Max Chandler-Mather (Griffith, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Something is terribly wrong when a nurse is paying more tax than a multinational gas corporation. In fact, in the last four years, big multinational gas corporations have paid $0 in royalties on 56 per cent of all gas exported overseas from Australia. That's $143 billion in gas, and those big gas corporations paid $0 in royalties—zero! These companies included Santos and Chevron, and, by pure coincidence—I'm sure it's just a complete fluke and this occurred completely by chance—Santos and Chevron happen to have been two of the biggest donors to Labor and the Liberal Party over the last two years. Santos and Chevron have given $290,000 to the Labor Party in donations and $100,000 to the Liberals, which is a pretty good return for those two big corporations because, for instance, Santos, in recent data, in just one year made $6.2 billion in income and paid—you guessed it—$0 in tax. Over a five-year period, Chevron made $43 billion in income selling Australian gas overseas and paid—surprise, surprise—$0 in tax.

Now you might think, and maybe some people will argue, that it's just really hard to tax multinational gas corporations. Maybe it's impossible and no country has figured it out—except that's just not true. While Australia exports more gas than Qatar, Qatar collects 20 times more tax from its gas than Australia does. That's 20 times more in tax collection from their gas exports when they export less than Australia. Norway taxes its oil and gas industry at an effective rate of 78 per cent and now has a sovereign wealth fund of close to $3 trillion—$2.9 trillion. In fact, just the interest on that sovereign wealth fund that they have accrued as a result of properly taxing their oil and gas industry helps fund their social programs. They give all their citizens free university education.

The Greens have proposed a pretty modest increase to national gas royalties, cracking down on loopholes in the gas taxes at a federal level. Over the next 10 years, that would raise an extra $111 billion in revenue. That's $111 billion in revenue that both sides of politics are leaving on the table in the profit margins of Santos and Chevron rather than in the pockets of ordinary, everyday Australians, who are already doing it tough. How is it fair that a teacher saving up to buy a home is paying more tax than Chevron and Santos in some years? These are companies that make tens of billions of dollars in revenue and often get away with paying $0 in tax. In fact, in the most recent recorded tax year, Santos made over $6 billion in income and paid $0 in income and corporate tax. That means that they gave more in political donations to the Labor and Liberal parties than they paid in corporate tax on $6 billion of revenue. And you wonder why people are fed up with politics!

There are pensioners choosing between paying the rent and feeding themselves for a week. There are single parents wondering how they're going to make ends meet at the end of the week after they cover massive mortgage or rent payments. And then you have Chevron and Santos dancing over everyone else, making billions of dollars in revenue and paying $0 in tax. I don't think it's too radical to suggest that we follow countries around the world that properly tax their resource industry, make them pay their fair share in tax and use it to ensure everyone in this country has what they need to live a good life.

In the most recent housing data, we have just found out that in Brisbane the median house price has now ticked over $1 million. In the space of a few years in some suburbs, house prices have more than doubled in Brisbane. Basically, that means it's more than triple what someone earning the median income can afford in Brisbane. It's clearly unaffordable for anyone earning an income of less than $200,000 a year. Right now in Brisbane as a result of that price increase, houses in Brisbane now cost 14 times more than the median income. Back when the Prime Minister bought his first house in the early 90s, it was more like five times the average income. The national median price for a house in Australia in capital cities is now $1.2 million—that's four times what someone working with a median income can afford. It's clearly unaffordable for anyone earning less than $229,000 a year. It's 16 times the median income. That's a median house price.

Rents in Australia have, since 2022, increased by 40 per cent. We have a situation now where, nationally, in a capital city you have to be earning more than $229,000 to afford price of a home, and in Brisbane you need to be earning more than $200,000. Then you have the federal Labor government say they would like to see house prices continue to increase, and both sides of politics have housing policies that are turbocharging house prices.

How is it fair that a property investor, sometimes with 10, 20, 30, 40 or hundreds of investment properties, can collect billions of dollars collectively in tax handouts from this government in the form of negative gearing and the capital gains tax discount? In the middle of one of the worst housing crises this country has faced in generations, where so many of my generations are giving up on ever being able to afford a home, you have a situation where the federal government and both sides of politics—both Labor and Liberal—are committing to $176 billion in tax handouts for property investors over the next 10 years. How is it fair that when one-third of this country rents, they have copped 40 per cent in rent increases since 2022? How is it fair that the policies of both the major parties is that they are okay with unlimited rent increases? There is no limit on the amount by which rents can increase. How is it fair that in a country where millions of people are in severe housing stress, this government spends more on tax handouts for property investors than it spends on building public housing?

Fixing this housing crisis isn't going to be done by this new wonderful idea or these new complex solutions or this fancy new ideas. All it would take is copying what is done around the world and what Australia did in the past. Start building public housing the way we used to. Stop giving so much money in tax handouts to property investors so that first home buyers and renters actually have a chance. Start putting caps on rent increases the way this country used to and the way countries around the world do. Spain and France both have caps on rent increases. Australian rents right now are increasing at about three times the rate of Spanish and French rent increases. All the Greens are proposing is to take what has worked around the world, take what has worked in Australia in the past, and do it again.

I have been in this building now for close to three years, and time and again we have seen the power of billionaires and big corporations win out over the interests of ordinary, everyday people. I'll speak about three moments where that has been starkly clear. One: where the Greens secured a deal with the government to introduce million-dollar fines for bankers who broke the law. You would think that was the bare minimum after the banking royal commission and the devastation that the banking industry wrought on ordinary and everyday Australians. Within 24 hours of that deal being announced, the banking lobby and the Australian Banking Association—headed by none other than former Labor premier Anna Bligh—found out about the deal, and within 24 hours the government had reneged on the deal. That's all it took the banking industry. The Commonwealth Bank earned a $10 billion record profit in 2023—the same year as millions of mortgage holders were in mortgage stress. They get what they want in 24 hours. What about the pensioners who are living in poverty? Why do they have to wait for longer than 24 hours? Why do they have to sometimes wait for years to get what they need? Single parents are choosing between feeding their kids and paying their rent, and they have to wait longer than 24 hours to get what they need. But not the banking industry—no! They get exactly what they want in less than 24 hours, overturning a deal done with the Greens to introduce million-dollar fines for bankers. Then, when it came to gas tax, the government announced the new changes to the PRRT. This is their federal royalty regime that's meant to tax gas corporations. But then we find out that, actually, it raises less money than the government makes from charging interest on student debt. We find out that it carves out a sweetheart deal for Woodside, a major gas corporation in Australia that happens to also have donated to both major parties in the past. And then we come to taxing big corporations. The Greens announced that we'd like to introduce a super profits tax on the big banks and other big multinational corporations. I read the headline: 'Commonwealth Bank CEO labels Greens' tax policy "insidious populism" after firm's $9.8bn profit'. I would argue that what's really wrong with this country is that, in the middle of a massive housing crisis, the big banks can make billion-dollar record profits while millions suffer.