Jane Hume (Victoria, Liberal Party, Minister for Superannuation, Financial Services and the Digital Economy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That these bills be now read a second time.

I seek leave to have the second reading speeches incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The speech es read as follows—

SUPPLY BILL (NO. 1) 2022-2023

The Supply Bill (No. 1) 2022-2023, together with the Supply Bill (No. 2) 2022-2023 and the Supply (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No. 1) 2022-2023, seek appropriations to facilitate the continuation of normal government business for the first five months of 2022-23.

The Supply Bill (No. 1) 2022-2023 provides for just over $80 billion of appropriations for proposed expenditure on the ordinary annual services of the government.

The appropriations proposed in this Bill are generally based on five-twelfths of the estimated 2022-23 annual appropriations. The 2022-23 estimates are broadly the 2021-22 base, adjusted for economic and program specific parameters, and the effect of decisions announced as part of the 2021-22 Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook or included in the 2021-22 Additional Estimates Appropriation Bills.

The five-twelfths allocations are adjusted where necessary for programs or entities that have uneven expenditure early in the financial year: for example, administered payments under programs that are made upfront in the financial year.

The Bill also includes COVID-19 response measures that have been extended since the 2021-22 Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook or the Additional Estimates' processes. This ensures that funding is available over winter and that essential support can continue to be provided early in the 2022-23 financial year.

I wish to emphasise that this Bill seeks only to fund government expenditure on an interim basis until 2022-23 Budget Appropriation Bills have passed, therefore no new measures for the 2022-23 Budget are included in this Bill. This arrangement allows for an annual Appropriation Bill for the ordinary annual services of government to be passed by the next Parliament, in the usual way.

The Bill also contains an Advance to the Finance Minister (AFM) provision of $2.4 billion to provide the Government with the capacity to allocate additional appropriations for urgent and unforeseen expenditure: $2 billion of the AFM provision is set aside for COVID-19-related expenditure and $400 million for other urgent and unforeseen expenditure.

While the COVID-19 AFM provision of a higher value accommodates the ongoing response to pressures emerging from the pandemic, the general AFM provision of a lower value marks a return to standard AFM arrangements. This completes the Government's commitment to return to pre-COVID-19 AFM settings when circumstances allow.

The COVID-19 related AFM remains a temporary measure and will be ceased in a future year when it has been determined that COVID-19 risks have sufficiently moderated.

In light of the size of the AFM, it is proposed to continue the strong accountability and transparency arrangements that have been in place from 2019-20 through to 2021-22, including a regular media release in weeks when AFMs are issued, which reports and reconciles the use of the AFM provision, and seeking the concurrence of the Opposition for any proposed AFM greater than $1 billion.

Details of the proposed expenditure are set out in the Schedule to the Bill, the Explanatory Memorandum, and the Portfolio Budget Statements tabled in relation to the 2022-23 Budget Appropriation Bills.

The Bill must be passed in this session to ensure funding is available for the first months of next financial year to all entities from 1 July 2022, thereby ensuring the continuity of program and service delivery.

I commend this Bill to the chamber

SUPPLY BILL (NO. 2) 2022-2023

The Supply Bill (No. 2) 2022-2023, along with the Supply Bill (No. 1) 2022-2023 andthe Supply (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No. 1) 2022-2023, seek appropriations to facilitate the continuation of normal government business.

The Supply Bill (No. 2) 2022-2023 provides for just under $10.7 billion of appropriations that are not for purposes that include capital works and services, payments to States, Territories and Local Governments, and equity injections for the first five months of 2022-23.

The appropriations proposed in this Bill are broadly based on five-twelfths of the estimated 2022-23 annual appropriations. The 2022-23 estimates are largely the 2021-22 base, adjusted for economic and program specific parameters, and the effect of decisions announced as part of the 2021-22 Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook or included in the 2021-22 Additional Estimates Appropriation Bills.

The five-twelfths allocations are adjusted where necessary for programs or entities that have uneven expenditure early in the financial year: for example, the Government Schools National Support program in order to provide additional transition support for Northern Territory government schools to implement reforms agreed under the Commonwealth Government's Quality Schools package.

The Supply Bills also include COVID-19 response measures that have been extended since the 2021-22 Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook or the 2021-22 Additional Estimates' processes. This ensures that funding is available over winter and that essential support can continue to be provided early in the 2022-23 financial year.

The Bill also establishes the debit limits for 2022-23 for general purpose financial assistance payments and national partnership payments. The debit limits in the Bill reflect a full year of the estimated 2022-23 debit limits, so that agreements with other governments can be established with certainty for the full year.

The Bill must be passed in this session to ensure funding is available for the first months of next financial year to all entities from 1 July 2022, thereby ensuring the continuity of program and service delivery.

As with the Supply Bill (No. 1) 2022-2023, this Bill seeks only to fund government expenditure on an interim basis until Budget Appropriation Bills have passed, therefore no new measures for the 2022-23 Budget are included in this Bill. This arrangement allows for Annual Appropriations to be passed by the next Parliament, in the usual way.

The Bill also contains an Advance to the Finance Minister (AFM) provision of $3.6 billion to provide the Government with the capacity to allocate additional appropriations for urgent and unforeseen expenditure: $3 billion of the AFM provision is set aside for COVID-19-related expenditure and $600 million for other urgent and unforeseen expenditure.

While the COVID-19 AFM provision of a higher value accommodates the ongoing response to pressures emerging from the pandemic, the general AFM provision of a lower value marks a return to standard AFM arrangements. This completes the Government's commitment to return to pre-COVID-19 AFM settings when circumstances allow.

The COVID-19 related AFM remains a temporary measure and will be ceased in a future year when it has been determined that COVID-19 risks have sufficiently moderated.

In light of the size of the AFM, it is proposed to continue the strong accountability and transparency arrangements that have been in place from 2019-20 through to 2021-22, as outlined in the speech for Supply Bill 1 and as particularised in the Explanatory Memoranda to the Supply Bills.

Details of the proposed expenditure are set out in the Schedules to the Bill, the Explanatory Memorandum, and the Portfolio Budget Statements tabled in relation to the 2022-23 Budget Appropriation Bills.

I commend this Bill to the chamber.

SUPPLY (PARLIAMENTARY DEPARTMENTS) BILL (NO. 1) 2022-2023

The Supply (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No. 1) 2022-2023 provides appropriations for the first five months of 2022-23 for the operations of:

This Bill seeks approval for appropriations from the Consolidated Revenue Fund of just under $114 million.

The appropriations proposed in this Bill are based on five-twelfths of the estimated 2022-23 annual appropriations. The 2022-23 estimates are broadly the 2021-22 base, adjusted for economic and program specific parameters.

The Bill must be passed in this session to ensure funding is available to the Parliamentary Departments from 1 July 2022, thereby ensuring the continuity of the Parliament's operations.

As with the other Supply Bills, I wish to emphasise that this Bill seeks only to appropriate money to fund government expenditure on an interim basis until the Budget Appropriation Bills have passed, therefore no new measures for the 2022-23 Budget are included in this Bill.

This arrangement allows for Annual Appropriation Bills for the latter part of next financial year to be passed under the new Parliament in the usual way.

Details of the proposed expenditure are set out in the Schedule to the Bill, the Explanatory Memorandum, and the Portfolio Budget Statements tabled in relation to the 2022-23 Budget Appropriation Bills.

I commend this Bill to the chamber.

Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on Supply Bill (No. 1) 2022-2023 and Supply Bill (No. 2) 2022-2023, as well as Supply (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No. 1) 2022-2023. These bills are required to ensure continuity of government for the 2022-23 financial year, and Labor supports these bills. In supporting these bills, I'd like to make a few short remarks.

Those opposite have been in power for almost a decade. That's nearly ten years that they've had to act on some of the pressures that are clearly here with us now. They take their lead from their Prime Minister. Apparently, you've got to wait for a problem to become a crisis before you can act and wait until wages haven't just flatlined but actually gone backwards, leaving the average worker hundreds of dollars worse off, before you can do anything about it. It's never meaningful action once a problem has become a crisis, is it? They don't have the vision to come up with a plan that will help Australians for the long term. It's all about political management with the Morrison government: short-term fixes and one-off payments to get through the media cycle, or, in this case, the next election.

This is a government that is long on politics but short on plans, and this budget is just another example of that. What are they doing about the crisis that remains in aged care? They are saying, 'Oh, there's a one-off payment for staff, that's it,' and making no real commitment to implement the findings of the royal commission, including on minimum staffing levels. On wages they've come up short 52 of the 55 times they've presented wage forecasts, but they want us to believe that this time they really mean it—and, still, wages in this financial year go backwards.

What they've handed down in this document is a bandaid, not a budget for the future. All the announcements in the world can't cover up the fact that, over the course of this term in office, they have tucked billions of dollars away in slush funds that they will rort all the way to the election, and there's no reason for us to believe that this budget is anything different. With nearly $1 trillion in debt and deficits for as far as the eye can see, the only thing that the Treasurer and the Prime Minister have their eyes on is how they can hide billions in the budget to pork-barrel their way through the election and save their political lives.

The Safer Communities Fund got a top-up last night. We know that this is one of the government's favourite funds to rort. Ninety-one per cent of round 3 funding went to the coalition's target seats. We wonder how much of that $50 million top-up is going to be distributed genuinely, or is it just going to happen in the same way that we saw 77 per cent of the Commuter Car Park Fund funnelled into coalition seats, the Building Better Regions Fund rorts and the sports rorts? There are so many examples of this government using the budget as the Liberal Party's own re-election fund. Is this really a budget for everyone, or is it a budget for those who live in the electorates where Mr Morrison wants to pick up votes? No wonder they have not funded the federal anticorruption commission Mr Morrison promised over 1,200 days ago. With these kinds of statistics, I'm not surprised they're worried about what it might find.

That's not to mention the colossal waste we've seen at the hands of this Prime Minister and his Treasurer. Over half a billion dollars has gone out the door to major consultancy companies in just the first eight months of this financial year alone. There was $20 billion in JobKeeper that went to companies whose revenue increased during COVID: that's $20 billion. Billions of dollars went on a second-rate NBN blow-out. Billions were spent on the submarine deal with the French before it was cancelled, and damages are still to come. There was $6 million on the COVIDSafe app, which didn't work. The list goes on and on.

One of the most concerning things in this year's budget that there hasn't been much discussion on yet, but I expect there will be, is the $3 billion of hidden cuts forecast for after the election. What we see from the government—and it sums up their approach around political fixes versus governing for everybody—is that there's a big load of expenditure this side of the election and then secret cuts to services after the election. We don't know what they are. This morning, when asked, the Treasurer didn't know what they were either—or just wasn't telling us. That's $3 billion. Is it cuts to Medicare? Is it cuts to payments? Is it cuts to the Great Barrier Reef? Who knows? We have no idea where these cuts are going to be made.

What we do know is that they come in after the election. That's what this Prime Minister's done. That's what this Treasurer has done in this budget. He's said: 'Here's a bandaid to get us through the next two months, three months, four months. We're going to give you this. But, when the election's over, if we are to win, this is what we're actually really about.' These secret cuts have to be called out and the government need to explain what they are. They cannot sneak their way through an election campaign when their own budget documents show $3 billion is going to be cut from spending programs after the election. We need to know the answer now. It's not good enough to hide it in the decisions taken but not yet announced column of the budget. We saw what they did with that last time, when they hid $16 billion there: 'Oh, yes, we've made all these decisions; we're just not going to tell you until it politically suits us.' This is exactly the same thing that's happening here: 'In decisions taken but not yet announced, in the years following the election, we are going to cut services; we're just not going to tell you what they are.' It could be Medicare. It could be aged care. It could be the NDIS. Who knows? The Treasurer knows. The Prime Minister knows. The cabinet know, presumably, because they signed off on the budget. Nobody's talking about it.

With a few weeks to go before the election, we need to call this out and the government need to be upfront with what they have hidden in that part of the budget. We've cottoned on to it. Australians have cottoned on to it. They know they can't trust this government. They know that this government doesn't tell the truth. They know this Prime Minister doesn't tell the truth. They know it's all about marketing, quick fixes, never taking responsibility, never planning, never preparing and only managing a crisis in a media cycle. That's what this budget is: it's a political fix; it's not a plan for the future.

What Australians need is a plan for a better future, and that's what the Labor Party, under the leadership of Anthony Albanese, will offer and will campaign on and will deliver if we win government. And that's our plans to get wages moving, our plans on cheaper childcare, our plans on cheaper and cleaner energy and the jobs and economic opportunities that come with that, and our plans on free TAFE and skilling the nation after years of neglect that have left us in a situation where we have low unemployment and a massive skills mismatch across the country. That's because of the failure of this government to deal with the skills crisis in this country, which has led to the skills crisis through lack of planning. And most important for many Australians is how we deal with Medicare, how we guarantee Medicare, how we protect Medicare from this mob on the other side of the chamber. Strengthening Medicare and protecting Medicare is in Labor's DNA. We created it, we've protected it and we will continue to do so. We need to know whether the $3 billion in cuts that have been outlined in this budget, after the election, are about cutting peoples' access to Medicare. Until the government comes clean on that, that's what we will presume because they have got form on that. So I would challenge the government to come clean on what the $3 billion worth of cuts are.

Rex Patrick (SA, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I must correct Senator Gallagher. Perhaps in the interests of brevity she forgot to mention the $3.5 billion of spending on utility helicopters that has now been cancelled as well, and the Army Battle Management System that has been withdrawn from service. Thank you very much, Senator Gallagher, for leaving that for me. That's good. There is a huge problem in the defence space. Everything the Prime Minister is doing is targeting 2040—we're going to have a submarine in 2040, we're going to have submarine bases in 2040 and we're going to have an upsized ADF in 2040. Right now we have trouble in Ukraine. That's a spark that may let off the tinder box that is Taiwan and China. We have had Chinese warships travelling through the Arafura Sea lighting up P-80 aircraft with a laser, we've had regular deployments to watch Exercise Talisman Sabre and now we'll likely have a military base set up by China in the Solomons. Yet the government focuses on 2040. Can I remind the chamber and those listening that the only way a 2040 submarine delivered to the Royal Australian Navy will be able to properly help us in defence is if it's got a time machine to be able to come back to the present moment where we need to have good ADF capability. I was disappointed in the budget last night with some of the spending commitments envisaged for the Future Submarine, and I will come back to those.

I want to talk about the fuel excise cut, and I note that I do have a second reading amendment in relation to this. On 22 February, I called on the government to reduce the fuel excise. I did that because, whilst it was prior to the Ukraine crisis, we could see the Russians mounting up at the border and it was almost inevitable that the Russians were going to cross into Ukraine. So I made a call for a cut in fuel excise. Then we saw a whole bunch of ministers responding to that call. On his show on 9 March, Ben Fordham asked Angus Taylor, 'Are you absolutely ruling out any change to the fuel excise between now and election day?' Angus Taylor replied, 'What I'm saying is that we have no plans to do that, Ben; we have no plans to do that.' Scott Morrison, at a presser on 15 March, said: 'You don't go and completely recalibrate your budget based on fluctuations in oil prices. They have gone up. They have gone down.' He was asked: 'Barnaby Joyce says changes to the fuel excise are off the table. Is he right?' The Prime Minister said: 'I haven't seen those comments'. Let's go to an interview on 17 March:

Asked whether cutting the tax would help in easing cost of living, the Deputy Prime Minister said: "No it won't".

"But what it will do is it'll take money away that we spend on roads," …

There's quite an irony. When the Treasurer gave a hint, over the weekend, that the fuel excise would be cut, at the same time he announced $18 billion in infrastructure programs, including roads. The Australian public have to make sure they understand this: fuel excise is not connected to road spending. Fuel excise, by law, must go into consolidated revenue, and it is politicians who decide how much is spent on roads. So there's a fallacy there.

The government has been dragged, kicking and screaming, yesterday, to have a reduction in fuel excise, which is desperately needed by Australians who are suffering from increased rents and increased grocery prices. We've seen fuel prices go from $1.80 to $2.20 per litre, and that's crippling. You can't ease off on your fuel expenditure: you have to go to work; you have to take the kids to school; you do need to go to a doctor. Indeed, if you're in the country that situation is worse, because all of the distances are much greater. So it was obvious we needed some form of relief. But what did we see last night? We saw a halving of the fuel excise for six months.

Let me tell you: the reason fuel prices are high is that there has been an unlawful invasion of Ukraine by Russia. That's driven up the fuel prices because of sanctions. If you look at what's happening in Ukraine, the Russians are bogged down. They are not—thank goodness—going to annexe Ukraine. They might get part of it, and stop, and there will be some sort of negotiated settlement, no doubt. But before that there will be an insurgency, and these fuel prices are going to remain high until that insurgency concludes, because the sanctions are going to stay. There is no way that this is going to be over in six months—no way. And the government should know that. The government should be aware of the strategic circumstances.

So why has it only given six months of relief? Because that's what it takes to get through the election. That's why we've got only six months of the cut in the fuel excise, because it's about buying votes. In fact, when I look at the budget as released last night, it is a budget to buy power, with a whole bunch of short-term sugar hits. Billions and billions of dollars are being spent to buy power. And that money will be a debt for our children and grandchildren. That's what's going on.

When I looked at the budget last night—and particularly as a South Australian—I was very disturbed. It is clear to me that Mr Morrison has delivered a budget that is a payback budget for South Australia. It's a payback budget because South Australian electors decided to elect Premier Malinauskas as our state leader. I am sure what's happened is that the government has gone through and struck out, deleted, all the bits about South Australia and said: 'Here's our punishment to you. Here's our payback to you.' If I look at the expenditure that's taking place, it delivers so little to South Australia. The portion of infrastructure spend for South Australia has gone from 22 per cent last year to only 16 per cent this year.

South Australia has also been left out of the government's regional transformational infrastructure program, which is basically $7.1 billion targeting the Northern Territory, northern and Central Queensland, the Pilbara and the Hunter. Let's make no mistake—and I've just glanced at a Greens amendment in relation to this—that is pork-barrelling. That is pork-barrelling to win an election. Now, I just want to make sure that the chamber is really clear on this: pork-barrelling is corruption. I'll say that again: pork-barrelling is corruption. It's taking taxpayers' money and directing it at projects that are intended to buy votes to allow people to stay in power. That is using taxpayers' money for personal benefit. We really have to think about change here. I'm sick and tired of us sitting here watching time go by and, just prior to an election, suddenly a whole bunch of announcements are made. They're made depending on a red or blue square in a spreadsheet. There are people who live in safe seats—and I'm talking about safe Liberal seats and safe Labor seats—who sit back and get nothing. Do you know what? There is likely to be a need for those people that is simply not being met because of political corruption. It's wrong. I had someone say to me yesterday on Sky: 'But that's how it has always been.' That might be the case, but it's wrong. We've got to change that. We've got to stand up and act with integrity. Let's start having projects planned out, going through a proper needs analysis, a proper check for value for money, making sure that we spend our money wisely in a coherent manner that seeks to grow the economic pie, to make the economic pie much tastier. None of this corruption, please! The Australian public are over it, including people who might be the beneficiary of some of this pork-barrelling.

I foreshadow that I will, at an appropriate time, circulate an amendment to future appropriations bills related to that program to include South Australia. I would think that if Senator Lambie is listening she will do the same for Tasmania. And I would think that if Zali Steggall is listening she will do the same for people in her electorate. That would be harder for people in the Labor Party or the Liberal Party because they have to stick within party lines. But we Independents don't. I can assure you that that amendment will be circulated in due course.

I look at the budget spending for South Australia. The North-South Corridor—that's all we ever seem to get in our budget spending. There's so much that we need in South Australia that is just not being addressed. I look at the Eyre Peninsula. We need a desal plant there. Just as Thomas Playford brought a pipeline from Morgan to Whyalla that totally transformed regional South Australia, we need to have proper water resources on the Eyre Peninsula. We need to have rail on the Eyre Peninsula. We need to have proper power capacity on the Eyre Peninsula. We need to have an extended runway at Coober Pedy. We need to fix up the road that leads to the ferry down at Kadina, in Wallaroo. We need all of those things. This is a punishment budget for South Australians voting for the Labor Party—make no mistake.

I want to give a wake-up call to Rowan Ramsey. Liz Habermann may run in your electorate. You've got to get off your butt and stop just getting road funding, which is just a normal share. You stand up and wave a flag and say you've done a great thing for the Eyre Peninsula and for Grey. But you simply haven't—perfunctory at best. We saw what happened with Sam Telfer in Flinders, where Liz gave him a good shake-up. Good on her. She's taken a long-term safe Liberal seat and turned it into a marginal seat. That's going to be great for the people of Port Lincoln and Ceduna and all up the west coast of the Eyre Peninsula.

I looked at the shipbuilding plan. I looked at the graphic the government put in the budget around shipbuilding. For South Australia, for jobs, they included the Air Warfare Destroyer, the Hunter project and the Collins full-cycle docking work and life-of-type extension. But there is no graphic there that shows a future submarine—and that's because it's a decade away.

The government keeps promising to South Australians projects like the Future Submarine project. We are obviously the most capable state for delivering something like that. But, in actual fact, there's really nothing in the budget in relation to that. We are not going to be building a submarine in South Australia for a decade, if ever, because the government's realised the mistake of the 2040 deadline. They are trying to roll it all the way back now. As they try to crunch that schedule, they are going to try to removes risks and they are going to point to South Australia and say: 'You know what? We are not going to do that there.' It will be just as we saw with Minister Reynolds making an announcement that they were going to build an HADR ship in Australia. Then, because of changing strategic circumstances, they have decided to buy that offshore. That's just the way this government has worked. Sadly, for South Australia, there's payback in this. People should remember when they go to the election that that's exactly what's happened. We have been ignored and punished because people chose to vote in Peter Malinauskas.

I move:

At the end of the motion, add ", but:

(a) the Senate highlights the impact on Australian families and small businesses, including inflationary consequences, of current extreme petrol prices;

(b) the Senate calls on the government to:

(i) introduce legislation to amend the Schedule to the Excise Tariff Act 1921to cut the fuel excise by 23 cents a litre for a period from 31 March 2022 to 30 June 2023, and

(ii) suspend indexation of the fuel excise for the same period; and

(c) a message be sent to the House of Representatives informing it of this resolution and requesting its concurrence in the resolution".

Dorinda Cox (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We are in a climate crisis, and the government is pouring fuel on the fire. We need to ensure that this budget doesn't fund opening up the climate bomb in the Beetaloo. That is why we will be taking the unusual but not unprecedented move to seek to move an amendment to the Supply Bill (No. 1) 2022-2023 today. We are not seeking to block supply. We will not vote against the bill. This amendment will not affect the passage of the bill. What this amendment will do is not reduce the money being provided by the government, but it will prevent the government from spending our money turbocharging massive gas projects in the Northern Territory, from the Beetaloo to Middle Arm to Barossa, just as the climate crisis has started arriving—and the levee has been breached in Lismore.

We are at a time in history when every moment matters and what we do matters. Unfortunately, we are running out of time. We must keep coal, oil and gas in the ground. But what we continue to see in this place is the government's infatuation with gas projects. This continues. It means approvals are being fast-tracked left, right and centre in this country without consent, without proper processes and approvals that truly assess the damage being caused to the environment and, again, without true free, prior and informed consent.

Last week I had the privilege of chairing the environment committee hearing on the Beetaloo. I heard from traditional owners, pastoralists and other people living in the Northern Territory about how they don't want fracking on their traditional lands, how they don't want this to affect the fragile and precious ecosystem in the Northern Territory. There's no doubt the drilling will have consequences on the flora, the fauna and also the cattle. This is what I heard from those farmers. It's further compounding the impact on endangered species and savanna ecosystems. Fracking will pose a serious risk to our precious groundwater. Groundwater is especially critical in the Northern Territory because it's 90 per cent of the water that is for human purposes, including drinking water, and it's drawn from the aquifers.

But here we continue to ignore the independent review of fracking in the Northern Territory, the Pepper inquiry, the climate science that has noted the environmental, social and economic risks from fracking in the Territory. It's clear from the evidence that I heard that our legislative frameworks allow big corporations to get away with the destruction of country, and the regulatory policy framework that is still on the drawing board for the Northern Territory government means there are no checks and balances.

These risks are unacceptable. Despite all this, despite the significant risk, despite the wishes of the people living in the Northern Territory, this government gives the green light in this budget to fast-track those approvals and continues the destruction of country that threatens the health, the wellbeing and the livelihoods of the people in the Northern Territory—granting public money to party donors for this climate-wrecking project that no-one wants and that is unethical, wasteful and a danger to our children's future.

Linda Reynolds (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Government Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to thank all senators who have contributed to the debate on the Supply Bill (No.1) 2022-23, Supply Bill (No.2) 2022-23 and Supply (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No.1) 2022-23. These supply bills seek authority from the parliament for the appropriation of money from the Consolidated Revenue Fund for the first five months of the year 2022-23. The total of the appropriation sought through these three supply bills is just over $91 billion.

These bills must be passed in this session to ensure funding is available to all entities from 1 July 2022, thereby ensuring the continuity of program and service delivery in the early months of the next financial year. I also wish to emphasise that these bills only seek to appropriate money to fund government expenditure on an interim basis, until the annual appropriation bills have passed. Accordingly, no new measures for the 2022-23 budget are included in these bills.

In relation to Senator Patrick's second reading amendment that calls for petrol indexation relief for 15 months, I would say this in response: we are cutting it to six months, consistent with what the budget and the Treasury have estimated for the duration of fuel price pressure. By the time we have got to the end of September this year, they're expecting the oil prices to have fallen. In New Zealand, by way of contrast, they have done it for the next three months—not six months as we have here. We think it will take longer than three months, and that's why we have kept it over the six-month period through when the fuel price increases are forecast, at this stage, to abate. Our excise cut halves the rate, which is currently 44c. This is broadly consistent with the reduction proposed by Senator Patrick, and for these reasons the government does not support the proposed amendment.

Once again, I thank all senators for their contributions and I commend these bills to the Senate.

Andrew McLachlan (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I intend to put the question in relation to Senator Patrick's second reading amendment. I put the question that the second reading amendment of Senator Patrick be agreed to.

Question negatived.

I now put the question that the bills be read a second time.

Question agreed to.

Bills read a second time.

Rex Patrick (SA, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—Mr Deputy President, under the standing orders I ask that my vote be recorded in favour of my amendment to the second reading.