Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Education) Share this | Hansard source

There may well already have been a briefing. I am not privy to any of this information. But I think it is important that the question is asked. If, all of a sudden, the Greens have become more important to the Prime Minister than her own backbench, then I am sure that her very own backbench would be rather upset. They would be rather upset to think that Bob Brown and his nine—10 all up, out of 226 members of parlia­ment—would get a briefing from the Prime Minister on something this important before the Labor backbench did. But who knows? Maybe somebody can clarify that for us throughout the course of the debate.

This carbon tax is something the Austra­lian people are going to have to deal with as one of the biggest issues this country has seen in a very, very long time. I am so concerned about the impact of this. I do not think I have ever been more concerned about the potential impact of a piece of legislation. And, Senator Furner, it is not scaremonger­ing. This is not scaremongering. We are not hysterical. We are out there every day trying to explain to the Australian people what the impacts and the ramifications of having a carbon tax in this country are going to be. They are going to be devastating on the cost of living, of food and of some aspects of fuel—goodness knows what we are going to hear on Sunday.

I put the government on notice: if you even try to touch the diesel fuel rebate—if you even try to touch the arrangements for off-road vehicles—a storm will come down on your head, the likes of which you have never seen. That excise is not paid because vehicles are off-road vehicles; that excise goes to road users because they use the roads. There is a very good reason that those off-road vehicles do not pay that excise. I say to the Prime Minister right now: do not even think about changing those arrangements, or the wrath of regional Australia will land on your doorstep.

It is not just that. There are so many areas where there will be an impact, and the impact on farmers and regional communities is going to be the greatest. Even Ross Garnaut said in his report that farmers, more than most other Australians, will face higher fuel and transport costs under the proposed tax. Certainly fuel might have been removed from the scheme for some users—who would know? We will find out on Monday. But I bet you pounds to peanuts it will still be on transport, which is a key component for regional communities. That is why this carbon tax will be so much worse for regional Australia—because of transport, because of the tyranny of distance. It costs more to get everything to the regions than it does to deliver it into a city area. That puts costs on everything, right across the board.

The extraordinary thing is that at the end of the day, in spite of all the bleating from the government on the other side of the chamber, it does not matter whether you believe man is contributing to global warm­ing or not. This carbon tax is not going to make the slightest bit of difference to the climate. That is something that we on this side of the chamber understand and that those out there in the community are starting to understand. They realise that we are going to put thousands of jobs at risk. We know that industry is going to move offshore. We know that the anticompetitive nature of bringing this carbon tax in is going to be huge. We know the impact it is going to have on our businesses.

I am particularly concerned as a regional, Nationals senator about the effect this is going to have on our farmers and our regional communities, because the effect it will have on farmers will flow right through those communities. Everybody out there knows that when the agricultural sector is not doing well it flows right through, down our main streets, to the newsagents, the clothes shops, the service stations on the corner, the teachers, the schools, policing, the numbers in schools—everything. It flows right through.

We have the NFF saying that if fuel used in agricultural production is included then the tax will slug beef producers with an extra $7,000 in costs every year and that cotton-farming families are going to face a five per cent cut to their farm income. It goes on and on and on. And for what? We are going to have a seismic shift in our economy that is going to hit families, carers, individuals, hip pockets right across the country. This government will stand up and say, 'No, it's not going to do that, because we are going to compensate.' What a load of rubbish.

Those emitters are going to pass those costs on, and when we move to an emissions trading scheme—which this government says we will—the price will fluctuate. Is the Prime Minister going to compensate people when that price is fluctuating day by day? Who knows where it is going to end up? It will be pushed by traders. It might get to the $100 a tonne that Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young would like to see, and that is not good enough. The Australian people deserve better. They deserve to have a say on this carbon tax. They deserve the opportunity to have their voice heard on this very important issue.