Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Before the debate is resumed on this bill I advise the committee that in the House it has been agreed that a general debate be allowed covering Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2008-2009 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2008-2009.

Stuart Robert (Fadden, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is an ugly fellowship—a not-so-secret society—that exists today. I call it the deficit or debt club. It remains unique. It knows no bounds or restraints. It is confined to no faction. It imposes no intellectual requirement and no geographic location. In the words of the mantra: union membership is required and blind adherence to collectivism is needed. No other circumstance or condition whatsoever, save the merit of lazy spending, shall entitle a Labor leader to membership of this fellowship as all post-war Labor leaders have received it. I rise today to make comment on Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2008-2009 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2008-2009, yet it is difficult to make comment on appropriation by a Labor government of some $3 billion without contextualising it with what the Labor government is doing with respect to its attempt to spend $42 billion—money it does not have.

If the Prime Minister simply put his hand in his pocket and threw in a dollar coin, at least it could be said that he had raised some of it. So today we draw a line in the sand, a line that divides the experienced, prudent economic management of the coalition with its track record from a panicked and deficit-ready government. We draw a line in the sand that divides the coalition, which paid off the last of Labor’s government debt of $96 billion, from this government—which this morning put forward a bill for an act of parliament of one page that seeks to increase the bond issuance and therefore takes the national debt to $200 billion. We draw a line in the sand that divides the coalition, as best able to manage money, from Labor in a long line of deficits from Whitlam, Hawke, Keating and now the Prime Minister.

Today the Prime Minister has demanded that the parliament approve his plans for $42 billion within 42 hours—a billion dollars an hour—and has refused to discuss let alone negotiate the package with the coalition, so today we draw a line in the sand. Almost all economists agree that the recession has a long way to go. It will not be a V recession. The Lord knows we hope it will not be an L recession. But it will be a U recession, and this Labor government is panicking. It has fired all its bullets at the first engagement. Rather than a few, well aimed shots and then working in concert with others around it, it has blattered off the full magazine.

Let us look at the history of Labor governments as we look at Appropriation Bill (No. 3) and Appropriation Bill (No. 4), because leopards do not change their spots. They apparently just hide behind economic conservatives. The Prime Minister before the election may well have stood with glass and the skyline of Brisbane at his back and said in his nonchalant way, ‘Some people have described me as an economic conservative.’ I spend time in my Gold Coast seat of Fadden and, when I go to Brisbane asking whether there is anyone out there who would describe this member of the deficit- and debt-laden fellowship as an economic conservative, you can hear the whisper of silence.

Mr Whitlam had a massive increase in spending and a massive increase in tax revenue to cover it and the Australian people, after being on a high through the ‘It’s Time’ campaign, threw him out on his ear where he belonged. The Hawke-Keating government came in ’83. In the first year of the Hawke government, debt increased by $7 billion up to $16 billion. By the time the nation threw out the subsequent Keating government, $96 billion in debt had been accumulated. Over $60 billion in public servant super liabilities had been left to go and grow. In 1996 there was $8 billion in interest payments per annum. By the time that debt was paid off and $60 billion was put away in the Future Fund, the combined amount of money that had to be raised to cover the debt and the future fund liabilities and to pay the interest was something like $200 billion—and it took the coalition 10 years to pay it off.

Now this Rudd Labor government is seeking to raise $200 billion of debt again, because that is what Labor governments do. That is what the fellowship of the deficit debt club does. You cannot enter the fellowship without thrusting the nation into debt, because that is all you know. This debt is not productive debt. It does not look for tax cuts or for R&D expenditure in cuts. It does not look for cuts in capital gains tax to get cash flow back into businesses. It does not look to cover superannuation liabilities to restore cash flow. This is as Obama-esque as it comes in funding all of Labor’s pet projects under the guise of the global financial crisis. Is it any wonder that not a single House Republican voted for Obama’s package? Not one did, because in Obama’s $800 million package they would be lucky to have $100 billion worth of actual productive expenditure. The rest of it is all typical left-wing pet projects.

Now Prime Minister Rudd joins the fellowship of the deficit and debt club. In 2008-09 he had a budget surplus of $22 billion—granted, a lot of that was from cheeky accounting tricks and other things put into it. It will now be a $22 billion deficit—a fairly impressive performance and turnaround for a first year in office. In his first year in office, how has he contributed to this great, unique fellowship of deficit and debt? A $44 billion turnaround in his budget position would have to be history-making. His $10.4 billion cash splash proved to be ineffective as an economic stimulus. That is not to say the people who received it did not appreciate it—I am sure they did. But looking at the spending increase in retail sales of a mere 3.7 per cent seasonally adjusted, with a maximum of a $500 million increase even though increases were building in November, let us say that the increase did not continue but stopped and that $500 million extra is due to the stimulus, which means only five per cent of the stimulus was spent. No wonder that has been no stimulus at all. That follows the US example where $125 billion was put into the economy and the figures showed a sharp increase in income but no reciprocal increase in expenditure.

Now we have $42 billion, all debt. Every single cent will be borrowed. We are expecting a budget where the forward estimates may well have debt going out to $115 billion. And we have that offensive one-page bill which seeks to raise $200 billion in debt to the issuance of government bonds. How any Labor parliamentarian can sleep at night is absolutely and utterly beyond me.

When questioned how the debt will be paid off, we had the Treasurer stand and say, ‘As soon as the economy starts to grow above the trend, we will start to pay the debt back.’ What does ‘grow above the trend’ possibly mean? He then wanted to say, ‘As soon as growth automatically kicks in, we’ll start to pay the debt back.’ Does he stand there, praying to the great financial gods and saying, ‘Please grow above the trend, please automatically kick back in.’ It is no plan to pay off one-fifth of a trillion dollars to say, ‘As soon as growth increases above the trend or growth increases automatically we will pay back the fifth of a trillion dollars we sunk this nation into.’ If you add in state Labor debt, which is approaching $100 billion, we now have a combined debt position put in by the Labor governments of this country approaching one-third of a trillion dollars. How in the name of all that is decent, how in the name of our children’s futures, is one-third of a trillion dollars going to be paid off?

I guess Labor do not care because after the failed Whitlam experience the coalition took care of it; after the appalling, abominable Keating years, the coalition took care of it. I guess in their haphazard thinking deep down, in places that they do not talk about at parties, after the failure of the Rudd government and the one-fifth of a trillion dollars largesse being left to the children, they are hoping and probably praying that the coalition will come in and pay it all back again.

The largesse does not stop here. There is a political strategy but clearly no economic one. The Prime Minister has declared 12 wars: wars on drugs, cancer, inflation, unemployment, global unemployment, whale hunting, Aboriginal disadvantage, downloads, pokies, alcopops, doping in sport and bankers’ salaries. Wars cost money. If you are going to declare war on a problem, I expect the community would expect to see solutions and solutions will cost money—$42 billion in debt being thrown away, on top of existing debt provisions, $200 billion more in total, and here we have 12 unfunded wars. We also have 160 unfunded reviews, summits, commissions, inquiries and conferences, all reporting back within the next 12 to 18 months, all with a range of recommendations which, I suggest, will cost money. Perhaps that is where some of the fifth of a trillion dollars is going.

Have you had a look through Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2008-2009 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2008-2009? It may simply be a mere $3 billion, but it will be $3 billion borrowed from the future of our children. There is $13.95 million for climate change and the government’s proposed Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. I gather that is for advertising, to put some more scare campaigns out there about what is happening rather than speak scientifically and legitimately about the science—an appropriate response. There is $101 million extra for solar panel rebates, rebates the government said were not needed until the coalition pressure overturned them and Minister Garret saw sense. There is $10 million extra for the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy to meet higher costs of the broadband project assessment process. This was the $4.7 billion broadband project, an election promise. Prime Minister Rudd said today that all promises will be met, but this promise was that within six months we would have the tender process well and truly finalised and ready to go. Here we are, 13 months later, and it is nowhere near finalised and we have an appropriation for $10 million more to meet the assessment process costs. We have a real increase for Defence of $278 billion due to ‘other expenditure reduced’—something like $580 million reduced.

Labor is selling the future of our children by loading them down with debt. Whilst these appropriation bills and some of their major areas are not contentious and will be passed by the coalition, there is no way known on this green earth that we will stand by on this $42 billion unproductive giveaway and allow its passage through the House or the Senate.

The ugly fellowship of the deficit debt club knows no bounds, it knows no restraints, and after question time today it knows no hide or cheek. It belongs to no faction, there is clearly no intellectual requirement and there is no geographical location. Union membership is binding. Adherence to collectivism is needed. No other circumstance or condition whatsoever, save the merit of lazy spending, entitles a Labor leader to membership of the fellowship. Prime Minister Rudd has now shown conclusively that he will join Whitlam, Hawke and Keating as members of the fellowship who have loaded the future children of this nation with unproductive debt.

Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have to say that that was one of the most interesting and strange contributions to any debate I have ever heard. The previous speaker, the member for Fadden, mentioned intellectual capability. It really has me worrying about the future of the opposition, of the Liberal Party, if what he portrayed to this House tonight was some form of intellectual capability. I think the other side of politics in this parliament is in real trouble. I note that he was highly critical of President Obama, attributing the budgetary problems in the US to his leadership, which only demonstrated to me that not only does he have a very limited understanding of economic matters but he really is not up to date with what has been happening in the US. The enormous budget deficit that exists there can fall squarely on the shoulders of President Bush, whom I think the previous speaker may consider to have been an outstanding president and somebody whose policies, plans and legislative program he would have followed—but enough about the previous speaker. Let us talk about the legislation that is before us tonight, Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2008-2009 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2008-2009, which are for about $3.1 billion.

There are a number of important items in this legislation. It looks at climate change. It makes provisions for health. It makes provisions for the Human Services portfolio and AusAID. I must say I am extremely proud of the contributions that this government has made in the area of overseas aid assistance to developing countries. It is something that has been long overdue and something that I know all of us on this side of the House are very proud of—and I know that there are members on the other side of this House who are also very pleased with the action that this government has taken in relation to overseas aid.

I would also like to spend a little bit of time on the stimulus package that was presented to parliament last year, the Economic Security Strategy package. It gave the $1,000 bonus to families receiving family tax benefit part A; the $1,400 one-off payment to single pensioners; the $2,100 one-off payment to pensioner couples; the $1,000 payment to those who receive carer allowance; the first home owner grants of $21,000 to buyers of newly constructed homes and $14,000 to people purchasing established homes; and of course the 56,000 new training places.

There has been much comment in the House by the opposition on the effectiveness or noneffectiveness of these measures. I have to report to the House that not only do the figures that the Prime Minister and the Treasurer presented support the fact that they have been very successful measures but so does the news I bring to this parliament from the electorate that I represent. There has been no end to the number of pensioners contacting my office saying how welcome that bonus they received before Christmas was, how they have put it to really good use, how they were able to do things that they were unable to do before—pay for things, buy things—and just what it meant to them at Christmas. I have even had letters that constituents have asked me to hand-deliver to the Prime Minister because they were so grateful for the help that they received. They utilised that help and they wanted the Prime Minister to know what they used that money for.

I have a friend who has a business that is called Walk on Wheels, which supplies motorised scooters to elderly people, and services those scooters. My friend reported to me that they had an enormous increase in sales of their scooters prior to Christmas, and she attributed it very much to the bonus that pensioners received. The other interesting aspect of this is that, in January, as part of her business protocol, she rings around and talks to those pensioners who have purchased scooters, and she reported to me that this year every pensioner she rang to ascertain whether or not they needed their scooter serviced actually undertook to have that servicing done. She said that was very different to what usually happens. It is obviously good for her business, but it is also good for the safety of those pensioners who rely on motor scooters to get around. So for pensioners the bonus was very welcome.

Families have also found it very useful. Some of the families in my electorate have been able to purchase things for their children or organise their sporting equipment—things that they would not otherwise have been able to do. I had one mother come to see me. Her children all played representative sport. She reported to me that that bonus had enabled her to buy the equipment that her children needed. So those people who are being very negative about the last bonus should talk to people in their electorates, because I know that that money was put to very good use.

Then we need to look at first home buyers. I have been going out and looking at homes with a first home buyer. I know it is very difficult to actually find established homes around the price that first home owners who are entering the market can afford, because there has been such a take-up of the first home owners grant. There have been a number of people who would not otherwise have been looking for houses who have decided that, given the fact that this grant is there, they are going to buy their first home. That is very good for those people, and it is also very good for our economy. Madam Deputy Speaker, you can see that the first package was well and truly utilised for the benefit of people within the electorate of Shortland. They truly appreciated what the government did.

The other aspect of Appropriation Bill (No. 4) that I would like to concentrate on is in relation to the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government. There was $300 million allocated to councils. In the Shortland electorate there are two councils: Wyong Shire Council and Lake Macquarie City Council. Wyong Shire Council was allocated $1.529 million and Lake Macquarie City Council was allocated $2.117 million. I must say that both councils have chosen projects that are worth while. Both councils have chosen projects that will provide much-needed infrastructure for their local government areas.

Dennis Jensen (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Dr Jensen interjecting

Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is a little bit loud. It is interrupting my—

Janelle Saffin (Page, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Could I ask the honourable member for Tangney to speak a bit softer, please.

Dennis Jensen (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Dr Jensen interjecting

Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Member for Tangney.

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was a bit rich. He was louder than the speaker!

Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He was louder than I was, yes! Thank you. I had to stop there because it was interrupting my train of thought. I do not present written speeches, so I needed to be able to gather my thoughts rather than listen to what the member for Tangney was saying on the telephone.

In both local government areas, the councils have consulted with the community, looked at projects that were ready to go and chosen wisely. They have chosen projects spread throughout their local government areas so as to provide benefits to all their residents. They will provide not only infrastructure but jobs for people within those local government areas. I welcome their embrace of the money given to them. I know that the projects they have chosen will be extremely useful and worth while in the community. The money that was provided through the Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts will see much of the neglect of the previous government addressed. Obviously there will be still more to do. Our next budget will address some of those issues. This week there were some steps taken to address some of the neglect of the past and to look at stimulating the economy yet again.

This week we have had the second economic stimulus package. The first area I would like to concentrate on is the money going towards building schools for the future.

Dennis Jensen (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You could build 15 nuclear power stations with that money!

Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We are not investing our money, as the member for Tangney would like us to, in nuclear power stations. Rather, we are investing money in a way that will enable children to attend schools that are not run down and neglected and where there are science blocks, and to attend high schools where there are language laboratories. I think this is an excellent way to create jobs. It is not only creating jobs in the construction industry but also building infrastructure that has been long sought after. I have many schools in my electorate that applied for funding under the previous government’s program, and the approach was very subjective. This is long-term investment to improve the quality of facilities. I talked about the high schools and primary schools, about gyms and libraries. This is for multipurpose halls and libraries. We are looking at around 500 new science laboratories being built in schools and at providing $200,000 to schools for maintenance, renewal of buildings and minor works.

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That’s nice, but where’s the job going to be next year?

Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If this maintenance work is not done, the schools will deteriorate and the people who could be doing that work will be unemployed. I believe that this aspect of the stimulation package is particularly important because it is building the education revolution. It is not just providing computers and all the other things that are so important but concentrating on investing in our schools, our future and our children. Whilst investing in our schools, our future and our children, we are providing jobs within the construction industry—which has been very adversely affected in this downturn.

This $42 billion Nation Building and Jobs Plan that we are currently debating downstairs and will be debating well into tomorrow, and which I will be speaking on, I think, at about 10 minutes to 4 o’clock in the morning, will provide insulation for 2.7 million homes—that is, free ceiling insulation. It will also upgrade buildings in every one of Australia’s 9,540 schools. It will build more than 20,000 new social and defence homes.

Under the previous government money was ripped out of housing, and social housing, public housing, declined enormously. In the Shortland electorate the waiting time for a public house is 13 years. Somebody who is in desperate need of housing has to wait 13 years! It is absolutely disgraceful. You put this together with the National Affordable Housing Strategy which invests money in the private sector—and I might add that there has recently been housing approved under that scheme in the Shortland electorate—and you have a real attempt by our government to address the housing shortage in this country. I might add also that in the Shortland electorate the vacancy rate within the rental market is 1.8 per cent and, when three per cent is presumed to be a crisis level, 1.8 per cent is untenable.

The package will invest money in housing and, at the same time, invest money in construction and in the future. Unlike the previous government, which missed every opportunity to prepare for the future; unlike the previous government, which thought that the mining boom would never end; unlike the previous government, which allowed the worst skills shortage in Australia’s history to eventuate; unlike the previous government, which just sat on its hands; the Rudd government is acting now for Australia’s future to ensure that we handle the global financial crisis much better than it would have been handled under the previous government and much better than most other countries in the world. (Time expired)

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak about Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2008-2009 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2008-2009 and two rather interesting realities. The first is that probably two per cent and maybe as much as four per cent of North Queensland is currently under water. You can fly for hundreds and hundreds of kilometres and not see much land—virtually no land at all. Australia is a dry continent but the north-eastern quarter of Australia is not dry, nor is the north-western quarter. They are not dry places at all. The extraordinary fact about our country and the reality of government and where it has dismally failed our country is that the top third has 300 million megalitres of water and the bottom two-thirds has only 80 million megalitres of water. It is really very dry, and 95 per cent of our agricultural production comes from the dry area. There seems to be something very strange here.

Our water comes in a great rush, as it is doing at the present moment, and then it is all gone. We need to build little receptacles to hold some of that water back so that we can use it later in the year or in our dry years. They are called dams. Every other country on earth has maybe seven or eight per cent of their entire rainfall run-off retained and available through dams and irrigation systems. For those that say these things are destructive, the Chinese built most of their canal system 1,000 to 2,000 years ago and 1,300 million people attest to the sustainability of their agricultural approach.

The second thing that dominates the current consciousness is, I think, the financial crisis. The most powerful leader on earth now is a man called Barack Obama and when he was asked whether he would give tax concessions—that is really a handout to people—he said no. He said that they were going to expend money that would provide jobs into the future.

A lot of what the previous speaker said was very laudable, but her basic premise is that of the current government. Yes, I applaud the current government for what they did before Christmas. Yes, I applaud the current government for spending money in the building and construction industry. But not one single permanent job will be created by the current government program—not one. If you look back to the Great Depression in Australia, you see that it was characterised by the hopeless failure of government in Australia. And if the Prime Minister is looking for advice from Treasury here, well, you can thank them for a country that has no manufacturing base, a dwindling and negligible agricultural base and a mining base that has collapsed because of world prices, which we in the mining industry know are cyclical. Any person in the mining industry can tell you: ‘Do not rely upon the situation that exists.’ They would have told you three years ago, they would have told you four years ago and they would have told you two years ago: ‘Do not rely on this. This is a spike in the market.’

I come from the mining industry, and I have been in and out of mining all my life. That was what I was doing before I came into parliament. But I was not someone who worked as a labourer, although I did for quite a long time, in the mining industry. I owned my own mines, I found my own ore reserves and I floated my own company. I know the industry inside out and backwards. My entire livelihood for almost all of my life has depended on knowing that industry, and I was Minister for Mines and Energy in Queensland. And I can tell you that only Third World countries rely upon mining. That is for African countries, not for advanced countries. If you base your economy around mining, you are so foolish—and I say that as a person who represents the mining industry.

I am sorry that the current government policy does not agree with the policy of the American President. He is looking at creating jobs out into the distance. Every single thing that this government has done in this great package of expenditure has provided jobs for two or three years, that is all. At the end of two or three years, it will all be gone. Wherever I go in the northern half of Queensland people say, ‘Do you ever get sick of bashing your head up against a wall?’ And I suppose that you really have to say that.

Currently, the state government of Queensland has done a dirty, filthy, slimy deal—for which the AWU is going to stitch them up very shortly—with the Greens to get their support in the forthcoming election. They are very stupid people. Didn’t they see what Mr Latham did in Tasmania? Yes, you will get five per cent of the vote from the Greens; you most certainly will get their preferences. But the 95 per cent is what I would be going after in an election. It is the mistake Mr Latham made, and the mistake the Queensland government is making now. If you take 25 per cent off each of those sugar mills, they will all close—every single one of them. They could not possibly take a 20 per cent reduction in their gross. They will all close and 50,000 people will be out of work.

This government has given the stamp of approval to the last government’s decision to bring bananas in from overseas. I don’t know whether I live in a lunatic asylum! Does anyone look at the figures? Australia is a net importer of food, in fruit and vegetables. We no longer feed ourselves. We went from a $400 million surplus to a $50 million deficit, to a $90 million deficit, to another $90 million deficit, and last year it was a $300 million deficit. That is something we can be proud of as a nation: we can’t feed ourselves! If you bring the bananas in, it will blow out to a $700 million deficit, assuming there is no growth, which of course would be a ridiculous assumption. So there is no doubt that one-seventh of our fruit and vegetables next year will have to come from overseas. We will not employ Australians to grow and produce fruit and vegetables and their downstream products; we will provide jobs to people overseas.

Does anybody think about this parasitic economics, where you go and borrow money, you print money or create money, and then you go and spend it on self-indulgence? Sure, it will be nice to have a lot of new schools. Sure, it will be nice to have a lot of community halls. Sure, it will be nice to have plenty of work doing up our houses. But what happens in three years time?

The argument of the current government against the last government is, ‘You blokes have based it all on the mining industry.’ I do not know. The current government seems to be basing it upon nothing at all. I do not know whether anyone is cognisant of the current account. I am only a lowly Cloncurry boy; I would not know these things. But Mr Keating, who was Treasurer of Australia for 12 years and Prime Minister for another four years, said, ‘When the current account is $15,000 million, we are going to be a banana republic.’ The then Leader of the Opposition, Mr Howard, who was himself Treasurer for some four or five years and then became Prime Minister for 12 years—a man who should know—reminded Mr Keating of this and said, ‘You said we would be a banana republic at $15,000 million but it’s now $23,000 million.’

I am only a simple Cloncurry boy, but it is now $75,000 million and rising. That means that this country has to borrow $75,000 million from overseas this year. I am rather intrigued to know who is going to be loaning us $75,000 million. That will be very interesting indeed. Substantially, money has come from the Americans. It came from the Arab countries, from China, from India and from Brazil, those countries that are going forward at a hundred miles an hour—the BRIC economies, as they are called. They have a lot of money to spare. They have been very competitive and they have given money to the Americans to invest, who have loaned it to us. But that most certainly will not be occurring this year. So it will be rather intriguing to find out. We are talking about a $20,000 million package for this year. The whole package is over three years. Madam Deputy Speaker, let me tell you what it should be spent on.

Firstly, this government should decide that we will put ethanol in our petrol tanks and not petrol. Petrol destroys the atmosphere and is causing global warming—I do not know about that, but it is certainly causing problems in the ocean which will get worse. Why would you not use ethanol? We have a record flood in the Burdekin River, the third-biggest river in Australia. The Murray-Darling, which produces 60 per cent of our agriculture, has 22 million megalitres. The Burdekin has 12 million megalitres, so it is smaller but not all that much smaller than the Murray-Darling. It is running at a record height. I have not seen it—I left before it really rose—but it is at the highest level in white man’s history. Surely we can build a dam in the Upper Burdekin to hold some of that massive outflow and use it to produce ethanol?

A dam was proposed at Hells Gates above Charters Towers to hold a tiny bit of these flood waters back. This year, the Burdekin River will probably run 20 or 30 million megalitres. We just want one million megalitres a year out of it; that is all. If you give that to us then we will give you 1,200 million litres of ethanol every year. At maybe a dollar a litre, we will produce $1,200 million of wealth. That will not stop in two or three years time, as this program will. That will go on forever and ever. We can produce our fuel forever and it is not harmful to the environment. At Georgetown, the Gilbert River is nine million megalitres. Remember that the Murray-Darling, which produces 60 per cent of our agriculture, is 22 million megalitres. This one is nine million megalitres. The Gilbert River is very suitable for farming. You can get 2,400 million litres of ethanol a year out of a moderate scheme on the Gilbert River.

The deputy head of the Department of the Premier and Cabinet in Queensland observed to me that there are fools out there who talk about the Bradfield scheme. I said, ‘Sonny’—and I used the word ‘Sonny’—‘what university degrees do you have?’ He said, ‘I’ve got a degree in engineering.’ I said, ‘And what have you built?’ He had not built anything. He had not even built a hole in his backyard. He had built nothing in his whole life. He was a very young person and a quite intelligent person too. I said: ‘Dr Bradfield built the Sydney Harbour Bridge. He built the Story Bridge in Brisbane. He built the University of Queensland, the beautiful old sandstone building there. He built the underground railway system in Sydney and he built two of the biggest dams in Australia even to this day. He may know a little bit about what he is talking about. I have to say, with all due respect to you, you do not have any experience at anything that would qualify you to make an authoritative statement like that.’ Dr Bradfield’s scheme is nothing very dramatic. It just takes a little tiny bit of the flood waters from where it rains all the time at a very high level—in Innisfail, Tully and the heartland of the electorate of Kennedy—and puts it back through the ranges. We can only do a little tiny bit at the top, but it is a very big picture if you put it out on to the western plains.

The western plains currently have an area the size of Tasmania where all flora and fauna have been destroyed by prickly acacia trees. That is how we are husbanding the resources of Australia. We should be ashamed of ourselves. We should replace the prickly acacia tree with ethanol-producing crops. Ethanol from sugar cane reduces CO2 emissions not by 29 per cent, like corn ethanol does, but by 194 per cent. Not only is that magical in itself but also with sugar cane we will be producing about 1,000 megawatts of electricity, so there will be another $400 million or $500 million in electricity income coming in as well. Once again, this is something that will go on forever. It will create jobs for forever and forever and forever.

If that power station, which also has coal, is built, it will supply much-needed power to the greatest mineral province on earth, the north-west mineral province. I am being quite technical. It produces $13,400,000 worth of product every year. There is no area as small as that in the world that has anything like that amount of mineral production. But, big as it is, we have 500 million tonnes of iron ore that has not been touched. We have the Roseby copper, silver, lead and zinc deposits and the Rocklands deposits. The Cannington will double its size, and that is BHP’s most profitable mine in the world—or it was the last time I looked. That is the biggest mining company on earth and its most profitable mine and it wants to double it in size. None of the other projects—not the oil shale nor the vanadium at Julia Creek, which are world-class resources, nor the iron ore, silver, lead, zinc or copper—are as big.

Joe Gutnick is proposing an eight million tonne a year phosphate production operation. If we could convince him to process that in Australia, that would be $8,000 million a year for the Australian economy. But, however you look at this, if you can enable and facilitate these mines to open we will double that $13,000 million production.

This is not just a job for the next two or three years. Mount Isa Mines started operation, I think, in 1926—at the latest, 1929. It is now 2009. That mine has been operating for 80-odd years. It has created great wealth for Australia for 80 years. We have people being put off at the giant nickel plant in Townsville. I do not doubt for a moment that we will be putting people off at the giant zinc plant in Townsville. Both these plants employ a thousand people. But they have very expensive electricity. People must understand that aluminium, for example, is just congealed electricity. The vast bulk of the price of aluminium is electricity. If you have cheap electricity you will get aluminium processing. If you have cheap electricity you will get nickel processing and zinc processing. If you do not have that, then these great projects will close down or they will find it very difficult to keep going.

There is not a single baseload power station in Northern Australia. If you were to draw a line across Australia stretching from Rockhampton across to Geraldton, you would find that there is no baseload power north of that line. Yet all of Australia’s mineral wealth—except for coal, of course—is north of that line. It is crazy that you would put the power stations away from where you need the power stations if you want to be internationally competitive. It costs an awful lot of money to take power great distances. But if you were to build the Hells Gates dam and you built a power station beside it on the coal reserves there, you would produce 500 megawatts of hydroelectric power and renewable power from bagasse, and you would produce 1,000 megawatts of coal-fired power. The proposal that we have there is for zero-emissions power—but that will be a story for another day.

The great Dr Bradfield proposed that we fill up Lake Eyre with water. I do not think it would be a good idea to fill it up with water from North Queensland. But if you were to dig a ditch and fill it up with water from the Spencer Gulf, it would cost about $3,500 million. And you could put 100 square kilometres there under salt production. You have a giant lake of which you could take a small proportion—I am not quite sure of the exact proportion, but 100 square kilometres would produce $2,000 million worth of salt every year. It could be barged out in the irrigation ditch through which the water comes in, at virtually no cost at all, and we would become one of the great salt producers of the world. One of his alternative proposals was to fill Lake Eyre with a ditch dug between the lake and Spencer Gulf.

So I stand up today and say Joe Gutnick—to be very specific—says: ‘Yes. I will open up that mine and I will build a phosphate plant here and I will process that phosphate into diammonium phosphate—which is very, very valuable: $1,200 a tonne—and maybe send two-thirds of it overseas unprocessed because my partners are Indian and they want it unprocessed. So we will do that for you. We will produce $4,000 million or $5,000 million dollars worth of income for Australia. But I need land to build houses for my workers on’—land which our forebears fought and died for at Eureka—‘and I want some water. I want some electricity. We are on a 90-days water supply.’ Now we are in a record flood but, you know, a month ago we were on 90 days supply—to close down all the mining operations in north-west Queensland! ‘If you give us that electricity and that water, we can give you $20,000 million a year, and jobs that will be there year after year, out into the foreseeable future—or even the unforeseeable future. Those are the wonderful things we can do for you.’ We plead with the government to redirect some of that money away from self-indulgence, from nice little things that are wonderful to have. You have to sacrifice yourself to build for the future, as Barack Obama has said. (Time expired)

Craig Thomson (Dobell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am supporting the Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2008-2009 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2008-2009. Appropriation Bill (No. 3) is for $2.05 billion and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) is for $1.04 billion. These additional estimates bills seek authority from the parliament for additional expenditure of money from the consolidated revenue fund in order to meet requirements that have arisen since the budget. The total additional appropriation being sought through additional estimates bills No. 3 and No. 4 this year is $3.1 billion, or about 4.1 per cent of total annual appropriations. The total appropriations being sought this year through Appropriation Bill (No. 3) of $2.05 billion arise from changes in the estimates of program expenditure due to variations in the timing of payments and forecast increases and program take-ups, reclassifications from policy decisions taken by the government since the last budget, and many new policy initiatives that have been welcomed by the community.

I will try to go through both of these appropriation bills and look at what is there. There is a vast array of particular funding items, but it is important to go through them all because the bills set out part of the Rudd agenda in terms of how we assist Australia on a range of issues, many of which were neglected for many years under the coalition.

Appropriation Bill (No. 4) provides additional funding to agencies for expenses in relation to grants to the states under section 96 of the Constitution, for payments to the territories and to local government authorities, and for non-operating purposes such as equity injections and loans. In particular, in relation to Appropriation Bill (No. 4), I would like to talk about, later in my contribution, the local government authorities’ money and the plans for that money in my electorate, particularly from Wyong council, and just how welcome that has been.

The principal factor contributing to the additional requirements since the 2008-09 budget is the proposed increase of $791.2 million in payments to states, territories and local authorities. The main items under Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2008-2009 include $157.2 million to AusAID as part of the government’s commitment to increasing Australia’s overseas development assistance over the long term. The Department of Defence will be provided with $87.8 million to reimburse it for the costs of extending Australia’s military participation in stabilising and reconstruction activities in Iraq to 30 June 2009. There is $307 million to address pressures in a number of areas, including the graded other ranks pay structure review, superannuation, rental allowances and higher fuel costs. This funding is matched by reduced estimates for Defence in later years. There is $153 million for Defence to meet additional costs arising from movements in exchange rates and $29.4 million to cover unavoidable overspends on operations in the previous financial year which are funded by the government on a no win, no loss basis.

The sum of $21.3 million from this appropriation bill will go to the Department of Health and Ageing to increase the number of organ donations and transplants across Australia by implementing a comprehensive set of initiatives. The substantive legislation in relation to this has already passed, as has most of the substantive legislation in relation to these appropriation bills. In terms of organ donation, Australia on the one hand is a country that has been internationally recognised for its strong record of successful organ transplants. More than 30,000 Australians have received transplants in the last 60 years and we have been leading the world, right at the cutting edge, in the tremendous work in transplantation that our doctors and health professionals have done. But on the other hand, ironically, we have one of the world’s lowest rates of organ donation. Demand massively outweighs supply in Australia, and the consequence of this is that a substantial number of people will die while waiting for suitable organ donations. In fact, in Australia about 200 organs are donated each year on average, with 1,800 people on the waiting list. So there is a shortfall of around 1,600 each year. That is why the legislation that passed through this place last year went to set up a comprehensive national system that will assist with organ transplants. The appropriation bill that we are discussing today allocates $21.3 million to make sure that that aim of increasing organ transplants—something that is vital for this country—is achieved.

Also for the Department of Health and Ageing there is an additional $7.5 million to be provided to increase the number of places available under the general practice placement program. Another item under the same department is a return of $21.4 million to the diagnostic imaging industry as part of the recently expired memorandum of understanding between the Commonwealth and the industry, and $14.4 million goes to the department to meet costs associated with the increased uptake of a breast cancer drug provided under the new Commonwealth program. These are all good initiatives. These are all initiatives that have come in the first year of the Rudd government. These are all initiatives that show that the health and wellbeing of Australian citizens is at the forefront of this government’s mind in deciding policy steps that need to be taken and need to be implemented.

Thirty-nine million dollars will go to the Department of Human Services for a Job Capacity Assessment program to meet higher than expected demand for assessments. This will provide for an additional 139,555 assessments to be undertaken in 2008-09. The Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts will receive $101 million to meet the increased demand for household rebates under the Solar Homes and Communities Plan. This is a program with a very high demand. This is a program that, after the Rudd government made changes in the budget, we were told was going to founder because there was not going to be enough uptake. There has been quite the reverse. What we have in fact found is that this program has been so popular that additional funding that was not envisaged has been brought forward to meet the high demand. This is good for Australia. This means that we have people taking advantage of the Solar Homes and Communities Plan. This means that in terms of renewable energy, Australians are keen to move in that direction where they have an opportunity and government incentive.

There is $61.6 million being made available to assist small block irrigators in the Murray-Darling Basin affected by drought who wish to cease irrigation farming but stay on the farm. The Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts will receive $57.1 million and the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry will be provided with $4.5 million. For the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, an additional $59.4 million will meet commitments for which funding was provided last financial year but, because of program delays, payments were not able to be made until the current year. From that funding, $43.4 million is proposed to fund drought assistance grants to irrigators in the Murray-Darling Basin and $16 million is proposed for the Tasmanian Community Forest Agreement to enable the department to meet commitments that were entered into in 2007-08.

Again, these are important initiatives. These are initiatives that go to the green credentials of the Rudd government, initiatives that have been dramatically built upon in the legislation that is being debated in the main chamber at the moment, but which the opposition are seeking to reject, in relation to the latest stimulus package. But these earlier initiatives are very important for making sure that the commitments we made to renewable energy and to trying to repair some of the damage that has been done to the Murray-Darling Basin are commitments that we take very seriously. This appropriation bill, in part, provides funding for that as well.

The Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research will be receiving an additional $93.3 million, and that is proposed to meet the increased cost of the LPG Vehicle Scheme arising from the additional customers who are expected to access the scheme in 2008-09. It is good that the government is having to provide this additional money, because it shows that where this government has put in place incentives for the community to take on board new technology that is green, that is going to decrease the carbon footprint, Australians are not only willing but also eager to take it up. Again, it is an example of an oversubscribed scheme that needs to be topped up. There is $37 million for the Ethanol Production Grants program to meet an anticipated increase in expenditure due to the New South Wales government’s two per cent ethanol mandate, their expansions of the Manildra facility at Nowra and CSR’s facility at Sarina, and a new ethanol production facility at Dalby.

In the Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism there is a reallocation of $99.4 million for the establishment of a global carbon capture and storage institute. The institute will accelerate the take-up of carbon capturing projects by facilitating demonstration projects and identifying and supporting necessary research on related topics, including regulatory settings and regulatory frameworks. Funding in 2008-09 will be provided by the redirection of amounts from the National Low Emission Coal Initiative, formerly known as the National Clean Coal Fund. This additional funding is also partially offset by savings in other programs.

Australian financial regulators, who in the last 18 months have been under more scrutiny than ever before, will receive $21.5 million in 2008-09 and $83 million over the next four years to help maintain the strength of Australia’s financial system during the global financial crisis. This will provide the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority with an additional $9 million in 2008-09 to meet the increased demands being placed on it to undertake a range of additional supervisory services. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission will receive an additional $10 million to undertake market monitoring and enforcement activities, while the Department of the Treasury will receive $2.5 million to ensure Australia’s regulatory environment continues to be world’s best practice and to pursue reform of the global financial architecture. There is probably no more important time than now for this to be taking place—making sure that our regulators, who are amongst the best in the world, remain that way by making sure that we properly fund them.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is to receive $18.8 million to account for the impact of foreign exchange fluctuations. Again, this is an important appropriation that needs to be there. It helps our ability to make payments to both the international peacekeeping organisations and other international organisations on behalf of the Australian government. With its long-standing support of the UN and other multilateral peacekeeping and peace related operations, Australia has a good name in international peacekeeping. Australia continues that tradition today and is an active contributor of personnel and financial support to the UN and other multinational peace operations throughout the world.

Our personnel, both military and police, are currently present in countries including Cyprus, Egypt, Sudan and Timor Leste. This country’s peacekeeping roles also include being part of multilateral peace operations in the Solomon Islands. Australia is an active participant in efforts to further improve global peace operations. Australia’s contribution to global peace operations is a demonstration of our commitment to the UN Charter and efforts to resolve disputes through the international system. It is important that this work is done.

I would like to talk, in relation to Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2008-2009, about the $300 million for the regional and local infrastructure program, of which $250 million is being distributed to local councils. In my electorate we have two councils, one of which, the Gosford Council, is predominantly in the electorate of my colleague the member for Robertson, with a small part in my electorate. The Wyong Shire Council is the shire council that covers the majority of my electorate. Both of these councils received around $1½ million out of this fund, which was a tremendous boost to them. In the Wyong shire amongst the programs that this is funding is an upgrade of the netball courts at Wyong. This is very important. The Wyong netball courts are amongst the busiest in New South Wales. By upgrading them and building new courts it will enable the area to put bids in for state championships and the like, as well as providing first-class facilities for the locals on a weekly and daily basis.

There was also money that went to the establishment, at Canton Beach, of a second disability playground, which is vitally important. Only last year, through fund raising and local government efforts in the Wyong shire, we established the first disability park on the Central Coast at Long Jetty. That was almost completed but a small amount of money coming from the $1½ million for Wyong shire will also go to complete the disability toilets at Long Jetty. Not only is this money providing local infrastructure in my electorate—and electorates right around Australia—but by doing so it is providing local jobs where they are needed in particular projects that are ready to go, starting to work right now.

It was interesting to gauge the response of the community and the elected council to this. The mayor of Wyong shire was absolutely lavish in his praise for this particular initiative, and could not say enough about this Rudd government initiative. One might ask: ‘Well, is this mayor a Labor mayor? It is Wyong shire; is this someone who has spent his life in the Labor Party and is his public appreciation of this initiative in some way a payback to the Labor Party?’ Quite the contrary; this particular mayor at one stage was the state Liberal Party member for The Entrance. But he can see—

Belinda Neal (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He saw the error of his ways.

Craig Thomson (Dobell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He saw the error of his ways, saw the wisdom of this particular initiative by the Rudd government and has been lavish in his praise and support. These types of programs are reaching through and getting to all levels of the community, and the community and their representatives, whether their history has been on the other side of the political spectrum or not, cannot but support these great initiatives that the Rudd government has brought about. For that reason, there is broad support in the electorate and with those local elected councillors.

There are literally a dozen other very important initiatives in these appropriation bills. Clearly, the time available is not going to allow me to go through them in any detail that will give any real justification for the importance that they actually have to the community. But going through and touching on those initiatives that I have mentioned so far in this contribution gives a taste of the important work that this government has undertaken not just in the May budget of last year but since then and incorporated in Appropriation Bill (No. 3) and Appropriation Bill (No. 4). These are important bills. This is important work. This is nation-building work that has been carried out by the Rudd government. These works provide jobs locally. They ensure that the community is involved in many of these issues, and they are broad-ranging issues. What I have touched on today is the importance of issues going to the environment and the uptake that we have seen from the Rudd government’s initiatives in relation to that area, to health and the important role that the government has played and continues to play in trying to encourage greater organ donation, and to the direct stimulus to the local economy through the local council initiatives. These are very important initiatives that these two appropriation bills incorporate, and I commend both of these bills to the House.

Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise in the House today to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2008-2009. I want to make reference to the fact that I will be quoting extensively from a study, which has come from the Australian Local Government Association, titled the National financial sustainability study of local government. It is a PricewaterhouseCoopers report that was released in 2006. But, whilst I quote extensively from the study, it is not verbatim. I just wanted to put that on the record for Hansard. This report has drawn upon studies by Access Economics for state local government associations in Western Australia, South Australia and New South Wales, as well as a detailed analysis by the Municipal Association of Victoria. The research was complemented by financial analysis of over 100 Australian councils.

I rise to speak specifically on this because I would like to go to the possibility of a constitutional recognition for local government. Within my speech on this appropriation bill, which deals with local councils and local government issues, I will also try and touch upon the drought relief and drought measures within this bill. I want to talk about some of the issues associated with drought and a single desk, particularly for wheat growers within my electorate, but I do want to raise the issue of whether or not we should constitutionally recognise local government.

I was formerly a councillor of Wagga Wagga City Council. I was Deputy Mayor of Wagga Wagga City Council prior to coming into this House. Local government, being the government closest to the people, deserves recognition. I personally believe that we need to revisit the issue of constitutional recognition of local government. It is a fact out of this report, and I know, through working closely with local governments right across my electorate of Riverina and beyond, that local government is responding to rising community expectations. There has been significant cost shifting, particularly from the New South Wales state government, to local governments. In the last few years what was once a New South Wales state road has been downgraded to a local road so that it has gone off the New South Wales government’s books. It is incumbent upon local government, when the supply of medical infrastructure is low or doctors are not available, to try and find solutions and resolutions. There is a growing expectation that local governments will provide the range of essential services and infrastructure that underpin local communities.

The growth in input prices generally has exceeded the average rate of revenue growth, resulting in a significant number of councils who are now developing financial deficits. That is significant, because many decisions are imposed upon local government. Take, for interest’s sake, when there was a separation of land and water. The proponents of separation of land and water did not anticipate the impact that separation would have on local government, particularly in my electorate of Riverina. Water was always the most extensive of financial assets in land and water, particularly in the MIA and around the Hay area. When the water value is high, you have a separation and there are no rates applied to water, council is left with an enormous shortfall of revenue with nowhere else to get funds. Rates revenue then comes only from land, the value of which may go down by two-thirds. Yet, local government is still expected to provide the same facilities. So there has been a tendency for local governments to defer or reduce expenditure that could aid and abet infrastructure renewals in their local government areas. Councils may have no option but to cut back on the level of local community services and infrastructure, for the very reasons that I have just pointed out.

The PricewaterhouseCoopers report says that up to 30 per cent of local government councils might not be sustainable, and I think that is a tragedy. I think it is an absolute tragedy. That report is consistent with state based reports that between 25 and 40 per cent of councils in states could be financially unsustainable. This report, which was done involving local government, called for a range of reforms to deal with the national total backlog in local government infrastructure renewal work. That was worth an estimated $14.5 billion. During our term in government, we delivered Roads to Recovery money directly to local governments and they directly spent it. No money was siphoned off by the state bureaucracies. I believe that should take place in health initiatives. I lobbied hard when we were in government to get health money delivered directly to local governments, and we succeeded in many of the programs that we put in place. But there is a greater need to deliver money directly through local government and to bypass states. Am I a proponent of the dissolution of states? Probably yes. I am certainly not a proponent of local government not getting recognition.

Many community centres and aged-care facilities, health clinics and sport and recreation facilities were established in the 1950s—and earlier—and are not being sufficiently upgraded because local governments have a lack of funds. A detailed analysis by Access Economics of over 441 councils completed over 2005-06 across four states—New South Wales, South Australia, Western Australia and Victoria—found that the average infrastructure renewal backlog per council was $20.8 million. This is significant because they seem to have to provide an enormous number of services that were once provided by the states.

If this average result is applied across 700 councils, the aggregate national renewals backlog would be, according to this report, around $14.5 billion. The estimated funding gap to clear the backlog and to cover the annual underspend on renewals was estimated in this report to be $3.1 million per council per annum, or a $2.16 billion package nationally. This indicates the plight of local government. But the sustainability problem is typically more acute in our smaller councils, which are primarily in rural and remote areas. It is a significant issue for numerous regional and more remote communities, and local government is generally the only institution present in many of the economic activity drivers in these areas.

So it seems that over the past 30 years the range of functions that has been undertaken by local government in Australia has expanded well beyond the physical infrastructure of roads, rates and rubbish that we have always seen, and it does include an enormous number of important social and human services. Again, as this report indicates, this has come about through a combination of community pressure and expectations, state and Australian government inducements, and the withdrawal of services by other levels of government.

For many of the 60 per cent of councils that are rural or remote, static or declining populations have tended to translate into static or declining revenue. Councils in agricultural areas have more pronounced viability problems than their metropolitan counterparts. These councils typically appear to have a relatively larger scope for internal reforms, but they battle against lack of scale, so they cannot share resources because of the tyranny of distance and the expectations of their community, and they really do require additional funding for community infrastructure.

There were programs that were funded under the old Regional Partnerships program that renewed and built community infrastructure. Whilst I stand, I will declare that I had enormous success in my Regional Partnerships projects. Each one of the projects in my region stacks up on its own merit and I will back them 1,000 per cent. Each delivered, in spades, benefits to the community. I will never, ever say that the applications from the communities that I represent were funded on the basis of anything but merit.

I have local governments and councils that are having to refurbish community centres and public halls, and upgrade senior citizens centres—make provisions for senior citizens centres. They are responsible for the renewal and refurbishment of theatres, galleries and museums. Hay used to be an area I represented, and that little town has five museums, including curators. It is just an extraordinary town. I love Hay—I was so sad that it was removed from my electorate—and I will continue to represent the needs of Hay, because it is a vibrant, can-do community that continually gets kicked and knocked back because government decisions impact on it enormously.

There is also responsibility for the enhancement of main streets and the upgrading—in more coastal areas; certainly not in mine—of boat ramps, jetties and wharves. Above all there is the upgrading of recreational facilities to enable communities to come together: swimming pools and playing fields. These are essential recreational facilities for rural and regional communities. Councils are also responsible for the improvement of park equipment, such as playgrounds, benches and barbecues, because the people who inhabit rural and regional communities also have an expectation that they deserve a quality of life and deserve to enjoy these things. Local governments and councils have an amazing amount of responsibility that is certainly not understood.

I tried desperately—and I will continue to try—to get what I call the Runways to Recovery Program funded, the R2R of aviation, for airports in rural and regional communities to upgrade and maintain aerodromes, airstrips et cetera. The airports are used to fly in essential services such as health services, including mental health services. In many cases the fly-in services provide the only access that these communities have to health services.

There are libraries and information centres. I note that the Prime Minister’s package includes upgrading libraries. That could certainly help local government. Then there is the refurbishment of kitchen and council facilities which provide meals on wheels. These are things that local governments and communities provide for members of their communities. These are things that fall to the local governments to do. I stand here recognising as best as I can the enormous job that local governments do. Why shouldn’t they have constitutional recognition? Why shouldn’t they be completely included in budgetary processes et cetera? I feel very strongly about this, and I felt that this evening was an obvious time to raise this issue.

I will finish by highlighting the impact that the dismantling of the single desk last year had on my electorate. I have farmers who are at breaking point. They have just tried to market their grain and have been told that the 27 tonnes of prime hard wheat they have just delivered out of the millions that they should have is worth less than the price of feed wheat. That was just a few months ago. We have imposed this significant decision on the people who live in rural and regional Australia. They are incensed about the decision to deregulate the export wheat market in a year such as we have just had. It has been a horrible year. Of all the years to make a decision of the magnitude that was made by the Rudd government and the minister! We were staring down the barrel of the subprime collapse. It was certainly not the year to irreversibly put wheat farmers against the wall.

In the month the Labor Party deregulated the wheat desk they concentrated on workplace changes and the rights of unions to again dominate a workplace and to collectively bargain in the sole interests of workers yet the minister removed the right of growers to collectively bargain with their grain. Minister, you have taken away their rights. You have given rights to every other Australian and have removed the rights of my growers to collectively market their grain. They are now at the mercy of these grain traders who are simply not able to be found. They have picked off my growers one by one. It is a tragedy. I will continue to outline and highlight this tragedy not because it is a political issue but because it hurts and burns my heart and my soul intensely to see the people I represent so badly affected by that decision.

The pools that are operating at the moment are ineffective. They do not have the advantages of a large national pool. There is no parcel of grain accumulating with enough hedging attached to it to offer any sort of competitive pricing. I have had AWB openly making it very clear to growers that the pools will open and close as they please and that sellers should lock in early to avoid missing out. There is no sense of security. The growers have been decimated by drought and have been hurt in recent years through forward selling grain. A large national pool would have carried stock from previous years into a weaker harvest and not have left our growers exposed to the weaker position that they now find themselves in.

I think all growers would concede that, whilst the highs of the pool may not be the one-off extreme high-buyers or risky futures-swaps might offer, the plummeting lows could certainly have been ridden out and their effects cushioned. The price of Australian grain has fluctuated substantially through domestic consumption and demand. During this drought the demand has been worth $100 per tonne to the grower, which effectively has meant that grain has been worth more than the US futures price. Our basis has gone from positive to negative, however, and is now negativing our grain to the tune of A$40 to A$50 per tonne in comparison with US futures pricing. We have a tragedy. There is not a single national pool to ride the current lows and carry grain for longer periods to ensure a greater average return coupled with an upfront payment to keep farming entities afloat into sowing.

It is a harsh reality that our bank managers are not willing to sit back and let farmers carry their grain to attempt to avert the current paltry returns. Much was made during that inquiry by both Liberal and Labor senators of the fact that grain could be stored on-farm or warehoused at receival sites. I kept saying, ‘This cannot happen; this is simply a nonsense,’ and that is exactly what it was. Until a few days ago farmers in our area were holding prime hard grain valued at $270 per tonne. Its value has now fallen to less than $240 per tonne. If they were to hold this grain, as was suggested in this inquiry, and store it on-farm, it would cost them 10 per cent interest on their overdrafts, which would easily take off $13.50 per tonne. Six months of warehousing at receival sites would have cost $1.25 per tonne per month in storage fees, which would equate to about $7.50 per tonne. So, before growers could even get out of bed they would need to be looking at $300 a tonne to profit if they held onto the grain. This is what we were trying to explain. This is just a nonsense.

Appropriation Bill (No. 4) talks about drought. I talk about reality. This is a travesty of justice. This has been imposed upon the people I represent. I detest what has been done. I feel strongly about this, and I will not stop raising it until some relief is given to those people who have been so badly affected by the policies of this government.

Damian Hale (Solomon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to acknowledge the contribution from the member for Riverina. I assure her that she took me on a trip down memory lane there, from when I coached in Temora. I have some friends who live in Temora, Mimosa, Ardlethan and Ariah Park who are farmers. She will be happy to know that I have invited them to come to this place later this month to meet directly with Tony Burke. It is a meeting that Tony is very keen to have with young farmers, so they can say first-hand how that system worked and be able to put their concerns to him.

Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you.

Damian Hale (Solomon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No worries. I appreciate that. I rise today to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2008-2009 and the Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2008-2009. These additional estimates bills are presented during a crisis that is unprecedented in our lifetime, a time where strong and decisive action to support jobs and the economy is required. The additional estimates bills seek appropriation authority from parliament for additional expenditure from the Consolidated Revenue Fund in order to meet requirements that have arisen since the last budget. I will outline some of the major appropriations processed in the bill that are particularly significant to the people in my electorate of Solomon.

This bill provides the Department of Defence with an additional $87.8 million to reimburse it for the cost of extending Australia’s military participation in stabilisation and reconstruction activities in Iraq to 30 June 2009. The Department of Defence will also be provided with $153 million to meet additional costs arising from movements in the exchange rate; $29.4 million will also go to the Department of Defence to cover unavoidable overspends on operations in the previous financial year, which are funded by the government on a no win, no loss basis.

Very importantly, the Department of Defence will be provided with $307 million to address pressures in a number of areas, including the graded other ranks pay structure review, superannuation, rental allowances and higher fuel costs. Well over 5,000 ADF men and women are based in Solomon at HMAS Coonawarra, Darwin Naval Base and Headquarters Northern Command located at Larrakeyah Barracks. The Australian Army has a large presence at Robertson Barracks and NORFORCE is at Larrakeyah Barracks, and of course there is the Royal Australian Air Force at RAAF Base Darwin.

Defence personnel and their families are an integral part of our vibrant city in the north. I must say that both during the campaign and since being elected I have been extremely fortunate in meeting so many members of our Australian Defence Force community. I know these commitments by the Rudd Labor government deliver for the Australian Defence Force community. These bills demonstrate our government’s strong commitment to the Defence Force and, through a significant military presence, they also build the economy of Solomon. On 19 February, we will remember the bombing of Darwin, a significant event in the history of Australia. These measures show that the Australian Defence Force and their families are front and centre with the Rudd Labor government. They build on the existing funding programs, from child care to health care to housing.

It was fantastic to hear the Minister for Defence Science and Personnel reply to my question regarding the role Defence Housing Australia will play in yesterday’s announcement in parliament of the $42 billion Nation Building and Jobs Plan. As a result of our package, the government will provide $251.6 million to the Defence Housing Authority to construct 802 dwellings in metropolitan and regional centres. Importantly, these new houses will not be built in just one or two areas of the country. Seventeen different regions across Australia will benefit from the initiative, including 185 new houses to be built in Darwin.

Not only will this ensure Australian Defence Force personnel have appropriate, quality housing available to them but it will also mean a huge boost to the local construction industry across all 17 regions. Building will commence in April this year and continue until mid-2011. The government will continue to support employment initiatives for spouses, assistance with housing, relocation, childcare programs, health care, the transition to civilian life at the end of a military career and a number of other support services. As many of my colleagues often say, it is ‘recruit the member, retain the family’. I know these types of initiatives are of great benefit to the fantastic Defence Force personnel and their families who live and work in Solomon.

Back in December the government brought all the mayors and shire presidents from around the country to Canberra. It was a historic moment and one I was proud to be involved in. Not only were partnerships between federal and local government strengthened but also it was about setting local infrastructure projects that would be federally funded. The two lord mayors in my electorate—Graham Sawyer, the Lord Mayor of Darwin, and Robert McLeod, the very enthusiastic Lord Mayor of Palmerston—had a fantastic time. This bill appropriates $300 million to local councils and shires across Australia, including $250 million to be allocated between all councils through the Regional and Local Community Infrastructure Program.

As we heard yesterday, the government will provide an additional $500 million over two years to expand the Regional and Local Community Infrastructure Program. These are fantastic initiatives by the Prime Minister and the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, bringing the federal government to a greater understanding of and being of greater assistance to local government. These are grassroots projects. They help local businesses to create local jobs at the grassroots level. As the member for Riverina touched on, it brings local pride and builds community. That is what we are all about. We have gone so much away from building community in the last 12 years.

In Solomon, councils have been allocated $661,000. This money would never have been allocated under the previous government; it would not have happened. They would never have brought all the lord mayors to Canberra to talk to them about how federal government could assist local government. There was $313,000 to the Darwin City Council and $196,000 to the Palmerston City Council. I know the money was extremely well received. Both my lord mayors, Graeme Sawyer and Robert Mcleod, are very passionate about their patch and what they can do. It is just the shot in the arm that both councils and local contractors needed and something that I know that the people of Darwin and Palmerston are particularly happy about.

This bill provides funding for local projects—things like community centres, swimming pools and sports grounds—projects that will need to meet the program’s guidelines and be approved by the government before funding can be provided. I have been working with, and will continue to work with, councils and shires in my electorate to put forward projects that our community really needs. This means worthwhile projects that stimulate our local economy and support jobs in our communities during this global financial crisis. The Regional and Local Community Infrastructure Program is yet another example of our government taking decisive action at a local level to support our local economy through these types of initiatives. These are unprecedented times. Many countries around the world have already slipped into, or are slipping into, recession. We have two options. We can either sit on our hands and do nothing or we can act swiftly and decisively to continue to grow Australia’s economy and to continue to save Australian jobs.

This bill will also provide almost $100 million to establish a global institute to speed up the development of carbon capture and storage technology. Through this institute the Rudd government will work cooperatively with other countries to help reduce the amount of CO released into the atmosphere. The government has offered to host the institute in Australia and would continue to contribute up to $100 million per annum towards its operation. Developing and commercialising this technology is vital for Australia’s future. In fact, CSIRO Chief Executive Dr Geoff Garrett said that the initiative would significantly reduce the time frames currently projected to develop and deploy critical carbon capture and storage technologies on a commercial scale. Australia has already held informal consultations with industry and foreign governments over a possible model for the institute. This will pave the way for its commercial deployment across the world by the end of the next decade. It is an initiative that proves once again that we on this side of the House are serious about climate change. The commitment was again apparent yesterday with the second stimulus package initiative and the Energy Efficient Homes Program, for instance, which will assist in the insulation of homes and the rebate for solar panels to assist in reducing our power consumption.

This is an unprecedented financial crisis, a crisis of a magnitude never seen before. Australia is not immune to it. It will be a hard year, a hard fight. However, it is a fight we will win. The decisive action in this crisis by the Rudd Labor government will enable us to fight through these uncertain times. I commend these bills to the House.

Debate (on motion by Mr Laming) adjourned.