Media companies to front Senate inquiry into Conroy reforms - Sydney Morning Herald

Independent MP Rob Oakeshott does not believe the federal government's proposed media reforms will hurt free speech, but he still won't support the package as it stands.

A Senate committee on Monday will begin looking at the bills and taking evidence from media companies, academics, peak industry bodies and the Australian Press Council.

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy wants a package of six bills passed by both houses of parliament by Thursday, and needs the support of crossbench MPs in the lower house to get it through.

But the independents, the Australian Greens and the Coalition have complained the process has been rushed and Senator Conroy has not allowed proper time to scrutinise the legislation.

Mr Oakeshott says he will wait and see the outcome of the Senate inquiry, but the policy package is ''not there yet''.

''If the voting bells went right now I'd probably be on the negative side,'' he told ABC television on Monday.

He disagreed with claims the proposal for a new public interest media advocate would harm press freedom, calling it ''overblown rhetoric''.

But he questioned whether the reforms were needed at all.

He said it appeared the Press Council had been either ignored or misunderstood in the consultation process and he urged Senator Conroy to engage more with the concerns of stakeholders.

He said the process to date had been ''madness'' and was still moving too fast.

Mr Oakeshott said while he couldn't know for sure, he doubted the legislation would clear the lower house.

Opposition communications spokesman Malcolm Turnbull said the government was threatening freedom of the press for the first time in Australia's peacetime history.

''And all of this, apparently, has to be passed by the end of this week,'' he told reporters in Canberra on Monday.

''We've got committees scrambling to get organised, media executives rushing down to Canberra, all in a vain exercise on the part of Stephen Conroy.''

Freedom of speech and the press would be a key election issue for the Liberal Party, Mr Turnbull said.

Nationals MP Paul Neville, a member of a joint select committee examining potential areas for further reform of broadcasting laws on Monday, said he wouldn't jump to any conclusions before it had finished hearing evidence.

''But there's been a long-standing tradition of freedom of the press in this country, and it will take a lot of convincing to change any of that,'' he said.

Labor MPs insisted that they were adequately briefed last week about the proposals by Senator Conroy, many of which had been on the table for years.

Government backbencher Shayne Neumann said the issue of media reform had been in the public domain for a long time.

''I think this is a moderate sensible approach that the minister's taken,'' he said, adding some elements of the media had been ''hysterical'' in responding to the proposals.

AAP