Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is exactly as the minister says. Only this week, the company ran the world’s first trials of the technologies that they will use to convert that coal into methane and into hydrogen and to bring it to the surface to then produce kerosene and diesel. If they get the approval of the state government and from the EPA and other approvals required, they will be constructing the enterprise. It is just one of many, I might add, that is being constructed right now, but this particular one will deliver 800 jobs during the construction phase and 200 jobs permanently thereon. Their estimates, on which they base their economic studies for the viability of their operation, indicate that they are looking not to the next two, three or four years but to the next hundred years. They will be producing 100,000 barrels of oil equivalent per week. Putting aside all the coal seam methane development, the power station developments using coal seam methane for clean energy or the coal resources of the Surat basin that Xstrata want to open up near Wandoan and the development that will go hand in hand with that—the equipment will of course all come in on roads along the Warrego Highway—Linc Energy say that by 2012 they will be putting a B-double on the road transporting fuel from Chinchilla to Brisbane every half hour, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

We are seeing in the electorate of Maranoa an exponential rise in transport not only on our major roads but also on our local government roads and, of course, state governed main roads. I am sure the Minister for Resources and Energy, who is at the table, would be aware that if the road user charge goes up to 21c not every road will benefit from that increase in terms of a truck stop. We will certainly be monitoring the situation to make sure that truck stops are appropriately placed along our national highways.

I have raised this concern about truck stops with some of my colleagues. In the far west in my electorate there are very long distances between communities, even between small communities. I am not sure that we should be putting truck stops in the middle of nowhere. Many people would say that they would be in the middle of a beautiful part of Australia, and I would agree with that, but I think that these truck stops would be much better placed if they were close to or on the outskirts of those smaller communities. When truckies stop they like to get a cooked meal from the local cafe or service station, which generates some revenue. If you put them in the middle of nowhere there is very little benefit to those smaller communities. On the Landsborough Highway there are places like Tanbar and Blackall, and then you get to Winton on the way up through to Cloncurry. East of Tanbar are Augathella and Morven. They are very small communities and their economies are very fragile. Locating some of these truck stops near those small communities will bring a benefit not only to the trucking industry but also to the economies of some of those communities. I think we would see a win-win situation. If we put them 30, 40 or 50 kilometres out of town, between major centres or even small communities, as we have in my electorate, I think we would see tourists pulling up to camp the night and use the facilities. Although their vehicles are often self-contained and they have their food and water in their refrigerators, I think they would use these truck stops, which is not their intended purpose. I hope the minister has some influence on his colleagues in relation to where these truck stops will be located. I will certainly be pushing that point, as I will be pushing the issue of outback roads, where truckies will still be paying the fuel excise but seeing little if any benefit on the roads on which they operate on a day-to-day basis.

My time has almost expired, so I would like to say that I hope the government will accept the opposition’s amendments. I want to make sure that we do have transparency in any increase in taxes that are imposed by this government. It is important that we do not have a process where the government can automatically increase indexation on fuel excise without the scrutiny of the parliament. As I said earlier, that was something that the coalition abolished. It was one of those policies introduced by the Hawke and Keating governments, and we all know what that led to in Australia. When there is a process of automatic indexation of any excise there can be no scrutiny and no influence from the other side of the House. The industries that have to pay that increased fuel excise do not have any input into how and where those moneys are spent.

I commend the bill to the House in the hope that we can get these amendments through. I hope the minister at the table is able to have some influence in relation to the points I have raised about the location of truck stops and the importance of making sure that the outback roads of the AusLink network will benefit from the increased revenue from this fuel excise. Those who use the road pay the excise and they deserve to see some benefit from it on the roads on which they operate on a day-to-day basis.

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