Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the following matter be referred to the Economics Committee for inquiry and report by 17 June 2009:

(a)

the international experience of sovereign wealth funds and state-owned companies, their role in acquisitions of significant shareholdings of corporations, and the impact and outcomes of such acquisitions on business growth and competition; and

(b)

the Australian experience of foreign investment by sovereign wealth funds and state-owned companies in the context of Australia’s foreign investment arrangements.

It is a sad day indeed when a motion for an inquiry is denied formality for no reason other than what I believe is petulance. This had been discussed by the economics committee. The terms of reference were predominantly driven by the chair of that committee and the committee tried to take away any sense of parochialism. They defined a wider sweep of issues pertaining to the Foreign Investment Review Board. This is an issue that is at the front and centre of the Australian psyche at the moment, especially with the current acquisitions by such companies as Chinalco—fully owned by the People’s Republic of China. These issues definitely require immediate consideration. We have coming up a break of approximately six weeks. We have the time to take this issue to a committee. We have the reason to: the Foreign Investment Review Board is currently considering these matters, and we should be doing our very best to publicly hear all current information and to give all Australians a chance to ventilate their desires to a committee. Tomorrow I have to go to the CPA conference in Sydney, so it has to happen today. We cannot postpone it. That is the last day before the break. After the break we will have the budget. We need to give this issue the best possible chance of ventilation.

It is extremely important for the Australian people to have a chance to have their say on this issue. There is immense concern out there about why we would have a sovereign nation as the owner of a sovereign asset in our country. This is not about parochialism. It is just about clear effect—that is, the purchaser of our mineral resource will step towards the ownership of the mine. This has huge ramifications for vertical integration and for losing the capacity to determine a fair outcome for the price. Australia relies on the royalty revenue that comes from that price to sustain so much of the wealth of our nation. Even the building we sit in today is the result of the benefaction of that mineral wealth. Our nation will be in a very dangerous position if we start handing over to another nation the nexus to the connection that has been the benefactor to our nation. This inquiry needs to go forward. People are writing to our offices asking for the chance to put in petitions. They are writing to our offices in the form of emails. I believe throughout this chamber there is a sentiment of goodwill and a wish to give people the chance to clearly ventilate and discuss this issue. I am disturbed that Senator Bob Brown today disallowed formality. That is unusual. It sets an unusual precedent. Putting that aside, I hope this issue gets resolved. I hope we take it to a vote. I hope the motion is passed. I hope we have the capacity to give this issue due and proper process.

People from all sections have raised concerns. The AFIC have come out and said they have immense concerns about a purchaser being the owner of the resource and being a sovereign nation. Even Legal and General, one of Rio’s biggest shareholders, has concerns about this deal. There is a whole range of things but the Australian people are focusing on one issue. The issue is: a sovereign nation is now starting to purchase our sovereign wealth. That is a completely new scenario for us. If it were the Republic of Ireland I would have a big problem with it. If it were the United States of America I would have a problem with it. In fact, if our own government were purchasing the mines I would have a concern.

One other concern we have with the People’s Republic of China is our opportunity for recourse if things come unhinged. This becomes not a corporate issue but a diplomatic issue. The best way to get yourself out of a problem is to not put yourself in the problem to start off with. I have heard said by some, ‘The Foreign Investment Review Board process is going ahead; therefore we should wait until the conclusion of it.’ At the conclusion it will be too late. We cannot put Humpty Dumpty back together again if they say the word ‘yes’. That will be it. Then we really will have a problem on our hands. We have heard that the Foreign Investment Review Board generally just gives one answer and that that answer is ‘yes’. What Mr Costello said the other day was correct. He said that in fact it was the only recommendation he ever got. Rio in the past have put aside the conditions they gave up to Australia. Rio is now based in St James Square in London. So much for having an Australian base! The history of this company is not good. This is another step away, and it will have an effect on the major resource we export—that is, coal. Coal is our major resource and our major export earner, and one of the major owners of access to that resource is Rio Tinto.

Amongst this are other issues such as the technology associated with alumina refining. Bauxite is particular to the refinery. There is immense intellectual capital in the refinery. We have to be careful we do not lose that. We in Australia are now in a position where our wealth is at bargain-basement prices in some instances. China has been provident and has stored up its money. There is a lesson in that. It has money in the bank to basically go shopping—that is, to go shopping throughout our nation—and to pick the eyes out of our nation. This inquiry is immensely important because we are at a particular point in time and at a particular price in time. We are heading towards a recession. In some instances, maybe even the dynamics of the world and the dynamics of where power lies in the world may be shifting somewhat. We have to look at it in its full context. Maybe it is no longer the umbrella of a British empire and a British system. We might be seeing the waning of the US umbrella. We may be seeing the emergence of China as a major superpower. We have to work that into exactly how we are going to be positioned.

One of the problems that we have with China is recourse through their court system and the process that Australia would have to follow in that event. We want to make sure that we keep a good working relationship with China, and the best way to do that is to keep a bit of separation there. All these issues need to be ventilated. We know how busy this place becomes, but we have an opportunity now because we have a period of time in front of us with the recess, and we can put this committee to work then.

I put aside the discussions by some that you must allow the Foreign Investment Review Board to get to the finality of their decision. If that were the case, we would not have the Premier of Queensland, Anna Bligh, lobbying that the Rio deal go through. We would not have certain undisclosed sources from within the government saying that that deal should go through. We would not have people from China turning up and lobbying the government that that deal should go through. There is a process of lobbying and we have to be honest about it. We should be creating a mechanism so that at least we can give the Australian people the capacity to have a contrary view and also the capacity to mount their case in such a way as is heard by our nation’s parliament.

I welcome Senator Brown putting his name to this motion. I want to briefly go through its history. This issue was discussed in the Senate Standing Committee on Economics. It was agreed in the economics committee that a motion should go forward. Senator Hurley, Senator Bushby, Senator Eggleston, Senator Cameron, Senator Pratt and I sit on the economics committee. There was a discussion about the economics committee putting forward this motion. We agreed to it. I want the inquiry, so I basically left the running to the Labor Party to draw up its terms of reference. It is the Labor Party’s terms of reference that I have read out as the motion. The terms of the inquiry are not the issue. My concern is that people who are extraneous to that committee system come in and basically usurp the position that was well considered by an appropriate body within this parliament, the economics committee. We foreshadowed the motion yesterday and today we have moved it, but Senator Brown has disallowed it and I do not know why. No doubt Senator Brown will tell us.

I truly believe that the issue of sovereign wealth funds is more serious than one based purely on personality or on certain differences; this issue is about the sovereignty of our nation and where that lies, the possible ramifications of these funds into the future and the capacity of the Australian people to have their say in relation to them. It is not one that declares an outcome one way or the other. Obviously, I hold a certain strong view in a certain area, and I expect to find people who will put forward a contrary view and mount their case in a very vociferous way as to why they believe that a sovereign wealth fund should have ownership of an instrument that has given our nation the wealth that it still relies on to this day. But other people have different views, and this committee will provide them with the capacity to have those views heard.

I am a keynote speaker at a CPA conference tomorrow. I would feel that I was derelict in my duty as an individual who has the honour and the privilege of being in this Senate if something were to happen while I was not here and this inquiry were not to go forward. There are times in here when you have to take up the cudgels and do your best to prosecute an issue because you believe that is right. I welcome the support of my colleagues and I thank my National Party and Liberal Party colleagues who have given the committee the benefit of the doubt and are supporting this inquiry. That is extremely important, and I personally thank them.

I see from the terms of reference that obviously the Labor Party—because they are their terms of reference—support the inquiry. What I cannot work out is why we are having this debate. Formality has been denied—why? This issue will come to a vote. I implore Senator Fielding and Senator Xenophon, because they will be crucial in this, and I also implore the Labor Party to put any differences aside and get this thing underway because there are people out there who feel that they are not being heard. There are people out there who have serious concerns about this issue. Our job in this place always is to reflect their concerns. This matter did not just appear overnight. It has been planned through a specific process, through the Senate process and the committee process, and then it has been brought to this chamber. It has been going through this process on the basis of bipartisanship. I know that other extraneous factors are pulling the bipartisan nature of this motion asunder, and I feel that is wrong. But we cannot delay until tomorrow because tomorrow is too close to the end of this sitting. When we all come back to parliament after the recess, we will be talking about the budget and this thing could be swept under the carpet. We have to start influencing the process now and not be so naive as to think that we are not effective in influencing this process.

I acknowledge that there are individuals out there who are willing to put a lot of their money—not my money—towards ads. All I am is the mouthpiece in the ads. If it were not me, it could be Senator Brown or anybody else. The process is to try and get people informed, and that is a marvellous thing. Madam Acting Deputy President, do you know why we can do that? We can do that because we live in a democracy. We can put that ad on television because this is a democratic nation. All the liberties and privileges that we have are supported by the fact that we are a strong democratic nation. Our strength lies in the manner and type of our people, their resilience and their patriotism. It also lies in the fact that we are blessed with a mineral wealth that has given us the capacity, the opportunity, to create a structure that has maintained us as a very peaceful nation and, I believe, the premier nation of this earth.

That opportunity is backed up by the fact that we are a wealthy nation. The issue of wealth is always who actually owns it—where does that wealth lie? Our legacy to those who come after us must be that the wealth lies with the Australian people first and foremost. Other people have the right to come in to buy minerals, corporations have the right to mine, but we must be completely cognisant of all possible ramifications when the wealth goes from residing with the Australian people to becoming a sovereign asset of another nation. If it resides with another nation and matters come to dispute, we must be completely cognisant of and open and transparent about our recourse. What is the propensity for that and what is the history of other disputes of a similar nature with that nation? How were they resolved, what were the terms and conditions and what access does the Australian citizen have to appeal via a judicial process? Do we believe that the point that people arrive at this time is the final point? There are other things that are coming to the fore at the moment.

Unfortunately, as Australia borrows more and more money there is someone lending us more and more. We are becoming indebted more and more to other people outside our nation. With debt comes influence. A lot of our debt is owed to China. In recent times we have seen—and maybe rightly so—a certain change in the inflection of the relationship between China and the United States. They are saying, ‘Maybe things are different now because you owe us an immense amount of money.’ This is a clear clarion call of what happens when you have influence and how, in minutiae and then in a wider sense, you can create influence in another nation.

We will have a robust discussion today because that is the essence of our democracy. It is a wonderful thing. Although I might have differences with Senator Brown, I respect absolutely his right to stand up next and completely disavow some or all of the things I say—because it is our democratic right. But do not think for a moment that democracy extends from God or is an intrinsic right; it is not. There are so many nations in the world today where people do not have that right. To protect that right means more than just saying it; you actually have to be strong and have ownership of everything that enshrines that right. One of the things that enshrine that right is your wealth. Without wanting to belittle it, I remember a famous Scottish comedian who said, ‘I’ve been rich and miserable and poor and miserable, and I know which one I preferred.’

This proposed inquiry is far bigger than any of us. These are not my terms of reference. They are not, as one reporter said last night, a ‘Barnaby Joyce’ issue, because I did not write these terms of reference. I am absolutely aware of and support the fact that these are the Labor Party’s terms of reference. I am just moving this motion because I think it is a good thing for us to do. As you well know, you can bring into an inquiry what you deem fit—and that is the message that we will be selling to the people of Australia.

In closing, I implore Senator Brown to accept that this is not about me or anybody else; this is about getting back to the Australian people. Saying, ‘Barnaby, I’m annoyed with you; I don’t like you,’ or whatever is fair enough. I accept that—that is fine. But let us get this inquiry underway, because we cannot wait another day.