Sue Lines (WA, Deputy-President) Share this | Hansard source

I'm pleased to follow Senator Hume, because we can put some facts on the table. The MPI today from Senator Bernardi urges the Australian government or the Australian people to follow in the wake of Mr Donald Trump, the President of the United States, in terms of tax cuts.

I can't imagine that Senator Bernardi really believes this, because what we've seen in the US is that a significant number of top US companies are using those tax cuts to restructure their businesses and sack workers. Let's put a truth on the table—no rhetoric, no fluff, no spin: a truth. The company Kimberley-Clark, who make the tissues and the nappies, are using their tax savings—gleefully triumphed by those opposite—to restructure their business to sack workers and cut a staggering 5,000 to 5½ thousand jobs. That's what Kimberley-Clark are doing with their tax money. They're not the only ones. Walmart is also in the business of using its tax cuts to sack workers. When Senator Bernardi put this proposition to the Senate, surely he did not mean we should emulate those US companies and start to sack Australian workers with a tax cut? But he's not here to defend himself, so I don't know. Maybe he missed this. It's been in the media for the last couple of weeks that US companies are using the tax cut to sack workers. I don't know how he missed it; certainly I didn't. Those are the facts there; that's what is happening in the US.

Today we found out that just nine per cent of top US companies are actually using those tax cuts to share with workers and customers. We are always hearing from the government that somehow trickle-down economics still works. But the trickle-down ends in the boss's pocket. That's where it ends; it trickles down to the boss's pockets. Never have we seen any trickle-down ending up benefiting workers. Never in my 20-odd years as a union official did I ever see that. Every wage increase won by the workers of United Voice was hard fought by them. In the days of enterprise bargaining, they traded off to get wage increases.

Let's have a look at what's happening here in Australia. One of the things Labor has consistently raised, over and over again, is: let's go after the companies who are not paying tax. Before we give hard-earned dollars to the big end of town, let's see which companies are not paying tax. Well, 732 companies who last year had a collective income of over $500 billion paid no tax at all in Australia. How shameful. What we see from the Turnbull government is this banging on about, 'We need to give tax cuts to big business.' Actually, what we need to do is make sure that the 732 companies who paid not one cent in tax last year in Australia start paying their fair share.

All of us in this place who are PAYE taxpayers—the same as Australian workers—are paying our fair share of tax. I don't have a problem with paying tax, because I know that it goes to our hospitals, to our schools, to Medicare and to a whole range of government services that I value. I see that it is the role of government to provide these services. But it annoys me—it beyond annoys me—when 732 companies who operate in this country, who made $500 billion last year in income, paid not one cent of tax.

I want to go back to Glencore. As I said earlier in this place, I was really shocked and very disappointed to see a senior member of the government attack workers in the gallery yesterday. All those workers did was vote against their enterprise agreement, and their company, Glencore, locked them out. They've been locked out for more than 200 days. That has set a record in Australia. Let's have a look at Glencore. They declared $18.3 billion in income—$18.3 billion—and here they are arguing with their workers, locking them out for more than 200 days. How much tax have they paid? Not one cent. So, they've locked out their workforce, they've paid not one cent in tax and yet they've earnt $18.3 billion. Yesterday a senior member of the government attacked two workers in the gallery. I'm happy to stand corrected but as yet I have not seen an apology from that man who attacked workers. What a disgrace. But we shouldn't be surprised, because that's what the Turnbull government excels at: attacking workers, attacking unions. But yesterday was a new low—they went right down to workers.

Thankfully, the ATO is after Glencore. To put more facts on the table: the 732 companies that I'm talking about paid no tax in Australia and, in the 2015-16 financial year, their collective income was more than $500 billion. That's not some made-up, left-wing jargon. That's not some airy-fairy figure plucked out of nowhere. That's in the dataset on corporate tax released by the Australian tax office. That tax evasion by companies like Glencore and Chevron is on the public record for anyone to see. But, rather than look there, the Turnbull government, who we know always looks after its mates at the big end of town, is simply saying, 'No, we'll give you a tax cut.' Well, these companies don't need a tax cut; they need to pay their fair share. If they were fair dinkum Australian-managed companies, they would pay their fair share, because Australians still believe in a fair share. I think the ATO went after Chevron for two or three years, and they owed millions of dollars. Now it seems that they've been caught out, but not before a showdown, not before the ATO had to invest millions of dollars in pursuing Chevron simply to pay what it should be paying in this country—its fair share.

People are talking about tax cuts and the Prime Minister is going on about how trickle-down economics works, when it doesn't, but we've got record low wage growth in this country that all manner of experts are worried about. It's no longer an issue just for trade unions; we've got business leaders in this country saying, 'In order to get our economy moving, we need workers to earn money.' We don't need them being locked out by Glencore, who paid no tax, or having to bargain for 12 months or more to get a one or two per cent increase. They should have a fair share put into their pockets. But companies never do that willingly. They need governments to take the lead. We need the Turnbull government to start to take the lead and talk the sort of language that companies need to hear—that is: when you're making profits, you share with the people who made the profits for you.

The managing director or CEO of a company getting millions of dollars a year in income is not the one making the money for that company; it's the workers putting in the hard yards. That's who's making the profits for those companies, and it is time those profits were shared. I don't begrudge anyone making a lot of money—good on them—as long as they're paying their fair share, as long as they're paying what they should be and not having a free ride on the backs of workers, because that is not fair. BlueScope Steel—there's another one; Sydney Airport—another one; Toll Holdings; and Transurban are all companies we hear a lot about and that most Australians would have heard about at one time or another that are not paying proper tax in this country. It is time for the government to focus on tax avoidance and getting big companies to pay their fair share. Big companies who've made $500 billion in profits need to start paying what they owe. They're the facts on the table. Never mind a tax cut for the big end of town; let's get these companies paying their fair share so that we can put it into services, and workers can start to get a fair share of it, not the one or two per cent wage increases that are being doled out—and workers should not be locked out by a company such as Glencore that's paid not a cent of tax in this country.