Roger Price (Chifley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I think they might be on the mark, and I think you might agree with me that they are on the mark. There is a problem that I want to refer to, and I must say that I have only recently been made aware of it—that is, petrol companies actually own the petrol that is in the storage tanks of the retailers. Now I am not saying that I want to put an extra burden on the retailers, far from it, but I do say that while the petrol companies own the petrol in those petrol station storage tanks they will have ultimate control of the price. You will not get a free and fair market. I am very keen for the NRMA in their petrol summit in October to have a look at that and to get some advice and see what can be done about overcoming this anomaly.

The other issue I want to raise is ethanol. Mr Deputy Speaker, you know that when it comes to rural industries the National Party will always offer them a ‘funeral option’. What do I mean by that? I mean that when they are in trouble they will always get people out of the industry or they will pay them to get out of the industry. I know the honourable member for Kennedy is very close to the sugar industry, and I say to him: when prices were so low just a few years ago, what a pity we did not have an ethanol initiative then rather than the $600 million to buy people out of industries they had been in for generations. They did it in dairy; they do it in all the industries. They can never get it up over the Liberals in here so all they do is offer the funeral option: ‘Goodbye, you’re finished. We don’t want to know you anymore. Get out of the industry.’

I am keen about ethanol and I always have been. One thing I will say about giving Australian consumers more choice by spending some $17.2 million to allow service stations to have or convert storage tanks into ethanol storage: it is a good thing. I know that in my electorate there is not one petrol station that sells ethanol. Surprise, surprise! Why would that be so? It is that, although the Labor Party many years ago supported the establishment of this industry, we have kept that very minute. I would like to see it a lot stronger. I sincerely hope this measure works, but I do note that there is no monitoring in this, there is no control and there are no targets. There is a total absence of targets.

When there is talk about mandating ethanol, people run up a lot of arguments. I think we ought to look at mandating. I hope the NRMA conference in October gives mandating a good look, if for no other reason than this press release from BP in which they talk about rolling out E10 and which says:

This initiative is due in no small way to the policies of the Federal and Queensland Governments. By incentivising ethanol instead of mandating it, they are ensuring that the benefits will be passed on to consumers.

In my electorate we would just like to have the opportunity to buy ethanol! Notwithstanding the measures in this prime ministerial statement, there is no guarantee that we will see ethanol being offered at one of the service stations in the electorate of Chifley. I say to petrol companies: when you say that you do not like mandating it makes me a bit suspicious. I have never in this House been an advocate for petrol companies. I realise they are necessary bodies and they provide a most important ingredient for my constituents and for the economy but I am inherently instantly suspicious, as any good person from Western Sydney is, of petrol companies.

I read with interest an article about the Holden car company in Australia. They are now manufacturing engines that are capable of taking up to 25 per cent of ethanol. Isn’t that marvellous? Isn’t that wonderful? But the problem is that they are not selling them in Australia. They are exporting them. How ridiculous is that? The honourable member for Batman and the member for Hunter talk about the new technologies, and I totally support their views on that. But what I do say is this: ethanol we have already. There are many people who want to get into producing ethanol and we have to make sure that we have the policy framework right. Last but not least, if the Prime Minister’s target of 350 megalitres of biofuels is achieved by 2010 it will constitute just one lousy per cent of our production. How is this helping our current account deficit? How is this helping sustainability? It is a lousy target. I am sure that we as a country are able to do a lot better than that.

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