John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—I wish to provide the House with the government’s assessment of some key energy challenges and to announce a number of measures to assist hard-pressed motorists to better cope with very high petrol prices. Before turning to these issues, it is important to note the broader economic context. Australia’s economy continues to perform very strongly relative to other countries and in historical terms. This was amply demonstrated last Thursday by the fall in unemployment to 4.8 per cent, the lowest level recorded since August 1976.

The OECD said in its Economic Survey of Australia two weeks ago that Australia is one of a handful of developed economies to have averaged three per cent annual growth since the start of the millennium, a performance that is forecast to continue into 2006 and 2007. The OECD found that living standards in Australia have now surpassed those in all the major industrialised nations, with the exception of the United States. With a strong economy, Australians can plan for the future with hope, optimism and confidence.

This statement comes against a backdrop of high world oil prices and, in turn, high petrol prices. There is a degree of irony in the fact that Australia is a major beneficiary of the single most important structural cause of high world oil prices—namely, the re-emergence of China as a global economic powerhouse. Australia is more fortunate than other developed nations, all of which endure the pain of high fuel prices without benefiting nearly as much as Australia from China’s rapid economic growth.

Last month, I outlined the enormous opportunity this country has to build its global energy advantage in the 21st century if we think and act boldly. I stress the need to maintain policy flexibility at a time of growing international concern about energy security. Despite our substantial energy assets, most Australians feel the impact of soaring global energy demand not via a better job, a larger pay packet or a bigger share portfolio; they feel it at the petrol bowser. Today, I am announcing a series of practical steps that will give Australians cheaper fuel options, further develop our energy resources and help to underpin the nation’s long-term energy security. This total expenditure on these measures will be $1.576 billion over the next eight years.

In the last two years, world oil prices have risen to historically high levels. Australian families and businesses are hurting from the rise in domestic petrol prices of about 40 per cent over that period. There remains a spectrum of opinion on future oil price trends. Based on new production and refining capacity that will come on stream, the International Energy Agency expects some easing of high oil prices over the next few years. Even so, the best guess of the futures market is that prices will remain at or above $US75 a barrel through the first half of next year.

Many factors have contributed to high world oil prices. Geopolitical instability, especially in the Middle East, is one factor feeding heightened energy security concerns. The major cause, however, is to be found in market fundamentals. On the demand side, China’s rapid industrialisation, combined with a pick up in demand from India and a period of synchronised global growth, has prompted a rapid increase in oil demand. On the supply side, an extended period of underinvestment in global exploration and refinery infrastructure has limited the capacity of the industry to respond quickly to the surge in world demand. One-off events such as Hurricane Katrina and the shutdown of North America’s largest oilfield in Alaska have added to supply constraints in recent times.

Since oil is a globally traded product, and Australia is a net importer of oil, there is no escaping the surge in oil prices. Changes in Australian petrol prices closely track changes in the world price of oil, notwithstanding the claims by many to the contrary. The facts speak for themselves: in the last 12 months, the world oil price has risen by 16.8 per cent and the price of unleaded petrol in Australia has risen by 15.7 per cent.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has powers to protect consumers from unlawful, anticompetitive conduct and unlawful market practices through the provisions of the Trade Practices Act. The ACCC monitors the daily average retail prices of unleaded petrol, diesel and automotive LPG at roughly 3,600 sites across Australia. Last week, the Treasurer announced that the ACCC would extend its monitoring of fuel prices to include E10. Petrol retailers who engage in price fixing are breaking the law, and the ACCC has the power to take action against them. Last year, penalties of over $20 million were imposed on petrol retailers in two cases as a result of action taken by the ACCC. A further case is currently before the courts.

However, all price movements are not necessarily price fixing. ACCC monitoring of petrol prices shows that regular weekly price cycles occur in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. In most of these cities, prices overwhelmingly tend to peak on Thursdays and trough on Tuesdays. The weekly price peak on a Thursday occurs whether or not there is a public holiday in that week. Evidence from ACCC price monitoring over a six-month period shows that the price variations that occurred before public holidays were in some cases below the average and in some cases above the average.

The simple, if unpalatable, truth is that the government’s capacity to alleviate the impact of high petrol prices on consumers is necessarily limited, and going beyond carefully considered measures consistent with our long-term national interest would be irresponsible. Let me illustrate: a petrol excise cut that would deliver a 10c per litre reduction in the petrol price would blow a hole of about $2.5 billion or more in the budget surplus and reduce our capacity to meet spending priorities in areas such as national security and health or to provide further tax relief. Given the volatility of oil prices, the benefit to the motorist of such an excise cut could be easily and quickly devoured.

As the House will know, excise is a volumetric tax so that Commonwealth revenue collections do not rise in line with higher petrol prices. It is true that GST collections, all of which go to the states and territories, will have risen, but even here there will have been a substitution effect at work. Revenue from the Petroleum Resource Rent Tax is higher due to increased oil prices; however, this tax is also a deductible business expense.

Though of no comfort—and I stress this—to Australian motorists, petrol prices in this country are relatively low by international standards—the fourth lowest in the OECD, according to the International Energy Agency. If we look at the price of unleaded petrol around the world, in France it is currently 58 per cent above what it is in Australia and in Germany it is 67 per cent higher. In the United Kingdom, the price of unleaded petrol—which is equivalent to more than $A2.30 per litre—is about 70 per cent higher.

The lower price in Australia largely reflects relatively low fuel taxes and the steps the government has taken to help keep petrol prices down. For example, when the GST was introduced, the level of excise on petrol and diesel was cut by 6.7c per litre. In March 2001, the government reduced fuel excise by a further 1.5c a litre and abolished half-yearly indexation. This decision froze the rate of excise, removing an ongoing source of price pressure. If we had not taken this decision, the excise on petrol products would be about 8½c a litre higher than it is today.

Looking to the long-term, the energy white paper that I released in June 2004 established a balanced framework for supporting alternative transport fuels. Measures announced include significant ongoing excise concessions, a $1,000 grant for new liquid petroleum gas vehicles from 1 July 2011, and a $37.6 million capital fund to support new biofuels production capacity. Alternative fuels, such as LPG and ethanol, are currently excise free. The gradual introduction of excise between 2011 and 2015 will result in a transport fuel tax regime that is both efficient and fiscally responsible. In 10 years time and beyond, the excise rate on alternative fuels will still be at least 50 per cent lower compared with other fuels with similar energy content. Australia has access to potentially large sources of alternative fuels, and a diversity of energy supplies helps to ensure reliability, security and competition.

Working with market forces at a time of higher oil prices to encourage investment in alternative fuels is simply common sense. Today I am announcing new measures to further accelerate investment in alternative fuels and to provide Australian motorists with more and cheaper fuel options. Our largest alternative transport fuel is LPG. Australia has the capacity to produce substantial amounts of LPG given our natural gas and oil reserves. It is a product that has been in the marketplace for some time and is a familiar source of alternative fuel for consumers.

LPG is readily available through 3,200 service stations in Australia, and nearly half of them are in regional or rural areas. It is usually much cheaper than regular unleaded petrol and diesel due to a range of factors, including concessional tax treatment. The average LPG retail price across Australian capital cities in July was 40 per cent of the price of unleaded petrol.

To capitalise on Australia’s LPG resources, the government has decided to bring forward the previously announced rebate for the purchase of new LPG vehicles for private use. As of today, we will contribute $1,000 to the purchase cost of a new factory fitted LPG powered vehicle. In addition, the government will provide a grant of $2,000 towards the cost of converting vehicles to LPG for private use. In the past it has typically taken consumers up to two years to pay off the additional costs associated with purchasing or converting to an LPG vehicle. The new LPG rebates are expected to cut this payback period significantly.

Whilst savings will depend on fuel consumption and driving habits, the Australian LPG Association estimates that, on average, the fuel bill for a six-cylinder vehicle travelling 15,000 kilometres a year would be cut by $27 a week, or more than $1,400 a year, following the conversion. With these savings and the $2,000 rebate it would take only four months for the motorist to recoup the net cost of a $2,500 conversion. The Western Australian government is currently providing a subsidy of $1,000 on the purchase of new LPG vehicles or for LPG conversions. I encourage other states and territories to follow the lead of the Commonwealth and Western Australian governments in encouraging Australians to explore this cheaper fuel alternative.

I am also pleased that the board of the peak industry body, LPG Australia, has established a task force to address the future needs of consumers and the industry. The government will be working with the industry to provide advice to consumers on issues such as the suitability of vehicles to be converted. Australian motorists will need to weigh up the costs and benefits of taking up the incentives which I am announcing today. The government will ensure that consumers have all the relevant information they need to make the right decisions. The estimated cost of the LPG incentives is $677.1 million over the eight-year life of the program. Taking into account revenue forgone, the total cost is more than $1.3 billion over eight years.

Ethanol blends can also make an important contribution to meeting Australia’s transport fuel needs. The government has spent $55 million to date in production grants to effectively offset the excise on ethanol production in Australia. We have already implemented a range of measures to help companies achieve a target of at least 350 megalitres of biofuel production in Australia by 2010. Substantial new investments are now underway. While there were 70 service stations selling ethanol in Australia in June last year, today the figure is about 260. BP plans to increase ethanol sales a hundredfold over the next two years. Caltex plans to double the number of ethanol retail sites by the end of this year, and Woolworths is set to enter the market next year with 50 sites.

The government recognises that lack of access to distribution infrastructure remains one of the barriers to the uptake of ethanol. To address this issue I announce today additional expenditure of $17.2 million over three years to reduce the infrastructure costs to retailers of installing new pumps or converting existing pumps to E10 blends and to encourage sales of E10. The government will allocate up to $20,000 to the cost of converting retail petrol stations to supply E10. Up to $10,000 will be provided after the conversion is complete and an additional $10,000 after an ethanol-blend sales target is reached.

The additional grant on reaching a sales target will provide a clear incentive for retailers to discount the price of E10 fuel. Recipients of grants from the ethanol distribution program will be expected to sell ethanol blends at a discount and to display the price of ethanol blends alongside price information for other petroleum products. Because this government believes in consumer choice, we are not persuaded to mandate the use of ethanol. We will, however, continue to explore practical measures that effectively mandate the availability of cheaper ethanol blended fuels for Australian motorists.

This government has worked hard to restore confidence in ethanol after the disgraceful campaign waged by the Labor Party against this industry. Labor spent the better part of a year trying to discredit ethanol, criticising the government’s support for ethanol production in Australia, even targeting an individual company and its owner. The Labor Party deliberately set out to scare Australian motorists off using ethanol blended fuels. The former Opposition Leader, the member for Hotham, talked about motorists ‘having their engines wrecked by ethanol fuel’. It really pains me to say that even the member for Batman was up to his neck in Labor’s campaign to destroy consumer confidence in ethanol. This is what he had to say on 17 September, 2003:

We—

the Labor Party—

have still failed to see any demonstrated advantages in the subsidisation of the local ethanol industry.

                        …                   …                   …

The facts speak for themselves. Up to one-third of the 10 million cars in Australia will not operate satisfactorily on petrol containing 10 per cent ethanol.

That was wrong then, and it is wrong now. Ninety per cent of cars on the road in Australia can confidently run on E10, including all new cars. Ethanol has a future in this country because of only one side of politics, and that is the coalition. High oil and petrol prices do have an acute impact on regional and remote communities that rely on diesel for power generation as well as transport. The government’s Renewable Remote Power Generation program is designed to encourage the replacement of diesel generators with renewable energy sources for power generation and water pumping. In a good example of the success of this program, Bremer Bay, a small community on the south coast of Western Australia, is now being supplied by a wind diesel system, with a wind turbine providing an average 40 per cent of the town’s electricity. Diesel consumption has been cut by up to 340,000 litres a year, which equates to almost $480,000 a year at today’s fuel prices.

Today I announce that the government will spend an additional $123.5 million over four years to extend and expand this program. For the first time, funding will be made available for energy efficiency projects to reduce demand for industry support activities that encourage the uptake of renewable energy technologies in these areas. Encouraging further oil exploration in Australia is a very high priority for the government. Two-thirds of the world’s oil reserves are concentrated in the Middle East. The role played by the Middle East in world oil production is set to grow in coming decades. Australia must explore all avenues to reduce its future dependence on Middle East oil. While known oil reserves are declining, much of Australia has been explored only at a shallow level and large areas of remote frontier provinces remain underexplored. Current exploration activity is largely brownfields exploration rather than the higher risk greenfields exploration that is aimed at identifying new resource provinces. Australia has some 40 offshore basins that display signs of oil potential, and half of them remain unexplored. Encouraging further exploration could see the discovery and development of resources the size of those in Bass Strait.

In a high cost, high risk field, where global investment competition is fierce, governments have an important role to play in providing good geoscience information. Identifying and assessing Australia’s resources is the first step in developing them. To this end, the government will expand Geoscience Australia’s current program of seismic acquisition, data enhancement and access. At a cost of an additional $76.4 million over the next five years, this expanded program will focus on new frontier offshore areas to be chosen in consultation with the industry.

The government will also commit an extra $59 million over five years to identify potential onshore energy sources such as petroleum and geothermal energy. Using the latest geophysical imaging and mapping techniques, this information will help attract companies to explore in new areas by enhancing the chances of discovery and reducing the risks to investors. To secure Australia’s energy future in the face of high oil prices, the government will continue to examine a range of additional fuel and energy technology options. We are keen to explore how Australia might contribute to the development of more fuel-efficient vehicles, including hybrid vehicles, tailored to our market and to export opportunities. Our abundant coal and gas reserves also provide the basis for meeting future transport fuel needs should commercial circumstances and technology dictate their feasibility.

I therefore ask the Minister for Industry, Tourism and Resources, the Hon. Ian Macfarlane, to bring forward to cabinet a proposal for a dedicated fund to position Australia as a leader in gas to liquids and coal to liquids research. This is consistent with the approach we have adopted with the Low Emissions Technology Development Fund. Like the Labor Party, this government is determined to build Australia’s energy advantage through leading edge technology and not sacrifice jobs—the jobs of Australian workers—and Australian exports through premature carbon taxes that would only cripple Australia’s coal and gas industries.

This is a difficult time for Australians faced with high petrol prices, and it is only appropriate that the benefits which accrue to Australia from our substantial resource base flow through beyond a narrow part of our society. Even so, we should not lose sight of the positive outlook for Australia as a major global energy supplier. Our natural resources and man-made assets are the envy of most other countries in the world, and the principles laid out in the energy white paper two years ago continue to provide a robust framework for meeting the nation’s energy goals of prosperity, security and sustainability. The measures I have outlined today will make a practical contribution to further developing and utilising Australia’s energy advantage for the benefit of all of the Australian people. I present the following document:

Energy Initiatives.

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the House take note of the document.

I seek leave to move a motion in relation to the debate.

Leave granted.

I move:

That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent Mr Beazley (Leader of the Opposition) speaking for a period not exceeding 30 minutes.

Question agreed to.

Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Here is the good news: over the next eight years the Commonwealth will take in revenue associated with the fuel excise of over $100 billion, and big-hearted Arthur opposite, the Prime Minister of Australia, will return to the Australian people in one way or another perhaps $1½ billion. This is the government’s relief to the Australian people for the suffering that they are currently experiencing with regard to the petrol prices they are paying. I guess anything is welcome, but we ought not to be jumping through hoops over this particular exercise by the government.

It seems to me that the longer the Prime Minister speaks on this the less substance there is to the things he has to say. He was described recently in the Australian in an article by Ross Fitzgerald as the ‘Geoff Boycott of Australian politics’: he occupies the crease at any cost but does not bother about making any runs. This $1½ billion over eight years is a classic Boycott century. Every second or third over there is a small prod to mid wicket, either side of the mid wicket fielder, the single is taken, the game goes on and gradually, slowly, after about eight hours at the crease he gets to 100—shame about the crowd, which has long since disappeared; shame about the game, which has long since lost its lustre. This is a typical Geoff Howard innings. On the issues which are absolutely critical to the future of this nation, the Prime Minister has given it a bit of a nudge.

Government Members:

Government members interjecting—

Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He has given it a little bit of a nudge, and the screaming and ranting of the honourable members opposite after the Prime Minister was heard in silence is a pretty fair indication of the extent to which they are feeling the barbecue stopper pressure at this point in time as the Australian people experience the consequences of the triple whammy: rising interest rates, which themselves involve a massive breach of trust by the Prime Minister; increasing petrol prices; and now a substantial threat to their capacity to enjoy the rights they have in the workplace and the remuneration that they get from their jobs. They are feeling that pressure intensely, and some of that pressure seems to be emerging onto the Liberal Party backbench.

We welcome any relief at the petrol pump for Australian families because they are experiencing such considerable difficulty at this time. But this is not even a beginning. It might be the beginning of a beginning, but it is not even a beginning in dealing with the challenges that we now confront in order to render ourselves independent of Middle East oil or even a decent effort at giving some succour to the people who are experiencing those regular rip-offs at the petrol pump when they go away on weekends, on holidays or whatever. Meanwhile, the Treasurer persistently under questioning in this place says he is going to give no decent reference to and make no demands on the one protective agency that they have—the ACCC. I will say a bit more about that later on.

There is too little in these measures to uncouple us from the tyranny of overseas oil. There is no vision for the fuel industry we need—an independent Australian fuel industry—so we are not forever at the mercy of foreign oil cartels, so that overnight price spikes in Saudi Arabian oil do not spark a fault line in the family budget and the national economy. It has taken this Prime Minister far too long to act on this petrol issue. We in the opposition have been talking about a long-term plan for fuel independence since last October. That is when we released our blueprint on fuels—our plan to develop a diversified, home-grown fuel industry so we are not permanently held hostage to Middle East oil prices.

Today the Prime Minister announced that he is taking up some of Labor’s proposals and that he will look at a few others, but that is about it. In the national interest, I urge him to swallow his pride and adopt all of them, because, as the Australian says today:

... Australia has the capacity to break its dependence on imported crude oil. But this will not be done by political posturing and bandaid solutions.

This particular solution comes into the category of not quite the bandaid; taking the paper off the bandaid is the form this solution presents. In the interests of Australian families and in the interests of our economy, adopt Labor’s comprehensive plan to build an independent Australian fuels industry. To relieve the pressure on families today, immediately give the consumer watchdog, the ACCC, the powers it needs to investigate petrol pricing, not just tinker at the edges and not just look at the passing parade of prices; to get down to the serious business of investigating exactly how prices are arrived at and to have the ability to question them and obtain the documentation; and to get down to the job of ensuring that there is at least a watchdog with teeth to protect the position of Australian motorists now.

Today’s Australian reinforces what Labor has long maintained. It said:

Australia must seize the opportunity of a high world oil price to finally get serious about its long-term energy future.

It backs up everything my resources spokesman, the member for Batman, has been saying, and I quote the Australian article again:

Opposition resources spokesman Martin Ferguson has raised the issue of gas or coal to liquids as the best long-term answer to the current oil price shock, and he is correct.

                        …                   …                   …

... the abundance of gas is the key to breaking our exposure to the increasing stranglehold of Middle East crude.

Given that the Prime Minister has seen all this and had months to deliberate on it—he has seen the consequences, in part because of the disastrous policies he has pursued in Iraq, of a rise in the price of oil emanating largely from the Middle East—I cannot for the life of me understand why he has not, in that period of time, got it into his noggin that we actually have a solution here. We are not asking that the Australian government break new ground in this area. Frankly, the technology here in relation to gas to liquid conversion already exists and is in operation in Qatar and Nigeria. It is simply a matter of getting the taxation regime right here and you will get it here. You do not have to invent anything else; it has already been invented. We can no longer afford to be complacent about either the supply or the cost of petrol. The Prime Minister must go further than the measures announced today.

Last year I released Labor’s Australian fuels blueprint. It sets a crucial goal to reduce our reliance on foreign oil and diversify the Australian fuels industry, because a more self-sufficient fuels sector will make Australia a stronger nation. Back then, talking about our dependence on Middle East oil, I have to say, was not fashionable, but after just 12 months of campaigning on the subject reducing our dependence on Middle East oil is now the dominant way of seeing Australia’s fuel problem. That is what I call effective opposition. We state the case, we state the problem and we identify it as a key strategic interest. In relation to the Australian economy and the Australian nation overall, we are mocked, ridiculed and ignored by the government and then gradually, slowly and without acknowledgment the government slopes and slouches towards our position.

Martin Ferguson (Batman, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Primary Industries, Resources, Forestry and Tourism) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Steals our clothes.

Kim Beazley (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The honourable member for Batman says, ‘Steals our clothes.’ I do not actually think quite that. Perhaps they have cut one of the toes off our socks as they have long gone through this proposal. They have thieved that, because this $1.5 billion over the next eight years scarcely makes up a suit. The Prime Minister has finally acknowledged this problem today.

On the same day, the Howard government’s recent energy white paper, of which he is still proud, it appears, from the remarks he has made here today, was labelled by commentators as all but redundant. That white paper, which he said was the be-all and end-all, was labelled today by all reasonable commentators who know something about it as being all but redundant—meaningless—in terms of the problems this nation now confronts. The evidence is overwhelming: Australia needs a comprehensive Australian fuel industry plan, with more fuels, more types of fuel and cheaper and cleaner fuels. At the heart of this, we need policies to increase the supply of Australian fuels, especially liquid fuels made from gas, because we have such bountiful supplies.

I want to speak first about the huge potential inherent in turning Australian gas into liquids. To encourage exploration—and this is what there should have been here today, not just a flick pass to the minister for industry: ‘Come back to us, Ian, and tell us a bit about what we ought to be doing’—I believe there should be petroleum resources rent tax incentives for developers of gas fields who provide resources for gas to liquid fuels projects, but there is no mention of anything like that in the Prime Minister’s statement. There should also be the selective use of flow-through share schemes in the gas, oil and mineral exploration industry. Why on earth you would not do that to encourage exploration, I cannot fathom. I cannot understand, with the mining industry generally constantly approaching the government about this, why they would not do something serious about the flow-through share scheme. It encourages small explorers out there—gets them on the job—and backs up the big fellows. You can arrange it in a reasonable way so that it assists the big fellows as well. I would have this looked at across the whole of the mining industry; I once had an undertaking of that at a previous election, and it was a very sensible policy to encourage exploration. Further, there should be improved technology through a targeted funding scheme for fuels R&D.

To assist the construction of a gas to liquids plant we would develop a more favourable depreciation regime explicitly for it, examine a new infrastructure investment allowance for investment in Australian gas to liquids infrastructure, and work with industry to improve engine design and fuel quality standards, because both will need to change in the light of us increasingly becoming utilisers of the product of that gas to liquid technology. We would support the development of regional towns by building and supporting the infrastructure they need.

We also need to encourage Australians to buy cars that use alternative fuels. Today the Prime Minister has announced the government is adopting Labor’s proposal to subsidise the conversion of cars from petrol to autogas, or LPG, but it will take time to develop the infrastructure for the conversion of cars and the guaranteed supply of LPG from a network of distributors. Take-up could well be hampered by the availability of conversion workshops and LPG outlets. For example, in my home state there are now no conversion workshops in Karratha or Port Hedland, so vehicles are sent to Perth for conversion at a transport cost of $750. On top of that LPG prices in the bush are significantly higher, and what confidence can Australian motorists have that once they have made the switch to LPG the Howard government will not just up the tax?

In the last parliament alone the government changed its mind three times about the excise regime for LPG. If he is serious about fuel diversity, the Prime Minister should also take up Labor’s proposal to encourage a sustainable ethanol industry and he should ease regulation of biodiesel production on farms. There was nothing in this statement about biodiesel production on farms. Where was the National Party when this statement was being prepared? If you go around regional Australia now, they will nag you on this. They will keep telling you things like: ‘We’d love to and we do do a bit of production of biodiesel here, but every time we try to do anything with it we run into trouble. We have a regulatory regime which is utterly absurd.’ There was obviously no effort by the National Party for any serious input into this particular statement, because there is nothing in here that reflects the fact that there needs to be an easing of the regulatory regime around biodiesel on farms.

A long-term plan for an independent Australian fuel industry is essential, but the government should be doing so much more right now to give consumers confidence that petrol prices are as fair and reasonable as they could possibly be. It should support Labor’s move in the parliament today to strengthen section 46 of the Trade Practices Act to provide greater scope for dealing with abuse of market power. It should immediately strengthen the ACCC’s powers by giving the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission the power to: formally monitor petrol prices at the terminal gate, and wholesale and retail petrol prices; obtain all information from refiners, wholesalers and major retailers in the transport fuel sector relevant to fuel prices, including costs, profits and margins; and conduct other inquiries relevant to the spiralling fuel prices.

That would be a serious mandate for the ACCC at this point in time. I would have thought that today, if the Prime Minister was going to at least bite and eat a bit of humble pie in relation to the Labor Party’s proposals around ethanol, having the minister have a look at gas to liquids technology and about picking up suggestions we made about LPG car conversions—if he is going to eat that much humble pie—he could have extended it out a bit and made his Treasurer eat a bit of humble pie too. It has basically been his straw man Treasurer who has been doing most of the blocking in relation to propositions made in this place and elsewhere that the ACCC, which is under his authority, needs to start doing something about protecting motorists. I do not know what it is. It is a hard and difficult task I suppose—maybe they would need an odd extra staff member for it; I am not sure! There must be some reason beyond simply the fact that every member of parliament gets a fuel card why the Treasurer cannot be bothered dealing with this particular problem.

There is nobody out there who believes that more effort could not be made in regard to monitoring fuel prices to ensure that they are not being ripped off, because the sight evidence to them, week after week, is that they are. That is all there is to it. No Prime Minister or Treasurer can give them the assurance that they are not being ripped off if that Prime Minister or Treasurer is not prepared to see the ACCC properly monitoring what has been going on with regard to the pricing arrangements for people at the petrol pump.

The government has no real plans here for transport fuels. I pointed out at the beginning that the government in that eight years is going to make over $100 billion at today’s prices out of the fuel excise. This initiative, with a bit of cheating up in regard to an estimate of forgone revenue, makes $1½ billion over exactly the same period. The Prime Minister was proud to say, ‘Look, I don’t want to do anything about reducing fuel excise.’ That is $2½ billion a year if you take 10 cents off. That would be much better spent, I think he said, on education, on defence and I am not sure if he did not say on developing something in relation to the fuel industry. There is a hell of a lot of surplus left in that $100 billion in terms of the $1½ billion here that he has been talking about.

But I do want to pick up, before I conclude, on one or two of the false claims that the Prime Minister resorted to in relation to Labor’s fuel plan. The Prime Minister falsely claimed that the Labor Party support a tax on carbon emissions. The Labor Party have not ever supported a tax on carbon emissions. There is only one serious prospect of major carbon taxes in this country, and that is if the prime minister has his way, as he will have if he wins the next election, and develops a full-blown nuclear power industry in this country. I can tell you this: there is absolutely no way you can make the economics of a nuclear power industry in this country work unless you slap a massive tax on gas and coal to ensure that they are rendered uncompetitive with nuclear power when people come to paying their electricity bills. We are not talking here about the odd 10 per cent here or there; we are talking about taxes in the realm of about 100 per cent of the cost if we are going to make that work.

What the Labor Party have called for is a market solution on carbon emissions, the sort of market solution that is now appealing more and more to American states as they work around the blockage in Washington and make their own deals with the people in Europe who are interested in carbon emissions trading regimes. That is a very different thing from a tax on carbon. That is a market based performance in bringing down our levels of carbon emissions, and an absolutely essential co-commitment with any serious policy related to dealing with the huge problems we now confront globally in relation to greenhouse gas emissions. This was not meant to be a debate or a discussion about greenhouse gas emissions, but the Prime Minister managed to bring it up in the remarks that he made in this place and to give us a gratuitous, deceitful and dishonest slap on the way through.

The simple fact of the matter is there are things that we need to do. In the same way we should be preparing Australia to be independent of Middle East fuel, we should also be preparing Australia to make a contribution to dealing with a problem which massively threatens great Australian values, not to mention all our coastline, the Great Barrier Reef and Kakadu—all of which, on the government’s own conservative scientific analysis, will be effectively washed away within 20 years. That is not the report of some bug-eyed greenie out there in the bush who is communing with a rainbow; that is the assessment of Booz Allen consultants, which the Commonwealth government set up to advise them on that subject.

We do think we need to be in emissions trading, but we do not think, as the Prime Minister thinks subliminally, that we ought to be into carbon taxes, which will be absolutely essential if he is going to make that nuclear power of his work. He also had something to say, and I thought there was a real cheek to him here, about the value in a particular area of utilising wind as a mechanism of power generation. I mean, really, after that performance, that quite probably illegal performance, by the minister for the environment in Gippsland! There has been a lot of discussion around this chamber in recent weeks about the fowl yard and the presence of chickens and otherwise in the parliament, but this is a parrot—the thousand-year parrot: once in every thousand years a parrot may be flogged by a windmill working in Gippsland. On the basis of that, this government of geniuses, this government so basically concerned with the development of renewable energies and Australian alternative fuels and the rest of it, sees it vetoed by the minister for the environment. It does not go ahead.

This is a Prime Minister who has no track record of any decency at all when it comes to dealing with the critical issues this nation now confronts in getting itself energy independence—or for that matter in getting ourselves into a position where we make a serious contribution to bringing down levels of greenhouse gas emissions globally. He actually has some moral responsibility in both areas. His moral responsibility in relation to making us independent of Middle East oil is that he has made a small contribution to making it a great deal more expensive.

The simple fact of the matter is that though we are now three and a bit years on from the conclusion of the first phase of the hostilities in the Iraq war—to which the government committed us and unwisely and without patience argued that our American friends and allies ought to be committed to too, intervening in the debate inside the United States on whether or not the US should go to the Iraq war on the side of war against those in the State Department, like Rich Armitage and others, who were arguing patience—the production of oil from Iraq has averaged less than half what it was in its admittedly very straitened circumstances prior to then. Having become a byword in corruption through the oil for food program, their resolution of it was to commit acts that operated in such a way that there would be no oil at all.

The Labor Party has put forward a serious proposal with serious measures that needs to be considered by the government. There is an additional obligation to have those things considered when we look at the government’s take of excise at the petrol bowser. The Prime Minister came into this place and occupied the House for 30 minutes to talk about a scheme, all of which appeared in the Labor Party’s document. At least, the words appeared in the Labor Party’s document; of course, the Labor Party proposals, except in the area of LPG conversion, went way beyond anything that was suggested by the government here.

The Prime Minister rarely makes a statement in this place—he had to effectively have his hand forced to make a statement about the troops going to Iraq—and he never makes one of 30 minutes length. Today for 30 minutes he laboured mightily in the field to bring forth a mouse. With $100 billion raised, there will maybe be $1½ billion committed to this in that same period. Will there be independence from Middle East oil? No. Will there be monitoring of what has been going on in a way that would give ordinary Australians some satisfaction? No to that as well. It was a very disappointing statement indeed. It was definitely a Geoff Boycott innings. I suggested it might have been a Geoff Boycott century; I think it was a Geoff Boycott 99 not out—so not only is the crowd disappointed; ‘Geoff Boycott’ Howard ought to be disappointed as well.

Debate (on motion by Mr Turnbull) adjourned.