Peter Slipper (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have received letters from the honourable member for Dunkley and the honourable member for Fraser proposing that definite matters of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion today. As required by standing order 46, I have selected the matter which, in my opinion, is the more urgent and important; that is, that proposed by the honourable member for Dunkley, namely:

The adverse impact of the carbon tax on the business sector

I call upon those members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

Bruce Billson (Dunkley, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Small Business, Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The adverse impact of a carbon tax on the business sector is undoubtedly the most compelling issue facing employers and those who are worrying about their financial security and the broader health and wellbeing of the Australian economy. It was not enough for the Australian public's confidence in the democratic process to be assaulted by the Prime Minister with her promise that 'there will be no carbon tax under a government' followed by her introduction of the very tax she had promised not to introduce. In addition to the damage to the public's confidence in the democratic process we are now seeing damage to the confidence of Australian consumers and damage to the Australian economy. I am sure we will hear from members opposite, who will say, 'Oh, there are the Libs and the Nats again talking about the business sector.'

Ian Macfarlane (Groom, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Energy and Resources) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

And the LNP.

Bruce Billson (Dunkley, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Small Business, Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

And the LNP. It is an interesting point to emphasise that the business sector is the one that is providing the bulk of the jobs in the Australian economy. If we are not interested in the health and welfare of the business sector, we are not interested in the livelihoods of Australian families and the security and prospects of Australian businesses. But that is why the carbon tax is such a crucial issue for that important part of our community. We are talking about the mums and dads who run small businesses and family enterprises. We are talking about the employees who give of their skills and talents day in and day out in a workplace where those organisations have the spectre of the world's largest carbon tax hanging over their heads, threatening their survival.

It is interesting to remind those who are listening that this carbon tax is like no other carbon tax that any other economy is facing. This carbon tax will generate revenue some 18 times the amount that is raised in Europe. Eighteen times the amount of financial burden on our economy is being imposed by this Gillard Labor government's carbon tax. It is worth remembering that the population of Europe is some 22 times the size of the Australian population. Here we have a tax 18 times the size in terms of its burden, impact and harm on the Australian economy compared to Europe, and yet Europe has 22 times the number of people. Put simply, the Australian carbon tax amounts to $400 per capita—$400 for everyone in the Australian continent—whereas the European carbon tax amounts to $1 each. We have a 400 times greater impact on the Australian economy through this carbon tax than is faced over in Europe, and the government is trying to tell the Australian public, 'Don't worry. It's happening in Europe. Everything will be okay.' But we know the Australian public have no confidence in what the government says. There is much evidence to justify their suspicions about these kinds of assurances.

Let us look at what people are actually doing. At the present time Australian households are saving 13 per cent of their disposable household income, where just 18 months ago it was negative one per cent. People were actually adding to their personal debt. Thirteen per cent of household income is being saved. It is being saved because people are concerned and anxious. They are not convinced by what the government says and there is evidence, argument, insight and concern being raised day after day by those who create wealth and opportunity in this country that this government just continues to ignore.

While you see the coalition go on about hope, reward and opportunity, this government is about hardship, risk, redistribution of wealth and obfuscation on the impact of its actions. That is the contrast that the Australian public is seeing. You do not have to go back too far to see the research. Interestingly, in the lead-up to the Queensland election the Queensland Chamber of Commerce and Industry surveyed 1,000 businesses in Queensland. Yesterday the Prime Minister tried to accuse the opposition of somehow creating and nurturing concern and anxiety. The message for the Prime Minister is that she has done plenty of that without any help from the opposition. Her government has created a great degree of uncertainty and concern about one particular issue, and that is the carbon tax. Have a look at the data: 94.6 per cent of businesses surveyed in Queensland are concerned about the carbon tax. That is an enormous proportion of those in the business community, not prompted or cajoled by the coalition but who of their own volition identified the carbon tax as a leading concern about their economic future, the vitality and viability of their businesses and the opportunity for them to succeed, to get ahead and to create job opportunities for those in their workforce.

But that is not all. In fact, this polling calls on whoever is the next Queensland government to do all they can to take the fight to Canberra to see that this carbon tax is not introduced. They call it a 'tax trap'. They recognise that it will have an enormous detrimental impact on the Australian economy and also particularly on Queensland. It does not matter what region those survey results come from; it has carbon tax or higher energy costs as the biggest issue. It does not matter what sector of the economy those businesses come from. Again, their biggest concern is the carbon tax and increasing energy prices. The size of the business does not matter. This is still the biggest concern. This is why this survey report is calling on the government to scrap the implementation of the carbon tax, so that Queensland businesses have half a chance of finding their way through the murk, mist and smokescreen that is this government to try to forge a better future for themselves and their communities and to get ahead in this country.

Also in that survey, 84.3 per cent of those surveyed are calling on whoever is the next state government in Queensland to urge the federal government to dump this dodgy tax. There is only one way that will happen and that is if there is an LNP result in Queensland because, as sure as night follows day, the state Labor Party will be in a headlock controlled by Canberra to make sure everyone is singing from the same hymn book. That singing ignores any of the messages coming from those people having to make big decisions about the future of our economy. We have seen it day after day and we all have felt the pain and the uncertainty about job losses in major employers, particularly in the energy intensive manufacturing area of our economy. We see that every day. Every day that is highly visible and we know the concerns of those people.

I want to put on the table tonight something that is also happening every day but that is far less visible though still very raw in the Australian economy—and that is what is happening in the small business space. Small businesses and family enterprises are having to look at an employee who has been on their team or staff for years, knowing they have family and obligations—and they know this because they are a small business with a very personal relationship with and interest in the wellbeing of that person—and tell them that they do not have any more work for them, that they have to reduce their hours or that they have to wind back the opportunities for extra income from extra work. That is happening and it does not get attention. It does not get the attention that it deserves but it is happening right across the Australian continent. This is a very difficult environment that does not hit the headlines. The government come in with their own stories about what is happening with big employers with major layoffs. They do not even try to turn their minds to what is happening in terms of the atrophy in the economy of the small business and family enterprise sector—the 300,000 jobs that have been lost since this government was elected and the 14,500 fewer employees of small businesses we now have under Labor.

The constant message is that the carbon tax is going to make the difficult economic situation even worse. There is a reason why the government does not want to talk about that—and that is because the government has airbrushed the experience and the impact of small business out of its policy-making process. This carbon tax is designed to offer no direct compensation to small business—none whatsoever. While you have got all these carve-outs and compensation arrangements that will see this carbon tax actually cost the budget more than it is going to bring in, there is nothing in there for the small business community. They are told to suck it up. They are told to just absorb it or pass it on to their consumers. Does anyone know a consumer that is just itching for a price rise? Has everyone ignored the fact that there are cost-of-living pressures in every Australian household? Cost-of-living pressures in business are cost-of-input pressures, and the small business community are being told by this tawdry government: 'Suck up the impact or pass it on.'

When there is an opportunity for Minister Combet to address this issue directly, he ridicules the concern. I have pointed out that 19 out of 20 businesses in Queensland are horrified about this carbon tax, but apparently it is 'She'll be right; don't worry.' It is like the political equivalent of a flesh wound—when all of these businesses are terrified about the impact. When Minister Combet spoke at the Press Club, he ridiculed the concerns of the small business community. He said: 'Oh, it's all overstated. There's nothing to be worried about.' He went on to say that the electricity costs will only be a microscopic increase. But no-one believes him, and there has been no modelling done on the impact on individual small businesses in terms of their type, their supply chain, the energy that they use, the energy that is embedded in their inputs and the ability of the business to absorb that additional cost. No analysis has been done on that whatsoever. Yet Minister Combet stood up before the Australian National Press Club and said to the small business community: 'Hey, you've got no reason to be worried.' He said:

A dry cleaner is not competing against dry cleaners in China.

What a genius contribution that is! He went on to say:

Drivers cannot get their cars serviced in India.

He was trying to make the clumsy point that, whilst the countries with which we compete in many markets might not have a carbon tax, you cannot take your car over to them.

Tony Smith (Casey, Liberal Party, Deputy Chairman , Coalition Policy Development Committee) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

People won't get them serviced!

Bruce Billson (Dunkley, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Small Business, Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank my friend and colleague. What people will do is they will delay activity in those areas. You go and talk to any mechanic around Australia. Those scheduled services are not being done in quite the same way they were in the past. People are waiting till their car needs a repair before they go to the mechanic. You go and ask anybody who installs LPG, an investment that has a long-run benefit. But there is no need to do it right now—and people are simply not doing it. This government has created a hibernation climate for these small businesses, because the consumers they rely upon are anxious about their future, uncertain about the impact of a carbon tax and absolutely clear that you cannot trust the government about what they are saying the impact will be. So what does the dry-cleaner do? He does not get to see the customer quite so often. If people can put off that extra visit to the dry-cleaner, they will. If there is some other way—a hand wash perhaps, for a cardigan or a vest—they will use that, but they will not go to the dry-cleaners.

This is happening right across our economy. This is why the small business community need a government that partners with them rather than punishes them. This is why we need the small business minister and ministers with responsibility for policies that have a profound impact on the viability and the future of small businesses to give a damn about what is happening in the small business community. They are copping it every which way from this government, and this is undermining employment in small businesses and it is undermining the very viability of those small businesses.

You might hear the government say: 'We're going to give this little bit of help to this particular big industry.' Why? It is a big industry, it has got the ear of the big government, and the big unions are in there cheering for it. Well, we are here to reaffirm our support for the small businesses that are not organised into unions, that do not have the ear of this government. They can count on the coalition to partner with them in terms of their prosperity and their opportunities into the future.

Let us have a look at what is actually playing out here. You will probably hear from those opposite: 'We've got all these compensation plans. It will all be just fine. It will all be peachy. Just ignore everything that is said by anybody who runs a business. Just ignore all of the analysis that's done. Ignore all the research and ignore all the impact work that's been done'—the research the government should have done but could not be bothered getting off its backside to do.

You stand condemned for your indifference to the impact of your policies on the men and women in small business who are the backbone of our economy. They know what you know. They know that you do not care. They are not looking for you to do anything for them, because that would be the first time. What they are hoping for is a chance at their future, a chance not to get this dagger in their heart of a carbon tax that is a ridiculously implemented proposition that is nothing like anything else that is going on in the world and that will have a very profound impact on small businesses and family enterprises. They cannot rock up to their suppliers and say: 'Hey, I'm a big business. If you want to keep working with me, you just go and absorb that cost.' They do not have that market power. They cannot go to their energy company and say: 'You want to put your prices up by 10 per cent? No, no. I don't think we'll cop that, because we're a big business.' They cannot do that.

So often, small business are price takers. So often, what they can afford to charge depends on what the import alternative might be. So often, they are at the pointy end of that difficult conversation between a consumer and someone providing the goods and services who has to say: 'This will cost this much.' They have to look in the eyes of those anxious consumers, who are uncertain about the competence of this government and wary about having confidence in the economy when the government cannot seem to manage its own affairs, let alone those of the nation. They have to be there when the decision is made: 'Maybe I'll just put that off.'

They cannot run off to somebody and say, 'Gee, business is a bit grim. Oh, well, we'll just work a little bit slower. There's always scope that the boss will throw in more money.' They are the boss. They are the last person to be paid. They are the ones who come in on the weekend, looking for those opportunities. They are the ones who turn up for this nation. They drive innovation in this country. They create wealth and opportunity, and this Gillard government does not give a hoot about them.

I am interested to hear what the Parliamentary Secretary for Climate Change and Energy Efficiency has got to say. He was at a business conference in the Isaacs electorate with SEMMA. He visited them and tried to explain the carbon tax. When someone explained the punishing impact of the carbon tax on their energy-intensive business, he just dismissed it: 'Oh, that's not much money. It might make you broke, but that's tough. That's a bad choice for the business.' This is a bad government. (Time expired)

Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am always happy to speak on a matter of public importance that raises the government's plan for a clean energy future, because it is such a good plan. It is important to talk about the opportunities that will become available to Australian business as the economy transforms. I know that the member for Dunkley is interested, which is why he is staying to hear some details of the government's clean energy future plan—

An opposition member: He's got nothing!

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

The member for Dunkley was heard in silence!

Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

None of that would be apparent to anyone who was listening to the speech that we have just heard from the member for Dunkley because he did not actually go to any of the aspects of pricing carbon, any of the aspects of the actual Clean Energy Future plan. We have a plan which will cut pollution. It will drive investment in clean energy technologies and it will drive investment in infrastructure like solar, gas or wind. It will help build the clean energy future that future generations deserve. It will help our children and it will help our grandchildren. It is, of course, disappointing to have this important debate raised in the way that it has been, as—so we have heard from the member for Dunkley—a risk to the economy or as a risk to business. It is astounding to see the degree to which those on the other side of this chamber have wilfully perpetuated their own ignorance. They have deliberately ignored the benefits of the Clean Energy Future plan for what can only be described as reasons of base political expediency. It is shameful to see them engage in what can only be described as an all-out scare campaign for months and months and months, claiming that our policy will have a negative impact on the economy. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Let me make this clear: our policy will help Australia take part in the global economy of the future. It will reduce our emissions and position Australia business for the development of the global low-carbon economy. It is not our policy that represents a grave risk to the Australian economy. Rather, it is the opportunistic, false and deliberately misleading campaign by those opposite—indeed, what I would describe as the grubbiest opposition in the history of Federation—that represents a risk to Australian business. It is a risk because it reduces business and consumer confidence. It is a risk because it undercuts certainty. It is what we have come to expect from this opposition: the talking down of the Australian economy. It is no wonder that some Australians at least are concerned about the pricing of carbon because of the way this opposition has misrepresented the government's plan, the way in which this opposition has represented the effects of pricing carbon and, indeed, the way this opposition continues to talk down the Australian economy. And, worse than this, it is the ongoing economic ineptitude of this opposition that, should they ever be elected to govern—and I hope that day never comes—which actually represents the biggest risk to the Australian economy and the biggest risk to Australian business.

I say 'ongoing' because it has been for many, many months, going right back to the last election, that we have seen the economic ineptitude of this opposition demonstrated. I would go right back to an observation made by one of Australia's most respected journalists just after the last election. Writing in the Australian Financial Review on 3 September 2010, Laura Tingle said this:

There are two possible explanations for how an opposition presenting itself as an alternative government could end up with an $11 billion hole in the cost of its election commitments. One is that they are liars, the other is that they are clunkheads. Actually, there is a third explanation: they are liars and clunkheads. But whatever the combination, they are not fit to govern.

Nothing has changed since 3 September 2010. Nothing has changed since the opposition were caught out over the costings that they took to the Australian people at the time of the last election. They were caught out over an $11 billion hole in their costings produced by accountants who were later found to be guilty of professional misconduct. Nothing has changed except that they are now looking for cuts of $70 billion, not for cuts of $11 billion, and there is no explanation to the Australian people as to how they are going to produce those.

Labor governments represent working families. We know that the best way to look after those working families is to manage the economy for jobs and growth. As a result of our stimulus during the global financial crisis—which those opposite opposed—Australia stands out around the industrialised world. We have low unemployment, we have solid growth, we have moderate inflation and we have massive business investment and low public debt. Our policy to move towards a clean energy future will not hurt the economy. Rather, it has been designed to ensure that we can continue to manage the economy in the interests of working families.

Let me recap on what is at stake here and why the government must act on climate change and why we have put a price on carbon. There is clear consensus among climate scientists that climate change is real and will have significant future impacts if no action is taken to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions. It is clearly in Australia's national interest to continue to work towards the international goal of limiting warming to below two degrees. To do this, it is imperative that we play a responsible role in international action and that we do so by taking strong action at home—which is something those opposite continually forget. That means we must actually reduce our emissions of carbon pollution into the atmosphere. Labor has a plan which is in line with expert opinion: a broadly based carbon price which directly creates incentives for businesses throughout the economy to reduce emissions and for all consumers to use energy more wisely. We are putting a price on carbon because we know this is the cheapest and most effective way to transition to a clean energy future.

A low-carbon global economy is coming and it is up to us to decide whether we help Australian businesses to take advantage of this or simply bury our heads in the sand. The Clean Energy Future Plan is one of the most significant industry and innovation policies that this nation has ever seen. Over $15 billion will be invested in creating the jobs of tomorrow, most notably in manufacturing. Those opposite would have our industries stand still as our overseas competitors reduce their pollution intensity and get a head start in competing in the low-carbon global economy.

And because we are the Labor Party, a party that represents working people, we are making sure that low- and middle-income earners receive assistance as we make these changes. Our tax cuts and increased payments through benefits and pensions are targeted at those who need them most. Labor will make sure that pensioners, low- and middle-income earners and families doing it tough are looked after. The rest of the world is acting, and if one needs any demonstration of that one has only to look at the agreement reached to go forward that was made at Durban last year. So the rest of the world is acting and our economy and our environment will be badly damaged unless Australia acts too. You would have to say that all of those opposite in the Liberal Party are in some kind of alternative universe, where they have wilfully divorced themselves from reality. We know that many of those opposite like to pretend that climate change is not happening. It is a bit like how they like to pretend when they talk about the economy that the global financial crisis did not happen.

Back to climate change, they ignore the facts and the overwhelming weight of evidence from the scientific community that climate change is happening. Those opposite have cobbled together a policy—their so-called direct action policy—which they have no intention of ever pursuing, if they ever hold office. No-one should be fooled by this. This policy is not designed to reduce emissions; it is a policy that is only designed to give an appearance of action—just a fig-leaf appearance that the opposition do actually care about taking action on climate change. This so-called direct action plan—if you can call it a plan at all—involves the purchase of abatement of emissions at taxpayers' expense.

It has been tried before and it has been found to be ineffective and very expensive. In fact, what the member for Dunkley should have faced up to when he spoke earlier was the analysis of the opposition's policies and its direct action plan by the department of climate change, which was provided in response to a question raised at Senate additional estimates, in February 2010.

The analysis found that the plan would be unlikely to achieve more than 40 million tonnes of abatement in 2020, that it could not achieve the level of abatement at the costs claimed by the coalition and that an average cost of carbon of $50 per tonne in 2020 would be the minimum realistic average cost for such a program. That of course is well above the cost of the carbon price that the government has brought in.

Families would be worse off under the plan that has been advanced by the opposition. You would have to pay $1,300 more in taxes and that money would be given by a coalition government straight to the big polluters. We have been debating this matter for years and it is time that the opposition put aside the mindless negativity that we have become accustomed to and let the rest of the country get on with it.

I have very briefly advanced reasons regarding the hopelessness of the opposition's direct action plan. That was why John Howard—the leading light of the conservative political class in this country—thought that a direct action response was inadequate and why he went to the election in 2007 with an emissions trading plan. We need an explanation as to why it is that those opposite have abandoned the policies that their former Prime Minister, John Howard, took to the 2007 election.

I just want to talk a little bit more about the absolutely shameful scare campaign that we are seeing from the opposition. We have had another instalment here today from the member for Dunkley. Australian consumers are already cautious in the wake of economic turmoil overseas. The last thing they need is the relentless, baseless and totally unprincipled scare campaign that is being run by those opposite at a time when global economic uncertainty is impacting on the savings of all Australians and when we have the Leader of the Opposition running around the country making patently false statements about the impact of the government's carbon price.

We heard that the coal industry is doomed, only to read of record takeovers in the next day's newspapers. We note that there is investment of $80 billion in the coal industry in the pipeline, with 87 new mines either under construction or awaiting approval. We heard from the opposition that the steel industry will be wiped out, only to hear that the industry is comfortable with the government's Clean Energy Plan. We heard endless statements about 'unimaginable price impacts'—that is the sort of language that those opposite use—on businesses and consumers when, in reality, these impacts will be modest and when nine out of 10 households will receive assistance in the form of tax cuts or increased payments in pensions and benefits.

Throughout this unprecedented scare campaign, the Leader of the Opposition has made it perfectly clear that he values his career over and above the wellbeing of those very Australians whom he claims to be fighting for. He has made it clear that he will say and do anything to get a headline. It is not possible that he is so economically illiterate that he believes what he is saying. Perhaps it is.

Just last week a report by the Australian National Audit Office was tabled in parliament. The complete lack of concern by the opposition about facts when it comes to climate change and the carbon price now stands exposed. Last July Mr Abbott wrote to the Auditor-General asserting—and then immediately told the newspapers about his assertions—that there were factual inaccuracies in the government's campaign. That assertion was accompanied by banner headlines, which asserted these supposed inaccuracies in the government's advertising campaign. Last week, the report tabled by the Australian National Audit Office, found that all of the factual statements in the government's 'clean energy future' advertising campaign were supported by the evidence. That means that the opposition leader has, once again, been caught out misleading the public, as we have grown accustomed to in this campaign on the carbon price. The report showed, in direct terms, with a line-by-line analysis of the advertising, that the opposition leader's complaints had no substance. It showed that the opposition leader stands totally discredited in relation to just about everything that he has said about the carbon price, because it showed that the facts are that the carbon price will apply to around 500 of the largest polluters, that more than half of the revenue will be used to provide households with tax cuts, increases in family payments and higher pensions and benefits and that nine out of 10 households will receive assistance. Those were the things that the Leader of the Opposition attacked, and they have been endorsed and verified by the Auditor-General in the report tabled last week. (Time expired)

Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Innovation, Industry and Science) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It does not please me to follow such a disappointingly woeful and sleep-inducing performance from a particularly unconvincing parliamentary secretary. He did talk about being divorced from reality. Let me inform the House of an example of what it means to be divorced from reality when we talk about the carbon tax.

The member for Isaacs occasionally speaks to some of the manufacturers in his electorate—and he has got a lot of them. He attended a meeting last year where he was asked a question by an entrepreneur, a businessperson who invests in manufacturing and who at the moment is experiencing wafer-thin profit margins, if any at all. The member for Isaacs, who is at the table, turns his back, of course, like he turns his back on those hardworking businesses and the people they employ in his own electorate. This businessperson said to the member for Isaacs, 'A carbon tax will increase my electricity bill and a carbon tax will make it very difficult for my business to be viable,' and he went on and explained that. What did the member for Isaacs—that great entrepreneur, with experience in running a business and putting all his money at risk to have a go in the free market—say? He said words to the effect of, 'Well, maybe you're in the wrong business.' So we have got a parliamentary secretary in the area of climate change and now industry—which is quite irrational—saying, 'We are going to impose all these additional government taxes and charges on you, including the carbon tax, and if you cannot be competitive because of those additional costs we have imposed upon you, well, you run a bad business model.' It is pathetic. That, my friend from Isaacs, is—

Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Deputy Speaker, on a point of order, this is a patently false account of what I said at a meeting not attended by the member for Indi, patently false—

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

The parliamentary secretary will resume his seat. He has other opportunities for this in the House. I will caution the member for Indi to not continue to reflect upon another member.

Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Innovation, Industry and Science) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

To assist any member interested in this particular matter, I do have the video available; I am getting it converted to be available on YouTube for everyone to see an accurate and correct reflection of events.

The government espouses all these benefits of the carbon tax. It is such a ridiculous proposition. If the carbon tax is so good for the jobs of tomorrow, then why don't you double it? Then we will have even more jobs! That is how illogical this actually is. The government talks about compensation for industry. Well, you only provide compensation when you injure someone. This carbon tax is intended to injure business, is intended to injure industry.

It is particularly heinous because what we have done in this parliament is pass a tax before the rest of the world has done so. It is insane, absolutely insane, to penalise Australian businesses, to put extra lead in their saddlebags when they try to export overseas, competing against businesses that do not have the costs of a carbon tax imposed upon them. It is insane to penalise our businesses that compete with imported products, because those products are not exposed to a carbon tax. There is no other country that has a carbon tax of this nature, one that is intended to increase, to go up and up and up. This is why, fundamentally, the carbon tax is bad; it is disastrous for business, particularly in the manufacturing sphere, particularly for energy intensive businesses, because it goes to the heart of the competitiveness of those businesses. And there is no answer. As Graham Kraehe from BlueScope said, any compensation is 'like putting a bandaid on a bullet wound'.

This is affecting all sorts of industries. The food and grocery manufacturers, who employ over 300,000 Australians, are labouring under extraordinary pressure. They have said that a carbon tax will be bad for Australian manufacturers. Kate Carnell, the recent Chief Executive of the Australian Food and Grocery Council, said:

For Julia Gillard to say that food companies who aren’t in the top 1000 emitters won’t be affected by carbon tax is simply wrong.

Further, she said:

Products requiring the most energy to manufacture would see the biggest cost increases such as baked goods, dairy sugar and paper products like nappies.

The Labor Party bleat and try to label us on this side as scaremongers because we merely oppose the carbon tax. Do they say the same thing about a whole list of industries and businesses who have condemned the carbon tax? Let us look at other trade exposed industries. We saw economic modelling showing that there would be a forced closure of eight coalmines and that $22 billion of exports would be forgone. We have seen Treasury's own modelling of the carbon tax show that the aluminium industry would be cut by more than a half by 2050. We have seen the shelved expansion of the refinery in Western Australia and we have seen the situation in Geelong, where the car industry is also affected. We saw independent modelling regarding the impact of the carbon tax on the car industry—an extra $460 million over 10 years. If this carbon tax is so great, why are all these industries saying, in one way or another, that a carbon tax is going to make them less competitive and that a carbon tax will make a difficult situation much, much worse?

There are some further words of wisdom from Graham Kraehe, a great Australian with over 40 years experience in manufacturing. I hear some members on the other side laughing. Well, colleagues on the other side of the House, you actually do need business people to run businesses, to employ people and to increase the living standards and the economy of this nation. He has asked a very simple question: why is the government prepared to sacrifice a key sector of the Australian economy by introducing a carbon tax on Australian manufacturers, with little impact on world CO2 generation? What is being proposed is a system that will tax Australian made goods but will give importers of those same goods a competitive advantage, with no comparable tax payable.

It could not have been said more eloquently and concisely. We see this right across the board. We see the pressure on the furniture, cabinet and joinery makers, who employ 137,000 people. They say that a carbon tax will further erode our competitive position, with no real effect on climate change. We see an impact on the tourism industry of $731 million. The government claims, bleats, that the carbon tax is good for Australian businesses and is setting us up for the future, but it is setting us up for failure. It is setting us up for more job losses, and they know it. That is why they are sneaking behind closed doors trying to keep certain businesses and industries sweet by saying, 'Look here, we'll throw you a bit more compensation money to make up for the injury we are causing you.' That is no way to run a government or an economy and it is no way to plan for the difficult economic months and years we have ahead. This government should stop listening to those lunatic greens and start listening to the people who make this country great: those businesses that employ great Australians.

Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I think those last few words from the member for Indi said it all about her contribution—all bluster, filling us all with complete falsehoods. When you have no argument the typical approach is to start telling those fibs. It was a shocking speech.

I have just come from a meeting—it is a busy time of the afternoon for the Chief Government Whip, but I wanted to speak on this matter of public importance for some very good reasons. One of those reasons concerns the nature of my electorate, which is well known to have a substantial coal mining industry, a substantial power generation industry and a substantial aluminium industry. This gives me the opportunity to correct some of the falsehoods being promoted largely by the member for Indi, but no doubt as well by the member for Dunkley.

The amazing thing about this debate is the total absence of any capacity at all on the part of the opposition to deal with some of the realities. We heard lots about the carbon price mechanism. We heard lots about alleged impacts on businesses. But we heard nothing about climate change and the need for governments to act. It is worth reminding ourselves that both the government and the opposition in this place have the same climate change policy. We are both committed to acting on climate change. Indeed, the opposition's carbon reduction targets are the same as those of the government. Yet I did not hear the member for Dunkley—I will stand corrected if needed—mention the opposition's policy at all. I certainly did not hear the member for Indi mention the opposition's policy. She blustered about the alleged impact on business but did not say anything about her own policy to reduce carbon emissions and the impact that might have on businesses. Direct Action will of course have an impact, just as our policy has impacts. But there are big differences. Their policy is to tax Australian families—more money—and use that money to fund carbon reduction programs within business, which will transfer wealth from families to big business to let them off the hook in terms of the efforts they must make to address climate change.

I am challenging those on the other side who have not yet spoken but will make a contribution to this debate to start talking about their own policy, how it is gong to work and what impact it is going to have on Australian families. I will take it that, if none of them gets up and talks about their policy this evening, they no longer have one. We will be able to have a real debate in this place about climate change and carbon reduction and whether they are not opposed to doing anything at all. We welcome that debate, because we believe the scientific evidence is in and that it is overwhelming. We are concerned about a whole range of issues in environmental terms, including the Pacific islands that will no longer exist once sea levels rise to certain levels. Let us have that debate. If they are still committed to reducing carbon pollution let them get up in this place and explain how they intend to achieve it.

At least the member for Dunkley devoted some time to business, and small business in particular, and I welcome that because we have been combatants on these issues in the past. It surprised me, though, that he did not go to the core issue—that is, the environmental issues—because he has a history in this. I have a speech here from right back in 1999 in which he devoted quite a bit of time in this place to talking about the need to make small businesses more efficient and reduce their environmental impact. He also spoke about the initiatives his government was taking. He referred to dry cleaners in particular. I was reminded of his speech when he used it in his own address just this afternoon. I am disappointed that the member for Dunkley was previously so dedicated to helping businesses to reduce their pollution footprint, yet he has now thrown that out of the window. I think the dry cleaning industry would be very disappointed indeed.

But let us think about these alleged impacts on business. Take two of the government's biggest policies and achievements in this place—the mining tax and the carbon price. It delivers small business tax breaks—immediate write-offs of up to $5,000. They must be against this. It gives us infrastructure funding in the regions, where small businesses operate. You come to my region and you will know that one of the big issues for small business is basic community physical infrastructure, including road networks. It gives a company tax rate reduction. Is that not going to help big business? What about personal tax rates. What about the raising of the tax-free threshold. Is that not going to help people in unincorporated businesses, sole traders and partnerships? Are they not going to get a tax break? The estimated power price rise for a small business is about $5 a week. These same small businesses are getting multiple tax breaks. The member for Dunkley does not acknowledge any of this. They talk about the downside, as they see it, of this policy but they cannot be taken seriously if they are not prepared to talk about the upside, including the exemption of petrol from the scheme. We all know how important fuel costs are to both small and large businesses. You hear none of that from them.

The big challenge for business in my electorate is the skills shortage. That is why we are investing literally billions of dollars in addressing that issue, through productivity, placement programs, trades training centres, increased TAFE funding and the Education Investment Fund. These are all things they oppose over on that side of the chamber. When I was representing the small business constituency I used to have a little phrase that I would use on almost every occasion when addressing them. It was, 'The best three things a government can do for business, and small business in particular, is to grow the economy, keep interest rates low and get out of the way.' That is exactly what this government has been doing. We have been growing the economy in the face of a global recession. We are the envy of the world. What more would you want to do for business than that? Wouldn't they just love to have our economy in Europe? Interest rates are still at historical lows, and we are reducing red tape on small business in this country.

The member for Indi again repeated these claims that we are losing jobs in the coalmining industry. If you came to my electorate and said that—and I would love to see the member for Indi do it—they would laugh at her. They know it is simply not true. We do know that there was some coal industry modelling which suggested that under the carbon price the industry might not grow in job terms as fast over the next decade as it might have otherwise. The opposition have misused that data and turned it into a job losses proposition. But before they say, 'Jobs will not grow as fast,' that is a good thing in mining regions because the businesses that the member for Dunkley and the member for Indi were talking about cannot get people to work in their businesses. So this is a rebalancing of the model. They would be laughed at if they came to the Hunter electorate and made that statement.

I will quickly finish on something local and close to my heart, and that is the aluminium industry. The aluminium industry is in trouble globally. Smelters right around the world are closing or are planning to close. Why is this happening? It is happening because aluminium prices are at record lows, particularly here in Australia because the Australian dollar is so high and input costs are rising. They would have you believe on the other side that they have got a solution to those problems. Of course they have not. And they would have you believe that it has something to do with the carbon price. Well we would be having a conversation about Hydro Aluminium in my electorate with or without a carbon price. Those on the other side understand that but they want to perpetrate this lie on the Australian community, including my own community, because they think there are votes in it. They would be better placed talking to the New South Wales government—their mates; and the member for Dunkley talked about state elections—about finally giving Hydro a decent electricity supply contract and the certainty that goes with it. (Time expired)

George Christensen (Dawson, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As much as the government would have us believe otherwise, the carbon tax will have an impact on business—it absolutely will. While it will be a negative impact on most, for others it will absolutely devastate them. There was a time when, despite all the noise that they make, the government actually accepted that there would be impacts. They once accepted that fact. I could go back to the grand architect, when the Labor Party paid Professor Ross Garnaut to do a report for them, and this was the forerunner of it. He said in that report:

… imposing a carbon price in Australia ahead of similar carbon constraints in our trade competitors—

Mr Champion interjecting—

If you will be quiet mate you will learn something. He said that it could result:

… could result in some movement of emissions intensive, trade-exposed industries from Australia to other countries that impose less of a carbon constraint.

That is from the guy who came up with the policy for this government. But look, your Prime Minister actually admitted it—that is, your current one; she might not be that next week. She said, 'It has price impacts.' It is meant to have price impacts, that is the whole point. Remember that one—'price impacts'? There was a reason why she admitted that there would be impacts. The government had put out so much spin that the carbon tax would not hurt anyone that people were starting to ask the question: 'What is the point of it. Why are we having this thing if there is no impact?' You know, 'If you put a price on something, then people will use less of it'—another quote from the Prime Minister.

This Prime Minister, this Labor Party—this Labor-Greens alliance, I should say, and the motley crew of Independents—think that by increasing the cost of electricity that is going to solve everything. Let us go through some of the impacts on jobs and the impacts on businesses that this carbon tax will have. We have had a lot of talk about Alcoa and the government is desperate to say that there are going to be no impacts on Alcoa. It is a shame that the last member who spoke, who has aluminium in his electorate, is not here to listen to this. Alcoa has shelved a $3 billion expansion of a refinery in WA. An Alcoa spokesman said that the company would not return to the project until it understood the full impact of the $23 a tonne carbon tax. I quote further from Alan Cransberg of Alcoa, who said:

I don't think there's anybody in the world who's going to put billions of dollars into the ground without understanding what are the rules for an ETS or a carbon tax.

You want to look further at Alcoa's statements. Its director of government relations, Tim McAuliffe, spells it out for the government:

Smelters use an enormous amount of power and the way the carbon pricing mechanism is structured, it assumes you will get carbon pass-through effectively at one tonne of carbon for every megawatt hour. You can't get power in Victoria at that intensity.

I could go on to quote Deutsche Bank analyst Tim Jordan, who did an analysis of the Point Henry plant. He assumed that Point Henry operated at the average carbon intensity for Australian industry and he said the carbon price would add about $4 million to the smelter's costs in 2013. For all of the government's bleating and saying that they are going to help the workers at Alcoa and they are going to help the aluminium industry, they are not going to do anything of the sort. This was the plan all along. It is because of one thing: they are in bed with Bob Brown. Here was Bob Brown the other day saying:

… this is an industry which I don't think has been investing wisely and the market does come into play, as indeed it is doing with the logging industry in Tasmania at the moment.

This guy wants the aluminium industry shut down. The Greens have got a written agreement, a written alliance. He helped draft this carbon tax, the one that they have all signed up to.

Let us go on to other parts of the aluminium industry. The Chairman of Rusal Australia, John Hannagan, said:

Whatever anyone says about the carbon tax, it does have an impact. It does have a significant impact.

The system being put in place for the carbon tax is really based on, I think, a very flawed assumption that our competitors are going to have similar or more aggressive carbon or energy policies attached to them.

I could talk about Norsk Hydro with their plant at Kurri Kurri and reports that 2,000 of their jobs could disappear. That is in the member for Hunter's electorate, and he stood up here saying there would be no impact. The Chief Executive of the Federation of Automotive Products Manufacturers, Richard Reilly, said that continuing government help would be needed. But then he went on to say, 'We are going to be impacted by a carbon tax and our competitors overseas won't.' It is a bit of a case of Julia giveth but the carbon tax taketh away.

There are jobs that are going to go in abattoirs around the region, and all of this was known from the start. I go back to what Professor Garnaut said:

… imposing a carbon price in Australia ahead of similar constraints in our trade competitors … could result in some movement of emissions-intensive, trade-exposed industries from Australia to other countries that impose less of a carbon constraint.

Let us have a look at what other countries are doing. The Labor and Greens government are proposing $23 a tonne. The member for Herbert wants to see comparable schemes. In New Zealand the spot permits under its emissions-trading scheme actually rose by two per cent in the last fortnight to about A$6.38 a tonne. In Europe they are hoping for help this year because the prices have slumped to record lows. Guess how much—to $8.45 a tonne. The government was spruiking that China is now on board with carbon taxing, but it is putting in $1.59 a tonne. That is $1.59 compared with $23 a tonne. You guys have got to be kidding. Ross Garnaut, the government's own advisor, said that Australian industries would be destroyed if there was not comparable carbon pricing around the world. The chickens are coming home to roost.

I could also talk about what small businesses are saying about this. Here is a document that over 70 chambers of commerce from Queensland have signed and sent to Julia Gillard on 21 June. It said:

A carbon tax will flow through the economy affecting the price of all goods and services and increasing costs for all businesses including those without a direct carbon price liability. Trade exposed and small and medium-sized businesses have limited liability to pass these costs onto their customers and as such are at even greater risk of reduced business competiveness and viability.

They begged the Prime Minister not to bring this in. I am particularly concerned, because Mackay is ground zero for the carbon tax. I have the mining industry in my electorate. I have the tourism industry in my electorate. I have agriculture, particularly sugar, in my electorate. All these industries will suffer under the carbon tax. Deloitte said that Mackay was going to be the hardest hit region in the hardest hit state.

The last speaker wanted to know what we were going to do. I will give the members opposite a tip, a titbit, a heads up. When the election is finally called the Leader of the Opposition is going to stand up and is going to say, 'There will be no carbon tax under a government I lead,' and the Australian people will believe him because we will mean it. We will remove the carbon tax that you introduced, that the Australian people are going to have to pay, that small business is going to have to suffer and that people are going to lose their jobs over. I say: shame, shame, shame to the government for bending over to the Greens and forcing this tax on the Australian people.

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Can I say: hooray for the opposition! After nearly 12 years of debate in this House, 35 parliamentary inquiries and countless, almost infinite, number of words spoken on climate change, I have changed my mind—I am convinced! I have just heard the convincing words that we do not need to change. In fact, not only am I convinced, but climate change has ceased—that is it! It is all done; it is all said. Methinks climate change is fixed!

The reality is that this MPI is just like every other MPI, every other bit of political claptrap that we have heard from the opposition. They come in here actually misleading people on what the facts are, on what they will do and on the impact of what we are trying to do, shirking their responsibilities in terms of the national interest and what is happening globally. Instead, they are interested in one thing, and we see it in here repeatedly, day after day: the political game, the political advantage. But, unfortunately for the opposition, you can play that game—you just have to introduce some facts. That has to be the bottom line for any debate: there at least has to be some facts you can underpin your argument with. You cannot come in here and not even make an argument but just read out other people's comments. There are plenty of other people's comments, but unfortunately they do not underpin the science, the facts or what this government is actually trying to do after more than 10 years of debate in this House, under consecutive governments, and 35 different parliamentary inquiries.

I think the debate has been had, and I think we have actually passed the legislation. It is actually going to happen. Finally, there is a government with the courage to stand up and make it happen. And guess what? It is going to happen: we will take action, we will do something about climate change and about our competitive position in the world. Because if we do not do something, let me assure you there are 30 other countries doing something right now. You have a choice. You can either get with the program, get on board with what the rest of the world is doing, or end up in the ludicrous position that, for example, China find themselves in right now, where they refuse to pay the carbon price for flying their aircraft into Europe or the United States because they are going to be slugged with a penalty as they do not have a carbon price system. So they are now in this ludicrous position of having to make a decision: do they no longer fly their aircraft into Europe or the United States because they do not want to pay the penalty? Do we really believe in Australia that we are going to do the same thing? I do not think so.

What we are doing is really clear; it is really simple. The 500 largest companies in this country have for more than 100 years been allowed to pollute the environment, the air and our rivers. If anyone does not believe me, have a think about it: where would big industry always set up their factories? Next to a river. Why was that? Because that was the natural sewer; that was where you dumped all the chemicals, the rubbish—the whole lot. But then we woke up one day and we said: there is actually a cost to doing that—a cost to society, to the environment and to us individually. So smart governments over the years introduced laws that said you cannot just dump all of your pollutants and rubbish into the river. And guess what? Then we woke up to air pollution. We said, 'You can't just dump it all into the air, you can't just dump it all into the environment; you have to do something.' And the same principle applies here. The 500 biggest polluters are now going to have to do one of two things: either clean up what they are spewing into the environment or pay a penalty for doing so where maybe they cannot do that as effectively. So what we are going to do is put an incentive in place so that these polluters do not do that any longer.

From the revenue that is raised from the carbon tax we are going to do two things, which are very simple again. First, we are going to compensate average families and households—nine out of 10 households in Australia will get some compensation—because we understand that there is a cost and we are honest about it: because there is a cost, certain things will go up in price. But, let me tell you, it is a very small price. There have been a lot of issues made about, for example, how much a kilo of meat, say rump steak, will be under a carbon price. There has been some really good work done on this. It equates to just 1or 2 cents. When we take into account the normal fluctuations in given prices between different shops and outlets, and inflation, it is not a big burden to pay. But we will compensate families.

The other part of the revenue that comes from the carbon price will go to something that I think is just as important, if not more important—as it is going to be the job creator, the future generator of jobs in this country—because it is about productivity, it is about innovation, it is about competitiveness. And that is because we are going to invest in R&D. We are going to invest in the future. We are going to make sure that, unlike the last 30 years, the next 30 years are going to be about future industries. And you can do that at the same time that you support existing jobs. I think that is a bit lost on the opposition. For them it is black and white, all or nothing. On this side we can actually walk and chew gum at the same time. We can be in a position where we are planning for the future and also supporting existing jobs.

If we are going to talk about existing jobs in the aluminium industry, let us be honest about what is happening in the aluminium industry. We may live on an island but we are not in isolation from the rest of the world. What happens in Australia is not just linked to domestic markets; it is linked to global markets. There is a curious fact. Countries that have already introduced carbon pricing, carbon taxes, on the most polluting industries—of which we all accept aluminium is one—for example, Germany, have seen their aluminium industry grow. It has grown in size, in profitability—it has grown across the board. Why is that? Because the Germans understood that, if their economy was going to thrive and grow into the future, they needed to make the change, they needed to make the investments.

There is one other little thing that really sets this off, and that is demand. There is a high demand for aluminium right across the planet. Unfortunately, Australia has two things working against us right now. First there is a high Australian dollar, at around 106/107 US cents, which is unfortunate for our exporters and for the aluminium industry. It is also unfortunate, as a matter of fact, that the price of aluminium has reduced sharply in recent years, which is putting a lot of pressure on our industry. So we have accepted all of those things and we are actually working with the industry.

But, while I say all of that, you have to remember: this is before a carbon price comes in, this is before there is a carbon tax, this is before anything that the opposition is talking about has taken place. So we have already accepted the fact that there is some pain and some change—we have called them 'growing pains' in different sectors—but we are going to help and we are going to assist and we are going to do it through a number of packages. We are going to make sure we do not lose our manufacturing sector; that we do not lose our aluminium smelting sector; and that we support, underpin and invest in those jobs. And we have actually done something concrete about it—not just drafted a plan. We have actually put money on the table; we have passed legislation.

What is curious, though, is that the other side talk about supporting jobs but they come in here and vote against jobs. They vote against the support packages. They vote against those workers, whom they are trying to frighten and scare—those families who are looking at their own industries and sectors and are unsure about where the future may take them. I would be unsure, too, if I continually heard on the radio members of the opposition, the shadow Treasurer and others, basically pooh-poohing their sector, carrying on like it is the end of the world and there will not be an aluminium smelting sector in Australia or any other manufacturing, when that is just not the case. This MPI is completely meaningless, except for the fact that it is a cheap political point-scoring exercise, because we have already passed all the legislation that needs to be passed. The opposition should now get on with the reality of life—start supporting industry, start supporting the legislation that we bring into this House that will actually support jobs, make sure that we have a strong and growth focused manufacturing sector by supporting the proposals that we are putting forward and make sure that they do not go out there and frighten industry and frighten workers. The opposition has made all sorts of baseless claims about jobs. I say baseless because there are no facts attached. They talk about jobs going because of the carbon price, but it has not come in yet. What is the cause of what is happening out in industry? I think it is pretty clear to everybody what it is.

The coalition say they have a plan. I will be brief when listing their plan because it is not very complicated and it does very little. They call it the Direct Action Plan. It is really simple: they will directly charge consumers and every taxpayer $1,300 on average per household. That is the exact amount under the opposition's plan, which will cost around $13 billion in 2020. We are doing the opposite. We are saying that those who pollute ought to pay the price and those who will be impacted by it should be compensated. That is our plan. That is what we are going to do. That is what has been passed by the parliament and that is what will happen. People will be compensated for any extra costs they incur and it will mean that Australia will move on to a clean energy future, to jobs for the future and to industries for the future, industries that will survive under our plan.

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Let me at the outset take issue with the member for Oxley, who talked about compensation for the carbon tax. Why start talking about compensation if the carbon tax is such a good thing? The carbon tax is not going to do one thing for the environment. It is not going to decrease sea levels. It is not going to reduce global temperatures. If the carbon tax is such a good thing, why isn't every other country in the Western world doing it? The President of the United States of America, Barack Obama, did not make a commitment to a carbon tax when he came here. Why would he? America is in financial uncertainty at the moment. Europe is in meltdown. Carbon taxes are not on the radars or the agendas of those countries.

The member for Oxley talked about the 500 biggest polluters that are going to be hit with a carbon tax. Labor denigrates the biggest polluters but they should be praising them because these so-called biggest polluters are in fact our biggest companies. They are producing things. They are making things. They are mining companies. They are abattoirs. They are doing a great job by making and producing things and moreover employing Australians, including many Australians in regional areas. It was only last week that we had the representatives from the abattoir industry here talking with members of parliament. They are deeply concerned about a carbon tax that they know is going to cost jobs and production. If the abattoirs go over 25,000 tonnes of emissions, they are going to have to reduce that so that they come in under that level and do not have to pay a carbon tax. They can do that either by stopping work or by reducing their throughput. Why would an abattoir want to close its doors and lay people off? Why would an abattoir want to put less stock through when people are hungry? That is what is going to happen under a carbon tax.

I know the carbon tax is going to hit Regional Express airlines, based at Wagga Wagga, very severely. The airline industry is already squeezed by low return rates and low profits and the carbon tax is going to be a big hit on Regional Express. Regional Express is a linkage for people in metropolitan areas to come to regional Australia. It is also a vital link for people in regional Australia to go to metropolitan areas for all sorts of things, many of which are related to business and also health issues. Unfortunately, we do not always have the health services and the specialists available in regional areas. These people need to be able to get on aeroplanes to go to Sydney, Melbourne and other areas to consult specialists and this is going to have a big impact on them through the additional price that they are going to have to pay on their tickets. Perhaps less viable routes might even be looked at by Regional Express and other airlines. This is all due to the carbon tax or is certainly not helped by it at the very least.

The next election will be a referendum on the carbon tax. The last one should have been. It could have been if the Prime Minister, five days out from the election, had not said, 'There will be no carbon tax under a government I lead.' Had the Prime Minister been truthful and said, 'Yes, I will contemplate putting in a carbon tax' or 'Yes, unequivocally there will be a carbon tax under a government I lead' then maybe the vote would have been different. But the Labor Party was elected with the help of the regional Independents, the sell-out Independents, and the one Green member of the House of Representatives and on 24 February last year the Prime Minister announced that her government would introduce a carbon tax. As she announced it the Greens leader, the quasi Prime Minister, Senator Bob Brown, stood there front and centre, taking all the glory and the kudos for the fact that a carbon tax would be introduced. Let me tell you that the Greens are no friends of business. Certainly the Greens are no friends of regional Australia. They have shown that time and again. The next election will be a vote on the carbon tax. The 72 members of parliament who betrayed their communities by voting for the carbon tax will be condemned at the next election.

Earlier in this matter of public importance discussion the member for Hunter said that people in his electorate, the coalminers and aluminium smelter workers, would laugh at the member for Indi for the comments that she made and the fact that she said that there would be job losses as a result of the carbon tax. He said they would laugh. Certainly no-one is laughing who has a job at the moment but perhaps will not have a job under the carbon tax. They certainly will not be laughing at the member for Hunter. In fact, they will be angry, just as people right across Australia are angry, that the Prime Minister went back on her word. They are angry that the Prime Minister's Labor people and the sell-out Independents and the Green voted in favour of a carbon tax that they were promised would not occur. The Prime Minister and the Labor government had no mandate for this legislation. Now it is in; unfortunately it is coming like a steam train, like a train wreck, on 1 July.

The coalition will continue to fight this carbon tax. If elected, the coalition will repeal this carbon tax as the first order of business in the 44th Parliament. The opposition leader has said that. We have said time and again that we will repeal it, and we will. We will continue to fight the good fight against the carbon tax because we know in our heart of hearts that it is bad policy. Indeed, the member for Makin knows in his heart of hearts, and other members opposite know in their heart of hearts, that it is bad policy too. But to form government the Prime Minister has gone back on her word, as she has done in relation to the carbon tax and so many other things, including this morning the private health insurance rebate. She has gone back on her word and introduced things that she said unequivocally she would not introduce. If Labor attempts to block the scrapping of the carbon tax, we will go to a double dissolution election. That is on the record. Australians are already facing substantial cost-of-living pressures and the carbon tax will only have a very disadvantageous impact there.

I know that in my own electorate of Riverina small businesses are very worried at the moment, not just because of the carbon tax but also because of the fact that water security is not there anymore. Fly over Griffith at the moment and, in contrast to a few short years ago, you see lush fields of green everywhere as the farmers are actively engaged in what they do best: food production. For the benefit of the House, farmers are people who till the soil to grow the food we eat. This year is the Australian Year of the Farmer. Farmers did not need a carbon tax to be foisted upon them in this their special year. It is an important year.

Soon, the Murray-Darling Basin Authority will announce its plan. This follows previous ill-informed and misguided attempts in the authority's guide and then in its draft. A farmer at Griffith has made sure anyone flying overhead sees what he thinks of the authority's efforts to date. Hanwood's Steve Graham has ploughed 'Jam the Plan' into his paddock in letters large enough to see from the air. He said it is important to remind people that Griffith is not going to back down and that a united front is needed to ensure that this vibrant regional community not only survives but thrives into the future. That is the case with all communities in regional Australia, Mr Deputy Speaker Scott. I know that in your seat of Maranoa people do not want to just survive, they do not want to just hang on. They want to thrive. They deserve to thrive. They grow the food to feed this nation and to feed other nations as well.

Mr Graham summed up the crux of the water issue when he said that people have a right to sell their water but that the third-party impact has locals worried. They are also worried about a carbon tax. And, as he added, the more water that is sold out of the area—out of any irrigation area—the higher the user fees faced by irrigators. The water issue is about food security, home-grown food availability, reasonable grocery costs and the sustaining of regional Australia. Grocery costs are going to go up and up under a carbon tax. Small businesses which are operating at the moment but which cannot compete with the big duopoly will see their costs go up and up. Their power costs are going to go up. Unfortunately, these days people are fighting cost-of-living pressures. They are extremely worried about the fact that they may not be able to fill their car as often as they used to. When those sorts of things happen parents stop taking their kids to sport and they stop taking their kids to the movies, and it has an impact upon the whole community. This carbon tax is not only going to have an impact on small business; it extends throughout the community and is going to have a huge impact on families. A bad water plan is not going to benefit the environment, and I and my Nationals colleagues will not in any way support any plan which will harm the people we represent. We certainly do not support a bad carbon tax. (Time expired)

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The discussion has concluded.