Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

and of course trade. There is no way that we can have an effective trade regime in this country without an effective and efficient trade measurement system, and that is at the core of what this bill is about. Like on many bills that I have spoken about in this House over a long period of time, but particularly in the last 11½ months or so, I am very proud to speak on this issue. The Rudd Labor government is picking up on the leftover issues, the unfinished business, of the previous government. This area is important, as people will understand once they hear from the speakers about what it involves and how it can impact on their daily lives, their hip pocket and their family budgets—all the things that matter on a daily basis.

We need to start by at least getting one thing right: what is trade measurement? On first inspection, a lot of people might consider this bill to just be about how long a piece of string is or how much something weighs. It is much more than that. In fact, I have often been asked that very question: how long is a piece of string? I have an answer for that: it is twice as long as it is from the middle to the end. Perhaps that should be contained somewhere as well! Trade measurement is a term that refers to the use of measurement as the basis for price in a transaction. It is very important in business. For example, there is the volume of petrol when you go to the petrol station and fill up at the bowser. We have heard that example; it is a very important one. When you put in, say, 50 litres, you know that you are getting 50 litres of fuel. You are not getting 45 litres and, more than likely, you would not be getting 55 litres. The idea is that you get what you pay for, and that is the essence of it. After a cursory examination, people might think that is important in terms of the consumer aspect, but it actually goes much further; it is important to our national economy, the efficiency of our economy, our productivity and our trade with trading partners.

However, while we have some very good standards in Australia, there has been over several decades a desirability right across the board to have some uniformity—a bit of harmonisation and a bit of national consistency in the way we apply rules, the way we license and the way we approach these things. That is a hallmark of the Rudd Labor government. We are determined that in Australia there is a better way to do a whole range of things. We believe that you can have productivity growth and efficiency gains in a whole range of areas. Trade measurement in itself can become more efficient and can help with productivity. You can apply the same principles—national consistency, licensing, efficiency and productivity—across a whole range of sectors. We have seen that in the way we have approached the issue of health provision in Australia—that we need to have a more consistent approach. National consistency is important in removing regulatory burdens and unproductive red tape across the board. That goes not just to health but also to education. We see that in the areas in which Labor have pursued an agenda. It is not just about saying, ‘We will put more money on the table,’ because we are doing that—we have made that financial commitment—but we are saying that we need to look for efficiencies and productivity gains. We do that across a whole range of areas, and education is one area.

In the area of business—and this pertains more closely to trade, but when you dig deeper it pertains to the little things in all of our lives every day and it reflects the confidence that we all have as consumers in the systems that we have in place—it is exceptionally important that we get this right across all jurisdictions in Australia and, in the end, across one jurisdiction: the national economy of the Commonwealth. That is where we need to get this right. That is not a statement critical of the way that the states have operated, because it is certainly true that over a number of years the states and territories have put in place a number of consistent regimes across the board. In fact, in 1983 the Scott review recommended a national approach to the administration of trade measurement. They did that for good reason. The recommendation resulted in the drafting of uniform trade measurement legislation. Unfortunately for all of us, it took more than 20 years for all jurisdictions to enact that legislation. That is lost time, lost productivity gains and lost efficiency. We cannot regain that, but we can move forward.

So, despite the fact that we had uniform format legislation, practical problems persisted. That was largely because all states and territory regulations were not implemented at the same time, causing difficulties in timing issues, with different jurisdictions across different states. There were also differences in the way the regulations were applied, administered and interpreted, with varying nuances between jurisdictions. That led, very importantly in the progress of getting this right at a national level, to the Business Regulation and Competition Working Group of COAG being directed to deliver some early action on regulatory reform, in particular in relation to some hot spots. It was identified that there were a number of areas, called hot spots, where this was actually having an efficiency impact, a productivity impact. COAG identified that back in 2006 and again in 2007. The area of trade measurement had become one of the top 10 identified regulatory hot spots for COAG. So this is an important issue. This is in that basket of goods which, on the surface, some might think is inconsequential—an inconsequential bill and inconsequential changes—but in effect it has some real impact.

Following on from that, the Ministerial Council on Consumer Affairs also commissioned a review of trade measurement arrangements. They identified a number of problems and costs associated with businesses that operate across borders, that have different cost-recovery procedures in different jurisdictions, different processes for licensing, different costs involved in what those licences are, inconsistent advice and basically the mishmash that you typically end up with in a system such as ours, where you have a federation of states, which in principle works well but has areas of difficulty, inefficiency and bureaucracy—layer upon layer of ineffectiveness. This is just another tranche for us, the Rudd government, where, as a new government coming in, we can start paring away at the red tape burdens and inefficiencies and start stripping back the bureaucracy that prevents national efficiency, that prevents us being competitive not only on a national platform but also on a global platform. This review concluded that the adoption of a national trade measurement system would deliver a net economic benefit to Australian industry, to business, to government and to consumers alike. In April 2007 COAG accepted this recommendation. The National Measurement Amendment Bill, which is now before us, will give effect to that COAG decision.

As I said at the outset, I am very pleased to be able to speak on this legislation. I think it is an important part of our national trade system. Just as importantly to me, it is about consumer confidence and consumer affairs. This has certainly been an issue for a lot of constituents of mine. I know that right across Australia there are from time to time circumstances that arise where people’s confidence in measurement is undermined. It quickly becomes apparent to members of parliament that it is one of those areas where consumers can really be dealt a harsh blow.

There is an expectation from the Australian consumer that, when they go to a trader and buy an article that says ‘100 grams’, that is what they will be purchasing—100 grams of whatever that article is; that if they go to a service station and buy 50 litres of fuel, it will be 50 litres of fuel; and that, if they buy something by length, they know exactly that that is the length that they are receiving. It is a base standard and an expectation that we have in this country that we can have confidence in our systems, and largely speaking we do have that. From time to time there are issues and problems about packet weights. We have already passed legislation in this place to make sure there is some clarity not only in the way items are measured and recorded but in the way they are promoted so that people can have confidence in that and there is no trickery involved—by duping or conning people into buying something they thought was something else. We have seen examples of that over the years. It is important to note how that system works and why it is so important: to make sure that we give confidence to buyers and sellers in the marketplace, to make sure that we have accuracy and to reduce the transaction costs of each trade.

As we heard from the previous speaker, this is not a small area of concern. Trade measurement and trade based on measurement is worth something in the order of around $400 billion per year, so it is a significant amount. If we were to allow that system to deteriorate that could jeopardise not only consumer confidence but trade confidence. It could also jeopardise the confidence that our trading partners have in us—that what we do is of the highest standard, that when we say something is of a particular measurement that is actually the case. Again I acknowledge the presence at the table of the member for Lowe, who is the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Trade; he would understand very well just how important it is in our global relationship with our trading partners that they have confidence in our system, not just that we have confidence in it.

Unfortunately, while Australia’s current trade measurement infrastructure is good and is sound, it is not as efficient and certainly not as effective as it could be. That is just one more reason why this change is so necessary and why we have this measurement legislation—to remove some of the confusion. Significantly, every state and territory will be brought into line by agreement and through partnership so that we have a nationally consistent, efficient and effective trade measurement system. COAG has identified this as a major area of reform and we are following through on the commitment that we have made in that area.

The Rudd Labor government made some big commitments pre the election that we want to see through—commitments in the area of supporting business, small business, contractors and trade, making sure that we remove for them the impediments to business and to trade. In our view, government should be there to assist their business, not hamper it. The role of government should be to provide an effective system of standards, licensing and regulations to ensure that the most efficient and effective trading platforms are in place. That is not the case yet; that is not the case today. The system we have inherited from the previous government is overly burdened by red tape and regulatory regimes, and represents inaction and lost opportunities in what could have been done in those 12 years.

The Howard government did not really pay attention—which is probably the kindest way I can put it—to what they claimed was one of their core constituencies, and that is the small business sector. Apart from perhaps dealing with a couple of the more populist issues within the business sector, the real issues of efficiency, red tape and other burdens—real, practical, everyday cost burdens—on small business were not addressed. What we saw was a growing mountain of red tape, a growing mountain of regulation, a growing mountain of requirements placed on small business and other businesses to comply with the ever more complicated systems and regimes put in place by the previous government—let alone the system of taxation in this country. It is so complicated, so complex, so inefficient that we have been placed in a position today where we need to look at how we measure all of that. If you brought our tax system in here and measured it from the floor, it would be the height of a tall child. The reality is that there is a lot of work to be done.

This is one more step in that process that we have put in place to harmonise regulation across this country, to bring into line the ability of the states and territories of the Commonwealth to work together at all tiers of government, truly, I would say, for the first time in Australian history. That is the great opportunity that is provided by this bill before us. At its core are productivity gains by reducing red tape and reducing the costs and burdens for small business. We as a government are committed to that sector through this bill but we also believe that it will flow on to other areas of the economy. In effect, that will give us greater quality and a greater capacity to grow and better link with our trading partners.

I want to mention briefly the global systems of trade measurement and how important it is for us to be on the same platform as our trading partners. Currently, ours is a minimum quantity system, which means that you are basically guaranteed that within a particular measurement you will get a minimum amount. While on the surface that seems like quite a reasonable approach to take, what it means is that business tend to overfill or give a little bit extra just to be certain they do not breach any regulation or more. The bigger picture is that it means massive inefficiency for business. There are good data and statistics and evidence to show that moving to an average quantity system will mean that you get roughly 98 per cent accuracy on average weight, on average length, on average quantity, and that is a satisfactory amount in terms of tolerances that are acceptable not only to consumers but also by regulations, law and government. I think that by moving across to that system and joining with our major trading partners which have the same systems in place—countries such as Canada, China, those in the European Union, Japan, the United States and New Zealand—we will ensure that we maintain a competitive advantage not just in the quality of our trade and all that is associated with that but also in the quantity of it. We will maintain the confidence that people have in our systems and that competitive advantage that we always need to ensure that we have.

The bill before us contains an array of systems that will give us a range of things. The bill will ensure the accuracy and reliability of our trade measuring instruments, such as scales, fuel dispensers and weighbridges. It will also mean that prepacked articles contain the stated quantities. It means the appointment of trade measurement inspectors and proper licensing provisions for the verifiers of measuring instruments. It means that private sector firms or individuals will be licensed to verify trade measuring instruments, while transitional provisions will ensure a seamless transfer from the states and territories to a national system. This is good public policy, this is in the national interest, this is a very important bill, and I commend it to the House. (Time expired)

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