Ian Macfarlane (Groom, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure and Water) Share this | Hansard source

This resource super tax will hurt all Australians. It will not just hurt those who work in the mining industry; it will not just hurt those who work in the industries that support the mining industry; it will not just hurt those people who rely on income from the mining industry through shares or superannuation. Its tentacles reach into every household in Australia. It will produce higher power bills. It will produce higher house prices because bricks and mortar and sand and gravel will all be affected by this tax. It will increase fertiliser prices for farmers who grow the food for this nation and earn export income. As observed by a journalist in one of this morning’s newspapers, ‘The RSPT actually stands for a really stupid political tax.’ And that is what this is: this is a stupid political tax grab by a government that has lost complete control of its budget, has lost complete control of its debt and has completely lost its vision for the future of this country. The mining industry has been delivered a sledgehammer blow by a government that only thinks in 24-hour spin media cycles and does not think of the impact that this tax is going to have on the future investment in Australian mining, the jobs that that creates and the impact of making Australia’s mining industry so uncompetitive that miners will simply base their new operations overseas.

I am not suggesting there are going to be widespread mine closures in Australia. There is going to be a continuation of those mines, but as most people who understand the mining industry know—and probably the only two people in the government who do are sitting opposite me: the minister for resources and the member for Brand—mines have finite lives. Mines close; other mines open. Miners move from one mine to the next, often only a few kilometres, sometimes hundreds of kilometres, sometimes interstate. The new mines that replace the old mines will, under this tax, be located in Canada, in Brazil, in Peru, in Chile, in Indonesia and in Africa—everywhere else has a lower tax on its mining than Australia as a result of this tax.

The resource industry in Australia has protected us and our economy through many ups and downs and it is Australia’s largest export earner. This year it is estimated it will earn $150 billion in export earnings. It is already paying above the norm in terms of taxes. It is paying somewhere between 37 and 43 per cent—about 40 per cent—in government taxes already. It represents eight per cent of the economy over the last decade and yet pays 18 per cent of the company tax. Yet we have a Prime Minister who has the audacity to say that these people are raping the profits out of Australia and taking them back to their homelands. Most of the companies that operate in Australia either have Australian shareholders or have in fact in the last five years invested more money here than they have taken away. This just highlights the fact that the Prime Minister knows nothing about this industry. He certainly does not understand that Australia was built on a philosophy that, if you invested money and took a risk, you did not ever get an assurance that you would get a return, but if you did then you were entitled to make a profit. This Prime Minister belittles people who make profits. He belittles people who are successful in their own right. He belittles people who are millionaires, and on one or two occasions billionaires, as a result of their own risks and their own efforts.

We have a Prime Minister who demonises foreign ownership, who pulls out the racist card against foreign companies and says that they are not welcome here. That is xenophobia. Foreign investment built this country—it made this country what it is today, along with the blood, sweat and toil of farmers, miners and people in the city going about their day-to-day work. Yet this government, this Prime Minister, has chosen to single out one industry and say, ‘You are already paying 40 per cent tax when the company tax rate is 30 per cent, but we are going to make you pay 57 per cent tax’. In some cases it will be 80 per cent of their profits because the parameters of this super tax are not the same as they are for the petroleum resource rent tax; they are not based on allowing companies to deduct all their costs, particularly in terms of how they deal with those costs. It is a super super tax—a tax that will simply drive investment overseas.

This issue is not just about the future of the mining industry; it is about the future of the jobs of the people who work in it. It is not just about the future of the miners, the men and women who go down these dark holes and drive heavy machinery in open cuts; it is about the men and women who work in the fabrication shops, in the engineering works, in the air-conditioned offices across this country, in Sydney, in Melbourne, in Perth and in Brisbane—the people whose livelihood is linked directly and quite unashamedly to the mining industry and the risks it takes. And it is about the people that they employ—the gardener who works in their gardens when they are at work or the cleaner who assists them in cleaning up the office after work. All these people will be affected by this super tax. It will flow through and affect every city and town in Australia, and particularly it will hurt the regional towns—country towns like Cloncurry, which had a $30 million project cancelled yesterday; Karratha, which in time could see the investment that is going on there at the moment suddenly shift to a new focus; and Ballarat and Parkes. These are towns that rely on significant income from their mining industries. One in eight Queenslanders is employed by the mining industry. We wonder about their future in regional Australia.

This is also about people who have already done their toil for this country and have invested their retirement moneys in stocks and shares or in superannuation funds that are now being decimated by the news of this super tax and the effect that it will potentially have on the country’s resource industry. We saw figures released this week that around 9.3 per cent of Australia’s superannuation is invested in resource industry stock. At the close of trading on Monday, 10 May, yesterday, Australians had lost around $13.4 billion in superannuation earnings and capital in superannuation funds as a result of the fall in stocks.

Abraham Lincoln, that fantastic American statesman and leader—the Prime Minister should look to him at times to see what a leader is—said that you cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. Yet this government is happy to weaken the strong. It is happy to do anything that will prop up its excessive spending, its excessive debt and its inability to manage money. I want to quote from people who do not have a political interest in this debate. The Globe, a Canadian publication, has said that as a result of this tax:

Mining company shares, particularly those with operations in Australia, were roundly pummelled …

Another quote pertinent to this debate states:

Slowing down the development of Australia’s mining and energy resource industries would be a scandalous wasted opportunity to lock in future prosperity and achieve social and environmental goals such as supporting school students in disadvantaged communities, Australians with disabilities, those with mental illnesses and others who are too sick to work, and preserving Australia’s unique biological diversity.

Who said that? A member of the government—a minister, the member for Rankin, said that not very long ago. I wonder what he says today. I wonder whether he has had that thought purged from his mind. Let us go back to what this is doing to Australia. A Southern Cross Equities publication states:

This economic thinking runs counter to everything that made Australia rich over the last three decades: namely, the embrace of competition and capitalism, which rewards high risk with high returns.

The member for Rankin, Craig Emerson, agrees with that. But I bet he is not allowed to say it anymore. Going back overseas, the Wall Street Journal says:

It’s a new day Down Under when a government starts setting rates of return for private industry in a nominally capitalist economy.

That is government interference in the economy in a way which is sending shock waves through the industry.

Let us go to a Labor source. What does the Premier of Queensland think of this? She says:

You can’t expect international companies to make those investment decisions unless they’ve got absolute certainty about the costs of doing business.

I could not agree more. There is no certainty anymore—everything changes every day. Again, it is said that Anna Bligh ‘fears the Rudd government’s Resource Super Profits Tax will undermine her election pledge to create 100,000 new jobs’. She says:

… it will not only impact on jobs in Queensland, but jobs around the country.

Let us move to South Australia. This is a quote by Kevin Foley, the Deputy Premier and Treasurer:

… but there are clearly desired issues that need to be rectified to ensure that it—

the resource rent tax—

is not as impacting as it would appear to be on particularly some of the new mines coming on stream.

Kevin Foley can see the damage coming. I have here a transcript that is too long to read. It is about the Prime Minister, who tried to explain this tax on 6PR in Perth last week. I will seek to table that transcript because it is a public document. Clearly the Prime Minister does not understand that tax. He says it is the same as the petroleum resource rent tax. It is not. The red crosses on the document that I am holding up are the things that are not similar.

We have to do something about this tax. We on this side of the House are going to stop this tax, not for our political gain but because of what is in this document I am holding: this is Australia, second only to America at the moment; we are going to move to here, 58 per cent. What has our largest competitor, Canada, got in terms of company taxes and resource taxes? Twenty three per cent. It is any wonder that the Canadian minister could hardly wait to get on the radio to tell Australia what he believes: ‘If you don’t want them there, send them over here.’ Brad Trost says:

Well money goes where the biggest profits are and when you raise taxes profits tend to go down. So I’m sending out the message—Canada wants Australian business.

The final document I have here is by Moody’s, the people who make credit ratings around Australia. They are not a political organisation. They are not stockbrokers. They are an organisation which rates risk. They say:

If enacted, the so-called ‘Resources Super Profits Tax’ would have a negative credit impact on Australia’s resource sector …

This government has gone berserk with this tax. This government has lost complete control of the economic agenda. This government wants to take the money now. It wants to kill the golden goose, take the golden eggs and not worry about what happens in five years time when there is no golden goose, there are no more golden eggs and no more mines being opened. (Time expired)

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