Stuart Robert (Fadden, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

It's wonderful to stand and speak on Treasury Laws Amendment (More Competition, Better Prices) Bill 2022. We love competition and we love lower prices, so the opposition will be supporting the legislation.

This bill includes important reforms to unfair contract terms that will better protect consumers and small businesses. These are important reforms to support small businesses and they were initiated by the former coalition government. I was the former small business minister and went through, as Assistant Treasurer, in 2018-19, when we started the unfair contract terms; this is like tranche 3 or 4 of them. This is a process that's been ongoing for almost a decade—to respond to the Minister for Small Business, across the table. This is part of the coalition's longstanding commitment to supporting small business. These amendments were put to the parliament before the last election, Minister across the table. It's good to see that they've been retained, building on the previous tranche of legislation that we'd put in progressively over the last nine years.

The reforms will make unfair contract terms unlawful, give courts the power to impose civil penalties, increase the small business eligibility threshold for protections from less than 20 employees to less than 100 employees and introduce an annual turnover threshold of more than $10 million as an alternative threshold for determining eligibility. It'll remove the requirement for the upfront price payable under a contract to be below a certain threshold in order for the contract to be covered by the protections of the ACL, and it'll increase the relevant threshold under the ASIC Act from $300,000 to $5 million. It'll provide more flexible remedies to a court when it declares a contract term unfair, including by clarifying the court's power to determine an appropriate remedy. It'll clarify that remedies available for non-party consumers also apply to non-party small businesses, and it will improve clarity around the definition of 'standard form contract' by providing further certainty on factors such as repeat usage of a contract template and whether the small business had an effective opportunity to negotiate the contract.

However—and there's always a 'however' with the Labor party—while the opposition will support the legislation for these reasons, it's important to note the costing blowout attached to the other section of the bill. Treasury costings confirm that there is a staggering $500 million black hole in this policy which Labor were relying on to offset their largest deficit. The first bill of the small business minister, who happens to be here in the House, which is pretty exciting, has got a $500 million black hole. I'm sure she's very proud of that! Prior to the election, Labor claimed that the policy to increase penalties under the Competition and Consumer Act would raise $557.7 million in its first four years. That would be the minister's pre-election costing, I'm sure—$557.7 million. It's in her pre-election costing document, so I think we can all safely assume that it is indeed the minister's number. But then Treasury, the grown-ups in the room, come along, and they cost the government's legislation—the minister's legislation. It'll actually raise $63 million in the first four years. That's not missing it by a little bit, is it—$557 million versus $63 million? That is missing it by a country mile.

The black hole in Labor's costing explains why Labor is looking to break its promise to support legislated tax relief. Labor was talking a big game before the election, but now it's clear that it doesn't add up. We saw that with electricity. Over 90 times, we heard that there would be $275 cut from consumers' electricity bills. What did we find out last night? No, they're going up by 57 per cent—another miss by a country mile. This will continue as we drill into the budget that came down last night. This budget fails families at a time when they really need a plan for cost-of-living pressures.

There's a $1 billion black hole in Labor's budget—a further one. At the election, Labor promised to crack down—to the tune of $1.9 billion over the next four years—on multinational tax avoidance by following up on some of the OECD work. It was hilarious. Labor criticised us for not doing it; we were the deputy chair of the OECD committee that recommended the work! But, again, the budget confirms Labor is big on rhetoric but not particularly good on the numbers. This measure is now expected to generate $950 million. That's another $1 billion black hole on top of the minister's half a billion dollars I announced before.

We also know that Labor has waved the veritable white flag on productivity. GDP growth has been downgraded significantly. Labor expect that GDP will be lower in the coming years. By their own admission, they do not believe that their spending will grow the economy. They can't even back their own plan. It's quite extraordinary.

This government has failed to provide a limit to taxes imposed on Australians. Under Labor, taxes paid by Australians will increase—on Labor's own budget papers—by $142 billion over the forward estimates. The coalition had a tax speed bump where we had receipts for taxation—or expenditure, if you like; the same side of the ledger—at 23.9 per cent of GDP. The Labor Party has no plan to reduce spending or to cap it at any level. Families facing cost-of-living pressures should be able to keep more of what they earn to deal with them.

This budget provides no certainty, none, for 10 million Australians on their legislated tax relief in 2024. The only new change to the tax system announced in this budget is a new tax on investments. Who would have thought! I must have missed that in the Treasurer's speech, but it's there in the budget papers. A sneaky new tax will slug Australians who invest their own savings and superannuation. Despite ruling out these changes before the election, Labor will hit investors and retirees with a new $555 million tax, depriving investors of franking credits which they have previously relied on. It's one of the many broken promises in this disappointing budget.

On cheaper energy, Labor's own budget numbers confirm electricity and gas prices will rise sharply over the next two years. Treasury has assumed retail electricity prices will rise by a staggering 50 per cent, and retail gas prices are up some 40 per cent in 2022 and 2023. Just so that the minister opposite knows where to look, it's page 57 of Budget Paper No. 1, old boy. Have a look there, and you'll see electricity prices going up 50 per cent, despite 91 iterations pre-election about a $275 saving. I'm looking for that $275. I can't find it. Is it there? Where is it? You said 91 times that it would be there. Budget Paper No. 1, page 57, says, 'It's not there; actually, your power price is going to go up by 57 per cent.' The broken promises and the chutzpah from this government are staggering.

Labor's forecasts reveal that real wages will fall over the coming years. But the Prime Minister promised—he promised that no-one would be left behind! The Prime Minister must have forgotten about the 150,000 Australians who will lose their jobs as unemployment goes up to 4.5 per cent. On bringing down the cost of living, there's not one measure in this budget that will help families struggling with the cost of living this year.

This year. Your child care doesn't start until 1 July next year, Minister for Small Business. Don't you even know the government's own policy? Unbelievable. There's not one measure in this budget that will help families struggling with the cost of living this year, and all the two ministers across the other side can do is smile gleefully. This budget shows inflation will be higher and will remain higher for longer and the cash rate—forecast at over 3.3 per cent—will be higher.

The test for the federal budget was for the government to build on the strong position it inherited from the coalition to address the cost-of-living crisis bearing down on Australians, and the jury is quite clear: Labor has failed this test. This budget does nothing for your budget, for family budgets. There is no credible plan to deal with the source of inflation or to help families deal with their immediate cost-of-living pressures. This budget confirms the following, and this is not in dispute: the cost of living is going up; your electricity and gas prices are going up; citizens' tax payments are going up; government spending is going up; employment, as the number of Australians who are employed, is going down; and real wages are forecast to go down, despite this government saying less than six months ago that this wouldn't happen, no-one would be left behind and the halcyon days were ahead. It's a high-taxing, fairly high-spending, typical Labor budget that does nothing to help everyday Australians. So what does it mean? Before the election the Prime Minister told Australians they would be better off under Labor. The facts are by Christmas the average Australian will be $2,000 worse off. I think the average Australian has got the right to ask for their money back, because they were 100 per cent duped at the last election. It is a disgrace. The budget is an extraordinary disappointment.

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