Kerry O'Brien (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Transport) Share this | Hansard source

I am happy for the minister to respond to that. I was concerned that the debate would end without that response. I am afraid that the minister’s reasons for not supporting this amendment do not cut much ice with the opposition. We recall the Ralph committee report and all of the worthy recommendations on tax reform. The government passed legislation on some of it and then found the rest too hard. The opposition is concerned that this is yet another opportunity the government are taking to have the parts of the measures which they propose which are supported by the opposition and others passed but then to say: ‘Hang on. We’ll bring some legislation in here to deal with these other problem, but you’ll have to wait and see that some time down the track. We’ll let you know what it is. Trust us.’ That does not cut much ice with the opposition, and that is the reason we are moving these amendments.

Let me say to Senator Fielding that the reason we have moved the amendment that he referred to is that the Treasurer has had the power to require the ACCC to conduct the sorts of inquiries that our amendment talks about, but he has chosen not to use it in the face of a number of circumstances in the community over the last four or five years where there have been serious concerns about the way petrol is priced. I am a member of a Senate committee inquiring into petrol prices. It is very interesting to see how prices zigzag in the various markets. It is very interesting to hear evidence about the impact of the major players on those markets. It is very interesting to talk to some of the witnesses who will say things when they are not on the record that they know they cannot afford to say when they are on the record because they have to maintain a commercial relationship with an oil company.

The best way to get behind that is to empower some organisation, such as the ACCC, to go behind these commercial arrangements and find out exactly what is going on and to report that to the public. Clearly, the Treasurer has squibbed the opportunity to use section 29(3) of the Trade Practices Act on numerous occasions. So we are going to hold the government to the mark. The reason we have moved this amendment is that the Treasurer has chosen not to exercise the power that he has had all of the time he has been Treasurer. He has had every opportunity to use this power and he has declined. I am really interested to know how the government defends the inaction of the Treasurer and how the government justifies, in the face of that inaction, that the parliament ought not to have the power that the Treasurer is clearly too frightened to exercise.