Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is a simple fact that it is not because of iron ore. We have only had income from iron ore in relatively recent years. It is not from much produced out of Tasmania, I can tell you, Senator Bilyk. And it is certainly not even from agriculture. Why is it that in a country the land mass of America, which has 300 million people whereas we have a population of 23 million people, we are so advantaged? The answer is two words: cheap energy. That is what has made this country the great country it is—cheap energy. That is because we are very rich in resources, originally coal but more latterly LNG, upon which we can generate cheap power. That is the advantage this country has for so long had. One has to ask the question: why is it that this Labor government wants to tax the very thing that has advantaged this country and given us such a high per capita income and such wealth? One need only have a look at the actions of the Indian and American companies when it was announced recently by the Prime Minister that the carbon tax was on the agenda: of course, they went straight in—Mittal Steel and their associates, Peabody—to make a bid for Macarthur Coal. Prime Minister Gillard came out and said it was a round endorsement by the Indians and the Americans of this decision by Australia on a carbon tax. What a lot of nonsense! It was simply the fact that Mittal and Peabody, two of the world's biggest steel manufacturers, saw the advantage of an Australian government that is now phasing out the use of coal in this country and therefore saw a capacity to grab hold of as much as possible of the best coking coal in the world for their own purposes. So here is the duplicity and hypocrisy of this decision, which actually says, 'We want to sanctimoniously try and reduce greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, but we're going to continue to sell coal to the rest of the world so that China, India, Indonesia and other countries can go on polluting at will'?

What are other countries doing? What decision has the United States of America taken as the leader of the free world? It is making a decision to not proceed at all. What are the Indians doing? The Indians' greatest concern at the moment, as a stimulation to their economic wellbeing, is to get more access to Australian and other coal. We have heard the Chinese say, 'Oh, yes, we're going to have a look at all this.' Of course they are going to have a long look at it. They are going to have a look at it whilst Australia stupidly reduces its competitiveness. These were the issues that came out in the select committee.

I move now to the first of the points made, and that, of course, is economic pain. Who will suffer the economic pain? Of course, everybody will. As said by Senator Joyce yesterday morning, every power point in every home and every business, everywhere across Australia, will become a tax collector for the government. What will happen to business? Of course, business will suffer badly, with increased electricity costs and power costs for anybody who requires foodstuffs to be chilled, frozen or held in a particular condition. We have seen evidence, for example, that business development and stimulation will stop. There was the evidence given recently by my colleague Mr Truss in the other place, talking about abattoirs in Australia being faced with the prospect of a quarter of a million dollars a year more in power costs—but only if they stay at their current levels of production. If they increase their production and put themselves into a higher category, the costs will be even greater.

Reflect on the companies here in Australia that produce in competition with importers. They will immediately be disadvantaged because the importer from another country will not be suffering the same carbon tax in their country; they will be landing the product here, in competition with our own local producers. Why was it that Manufacturing Australia came out in the last few days sounding a warning to the government to not move on this in the current uncertainty of the world economic climate? You cannot have it both ways. You cannot say that climate changes in Australia and we must do something uniquely here but leave the rest of the world to do nothing and then turn around and say, 'Yes, we understand that the economics of other activities in the world do impact on this country'—and, of course, as we know, they do. I then come to those companies in Australia that are themselves exporters. They, of course, will be the subject of greater competition as they try to put products into markets overseas where the local suppliers are not subject to this same tax.

On the question of transport, I was in Kalgoorlie only the other day; I was in the wheat belt of Western Australia and in the northern wheat belt of WA. In every one of those places, Mr Acting Deputy President Furner—you, being from Queensland, would understand this only too well—everybody is so fearful, because we all know the importance of the cost of transport for freight. We heard Senator Singh say to us the other day, 'Oh, all trucks under a limit of five tonnes won't be paying this carbon tax or the equivalent for fuel.' There are not too many trucks in Western Australia that deliver anything outside the metropolitan area at less than five tonnes. To put it into perspective for you, Western Australian roads are now moving 400 million tonnes of freight a year. That is the roads. That is not rail; that is the roads. Imagine the impact of this carbon tax on fuel in that circumstance.

I conclude with these questions. Who are the '500 big polluters'? Imagine using the word 'polluter'. I have been trying to find out. We are not told. I would like to ask the question: how many of them are actually among our 500 biggest employers? How many are among our 500 biggest investors—our investors in R&D or in exploration? How many of those 500 operate overseas, where they are welcome in other countries and are not blasted as being polluters but are very, very welcome companies? I congratulate the select committee on its findings.