Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for the Arts) Share this | Hansard source

I want to speak in support of the motion that's just been moved by the Leader of the House. And I want to make clear that what the Leader of the House has just moved is the opposite of what the Minister for Communications, Urban Infrastructure, Cities and the Arts has been arguing all day today and for some time. The bill that's in front of us does a very good thing at the government's initiative, and that is to change the screen producer offset from 20 per cent to 30 per cent for TV production. There is a really good reason why the government came forward with that. Years ago, it would have been the case that the cost per minute of feature film production was way in excess of the cost per minute of producing something for TV. That has changed fundamentally, and now, as we all know from the different shows we've binged on from time to time, the cost of producing television is way in excess of what it used to be. That part of the bill has always been supported by both sides of the House.

The minister for communications had also included some measures that were effectively a tax on small businesses operating within the film sector. That was to change the threshold from half a million dollars to a million dollars for postproduction, effectively for documentary. It was having an impact of composers. It would have meant that, if you were in charge of a very large production, this bill was very good to you, but, if you were a smaller player, you were going to take a hit with small-business tax.

When Labor moved these amendments in the Senate with the support of all the crossbench—including the Greens party, and I acknowledge the leader of the party here now—it didn't even go to a division. But immediately after, the minister was in contact with one film production company after the other, saying, 'You need to stop Labor from doing this.' He put out on Twitter:

Labor's political games are putting the Australian screen production sector at risk.

I call on Labor to provide certainty to Australian businesses and pass our bill as it stands.

The position the minister was saying was putting everything at risk, he's now adopted and the government has now adopted.

I won't detain the House further, because what we have now is a really good outcome for the screen sector, a really good outcome for jobs, a really good outcome for Australian stories being told. I want to thank the Leader of the House for moving the motion and note we could have got here so much earlier had the minister for communications not been determined to look after larger productions and have small businesses take a hit.

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