Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

If the honourable member from Western Australia would reflect on what the head of his own state motoring organisation has said on FuelWatch, it would be a very useful advance to the debate. The reason, I presume, that people support Fuelwatch is based not just on the positions plucked out of space by those opposite but on the findings based on detailed econometric analysis by the ACCC. Of course, each one of those opposite knows better than this econometric analysis. Despite the fact that those opposite commissioned this volume, despite the fact that taxpayers’ dollars were spent in putting this volume together, despite the fact that Graeme Samuel, the appointee of those opposite, ultimately produced a finding which contains the conclusions I have just referred to about the price being 2c a litre down, on average—despite all of that—those opposite, as some practice, process or expression of ideology, say it is of no relevance whatsoever.

The honourable member raised a question about the cost impost on business. The honourable member may not be aware that currently a large number of petrol stations are now submitting their prices to a data collection company. This can be as frequently as every 15 minutes. In exchange for a fee, petrol companies have access to their competitors’ prices. As the Assistant Treasurer said before, apart from anything else this places those in the petrol industry, including the retailers, in a position of competitive advantage over motorists, because motorists do not have access to that amount of information. So what we have from the party of free enterprise opposite is an argument which says that those in the petrol industry—the petrol majors and retailers—should control all the price sensitive information and that consumers out here should not have access to that information. That constitutes the essence of the proposition which underpins Fuelwatch. Under FuelWatch, petrol stations need only submit one price every day to the ACCC and not be charged for it. There is a plain contrast between the two. The contrast here between our position and that of those opposite is pretty stark. We are simply saying, ‘Here is a—

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