John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I have to put some things on the record. Senator Cameron was talking about truth, integrity et cetera. Just recently we had a state election in New South Wales. There was a big board that said: 'Vote Nationals, get coal-seam gas. Authorised by Senator Doug Cameron.' It is amazing in that northern coastal area of New South Wales with the controversy over coal-seam gas. It was the previous Labor government of New South Wales that approved all the exploration licences. Every one of them was approved by the Labor Party. Mr Ian Macdonald—not the good Senator Ian Macdonald—is of course well known for his ICAC investigation, along with his colleague Mr Eddie Obeid. Perhaps Senator Dastiari might be able to fill us in a bit on them. But we were talking about integrity and honesty, and there were placards, posters, saying: 'Vote Nationals, get coal-seam gas', all approved by the Labor Party of New South Wales; none by the coalition. We talk about honesty and integrity.

Let's talk about growth. Those opposite in the Labor Party are saying that growth was 3.5 per cent for the March quarter of 2014. That is true: 3.5 per cent; it was a good year. Let's go back to March of the year before and go through the quarters of growth. For the June quarter of 2013, it was 0.6 per cent. Labor was in government. Senator Fierravanti-Wells, you will note that in the September quarter it was just 0.6 per cent. Who was in government? Labor. Then came the December quarter—and in September there was a change of government—and growth went to 0.8 per cent. Who was in government then when growth rose? Then we get to the March quarter of 2014—1.1 per cent. The figure of 3.5 per cent was a good figure. It was just 1.2 per cent when Labor was in government and almost 2 per cent in the six months of the Abbott-Truss government. So, if Senator Bullock wants to ask questions about growth, employment et cetera, he should look through the details and give us the facts, not just the blurry summary of what he thinks. It is amazing.

There was some good news today. Mr Shorten, the opposition leader, is going to back our changes to the indexation of the fuel excise. The money will go into roads. That is good news for people like us who have dirt roads in front of our front gate. I wonder if any of those on the opposite side, when they go out the front gate of their house, have a dirt road to drive on. Probably not. Incredibly—Senator Fierravanti-Wells, you might be interested to hear this—they are going to put this money back into the Roads to Recovery program, a great coalition program where money is directed to councils to do local roads. But when the land transport bill came to the House of Representatives, the Roads to Recovery program bill, Labor voted against it. They did not want the Roads to Recovery program. They said, 'We'll vote this down.' Of course, if the Senate had not changed over, if the Greens and Labor had stuck together, we would have lost the Roads to Recovery program. The member for Richmond, Justine Elliot, was so grateful when the Roads to Recovery program went through here, but she voted against it in the other place.

Labor is now saying, 'Yes, we'll back the indexation of fuel.' So they should. We need our roads fixed. Let's look at the history of fuel excise with the Labor Party. When Mr Bob Hawke won government in 1983, there was just 6.4c a litre excise on a litre of fuel. Thirteen years later, when the Hawke government was thrown out and it was the Keating government at the time, it had climbed to a massive 34c cents a litre. From 6.4c a litre to 34c a litre—that is how your fuel tax is under Labor. It then grew from 34c to 38c—

Senator Urquhart interjecting—

Hear me out. You will be interested to hear this.