George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Attorney-General) Share this | Hansard source

Senator Ludlam, if I may say so, your memory is too short. When I first sat in the Senate during the Howard government, it was not the case that budgets were very tight. In fact, in all but one of the budgets delivered by my former colleague Mr Peter Costello there was a very substantial surplus. I remember the late, great Matt Price making an observation about one of the last Costello budgets that budgets were like birthdays those days; the public so looked forward to them. In those happy days of the Howard government, when the economic affairs of the nation were conducted competently, there was a rolling surplus budget for more than a decade. But that is a political point, I unashamedly concede. Senator Ludlam, you need to get out more if you think that letter is the most extraordinary letter you have ever read. I get more extraordinary letters than that on a daily basis, I can promise you.

Being a little more serious, Senator Ludlam, because I am teasing you, I know, industry will have certainty—of course industry will have certainty—because, at the appropriate time, the government will announce the proportionate contribution that it will make. In his second reading speech on 30 October 2014, Mr Turnbull, in the other place, committed the government to making a substantial contribution to the capital costs. The determination of what the capital costs are will be informed, among other things, by the range estimated by the PwC report of between $188 and $319 million. The government will make a substantial contribution to an appropriate figure within that range.

What that substantial contribution will be has not yet been determined. It has not yet been determined, but I can tell you that it is close to being determined. That determination has been informed by long discussion with industry. It is, as you yourself have shrewdly observed, part of the budget process. The budget is being delivered on 12 May. It does not create uncertainty for industry merely to say to them: 'We will be announcing at a date in the near future the precise proportionate contribution that the government will be making to help meet the obligation provided for by proposed section 187KB.'

The TEMPORARY CHAIRMAN: The committee is considering Australian Greens amendment (20) on sheet 7669. The question is that the amendment be agreed to.