Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Hansard source

I'm not kidding. The departmental officials said—I'm assuming based on the instruction, though, of the Labor government—'It is not necessary.' On behalf of all Australians, who just want to see proper process from this government, who want transparency and integrity, that is an absolute disgrace.

What is worse is that energy experts are also telling the government to unlock further supplies of gas, but, as we know today, the one word that has been missing in the argument in terms of gas is 'supply'. You need to unlock further supplies of gas. That's what the energy experts are telling this government, but all we've seen and what we're going to witness is a dodgy deal done with the Australian Greens to prevent the NRF from actually assisting in that matter. You have the energy experts of Australia, who actually want to help Australians, wanting to get more gas into the market because, as we know, getting more gas into the market will actually put downward pressure on prices. That is what the energy experts want. Instead, the left-wing government and the even further left Australian Greens have done a dodgy deal to prevent the NRF assisting in that matter. You have a minister that talks big about value add onshore but, as soon as he goes and sits down at his desk, he just sells out. The desperate, dodgy deal with the Australian Greens is proof of that. The minister is selling out Australian manufacturers—and I say shame on you—to save his pride, and he is now recklessly pushing this bill through the Australian Senate.

What this bill demonstrates not just to the Australian people but in particular to Australian manufacturers is that the Labor Party will always talk the talk. They did a lot of talking before the May 2022 election. I don't have time, unfortunately, to go through the number of now-broken promises. But I do have to mention the fact that even yesterday, in the Australian Senate, Minister Farrell, representing the Prime Minister of this country, was asked a very simple question: 'Can you actually say the words "two hundred and seventy-five"?' He was asked, 'Can you actually read out the highlighted part of your policy that refers to your promise prior to the election to reduce Australians' energy bills by $275?' and he couldn't even do that. So they can talk the talk on supporting Australian manufacturers but, when looking to implement policy, they cannot walk the walk. In fact, the policy they look to implement is going to have a detrimental impact on manufacturers and, ultimately, Australians.

The government continue to refuse to rise to the occasion and address the key economic challenges which are holding industry back. This sort of government spending does nothing to improve the situation. In fact, any financial support that is ultimately provided will end up being whittled away by the increased costs that are put on industry. Money goes into one pocket, but the bad news is that it just gets transferred through and falls out the other pocket. It's very simple, and manufacturers in Australia will tell you: input costs affect the bottom line. I think anybody would know that. Quite frankly, I think someone doing Economics 101 would understand that. And the price of energy is the first among those input costs for many of our manufacturers. When I go around the country, as I know my colleagues do, at every single meeting I have with businesses they talk about the rising costs of energy as a concern.

All of these underlying issues make it even more unbelievable that the government would sell out our resources industry. In a recent survey conducted by the Ai Group, 83 per cent of survey respondents said they were experiencing rising energy prices. Solaris Paper, a company that has been manufacturing in Australia since the 1950s, including a product people will be very familiar with, Sorbent toilet paper, are facing—wait for this—a tripling of their gas bill. That is an input cost. It means money goes in and then, unfortunately, it comes out reduced at the other end. Sorbent toilet paper: a triple gas bill!

Advance Bricks have announced that, after 82 years in business, they will let their brick oven go cold. You have to be kidding me! After 82 years of being in business, because of the actions of the Albanese Labor government, they are going to let their brick oven go cold. You've got to ask why, Madam Acting Deputy President. Why would you make such a decision after 82 years? It's because, overnight, they have gone from paying $6 for a gigajoule of gas to paying more than $37 a gigajoule. In going from $6 to $37, the only decision you can make, after 82 years, is to let your brick oven go cold. That is an absolute disgrace! What this bill is now saying to all those manufacturers out there is: there is no hope for you, and in particular there is no hope for you when you are a second-generation family business like Advance Bricks.

So many of our manufacturers rely on gas, yet what we have is the Albanese Labor government demonising the gas suppliers. When you demonise the gas suppliers, you don't get additional supply into the market; it does nothing but drive prices up. The Minister for Industry and Science seems to think that he can shirtfront gas companies into submission and, as a result, prices will drop. Then we have the Minister for Resources running around saying exactly the opposite. It is actually getting very confusing for the companies out there, and it's not just confusing in Australia. That confusion has a flow-on effect to global decisions that are being made. We don't operate in isolation. We might be an island and we might like to think we operate in isolation—seriously, those on the other side seem to think we operate in isolation—but we don't. The decisions made in this country can ultimately have a flow-on effect globally.

I have to say, though, it's unsurprising that this dodgy deal passed the parliament while the resources minister was overseas in India, because the resources minister has one view and the minister for industry has another view. What that type of contradiction between government ministers does for those who are impacted by this policy is create uncertainty for industry. This government doesn't seem to understand that uncertainty for industry is bad. Quite frankly, I think people are becoming quite used to that, because almost everything this government does pits our manufacturers against succeeding. Whether it be the safeguard mechanism, their industrial relations policy or their failure to properly manage the economy, they are letting the manufacturers of this great nation down in a woeful and quite frankly inexcusable way. And, as I said, this bill actually does nothing for them. It does nothing to address what the manufacturers are telling the government they need from them.

The government frame this bill as being a blue-collar bill, but it's actually not that. Small and medium manufacturers do not want loans or equity from government. They want lower input costs, access to workers and a fix to our disrupted supply chain. That's what they're telling the government. The reality is that the Labor Party, in so many ways, misled the Australian people—that is now becoming very obvious—prior to the last election by saying they would reduce people's energy prices. If they listened to our manufacturers, they would know that these are the issues manufacturers demand action on, instead of arrogantly bringing a bill to the Australian parliament in which they are hellbent on telling manufacturers what they believe they need. Look at what, say, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry said: 'It would be a particularly damaging, given the already serious global risks and uncertainty.' Again, this government does not listen. It does not listen. The time it takes to establish the NRF will cumulatively cost our manufacturers some two years before they start seeing any government support for their work.

The government has modelled the National Reconstruction Fund on the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, known as the CEFC. After that legislation passed the parliament in August 2012, the first investment was made in June 2013, some 10 months later. The government claims that this legislation will get Australian manufacturing moving again. Again, based on past form, we can tell you that is not going to be the case. It will not do anything this financial year, it probably won't even do anything next financial year, and it certainly does not address those issues which manufacturers are telling those opposite they urgently need addressed now. That is why the government has yet to commit to a time line. This is lost time for our manufacturers, for prospective workers and for our economy, and it dampens prospects for investment. But, of course, what the government were quick to do was dismantle the policies they were working on under the coalition's Modern Manufacturing strategy. In fact, they were so spitefully partisan when they took an axe to those successful programs, and they've held many projects in limbo. That is, quite frankly, an absolute disgrace.

We obviously have stated that we will be moving a number of amendments to this bill. They will seek to increase the woeful lack of transparency and accountability in this bill. They will provide certainty to industries, which this government is seeking to just leave behind. We will obviously move an amendment to seek to remove from this bill the government's dodgy deal with the Greens. Why would we be doing that? Because the Greens amendment, which the government is agreeing to, is going to have serious consequences for the economy, it demonises the resources and forestry sectors, and it is an absolute disgrace. If the government supports this, quite frankly, anyone in the resources and forestry sector in Australia should not vote for this government at the next election. On that basis, again, we are not supporting this bill. This is bad policy.