Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—I move amendments (1) to (3), as circulated in my name:

(1) Clause 2, page 2 (table item 1, column 2), omit the cell, substitute:

(2) Clause 71, page 62 (after line 8), after the paragraph beginning "This Part also", insert:

Finally, this Part deals with the review of this Act by the Productivity Commission every two years.

(3) Page 71 (after line 2), at the end of Division 3, add:

85 Re port by Productivity Commission

(1) The Productivity Commission must report to the Minister on:

(a) the operation of this Act; and

(b) the matters mentioned in subsection (3).

(2) Reports must be prepared in relation to the following periods:

(a) the 2-year period starting on the commencement of this Act;

(b) each successive 2-year period.

(3) Without limiting the matters to be covered in the reports, the reports must include an analysis of the following:

(a) the costs and benefits (including employment generated) during the relevant 2-year period of the measures implemented by this Act to improve security and confidence in Australia's fuel supplies;

(b) the impact during the relevant 2-year period of the following on fuel security, economic activity and employment (including matters relating to industry, industry development and productivity):

(i) the manufacturing, sale, purchase and use of electric vehicles, electric vehicle components and electric vehicle batteries;

(ii) commodity value-adding in relation to electric vehicles;

(iii) investment in fast charging network infrastructure;

(iv) the manufacturing, sale, purchase and use of other forms of zero emissions transport (including transport powered by zero emissions fuels such as clean hydrogen);

(v) any related matters.

(4) The report must be provided to the Minister within 60 days after the end of the 2-year period to which the report relates.

(5) The Minister must cause the report to be tabled in each House of the Parliament within 15 sitting days of that House after receiving the report.

(6) In this section:

matters relating to industry, industry development and productivity has the same meaning as in section 6 of the Productivity Commission Act 1998.

For the Hansard, as would have been apparent from the speech at item 2, the Greens opposed the bill. We're moving amendments that should be supported by everyone in this place because they're sensible amendments that will deal with some of the big problems that are in this bill. One of the main problems with the bill is that it talks about fuel security but completely ignores the best way of getting Australia to be 100 per cent energy independent, which is getting our country running on 700 per cent renewables: 100 per cent for electricity but not just electricity. It is getting our transport and our industry running on renewables and exporting it as well.

Now, getting an electric vehicle strategy in this country will improve fuel security because we can generate enormous amounts of renewable electricity here. We know that. We are blessed with sun and wind—the best in the world—and we know we've got people who know how to make batteries here in this country. We had the capacity to make cars, and I'm sure that we could generate it again for the capacity to make electric vehicles in this country. We could be completely secure if we had an electric vehicle strategy, but we don't. We wouldn't have to rely on overseas governments or on big corporations who have interests only in profit and not in the security of the Australian people.

One of the amendments that I'm moving is to delay the commencement of the fuel security components until passage of the electric vehicle accountability bill, which is being progressed through the Senate. It makes sense to have an electric vehicle strategy in this country. The rest of the world is moving. As I said during my speech, if you don't want to listen to the Greens, listen to General Motors, which is going to be moving to all-electric by 2035. We don't want to be the world's dumping ground, forced to rely not only on overseas producers for fuel-guzzling cars but also for the petrol, but that is where this government is taking us. They're taking us there and they're asking the public to dip into their own pockets and pay for it.

We should not go down that road. We should go down the road of making Australia fuel secure by having an electric vehicle strategy. First, pause this bill until we've got one so that we don't just tip good money into the pockets of big corporations with no guarantee that it's even going to any of the workers. The second amendment that is being moved asks the government to do something that should be thoroughly unobjectionable, which is to ask one of their favourite commissions, the Productivity Commission, to use the driest of economic logic to assess the benefits of the 'tip money into big corporations' pockets' approach of the government verses having an electric vehicle strategy for fuel security.

If the government has nothing to hide they should support this amendment. I suspect that the Productivity Commission will also find that the best way to ensure our fuel security is to minimise our reliance on oil and petrol. That is the way we can best ensure our fuel security, and we would get a better bang for our buck if we did it that way. And if we did that we would drive the electric car industry in Australia and the renewable electricity generation industry in Australia. If the government really thinks that the best way to go in order to deal with Australia's fuel security is to give $2 billion to a couple of handpicked corporations, then let's allow the Productivity Commission to run a ruler over it. They should have nothing to hide with respect to that amendment.

I urge that these sensible amendments be supported by the government, the opposition and other members of the crossbench. There should be no problem with asking the Productivity Commission to look at it, unless the government knows in its heart of hearts that this is not the most efficient way of ensuring Australia's fuel security. It would force the government to come up with an electric vehicle strategy. It currently does not have one. It has promised us one. It has refused one. The only thing it came up with in 2019, after promising us an EV strategy, was a paper that said they are not going to provide any incentives at all. (Time expired)

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Katter's Australian Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

People will be surprised that I am backing this amendment, but the argument put by the honourable member is a good argument. We don't have enough petrol. The very best we can hope for is 24 per cent self-sufficiency in petrol. If some of our transportation is met by electricity, that would dramatically help to make us self-sufficient; hence my support for what the honourable member is proposing here.

I don't think many people in Australia are aware that almost all of our petrol comes from Singapore and South Korea. As I pointed out, the First World War and the Second World War—and every war we have been in for the last 50 years—were about Middle Eastern petrol or petrol from Indonesia. I was sent as a young man to fight in Indonesia. Thank goodness, I survived before we got over there. If China embargoes oil coming into Australia, there is no way in the world that Singapore and South Korea are going to defy China. So Australia would be left without any petrol. I mean no disrespect for the government on this issue but there will be queues four kilometres long in front of every service station in Australia, and your five weeks supply will be used within a few days.

I've never been long on CO2 but I've never been a climate denier insofar as there is a problem that arises in the oceans with a change in the pH levels and the ability of shellfish to form their shells—and I quote the work done by Katharina Fabricius at the Australian Institute of Marine Science. There is no doubt that the institute and that scientist are correct in what they are saying. So we want a pullback. We've done some wonderful work with algae technology, and we believe that even coal-fired power stations can use algae technology. But it can only be used where you have a lot of water and a lot of flat land. Unfortunately, none of our existing power stations fall into that category.

So, without going too long and too sideways on the proposals here, again I reiterate that I support the amendment on the basis that two corporations are getting a $2 billion golden handshake, and what is Australia getting in return? Well, it's an abolition of a competitive system. Suddenly two of the players have a massive head start, in the case of Ampol, against United Petroleum. The ACCC have advised me, unofficially, that United Petroleum are holding the price of petrol down by about four cents a litre. So if they are excluded from the marketplace then you can rest assured that the price of petrol is going to go up by four cents a litre. There is a very real possibility—I might even say probability—of the damage to United Petroleum here being very critical indeed. Hence my opposition to the bill in its present form, without protections for competition in the marketplace.

I'm not the one advocating free markets and fair competition and not picking winners. Both sides of the House are in that camp. I'm not. But where there is an injustice and unfairness, the government should take cognisance of that. I applaud the government for taking cognisance of the point raised continuously in this place about fuel security—repeating that it arguably caused two world wars and has been responsible for almost every single war since World War II, with the exception of the African wars.

So I applaud the reasons why the government is doing this, but the implementation is a huge flaw. Firstly, I'd like to see the minister in this place while we are debating this legislation. Secondly, I would like him to take into account the effect upon the other competitors in the market and the golden handshake that's being given to one— (Time expired)

Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'll just briefly detain the House to outline why the Labor Party will not be supporting the honourable member for Melbourne's amendments. Firstly, of course, the government's record on electric vehicles is utterly appalling—he's right to make that point—but I don't believe it is correct to link the two issues. We have our own electric vehicle policy in the Labor Party: to make electric vehicles cheaper and to give Australians more choice by taking taxes off them. I don't think you need to link this legislation with another bill in the Senate, which the Greens are only just introducing now. I think this bill should be passed or defeated on its merits, not linked to another piece of legislation.

Secondly, while I'd have no problem with the Productivity Commission reviewing this legislation's operation after a period of time—I'd be quite supportive of that, in fact—there is a process for determining Productivity Commission referrals. It can be done in a couple of ways, but including it in the legislation is, I believe, not the appropriate way on this particular occasion. So we will not be supporting the Greens' amendments.

Ross Vasta (Bonner, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question is that the amendments be disagreed to.

Question agreed to.

Bill agreed to.