Lee Rhiannon (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

What a week! We have seen the government really deliver in spades, so to speak, to the mining industry. They are right out there, you would have to say—sycophantic, pandering. It is going to be tough, because, when you do not have such a revenue stream coming in, somebody has to pay. What we are seeing here is a very clear reason why the coalition has earnt its name as the party of the one per cent. The government is actually propping up a dying industry, particularly when it comes to the mining of coal and the use of coal. The world is starting to turn its back on this industry—and that is why, at this moment, when Australia does have these resources that are being mined, and sections of the world do want them, rather than repealing this tax, we should be strengthening it. That is something that the Greens have long worked for and that is what should be happening tonight—but we know in fact it is going in a very ugly direction.

We will lose this very rich revenue stream. It is very simple, what is going on here tonight. Mining companies make massive profits, huge amounts of money, out of digging up the resources of this country. Surely much more of that money should come back to Australia, because by far the bulk of the profits go overseas. And we are talking really big profits. Just take three of the big mining companies—BHP, Rio Tinto and Xstrata. They are on track for $30 billion in after-tax profits for one year. That is not unusual. That is what has been going on year in, year out. I certainly acknowledge they are not just the profits from digging up our mineral wealth—they come from around the world—but a lot of the profits come from Australia. And, like they are ripping off Australia, so many of these companies are ripping off other countries, particularly many of the low-income countries.

I think we also need to ask ourselves: when we lose this revenue stream, who will pay? It will be the disadvantaged, who are copping it as we have seen set out in the budget. People who have been really targeted in this budget include the sick, Indigenous people, the elderly, students and people who are unemployed. They are the people who will carry the burden. Also it will be working people, because the taxes, the money, will have to come from somewhere. We again need to remind ourselves that the mining tax could be and should be a rich revenue stream. That was what was originally envisaged by the Henry tax review. It could have brought in $35 billion in the original form, with some of the loopholes plugged. That is where we should be heading. That is what big business should be paying for.

I think it is worth reminding ourselves what that money could and should have been spent on. This is the Australia that I think most of us envisage. It is just that, unfortunately, the policies of this very conservative, neoliberal government cannot deliver it for us because of the mean, greedy way they operate. We should have dental care. It is an extraordinary aspect of our medical service that the health of our teeth is not covered in a free universal health scheme. We should have high-speed rail—something the Greens have worked on for so long, along with so many in the community—along the east coast. The jobs boom that that would bring is so exciting. But, if we do not have the revenue there, it is certainly off for a long time. There are issues to do with disability, with welfare, with public education. With regard to our higher education system, so much of Europe still has a free higher education system. This is not just light talk. This is not just something that is a dream of a past era. It is achievable. The revenue is there. We need a government with the political will to raise the money. Then there is the all-important area of overseas aid. We heard just yesterday that the government has come up with another way of taking money out of the overseas aid budget. Again, this is where we should be on track to get to 0.7 per cent of GDP, and we could be if the government had the political will to stick with and improve the mining tax.

I congratulate Senator Christine Milne and the Greens MP for Melbourne, Adam Bandt, who have consistently worked to strengthen this tax and save this important legislation. We have to acknowledge that this legislation has had an unfortunate history, with Labor watering it down from what was originally envisaged. That certainly was a setback. There has also been the problem with the loopholes. A deal was negotiated with the big miners, and they won hands down and the Commonwealth lost out. We lost out at a federal level in terms of funding, because every time the state premiers raised royalties it was a hit to Commonwealth revenue. The Greens worked, with a private member's bill, to try and tighten up those loopholes and eliminate them. Again, there were so many possibilities with this legislation, and this was a big setback.

We also need to remember that a part of this story that we are dealing with tonight is the power of the mining companies. That is why Labor went for a weaker form of the tax and the coalition have delivered in spades. The coalition and Labor have benefited. Considering the wealth of the mining industry, I do not think it is that much, but, since 1998, the political donations to the Labor, Liberal and National parties run at more than $11 million. That is the amount of political donations to those parties over the period of time since 1998. These companies probably think it is just a bit of petty cash for them, considering the profits they make and what they get back. But they have got a lot more than just this weakening of the tax. I am from New South Wales, and what I have seen, year in, year out, from successive state Labor and coalition governments is a weakening of laws and a level of corporate welfare to the mining industry that is really quite staggering.