Pat Conroy (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The snobbery is on your side, mate. I represent real Australia, not the wealthy parts of the country. The Australian jobs test means that taxpayers' money will only be used if the entity and Efic can demonstrate that it will increase the number of jobs in Australia. To me, that is a commonsense amendment that would improve the bill.

The second amendment goes to preventing companies using a loan to offshore Australian jobs, so that they cannot use a loan to replace what they currently do here or contract a third party to do here. That is very important in the example I highlighted earlier. Bank X cannot use an Efic loan to outsource a call centre that they have already established in this country and, importantly, given the complex web that corporations often use in terms of structuring businesses, they cannot use an Efic loan to offshore work they currently subcontract to an Australian based activity. That is very important, and, again, I would submit that is common sense.

The third amendment goes to dealing with a case that we saw recently: a South African coalmine, where Efic were actively considering providing a very generous loan to Resgen, a South African based coalmining company, to set up a coalmine in South Africa which would be the very significant size of Adani's Carmichael coalmine. To me, it is incredible that we would be considering using taxpayers' money to establish a mine in South Africa with some very vague assurances that some Australian mining supplier might benefit by supplying a bit of equipment to the mine at a time when global coal consumption is declining. So we have global coal consumption declining, we have Australian coal exports under pressure and the Australian government will be actively considering financing a direct competitor in South Africa. That is a huge concern. I am relieved that at estimates a few weeks ago, Efic stated that they would not be going ahead with that proposal. Hopefully they maintain that commitment and do not go ahead with that proposal. Our third amendment would prevent that. Our third amendment would prohibit Efic from providing a loan to an overseas based activity unless they can demonstrate that there will be no negative commercial impact to an Australian based activity. That is incredibly important.

Let me summarise. Labor's amendments are threefold. Firstly, it must grow jobs in Australia. Secondly, it must prevent a company offshoring existing Australian operations through the loan. And, thirdly, it must not lead to the establishment of an overseas based activity that will compete with an Australian inactivity. That is only fair and reasonable. This is not saying to Australian companies, 'You can't do any of those things.' They are in their rights to offshore jobs. We will object at times, as will other political parties in this place—no-one likes to see Australian jobs going offshore—but companies do have a right to establish operations around the globe, and good luck to them, but they should not be using taxpayers resources to do that. They should not be using taxpayers' resources to offshore jobs or set up activities overseas in direct competition with Australian operations.

That is the essence of Labor's amendments. They go to the nub of some of the concerns we have seen in some of the submissions to the Senate inquiry, particularly the submissions from the Australia Institute, the Australian Fair Trade Investment Network and the Australian Council of Trade Unions. It is really important to return to the true goal of Efic, which is to advance Australian commercial interests overseas. We have moved a long way from that—being purely related to Australian manufactured goods. I would like them to keep concentrating on that activity because Australian manufacturing needs all the help that it can get. I would urge Efic to keep concentrating on promoting Australian manufactured goods overseas, but we need to recognise that services are, increasingly, a dominant part of our economy. We need to make sure that we can assist Australian service operations to expand overseas, as long as it is not at the expense of existing operations in Australia.

I am going to use the time remaining to refute some of the ridiculous claims from the member for Hughes, since the Deputy Speaker is allowing a free-flowing debate—in his wisdom. Let me place on the record again that the member for Hughes occupies a parallel dimension where black is white and right is wrong. He keeps talking about expensive electricity in this country. He is absolutely right—wholesale energy prices—

Government members interjecting—

No. He is right on one thing. Even a broken clock is right twice a day, and this is one of your two, member for Hughes. He is absolutely right that wholesale energy prices have doubled in the last four years under his government. And why have they doubled? According to the Australian Energy Council—so the generators themselves, not the Labor Party or some mad conservation group—have identified the single most important driver of the doubling of wholesale energy prices. And it is uncertainty around climate change and energy policy. They have said that that uncertainty is equivalent to a $50 megawatt charge increase. So wholesale energy prices have increased from $60 a megawatt hour to about $130 a megawatt hour. Fifty dollars of that $60 to $70 increase is because of policy uncertainty, driven by the fossils in the Liberal party room, including the member for Hughes. It has been driven by the real minister for climate change and energy, the honourable member for Hughes. So that is the first issue that I have to rebut—what is driving wholesale energy prices.

Secondly, what is the salvation? We need more investment in the electricity sector. But I have news for the member for Hughes and all the dinosaurs in the Liberal party room. Unfortunately, it will not be coal-fired power stations unless they are massively subsidised. That is because of not environmental policies but base economics. The cost of building a brand-new coal-fired power station in this country is around $130 to $150 a megawatt hour. The cost of new renewables—

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