Andrew Bragg (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to make some statements about the National Reconstruction Fund Corporation Bill 2023. I note at the outset the confidence that Senator Rice has in the distribution, or, perhaps, the distributional focus of the fund. This is another bill that the parliament is considering that is effectively a shell bill with no detail and that grants the minister of the day god-like powers—if you don't mind me using that expression in here, Mr Acting Deputy President O'Sullivan.

This fund is going to be part of the Albanese government's strategy to massively fuel inflation in Australia, or perhaps I should be a bit kinder and say it is part of their plan to have no plan to address inflation in Australia, which is riding at a 33-year high, at 7.8 per cent. This $15 billion fund is one of three major off-balance-sheet items where the government is seeking to appropriate $45 billion of taxpayer funds and set them up as slush funds for their favourite vested interests. The International Monetary Fund has warned against the use of these structures because they are inflationary, and inflation is driving the Reserve Bank to jack up interest rates. We've had 10 interest rate rises in a row since the election, and the government continues to spend. It's not just the off-balance-sheet items, like we see today with the reconstruction slush fund. It's also tens of billions of dollars baked into the budget in recurrent expenditure. This is the problem that the Australian people are facing in a day-to-day sense: a national government which is fuelling inflation. It is true that over the past few years federal governments have run inflationary fiscal policies. This government should be trying to put that to death, because it is hurting, in particular, lower income people, who deserve better from their government.

This is part of the key design feature of this government, which I've often called 'the government for vested interests'. When you work through the list of grievances of their best friends and backers at the unions, the super funds and the class action law firms, inevitably you come back to a bucket of cash, a big bag of cash or a sack of cash. In this case it's a $15 billion sack of cash which will be dished out in order to placate their favourite vested interests. The major problem here, though, is that, when you are only focused on the narrow vested interests of a few select parties, you don't have time to consider the major economic issues that the nation is facing. That is the major consequence of being the government for vested interests and the government which is only interested in introducing new slush funds, of which this is just one of three.

It's the Australian people who are suffering, because no-one is interested in their welfare. You're at the back of the queue if you're an everyday Australian, but you're at the head of the queue if you're a union official, a super fund, a class action law firm or just a fellow traveller with unique access. This, I would say, is probably the best example of the government for vested interests focusing on delivering cash directly to its favourite persons and organisations.

We often hear the talking points that are read out from the Labor Party senators. They're usually indistinguishable, but they often talk about this trillion dollars of Liberal Party debt. I always think that's an interesting expression. When Labor was last in office, from 2007 to 2013—they left office in 2013—their last MYEFO had a debt projection of $667 billion. I would've thought that, if the Labor Party had already racked up almost $700 billion of debt, then the so-called trillion dollars of Liberal debt must therefore be $700 billion of Labor Party debt and perhaps the balance incurred through the COVID period. I think that's always an important stat to remind the chamber of: that the 2013-14 MYEFO records that $667 billion was the Labor Party's debt trajectory for this nation. I urge the chamber—through you, Mr Acting Deputy President—to consider that.

This bill, as I say, is a shell bill. It sets up this corporation with very little detail on what exactly it will be doing in terms of its priorities, its investment objective and its investment capability. The priorities are to be set by a minister in due course. These are to be disallowable, and then the mandate of the fund is to be non-disallowable. We have a very interesting distinction there. We're going to see the priorities set by a minister. They could be disallowable and they could, of course, be anything. I make these remarks in a most constructive way, but I note Senator Rice's confidence about how the funds may or may not be invested. Effectively, this bill allows the minister to set any priority. The priority could be that the Senate should have a different tinge of red. It could be that we should have a very good economy. Any platitude could be the priority. It could be that Australia should have a strong and fair economy and be a nice country. It could be anything. My point is that the broad shell of the bill is not helped by having a great big woolly priority attached to it which is disallowable. If this is a concession then I'll eat my hat.

The key here will be the investment mandate, which is not disallowable by this chamber, and the investment mandate will be set by the minister, not by the board. This is held out to be an independent entity, I understand. We discussed this at the estimates process, and we also had a very good committee inquiry, conducted by Senator Walsh and the economics committee, and at those hearings we were able to ascertain that the mandate and the priorities would be made by the minister, in due course, but not by the board.

The board is going to be appointed, and there will be a range of different people on the board. I think there have been some concerns raised by stakeholders on these matters: the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry have noted that the legislation lists industrial relations as a relevant skill set, so you might find you've got a few people with that skill set on the board. I don't know. It might be a bit like the Senate—there could be a lot of people from that area. That's going to be one of the criteria to be on the board. But it probably doesn't matter that much because the board is going to be a toothless tiger. The board isn't going to be setting the priorities, which will be woolly. It's not going to set the investment objectives or anything like that. That's going to be done by the minister. So what's the board going to do? They might poke around with a few tiddlywinks and find a few pieces of paper and a few rats to rub together. But the board isn't going to be doing too much, is it? The board has been neutered. Maybe they will pick people that have industrial relations as a skill set, stick them in there, make their disallowable instrument and stick the money where they want it to go, and that will be the end of it.