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

I move:

That all words after “That” be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:“this House supports the Government’s creation of a National FuelWatch Scheme as announced by the Government on 15 April 2008 and foreshadowed in the report of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) into the price of unleaded petrol in December 2007, with the following characteristics:

(1)

under the National FuelWatch Scheme, petrol stations in metropolitan and major regional centres will be required to:

(a)

notify the ACCC of their next day’s prices by 2 p.m. the day before;

(b)

maintain this advised price for a 24 hour period; and

(c)

apply the scheme to unleaded petrol, premium unleaded petrol, LPG, diesel, 98 RON and biodiesel blends;

(2)

the extension of this scheme outside of metropolitan areas and major regional centres will be subject to negotiation between the ACCC and local Government authorities in rural areas. Rural local authorities will be able to opt in to the National FuelWatch Scheme—as they can under the WA FuelWatch model; and

(3)

the petrol price information collected from these petrol stations will be made available to consumers through:

(a)

an email and SMS alert service informing subscribed consumers details of the cheapest fuel in their area;

(b)

a national toll free number where motorists can locate the cheapest petrol in the area they are looking to purchase fuel; and

(c)

a National FuelWatch website with station by station, day by day and suburb by suburb petrol price information; and

further, that this House supports FuelWatch as the most effective tool to empower motorists with their fuel purchasing decisions, leading to real benefits for motorists including:

(1)

the ability for motorists under a National FuelWatch Scheme to find and access with certainty the cheapest petrol prices;

(2)

the downward pressure in prices as a result of introducing FuelWatch with an independent analysis conducted by the ACCC concluding that petrol prices were on average 1.9 cents per litre less under Western Australia’s FuelWatch Scheme;

(3)

the convenience of motorists being able to find the cheapest petrol via the FuelWatch website, or by SMS or email alerts; and

(4)

addressing the information imbalance in the retail petrol market as outlined by the ACCC’s Petrol Pricing Report, a report and inquiry commissioned by the previous government”.

The purpose of the amendment is pretty straightforward. It is to get those opposite to finally put their money where their mouths are. We have been having this debate since 15 April, and every time those opposite have been asked this question—are you going to go for it or are you against it—they go to water. They went to water on it again this morning. It is time for them to put their money where their mouths are, because in a few minutes time they will be required to vote on this amendment in order to nail to the mast once and forever their opposition to this proposed national Fuelwatch scheme. When they do so, and that action is followed in the substantive vote on the substantive legislation in the House of Representatives and followed in the Senate, where they have the numbers to defeat this legislation to bring in this national Fuelwatch scheme, the whole country will know where they stand—that is, opposed to this scheme. At present, the classic politics of those opposite is to carp about the edges, but on the substantive question of whether they are going to vote for it or against it they are hiding in the trenches and ducking for cover.

We are not going to allow them that opportunity anymore. When this amendment comes to a vote very soon in the House of Representatives, they will be required, on the question of a Fuelwatch scheme, based on the previous government’s own commission of inquiry by the ACCC—a scheme which could bring about on average a 2c per litre reduction at the bowser—to stand unequivocally in the parliament and say, ‘We’re not going to give the Australian people that scheme.’ They will stand and vote in this parliament and say unequivocally that when petrol stations in a single metro area vary their prices between 15c and 20c across the metro area on a given day they stand for a proposal that says, ‘We’re not going to give consumers that information.’ They will, through their vote, tell the Australian people that they do not stand for—in fact they oppose—providing consumers with this kind of basic consumer information. And they will be standing up there and saying all the consumer power, all the market power, should lie with the petrol majors and with the petrol retail outlets and not be given to consumers. That is the clear-cut alternative that we face in this debate before us, and that is why the amendment to the censure motion is as explicit as it is.

What we are putting to those opposite today is a very clear-cut position: nail your colours to the mast, tell us whether you are for or against this, because, on everything else we have heard from you up until now, your preferred position is to sit on the middle of a barbed wire fence. They do not know whether they are for inflation or against inflation. They do not know whether there is an economic case for government expenditure cuts or not. They have said they do not know whether they support means-testing of welfare payments or not. They are not sure where they stand ultimately on the question of their own fuel excise proposal. Where their entire argument on this collapses—I listened very carefully to what the Leader of the Opposition said on this—is where he said that their position was clear. If it is so clear, why does the alternative Treasurer of Australia not stand up and say at the dispatch box that when he replaces the Leader of the Opposition as the leader of the Liberal Party it will be their policy come the next election? This fraudulent debate engaged in by those opposite falls apart at the seams because the alternative Treasurer of Australia—the person who conspires day in, day out to replace the Leader of the Opposition—when asked point-blank at the National Press Club whether this would be Liberal Party policy at the next election, said, ‘I cannot give that commitment.’ That is how robust the position of those opposite is.

It is not just the member for Wentworth. The email trail, and those associated with it, cries out to various journalistic contacts to make sure that their name is not associated with the 5c a litre proposal. It is led by the member for Higgins, who has now escaped from the chamber to do some more plotting, and endorsed by the member for Mayo, so I understand it—that is, he does not support it because it would trash the economic credibility of those opposite. Then we have the position of the member for Flinders, who seems to have fled from the chamber as well. He did not want to miss out in the rush to disassociate himself from the position formally adopted by the Leader of the Opposition. If this is going to be a fair dinkum debate, the proposal on the table from us is: here is a national Fuelwatch scheme—not a silver bullet but a way ahead. We have had a debate about it and we have agreed on a policy position.

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