Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Finance, Competition Policy and Deregulation) Share this | Hansard source

The Trade Practices Amendment (Access Declarations) Bill 2008 seeks to amend the Trade Practices Act 1974 to clarify that access declarations are not legislative instruments for the purposes of the Legislative Instruments Act 2003. This bill removes uncertainty for the telecommunications sector following a recent Federal Court decision which has made possible legal implications regarding access declarations. By way of background, the telecommunications sector needs clarity in regard to access declarations made by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. Access declarations provide a right of access to declared telecommunications services. They aim to prevent those owning and controlling networks from taking advantage of their position in the market by only providing access on unreasonable terms or conditions. Their purpose is to encourage competition in the telecommunications sector. As we have heard, the recent Federal Court decision Roche Products Pty Ltd v National Drugs and Poison Schedule Committee may have implications relating to access declarations. This decision has created uncertainty as to whether access declarations made by the ACCC may be open to legal challenge on the basis that they are legislative instruments and are invalid as they have not been tabled. The bill provides certainty to the telecommunications sector by clarifying that access declarations are not, and are taken never to have been, legislative instruments for the purposes of the Legislative Instruments Act 2003, and it is for those reasons that the opposition now supports this bill.

It is important at the moment to place some facts on the table in relation to some of these debates, because what has taken place in the Australian community is a rewrite of recent history by the current government. It is important as part of this debate to note some facts in relation to competition in the telecommunications sector. In 1997 the Howard government decided to open up telecommunications to full competition. Back then there were just three telecommunications carriers; by May 2007 there were 167 carriers. From 1997 to 2007 the overall average price of telecommunications service had fallen by over 30 per cent. The flow-on effect to consumers and businesses of cheaper communications services is estimated to have been responsible for adding billions of dollars to the size of our national economy. In fact, from 1996 the coalition government made available for $4.1 billion for broadband and telecommunications funding. As a result, over a million businesses and households have access to broadband. Broadband is a consistently and constantly evolving technology, and the coalition’s programs have evolved with the technology.

When last in government, it is important to recognise, Labor presided over a cosy Telstra-Optus duopoly, which failed to deliver substantial price reductions and left most of the cost savings from technological improvements in the pockets of the carriers and not Australian consumers. The increased competition and other microeconomic reforms—that is, reforms that drive efficiency in the economy—have delivered significant benefits to Australians. In 2005, the Productivity Commission estimated Australia’s GDP as 2.5 per cent higher and Australian households’ annual incomes are on average around $7,000 higher as a result of competition policy. Notable examples of the coalition’s push for greater competition include the airlines, where the coalition liberalised air travel both to and within our country; a landmark open skies agreement that was concluded with New Zealand in 1996; and the fact that greater competition with Qantas has been permitted by carriers such as Singapore Airlines and Emirates and now many others. We also concluded an open skies agreement with Singapore in 2003, which gives unlimited rights to carriers from both countries to operate services between Australia and Singapore. We reformed domestic aviation policy by removing the restriction preventing foreign owned but locally based airlines from operating domestic services in Australia. As a result, we have now seen airlines like Virgin Blue operating here to the undoubted benefit of the travelling public. In fact, between 1996 and 2006, international airline passenger numbers have increased from 13.3 million to 21.5 million, a staggering increase of 62 per cent. Domestic air passengers increased from 27.8 million to 44.2 million, an increase of 63 per cent.

There is a similar story in the energy sector, where the coalition overhauled the national energy market with an eye to generating greater investment in the generation and transmission of electricity and gas. Following the Parer review, the coalition worked with the states to create the Australian Energy Regulator and the Australian Energy Market Commission, national bodies that replaced some 13 state based authorities. And reform continues as more gas and electricity responsibilities are brought under the umbrella of these new national bodies.

In June 2007, the coalition put forward Australia Connected, a nationwide broadband solution that would have revolutionised communications in Australia. The centrepiece of Australia Connected was the immediate rollout of a new competitive state-of-the-art wireless broadband network that would extend high-speed broadband to 99 per cent of the population and provide speeds of 12 megabytes per second by 2009. By 2009, 99 per cent of Australian households and small businesses would have been able to access a high-speed broadband service which would have had the capacity for live video streaming, five-second CD downloads and multichannel television. Importantly, fast speeds would have been delivered to rural and regional customers at prices comparable to what is being charged in metropolitan areas today.

Labor’s plan to spend $4.7 billion of taxpayers’ money on a network that industry is prepared to fund itself is economically irresponsible, and it is the kind of irresponsible behaviour that we have come to know of Labor governments at a state level over the last decade as well. Most importantly, the point that needs to be made is that it does pose another risk to the Australian economy. By unleashing the skill and expertise of the private sector, the coalition would have, in contrast to Labor, delivered universal high-speed broadband to all Australians, regardless of where they live, within two years and at a fraction of the cost of Labor’s plan. Labor’s broadband network will not be completed until 2013 and is likely, at best, to reach only 75 per cent of the population. The fibre-to-the-node technology proposed by Labor is not practical for rural Australia. It will outdate quickly and will likely be already outdated by the time it is completed in 2013.

When I started my comments I made reference to the rewrite of recent history by the Labor government during this honeymoon period of their first few months in government when few are questioning the propositions put forward by members of the government, and there has been no greater rewrite of history in recent weeks and months by the Labor Party than in relation to the state of the Australian economy. It is important to remember as part of these debates that when the previous government came to power in 1996 we inherited a $96 billion debt from the Labor Party, who were also running a $10 billion deficit at that time. It is important as part of this debate to put on the record the reality now faced by the Australian Labor Party. Over the course of 11½ years of the coalition government we repaid all of that $96 billion of debt, saving over $8 billion a year in interest repayment moneys that were then applied to other sectors, including health and education. In addition to paying down that debt, whilst in government we were able to set aside $60 billion into funds in perpetuity to provide support to the Australian economy over the coming decades. We put money into the Future Fund and into funds like the Communications Fund. Through the $2 billion Communications Fund, the coalition provided future-proofing for the bush and ensured its future telecommunication needs would have been met. This perpetual fund was an investment in the future to provide an ongoing source of funding to continually improve services like mobile phone coverage in regional, rural and remote Australia.

Labor is proposing to raid the fund which was set up for Australia’s future and to waste it today. Last week Labor introduced the Telecommunications Legislation Amendment (Communications Fund) Bill 2008, which is set for rigorous debate in the parliament. Labor’s proposal aims to make the fund fair game for any broadband related expenditure considered politically expedient. The bill also aims to open the door for Labor to spend not only the interest earned on investment by the fund but also the $2 billion principal. In fact, last September the parliament passed legislation introduced by the former government to ensure the principal of the Communications Fund did not fall below $2 billion and to protect the fund from misuse. The government’s proposed amendments will remove that safeguard.

We have seen, by way of demonstration when Labor were in government up until 1996 and by the way in which they have managed the states and territories over the last 10 or so years, a complete lack of capacity to provide for the future and to future-proof some of these situations to safeguard the Australian economy against downturns. It is a concern—quite alarming, in fact—that we see in the early days of this government a raiding already of some of those funds.

Labor continues to claim that the coalition has made no plans to invest in our future, but, as I say, that is a hollow claim and, again, part of the rewrite of history when you consider that we have set aside, through the Future Fund, all of those unfunded superannuation liabilities and that we have addressed some of those concerns also in relation to public servant superannuation by closing the PSS and creating the Future Fund to meet those liabilities. We have created not just the Future Fund and the Communications Fund but also the Higher Education Endowment Fund and we have made plans to establish the Health and Medical Investment Fund, among others.

I want to make the point that when Labor came to government on 24 November they inherited an incredibly strong economy. They inherited an economy with unemployment at record lows. They inherited an economy not as we did in 1996 with that massive government debt but an economy with no debt. They inherited an economy which this year will easily deliver a surplus of over 1.5 per cent of GDP. They are running around the country at the moment making great claims that they will achieve a 1.5 per cent surplus in the May budget. If the Labor Party, even with their lack of experience and ability in economic management, do not deliver a surplus of 1.5 per cent or approaching two per cent, then really it will be a startling achievement even by their own low standards. But it is important that all Australians understand that, as we go forward with uncertainty in the US, Europe and Asia, we as a coalition government over the last 11½ years have provided an economy that can withstand many of those shocks. One of the shocks, though, that the Australian economy can never withstand is management by the Labor Party in government. That is something that nobody will ever be able to protect the Australian economy against, because Labor love to spend, they love to tax and they love to drive confidence down. That is what the incompetent Treasurer, Mr Swan, has been doing over recent months—a man who already has been identified not just by those in his own party and ours but by commentators in the financial world, both here and internationally, as somebody who is completely and utterly out of his depth.

It is important, I suppose, as part of this debate to recognise that Mr Tanner, the Minister for Finance and Deregulation, is waiting anxiously although as patiently as he can in the wings for Mr Rudd to cut the political throat of Mr Swan. Mr Rudd, of course, is driven by polling and he will see the polling on Mr Swan—the uncertainty of Australians in relation to Mr Swan, who is seen as a negative to the Australian people. Mr Swan is somebody who the Australian people know does not have a plan for the future. Mr Swan is a person who people really do recognise as being a great threat to the Australian economy. If we see that confidence going out of business, and small business in particular, we will see unemployment rise and bad outcomes for the Australian economy.

It is important to also note that there has been a lot made of the issue of inflation in recent weeks. The issue of inflation has been with us as a nation for many years.

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