Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It feels a little like deja vu, I must say. Only a couple of weeks after I stood in this place speaking to this legislation—legislation that the Senate duly voted down at that time—and, remarkably, here we are again. There was Senator Bushby again making a passionate speech against the passage of this legislation, joined by Senator Abetz, Senator Eggleston and others, who made very strong contributions as to why this tax impost should not be passed through the Senate. It is remarkable that, after the Senate exercised its democratic will just a few weeks ago, here we find the government wasting the time of the Senate by putting us through the very same debate yet again. Coming into this place, one has to ask whether it is a contempt of the Senate, a misjudgement by the government of its legislative program or indeed quite possibly a combination of both.

The government spent much time when it was on this side lecturing and hectoring about the Senate and the way that the former government handled the processes in the Senate. They argued that we showed some sort of contempt. There is nothing more contemptuous than bringing legislation in, putting it to a vote, having it voted down and then turning around and saying, ‘We’ve got nothing more important to do, so we’re going to put it straight back on the table again.’ That shows great contempt for the views of those Liberal, National and Family First senators who chose to vote against this and who had a clear view that this tax hike should not be passed. It is certainly contemptuous.

One also has to wonder whether it is a case of total mismanagement by the government of their legislative program. This time around they have cobbled together a whole raft of amendments to the legislation. They have put together a bit of an amendment to try to pacify this person and a bit of an amendment to try to pacify another person, to get a majority together in this place.

Quite clearly, what that shows is that the government did not do the necessary legwork the first time around. The government seems to have forgotten what the Senate is truly like. For all that the government is complaining about the role that the Liberal and National parties had when they had a majority in this place, the government seems to have totally forgotten what it is like managing a Senate where nobody has a majority. They seem to have totally forgotten that there is a need—not just a need but indeed a responsibility—to consult, to listen and to talk to senators in this place. They seem to have totally forgotten that there is a need to talk to the opposition about changes that we might accept to pass legislation, or to talk to the crossbench about changes they might accept to pass legislation. There is a need to work cooperatively.

Many uphold that that is the strength of the Senate. It is certainly what many people have praised about the new Senate structure. Whilst of course I would rather the Liberal and National parties still had a majority, I accept that there are some pluses perhaps for the country in the Senate having that strange balance of power situation. In doing so, I recognise that there is then a need for cooperation and conciliation between the parties sitting in here. It is amazing that the government fails so miserably to work to achieve that cooperation between the crossbench and the parties to put its legislation through. If it believes that its amendments that are being proposed this time around are acceptable just a couple of weeks later, you really do have to wonder why it could not manage the legislative program well enough a couple of weeks ago to get these amendments on the table and to get the result that it was seeking. Quite clearly, it is contemptuous. It is mismanagement. It is both.

We do have some amendments thrown on the table that obviously the government hopes will see the passage of this legislation this time around—a couple of weeks later. They have thrown a bone here and a bone there. They have put some amendments forward in the name of the government that I assume are amendments meant to pacify the Greens. They have thrown them a bone. There are some amendments put forward by Senator Fielding that may or may not have been developed in cooperation or conjunction with the government, so there is potentially a bone there. But when you look at the detail of these amendments, the important thing is that there is no meat on the bones. They have thrown these bones out but they are well chewed before they got to them. There is no meat on the bones of these amendments. In fact they do very little to improve the substance of the legislation that is before us.

The government-Greens proposal tries to provide some exemptions from this tax hike on fuel-efficient cars, but it sets a dollar cap on that. You can only have fuel-efficient cars up to $75,000 in value. That is your limit of fuel efficiency, then the tax hike kicks in again. As I have said in this place before when speaking about the solar rebate program, carbon emissions do not understand means testing. Carbon emissions are not means tested. They do not have threshold caps set to them. Indeed, in this instance, if the government is serious about supporting fuel-efficient vehicles and their place in the economy, and if the Australian Greens are serious about supporting fuel-efficient vehicles and their place in the economy, then they will provide an exemption from the luxury car tax increase for those fuel-efficient vehicles. They will make sure that it covers all potential vehicles on the market.

As Senator Bushby was saying before, much of the innovation that occurs in the automotive sector occurs in those vehicles at higher prices. Innovation is what we want to see in the automotive sector to get more fuel-efficient vehicles on the road—increasingly fuel-efficient vehicles on the road. To get that innovation we need to be incentivising it in all price brackets not just have a cop-out amendment that is designed to say, ‘Well, we have done something for fuel-efficient vehicles.’ Those at the cutting edge of development, those that will be the most efficient vehicles, the ones that provide the technology we rely on into the future, are not included in any exemption. They still get the full tax hike because this really is just about playing politics to claim to have done something to support fuel-efficient vehicles.

So there is the Greens-government proposed amendment, the bone that was thrown there. There is no meat on the bone there. It is a token amendment that ticks a box to say that they have done something for efficiency but in reality it does nothing at all that will provide long-term benefits for the development of fuel-efficient vehicles in the Australian economy.

Then we turn to Senator Fielding’s amendments, which we can only assume the government has either given a nod and a wink to or played some role in the development thereof. Senator Fielding’s amendments attempt to provide some exemptions to the increase for primary producers and for tourism operators. They are very worthy aims. They are aims I spoke about when speaking on this legislation a couple of weeks ago. I spoke about fuel-efficient vehicles. I spoke about primary producers and tourism operators, so I agree with all three of the aims of these amendments. It is not the objective that is the problem here from the Greens amendments or Senator Fielding’s amendments. It is the substance that is sorely lacking.

In regards to Senator Fielding’s amendments, there are numerous holes, I am sad to say. We look at primary producers—and that is just it: it covers only primary producers. It covers only those in primary production businesses. There are plenty of people in rural and regional Australia who rely on having a four-wheel drive or all-wheel drive vehicle to get around—to undertake their business or to take their children to school safely, or to get to and from the hospital or the town, or to do their shopping or anything else of that sort. There are plenty of people in rural and regional Australia who rely on such vehicles who are not in primary production businesses. Lots of Australians would be cut out. This is an extraordinarily narrow definition if you are going to protect the interests of rural and regional Australia from this tax hike. Have no doubt about it, a large number of the vehicles that are hit by this tax hike are sold into rural and regional Australia. Proportionately, rural communities are some of the communities most hit by this $555 million tax slug. So we think about those people and communities who may not be in the primary production business.

We can see that there are many people going about other forms of business in rural communities, such as postal contractors, who actually need to get into remote areas. There is no exemption for them because theirs is not a primary production business. There are fencing contractors who need to get into primary production areas, rural areas and agricultural areas. There is no exemption for fencing contractors who may need to access these types of vehicles. They all get hit by this tax slug, even with Senator Fielding’s amendment. It is a well-intentioned amendment but, unfortunately, an amendment that just creates further inequities in the system. If we are going to fix this legislation, it needs to be in a far more comprehensive way than isolating primary production businesses so that people directly on farms earning on-farm income may get an exemption but everyone else in regional Australia misses out. There is nothing equitable about that—far from it.

On the tourism side of the ledger, Senator Fielding’s amendment attempts to exempt tourism operators. As I said, that is another wise and reasonable objective. I have had many representations from the tourism industry on this matter. I was at a function for the Australian Regional Tourism Network in the Barossa Valley only last week. It was their annual conference, where tourism operators from regional areas right around Australia gathered together and talked about their industry and some of the challenges they face at present. There are many challenges that the tourism industry faces at this present time. There are challenges relating to the increase in oil prices and transport costs for both the air sector and on-ground transport. There are challenges imposed by the government not only with this tax slug in the budget but also with the increase in the passenger movement charge—the ‘tax on tourists’, as it is.

The tourism industry is feeling some angst and in—as Senator Conroy reminds us constantly—these uncertain global economic times we know that discretionary expenditure on things such as tourism will be one of the first things to be hit. The tourism industry is worried and regional tourism operators are very worried. They made known to me, quite clearly, their concerns and their views that this tax measure has unfairly hit them.

Senator Fielding has quite wisely and rightly attempted to draft an amendment to cater for those tourism operators, but again, unfortunately, it does not go far enough. His amendment only covers four-wheel drive or all-wheel drive vehicles. That is fine for those tourism operators in areas of my home state like Kangaroo Island, the Flinders Ranges or outback South Australia—some of whom may be based near Senator Williams’s hometown of Jamestown, well on the way to the Flinders. There are some beautiful parts of SA there. Those operators may well be providing services in four-wheel drives, but that is only a small part of the tourism industry. Left out of that are the hire car operators who operate throughout cities and tourism operators who provide tours in wine districts.

In my home state of South Australia, tours to wine districts are a critical part of the tourism industry, but they are not done in four-wheel drives. They are done in quality vehicles—luxury vehicles, as some may say. Of course, people paying for a tourism experience, travelling around wine districts and contributing to regional tourism, expect a good experience. They do not expect to be picked up in a second-hand car, but they also do not expect to be picked up in a four-wheel-drive.

That is the problem with Senator Fielding’s amendment: it excludes, once again in the tourism sector, a whole raft of tourism operators, creating great inequity. Indeed, if anything, it potentially runs the risk that tourism operators operating other businesses will be drawn towards four-wheel drive or all-wheel drive vehicles as the solution, because with the way it is structured there is nothing to say that you have to be in a regional area to get that exemption—you just have to be a tourism operator. We may well have the hire car industry suddenly switching over to four-wheel drives, which is hardly a sensible outcome from this legislation. It is hardly a good thing for the tourism industry, the environment or our roads. Unfortunately, well intentioned as they are, the amendments of the Greens and of Senator Fielding leave many inequalities and inequities in this legislation.

It is not just those sectors, though, where there is inequality. There are others who have been totally overlooked by these amendments. There are others who will still be hit by this tax. There are large families, whom many have spoken about before in this place, who need a large vehicle to get all of the children around. They are hit by this tax. Families may need a specialised vehicle because they have a disabled child—they will be hit. Then we have those who for recreational purposes may need a four-wheel drive but are not primary producers and do not even live in regional areas. Many recreational fishers or indeed commercial fishers need four-wheel drives to be able to tow their fishing boats. Many in the recreational horse industry need four-wheel drives to be able to legally tow their horses, as do many in the commercial horse industry.

There are many practical implications here; there are many others who will be damaged, hurt, by this $555 million tax slug that the government has proposed. It is just not good enough for the government to say that these people should wear it and cop the tax. It is just not good enough for the Greens or Senator Fielding to say that the proposed amendments will do enough to cover these people. They will not. There will be thousands of hardworking Australians still forced to pay an unnecessary tax slug because of this measure.

As has been spoken of in this place before and as I emphasised in my address a couple of weeks ago, it is also a terrible decision for, and a terrible hit on, the Australian car industry. In my home state of South Australia we have already been hit, as Senator Carr would well know, with the loss of Mitsubishi from the manufacturing sector. We see Holden—