, ‘No, no, no. The parameters that were given to us were western Sydney.’ So of course they are going to make that decision when that is the only decision they were given. Victoria ought to be calling that out. The Liberals and Nationals are calling that out because we want a share of those production jobs. We want our multicultural communities to feel like they are close to a service that they rely upon every day.

SBS has a lot of support in our growing communities, particularly in my electorate in the northern suburbs, but unfortunately we do not hear that and we have not heard that publicly from this government. Where is the Minister for Multicultural Affairs or the minister for the arts releasing a public statement condemning this and saying, ‘We want this in Victoria’? Where is the ministerial diary log of the Minister for Multicultural Affairs or the Minister for Creative Industries meeting with the federal minister for communications on this very topic? You will not see it, because this government has little interest in advocating for team Victoria, in advocating for Victorian jobs and Victorian multicultural communities. These multicultural communities in northern Melbourne or our south-east have just as much right as western Sydney to host an SBS production hub and to see their diversity recorded and broadcast and valued. They want to feel valued, and something like this in Victoria would have been fantastic for our diverse communities. It would have been fantastic for areas like Broadmeadows or Wyndham or Dandenong, but they will not get that under Labor because they have been sacrificed for a grubby vote-buying exercise again in western Sydney.

Victorian multicultural communities deserve a government that fights for them and does not stay quiet when they are betrayed. In this case, quite clearly from the evidence that we saw in the hearing, they have been betrayed by the federal Labor government, and there ought to be a bipartisan effort in calling this out – a tripartisan effort in calling this out on behalf of Victorian migrant communities. This motion calls on the Allan government to essentially do their job and advocate for a Melbourne-based SBS presence to facilitate the process of setting up in a diverse community like Broadmeadows or Dandenong.

I cannot see the future, but I can have a pretty good guess about what we are going to hear from those opposite who get up to speak to this motion. We are going to hear speeches about how the Labor government here in Victoria truly does respect and value multicultural communities, except for giving leave for our Sydney-based Prime Minister to show such contempt for our great state and not call out the federal government for bypassing Victoria, as we have seen so often. It is really an opportunity to stand up to the Prime Minister for this flagrant bias and to stand up to the federal government. Just say that you are disappointed, acknowledge that you are disappointed that Victoria was not in the conversation. What is so important, particularly in portfolios like the arts or multicultural affairs, is that you are making sure the voices of your communities are heard, the voices of your communities are on the table and are in those offices, in the ministerial wing, in those departments, putting Victoria on the map. Something like this would have been in the interests of all Victorians.

For SBS to fulfil its obligations to all Victorians, not just those in marginal electorates, it is vital that they have a presence, a footprint, in all regions of Australia that they seek to represent, that they seek to live in. I have mentioned Broadmeadows, which is close to my electorate office, and I have mentioned Dandenong, another vibrant multicultural community, and I am sure members on all sides of the house will talk about their very own diverse communities and how well connected they are with SBS. I have appeared on SBS Hindi, I have appeared on SBSAssyrian, I have appeared on a number of SBS programs. How fantastic would it be to have some radio studios in areas that they are covering? It would be brilliant, and it is incumbent upon the government to advocate for something like this.

Victoria is a multicultural state, I think quite proudly. It is also the fastest growing state in the country, and Melbourne is already bigger than Sydney according to 2023–24 ABS data. You would think that the federal government would recognise this, but no, in December 2024 Minister Rowland made her announcement that SBS would be going to western Sydney. She had the gall to thank the SBS board for that initiative, even though we now know, through that inquiry, that the parameters that the board was given were for western Sydney only. This means that not only did Victoria not have a seat at the table to have those discussions but they were completely bypassed and ignored – that is completely not good enough.

This motion calls on the state government to do their job and advocate for a Melbourne-based SBS headquarters and facilitate the process of setting up one in a multicultural location like Broadmeadows, like Dandenong. By doing this they would be doing a great service to our diverse communities in Melbourne’s north, the south-east and indeed across Victoria. It is so important that our multicultural communities feel valued and respected and have an ability to gain employment but feel connected to a service that they rely upon so much. We want it to be special. It is the Special Broadcasting Service. It should not be the Sydney broadcasting service, but that is what we have seen. SBS have about double the number of employees in Sydney as they do in Victoria. That is just not good enough. We want those jobs here. I have had my criticisms of the ABC over time, but we want those ABC jobs in Melbourne too. Yet the ABC makes the decision to go to Parramatta, and Victoria do not blink an eyelid because they are not actively at the table fighting for those jobs and what it means to Victoria.

This motion can go either of two ways. It can descend into a lot of silliness or it can be a genuine, united call from this chamber for an SBS presence in Victoria. It can be the genuine start of a conversation, not just one in the Labor caucus, but one where important decisions are made. It can be one that kickstarts some of the ministers – the minister for the arts or the Minister for Multicultural Affairs or the Premier – to sit down and have a conversation with the federal Labor government, the Prime Minister for Sydney, and say, ‘You gave this commitment to SBS in western Sydney. We would like an equivalent commitment. Not only would we like it, we demand it.’ It is incumbent on all of our leaders to take action on behalf of their communities. I know both Hume and Dandenong, and other councils, have all called for this. Many of us have worked with those councils and communities and want to see this become a reality. I commend this motion to the house.

David LIMBRICK (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (16:12): I also would like to talk about the SBS and potentially moving it to Victoria. I am a bit puzzled by some of Mr Mulholland’s comments about the SBS, and I will tell you why. When I was a young man I used to watch SBS a lot, and the reason I watched it was because I was living in the 20th century and it was difficult to watch foreign movies. We have a very large immigrant population in Australia, many of them with foreign-language-speaking backgrounds, and it was probably very difficult for them to watch television in their own language as well. So I can see how historically it would have had some importance for those communities. My family is a member of the culturally and linguistically diverse community, and I am the only person in my house that has even heard of the SBS. Everyone in my house is bilingual, and no-one has heard of the SBS except for me, because I used to watch it when I was younger.

The south-east is a very diverse area, as Mr Mulholland pointed out, and I have both friends of my family and friends of my kids from the Chinese, Malaysian, Indonesian, Indian, Russian and Ukrainian communities, just about every community that you can imagine, and I have never heard any of them talk about the SBS. I certainly do not know of any of them watching the SBS or listening to SBS radio, and that is because just about all of these communities can watch the shows themselves. My wife watches Japanese television all the time. You can just watch it over the internet. You can watch anything you want over the internet. Even before streaming services were really popular, I know lots of people from the Chinese community and the Middle Eastern community – you used to see those big dishes on the tops of their houses. And that was not because they were watching SBS; they were watching their own country’s television from satellite TV. That is why you used to see those satellite dishes everywhere. You do not see them so much anymore because you do not really need them anymore, because you can just watch it over the internet, like my family does, quite commonly.

But the other weird thing about all of this is: with the SBS, I do not understand why it needs government funding at all. Now, I know Mr Mulholland’s ex-colleagues at the Institute of Public Affairs did a lot of work on privatising the ABC, but with the SBS there is an even better case: it is already semicommercial; they have already got advertisements. You just increase the amount of advertisements a bit, change the streaming service to a subscription service like every other service that people access these days and defund it, and if people want to watch it, they can pay for it, like everything else that happens here. Instead we want to move 1319 employees to Victoria. I suppose it is nice to have lots of employees and stuff, but I do not see why taxpayers should be funding this at all.

The other reason that the SBS used to exist – it still exists, but you know, not many people watch it, I do not think, these days – was so that Australians could watch foreign movies and be exposed to foreign content and see subtitles and stuff. I was always interested in foreign movies; I used to watch lots of weird Spanish and French movies on SBS when I was younger.

Michael Galea: Which ones?

David LIMBRICK: Lots of them, actually, and a few Japanese movies too. But it just astounds me these days that anyone thinks that – like, one of the top-rating television shows in Australia now is Korean, Squid Game. You can watch it in Korean. We happily watch foreign television all the time on just about any streaming service, whether it is Netflix or any of these other ones. You can watch foreign movies, foreign TV shows, whatever you like; you can just pay for it and watch it, and some of it is really great content. I am a fan of Squid Game myself. It is a bit scary, but it is an interesting concept. I love watching some Korean TV shows and Japanese TV shows. I can watch TV shows from any part of the world, any time I want, on a streaming service, and I do not need the taxpayer to fund it for me. I do not need the SBS to choose what I see.

And here is another problem with the SBS: the SBS chooses what content they are going to show to Australian audiences. Let me tell you, that is a problem in itself. There are two problems here. One, you might be familiar: a while ago the local Vietnamese community, the very large Vietnamese community in South-East Metro, were very upset with the SBS because they were showing stuff that was effectively the Vietnamese government’s propaganda, the very government that they escaped to come to Australia as refugees from. They were not very happy about it at all. And I will tell you another thing –

Michael Galea: Bad decision – they should be shut down.

David LIMBRICK: Well, that was it. They were very upset about it. And I will tell you another thing: I have spoken to members of the local Japanese community about some of the stuff that SBS shows, and SBS only seems to show some of the weirdest stuff. They show this weird, fringe stuff from Japan that no-one has ever heard of. The Japanese people that I have spoken to are absolutely horrified that this is what their culture is being shown as to Australians; luckily hardly anyone watches it. But they are absolutely horrified that this has been portrayed as normal Japanese culture when it is really weird, fringe stuff that the SBS seems to choose. It always has been; that is why people used to watch it, because they liked the weird, fringe stuff. I used to like the weird, fringe stuff, too, to be honest. So I do not support moving the SBS and having a physical presence; I support the SBS not having a physical presence anywhere.

Jacinta ERMACORA (Western Victoria) (16:18): Well, well, well. I found it amusing to be lectured to about the arts and creative industry by those opposite in this motion here. I really have enjoyed listening to this debate, even though it has only just started. What we usually get from those opposite us is cuts and defunding for the arts and creative industries, and I think it is awesome that you are not only supportive of the SBS but that there is a real sense of synergy around the inclusiveness between Victoria and the content and vision and purpose of the SBS. To me, that is a by-default way of saying that you endorse the inclusiveness of our government and our commitment to the diversity of our government and our commitment to the diversity of the Victorian community. And what better match than having SBS in Victoria?

I think that is an awesome idea. I am amazed, given what we hear both economically and data-wise from you opposite all the time – that the sky is falling in – that then you finally owned up that we have got the highest population growth. Thank you for saying that, because it is actually true. Our economy is growing in Victoria. Again, another accidental admission that you know deep down that things are going reasonably well in Victoria. There is always something to do and there are always things to fix, but things are going a lot better than what those opposite actually say. Usually we hear all of this stuff running us down.

I actually originally thought that this motion was another way of saying, ‘Don’t look at us. Don’t look at the fights that we are having within our own party here in Victoria, within the Liberal Party. We’ll just have a chat about something from Sydney for 90 minutes.’ That is what I really thought was behind this. But now I can see there is a real passion and support for the principles of the SBS and for the diversity of our state, and on that basis I will now respond to the motion. I believe the motion will be amended in a few minutes time by agreement, which is good.

A member: A Liberal initiative, the SBS – Macolm Fraser’s government.

David Davis: And my good friend Petro Georgio.

Jacinta ERMACORA: What an awesome small-l liberal he was, yes. There does not seem to be much of that going on in this chamber.

David Davis: He was. I went to his funeral recently.

Jacinta ERMACORA: Yes, it was a great loss. I will take that up, yes. I acknowledge the contribution of Petro Georgiou to Victoria.

I will go on to backing, broadly speaking, what you are saying, but I cannot resist highlighting just how much the Allan Labor government is supporting the creative industries in Victoria, and in that regard it makes us well placed to host a move of the SBS to Victoria should that come about. We already have a thriving screen industry, strongly supported by the state government through VicScreen, the state’s creative and economic screen development agency. Only a couple of weeks ago I had the honour of visiting the set of I think Victoria’s first-ever Apple TV production that is being made. It is a series called The Dispatcher, and I guess it is a bit of a secret what it is about – they did not tell us that. They were shooting in Warrnambool, and they were explaining to us just how many jobs were being created, and we could see it. Hotels were full, the community and the restaurants were buzzing, and that was all because of Apple’s production of this series, which we will see next year sometime, but also the role that VicScreen plays. I met VicScreen representatives there at Flagstaff Hill in Warrnambool, and it was terrific to hear how supportive and passionate they are about the Victorian screen industry. When I then later conversed with the producers of the program, they quietly said to me how absolutely supportive VicScreen are for their production and their industry. It is not often that industries actually talk about how wonderful government departments are at supporting their industries. I am thrilled to mention that in this debate, because we are sort of being accused of not supporting creative industries and not bothering, but in actual fact we are very carefully and intelligently investing in the screen industry in Victoria.

The government’s first screen strategy, VicScreen, aimed to put Victoria at the forefront of the global screen entertainment boom, and it helped secure the state’s reputation as a global destination for screen and games production. The strategy is in its final stages and is expected to create 44,000 jobs and generate $1.7 billion in direct economic expenditure in Victoria. The Victorian screen rebate and the Victorian Production Fund helped fuel the pipeline of local, national and international projects across film, television and digital games, as well as visual effects, animation and post-production work.

The producers were talking to me about the trainees that they have on the project. They are all Victorian trainees, including trainees with all abilities and diverse and inclusive trainees, which is very, very important. Then of course half the community put their hand up to be extras, as usually happens. I think it is a really positive thing that we do invest in creative industries and the screen industry in Victoria. I am very proud that The Dispatcher is being shot in my regional community, in Portland and Warrnambool, but also in other parts of Victoria.

In closing, I would just comment on Mr Limbrick’s contribution. I am no expert, but I suspect that his ‘You can get it overseas’ approach to SBS might be a little bit reductionist in that I suspect that what SBS has to offer is an Australian interpretation of multicultural and diverse communities and a contextualising of those multicultural communities within Australia. Yes, it provides international movies and products made overseas, but I think it is the Australian context that really helps, that gelling of our most successful migration program in the world, so much so that 50 per cent of Australians either were born overseas or their parents were born overseas – and I can see people from migrant communities sitting in this chamber right at this moment who could probably attest to that statistic.

All up, I think SBS coming to Melbourne would be a great thing to happen. I think it would reflect the diversity of our community, and it would reflect the support of our government and the new support of the opposition to diversity and inclusion and multiculturalism in our community. I will leave my contribution there, and I look forward to hearing some of the other contributions.

Richard WELCH (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (16:28): I am pleased to rise on Mr Mulholland’s motion 892. I thoroughly endorse everything Mr Mulholland said about the fact that this is in a sense a very proudly parochial motion championing Victoria and championing Victoria multiculturalism. In some real senses Victoria has led the way on a successful multicultural society, creating a template for many other areas in Australia that followed our lead in the postwar period and beyond. We have a special role to play, we have special needs, we have an audience and we have communities that would have an augmented sense of their value when seeing the government reflect their value in the institutions it builds around them, and that includes SBS.

But I want to take a slight detour in some of this as well, because I think there is also a broader theme. Those who are old enough can remember the comedic interviews between John Clarke and Bryan Dawe – you know, the end fell off the boat and those ones. Well, there was one that they did in a similar vein where John Clarke was being interviewed and he was constantly substituting the word ‘Australia’ with ‘Sydney’, so it was the ‘Australia Symphony Orchestra’ et cetera, and every time Bryan Dawe corrected him, he said, ‘Yeah, that’s right, Sydney.’ What we saw in the 1980s and early 90s in Australia was a cultural drift, an economic drift and a corporate drift from Melbourne to Sydney. We saw lots of corporate headquarters go to Sydney. We certainly saw Melbourne lose its crown as the banking capital of Australia to Sydney. We also saw the ABC retreat. Once, the Melbourne part of ABC was the crown jewel; it retreated into Sydney and we saw similar with the SBS.

In some senses all the other things that have been mentioned are true in that this is about multiculturalism and supporting multiculturalism in a practical way, but it is also a genuine, practical thing that we as Victorians should not allow ourselves to fall into – this cultural, economic drift away from the state – because centres of gravity pull things unto themselves and they gather more unto themselves as they go. That is always going to be the case between Melbourne and Sydney in particular. If you allow it to happen, it will happen. It will happen very normally. What we have seen is the fact that Melbourne was not even put into the discussion – it was not even in consideration, in effect. You can see that happening in real time. One decision leads to another decision, and then other options get closed out and we get closed out of the conversation.

We are Australia’s biggest city by far now, and there are other comparisons that mean that we are even bigger again if you include Geelong and things like that. We are entitled to our share of the cultural capital of the nation, whether that is festivals, whether that is public servants who serve the nation, but absolutely cultural capital in terms of the arts and in terms of broadcasting services that serve us, who are just under 25 to 30 per cent of the nation’s population but getting roughly 12 per cent of the expenditure on these things. We know that it supports an ecosystem. It is not the mere fact of broadcasting; it is the skills that are called on and needed so that we can then have pathways for people pursuing the arts in our community, many of them from the multicultural communities in particular, so that people from our community can see themselves represented in the media. I think of all our communities – the Indian community, the Chinese Australian community, the Somalian community.

One thing I have learned around the world is every city that is multicultural has in a sense its own style of multiculturalism based on who has come to the place. In London it is a very Indian and Pakistani multiculturalism, and it gives it a distinct flavour. In Australia it used to be heavy Greek and Italian influences, and now we have got greater Chinese, Indian and Sri Lankan influences. They are all equal and interesting in their own way. But they are distinct in their own way, and Melbourne’s particular version of it is not represented properly on the national stage, because the key tool by which it is amplified is missing. We have somewhere between 12 and 15 per cent of SBS employees coming out of Melbourne. We occupy barely one floor of one building in Federation Square. That is it. That is the whole of it. No-one can tell me that that does not have knock-on effects in terms of who gets asked to do what, where the ecosystem sprawls out to, who gets engaged with, who is the easy phone call, who can come in at short notice – all these things cascade out.

I would like to see us parochially do the right thing for Victoria and fight for Victoria. Stop the cultural drift. Reverse it: let Sydney argue why they should have it, rather than us having to stand here arguing why we have not got it. There should be no natural default to Sydney on these things, and yet there is. I endorse Mr Mulholland’s comments. Let us not make this political; let us make this Victorian. We are entitled to better. We should stick up for the community. If we are not sticking up for the Victorian multicultural community, who else is going to on the national stage? It is our job to do it, so let us do it. We should have SBS headquartered here. Why shouldn’t we? Why wouldn’t we be ambitious like that? We should have more of the ABC pie to boot, and anything else that comes along we should have our share of it, because (a) we have got the talent, (b) we have got the community that would value it and benefit from it and (c) it is our job to make sure that these things happen.

I warmly, warmly endorse Mr Mulholland’s motion. I think whatever the fate of this motion, it is something we should not drop. I think we should go on and pursue this further over the next couple of years in particular.

Aiv PUGLIELLI (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (15:59): I rise to contribute, on behalf of the Greens, to motion 892 in Mr Mulholland’s name. In reflecting on this motion, it notes that the Special Broadcasting Service is one of two government-funded national broadcasters, both of which are currently based in Sydney; highlights figures based within the SBS report 2023–24 which recognise Victoria as having the highest proportion of population born overseas in the country; highlights that Melbourne’s population is increasing faster than Sydney’s and is becoming increasingly multicultural; lists a range of other points expressing concern, further concern and condemnation in some parts; and ultimately calls on the Allan Labor government to advocate for a Melbourne-based SBS headquarters and to facilitate a process of setting such a headquarters up in a multicultural Melbourne location like Broadmeadows or Dandenong, or as has been mentioned, it could also be in other locations.

The debate so far has been quite interesting. We have heard advocacy for a privatised SBS. We have heard advocacy for a paid streaming service over a free SBS, and that sounds like quite a hellish landscape to me. I think something that is universal and does unite people across our communities, irrespective of your political leanings, is access to free arts and news media and access to free viewing of sport, for example. These are things that are universal goods that we all benefit from, and whether you watch the programming or not, these are a universal good. Reverting to a world where it is user pays and those with means have access I think is a less equal world, and that is not one that I would want to look forward to.

I think there has been also concern raised around policing of the content that is shown on SBS. I think this probably is not the place, the forum, for that. I imagine you could contact the SBS and make a complaint if you have any concerns about what they are showing, but I do not think this motion, this debate today, is the place for it.

From what I have seen and heard in the chamber today, I think there is going to be a bit of argy-bargy over potential amendments to the wording of this motion about who said what and when, whether someone was forced or not forced. That detail, that granularity, I think is going to be borne out in those discussions over the amendments in the remaining 39 minutes or so on this motion, so I am not going to be drawn into that. I think that will hopefully resolve in a basis where we have got some more consensus around this issue. What I am going to focus on is paragraph 6, which is hopefully where we are going to land, and that is calling on this state Labor government to advocate for a Melbourne-based SBS headquarters, focusing on that issue here. I think having a production hub, as highlighted in paragraph 6, in a multicultural part of Melbourne means local jobs and means local stories. It means local embedded storytelling and really multigenerational pathways for shaping what the stories are that we are telling, how we are telling them and how we are centring Melbourne as a thriving city in this country, as a leading city in this country, in our news and arts and media landscape. I think having a hub would be a fantastic thing, and I think it is incumbent on us as state parliamentarians here, sitting in Melbourne right now, to advocate for such a service. I think it would be quite un-Victorian not to, frankly. We deserve our fair share of representation, in both media and working in production behind the scenes. Looking at point (1)(b) in the motion:

… according to the SBS report, 2023–24, of the 1319 SBS staff, 80 per cent were based in New South Wales, while only 14 per cent were based in Victoria …

To me that is a concerning figure. We are a huge city in this country. We are a thriving city. I think we have a lot of stories to tell. We have a lot of talent, both on camera – on air – and behind the scenes. I think we should be seeing a much more significant uplift in representation on our government-funded national broadcasters with Melbournians and Victorians being represented in those roles. That figure does concern me, and I do think we should be trying to do what we can to increase our representation there.

When I reflect on a few years prior to entering this Parliament, coming out of a fine arts institution where many of my colleagues now work – some are on camera or in more performative roles, I suppose, and others are working in production, working in a range of different fields, some in news media in different parts of this country, some also abroad – something that I reflect on is when we finishing that degree, the process that you go through of showcasing what you have been working on in those tertiary studies, the skills that you have accrued in that training and honing your craft in whatever form it may be within the arts and production sector, at that time, and I would say this is still the case today, the east coast of this country was predominantly where a lot of the employment opportunities were based coming out of that degree. The particular one I did at the end was based in Perth, and everyone was literally flown over to Melbourne and to Sydney to showcase what had been learned in that institution to different forms of representation, to professionals in those two cities.

Something that was really quite incredible to reflect on is that of the 20 or so of us that were in that cohort graduating, it ultimately became a choice of whether people would settle in either Melbourne or Sydney. Inevitably there is this comparison of what opportunities were based in those locations. As a born and bred Melburnian, I cannot possibly imagine living long term in Sydney – I actually did it for a year back in the day, and it is not something that I could continue to do. Perhaps if you really liked beaches, potentially you could see that pathway, and for colleagues who did ultimately move there, I am convinced that is why they are there, because I cannot imagine any other reason for being there. I think Melbourne has so much to offer.

When we consider what is in this motion today about establishing an SBS hub, what we are reflecting on is having an ongoing, multigenerational production hub and base for employment for that local storytelling in our state. That is where I do think it is incumbent on us to advocate for such a hub, because when you look at, as I believe Mr Welch described it, a centre of gravity being placed in a part of Melbourne, you are having that ongoing employment in a range of different fields through that service. The ripple effect it has across the community is really profound, and where we do see arts and news media organisations continuing over the years in different parts of the country, that is the ripple effect. Having more of those hubs available when I was graduating would have seen more of my colleagues considering Melbourne more strongly as a place in which to base yourself, because ultimately if there are more jobs and opportunities here, that is where those creators, those production staff and administrative staff and other staff will go. We are considering something that is going to have that significant ongoing ripple effect and impact into the future.

This is about whose stories are told, it is about where they are told and it is about embedding that storytelling and that ongoing vision physically in our state. I think it is something that we should be embracing. I think, again, there is going to be argy-bargy over parts of this motion, but ideally we can work through that and hone in on this goal of having that Melbourne-based SBS headquarters. I will leave my contribution there. May the debate continue.

Michael GALEA (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (16:44): I rise to also add my voice to the team Victoria debate this afternoon, and it is with great enthusiasm that I do so. In August 2023 Mr Davis first moved a motion about this matter in this place. I was due to be the first government speaker, but it was timed out and I never got to give my contribution, so I am very excited to be here today, albeit 22 months later. I am not sure if the urgency is quite as those speakers opposite are leading us to believe. It is a bit of a long wait between motions, but I am grateful to Mr Mulholland for picking up the mantle from Mr Davis on this motion.

I am not so grateful to you for picking up Mr Davis’s mantle on housing, but that is another debate. I am grateful to you for picking up the mantle on this motion, because it is an opportunity for us to talk about the creative industries in Victoria, the significant contribution it makes and what is – I will come to some of the details of the motion shortly – in a broad sense, a very good motion in the fact that it highlights, as Mr Puglielli was just referring to as well, the disparity of Victoria’s share of both SBS and also ABC jobs in this state. You always are going to have headquarters somewhere, and it is perfectly understandable and reasonable that that particular location will have the larger share. But we are the fastest growing state in the nation. Indeed I believe Mr Mulholland even referred to us as ‘the thriving state’, which we are. And it is wonderful, as Ms Ermacora said, to see a change in tone from those opposite from constantly running this state down to deciding to put on that navy blue jersey with the big white ‘V’ on it and say, ‘We’re all team Victoria today.’ I am not sure about Mr Limbrick. It was a very interesting contribution by Mr Limbrick. In fact I have to disagree with him. I have spoken to people in the south-east who do very much value and enjoy the SBS. Indeed it provides many programs that are relevant to some of the many multicultural communities in my electorate and I know for members across this chamber as well. It goes to the commentary again from Mr Puglielli that it is part of an ecosystem.

We also have a great range of diverse and new media emerging in our communities, and in particular in our multicultural communities. We could all name many, I am sure, fledgling or in some cases thriving local multicultural media organisations, like the Australian Multicultural Media Centre, and there are many others I could mention just that I have dealt with in my region alone. But bringing the SBS into Victoria does not run counter to that. It would be a great way in fact to support that and provide that work, support that ecosystem and support the continuation of a rich media landscape that we so very much deserve in the state of Victoria.

As I said, I do appreciate Mr Mulholland bringing this motion in today. I think it may perhaps be a bit of a departure for him as well, coming from his old days at the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA). So I am glad to see you have at least come on board for one policy. I think in 2012 they issued a report which was ironically called ‘Be Like Gough’, which recommended breaking up the ABC. Recommendation 1 was to privatise the SBS, which is an outrageous proposition.

Evan Mulholland interjected.

Michael GALEA: You were not there then. I am glad to see that you have hopefully turned their minds around too, Mr Mulholland. Now it is up to you to get Mr Limbrick on board. But beyond that, I think the whole chamber can be fully supportive, and I hope you have changed some hearts and minds at the IPA too and extolled to them the virtues of this wonderful organisation, because it is a wonderful organisation. It provides a very unique type of media and entertainment and news and factual information as well to communities that often do not get to have their voices, their stories, represented in the broader mainstream media. Broader mainstream media is definitely improving. If you look at just where we have come in the past 20 years, there has been a great deal of improvement. You might well say there is more to go. But when it comes to the SBS, you have always had a home for multicultural audiences and for those other, shall we say, quirky or unusual tastes as well, which the SBS is always happy to go into that other broadcasters may not. And that is literally how we have seen phenomena in Australia, cultural phenomena such as the Eurovision Song Contest, become such a big deal. It is because of the SBS. And it is a very, very treasured and valuable national institution that we have.

So with the repudiation of those ill-conceived thoughts of the IPA that were – and I will take his comments – before Mr Mulholland’s time there, I hope, from all members opposite, it is good to see a motion in support of both the public broadcaster and public broadcasting jobs being moved to the great state of Victoria. And whether it is Broadmeadows, whether it is Dandenong – I think it should be Dandenong – or whether it is Werribee or anywhere else, we have many, many locations. I am happy to fight Minister Erdogan on that subject, and we could have great debate about that. What a fortunate situation that would be for us to be in. Twenty-two months later, though, I believe the decision is probably finalised now. It may or may not be, but it is nevertheless valiant and worthwhile and an opportunity for us to come together in perhaps agreement today. Perhaps we may have one dissenting voice. We will see.

There are many parts of this motion which are quite reasonable, whether it is point (1), point (2) or point (6). I do note that in Mr Mulholland’s remarks he did talk about the spirit of team Victoria and hoped that we could come together above politics and above partisanship. It is in that spirit that I would like to now move an amendment which omits paragraph (5).

I move:

1. In paragraph (4), omit ‘initiative;’ and replace it with ‘initiative; and’.

2. Omit all words and expressions in paragraph (5).

Full credit and full marks to Mr Mulholland for having a crack and putting this point across. I would be surprised if he did not use the opportunity to have a bit of a cheeky crack where he could, and I hope he would agree that the simple removal of this one particular paragraph can make the motion a lot more agreeable to and supportable by members if not 100 per cent but fairly broadly supportable across the chamber, and there are some ancillary changes to paragraph (4) too in relation to the word ‘and’. But the substantive part of this amendment that I am moving is to remove paragraph (5) and go straight from (4) to (6), because if we are here to be on team Victoria and if we are to support what is, if this amendment is supported, a very good motion today, it is about working together for team Victoria so that we can see some good things happen.

Of course we already see a lot of great things happen in the state of Victoria when it comes to the creative industries. Ms Ermacora referred to the significant amount of support for VicScreen. We had a $46 million investment in the Docklands Studios provided by this government to really turbocharge the film and TV production that already takes place in this state. Indeed a great deal of movies and TV shows are filmed in Victoria – in Melbourne and in regional Victoria. I have mentioned the Foxtel show High Country before. We have also got many movies where Melbourne is used as a backdrop for usually American cities but all around the world. This has become a great and thriving hub.

It is through investments such as you will see this year in the budget papers. Over the forward estimates there is more than $400 million towards supporting Victoria’s creative agencies. There is $50.2 million over the forward estimates specifically for Victoria’s screen economy, an investment made as part of this budget. There are many, many things that we have to be proud of in this state when it comes to the creative industries. Again, not to mention it too much, but it does cover all topics so it makes it easy to reference, but being on the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee as well we heard of some of many initiatives and many great things that are happening already in the state of Victoria. That is in very large part, in very significant part, thanks to the investment and the support from the Allan Labor government. I note the interest and passion of Minister Brooks in this space as well in pursuing these opportunities and in making sure that Melbourne and Victoria and all corners of it have these opportunities.

The motion that we have before us today specifically relates to the SBS. With some other members in this place, although I am not a full member of the committee, I did have the opportunity to take part in some of the hearings, including with the SBS, and a few of us were putting that case forward to them. I note again the very significant contribution that they make to all corners of this nation and to our state, whether it is through multicultural media most importantly, whether it is through the NITV services as well supporting our Indigenous committees or whether it is the extensive work that they have been doing and continue to do in the career space too, including at a time when many other media providers were completely absent from that space. We do have a lot to be thankful to the SBS for. It is a terrific organisation, and it can only be more thoroughly improved by having more of its work coming out of the great state of Victoria.

David DAVIS (Southern Metropolitan) (16:54): I am pleased to rise and make a contribution on motion 892 in Mr Mulholland’s name. This follows the inquiry undertaken by the Economy and Infrastructure Committee, the report of which will be tabled in this chamber I think tomorrow. I might be wrong, but it is imminent. The inquiry heard significant evidence. Victoria is Australia’s second-largest state. It is its second-largest economy. Melbourne is the largest city. It is the most multicultural city. We are the most diverse state of all the states. SBS should be based in Melbourne, probably in the north or in the south-east of Melbourne, one or the other, where it can fully reflect the diverse nature of Australia’s and Melbourne’s population as well.

There is no justification for Australia having two government-funded national broadcasters, both of them based in Sydney and both of them recently moving huge chunks of their economic resources into western Sydney. It is an absolute outrage. We know that these are funded largely by taxpayers and they actually deliver very important outcomes for the community, but one of the important outcomes they deliver is a whole set of linkage jobs – production jobs, back-of-house work – employment and skills for a range of different professionals. For those resources to be concentrated in Sydney, and western Sydney in particular, is an absolute – I am tempted to use a word that I could not use in here – outrage. And the idea that the federal government would actually take the decision to move them there, commit money to moving them there, and to reject any opportunity for Victoria to take part – I mean, I wrote to the SBS inquiry and I –

Ryan Batchelor interjected.

Members interjecting.

David DAVIS: You agree with that, do you? You agree that one of them should be based here?

Ryan Batchelor: Your lot want to privatise the SBS and defund the ABC.

David DAVIS: I have never said that. I have always been respectful of both organisations, and I have always been active in ensuring that resources come to Victoria. Taxpayers resources should be spent in a way that reflects the Australian population and not in a way that respects the Sydney population alone. It is just simply absolutely outrageous. And the idea of an 80 per cent spread of resources in Sydney for the SBS and only 14 to 18 per cent here in Melbourne, given the very significant multicultural population here, is just completely and utterly unacceptable.

It is something that I think all Victorians can agree on and all Victorian MPs can agree on, that we should be prepared to campaign and to pressure the federal government, whatever its colour – I do not care what colour it is. The resources should come here. I led a campaign in the 1990s to try and move ABC resources to Melbourne, and I did that because we were, a little bit as outlined by Mr Welch, repeatedly losing more and more to Sydney, and yet here was a government-funded organisation where the same drift to Sydney was occurring. That was actually under a Liberal government, and I was very prepared to go and campaign strongly and say, ‘You need to move those resources to Melbourne.’ We actually need to have those resources here. It is about the future of our production, it is about the future of artistic activity, it is about the future of a whole range of matters, in this case with SBS, around our multicultural communities.

It is true that decisions are often made by boards that are hopelessly stacked with people from one particular region, and the ABC board has been such a board. The SBS board has not been sufficiently balanced either. Indeed the decision by Michelle Rowland, the then communications minister, to launch an inquiry into moving SBS to western Sydney was simply outrageous. I wrote to her and I wrote to the SBS board and said, ‘We need to actually look at this more closely before you head off on this frolic spending public money to further centralise resources for the long haul in Sydney.’ This is absolutely nuts and it is something that we have got to stand up against, and I think today in the chamber we are actually beginning to stand up for it. We are beginning to say that enough is enough. The inquiry will have had some effect.

Even if we only move $10 million of activity to Victoria, that is a huge win. If we move $50 million worth of activity to Victoria, that is a bigger win. If we move $500 million worth of spending and activity, that would be a good target for Victoria. Half a billion dollars of money moved from government-funded national broadcasters based in Sydney – a $500 million move would be the sort of move that would actually start to rebalance it properly and make it fairer. Anyone who knows anything about multiplier effects in economics will know that this is a huge amount of economic activity, a huge amount of jobs, a huge amount of linkage into production and all of the back-of-house activities and the artistic activities associated with these broadcasters.

Then there is the question of simply who these organisations are reflecting. The SBS charter requires it to reflect the Australian community. How can you reflect Australia’s second-largest city, the second-largest population in the state, when you have only 14 per cent of the resources in this state? How can you possibly reflect that? When you look at the diversity of our state and the significance of the concentration in Melbourne and Sydney – those two great cities – of our multicultural populations, the underdone nature of the spending in Victoria becomes a very big problem for this state, and we need to really push back very hard on this.

Mr Mulholland has very successfully and sensibly brought this this motion forward. I pay tribute to the inquiry and the work that was done there, and I also pay tribute to Ms Purcell and her work chairing that inquiry. This is a very important set of steps, and we can build a strong bipartisan consensus on this matter in this chamber and actually have a very big influence on the future of Victoria and Melbourne. We need to come together on this, and we need to make it clear it does not matter which colour the government in Canberra is. It does not matter which colour, whether it is Labor and Greens or Labor or Liberals and Nationals in the future, we need to make sure that Victoria is given a commensurate share of the spending and the activity on all levels that reflects its population and reflects, in the case of SBS, the multicultural nature of that population.

I was very pleased that a number of councils have stepped forward on this. Dandenong and Monash both stepped forward, and I know since that time I think Hume have stepped forward and said, ‘We would actually be prepared to work with government and find a location and even potentially commit resources to have that reflected properly and to see a move of one of these headquarters to Melbourne and SBS in particular to Melbourne.’ More resources here, less resources in western Sydney – more resources here to reflect our community and bolster our economy and the spending and the industry that is so important in Victoria.

I want to just say one thing here. We need to also be very clear with our federal colleagues – both parties, both groups – and say to them, ‘Enough is enough. Victoria has had enough of being taken for granted. We have had enough of you tearing the money out of our state and sending only paltry amounts back into this state.’ This is actually on a wider front. This is one very important area that we are talking about today with SBS, but it is a broader tendency, a broader trend that has occurred across recent decades of activity in Victoria where we have been funding more and getting less. We have been supporting other mendicant states, and that is the story of the Federation. When I was a minister I got some figures taken out which showed very, very clearly that Victoria is the only state that had been a donor state for every year of the Federation. Every single year we had sent more to Canberra than had returned from Canberra. You ask: how long can that go on for? It is still happening. There has been a recent rebalancing in the GST, that is true, but that is only one stream of funding. Here is another very big stream of funding: hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars on public broadcasting, and we should have our fair share.

John BERGER (Southern Metropolitan) (17:04): I rise to contribute to Mr Mulholland’s motion on the Special Broadcasting Service, or SBS, and his proposal to advocate for its move to a Melbourne-based headquarters. It sets out his wish that this chamber express concern to the Commonwealth government over the proposal to relocate the SBS headquarters to western Sydney rather than to suburbs of Melbourne, such as Broadmeadows or Dandenong. The SBS was created by Malcolm Fraser’s Liberal government in 1975, but much less known, however, is the history of broadcasting in Australia to multicultural communities and how it evolved over time. The purpose of the SBS was to broadcast news services and bulletins to migrant communities in a variety of languages as more and more people moved to Australia after we ended the White Australia policy. When that was brought to the end by the Holt Liberal and Whitlam Labor governments, attention was drawn to how to accommodate the needs of people who may not fluently speak English, and with that the Commonwealth began forming the strategy.

Initially the broadcasting minister under Gough Whitlam’s government executed a trial of limited stations broadcasting in different languages, those stations being 2EA and 3EA in Sydney and Melbourne respectively, especially for migrant communities that did not speak English. This formed the basis of the eventual panel convened by the Fraser government which established the SBS as an early radio network across Australia with the purpose of relaying news and media by air to a multi-ethnic audience. It became one of the two national broadcasters run by the Australian government, alongside the ABC.

As the motion sets out, the SBS has grown quite substantially over the years; it now has 1319 staff, 80 per cent of whom are based in New South Wales while the other 14 per cent are based in Victoria. The motion makes the observation that Victoria is growing, and that is something that I could not agree more with the member on. Victoria is growing, and it is growing fast. By 2051 we will have the same population in Melbourne that London has today, and we are the most diverse city in the country. More and more migrants are coming to Melbourne from all corners of the world and adding to the rich culture of this city and Victoria. Much like Melbourne, Sydney is also booming with activity. Sydney, especially western Sydney, is a much more vibrant and active place, with migrants from all around the world settling in. It is a move that has required a great deal of investment by the government over in New South Wales, whether it be in the redevelopment of Parramatta, the light rail expansion, the Metro or western Sydney airport – you name it.

Just as New South Wales is investing in its west, so is the Allan Labor government. Whether it be the $4 billion upgrade to the Sunshine transport hub to build a new centre of economic activity for the west or the extension of the rail capacity for the airport rail link, this government has been seriously investing in infrastructure and economic activity for the west. I think this is where the key difference is: migrant communities care about economic investment and development, because in the end that is what helps their material standards – a train to the airport, more frequent trains, more economic development and opportunities to get ahead. Headquartering the SBS in Melbourne would be a nice idea, but this motion is not about making a substantial difference to multicultural communities in these fields, it is just about making a statement. It is a grasp at straws, because the hard reality is that these communities are being supported by the Allan Labor government. What is the groundbreaking policy shift those opposite are suggesting? Is it to build more roads, to build capacity for more rail services or to build more homes here? The answer is no. They are all about their main issue, which is that SBS will be headquartered in western Sydney instead of Melbourne.

The motion says that there is a lost opportunity on a production hub. This is a false outrage. Just a few months ago those opposite stood with the then leader of the federal opposition Peter Dutton and with straight faces tried to explain how ripping $500 million from the Sunshine to airport rail project would actually be in the best interests of Melbourne. The Sunshine superhub is an opportunity to invest in the western suburbs, and it is a game changer for multicultural communities in Melbourne. A snapshot of the area conducted by Brimbank council showed that around 48.2 per cent of people in their council were born overseas. Of these migrants, the most common was –

Evan Mulholland: On a point of order, Mr President, on relevance, I am not sure what rail services have to do with the SBS motion.

The PRESIDENT: Actually I was going to interrupt rather than rule on the point of order, if you do not mind. I was going to interrupt Mr Berger, because I think it is an opportune time to give you a right of reply so we can get a vote in.

Evan MULHOLLAND (Northern Metropolitan) (15:59): Okay. Fair enough. I am happy to sum up. Can I thank everyone sincerely for their contributions. I think it is always good and notable to have motions like this where we can all agree, motions like this where everyone can be on the one page and where everyone can speak with one voice as a Legislative Council. Hopefully this passes with unanimous support. Then I will – but hopefully the minister will, write to the new federal Minister for Communications with the resolution of this chamber attached, having full agreement, to indicate that it is the view of the Victorian Legislative Council, both government and opposition and minor parties, that SBS have a presence in Victoria. I am not quite sure what Ms Ermacora was getting at by saying that SBS values are Labor values, or Labor values are SBS values or something like that, and that we did not support SBS, which is not true – SBS was created under a Liberal government, under Malcolm Fraser. Mr Davis went on to make a contribution about how influential Petro Georgiou was in that.

I would like to thank Mr Puglielli for his contribution and support and also to thank Mr Galea for his contribution. I know he genuinely takes a big interest in this and has a longstanding interest. He does not oppose motions like this – he supports them – which is very good of him. I thank him for his amendment. I thought that in the spirit of bipartisanship we would remove that amendment. Nonetheless, it is true. We have gone from condemning the Albanese Labor government to expressing concern at the Albanese Labor government, which is a polite way of putting things, but it is true. And to be honest, if it had been a Liberal government that made that decision, I think we would be in exactly the same place here. That sends a really powerful message as a chamber to the federal government on behalf of our multicultural communities and on behalf of our production sector, our arts sector; we would like to do that as well. I would be very keen to come back to this chamber about potential tariffs on our creative sector, on our film sector, tariffs that were threatened on our arts community and also move a motion condemning that because that is something that is causing a great amount of angst in our production sector.

Mr Welch and Mr Davis had some good points about the ABC for years and years, in dribs and drabs, moving staff to Sydney. It was interesting that in response to questions about moving to Parramatta the ABC said they could not possibly move to a presence in Victoria because of industrial relations settings, but they could, over years, over decades, move thousands to Sydney from Melbourne. I guess industrial relations did not have anything to do with it in the first place.

I would like to thank everyone for their support on this motion. It is a very important motion. It does send a message that if you live in an area like Broadmeadows or Dandenong, if you come from a migrant background, if you were born overseas or you have got a parent that was born overseas or a grandparent that was born overseas, Victorian members of Parliament want you to feel connected to your community, want SBS to be located in your community and want to see you employed in your community with the jobs that would create. I commend this motion to the house.

Amendment agreed to; amended motion agreed to.