Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

That was brilliantly done, again, Minister. I would be the member for Mitchell and you would be the minister. That would be the correct way to handle that point of order. Moving on to the substance of what we are here to deal with today, the Australian Industry Participation system, which the government is proposing to amend and also to make some revisions to the system implemented by the Howard government.

The coalition have no problem with the Australian Industry Participation scheme but the government is yet to convince or provide any set of compelling arguments—we certainly did not hear compelling arguments from the member for Corangamite—about why this bill should be revised. In fact, there is no part of industry in Australia today or any of the sectors that we have consulted with that is calling for a new, heavy-handed regulator to help them create jobs. So while the objective of an Australian Industry Participation scheme is to assist in the local sourcing of products, there is nobody saying to government and there is nobody saying to the opposition, 'What we need to buy more Australian products and employ more people in Australia is a new regulator, a regulator with new powers, a heavy-handed regulator.' Yet in this bill we see the proposal for the establishment of an IPA because a new bureaucracy, according to the government, will help us source more products locally. That seems to be their thinking in relation to a lot of things: a new regulator, a new committee, a new government approach will somehow produce a better benefit for the sector. Given the fact that this scheme has been in operation since 2001, if there was a body of argument that said we need a new regulator, it would be well-established in public argument and public policy. That argument has not been made and we have not heard any arguments in relation to this bill discussion today.

I think it is objectionable that this proposal of the government should seek to embed public servants into private companies' workforces to shape and perhaps even dictate their purchasing decisions. We heard from the member for Corangamite that perhaps they could help with procurement. I do not believe that government employees or government appointed people into this scheme will help with private sector procurement. The coalition takes a different approach, that it is an anathema to the operation of a vibrant private sector to have such people embedded into companies by government, especially for the success of a modern economy.

When you look around at different reactions in the Senate inquiry and certainly to the exposure draft that was released, and it does not matter where you look, you can see the in comments on the draft legislation from Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association, who say:

APPEA considers that the proposed legislative approach is unlikely to significantly increase opportunities beyond those created by the extensive efforts already employed by the oil and gas industry to provide full, fair and reasonable opportunity to local suppliers.

We have many other comments from many industries—the big miners, BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto and Xstrata, civil contractors, the South Australian Chambers of Mines and Energy, the Queensland Resources Council, the Minerals Council of Australia, New South Wales Minerals Council, the Department of Commerce Western Australia and the Industry Capability Network—all of whom are not expressing any support for such new proposals from government, in fact highlighting that there is a lack of clarity in the legislation around the items such as the proposed trigger date at which the production of an Australian industry participation project becomes mandatory. That is a legitimate concern. Again, we are adding to this idea of sovereign risk in Australia with these sorts of bills that float around proposing to do something for Australian industry but again adding to the red tape and regulatory burden that companies have to face in making decisions about whether they are going to invest and whether they are going to employ.

One of the concerns I have in particular is that by passing this bill we would be adding to that regulatory burden, we would be adding to that concept of sovereign risk and we would not be doing anything to enhance the ability of industry to make good-quality decisions in relation to their own businesses at the moment. In this climate is this sort of approach needed? No case has been made about this particular bill. We are very concerned at the approach of the government.

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