Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Madam Acting Deputy President. These days the Greens jump up and down and pretend that they have some level of disagreement with the government on things, but ultimately they will just vote along. They even vote along for the gag. In the last two days I have things seen things that I thought I would never see. Senator Bob Brown yesterday voted for a gag which prevented him from explaining his new-found support for the gag. Senator Brown yesterday voted to gag debate so that the Senate could not require him to explain why he all of a sudden supported the gag. This morning the Greens voted against Senator Hanson-Young explaining herself to this chamber. As much as I think it is regrettable, I understand why people look at our chamber less these days.

But, Senator Xenophon, I have to say when it was you and Senator Fielding on the crossbench this was a much more interesting chamber, because in those days the Senate could make a decision on the merits of an argument. When the government came up with something that was demonstrably bad policy, the Senate would be able to stop the bad government in its tracks. These days, if a bad government comes up with bad policy, the Greens will try and make it worse. In the past a bad government would come up with bad policy and Senator Xenophon and then Senator Fielding tried to make it better; these days a bad government comes up with bad policy and the Greens will do everything they can to make it worse. Having said all of that, I do hope that the member for Lyne—and somebody who is watching could bring it to his attention—will reflect on the power that he has to deliver better government to Australia without imposing significant additional red tape on businesses. That is a significant power he holds and indeed he should reflect on it.

With the level of scrutiny and intrusion that would come about with a study by the Auditor-General of business practices, many small and medium sized businesses will choose not to do business with government agencies as a consequence. Therefore, only the biggest companies with the resources available to prepare for and comply with an Auditor-General investigation are likely to be prepared to tender for contracts under these circumstances.

We know that the Labor Party likes big business. The Labor Party does not like small or middle sized businesses; the Labor Party only likes big business. Remember the way it negotiated, exclusively and in secret, the design of the mining tax? It went behind closed doors with the three biggest taxpayers around Australia, the three biggest mining businesses, excluding hundreds of thousands of small and mid-tier mining companies from the process. Remember how this government designed the tax exclusively and in secret with BHP, Rio and Xstrata. It designed the mining tax in a way that would make it harder for all the smaller and mid-tier guys to compete with the big guys. So we know that the Labor government is a big business government.

Senator Mark Bishop interjecting—

Maybe the reason Senator Bishop thinks this legislation is a good idea is that it will make it easier for big business to contract with the government. It will get rid of this pesky competition from small and mid-tier businesses, who will just give up because there is so much red tape involved that there is not a buck to be made. So maybe Senator Bishop and the Labor Party think this might help big business because it will get rid of some pesky competition, but of course that is not in the public interest. It is not in the national interest. This legislation will very quickly provide a significant impediment to many businesses in continuing to seek government business. This will particularly disadvantage small to medium sized businesses in Australia, denying them the opportunity to compete for government business.

With a reduction in competition for government business and the audit compliance burden for all tenderers, this legislation will lead to greater costs in the provision of government services. And who will have to pay for that? If you add red tape and reduce competition, you increase the cost. So you increase government spending and you increase the deficit further. What do you think our current Treasurer is going to come up with as a solution? I do not know, but chances are he will come up with yet another tax to line up behind the 19 new or increased taxes that we have had from this Treasurer over the last four years. This is what we are looking at. This is a government that just cannot manage its finances. It is trying to pile on more and more costs. It is trying to make it more and more expensive to do business with the government, and who ultimately pays the cost of that? It is, of course, the Australian taxpayer. The Australian taxpayer comes last in the government's considerations. That is the track record that we have seen over the last four years.

Many of the businesses that do choose to continue to tender for government work would face the prospect of an Auditor-General inquiry sometime in the future, and it would be a real prospect when you look at the myriad programs that have wasted thousands of millions of dollars in the last four years under this government. The programs that these businesses were in good faith seeking to do work for could well end up being the subject of an Auditor-General inquiry, given the record of this government and its total incompetence in terms of wasting public moneys and mismanaging so many programs.

As a consequence, many of these contractors will build into the tender price the increased cost to cover the potential audit requirements. So this is going to go across all of the contracts. All of these businesses are going to think, 'There's a chance that we might have to deal with an audit by the national Auditor-General as part of our contracting with the government, so we'd better make sure we price that into our contract.' The cost goes up again, and not just across the high-risk areas but across the board. On so many fronts, this is simply an addition to the existing reporting requirements. Also, this type of post-event auditing would be trying to chase any potential waste of taxpayers' money after the event, so well after the horse has bolted.

The proposition from the coalition for an office of due diligence is the way to go. My coalition colleague Senator Ryan will be moving amendments to remove the ability of the Auditor-General to audit private contractors which we believe will create an extra layer of bureaucracy for small business and will stop them bidding for government contracts. We cannot support this bill without this change. Furthermore, we will seek to reverse the government's amendment in the House of Representatives. The government amendment means that government business enterprises can now only be audited by the Auditor-General if approved by the Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit, effectively giving the government a veto over any audit of a government business enterprise. This is a direct attack on the independence of the Auditor-General. It crosses the line on accepted principles of the separation of powers. Unless the coalition's very sensible amendments removing the audit powers over private contractors are passed, we will oppose this bill.

I will sum up. The reason the member for Lyne felt compelled to put this legislation forward is that he, like us and like people across Australia, has witnessed a bad, incompetent and wasteful government mismanaging the affairs of the nation over the last four years. Instead of reflecting on the fact that he is actually part of this government, that the failures of this government are also his failures, instead of reflecting on how he can ensure that Australians can benefit from better government into the future, his backdoor solution increases red tape and increases costs for businesses across Australia. That is not the way to go. He has gone for a solution that is actually not going to achieve a proper resolution without excessive additional costs to be carried by business and taxpayers across Australia.

I urge senators in the chamber not to support this bill unless the amendments to be moved by Senator Ryan are successfully carried, because the amendments to be moved by Senator Ryan will ensure that small and medium sized businesses will continue to tender for business with government, that we will have appropriate levels of competition in the tendering for government contracts and that costs are kept at the lowest possible level. You want to have appropriate competitive tensions when there is government tendering for various services and contracts. That is the way to do it. That is, of course, the way a coalition government would do it.

It is time to ensure that we have better government. It is time to ensure that the waste and the mismanagement is stopped. It is time to ensure that taxpayers get value for money. But this legislation in its current form is not the way to do it. So I would very strongly urge all senators to vote against this bill unless the amendments that are going to be moved by Senator Ryan on behalf of the coalition are successfully carried.