Jacqui Lambie (Tasmania, Palmer United Party) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Acting Deputy President, this is not my official first speech, which will be delivered at a time in the future when my family is present. However, in rising to speak I would firstly like to acknowledge and pay my respects to the traditional Indigenous owners of Australia and Tasmania both past and present. I would also like to acknowledge and pay my respects to the serving and former members of our military and their families for protecting us and sacrificing all to keep democracy and freedom alive in Australia. In recent times they have protected us from violent, murderous extremists and kept Australia sharia law free.

Before I speak directly to the carbon tax repeal legislation before the chamber, I seek your indulgence, Mr Acting Deputy President Bernardi, to note the sad passing of a great Tasmanian, His Excellency the Hon. Peter Underwood AC, the Governor of Tasmania. Apart from serving as Tasmania's 27th governor, I note His Excellency also served his nation and state magnificently as a judge of the Supreme Court in Tasmania and also as Chief Justice. His Excellency was involved in many community organisations and had a passion for the arts. On behalf of all Tasmanians, I send my sincere condolences to Mr Underwood's wife, Frances, and their family.

Mr Acting Deputy President, I thank you for your indulgence, and I now turn to the debate at hand and the package of government bills before the Australian federal parliament designed to remove the national carbon policy mechanism for Australia. The repeal of the Labor-Green carbon tax is vital for the future prosperity and economic survival of our nation and of my beautiful state of Tasmania. Palmer United members have met and resolved to support the repeal of the legislation that has imposed the job-killing Labor-Green carbon tax. In addition, an amendment that guarantees a power price decrease has been circulated by Queensland Palmer United senator, Glenn Lazarus. The simple legislative change, negotiated by Palmer United members and the government, will ensure that the carbon tax repeal savings will flow through to all ordinary Australians and not stay with the power companies.

Palmer United members will hold the Abbott government to account on behalf of our pensioners, families, workers and businesses and give them a legislative guarantee of lower electricity and power prices. Because of the Palmer United Party members in this place—as well as our good friend Victorian senator Ricky Muir and our friends in the motorists party—Australians will not have to rely on just a nod and a wink from our Prime Minister to receive up to an extra $500 a year. Because we have listened to ordinary Australians and finally given them a real voice in this parliament, they will have a guarantee in black and white that they will receive the money that is rightfully theirs.

Australians have been deceived by the Labor-Greens members of this place, who allowed their unfair carbon tax to be imposed on our nation while the rest of the world remained carbon tax free. Tasmanian pensioners, families, workers and businesses were told the fib that if they paid more for their energy and power then they could stop world climate change. This proposition is obviously wrong, ridiculous and absolutely absurd. Pensioners in my Burnie, who are freezing this winter because they cannot afford to turn on their heaters, are the victims of those in this chamber who support a carbon tax. Tasmanian workers who lost their jobs in manufacturing industries that could not afford record energy prices are the victims of those in this chamber who support a carbon tax. The Labor-Greens carbon tax has failed to deliver any global environmental benefits; however, it has caused the loss of tens of thousands of Australian jobs and in Tasmania we have record unemployment—unemployment that the Labor-Greens carbon tax has contributed to in a significant manner.

Every industrialised, advanced nation in the world knows that the only way that jobs will be guarded, sustainable new jobs created and standards of living protected is to ensure that world competitive, cheap, reliable energy is delivered to their businesses and their families. So at a time when our businesses are forced to pay up to three times more for their energy than their overseas competitors in America, the UK, Canada and Europe, I am proud—I am really proud—to be part of a political party which will take a small step in the right direction and vote for legislation that will lower the cost of energy for Tasmanian and Australian businesses and bring our nation more into line with our international competitors.

As part of the carbon tax repeal debate, the Palmer United Party will also, through Western Australian senator Dio Wang, move amendments to the Climate Change Authority (Abolition) Bill, which will establish the legislative framework for a future emissions trading scheme. This is an historic, practical and world-first climate change solution created by the Palmer United Party and its parliamentary leader, Clive Palmer, and endorsed by the former US Vice-President, Nobel Peace Prize winner and climate change warrior, Al Gore. Provisions of this ETS will only be made legal and come into effect once Australia's main trading partners like the US, China, South Korea and Japan establish similar legislative mechanisms and emissions trading schemes. This ensures that Australian jobs and businesses will not be placed in jeopardy, and that our energy prices have a chance of becoming world competitive, while the industrialised nations of our world collectively address the challenge of climate change.

The Palmer United's ETS amendment also provides the Australian business community with a practical economic plan to address world climate change. I urge all members of this place to vote in favour of the Palmer United ETS amendment. This will send a powerful signal, a message of unity, to the rest of the world and boost Australian business confidence at a time when confidence has taken a hit due to a poorly constructed and poorly sold Liberal-National Party Australian budget.

The Clean Energy (Income Tax Rates and Other Amendments) Bill 2013 [No. 2] is part of the package of bills before the Australian federal parliament designed to remove the national carbon pricing mechanism for Australia. The Palmer United Party will oppose this bill because this bill will stop the rise in the tax-free threshold for low-income Australian workers from $18,200 to $19,400. If the Prime Minister and the Liberal and National parties have their way and this particular bill passes this Senate chamber, effectively it will mean that a household with two workers will have $460 per year stolen from them by the government.

Palmer United Party members will not support government measures which take away from the poor while the government protects their wealthy, rich mates. We will not do that. $465 a year or $8.90 a week may not be a lot of money for Liberal and National Party politicians and their supporters, but for the people of my Tasmania—the sick, the elderly, the disabled—who are forced to rely on low incomes, $8.90 is the difference between eating properly, keeping your phone or electricity on or being able to afford pain medication or antibiotics to become well. Shame on any member of this place who votes to support this bill and cruel budget measure.

Strong legislative support for the repeal of the Labor-Greens carbon tax by Palmer United Party members also honours a commitment and a promise we made to the people of Australia. In voting with my fellow PUP senators to repeal the Labor-Greens carbon tax I will have kept my word. I will have honoured my promise to the people of my Tasmania. I will be able to look my father, my mother and my sons in the eyes and know that I have not let them down. I know that, by repealing the Labor-Greens carbon tax, my vote will ensure the full savings power companies receive under repeal are handed to everyday Australians—every last cent.

Noting our opposition to the Clean Energy (Income Tax Rates and Other Amendments) Bill 2013 [No. 2], I commend the remaining carbon tax repeal bills to the Senate along with the Palmer United Party's amendments. I know that this course of action will provide hope for my beautiful Tasmanian community, which is facing an extraordinary economic and social crisis after many decades of mismanagement and neglect by the Labor, Greens and Liberal parties.