Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Deputy Leader of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Hansard source

I welcome the opportunity to speak in this debate because for a whole year we heard the Prime Minister and the Treasurer hold a conversation with the Australian people during the 2007 election campaign. They came into this parliament and they have been trying ever since to match up with the rhetoric that they put in place during the election campaign. During the election campaign they held a conversation with the Australian people. Every night on the TV screens they came into people’s homes and they claimed that they were going to put downward pressure on the cost of living, they claimed that they were going to put downward pressure on petrol prices and they claimed that they were going to put downward pressure on grocery prices. What do they do when they get into government? They give up. They throw up their hands after only six months and admit they do not have a solution to the problems that people face. I think that the people out there are absolutely disappointed.

We heard the shadow Treasurer talk about the issue of the ACCC analysis, which is based on averages, not based on a volumetric average. So averages can create a very curious outcome and sometimes a very inaccurate outcome. The ACCC did not seem to be aware of the relative volume sold across the price cycle in a range of places. But I can help. I can tell this House that in Sydney in a sample month 34.5 per cent of motorists were purchasing fuel in the lowest 10 per cent of the fuel cycle. So 34.5 per cent of motorists were able to take advantage of discounts that were available on the day. In the next 10 per cent percentile band, 14.9 per cent of motorists were able to take account of the next 10 per cent of the percentile band. Then between 20 and 29 per cent, the lowest 30 per cent of the range in the price cycle, some 65.3 per cent of motorists purchased their fuel. No FuelWatch—this is the market at work.

What happened in Perth, where allegedly there is all this extra information that is going to allow motorists to make an informed choice, that is going to put power in the hands of the consumer, that is going to make the world an allegedly better place? What happened? Let us look at the situation over the same time period in Perth. In the lowest 10 percentile band only 18.1 per cent of consumers bought fuel compared to 34.5 per cent in Sydney. What happened to FuelWatch? They should have been all down there queued up ready to take advantage of these allegedly low prices because of all of this extra information. Let us look at the next percentile band. In Sydney it was 14.9 per cent; only an additional 8.5 per cent of motorists purchased in the 10 to 20 per cent percentile band. The third percentile band, which I mentioned, between 20 and 30, in Perth only 9.8 per cent of motorists purchased in that band. So in the rough and tumble of the marketplace in Sydney we have 65 per cent of motorists being able to purchase in the lowest 30 per cent of the fuel cycle; in Perth we have 36.4 per cent. What happened to all this extra information? What is it doing? Is it empowering consumers to get the very best price and buy at the bottom of the cycle? Apparently not.

But let us look at the other end, at the highest end of the cycle. What was happening there? It is an interesting observation. In Perth 11.7 per cent of motorists paid the top price, paid in the top percentage of the percentile band. What was the figure in Sydney? Was it eight per cent? No, it was not. Was it five per cent? No, it was not. It was 3.1 per cent of motorists in Sydney who paid the top price, when 11.7 per cent of motorists in Perth paid the top price. It seems absolutely amazing that members of the government can come into this House and can crow about ignoring the advice of four government departments and about alleging to be working on behalf of the consumer. And the figures are stark, that under a conventional market operating in a conventional way we have more people taking advantage of the low point in the cycle and fewer people paying at the top of the cycle, whereas in Perth it is a completely different result. We have an overwhelming shift up the price cycle in the Perth market. That is allegedly good for motorists, just as it is allegedly good for motorists to fine fuel stations for reducing their price. Will the Prime Minister come into this House and explain as clearly as he can how it is in the best interests of the motorist to fine a fuel station for providing motorists with cheaper petrol? It is clearly absurd.

When we look at the issue of FuelWatch, we see a range of commentators around the country concerned about its implementation. We have heard about the RACV, we have heard about the RAA in South Australian, we have heard of the concerns of the RACQ. These motoring organisations are very concerned about it. They are very concerned about the impact of competition. They are very concerned about the potential to lose independents from the market. We hear a range of commentators and departments commenting on the anticompetitive effect of this measure. Yet this government comes into this House and extols the virtue of a scheme which is nothing more than a fraud. It is nothing more than a cruel hoax on Australian motorists by a government which has given up, which does not have a solution to the problems that people face. It is all about providing a lower level of pressure on the Prime Minister rather than a lower level of pressure on working families. We see a Prime Minister who is more concerned with his own personal situation. We see a Prime Minister who is more concerned about taking the heat off, so much so that he is willing to perpetrate a fraud on the Australian people, a fraud which will push up the price for motorists, a fraud which cannot be justified, a fraud which is not supported by the evidence and a fraud which they are all too keen to come on board with.

I really think that the members of the backbench of this parliament should put some pressure on the Prime Minister to let him know very clearly that people want access to cheap Tuesday. The only reason there are motorists in long queues at service stations is not for some imperial edict from the Prime Minister but that they believe that in the marketplace it is worth their time to actually queue up and get the savings that are available at the particular service station. That is the only reason they queue up. They are not drafted and forced to go down there and take their places in a queue. They queue up because they have made a commercial decision of their own volition that it is worth it for them to queue up and get the benefit of that discount. They do not need to be told that. They actually make their own decision on that basis.

What we have now is Big Brother saying: ‘We are going to take that all away. We are going to take away the opportunity to buy on Tuesday and absorb those savings. We are going to replace it with a flat price structure that is good for you. Believe me, I am from the government, I know what is good for you. I will take away cheap Tuesday. I will get everyone paying up the price cycle because it is in my best interests as Prime Minister of this country to get fuel off the headlines and to get fuel out of the limelight. That is what I need. It is not what you need as motorists. It is what I need because I have come into your lounge room everyday, through an entire election campaign, promising cheap petrol. I am delivering nothing. I am under pressure, so I perpetrate a fraud so that you will all believe that I am actually doing something when in fact I am doing nothing.’ The Prime Minister’s logic is that FuelWatch is a system that you have when you are doing nothing about the price of fuel except pushing it up. FuelWatch is a system that will create a higher cost to the motorists of Australia.

You only have to look at the prices in Perth yesterday. We saw a price in Brisbane of $1.40. We saw an average price in Melbourne of $1.49, in Sydney of $1.50 and in Adelaide of $1.51. It increased in Perth yesterday to $1.55. Perth has not been performing favourably compared to other capitals. The ACCC inquiry did not result in an overwhelming endorsement for FuelWatch—far from it. It did not result in a recommendation for FuelWatch at all, yet this government persists with a misrepresentation and persists with this fraud. The people of Australia will not wear it. The media today is full of stories calling the bluff of this government. They are awake to your fraud. They are awake to your misrepresentation. They are awake to the fact that you have rejected the advice of four government departments. Whatever happened to the use of frank and fearless advice? I am afraid frank and fearless have left the building. What we have is the perpetration of an elaborate hoax—a hoax that is going to result in motorists paying more right around the country. I would like to reflect a moment on the words of Mr Luscombe of Woolworths. He said:

We provided the Government with some info that showed that quite frankly our inability to match the lowest price in the marketplace in WA during the day has meant margins in WA were stronger than most if not all states.

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