On 22 February 2016, the Senate referred this inquiry to the committee. The inquiry lapsed at the dissolution of the Senate on 9 May 2016.

On 13 September 2016, the Senate agreed to the committee's recommendation that this inquiry be re-adopted in the 45th Parliament with a reporting date of the 29 March 2017.

All correspondence and evidence previously received for this inquiry has been made available to the new committee. This means that submissions already provided to the committee about this issue do not need to be re-submitted.

The committee intends to refer to the evidence received during the 44th Parliament. The committee also invites new submissions to be provided by 17 October 2016.

Senator Hanson-Young is chair of the references committee for this inquiry.

On 28 March 2017, the Senate granted an extension of time to report until 11 May 2017.