David Gillespie (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I can put a torch on if you like! I would bring in some candles, but we might be offending the gods of CO2 if we generate too much hot air in parliament! I rise to speak on this very significant piece of legislation, the Treasury Laws Amendment (2018 Measures No. 5) Bill 2018, which I support. There is a problem with the cost of taking action in the courts. There is an unfair playing field. Just the very nature of legal costs will prohibit many people in commerce from bringing an action when there's anticompetitive behaviour. Whether it's the abuse of market power, unconscionable conduct, unfair contract terms, the arbitrary changing of contract terms in the middle of contracts, summarily, with one party to the contract having undue power—all of these need to be challenged in the court, but, time and time again, we hear that the costs or risks of taking legal action are prohibitive. So, getting the Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman to give fair and reasonable advice or suggest remedies and to ask for an exception so there are no adverse cost orders is a really great initiative. But the effects test and other things in the small business space need the courts to bring them to effect, and this will make it much more likely that small or even medium-sized businesses, who are taking on the giants in industry and commerce that have much deeper pockets, will have a more level playing field.

The member for Watson just gave us a diatribe about everything on the coalition. I know they are using this to wedge us, but I'm very happy to be wedged. I'm here saying this is a good idea, but I suspect there is not a genuine concern from the member for Watson, because he's more interested in bringing the reputation of our fine Prime Minister into disrepute.

This bills is the start of many things we need to do with the Competition and Consumer Act. General divestment powers exist in Canada, the UK and America. They've existed for decades in some of these jurisdictions and almost a century in others, and commerce has flourished in all those jurisdictions. It's not the end of earth if we have divestment powers. As the member for New England mentioned, it is a longstanding National Party policy to bring in these divestment orders, but, unfortunately, the logistics mean that this is where we're starting.

Many of you have a legal background. You understand that there would be costs running into millions of dollars if you were to bring the sort of case that needs to be brought to establish some of the things that have been established about the effects test, reducing competition and restricting trade and unfair trade practices and acts. But the missing ingredient is making it available to those that are most aggrieved. Most of them are very successful small businesses—horticulture and agriculture businesses, dairy suppliers and all sorts of people in the small and family business space—who develop longstanding relationships, get bigger and more successful, expand and then have unfair practices occurring in their contracting or undue pressure to lower their prices below the cost of production. We could keep going all night about misbehaviour in the marketplace. When the market is broken, governments are meant to step up and fix it, and this is an initial salvo. We in the National Party will keep fighting for further improvements, particularly general divestment powers.

Question agreed to.

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