2008-09-17 42 1 3 REPS 0 0 2008-09-17 The SPEAKER (Mr Harry Jenkins) took the chair at 9 am and read prayers. 7643 Committees 7643 7643 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —I have received a message from the Senate informing the House that Senator Fielding has been appointed a member of the Joint Standing Committee on the Parliamentary Library. 7643 Bills R3043 7643 Bill returned from the Senate with amendments. Ordered that the amendments be considered at the next sitting. 7643 Bills R3067 7643 Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr Bowen. Bill read a first time. 7643 7643 09:02:00 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP Minister for Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs, and Assistant Treasurer 1 0 Mr BOWEN —I move: That this bill be now read a second time. This bill gives force of law to a new protocol with South Africa. The new protocol will modernise and enhance the bilateral tax arrangements between Australia and South Africa and was signed in Pretoria on 31 March 2008. The protocol amends the existing tax treaty between Australia and South Africa signed in 1999. This bill will amend the text of the existing South African tax agreement in the International Tax Agreements Act 1953. The protocol was prompted by the need to meet Australia’s most favoured nation obligation in the existing tax treaty and the proposed changes to South Africa’s domestic law in relation to corporate profits. Tax treaties facilitate trade and investment by minimising tax barriers between treaty partner countries by relieving double taxation, preventing tax discrimination and providing certainty with respect to tax treatment of cross-border income flows thereby reducing compliance burdens on taxpayers. Tax discrimination under other countries’ tax systems can be a significant barrier to outbound Australian investment. The protocol inserts a non-discrimination article, which addresses our most favoured nation obligation and prevents discriminatory tax practices between the countries. Australia’s and South Africa’s bilateral economic and trade relations continue to grow. South Africa is Australia’s largest and most dynamic market in Africa, and South African investment dominates investment from the African continent into Australia. Accordingly, the protocol updates the taxation arrangements between Australia and South Africa to enhance Australia’s relationship with South Africa. The protocol reduces barriers to bilateral trade and investment by lowering withholding tax rates on interest and royalties. The protocol also amends the withholding tax rates applying to dividends. The new article provides a five per cent rate for all non-portfolio intercorporate dividends and a 15 per cent rate for all other dividends. These changes align with OECD norms and reflect South Africa’s changes to its domestic law system of taxing corporate profits. Australian non-portfolio investment in South Africa will generally benefit from a reduced total South African tax on total corporate profits as a result of these changes. In responding to the needs of both Australian and South African business and in ensuring the protection of Australia’s revenue base, the new protocol also includes a number of other key changes. It updates the capital gains tax treatment so that it aligns more closely with the OECD norms, to assist trade and investment flows between the countries; It modernises the exchange of information provisions to conform with current OECD standards, allowing the tax administrations of both countries to share tax information; and It also introduces integrity measures which provide for cross-border collection of tax debts. The new protocol will enter into force once both countries have advised that they have completed their domestic requirements, which in the case of Australia include the enactment of this bill. The treaty has been considered by the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties, which has recommended that binding treaty action be taken. Full details of the amendments brought forward in this bill are contained in the explanatory memorandum. I commend the bill to the House. Debate (on motion by Mr Keenan) adjourned. 7644 Bills R3038 7644 Consideration resumed from 3 September. Senate’s amendments— Clause 2, page 2 (table item 2), omit “Schedules 1 and 2”, substitute “Schedule 1”. Schedule 2, page 19 (line 1) to page 20 (line 25), omit the Schedule. 7644 09:06:00 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP Minister for Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs, and Assistant Treasurer 1 0 Mr BOWEN —I move: That the amendments be agreed to. The government reluctantly accepts the changes made to the Tax Laws Amendment (2008 Measures No. 4) Bill 2008 by the Senate. These amendments remove schedule 2 of the bill, which contains the family trust changes. The government is only agreeing to these changes because it is important that the amendments in schedule 1 of the bill, which apply from 1 July 2007, receive royal assent. This will provide certainty to policyholders of health insurers that have demutualised. The family trust changes were an election commitment, and I note that the Senate Standing Committee on Economics inquiry into the Tax Laws Amendment (2008 Measures No. 4) Bill recommended that the bill be passed. The family trust changes would have addressed the concern that the current definition of family, and the ability of family trusts to make one-off variations to their test individuals, provides significant scope for family trusts to transfer the benefits of tax losses to future generations. These changes would have reduced the scope for family trusts to be used to lower income tax by utilising losses, delivering on the government’s commitment to disciplined budget management. The changes to family trusts were expected to provide savings of $19 million over four years but much more significant savings in the longer term. We would have hoped that the new Leader of the Opposition would provide more economic responsibility than his predecessor, and we continue to have that hope. We expect that it may be forlorn; nonetheless, we continue to hope. This is another move by the opposition to block a savings measure, which underlines their complete lack of economic credibility. 7645 09:07:00 Keenan, Michael, MP E0J Stirling LP 0 0 Mr KEENAN —The House should welcome the changes that have been made by the Senate to the Tax Laws Amendment (2008 Measures No. 4) Bill 2008. The Assistant Treasurer has just talked about the savings measures in the bill, but what he did not mention was the compliance costs that they would have imposed on the Australian community. The government has not been able to say what those compliance costs would be. Also, and I think very importantly, would those compliance costs, which would be pushed back onto the community, outweigh the savings benefits that the Assistant Treasurer has just outlined? During this debate, no-one in the government has seriously defended these silly measures. It is probably one of the silliest tax measures that I have seen the government introduce into this House. The Senate changes are to be welcomed. The opposition supports the amendments as they have been placed before this House by the Senate. Question agreed to. 7645 Bills R3061 Cognate bill: 7645 Bills R3062 7645 Debate resumed from 16 September, on motion by Mr Swan: That this bill be now read a second time. 7645 09:09:00 Baldwin, Robert, MP LL6 Paterson LP 0 0 Mr BALDWIN —I rise today to speak on the First Home Saver Accounts (Further Provisions) Amendment Bill 2008 and the First Home Saver Account Providers Supervisory Levy Imposition Bill 2008, which include various provisions to make the first home saver account scheme operational. Let me say from the outset that these bills introduce savings measures, which is always to be commended. The idea of people saving, putting money in the bank, putting it away is a great idea, but this legislation does absolutely nothing to make housing more affordable. The rhetoric from the Labor Party is simply this: we now have a minister for housing and that is going to fix all of the problems. A minister does not fix the problems of housing affordability. This requires positive action by a government in reducing taxes and charges and in stopping itself from being one of the inflators of property prices. This is particularly so in New South Wales, where one of the government’s arms, Landcom, has become a commercial developer. It has walked away entirely from its original ideal and goal, which was to provide affordable land. By increasing its land, Landcom has kept the commercial price of land up and made housing so much less affordable in New South Wales. While these schemes do a couple of good things, and while these bills are designed to introduce a system for dealing with the unclaimed money that is saved into those accounts—they will introduce amendments to secrecy and information sharing provisions between the Australian Taxation Office, the Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority and the Australian Securities and Investments Commission and will also deal with issues surrounding family law situations—again, they do nothing to make housing more affordable. It matters very little how much money you are able to put away in the bank if, indeed, property prices keep escalating because of a restriction on supply that is being driven by state governments and supported by local governments. This makes the price of property go up. Property values go up because there is demand. Demand is driven by the amount of supply in the marketplace. It is simple economics 101—something that the Labor government has failed to address. While these savings provisions are good, they will have very little effect on the ability of a young person who struggles to put petrol in their car to go to work, who struggles to pay the rent, who struggles to feed themselves and who, hopefully, has a little bit of money left over at the end of the week to put money into this savings account. It is clearly true that, because of the financial pressures placed on them today, young people are living beyond their means. How often do we hear of escalating credit card debt, massive mobile phone bills and texting accounts that they cannot pay? Where are they going to get the money from to put into a home savings account? Most of them give up the dream of owning a home not because there is no financial savings incentive program in place but because the cost of the home far outweighs their ability to purchase that home. The cost of housing has risen so much that young people just feel that they are totally alienated from the market. Young people feel that they have been let down in times gone by. Even though the property prices in areas like mine have reduced by 10 or 20 per cent through the market crashes that have occurred, property is still unaffordable. It is unaffordable when a group like Landcom, a government instrumentality designed to promote and provide affordable housing, now holds some of the most expensive land in the region. The average price of a block of land provided by Landcom is in excess of $300,000. In my area, the cost of a block of land at a new estate around Koala Shores at Tanilba Bay is $130,000. When we talk about housing affordability, more important than a savings scheme would be to reduce the taxes, the charges, the levies and all of the other costs kept by government from developments. In fact, if Landcom were doing what it should be doing, it would be providing land to the marketplace without government taxes and charges. If it were indeed going to fulfil its obligation to provide affordable land to bring competition into the marketplace, it would live by its original charter. Its original charter was to provide affordable land. I can remember people camping out for nights and lining up in queues to make sure they had the opportunity to be the first ones to bid for that block of land. But that has got lost in the government’s desire to be a commercial entity—not a competitive entity, a commercial entity. The Minister for Housing stands up and says that the problems with housing are going to be fixed because the Rudd government has appointed a housing minister. That will not fix the problem; action will. As she sits around the COAG table with all of the planning and housing ministers, she needs to make sure that they reduce the taxes, the levies and the burdens applied upon land development to make that land competitive. She needs to make sure that restrictions on property development are lifted and that the period of time applications are held in planning departments of both the state and local governments is reduced. One thing that seems to have been obfuscated in this whole issue is the actual holding costs in undertaking developments. A developer will acquire the parcel of land. They will then proceed with the planning, the environmental impact statements, all of the due diligence required and then put it to council. Council might sit on that development for six, 12, 18 months or two years and beyond. All that time that developer is building holding costs. You do not need to be Einstein to work out who pays for those holding costs. It is not the developer. Those costs are passed on to the home purchaser and that drives up the cost of property in that area. If the minister really wanted to affect the cost of housing, particularly in New South Wales, she would get whoever the New South Wales planning minister is this week to sit down, go through the issues in relation to Landcom and make it competitive by a reduction in the taxes, charges and profit that it makes. That would then bring other developers into line in a commercial and competitive environment to make sure that they are not overcharging and to make that land affordable. It even gets ridiculous—Landcom in a promotion of their house and land packages now offer a free fishing boat. This is a government entity that is designed to make housing affordable but to promote their commercial land sale packages they are offering a free Quintrex 395 boat with the next seven lots sold. I know what the punters want. They do not want a free boat, because they would not have time to use it. They would not be able to afford the petrol to put into it as they are paying the inflated prices for this property. Around 40 per cent of the cost of land is involved in fees, charges, taxes and compliance costs. If a government wanted to do something serious—remember it is not the federal government that gets those fees, taxes, levies and charges; it is local and state governments—they would bring pressure to bear on state and local governments to clean up their acts, to be more competitive and to look at an opportunity to be can-do governments. If indeed they have a genuine heart of concern for people to have affordable homes they would drive this issue singularly. But they do not, because they have their hands in the pockets of the battlers. It is the battlers, at the end of the day, who pay all of these passed-on costs. My colleague the member for Charlton said in a speech yesterday something that I do agree with: In 1996 the average house cost was about four times the annual wage, and today it is no less than 7½ times the annual wage. A typical first home buyer now spends a third of their income on mortgage repayments. This compares to a figure in 1996 of less than $2 of every $10 earned. In that time costs in providing the land have escalated. Delays in development in New South Wales, while Frank Sartor sat on his hands, have driven costs up. There have been restrictions on opening up green belt areas. As our population increases the only way that you will address the situation is to open up further land development. If people are opposing increases in the height of buildings, the only other direction you can go to provide accommodation is outwards. We have the double effect from those who claim to wear their environmental heart on their sleeve. They do not want you to go up and they do not want you to go out. The question is: where do you want to put the people? In looking at this bill we support the idea of increasing savings and providing an incentive for people to save. If this bill is to address the issue of housing affordability and availability for young people then the core root of the problem needs to be addressed. These days in development, when a developer puts in a lot and the sewerage comes through, the developer has to pay all of the costs in providing that sewerage to that house. If they happen to be the first developer into that multiowned development site, they pay all of the costs. It is more logical for the person who is collecting the fees for sewerage and water to install the infrastructure and then for the individual lot owner to pay a connection fee. Groups like Hunter Water in my area are state owned corporations with a profit motive and they need to earn a profit to return to the state government. Well, I say government is about providing services to the people; government is not about making profit out of the people. And the sooner government gets out of the business of being in business and allows private entities to provide commercial competition, the better—then real progress on these issues will be made. If we had competition in the marketplace, at least, in the provision of water and sewerage then prices would be much different. But, no: our consumers, the people that we represent in this House, all pay the penalty. What I would like to see is an urgent meeting, with all of the COAG ministers and heads of local government authorities sitting down to map out a real plan that will address the issue of housing affordability. What needs to be taken to this issue is a clean sheet of paper. We need to start from the very beginning: a greenfield site. We should look at all the costs that are involved in providing housing and work out a way to make that housing more affordable. But, no. What do we have? We have bandaid measures like: ‘Let’s have a little home savings account.’ That is good in itself, but it will not address the issue because people struggling to buy houses usually struggle to put away extra money into savings accounts. As I said, they need to go back to the very beginning and address the issue: what is driving up the cost of housing? It is supply and demand. And when governments are a part of that supply chain, and want to make a commercial return and a profit on being part of that supply chain, it just falsely inflates the prices. So in supporting this bill I urge, on behalf of my constituents, that governments look at the issues. Very shortly, just around where I live, another couple of thousand home sites will be developed—the new town called Chisholm. But when I look at the cost of the infrastructure that is going in there, which is being borne and should be borne by the broader state entities, who then seek a long-term return on their investment, the cost of that housing will be high; it will be very expensive. And if there are delays in rollouts and in the approval of development applications for parts of it then that will increase the demand on a very specific area. What we need is more global planning, with long-term consideration of population growth throughout Australia, and even support and establishment by the federal government of new areas away from major cities that will open up large greenfield sites to further development of housing, to industry and to population, thereby shifting the pressure of population from our capital cities and major regional centres to the new centres being established. That is how you address it. If everyone wants to live in the one town on the one block of land and it becomes a supply and demand game then prices will become falsely inflated and unsustainable. And the reason why people’s property assets have been deteriorating is simply that the prices have been largely falsely inflated through supply and demand. So if we were to increase supply, spread demand and make land more affordable, and if the governments at local and state level got the taxes and charges down to realistic levels, then it would truly benefit all Australians. I commend this bill to the House. 7648 09:25:00 Perrett, Graham, MP HVP Moreton ALP 1 0 Mr PERRETT —I rise to speak in support of the two bills before the House, the First Home Saver Accounts (Further Provisions) Amendment Bill 2008 and the First Home Saver Account Providers Supervisory Levy Imposition Bill 2008. Unlike the member for Paterson, I took the time to actually do some research before rising to speak on these bills. I understand that those opposite would have been a little bit busy over the last couple of days, but he would have been guided by the joint media release coming out from the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, and the Minister for Housing and Minister for the Status of Women, basically detailing a program that maps out what the member for Paterson was complaining about. So it is unfortunate that he is not here in the House so that we can set him straight on what he was talking about. It was interesting to hear his comments, because one of the great claims to fame of the coalition’s time in government and of the member for Higgins’ time as Treasurer stretching back to 1996 was the elimination of government debt. And while those opposite would have us believe that it was because of their shrewd economic management, it was actually more to do with the sell-off of public assets like Telstra and also those significant reforms made by the Hawke and Keating governments. However, that is only half the story. At the same time as John Howard and Peter Costello were flogging off assets to reduce government debt, household debt was on the rise—and I mean on the rise and on the rise. When the Howard and Costello Show left office, household debt had reached a record $650 billion—up more than $70 billion or 12 per cent since 2002. And the ratio of household debt to disposable income had risen to 110 per cent—higher than in the United Kingdom and higher than in the United States of America. For the economically illiterate amongst us, that means that for every $100 we earned we owed $130. So, while government debt is nil, the burden has been shifted onto households, with every man, woman and child in the country owing about $32,500 on average. That means that my three-year-old son owes $32,500, on average. It will come as a shock to him; I have not broken that news to him yet! At the same time, the cost of home ownership has risen beyond the reach of many young families. In the Australian Bureau of Statistics article ‘First home buyers’ it is reported that the average mortgage of first home buyers rose from $165,400 in 1995-96 to $310,000 in 2005-06. That is nearly a 90 per cent increase in 10 years. Obviously, that is not too bad if you are a home owner—if, say, you have a house in Point Piper or wherever, that is not too bad because, obviously, it is an asset that is accumulating value. Obviously, it is not so good if you are a renter—very tough if you are a renter or if you do want to chase that dream of owning your own bricks and mortar. In Australia we often talk about that great Australian dream of owning your own home. But what does that mean? I just want to unpack that concept for a minute. I remember seeing a show on the ABC, I think it was last year or the year before, and the name of the show was Race—the Power of an Illusion. It was all to do with African Americans in the United States and talked about that progression from slavery to the present where we might soon have an African American President. It talked about how that had been such a difficult journey for African Americans in the United States. The final episode talked about how important inheriting bricks and mortar is in giving people an opportunity in life. It seemed to make the point that—I apologise to the makers of the show if I am recalling it incorrectly—in communities into which African Americans moved, sometimes the housing values would decrease. If there were too much of an African American community in an area, the housing values would decrease and, therefore, people would not be able to keep up the mortgages and then pass on a capital item to their children. It is certainly something to be explored another day, but it goes to show how important bricks and mortar are in giving Australians an opportunity to improve their lot in life. It does not matter if you grow up in a single-parent household renting in Sydney; you can go on to accumulate great wealth. Often it is about that ability to have an asset and then pass that asset on to your children over the years. It is like how MPs in some places, I hear, pass on their seats to their children, Mr Speaker. That does happen in some places! That capacity to pass on an asset to your children is what the great Australian dream is all about. It reminds me of a poem about how important it is that, when we build something, we pass it on. It is a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley that many people would have studied at school—I am sorry to stir up old memories for those who had poetry flogged into them. I will read it and then return to it. The poem says: I met a traveller from an antique land Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand, Half sunk, a shatter’d visage lies, whose frown And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamp’d on these lifeless things, The hand that mock’d them and the heart that fed. And on the pedestal these words appear: ‘My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!’ Nothing beside remains: round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, The lone and level sands stretch far away. Obviously that poem is about how hard it is for a human to pass on a lasting legacy. Every Australian, when they take on a mortgage, is trying to do something for their family, to do something for themselves, to pass something on to their children et cetera. Many people have studied the poem and the line, ‘My name is Ozymandias, king of kings’. It is amazing how something can be constructed that people think will last forever, but then, as the poem says, ‘Nothing beside remains: round the decay/Of that colossal wreck’. It is probably not dissimilar to Peter Costello’s attack on the Howard legacy with his memoirs coming out, attacking the legacy of John Winston Ozymandias. For the former member for Bennelong, history will judge him differently depending on who writes the history. His former Treasurer has started that process. To return to that idea of the great Australian dream, it is about passing on security to our children. That is why this legislation before the House is so important. It helps those people on the margins who might not be able to put away enough money to put down a deposit. With the great Australian dream such an important part of Australian culture, it begs the question: what was the coalition government doing to support young families and help them to save for their own home over those 12 years that it was in government? Today many young families are struggling to pay the rent, let alone to save for a deposit on their first home. As we have seen from the United States mortgage crisis, if you do not get the balance right it can have serious consequences for the rest of the economy. When the United States sneezes, we get the flu over here, so it is very important to get the balance right. I notice the member for Paterson, in his laissez-faire approach to economics, was happy to increase supply and demand with the stroke of a pen here and a bit of number crunching with the New South Wales Minister for Planning there, but it is a much more complicated balance. So many of the jobs in our communities flow from what goes on in the housing sector. I know that in Queensland, where it is still booming even though the market has tightened a little bit, it is still incredibly hard to track down a builder, an electrician or, God forbid, a plumber if you need one. It is a very important part of the economy to make sure we get right, and that is a lesson we can learn from the United States. Thankfully, we have had much better prudential regulation, so we have been spared some of the onslaught that is going on over there. That is why the Rudd government is introducing these first home saver accounts—to help young people save a bigger deposit for their first home. Obviously, the bigger the deposit, the smaller the mortgage. The smaller the mortgage, the less likely that borrowers will fall into mortgage stress. The passing of the First Home Saver Accounts Bill earlier this year ensured that these accounts would be available from 1 October—not far away at all. Last week, in the suburb of Moorooka in my electorate, I had a meeting with a couple of credit providers to see how they were approaching this initiative. All but one of them were definitely going to be taking on these first home saver accounts. Even though it was only introduced into the parliament not too long ago, they liked the concept, they liked the idea and they thought it was a great product to take to their customers. But for the fact that they had to get the technology right—get their accounts and information processing systems up and in place—they would all be ready to go by 1 October. They were very impressed with this product. Through the First Home Saver Accounts the government will match 17 per cent of personal savings up to $5,000 a year. That is an annual government contribution of $850. Account holders contribute from after-tax salary and earnings and they are taxed at 15 per cent, the same as superannuation. Government contributions and withdrawals will be tax fee. The two bills before the House amend the First Home Savers Account Act to finetune this framework. The First Home Saver Accounts (Further Provisions) Amendment Bill introduces changes in four main areas. Firstly, it makes amendments to ensure that the secrecy provisions enable agencies such as the Australian Taxation Office, ATO, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, ASIC, and the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority, APRA,  to access information while ensuring that privacy is protected. It also allows for information on first home owners to be shared between the Commonwealth and the states and territories. Secondly, the bill introduces a scheme for dealing with unclaimed money. It might seem hard to believe that people could forget where they have left money, but it does happen. Having worked in the mining and unions sectors, I know that people do move from job to job and leave behind unclaimed money. We do need regulations. The scheme will treat non-superannuation accounts, such as a bank account, the same way that unclaimed money is treated. If an account has been inactive for seven years and no contact can be made with the account holder, the funds will be paid to the Commonwealth. This measure will ensure that first home saver account providers will not have to service small, inactive accounts indefinitely. The bill also ensures that payments under a family law obligation—that is, to an account holder’s spouse—will receive the same treatment as if paid to the account holder. Finally, the bill also makes technical amendments to ensure that taxation of first home saver accounts operates as intended. The second bill—the First Home Saver Account Providers Supervisory Levy Imposition Bill—will enable the minister to impose a separate levy on account providers. This levy will cover the costs of APRA’s supervision of the financial institutions offering first home saver accounts. I read a report in the Courier Mail recently that questioned the efficacy of first home saver accounts. The article said that few banks or credit unions had signed up to offer the accounts. That might have been a little premature, because since then the ANZ Bank and quite a few credit unions have signed up. As I said, representatives of significant credit unions and building societies in my electorate with whom I met indicated that they will definitely be signing as soon as they get their ducks lined up. It was reassuring to have the meeting and to see how supportive the people at the front line were of these first home saver accounts. Many credit unions in my electorate will be offering the product. The first home saver accounts bills build on many other Rudd government initiatives designed to tackle the housing affordability crisis. We have heard all about the benefits of long-term saving rather than short-term spending. That is the problem which we are trying to address and which has crept into our society over the past 10 to 20 years. Some of the other initiatives include investing $512 million over five years to cut the planning and infrastructure costs of new housing developments. This is the information that the member for Paterson seemed to be unaware of. It is certainly part of our assault on red tape. In my former life as both an articled clerk and a solicitor, I was always shocked about the costs that could creep into the purchase of a house. It is funny because if you said to someone, ‘Can you pull out another $500 so that I can buy some beer,’ they would blanch. But when people are buying a $400,000 house, they do not get up in arms about the $1,000 here and $500 there that is requested because it is a relatively small percentage of the total cost of the house. Thankfully, the Rudd government has got up in arms about it and is doing something positive by investing $512 million. What will this do? It will reduce costs for new home buyers so that effectively they will receive grants of up to $10,000 per home by working with the local governments and the states. That $10,000 rolls off the tongue pretty easily. What does $10,000 represent? I did some testing last night at the local bottle shop. It would buy 312 cartons of beer at $31.95 a carton—that is what I paid last night. Those 312 cartons represent 7,511.74 beers, which would be more than five beers a night for four years. I suggest that that would keep anyone happy. Alternatively, if you went to a restaurant—I will not name it, but let us say a Scottish fast-food restaurant—you could get a large meal every night for 1,438 nights. If beer or fast food are not your cup of tea and you just want two litres of milk at $3.50, that is eight years worth of milk, or 2,857 cartons. So, $10,000 is not inconsequential. I welcome the announcement made by the Prime Minister and the Minister for Housing on Monday when they released the guidelines for this program. A lot of them have flowed out of the National Summit on Housing Affordability. These initiatives, ideas and innovative projects have flowed from that. Not only are we helping first home buyers; we have also set up the National Rental Affordability Scheme, providing $623 million to help create 50,000 new affordable rental properties across Australia. Contrast this with the Howard government’s approach, which was about giving a boon to landlords and not extending a helping hand to those in the community who are doing it tough. Over the next five years this government will spend $150 million to build up to 600 new houses and units for individuals and families who would otherwise be sleeping rough. This is a multipronged approach to tackling the very complex and difficult issue that is the housing crisis. I am proud to say that the first white paper commissioned by the Rudd government in January this year dealt with this complex issue. One of the first tasks the member for Bonner and I had as new MPs was to talk to people who were doing it tough. Tackling homelessness was one of the first initiatives of this government with heart. We were trying to do what we could to address this very complicated problem after too many issues had developed over the years. I am a very strong supporter of first home saver accounts because I believe they will be a significant benefit to young families in my electorate of Moreton. This is a substantial initiative and I commend the bill to the House. 7653 09:45:00 Rea, Kerry, MP HVR Bonner ALP 1 0 Ms REA —It is with great pleasure that I rise to speak on the First Home Saver Accounts (Further Provisions) Amendment Bill 2008 and the First Home Saver Account Providers Supervisory Levy Imposition Bill 2008. These bills provide very important additions to the government’s First Home Saver Accounts policy. They provide greater certainty and security over these new accounts for both providers and account holders. These amendments enable APRA to collect levies to fund the supervision of the accounts. They ensure that privacy for account holders is maintained. They ensure there are the necessary arrangements to protect the interests of those people who have direct access to the accounts when it comes to issues of family law being upheld. It is very important and very necessary to ensure the proper administration of the accounts and that account holders and account providers can benefit from this exciting new initiative with confidence. Most importantly, though, these amendments allow the proper implementation of the government’s first home saver accounts. In short, they enable many Australians to make their dream of owning their own home a reality. The statistics are frightening. Housing affordability in Australia is at historic lows. A typical home now costs 7½ times the average annual wage, compared to four times the annual average wage in 1996. The average first home mortgage has more than doubled in less than eight years from $123,000 to around $246,000. The typical home buyer now spends around one-third of their income on housing costs. The proportion of median family income required to meet the average home loan repayment has increased by 8.3 per cent since March last year—since only last year. The term ‘mortgage stress’ was very unfamiliar to us but it is now a very common phrase. It is in this context that the Rudd Labor government have recognised our responsibility to provide whatever incentive and assistance we can to enable people to own their own home. It is now a possibility whereas last year and the year before it was a dream that not many could achieve. From 1 October, many more Australians will be able to start saving towards their own home. Recent events in America have rocked the financial world. They involved Lehmans, Merrill Lynch and Bear Stearns—names that belong to the world of high finance, which many ordinary working families in Australia did not feel they had any connection to. But now they are very real. The current financial uncertainty has developed as a result of many Americans taking on mortgages they simply could not afford in a desperate attempt to own their own home. This underlines that the apparently old-fashioned but not so outdated notion that owning your own home provides some financial buffer in a time of economic downturn is actually quite true. It is so important for the certainty of individuals but more importantly the nation’s economic security that more Australians are able to invest their income into their own property. On a personal level, I believe that using the taxation system as a mechanism to create incentives for all Australians aged between 18 and 65, and particularly for younger Australians, is a very progressive and responsible way to encourage people to save for their own home. Enabling those who are eligible to contribute to a savings account from their before-tax income, and supporting that with an extra 17 per cent contribution from the government based on the first $5,000 of personal contributions made into the account each year, makes sound financial sense. It is responsible encouragement and that is why it will work. The opposition often laugh when the government refer proudly to Labor’s tradition of nation building. This phrase is used most commonly in reference to our commitment to build the infrastructure we need for our economy and society to prosper. But these first home saver accounts are just as much a part of our commitment to nation building. We are building a nation of people whose hard work can pay off. Our commitment to building a community includes a commitment to individual long-term certainty—and the most fundamental long-term certainty is owning the roof over your head. This initiative will build on those great Labor traditions of providing free universal education and superannuation, which have given so many Australians opportunities they would not otherwise have enjoyed. That is nation building. The first home saver accounts are a significant $1.2 billion part of the government’s four-year, $2.2 billion commitment to increasing housing affordability for those who are most in need. This $2.2 billion package addresses housing needs for the most vulnerable through to average- and middle-income earners who in days gone by would have assumed that buying a house was a given—but not anymore. That is why the introduction of the first home saver accounts is a critical part of the government’s overall housing affordability strategy. There are a lot of young people out there who are paying rents the size of a mortgage. I know many of them in my electorate and I know many friends and relatives who are in this boat. If it were not for the incredible increase in house prices and the struggle to save a deposit, they could use the rent they pay to invest in their own home. This means that many people out there in the rental market not only do not have the security of a property investment but are placing real pressure on housing opportunities for those who are less financially independent. Higher income earners clogging up the rental market affect everyone in the housing spectrum. Their staying in the rental market reduces the vacancy rate, which inevitably puts up rental costs due to an increase in demand. That means that many people who are in a position to move out of public or community housing and into the private rental market cannot do so because they simply cannot afford the private rents. In turn that means that those people who have found themselves in need of supported accommodation but are now able to move on, into independent accommodation, cannot do so. Those many vulnerable people languishing in emergency accommodation, desperately in need of more longer term housing, have to wait because there are no vacancies. This then means of course that many people living on the street today would not be homeless except for the fact there are simply no beds for them. We need to move everyone through the housing market in order to be able to provide housing, a roof, for those who are most vulnerable and in most need, particularly in the case of emergencies. That is why this initiative is a fundamental plank in the government’s overall housing affordability strategy, but it must be considered in conjunction with the whole scheme. The Prime Minister’s announcement of $512 million to bring down housing costs complements the First Home Saver Accounts policy. A fund that will bring down costs associated with housing construction is a practical measure that could see housing costs reduced by up to $20,000. Having served as a local councillor on Brisbane City Council, I know firsthand what a difference funding holding costs, in terms of developers wanting to develop, and infrastructure charges can make to the cost of a house. It is a reality that councils have to charge developers over the infrastructure to provide essential services such as water, sewerage, footpaths and parks. All of those things that we associate with housing and take for granted as going with a house come at a cost. Unfortunately, the costs are often passed on to the homebuyer at the point of sale. This $512 million package will ensure that the homebuyer is relieved of those costs while benefiting from the services. It will assist homebuyers to move into the housing market. I commend this initiative of the Prime Minister and look forward to seeing it implemented throughout the suburbs of Bonner. But the commitment does not end there. The Rental Affordability Scheme recently announced by the Prime Minister and the Minister for Housing underpins the need to focus on moving people through the rental market as much as on moving those who are able to move out of the rental market into home ownership. It provides $623 million to help build 50,000 new, affordable homes over the next four years. I am sure that the planned provision of another 50,000 by the year 2012 will become a reality because this scheme will be extremely popular. Institutional investors and other eligible organisations will receive a $6,000 refundable tax offset to build new homes for rent, providing that the rent is kept 20 per cent below the market rent. Also, the states and territories will contribute a further $2,000 for each dwelling. This will make a difference to those middle- and low-income earners out there struggling to make ends meet. You simply cannot get on with the rest of your life if you do not have a roof over your head—we know that for a fact. I am pleased that the government is honouring its commitment to make that reality much broader for the Australian community. I know housing organisations in my electorate of Bonner will welcome this initiative. The Winnam Aboriginal housing association, who provide community housing for a large number of Indigenous people within the bayside suburbs of Bonner, will certainly embrace this initiative. They already do a fantastic job. They have done so at times when housing has certainly not been on the national agenda, still managing to provide housing for many in their community. I know that this package will do a great deal to support them to provide an even better and broader service. Mangrove Housing, also located in the bayside suburbs and based at Wynnum, are also a community housing provider that will welcome this initiative, having also struggled in those difficult times when providing community housing was not a popular move. They are a very innovative and effective organisation. You know that they are one of the very sort of community organisations that, with extra money and a lot of bright ideas from their people, will do a lot more to provide housing to those people very much in need down in the bayside suburbs of my electorate. There is also the Bayside Tenancy Advice and Advocacy organisation, who do so much to support people who are struggling in the rental market as they look for a place to rent. I know the organisation, which supports families in need at very difficult times, will also welcome this initiative. I wish them well for their AGM on Friday, when I know they will be discussing with great enthusiasm this new scheme. This particular approach to housing—to look at the whole spectrum whether it is finding beds for the homeless, whether it is providing extra support for people to go into the private rental market or whether it is encouraging to buy their own home young people and those other Australians who without this particular savings account would not be able to buy it—is really important to my electorate of Bonner. I believe the electorate provides what is probably a very good snapshot of the housing diversity that we find in many of our major cities. We have the older suburbs of Wynnum, Manly, Lota and Tingalpa, in which we have a lot of pensioners and elderly people, some lucky enough to live in their own home but many who are renting. As we know, support for them is high on everyone’s agenda and there can be no greater support for them than providing subsidies and support for their rents. Public and community housing is stretched right across the electorate. Throughout the suburbs of Holland Park West, Mount Gravatt and Mount Gravatt East, there are significant areas of public housing where families are struggling and doing it tough. Many would be able to move out of that public housing and into the private rental market if they just had some form of support. The government is providing that in the form of rental affordability support. That will then free up that housing for people who are struggling and in need but unfortunately are on waiting lists that are far too long. There is a whole cross-section of the rental market. Students live around the south-eastern suburbs of Mount Gravatt, Mansfield and Holland Park to take advantage of their proximity to Griffith University, and now, with the wonderful bus way and green bridge enabling access to the University of Queensland, there are even more moving in to rent accommodation around that area. There are a number of high-income earners finding houses in the lovely bayside suburbs of Wynnum and Manly who have come in connection with the port, the oil refinery and other industries around Lytton Road and who may only stay for a short time but are using the rental market to provide housing for their families. There is the social struggle that we often see with the issue of gentrification. Those bayside suburbs once provided housing for a number of low-income earners. People are now seeing the beauty of Moreton Bay and the value of those bayside suburbs, and the cost of houses there is increasing astronomically. The change in the cost of those houses between the time I lived there as a kid and now is quite extraordinary, and it is an issue that we have to deal with. Hopefully, first home saver accounts and support for keeping those increasing rents below market rent will assist people to stay in their own homes and keep the diversity in those communities that we so enjoy. There are people living on acreage who, as we know, have often taken out big mortgages, to provide a lifestyle for themselves and their family, which they are now really struggling with. Increasing interest rates and the increasing cost of living are certainly putting some of those people under stress. There are new estates. There are suburbs in Bonner that within three years will have 3½ thousand people moving into them. New housing estates are mushrooming almost overnight, particularly around the areas of Wakerley, Manly West and parts of Tingalpa. These are people who are realising their dream. They are finding housing that suits their family, their lifestyle and their work commitments but they are struggling with mortgage stress; we know that. We want to support them but we also want to give other people the opportunity to buy their own home. It is really important when you look at an electorate like Bonner—and I know this is reflected amongst many electorates across the major cities of this country—to understand how fundamental this $2.2 billion housing affordability package is to the residents of that area. It is fundamental to the young people coming up through the workforce and the education system to know that when they become income earners there will be an opportunity for them to save and to purchase their own home rather than wasting up to 30 per cent of their income on rent by paying that income to somebody else. We always know that more can be done. Unfortunately, this government has to deal with the neglect that has occurred over the last 12 years when we had a boom; when we had revenue coming into the Treasury in amounts we had not seen before. If only the opportunity had not been wasted—if the former government had not spent the money on wasteful advertising, fridge magnets, Work Choices mousepads and pens, and all the bells and whistles it believed it needed simply to get re-elected in marginal seats; if those hundreds of millions of dollars had been spent on providing support for people struggling in the housing market, getting people off the streets and into accommodation, giving young people the chance of not simply wasting money on rent but saving for a deposit, because so much of their income goes into the private rental market and therefore they are not able to realise their dream of owning their own home—I believe that the residents of Bonner and the residents of Australia would be far better off and we would all see a much more prosperous future. But I am pleased that the Rudd government was elected just in time, and I congratulate both the Treasurer and the Prime Minister for initiating what is a significant amount of money to a very, very important issue not just for individual security but for the economic and social security of our country in the future. 7657 10:04:00 Swan, Wayne, MP 2V5 Lilley ALP Treasurer 1 0 Mr SWAN —in reply—I would like to thank all of those members, including the member for Bonner, who have participated in the debate on the First Home Saver Accounts (Further Provisions) Amendment Bill 2008 and the First Home Saver Account Providers Supervisory Levy Imposition Bill 2008. These two bills implement the final parts of the First Home Saver Accounts scheme, following legislation passed in this place in June 2008. The finalisation of the scheme marks an important new beginning in housing policy in Australia, as the member for Bonner was saying. Homeownership is important to the wellbeing of Australians, and the accounts will help Australians to once again realise the dream of homeownership. The biggest barrier to homeownership is of course saving a deposit. First home saver accounts will provide a tax-effective way for Australians to save through a combination of a 17 per cent government contribution and a low, 15 per cent tax rate on earnings. For example, a couple each earning average incomes and each putting aside 10 per cent of their income into individual first home saver accounts would be able to save more than $88,000 after five years. This is almost $13,000 more than they would otherwise have saved. The main features of the accounts include the following. An individual can open an account if they are aged 18 or over and under 65, have not previously purchased or built a first home in which to live, do not have or have not previously had a first home saver account and provide their tax file number to the provider. Personal contributions can be made by the account holder or another party and can only be made from after-tax income. The account is supported by government contributions. The government will contribute an extra 17 per cent on the first $5,000 of personal contributions made into the account each year. This will be indexed to average weekly ordinary time earnings. This means that an individual contributing $5,000 will receive a government contribution of $850. There is an overall account balance cap of $75,000, which is indexed to average weekly ordinary time earnings. Earnings can still accrue once the cap is reached. As a general rule, in order to access money to purchase a first home, personal contributions of at least $1,000 must have been made in each of at least four financial years. Individual contributions are not taxed, as they are made from after-tax income. Government contributions are not taxed and withdrawals to purchase a first home are not taxed. In addition, earnings on account balances are taxed at the account provider level, at the statutory rate of 15 per cent, rather than in the hands of the individual account holder at their marginal tax rate. I would like to address some of the points that have been raised in this debate by the opposition. Contrary to the member for Farrer’s assertion, $5,000 is not the maximum contribution which can be made to an account. There is no limit to the contributions an individual can make each year. The only limit is the account balance cap of $75,000. The member for Riverina also was mistaken when she said that Labor were trashing the first home owners grant. First home saver accounts will operate in addition to first home owners grants, and having an account will not affect an individual’s eligibility to receive a grant. Members opposite also made mention of an article regarding the number of potential providers. The media reports are based on a public list, which was maintained by APRA, of those entities which have registered with them to provide first home saver accounts. It is not a complete list of those entities intending to offer first home saver accounts. Discussions with major banks indicate that at least two of the four banks will be offering first home saver accounts from 1 October 2008, and 16 other ADIs, including many credit unions, have registered with APRA to offer first home saver accounts. Some of these credit unions are very substantial financial institutions and should not be ridiculed, as they have been by some. Contrary to the opposition’s assertions about these providers being obscure, some of the largest credit unions have registered an interest, including the New South Wales Teachers Credit Union, with over 150,000 members, and the Defence Force Credit Union, with over 80,000 members. The banking industry has been supportive of the first home saver accounts, has been working closely with the government and Treasury portfolio agencies and has been ready to offer first home saver accounts from 1 October. The government’s First Home Saver Accounts initiative is part of Labor’s responsible approach to economic management, as it encourages younger Australians to save. The government is investing about $1.2 billion over four years on the First Home Saver Accounts policy, including administrative costs. This is part of a package of measures, costing $2.2 billion over four years, to boost housing supply and to assist those most in need; namely, first home buyers and renters on low and moderate incomes. This package includes the Housing Affordability Fund, which will also assist local governments to reduce the costs of providing new housing related infrastructure and improving planning processes; the National Rental Affordability Scheme, which will provide investors with incentives to construct rental housing for low- to middle-income households, with rents 20 per cent below the market level; and of course a better approach to land release, with the identification of surplus Commonwealth land to be developed into additional new housing. Turning briefly to the changes made by these bills, the bills make a number of second order changes, including a scheme for dealing with unclaimed money; amendments to secrecy and information sharing between the ATO, APRA and ASIC; and a mechanism for dealing more comprehensively with the interaction between first home saver accounts and family law. The bills also introduce a framework for imposing a supervisory levy to fund the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority’s supervision of account providers on a user-pays basis. These measures that the government are taking are aimed at improving the affordability of housing for all Australians. The government are very proud of this very important initiative. It is the first one in our history. It is one that we support very strongly, and we hope that those in the opposition who have been critical will now get behind what is a very constructive measure which will assist young Australians to save for a home. Question agreed to. Bill read a second time. Message from the Governor-General recommending appropriation announced. 7659 Mr McCLELLAND (Barton —Attorney-General) 10:12:00 —by leave—I move: That this bill be now read a third time. Question agreed to. Bill read a third time. 7659 Bills R3062 7659 Debate resumed from 16 September, on motion by Mr Swan: That this bill be now read a second time. Question agreed to. Bill read a second time. 7659 Mr McCLELLAND (Barton —Attorney-General) 10:13:00 —by leave—I move: That this bill be now read a third time. Question agreed to. Bill read a third time. 7659 Bills R3030 Cognate bills: 7659 Bills R3027 7659 Bills R3029 7659 Bills R3028 7659 Debate resumed from 18 June, on motion by Mr Martin Ferguson: That this bill be now read a second time. 7659 10:14:00 Macfarlane, Ian, MP WN6 Groom LP 0 0 Mr IAN MACFARLANE —The introduction of the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and the three associated bills is where the rubber really hits the road in terms of lowering greenhouse gas emissions. We have heard a lot from those who sit on that side of the House about what they are going to do to lower greenhouse gas emissions. But, in the 10 months that they have occupied the government benches, they have in fact done very little, if anything at all, to lower greenhouse gas emissions. They have done all the symbolic stuff. They have always been good at doing the symbolic stuff. They have done the 24-hour news cycle and they have done the stunts, but this is where it is really going to get hard. Greenhouse gas emissions is probably one of the most complex areas that the government and opposition are going to have to deal with. I say here and now that the opposition, the coalition, will support the government in its endeavours to put in place a practical and operative suite of legislation that encourages the geosequestration of carbon dioxide in Australia. There are a whole range of reasons why that should happen, but the single biggest reason is that we must lower greenhouse gas emissions while maintaining the viability of the coal industry not only here in Australia but also in the rest of the world. If we do not do that then thousands upon thousands of workers in Australia will simply lose their jobs. They will lose their jobs because the coal industry will not have a future under the government’s flawed carbon trading legislation. They will not have a job under that flawed carbon trading legislation and they will simply be thrown out of work and onto the scrap heap. They will become part of the three million people already identified by Ross Garnaut who will have to change their professions as a result of the government’s policies on lowering greenhouse gas emissions. Rather than a practical, sensible, step-by-step approach to this matter, the government, led by the Prime Minister, is rushing this issue in such a way that is putting in jeopardy the jobs of the mineworkers in Victoria and the thermal coal workers in Central Queensland. And, apart from what we will be discussing in this bill, because it has yet to also clarify the position of those coalminers at mines that emit methane as part of the mining operation, the jobs in those mines are also going to be in jeopardy. Australia is an incredibly good miner of coal. It does it with some of the strictest, if not the strictest, safety measures in the world. It does it in a way which has the minimum possible impact on the environment. Yet there are those on that side of the House who do not want to see the coal industry grow. Last year we heard the member for Kingsford Smith, the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts, say that the automatic expansion of the coal industry in Australia is not a foregone conclusion. We know that the Labor Party continues to rely on the Greens vote, not only to secure its vote in House of Representatives elections but also to secure its votes in the passage of legislation through the Senate. We know the Labor Party is aligned with the Greens. We know they are a coalition and we know that the Greens want to stop the coal industry completely. If we do not get this legislation right then that will happen; the coal industry, as a supplier of energy to thermal power stations in Australia, will simply close down. Without this legislation working, the costs that the carbon trading scheme will impose upon them will simply mean they are out of business. Those power stations—like the ones that we see in Queensland and the ones that Australian industry has grown off the back of because of their ability to produce low-cost energy, which has not only provided jobs but given Australia a real advantage in a whole range of industries associated with black-coal power generation—will also be put in jeopardy. This legislation amends the Offshore Petroleum Act 2006 and attempts to establish a system of offshore titles that will authorise the transportation by pipeline and injection and the storage into deep geological formations under the seabed of greenhouse gas substances. In this instance we are talking about geosequestration in Commonwealth waters—that is, those waters more than three nautical miles offshore. In those waters within Australia’s territorial limits, CO2 hopefully will be sequestered—stored and locked away forever—in the same way that the earth had locked away, until human intervention, the oil and gas reserves that are currently providing us with that enormous and abundant energy. There are those who are opposed to this legislation per se. It is going to be an interesting time in the Senate for the minister responsible for this legislation, as the Greens oppose this legislation out of hand. They are making wildly erroneous and inflammatory claims that CO2 cannot be stored safely underground. I say to them: before you get into the rhetoric and start talking about all the issues that excite people out of fear, let us have some facts. Let us firstly acknowledge that many of these formations that will be used under this legislation are, in fact, formations that for not centuries, not millenniums, but millions of years have stored gases like the gas that we use in our houses and in industry—‘natural gas’, as it is commonly known, which is often a mix of methane and ethane. They are gases which have been locked away by nature for literally millions of years. Plugging those reservoirs and locking in their carbon dioxide is an incredibly important part of Australia’s and the world’s move towards a lower emissions signature. So we need to make sure not only that this legislation works but also that people, when they argue against this process of geosequestration as distinct from the legislation, do not revert to emotion and scare tactics. We need to make sure that people in both houses, particularly in that other place, actually understand the issue and are prepared to discuss it on a practical basis. A key to this legislation will be making changes to the existing regime of petroleum titles in order to accommodate the new kinds of activities being authorised under the act. Put simply, that means that, if a company has been granted an exploration lease and has converted that into a production lease on the hydrocarbons that lie below its lease on the seabed, we then need to ensure we have legislation that enables either that company or other companies to gain access to some of those aquifers—those cavities in the earth, so to speak—to store CO2. Perhaps it would be from that gas operation—as would be the case with Chevron’s proposal on Barrow Island—but it also may be the case in the Gippsland region and Bass Strait, where Exxon Mobil own extensive leases for oil and gas production. Companies that are operating brown coal power stations in the Latrobe Valley will seek the opportunity to store gas in that area. The bill provides that there will be access and property rights for greenhouse gas injection and storage. It will describe the appropriate management systems for ensuring safe and secure storage and attempt to balance the rights of what will be a new industry with those of existing resource industries—those industries that are already operating on that lease—in a way that will encourage future investment. In those last three words, ‘encourage future investment’, lies the key to this bill. If this bill is framed in such a way that it impinges on the ability to extract, particularly, natural gas, and hydrocarbons in the form of oil and condensate, then we will not have the opportunity to use those fuels. Gas, in particular, is going to be an incredibly important transitional fuel as we move to the next clean energy technology. If we do not have that right then companies will simply not come here to explore and spend the tens of millions of dollars finding oil and gas and then the billions of dollars—and it is billions of dollars—to actually exploit that reserve, take it ashore as natural gas into industry and domestic use or turn it into liquefied natural gas and fire the power stations and homes of countries all around the world in the place of coal. If we do not get this right, those companies are not going to come to Australia. In Australia, we always need to understand that, while we are a country of great natural wealth and enormous good fortune in terms of those resources, we are not the only country so blessed. Quite rightly, Australia has a reputation for imposing the strictest criteria when it exploits those resources to ensure that it is done not only for human safety and workplace health and safety compliance but also for compliance in terms of environmental impact. That is seen by companies as a cost—a cost they are prepared to bear. But if we then move into a situation where this legislation makes it too complicated or does not allow them to have the certainty of the lease that they need to regain their capital expenditure and make a profit—making a profit, in the end, is what this is all about—then they will simply go to the myriad other countries that are offering the opportunity to explore and exploit hydrocarbons. That is the first concern. The second concern is a far greater one: if this process to give the producers of carbon dioxide or greenhouse gases the opportunity to geosequester is not done in such a way that they can do it with relative certainty then geosequestration of greenhouse gas emissions will not occur. We need, for a moment, to just step back from the hyperbole and the 24-hour spin and actually look at how complicated this process is going to be. We need to understand that currently coal-fired electricity is produced, depending on how old the contract is, at between $35 and $40 a megawatt hour. Gas electricity is produced at somewhere between $45 and $55, again depending on the length of the contract of the company that is producing the electricity. To produce an electron of electricity for zero emission—and I will come back to zero emission in a moment—from a coal-fired plant requires that coal be first processed through a series of retorts and converters so that the hydrogen is split off from the coal, and the carbon dioxide and other gases are put into another stream. I will continue with the carbon dioxide stream process in a moment. The hydrogen stream is then fed into a gas turbine similar to those which you see on the wings of airplanes when you fly about. That gas turbine drives a generator, and the heat produced out of the exhaust of that turbine is used to boil water. The boiling water is then used to generate steam to drive another turbine—what is called a combined cycle gas turbine. What comes out the back of that, out of the chimney, so to speak, is steam—water. The combustion of hydrogen in oxygen produces water. This is the cleanest possible way to produce electricity, if you can do it. I say ‘if you can do it’, because the other half of that equation is to take the CO2 exhaust from the converters, compress and liquefy it and then pipe it to where you are going to bury it. In most cases, that will not be in the same place. It will be, perhaps, 100 kilometres away or even 1,000 kilometres away. It may be that as a result of this legislation, which covers offshore, we can get a situation where there is legislation relating to onshore, to allow the geosequestration of greenhouse gas emissions in saline aquifers in depleted natural gas fields across Australia, including the Cooper Basin. That process is incredibly expensive—converting that coal into a hydrogen gas and then firing it into a turbine. The first problem is that there is no turbine currently built that will run on pure hydrogen. They simply do not exist. Hydrogen burns at such a high temperature it would literally melt the turbine. The second thing is, as you can imagine, to compress, pipe, bury and store the CO2 is going to be very expensive. So, while those over there have committed Australia to a position where they are going to charge for carbon, they still do not have the technology that can actually save that emission. Companies are facing the very real proposition that, if they produce electricity from coal, they are simply going to have to buy credits, because there is no technology in commercial operation that allows them to bury greenhouse gas emissions, under this legislation. Companies are facing the cost of electricity consumption doubling for brown coal and probably doubling for black coal at the power station in terms of carbon price. That over time will increase. The impact that that is going to have on normal households is a 40 per cent increase in electricity at their door. Let us see where we are up to in actually being able to use this legislation to save greenhouse gas emissions as a result of the power industry in Australia. There is one proposal in the world currently still alive, and that is the ZeroGen proposal in Central Queensland. It is a proposal for an 80-megawatt power station—a 10th of the size of most of the power stations you and I would know, Mr Deputy Speaker—that will cost, they expect, at least $2 billion. That is 10 times what it costs to build a power station under conventional coal. You then have the expense I have just outlined. The cost of this electricity will not be $45 a megawatt hour, $90 a megawatt hour or $120 a megawatt hour; it will be somewhere north of $140 a megawatt hour—almost four times what it costs now. Those who sit opposite who think these solutions are simple need to understand the practical reality: the technology does not exist. The commercial development of this technology is still in its precommercialisation phase. There is no such project in the world at the moment. In the words of the Minister for Resources and Energy, who is putting forward this legislation, the sort of capacity to generate electricity and store the CO2 under this legislation is 15 to 20 years away—15 to 20 years of the electricity industry having to pay a carbon tax, because that is what they are confronted with, by having to buy carbon credits. There is only one group of people who are going to pay for that: the workers and the families of Australia. Being too impatient to lower greenhouse gas emissions, trying to show the rest of the world that we can do it when no-one else can, is going to cost Australians jobs. Families in Australia are going to face a cost-of-living increase that will see their electricity price rise by at least 40 per cent, if the companies pay their carbon taxes, or, if we rely on this sort of technology, double. So, if you are a household in Queensland and you are paying somewhere between $1,200 and $2,000 a year, double that—take that out of your weekly budget on top of all the other things you have to take out of your weekly budget now as a result of the inability of this government to deliver anything they promised in the last election campaign. They said they could do something about petrol prices. They gave that up at Christmas. We knew straightaway, when we saw the Prime Minister go out and say, ‘We’ve done as much as we can.’ He has given up the battle on grocery prices, which are hurting families. He has given up the battle on water. What this government does is it comes up with these great ideas and then does not know how to put them in place. Despite what some of my colleagues might say about them, those who sit opposite are not stupid. They understand this issue. They understand what it is going to cost. They understand that what they are doing for working families in Australia is actually preparing them for a major hit on their energy costs. It will not just be the working families in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, the Northern Territory, Tasmania, Western Australia and the ACT that will pay the higher costs of this—it will be the next generation as well. This legislation still has a number of areas which need to be addressed. I commend the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Primary Industries and Resources for their report. It is a detailed report that extends to around 120 pages and makes 19 recommendations. In the spirit of bipartisanship, I commend the Minister for Resources and Energy on his approach to this legislation. I know this is not easy legislation. I began the work on this when I was the Minister for Industry, Tourism and Resources and I commend the minister for his efforts on this. It is extraordinarily complicated. But this legislation has to work if the carbon trading scheme of those who sit opposite is not going to cripple Australia—not just for this generation but for the next generation. We know they will not use nuclear power. We know they think that it is all right to sell uranium to our friends, to our mates, to people who are important to us and for them to use nuclear power—that is fine. But when we try and have a debate on nuclear power in Australia, we get rubbish from those opposite. We get scare campaigns, and fear and terror about nuclear power stations when most of them, if they were prepared to consider it, would realise that nuclear power stations are in fact one of the solutions as we move towards a low-emission future. But if they do not consider nuclear power then they will need to make sure that they get this legislation right in the sense that, as I said, the companies holding existing leases not only continue to explore for and exploit hydrocarbons and oil and gas in Australia but also want to use this legislation to bury CO2  These companies need to have confidence that they can access the aquifers and, more importantly, that, providing they do everything right based on the knowledge of the time, they are given financial security for having done the right thing and for having helped Australia to show the way on lowering greenhouse gas emissions. I should mention that there will be a further report from a Senate committee, which I think will be released tomorrow and tabled in the Senate in October. These two reports highlight two issues. My understanding from the little detail that I have of the submissions to the Senate inquiry is that the issues are fairly common, but I have not had the opportunity to see that report—and quite rightly not—nor have I had the opportunity to see the minister table the amendments to this legislation in this House. He has given me an outline of the legislation, and I thank him again for that. However, until we see the amendments and are able to comment on them, the coalition reserves its right to move amendments—not in this place but in the Senate. In the last five minutes of my time, I wish to highlight two areas. The first area refers to a recommendation by the committee, which, while it has good intent, is not going to be supported by the government. The coalition will not be supporting it either, but I think we will be working very closely with the minister to amend it so that it clarifies for companies that are exploiting hydrocarbons on a petroleum lease their ownership rights as well as their right of access to bury carbon dioxide in the strata. I should just explain—very poorly, my grandfather would think if he were watching; he was the chief government geologist in Queensland and a far better authority on this issue than I—that, if you have a tenement which extends from the seabed, there will be a number of strata, perhaps 20 strata, underneath that, and only three or four of them will contain commercial hydrocarbon. If they are sandstone or something like, they might be able to store carbon dioxide or greenhouse gases. Those strata may also contain oil and the gas, and when that is taken out there will be more storage areas. Bass Strait is a good example of our need to give certainty to companies that are exploiting oil and gas from perhaps three or five strata. They need to be certain that they will always have access to those strata and that they will have the right not only to remove gas from them but also to reinject carbon dioxide into them after the natural gas has been taken out of that field or turned into liquefied natural gas. At the same time, we need to give coal-fired power stations in the La Trobe Valley the ability to use the vacant strata. They need to do it in such a way that they do not disturb the oil or gas production if there is a need to access the strata simultaneously for storage and extraction. They do not want to be in a situation where the company that holds the lease is able to hold them to ransom. There needs to be equity in this process. The minister and I have talked about a process where the minister has discretion and where there is an expert board—and, dare I say in this place, where there are as few lawyers as possible. We need to have a process that is based on science and on commercial realities. We do not want a process like native title where it can go on for years and years and perhaps even for decades. We want a process that can begin and then be judged and concluded within 12 months. That is highlighted in this report and is dealt with, perhaps not in the best way but certainly in a reasonable way, in recommendation 11. This issue has not been resolved in the report and it has not been resolved in this legislation. As I said earlier, we will, through consultation, commit our support to the minister to ensure that that part of the legislation works. The coalition also has concerns in relation to liability. In this situation, Australia needs to be a little broadminded. We are going to have a situation where gas will be taken with the best scientific advice, with the best geological advice and with the best geophysics advice. The gas will be put into an aquifer and stored. The company will be liable for that gas during the operation of that storage process and for any damage caused by that gas should it escape. How long that liability exists after the well is capped will determine how many companies will be prepared to involve themselves in geosequestration. If they hold that liability for hundreds of years, their boards of directors simply will not allow them to take that risk and there will be no gas sequestered and there will be no situation whereby we lower our greenhouse gas emissions. We need to get this right, and we pledge our support to a consultative process. 7665 10:44:00 Hayes, Chris, MP ECV Werriwa ALP 1 0 Mr HAYES —The Offshore Petroleum (Annual Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, the Offshore Petroleum (Registration Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and the Offshore Petroleum (Safety Levies) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 before the House essentially deal with the new range of offshore titles for the transportation by pipeline and injection and storage in geological formations of carbon dioxide, at this stage being defined as a greenhouse gas. The proposed legislation deals primarily with the provision of access and property rights for greenhouse gas injection and storage activities in Commonwealth offshore waters and provides a management system for ensuring that the storage is safe and secure while balancing the rights of the new industry with those of the petroleum industry in a manner that encourages participation and, moreover, investment in both industries. The proposed legislation recognises, firstly, the need to provide greenhouse gas injection and storage proponents with the certainty they need to bring those projects forward. Secondly, it preserves the pre-existing rights of the petroleum industry as far as practicable to minimise the sovereign risk to the existing titleholders’ investment in this country and their resources and the potential resource being extracted from those leases. Finally, it is to provide insurance to the community that the CO2, the liquefied—in most cases—carbon dioxide, will be stored in a safe and secure manner. I will turn to what the bill actually does a little later. This is an important piece of legislation for the House. You have just heard the shadow minister indicate the opposition’s approach. I understand, and it is true, that when minister he was also working on this as one of the technologies to be developed into the future. Geosequestration, the storage of gases underground, in the main is going to require the liquefication of CO2 that would be voided from the atmosphere and injected sometimes into depleted oil and gas reserves and at other times into saline aquifers where it can be kept subterranean in perpetuity. I have often been asked—and no doubt you have too, Mr Deputy Speaker—what are the risks associated with this technology? Are we having greenhouse gases stored, whether in gas or liquid form, that could potentially escape and do irreparable damage to the environment? I think that argument was made at some stage when I was on a geosequestration inquiry and a number of conservation groups tried to extrapolate on that very notion. One thing that keeps coming back to me is that when we are talking about the storage of these gases, whether in a saline aquifer or in a depleted oil and gas reserve, we must bear in mind that we have for some time now been drilling and trying to crack various geological structures to produce the hydrocarbons that we need, the energy that we have relied upon for the last hundred years. We have had in this country considerable reserves of both gas and oil, with Bass Strait the largest field. In terms of oil production, it is declining, but it still has significant potential in gas production. And then there are those fields in the North West Shelf. We are tapping into those fields and extracting those hydrocarbons which have been captured in those geological structures for millions of years, and that is effectively what we are trying to replicate in terms of geosequestration. We are attempting to avoid the production of CO2 in the atmosphere by returning CO2 to permanent storage in those geological structures. So this is certainly groundbreaking, if I could use that term in this respect. It is not a new technology. It is certainly one which is being used in the North Sea at the moment. Only last year I met with a number of delegates from the British parliament who were very interested in what we were doing in developing these technologies over here. They are presently trialling the injection of CO2 into the North Sea down to about 800 metres, and on that basis the pressures keep it there. Our position is that we are attempting to look at and define those areas offshore where we can use existing hydrocarbon reservoirs in order to store the CO2. I have a bit of a background—many years back now—in working with people in both the oil and gas industries, and injecting into existing oil and gas reservoirs is something that we have been doing for some time. The reason we did it was not to store the gases particularly in places where there were depleted fields such as Barrow Island. The reason for injecting gas there was for oil production, to create gas lift. That technology has been very much front and centre of the Australian oil industry for some time. As we are not inundated with supplies of oil, we have had to use advanced methods in order to extract as best as possible those oil reserves. It is also a very important step that we take in this legislation, and it is important for a number of different reasons. It is important to our economy. It is important to our ongoing electricity production. Presently 80 per cent of this country’s electricity is generated from coal-fired power stations. If we are going to be serious about our response to climate change—and I know there are many views about that around this House—we cannot proceed without taking steps to clean up coal. The most polluting aspect of industry at the moment is the generation of electricity to meet Australia’s energy needs. And it is not just this country. Whilst, as I said, 80 per cent of our electricity is produced by coal-fired power stations, the world presently has 40 per cent of its overall electricity needs met by coal-fired power. While coal shares a future in terms of power generation—and must, in this country—there will be a decline in favour of renewable energies as those energies become more commercially viable, which I will go into a little later. But any solution that does not involve clean coal will not be a solution for this country at all. There will be a suite of technologies that we should embrace and encourage. We should assist the commercialisation of those technologies. But our main means of providing electricity in this country will continue to be coal-fired power. By the way, in terms of looking at the world view, that is also the position which has been indicated by the International Energy Agency, which monitors the forecast of global energy supply and demand. The IEA estimates that the world’s future needs will primarily be met by fossil fuels, and it forecasts that coal will be, increasingly, the predominant fuel, with 44 per cent of the world’s needs being produced by coal-fired power in the year 2030. That is an increase on coal’s current share. While we, and other countries, are looking for alternatives, it is simply a fact that we do and will continue to rely on our coal industry to provide the bulk of our energy needs in this country. Therefore, it is vitally important to us, both domestically and internationally, that greenhouse gas abatement solutions go hand in hand with that reliance. Our policy position in terms of the development and deployment of low-emission coal technologies is absolutely critical. I know the view has been made out, with all the hype that goes with elections, by one of the minor parties that we should be closing down our coal industry within a period of three years. But I—no doubt like you, Mr Deputy Speaker—do not have an ambition that my children, or my grandchildren for that matter, will have earthen floors and thatched roofs. I have the ambition that my kids will enjoy a standard of living if not equal to that which I have enjoyed then better. Simply to close down what is Australia’s biggest export industry would be ludicrous. The economic value of coal in this country is some $24 billion a year in export earnings. Coal, as I said, is Australia’s largest export earner. The coal industry itself is also the lifeblood of many of our rural and regional areas. It employs in the vicinity of 30,000 people directly, and, downstream from that, many thousands who work in related industries. Therefore coal is essential to our economic wellbeing. Low-cost coal is responsible for our standard of living and is the foundation of Australia’s energy initiatives in various industries. The success of geosequestration technology will guarantee the long-term future of the coal industry in this country, the preservation of those jobs and, more importantly, the provision of low-cost power to the Australian community. If we were to stop exporting coal, or if we were to simply move away from coal as a technology, then countries like China and India—and no-one in this place doubts that we are relying on their trade to ensure the standard of living in this country—would simply meet their demands elsewhere. Therefore, any response to climate change pressures must take account of the need to maintain reliable energy supplies not only by making fossil fuels cleaner but also by embracing our ability to explore for new coal reserves and by developing our new coal technology industries. The government recognises that clean coal technologies are not simply going to be the answer. We know the value of coal and the contribution it makes to our economy. But we know we have to move to embrace, more and more, the renewable energy technologies, such as wind, solar, wave—and I visited, not all that long ago, a very innovative wave technology plant at Fremantle—and geothermal. I was very pleased to see, the other day, the minister contribute $50 million to the drilling program for geothermal or hot rocks technology. That was the first grant made under the Renewable Energy Fund. That is indicative of this government’s commitment to develop these technologies. They will provide, together with coal, a suite of technologies designed to lower Australia’s greenhouse gas footprint without damaging our economy. I know a lot has been said and will continue to be said about the price of a barrel of oil. I do not think anyone seriously thinks that the price is going to decline rapidly, as world oil supplies are in decline. Many academics have laid out the argument that we have already hit peak oil and that, therefore, it is going to take more time and expense to recover remaining reserves. Having said all that, this country is still an energy-rich nation. We have 800 years supply of brown coal in known reserves. We have 350 years supply of black coal. If we do not drill another hole out there, we have, we know, 130 years supply of natural gas at our current usage. That is taking into account the gas that we are sending to China, India, Japan and now South Korea, as well as our domestic use. We have 130 years if we do not find any more. We are an energy-rich nation but, for us to benefit from that, we must be able to develop those technologies that make that energy clean in terms of our greenhouse gas emissions. Those technologies need to be encouraged, but we do know what we can do with geosequestration. We can now start taking the carbon, we can liquefy that carbon and we can inject that carbon into permanent storage underground. This is a new and emerging industry that this government is proud to be a part of. Geosequestration is a key part of the effort to establish our climate change credentials and maintain our position in the industry and in trade. I was particularly proud of Senator Wong’s green paper on the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, which developed a scheme to be implemented by 2010. That will place a cost on carbon and will encourage industries such as those that are generating electricity to develop and deploy low-emission technologies over time. They are things which are going to be crucial for developing this industry because there will be a cost imperative. If people think there is no cost, they will just continue polluting. There is a cost, and it will be a real cost. That will be the incentive for carbon-generating industries to look at how those industries can be developed with a view to lowering their greenhouse emissions. It was also encouraging to go into the last election with Labor’s $500 million National Low Emissions Coal Fund. That was backed by the industry in the COAL21 initiative, which produced another $1 billion from the industry to also look at developing clean coal technologies. That is a very worthy coalition between government and the industry in looking at development of these technologies. While I have indicated that we are the world leader in coal exports, at the moment we are not the world leader in developing technologies for clean coal. If we are going to maintain our position in trade, we need to have that hand-in-hand with our development of technology itself. Therefore, the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme will be the incentive to establish mechanisms to ensure that these new coal abatement schemes are developed in this country. We should be the world leader in that. I congratulate the minister on this piece of legislation and on the leadership that he has shown in this industry. I, too, join in supporting the report on greenhouse gas emissions brought down by the Standing Committee on Primary Industries and Resources. I also note that in this bill the minister has accepted the views of the committee on 16 out of 19 recommendations. (Time expired) 7669 11:04:00 Tuckey, Wilson, MP SJ4 O’Connor LP 0 0 Mr TUCKEY —As has been indicated to the House by our shadow minister, the opposition supports the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and related bills as necessary steps in a process which, I think, is probably many years away and should not be given any form of priority compared to other options for Australia to address greenhouse emissions and their perceived effect on the climate of this nation. I would like to repeat, nevertheless, that if we were to evacuate Australia in the future years there would be no effect on the climate of Australia by that action because our contribution—at 1.4 per cent—is so little that, unless there is complementary action by the so-called big emitters, the climate of Australia will be dictated by their actions. Every time I fly I am reminded—as you might be, Deputy Speaker Georganas, as you come from South Australia—that the air blowing over Australia moves at 150 to 200 kilometres an hour and does not stop on the borders. Having put that position forward, I still believe that Australia has a responsibility to meet international obligations. Before my speech is done I will explain how I would do it without sending anybody broke and without reducing the contribution that coal-fired generation makes to this country without very expensive and risky carbon sequestration as proposed under this legislation. Furthermore, one might have a look at the legislative intent. One might even ask oneself how many trees this legislation cost and what emissions were associated with its presentation. It typifies an approach emanating from this government, which is to bring in some legislation and handball the responsibility to the private sector—to bring in an emissions trading scheme, rip $11 billion off the private sector and say, ‘Well, if you’ve got any money left, you’d better fix the problem.’ That is going to be a significant contributor to reducing greenhouse emissions in Australia because a lot of companies will pack up and go. They will emit no longer. Groups contemplating investment in Australia will say, ‘Why would I bother?’ Liz Bossley, a leading emissions trading expert—imported, I might add, by a finance dealing company, and we have seen how helpful they are to the world economy in recent times—was quoted in the Australian on 12 August as having made a couple of salient points. She said, ‘Of course we need an emissions trading scheme. We the finance sector are going to make a lot of money out of it. But you had better get on with it, because if you think you are going to wait for India, China and the US to come in with caps, they’re not going to do it.’ She also made the point that a $20-a-tonne entry rate is no incentive to those who want to stay to change their habits. A committee of which I am a member received a joint submission from the Australian Conservation Foundation and the Australian Council of Social Service telling us that if the green paper proposals were implemented the average household’s electricity would increase by between $250 and $300 a year, and a lot of poor people would have to be subsidised. That is what the submission said, in black and white. If we give them the money back, will the kids turn the lights out? I do not think so. We must look at the effectiveness of these schemes. The point I want to make is simply that initiatives must be practical in nature. Initiatives of past governments come to mind. I will name a Labor initiative first: the Snowy scheme. Sir Charles Court’s initiative is the only reason that Australia now profits so much from the production of liquefied natural gas on the North West Shelf. That area would still be undeveloped if the Charles Court government had not taken the initiative to buy more gas than Western Australians could use at the time and to build the pipeline infrastructure to get it to the market. There is a role for government in doing these things. However, it is a hell of a lot different from expending a great deal of Public Service time producing big books that are a substitute for action. I am a regular attendee at CSIRO breakfast briefings. I do not think I have missed one. Geosequestration was talked about at one of those briefings. It was said that the science is not very difficult and that there are all sorts of options, but they have yet to get the energy cost below 20 per cent of the output of the relevant power station. We would have to burn 20 per cent more coal to get back to where we started. I would not make that a high priority issue for Australia, and I will explain why. I wondered why all that energy was required, so I consulted the library. I tried to chase up a briefing given by the office of the opposition shadow spokesman when he was the minister about some aspects of these proposals. One approach is to pump in a heap of oxygen while the coal is being burnt to get lower emissions. There is no argument about that. But who makes the oxygen? I am a bit of a welder and I know that you buy oxygen in bottles, and it costs plenty. There is an energy cost in producing that oxygen. I established from my research that carbon dioxide captured from power stations usually needs to be transported to the place where it will be stored. That could be under the ocean. That usually involves compressing the carbon dioxide to what is called a ‘super critical state’. That is at above a pressure of 73 atmospheres, which is 73 times more pressure than we feel at sea level from atmospheric pressure and above 31.1 degrees Celsius. Clearly, this process uses energy, as does the transportation. Of course, someone has to build a pipeline that can contain 73 atmospheres, because the only other thing that keeps the gas inside the pipe is the outside pressure. While it is in the ground, the only thing keeping it there is the density of the surrounding soil materials. That is one atmosphere versus 73. My research went a little further. I read about a place called Lake Nyos in Cameroon. I quote: CO2 is an asphyxiant … It is not poisonous, but in concentrations you do not get enough oxygen and you die. The quote continues: … at high concentrations and is denser than air so may not immediately disperse. In a well-publicised incident at Lake Nyos in Cameroon in 1986, a large volume of naturally occurring CO2 came up suddenly from the lake floor and, being heavier than air, accumulated in the surrounding region, resulting in about 1700 deaths. There has been significant publicity recently about some people who bought land on top of an old tip. The methane is now bubbling up as a result of the decomposition of the refuse put in the tip and those people are now at some risk as a consequence. We are not talking about the natural pressure of decomposition; we are talking about 73 atmospheres. The quote continues. It says that model studies of CO2 storage in reservoirs in the North Sea suggest that in the absence of well failure or tectonic movement—that is, if those two things do not happen—it is pretty safe. But some people went drilling in Indonesia recently and now, because of some mistake, thousands of hectares of land are covered with red hot mud. It will be okay—provided that you do not have well failure and tectonic movement. If all the gas from the Hunter Valley had been buried under Newcastle, presumably it would have all come back when they had the earthquake. I do not want to say any more about that, other than to point out that this is difficult and highly energy intensive. Whilst there may be a reason for research—for the purpose of making our coal more acceptable as an export product—we in Australia should take an entirely different view. I have grave doubts that the best response for Australia can occur, because the government minister is working assiduously to deny that resource to Australia. The Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts, Mr Garrett, wants to put a World Heritage order over the West Kimberley. There is 6,000 kilometres of coastline in the Kimberley—because it is very fjord-like—but the minister and the previous state government in WA could not find 100 hectares along that coastline where the INPEX people could put in an LNG plant which would add significantly to our GDP and the revenues of Western Australia. So INPEX are considering putting a pipeline undersea to Darwin, where they are going to get a better deal. But what level of emissions would be produced in the manufacture of some 1,000 kilometres of steel pipe? It would take up a year’s production at one of the major steel factories in Japan. Why would you do that? It is all because ‘the Crocodile Hunter’ thinks it is nice for him to go and look at some isolated points of interest—nice waterfalls and things of that nature. According to the World Energy Council and the CSIRO, within that 6,000 kilometres of coastline and those inlets there is the potential to generate six times the power we get from Australia’s installed generating capacity of all sorts. From that resource we could produce six times the power generated by our existing capacity—and it would be 100 per cent emission free. How does that compare with other renewables? It would be perpetual—as long as the moon keeps going around the earth—and as predictable as the moon. That is a very fundamental issue when you have to back up wind generation or, to a lesser degree, solar generation with coal-fired stations. Because of the lack of responsiveness of wind and solar, the operator of the coal-fired station will say: ‘The total demand in my network is X. I’ll maintain steam pressure to deliver X because I can’t trust those wind generators. I don’t know when they’ll pause in their job for a minute.’ So we are burning the same amount of coal—people measure the amount of electricity that flows into the system, but that is meaningless. All renewable energy requires a backup. But if that operator were delivering to a network that was also being supplied by a substantial amount of tidal energy, he could take his fishing box to work with him—if I can use a silly example—to work out the contribution of his power station at any time in the preceding 100 years because tides are that predictable. The World Energy Council have been around since 1923. They are part of Oxford University. They have published a table of potential tidal sites. I might add that the British government are now staring down the greenies over the Severn Estuary because it could produce 20 per cent of their power. That table identified just two inlets in the Kimberleys. On their calculations, those sites—just two sites—could add 120 per cent of WA’s presently installed generating capacity. A group of us, with the member for Kalgoorlie, flew over that area last week and had a look at what we can do. There is new generating technology that is much improved on what the French have been doing for 40 years. With an average-sized Australian power station—about 240 megawatts—this technology provides the opportunity to put in new generating capacity which would inhibit the movement of fish and other marine species only to the extent that a revolving door at a hotel would impede a human being’s process. That technology is available and it has a tick from the David Suzuki Foundation. It is highly suitable for the Kimberleys. Furthermore, there is now an HVDC transmission system in Africa that delivers power over 1,700 kilometres away from where it is generated—and I have advice from Asea Brown Boveri Australia, ABB, one of the greatest electrical transmission companies in the world, that 2,000 kilometres would be okay. So with HVDC transmission you can transmit power from the tidal regions of the Kimberleys to Perth. You could transmit power from Perth to Port Augusta—or, more particularly, Roxby Downs—as a starting point and interconnect to the eastern states network. That is 2,000 kilometres, and that would be fine. There are very low line losses with high-voltage DC. Furthermore, it is bipolar—as now operates in Bass Strait. There is an HVDC line in Bass Strait. They feed brown coal power, which the member for Werriwa talked about—the cheapest electricity in Australia—into Tasmania as baseload power and, when the demand starts to pick up, they return hydro power, which they have been conserving, back into Victoria and the network. That brown coal power could be the backup—right up into the Kimberleys. What is more, you could electrify the Pilbara rail system—and how much would you save in emissions doing that? The Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Procurement, who is at the table and whom I think has an interest in people’s employment, might bother to go to my website, www.wilsontuckey.com.au, and have a look at the proposal. He will see that right at the end of the proposal I have costed it, on the best available advice. Putting a 30 per cent contingency figure on it, it is $10 billion. Ten billion dollars was laid on the table in this place in one day to save the Murray, although it has not done much to achieve it. Government would be the logical body to spend that $10 billion. Who built all the original carbon-spewing powerhouses? Government. Who built the Snowy Mountains scheme? Government. Instead of bringing loads of paper into this place and trying to devise a scheme that taxes people into leaving the country, why not spend 10 billion bucks and solve the problem? You do not have to geosequester to meet your international commitments. You say to the world, ‘We are progressing towards a fifty-fifty contribution, that being 50 per cent tidal’—and remember there is six times the capacity up there—‘and 50 per cent coal.’ You need the two. You make them partners. You take over no-one’s job, you do not tax them into submission and you meet your international requirement in a very real way—no funny business, no pumping into the ground over there something that is leaking out over here. Why don’t we get onto that? We talk about bipartisanship. Well, I have not kept this a secret for the next election. The PowerPoint presentation is on my website for people to see, and every member of the coalition has it in printed form. The energy up there is huge. It has been recognised by international bodies, but the Australian government do not want to know it is there and the minister wants to shut it down and let Geneva decide what should be done about it. (Time expired) 7673 11:24:00 Thomson, Kelvin, MP UK6 Wills ALP 1 0 Mr KELVIN THOMSON —One of the bills now before the House, the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, will enable carbon dioxide to be stored safely and securely in geological storage formations deep underground in Australian offshore waters under Commonwealth jurisdiction. The bill’s amendments will make available storage formations in offshore waters that will have the potential to securely store hundreds of millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide for many thousands of years. This represents a substantial quantity of Australian greenhouse gas emissions. The bill will achieve this by allowing exploration for greenhouse gas injection and storage sites through the release of areas in Commonwealth offshore waters. The bill will provide an underlying framework within which detailed regulations will be drafted specific to greenhouse gas injection and storage, which will provide a management system that ensures storage is safe and secure. Environmental concerns will continue to be covered through legislation such as the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 and the Offshore Petroleum Act management of the environment regulations. Carbon dioxide capture and geological storage—often referred to these days as CCS, which is easier to pronounce than ‘geosequestration’—is an important means by which carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions can be prevented from being released into the atmosphere. The importance of CCS has been demonstrated by the Australian upstream oil and gas industry, which for some time has undertaken successful carbon storage in this country. The Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association collectively accounts for companies that produce around 98 per cent of Australia’s oil and gas. It is these companies and the technology and know-how in carbon storage of Australia’s oil and gas industry that will be the key to Australia’s realising its ambitions to be a world leader in carbon capture and storage. For decades this industry has been injecting CO2 into the ground all around the world as a means for enhancing the recovery of hydrocarbons. The oil and gas industry has considerable expertise in utilising and developing the technologies that are required for CCS both in Australia and on the international stage. In Australia this has been driven through the former Australian Petroleum Cooperative Research Centre, under its GEODISC program, and the current Cooperative Research Centre for Greenhouse Gas Technologies, which is often referred to as the CO2CRC. It is Australia’s proposed Gorgon LNG project that is set to become the world’s largest commercial carbon sequestration project. It is the Australian gas company Santos, in conjunction with Australian companies Beach Petroleum and Origin Energy, that is progressing the commercial Moomba carbon storage project, a project that could eventually store up to 20 megatonnes of CO2-equivalent per year and one billion tonnes of it over the life of the project. It is the Browse LNG project joint venture partners who are currently examining a range of geosequestration options in north-west Western Australia. Anzon is also planning, as part of the innovative development of the Basker Manta Gummy petroleum project in the Gippsland Basin, to make available the infrastructure, after depletion, for storage of carbon captured from Latrobe Valley coal-fired power stations. So it is the Australian gas production industry that is one of the keys to the ultimate success of carbon sequestration in this country. This is a very important reason why we must ensure that our climate change policies enable the gas industry to help us realise our ambitions for carbon capture and storage. As I have mentioned in the parliament before, we have around 140 trillion cubic feet of offshore gas reserves. Australia’s natural gas reserves have the unique potential, in both the short term and the long term, to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions domestically through greater penetration of natural gas in the domestic market, and also in the Asia-Pacific region through increased LNG exports. The vast reserves of natural gas located in close proximity to growing Asia-Pacific markets make Australia well placed to positively assist in meeting the global climate change challenge while substantially contributing to Australia’s economic growth. On latest life cycle figures, for every tonne of greenhouse gas emissions associated with Australia’s production of LNG, four tonnes are avoided in Japan and between 5½ and 9½ tonnes are avoided in China, making the LNG industry one of Australia’s key clean global contributors. Australia’s vast natural gas resources have a vital role to play in reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the region. Clean-burning natural gas provides a vital stepping stone on the path to low-emission economies. I am told that every extra tonne of cooled gas that the LNG industry can export to China will help avoid global greenhouse emissions of up to 6.8 tonnes in net terms. In the region in general, the growth of this industry would assist in reducing greenhouse gases to the tune of 120 million tonnes. Clearly, there is an opportunity for Australia to generate significant additional national economic, environmental and social benefits from its substantial natural gas reserves, and this indeed needs to include the creation of a less carbon intensive national electricity market. Natural gas fired power stations produce 50 to 70 per cent less greenhouse gas emissions than equivalent coal-fired power stations and can use as little as one per cent of the water. This creates an enormous opportunity to respond to the growing public demand for cleaner energy. An expansion in the use of gas in resource processing could reduce the carbon intensity of the resource-processing sector. Furthermore, natural gas as an alternative transport fuel would enhance supply reliability and reduce our exposure to oil shocks, giving us greater energy independence. The lower carbon intensity of gas as a transport fuel will help diminish the incidence of respiratory illness, asthma and the like, and, in addition to its more greenhouse-friendly nature, natural gas represents a cost competitive energy source. This is particularly so when you consider the generation costs of natural gas compared to other energy generation technologies. The Australian upstream oil and gas industry has set itself a number of growth targets over the next decade, which include: first, increasing exports to 50 to 60 million tonnes per year from the current volume of 15½ million tonnes per year; second, doubling the use of natural gas use in resource processing; and, third, a more competitive electricity market where 70 per cent of all new electricity generation capacity installed in Australia over the next decade is gas-fired. If these targets are met, I am told, global emissions avoided could total at least 180 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent per year by 2017. Reaching these targets would also have significant economic and social benefits for Australia, with economic modelling suggesting: first, an increase of between $13 billion and $55 billion in GDP in net present value terms, which is equivalent to adding between 0.24 and 0.31 percentage points to Australian GDP growth in 2017; second, an increase in real consumption of between $500 million and $21 billion in net present value terms over the period to 2017; third, an additional $10 billion a year of tax revenue; fourth, an increase in Australian exports, leading to an improvement in our trade balance of $1.6 billion by 2017; fifth, increased employment in the oil and gas sector and service industries; sixth, the diversification of Australia’s energy economy with increased penetration of gas in the domestic manufacturing industry; and, finally, a major boost to remote regional economies, particularly in Western Australia, Queensland and the Northern Territory. Given the significant and sustained greenhouse and broader environmental and economic benefits that flow directly from a strong, vibrant and growing Australian upstream oil and gas industry, it is important that Australia’s greenhouse policy response encourages the further use of natural gas both domestically and in the region. The need for prompt action in addressing global warming is apparent, and the bills before the House make a significant contribution in promoting and developing one of the available methods of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The Labor government recognises that new clean energy technologies, including both fossil fuels and renewable energy sources, are a key to sustainable climate change solution. The government is providing leadership and policies that reduce or eliminate greenhouse gas emissions but at the same time seek to ensure that we continue to prosper from our abundant energy reserves. In this context and as a fossil fuel dependent economy, the Australian government has a pivotal role to play in driving technology outcomes that reduce or eliminate greenhouse gas emissions, and a key part of this effort is the need to establish a framework to allow for the capture and geological storage of greenhouse gases emitted from fossil fuel use both domestically and internationally. This bill indicates yet again that there is only one side of the House which is serious about tackling climate change. Whether you are talking about the Kyoto protocol and our international efforts, whether you are talking about emissions trading and carbon trading, whether you are talking about support for renewable energy or whether you are talking about carbon capture and storage, as we on this side of the House are, the government has been fair dinkum about tackling global warming and climate change. The other side of the House has had to be dragged kicking and screaming to even understand the nature of the problem. The former Leader of the Opposition, for whom in many respects I have a lot of sympathy, was of the view that Australia should not be prepared to engage in carbon trading unless and until the rest of the world was doing the same thing. As I have said before, this reminds me of some kind of student frat house where the residents of the house say, ‘I’m not going to clean up my room until everyone else does theirs.’ No-one does the dishes, no-one puts out the garbage, no-one does the laundry and pretty soon the house becomes a pigsty. Or you might like to think of a boat headed for Niagara Falls being rowed by a hundred canoeists. They work out that they are headed for Niagara Falls, but each of them keeps on rowing, saying, ‘I’m not going to change direction until everyone else does.’ That is a foolish approach. We need to understand that climate change is a major problem affecting us now and that all the scientific evidence for Australia, as well as for the rest of the world, is of very severe impacts in the form of drought, bushfires, loss of snow cover, increased vulnerability to tropical diseases, impacts on the Great Barrier Reef and Kakadu—you name it! There is scientific evidence on what is happening with the North Pole—the Arctic melt during the summer months and the pressures that that is placing on the Greenland ice sheet—and the melting of the West Antarctic ice sheet. All of these things suggest a crisis which needs to be handled with the kind of urgency with which we approached the Second World War. But the other side of politics has no understanding of this and simply wants to talk about what the costs will be. This issue has been measured by well-respected economists, such as Nicholas Stern and Ross Garnaut, who have informed us that the costs of doing nothing will be greater than the costs of acting. A few days ago the Australian Food and Grocery Council put out some information expressing concern that a carbon trading scheme could lead to an increase in the price of food. But everyone needs to understand that if we do not act to resolve this problem our water supplies in southern Australia, for example, will diminish. There is no doubt that reduced water supplies will act to increase the price of food. We need to understand what the costs of failure to act will be. I support this legislation. It establishes access and property rights for the safe and secure injection and storage of greenhouse gases into stable, subsurface geological reservoirs in Commonwealth waters more than three nautical miles offshore. It will provide project developers with the certainty required to commit to major low-emission energy projects involving carbon capture and storage. It will allow for the establishment of an effective regulatory framework to ensure that projects meet health, safety and environmental requirements. It is good, well thought through legislation and I commend it to the House. 7676 11:39:00 Lindsay, Peter, MP HK6 Herbert LP 0 0 Mr LINDSAY —The question of what is going on in the environment is not as simple as some would make it out to be. It is highly complex. Out in the Australian heartland there is goodwill on most people’s part and a recognition that we as a country have to show leadership in relation to the way ahead in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. But there is also a realisation that we have to be careful about damaging our own country for no gain. That is the trade-off that the parliament will wrestle with as this matter proceeds. There are some who say that if Australia cut off all of its greenhouse gas tomorrow, if the emission of every last tonne of greenhouse gas were stopped tomorrow, it would make no difference to the dire consequences that are facing the world—and there is probably some truth in that. Others involved in the debate would say: ‘Well, somebody has to show some leadership somewhere. We have to lead the world.’ To China’s credit, they are doing more these days than most people give them credit for in relation to meeting their responsibilities. However, I do not think the same can be said about India, the United States or Japan. So it may well be that we can join with China in leading the world in addressing these particular issues, and it is vital that we do. The Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 is part of our contribution to what we as a country may be able to do in facing up to these particular issues. On Saturday I was on Magnetic Island, in the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage listed area. I represent Magnetic Island and, of course, the city of Townsville in this parliament. The Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts was there to open a Solar Cities project. He said, as the member for Wills just said, that the former government did not do anything in relation to the environment. Here he was opening the first Solar Cities project in Queensland, which was a Howard government initiative. We will have a complete solar suburb on Magnetic Island, a great initiative. The bill before the House today was an initiative of the Howard government. The bill was developed in 2005, when we were in government, and certainly it carries our support, as it will go through the parliament in this sitting. No-one should underestimate the Howard government or say that it was asleep at the wheel in relation to climate change. We committed $10 billion to the Murray-Darling system, where the Australian government was to take over the comprehensive management of that system. But what have we now seen the Labor Party do? Basically give it back to the states, and we are back to where we were. It is a shame that that has happened. Under the provisions of this act, we will see authorisation for the storage of greenhouse gas substances—that is a quaint bureaucratic way of referring to what we are talking about—which, in essence, means the capture of carbon dioxide, together with any substances incidentally derived from the capture, injection and storage process. In looking at geosequestration in Australia we do have a Cooperative Research Centre for Greenhouse Gas Technologies, with the quaint name CO2CRC, which is conducting the first Australian CO2 geosequestration storage project in western Victoria in the Otway Basin. Its aim is to demonstrate the effectiveness of CO2 storage underground. All of us should support geosequestration with a caveat. The caveat comes from me, which I believe will also have the support of the government. There have been proposals to have geosequestration underneath the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. It is interesting that the member for Capricornia is here because it is that area under the park where this gas is proposed to be sequestered. I have said very publicly, and I believe that the government has agreed with me, that we should in fact exclude the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park from sequestration because of the other issues it would attract if we were to do that. One other issue is oil drilling on the Barrier Reef. Both sides of parliament have been totally opposed to allowing that course of action. I am advised that successful sequestration projects have already been undertaken in Norway, Algeria and the USA. In Australia, Gorgon are well advanced in their proposal to sequester deep below adjacent Barrow Island greenhouse gases from their North West Shelf gas project. Some people are concerned that CO2 stored underground could become unstable, could leak out slowly or could leak out rapidly following earth movements. This could result in the asphyxiation of people and animals. However, I observe that there are many places in the earth’s crust where oil, gas and CO2 have been safely stored for millions of years. Geosequestration aims to emulate these natural traps. I have the benefit of some professional advice on this—my son is a geologist and he has a PhD. In speaking about this he is quite convinced, in his professional opinion, that the evidence is there to trust this process. He says it is extremely unlikely that CO2 will leak to the surface from a geosequestration site because the storage location is deep and overlain by impermeable geological formations that act as a seal. Storage sites, of course, will also be monitored to check the location and behaviour of the CO2. It is vital that we reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Australia, and this is one of the ways that we can do that. In Australia, particularly in Queensland, coal is reliable, plentiful and relatively cheap. Its supporters argue that we are likely to remain dependent on it for our energy needs for the foreseeable future. Through innovative projects to develop clean technologies—and the development of nominated carbon capture and storage is one of the technology options—we can reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimated that a power plant with a carbon capture system could reduce CO2 emissions by 80 to 90 per cent compared to a plant without a carbon capture system. However, CCS is expensive and unproven technology. If it works, the IPCC estimates that it will add 25 to 50 per cent to the cost of coal-fired electricity. But that is the cost that the community has to bear and it is the cost that the member for Wills referred to in his contribution to the parliament. I want the parliament to know and understand that I support this technology. In practice, it will not be put into place in Australia for perhaps another 15 or 20 years, but we have to have the framework there. Through this bill, the Australian parliament is making that framework available for use in Australia. Hopefully, the rest of the world will see the leadership that we are showing as a country and take up the challenges that we are facing wherever those challenges may be. I wish to indicate my support for this bill. 7678 11:50:00 Thomson, Craig, MP HVZ Dobell ALP 1 0 Mr CRAIG THOMSON —The Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 will amend the Offshore Petroleum Act 2006 to establish a system of offshore titles similar to the offshore petroleum titles that already exist under the principal act. The bill will authorise the transportation by pipeline of greenhouse gas substances and their injection and storage in deep geological formations under the seabed. The bill will also make changes to the existing regime of petroleum titles that are needed in order to accommodate the new kinds of activities being authorised by the act. Petroleum and greenhouse gas operations will, in many respects, be similar. The resources of the seabed and subsoils that the two categories of title holders will seek to exploit have much in common. Each form of activity will have the potential to impact on the other, both beneficially and detrimentally. The bill therefore provides for the regulatory decisions made in respect of each form of activity to take into account the potential impacts on the other. This is something that is absolutely necessary in fighting climate change. I welcome the support that the member for Herbert just made in his contribution. Clearly, he believes in climate change. Notwithstanding his contribution, there is a clear demarcation between the Labor side of politics and the benches of the climate change sceptics who sit opposite us. It was one of the defining issues of difference in the 2007 election campaign. We all know who the Australian people trusted with these and the other important challenges that we face. We do not know how the new jockey of the Liberal Party horse will be on these new, important reforms. We know what he leaked from cabinet last year when in government. Media reports show that senior figures have said, ‘The young, mad Right have gone with Turnbull.’ The question that we have here today is: will the young, mad Right, so decisive in the election of the member for Wentworth and who are lock, stock and barrel members of the climate change sceptics club, be the ones writing the opposition’s new policy in relation to this area? This is an area that is too important for us to get wrong. It is too important to have those who want to bury their heads in the sand and take the ostrich mentality in relation to climate change making any contribution to what we need to do to make sure that we look after our planet. I want to talk a little bit about the effects of climate change on the beautiful electorate of Dobell. The electorate of Dobell—clearly the most beautiful electorate in all of Australia—while blessed with many natural beauties, is one that has a very fragile environment that is susceptible to climate change. Rising sea levels, the predicted increase in experiences of east coast lows—bringing more extreme storm events—increased bushfire activity and water shortages have the potential to cause major problems for my electorate. Dobell extends along the coast from just north of the Terrigal Lagoon through to Norah Head. Areas such as the Wamberal beachfronts and North Entrance have been identified as particularly vulnerable to rising sea levels and greater storm activity. Both suburbs have recently experienced severe beach erosion that has eroded the yards of private properties and destroyed fences, decking et cetera as backyards of houses have fallen away into the beaches. As sea levels rise and storm events and surges become more severe and potentially more frequent, it would be not unexpected to lose a number of homes within these areas. At Norah Head, coastal erosion has forced the local council to issue orders to residents to dismantle structures from backyards of properties to reduce pressure on the seaward slope and assist in the prevention of major land slippage. Heavy rain plus wave energy impact on the toe of this slope has placed a number of homes in the unenviable position of currently having no backyard—plus the potential of the homes being lost to the sea. This is a real threat that is happening right now because of the changes in our environment and climate change. Wyong Shire Council and the state government have both committed extensive amounts of money to try to minimise the rate of erosion of this slope at Norah Head. The reality is that these works might not prevent the loss of these properties if a severe storm were to impact on this part of the Dobell coastline again, as storms have done so frequently in the past. This is a popular recreation area for locals and tourists alike. Ocean baths provide safe swimming, and the area is popular with recreational fisher men and women. The Norah Head Lighthouse and the annual whale migrations attract many tourists to the area—understandably so. On the June long weekend of 2007 a storm associated with an east coast low caused some local severe flooding around Tuggerah Lake and Wamberal Lagoon. Over a thousand people were forced to leave their homes, and much of the area was without power for up to a week. Sewerage and stormwater facilities were unable to cope when severe flooding occurred. I would like to put on the record thanks to David Harris, the state member for Wyong, for his tireless work in relation to this and the work that he did with the local community. Just recently, Mr Harris and I conducted a ‘Thank your local hero’ barbecue at Chittaway Bay, where we were able to thank the ordinary citizens who had been out there helping their neighbours get out of the flood that occurred in June 2007. Since then we have had three more major storm events. They did not cause flooding as extensive as on that June long weekend; nonetheless there was serious flooding in the area. A research paper entitled The ecological history of Tuggerah Lakes: what the newspapers said, by the CSIRO in October 1998, detailed a long history of flooding, with damage to roads and bridges and the occasional loss of life. Extensive flood mitigation has been carried out, but climate change makes some of the supposed benefits of much of this work problematic. Areas around Wamberal Lagoon and North Entrance have already been identified as areas at increased risk through rising sea levels, storm surges and changes to wave direction through height and intensity of those waves. These areas have been adversely affected in the past by extreme weather events. Much of the development along these particular areas was built prior to current coastal management strategies and, although local government authorities now carefully constrain the development that occurs along these beach areas, the market price of these properties remains very high. Obviously, people are going to lose as their backyards continue to be washed away into the ocean. An environmental impact study for Gosford City Council in 2003 stated: Coastal investigations show that the foreshores of the Terrigal/Wamberal embayment have experienced a gradual recession over at least the past fifty years, interspersed with more severe episodes of storm erosion. The identified shoreline recession is ongoing and is gradually exposing the foredune (and development thereon) to more frequent storm erosion events. This has been dramatically demonstrated during the storms in 1974 and again in 1978. Then, many houses along the Wamberal foreshore fell into the sea. It is possible that a breakwater or similar structure at North Entrance may lessen the severity of storm surges on the vulnerable areas of North Entrance and allow for the opening of the channel from the lakes to the ocean during flood events, but a comprehensive study would need to be performed. I am happy to say that this was an election promise that the Rudd government made in relation to this area, and it was one that I campaigned very heavily on during the election, to see whether a seawall would assist in terms of the effects that climate change is having on the area. Another important promise that was made during the election was to commit $20 million to looking at how we can actively improve the run-off areas into Tuggerah Lake so that, when storms occur and when sea surges happen, we can assist in a better way and make sure that damage is ameliorated, that homes are not affected and that the health of the lake is at its best. The demographics of Dobell make disaster planning very problematic. There is a large commuter population, with over 30,000 working people travelling to Sydney or Newcastle on a daily basis. There is a large elderly population there too, and this again presents problems in terms of how these issues are managed. The population of Dobell is concentrated in urban villages separated by various waterways. There is pressure to supply more land for housing developments to ease population increases of the Greater Sydney region. It is estimated that there will be an additional 75,000 people moving into the area in the next 20 years. This increase in population is one that we welcome on the Central Coast, but it also comes with the difficulty that we need to plan around a fragile environment that is very susceptible to climate change. Local industries such as tourism and hospitality would be negatively impacted on by greater frequency of extreme weather events caused by global warming, and popular tourist destinations such as Wamberal and The Entrance would be adversely affected by rising sea levels. Dobell is also vulnerable to increases in bushfire frequency and intensity. In 1994 Central Coast residents were isolated for several days when fire closed rail and road transport links. Intermittent closures occur nearly every bushfire season. In the west, large tracts of wilderness area abut sparsely populated river valleys and are frequently subject to uncontrollable bushfires. Again, this is all evidence of the effect that climate change is having in my electorate and why we need to take concrete steps to address these sorts of issues. On the eastern side of the highway, urban villages are surrounded by bushland and, although there are well-designed bushfire plans, the sort of bushfire weather activity seen in other areas of Australia over the last few years could have a devastating impact upon the residents and environment of Dobell. Climate change represents one of the greatest threats to the future prosperity and security of Australia and its region. It is critical for Australia to implement long-term measures to address the environmental and economic challenges of climate change and to engage constructively with global efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The long-term prosperity and wellbeing of Australia depends on our sustaining our environment and tackling critical challenges such as addressing water shortages, protecting threatened species and reducing carbon emissions. Labor believe that establishing a long-term target for greenhouse gas emission reductions provides certainty for energy companies and helps industry make informed decisions about which technologies they should be investing in—allowing the economy and society to adjust in a reasonable time frame. We have already ratified the Kyoto protocol and join with 167 other countries in the effort to avoid dangerous climate change. This side of the House believes a national emissions trading scheme will provide a long-term incentive to cut emissions further and act as a mechanism for trading, so that energy is allocated efficiently in the economy and greater private investment in clean energy technology is encouraged. The government believes that adequate funding of research into the science of climate change, emission reduction technologies and adaptation management is vital if Australia is to meet the challenges of climate change. We will fund research into renewable energy and support research, development and demonstration aimed at technologies to reduce emissions from fossil fuels, including cleaner coal and gas, and technologies to capture and store carbon dioxide to prevent its release into the atmosphere. We will work with state, territory and local governments to ensure that five-star energy efficiency provisions are mandatory for new homes. The government will promote more sustainable management of Australia’s vegetation cover and an end to broadscale clearing. The government is committed to cooperation between states, territories and landholders to achieve a net expansion of vegetation cover and reductions in emissions related to land use change. A Clean Energy Plan to help Australian consumers and Australian businesses work together to tackle climate change is something that this government is doing. The Clean Energy Plan, which Labor promised at the last election, will help ensure all Australians reap the benefits of the latest clean energy supplies and energy-saving technologies. Expanding the cost-effectiveness of clean energy will be critical to meeting federal Labor’s science based target to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 60 per cent by 2050. The new elements of Labor’s Clean Energy Plan as announced are: a $500 million Renewable Energy Fund, to develop, commercialise and deploy renewable energy in Australia; a $240 million Clean Business Fund, to help businesses and industry deliver energy and water efficiency projects, with a focus on productivity and innovation; and a $150 million Energy Innovation Fund to keep our world-leading scientists and researchers in Australia, rather than losing them overseas. These announcements complement the other key element of Labor’s Clean Energy Plan—a $500 million Clean Coal Fund to fund the deployment of clean coal technologies. Labor understands that acting now on climate change is not only good for the environment but good for the Australian economy. The previous government failed to provide support to Australian clean energy researchers, and that has resulted in our experts heading overseas to develop and commercialise their technology in other economies. Only this government will provide the support necessary to keep Australian technologies in Australia, along with the jobs and economic opportunities that flow from commercialisation. Federal Labor will implement an emissions trading scheme and will make the investments today that are required to help the economy prepare for emissions trading. Under the previous government’s policies, emissions are set to increase by 27 per cent above 1990 levels by 2020; under the present government, emissions will go down. We have ratified the Kyoto protocol. We have set a renewable energy target of 20 per cent by 2020. We have $8,000 rebates for solar power, $1,000 rebates for solar hot-water systems, $500 rebates for greywater piping and rainwater tanks, $500 rebates for landlords to install insulation and $10,000 in low-interest green loans for solar systems and water- and energy-saving measures. We have invested $15 million in a Clean Energy Export Strategy. We have invested $20 million in a Clean Energy Innovation Centre. We have invested in a Green Car Innovation Fund to develop and build green cars in Australia. Labor went to the last election with a commitment of $100 million for a five-year Community Coast Care Program—as part of our Caring for our Coasts Plan—to help local communities protect the Australian coastline and prepare for the impact of climate change. I thank the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts for his visit to Dobell, where he re-emphasised this commitment and met with Landcare groups in my community, who are doing such a good job to try and make sure that our coastline does not end up in the ocean. Increasing storm activity and sea level rises from climate change are threatening coastlines, property, habitat and the financial viability of local councils. The previous Prime Minister’s Science, Engineering and Innovation Council estimated that 700,000 coastal addresses are at risk from long-term sea level rise and large storm surges. These impacts are exacerbated by coastal development as a result of the sea change phenomenon, which is driving massive population growth. Under federal Labor’s plan, local communities will be better equipped to deal with extreme climate related events and storms. Community groups will be able to seek grants for action to guard against habitat loss, erosion, damage to dunes, waterway degradation and invasive weeds and pests. The government is providing national leadership on coastal management and bolstering support to local communities so that they too can take some practical action in relation to these issues. The Community Coast Care Program will provide grants of up to $50,000 for community groups, from unallocated funds in the Natural Heritage Trust, to undertake on-the-ground coastal restoration and preventive work. In addition to the $100 million Community Coast Care Program, the Rudd government is committed to handover the Point Nepean and Malabar headlands to the New South Wales and Victorian governments for national park and public open space, provide a $200 million rescue package for the Great Barrier Reef and provide funding for rainwater tanks et cetera. Coastal icons will be among the first to experience the consequence of climate change if we do not act now. Our conservative projections of sea level rises would see Narrabeen Beach disappear by 2050; the Manly wharf made unusable; Cairns and its infrastructure under severe threat from storm surges; and Victoria’s 2,000 kilometres of coastline, including the Great Ocean Road, face frequent storm surges and saltwater incursions into wetlands. I have already gone into some detail about the effects that this would have on my electorate of Dobell. Federal Labor will provide national leadership that breaks through the political barriers to deliver outcomes for coastal communities and coastal environments. The storage of a greenhouse gas substance in deep geological formations under the seabed is an important part of the broader plan to deal with climate change. I commend the bill to the House. 7683 12:10:00 Hunt, Gregory, MP 00AMV Flinders LP 0 0 Mr HUNT —I rise to speak today on the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, in a cognate debate with the Offshore Petroleum (Annual Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, the Offshore Petroleum (Registration Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and the Offshore Petroleum (Safety Levies) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008. I want to proceed in two stages. The first stage is to address the problem and the second stage is to address our three-pillars response to climate change, clean energy and clean air. Let me start by addressing the problem and recognising a very important thing. As a coalition, we have made a clear judgement—we did this in government and we continue this position—that Australia has to be part of a clean energy future for itself and part of a clean energy future with respect to our international and global responsibilities. We do so because we recognise that the accumulation of CO2 in the atmosphere has been the subject of international work which in turn says that this will have an impact on the world’s future environment through the greenhouse process. I recognise that that is disputed by many, but we make the judgement that it is of sufficient magnitude that we treat it as a vital issue. I have clearly stated, on the record on many occasions, that this is a strong personal issue, a matter of belief, a matter of judgement on the balance of probabilities, which are, I believe, overwhelming. Having said that, the problem Australia faces is very simple. We contribute just 1.4 per cent of global emissions—about 578 million tonnes out of a total of approximately 40 billion tonnes of CO2 annually. Action alone is irrelevant. We have to do our part but action alone is irrelevant. We know that China and India are adding approximately 800 new coal- and gas-fired power stations over the coming five years. This alone is about 20 times greater than our entire generating stock in Australia of existing fossil based power stations. In essence, unilateral action will mean nothing. That leads me to our three-pillars approach and where this set of bills, in relation to greenhouse gas storage, fits in. The first of our three pillars is this: we must have unrelenting international pressure to make sure that the great emitters—China, India, the United States, Brazil, Russia and Indonesia—are fundamental contributors to any change. If they are not part of the solution there will be no solution. Any actions we take at home will be rendered utterly irrelevant. The second part of the international approach is that the Rudd government has utterly and completely dropped the ball in relation to protecting the great rainforests of the world. These forests—in Indonesia, Brazil, Papua New Guinea and other parts of the tropics—represent 20 per cent of global annual emissions when they are felled and burnt. That is eight billion tonnes out of 40 billion tonnes. This is the single biggest source of emissions reduction and the single cheapest way to do major work towards emissions reduction over the next five years globally. We believe it is possible to halve the rate of net deforestation. In turn, that has benefits for local ecology and for communities, and it has a profound impact on buying the world time and the capacity to do what it can to decrease emissions. On that basis we think that the failure of the Rudd government to treat seriously the challenge of deforestation is an abject failure, one which we criticise and one which we will deal with. The second pillar is in relation to the direct intervention in clean energy, and that is where these bills, which come from our work when we were in government, play a role. We support the general thrust of these bills but we have specific reservations, which we will make clear in the Senate. Those reservations include the minister being able to direct an outcome that potentially overlaps greenhouse gas storage and petroleum titles, incumbent petroleum operators, long-term liabilities and, in particular, ensuring that the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park is protected. Having said that, we support the general thrust of these bills, because half of Australia’s 578 million tonnes of CO2 per annum comes from the generation of electricity and on-site stationary energy production. That is the subject of these bills; that is the material that can be captured and stored. Where coal is used, greenhouse gas storage is a three-stage process—drying, gasification and then carbon capture and storage. In order to enable carbon capture and storage we need carbon supercorridors—we need the carbon highways that will allow the captured gases to be transmitted and then stored. In order to allow that storage we need a legal regime. We are seeing that greenhouse gas storage is occurring around the world. Carbon capture and storage is occurring in Norway with the Sleipner and Snohvit projects, in Algeria with the Salah project, in the USA in Illinois and in Australia with Chevron’s Gorgon project, which is well advanced in its proposal to sequester greenhouse gases below Barrow Island. We are already seeing in my home state of Victoria the CO2 Cooperative Research Centre’s Otway Basin pilot project advancing at a great rate. I am proud that we put that project into place when we were in government. It is a model of both clean energy and, importantly for communities, clean air. It is a way of dealing with particulates, although CO2 itself does not have a local impact. When CO2 is captured we also see the generalised clean-up of the other particulates that accompany it. So it is good for local communities in the Latrobe and Hunter valleys, it is good for global emissions and it is indispensable in ensuring that we have a long-term future for clean coal and clean gas as fundamental energy sources in Australia. That is why we support this bill. The third pillar of our approach to climate change is a marked, moderate and sensible approach to emissions trading that does not blow up the house and that does not mean that Australia puts itself at a competitive disadvantage with the rest of the world. If there is no global agreement, then we believe in a low and slow commencement price starting in 2011-12. We are committed to the concept of emissions trading—indeed, the architect of it is the new Leader of the Opposition, the member for Wentworth. But the member for Wentworth was sensible in putting in place a proposal that would be careful, that would not destroy the clean energy sector—as we are seeing—and that would not wreck Australian industry by bringing it in too quickly and out of sync with the rest of the world. We need to look at how we address the question of a level playing field. I have met with numerous industries, including industries from the cement, aluminium and LNG sectors. All of those industries will find themselves at a gross disadvantage internationally. There are also the import exposed industries such as automotive manufacturers, components manufacturers and cement and various forms of food and grocery production that will be exposed if there is not a level playing field. The government do not seem to have put an appropriate mechanism in place. We support the general concept, we believe it has a role, but it is the only mechanism that they are pursuing. They have dropped the ball in relation to cleaning up our energy sources, they have dropped the ball in relation to protecting the great forests and they have put all their eggs in the basket of a rushed emissions trading scheme. We believe in dealing with this issue, but there is a good system and a bad system—and the government have proposed a bad system that has been rushed. Under what they are currently proposing, Australian jobs will suffer while there will be no benefit to the environment. Nevertheless, cleaning up our energy sources is fundamental. The clean energy vision is ours; the solar continent vision is ours. We will prosecute them and we will develop them. We believe in the capacity of clean energy to be a fundamental source of innovation and competitive advantage for Australia if done correctly. That is why we support the bill in principle, but we will move the amendments as foreshadowed in the Senate. 7685 12:22:00 Dreyfus, Mark, MP HWG Isaacs ALP 1 0 Mr DREYFUS —I rise to speak in support of the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, the Offshore Petroleum (Annual Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, the Offshore Petroleum (Registration Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and the Offshore Petroleum (Safety Levies) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008. These bills create a new class of offshore titles that provide for the transportation by pipeline and the injection and storage in geological formations of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases such as methane. Carbon capture and storage is a process by which carbon dioxide—or potentially other greenhouse gases—is captured and separated from a source such as a power plant and then transported and injected into a geological formation, often undersea, for permanent storage. Through the creation of these new offshore titles, these bills provide for access and property rights to be allocated for the capture and storage of greenhouse gases. A greenhouse gas injection licence will authorise the injection and storage of what is termed in the legislation as a ‘greenhouse gas substance’. Under regulations, the responsible minister will have the power to extend the meaning of ‘greenhouse gas substance’ to include other greenhouse gases in several circumstances, including, firstly, if the protocol to the London dumping convention is amended to permit geological storage of other greenhouse gas substances and, secondly, if the provisions of the legislation are extended to include the permanent storage of methane from offshore petroleum operations. The Offshore Petroleum Act applies in the Commonwealth offshore jurisdiction, between three nautical miles offshore and the outer limits of the Australian continental shelf. Under the proposed model the Commonwealth will be primarily responsible for the administration of greenhouse gas storage. This differs from current arrangements that apply to the petroleum industry, under which there is joint authority between the Commonwealth and state and territory administrations. The framework established by this legislation will provide a harmonised and nationally consistent approach to carbon capture and storage. This will result in reduced administrative costs and greater certainty for market participants. This bill, although it is specific to a particular technology, is part of a broader comprehensive approach to dealing with the challenge posed by climate change. The scale of this challenge requires national leadership. It is clear that human induced climate change poses a threat to our prosperity, our natural environment, our lifestyle and standard of living, and our community. The uncertainty that is created by both the changes in weather patterns and the greater variability in weather patterns has serious implications for our economic prosperity. Climate change is an issue that will profoundly affect Australia’s economy and future national prosperity. The Minister for Climate Change and Water made this clear in a speech to the CEDA State of the Nation conference on 6 June, earlier this year, when she said: … this Government believes climate change is an economic issue, and the only way to tackle climate change is with real economic reform. The response of each country to the challenge of climate change will be unique to their particular circumstances. Australia’s response will necessarily be shaped by the importance of the coal industry as both a source of energy and a source of export revenue. Currently 80 per cent of Australia’s electricity is generated from coal. Black coal from New South Wales and Queensland remains an important and growing source of export revenue. In 2005-06 coal generated some $24 billion in export income for Australia, and it is expected to be worth some $55 billion this financial year. Quite simply, Australia is a fossil fuel dependent economy. Even as we invest in renewable energy sources and even as we reduce our energy consumption, Australia will remain a fossil fuel dependent economy for some time yet. As a Victorian, I understand the critical importance of brown coal to our state economy. Brown coal has been regarded since the 19th century as a cheap and easily accessible source of energy. The scale of the resource that is to be found in the Latrobe Valley is, I suspect, not appreciated even by Victorians, let alone other Australians. What is understood is that brown coal has helped to underwrite much of Victoria’s industrial and broader economic development. It is at present the case that the enormous deposits of brown coal that are found in the Latrobe Valley fuel some 95 per cent of Victoria’s electricity generation. The central part that brown coal plays in the Victorian economy is, whatever occurs in relation to other forms of energy generation, likely to continue for some time to come. The scale of the resource alone—estimated, at current rates of usage, to be a 500-year supply—would indicate that brown coal is going to continue to be used. Certainly planning in the Latrobe Valley, with which I have had some involvement, and planning by the state government for the future assumes that there will be continuing use for some time to come of the enormous brown coal resource in the Latrobe Valley. The Rudd government understand the important role that coal has played in building our national prosperity. In addition to this bill, the Minister for Resources and Energy announced in July the establishment of the National Low Emissions Coal Council and the carbon storage taskforce. The minister said at the time: The Taskforce will examine the work already underway in Australia and indicate priority issues going forward. It will make recommendations to the National Low Emissions Coal Council on a forward work program for geological mapping, infrastructure and storage locations. The carbon storage taskforce is particularly important in the process of making carbon capture and storage a reality for Australian industry. This approach has been welcomed by the Australian Coal Association. To acknowledge the importance of coal to our national prosperity in no way diminishes our commitment to tackling climate change. I have had a long passion for the natural environment of our country. As I said in my first speech in this parliament in February: We need to live in the land in a way that will leave it improved on our passing and not depleted. It can only sustain us short term if we sustain it long term, for our children and our children’s children. To deal properly with climate change requires us to understand the economic reality that sustains our standard of living while also acknowledging the scientific reality of human induced climate change. Denial of economic reality is just as dangerous as denial of scientific reality. For a long time now, the scientific evidence has been overwhelming. Senator Minchin, one of the climate change deniers on the other side of the other house, claimed last year: There remains an ongoing debate about the extent of climate change … Of course there remains an ongoing debate on this matter. There are so many avenues of scientific inquiry that there is always going to be debate. That is the nature of scientific research. But researchers around the world have meticulously and methodically established a body of evidence that shows that climate change is real and that it is being caused by human activity. For a long time now, Australians have understood this and have been taking action at an individual level, at a community level, at a corporate level and at a state level to alleviate the impact that climate change will have on our nation. The election last year of the Rudd Labor government has finally provided Australia with the national leadership that is required to tackle this issue. It was a little disturbing to come into the House today and hear the member for Flinders apparently moving away from what we had hoped might be a more bipartisan approach to the national leadership that is required on climate change. Very directly, it would seem that there still remain very serious divisions among those opposite as to what action should be taken in relation to climate change. One of these divisions was exposed this morning by the member for Flinders, who has had until now—and perhaps may continue to have—some responsibility for environmental matters on the other side of the House. Following a statement that members of the opposition seem to like to make often—that Australia is responsible for only 1.2 per cent of global emissions—we had this statement from the member for Flinders: ‘Action alone is irrelevant.’ I listened carefully to the member for Flinders when he said that. He followed on with reference to the large number of coal-fired generators that China and India are planning to construct in the next few years. He then made an even more direct statement: ‘Unilateral action will mean nothing.’ He then went on to try to explain what he described as the three pillars of the opposition’s policy in relation to climate change and the need for action on climate change. They are, one would have to say, very shaky pillars indeed, because, under cover of what is meant to be a debate about a group of bills dealing with carbon capture and storage procedures, the member for Flinders strayed to an accusation that the Rudd Labor government is not treating deforestation of the world’s rainforests seriously. These statements that the member for Flinders has made here this morning—that action alone is irrelevant and that unilateral action will mean nothing—put him as the opposition spokesman in this area at odds with statements made very directly by the newly elected Leader of the Opposition as recently as July this year on this very subject. The member for Wentworth said: The coalition’s policy, the Howard government’s policy, last year was that we would establish an emissions trading system not later than 2012. Of course, that is a remaining area of difference that the government has with the opposition, because we believe very strongly that urgent action is required and it has been made more urgent because of the failure of the Howard government to attend to these matters. Mr Turnbull went on to say: It was not conditional on international action; it was obviously done in the context of international action. That was the former shadow Treasurer, now Leader of the Opposition, saying in July of this year that the proposal for an emissions trading system was ‘not conditional on international action’ and yet here we have the member for Flinders today persisting with this opposition position that for Australia to act is somehow irrelevant and that for Australia to take action will, as he puts it, mean nothing. It is a complete failure on the part of those opposite to understand the need for Australia, as a major producer of coal, a major exporter of black coal and a major user of brown coal, to set an example for the world and to show other countries who are using coal that there are different and cleaner ways of using coal that might offer some future for the use of this resource. Far from being irrelevant, action by our country will show leadership to the rest of the world and is an important step for us to be taking. This group of bills before the House sends a clear message to the business community and to the scientific community: we are serious about climate change; we are serious about finding solutions to climate change that are in Australia’s best interests; and we are serious about carbon capture and storage as a solution. To be sure, it is a solution that requires more research and more work, but we as a government are setting up a framework within which that work and that research can take place. The technology is an exciting one and is particularly promising given Australia’s economic and geological circumstances. Around the world, there are international pilot projects taking place in Canada, in Poland, in the Norwegian part of the North Sea and in Algeria. This technology will be particularly important for the electricity generation sector, which makes up 35 per cent of net national greenhouse gas emissions. These bills, by creating a framework for the access and property rights associated with transportation by pipeline and the injection and storage in geological formations of carbon dioxide and of other greenhouse gases, will help Australia to meet its long-term target of reducing Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions by 60 per cent by 2050. I commend the bills to the House. 7688 12:37:00 Jensen, Dennis, MP DYN Tangney LP 0 0 Dr JENSEN —Interestingly enough, in the last parliament I was on the Standing Committee on Science and Innovation evaluating the technology of geosequestration. I have had further information about geosequestration subsequent to that. There are a few interesting things about geosequestration. One is that the coal industry itself acknowledges that the cost of carbon will have to be $50 a tonne in order to make geosequestration commercially viable. One of the questions is: why would people change their behaviour if there was no cost associated with it? In other words, if the cost of carbon is not $50 or more a tonne, there is no reason the coal-fired power industry would get involved in a geosequestration project. There are a few problems associated with geosequestration. One problem is that you pump it underground—carbon dioxide itself is very corrosive—and no-one is 100 per cent certain what will happen to it in the long term. However, we do know that the release of carbon dioxide into the environment in large doses can have very, very serious consequences. An example of that was the natural eruption, if you will, of carbon dioxide at Lake Nyos in Cameroon in 1986 and 1,500-odd people died. If you pump carbon dioxide underground into geological reservoirs, there are risks associated with that. We are told by people who want to get involved in geosequestration, ‘Well, we will constantly monitor it.’ The question is: what will be the cost of that constant monitoring into, basically, the infinite future? People talk about the problems of storage of nuclear waste, but at least that is very clearly contained in a small geographical area. With this, you are talking about areas all over the place where you are storing the carbon dioxide. The other issue is that the power industry says that they will not take on forever the responsibility of the continual monitoring and potential consequences of a leak of carbon dioxide into the environment. They would probably accept responsibility for about 50 years, but after that it would be up to the government to cover the costs of potential leaks. So there are very serious potential costs with this. Even if you go along with the so-called consensus view of climate change, having an emissions trading scheme with a high cost of carbon could potentially result in the loss of jobs and industry in Australia. This is before you even get into the issue of it actually having a negative effect in terms of overall global emissions. Everyone has acknowledged that this is a global problem—you cannot geographically confine the atmospheres all over the planet. Let me give you an example of this. In my state of Western Australia, there is an aluminium-smelting industry. At a cost of $50 a tonne, it may well be that Alcoa decide it is not viable for them to smelt aluminium in Australia anymore. The aluminium-smelting industry in Western Australia use gas as their source of power generation. So what are they likely to do in that case? They would be likely to ship their industry to China. So we lose the industry, we lose the jobs but—here are the factors that are very damaging for Australia—we also have not only the monetary costs associated with decommissioning an aluminium smelter in Australia and commissioning a new one in China but also the carbon costs. You need to then transport the bauxite from Australia to China, which has a carbon cost associated with it. In addition to that, it is highly likely that the power generation method for the aluminium smelter in China would be coal. The overall result is that we have introduced an emissions trading scheme, we have shipped jobs and industry overseas and we have actually contributed to increased carbon dioxide output. That is fraught with all sorts of consequences and it needs to be considered very carefully. I have heard many on the other side spouting about science, scientific consensus and so on. For instance, we have the member for Kingsford Smith calling himself a lay scientist. I wish he were in here so I could educate him a bit about what the scientific process actually involves. Science is about falsification. You put up a hypothesis and other scientists are duty-bound to try to prove that hypothesis wrong. That is what science is about. It is not about accepting a hypothesis because it feels great; it is about trying to prove it wrong. What we have, for instance, with the IPCC is the idea that everyone should be sitting around the table singing Kum ba yah from the same songbook. That is a stupid way of going about it and, quite frankly, science has never been about consensus. Science is about data and it is about evidence, and it is about evaluating that data and evidence and seeing whether it falsifies a theory. The point here is that there is a lot of criticism of anyone who dares to question the consensus view. This reminds me a little of the 1930s. Hitler could not stand quantum and relativistic physics because he saw it as Jewish science. As a consequence, he hated the theory of relativity. So he commissioned a book called One hundred authors against Einstein—Einstein being, of course, a German Jew. Einstein was asked how it felt to have 100 eminent scientists questioning the theory of relativity—and didn’t that give him cause for concern? Einstein’s response was that it doesn’t take 100 scientists; it takes one fact. And that is the problem here. There are also problems with some elements of statistical studies and so on. A lot of climate science is about statistics, and a lot of climate science is about computer models. Then there is the problem with the whole business of ‘Okay, how does the peer review process work?’ We hear a lot of discussion about peer review, as if, once a thing is in a peer review journal, it is unarguably correct. Let me give you an example of how peer review works and how science works. Let us assume you have an epidemiological study, a statistical study, and let us assume you want to correlate, for example, cancer clusters with high-tension powerlines. Let us make the assumption that there is, in fact, no correlation and that high-tension powerlines do not cause an increased incidence of cancers. The nature of statistics is that you might have 100 studies, and 20 studies would show positive correlation: yes, indeed, there is a correlation between high-tension powerlines and cancers. You might also have another 20 studies which show there is negative correlation: that proximity to high-tension powerlines actually results in fewer cancers. Then you might have the middle 60 studies showing effectively no correlation whatsoever. Remembering that scientific journals want to sell their journals, obviously they want to sell stuff that is interesting. As such, the no-correlation-whatsoever papers that might be submitted to the journal would not even go out for peer review, because they would not be seen as something that the journal would want to publish. The negatively correlated studies would be likely to have close to no chance of getting published, but the positively correlated studies—the interesting stuff—would be published. So then the consensus is: yes, there is this effect. Then you would have a metastudy, where someone would go through the peer reviewed papers and say, ‘You know, of 100 papers that I have reviewed on this, 95 of them show that there is a positive correlation between cancer and proximity to high-tension powerlines.’ This becomes the strong consensus for something where there is no effect whatsoever. This is the danger of not understanding how this entire process works. The point is: it comes down to journals wanting to publish what is interesting, but it also comes down, to a certain extent, to an old boy network. I will give an example of my own. When I was working with the Defence Science and Technology Organisation, off my own bat— 1000 Sidebottom, Sid (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr S Sidebottom)—I hate to interrupt the member, but we are discussing the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008. I wonder if you could bring your statements to that bill in time. DYN Jensen, Dennis, MP Dr JENSEN —I certainly will, because the issues of peer review, climate science and the need for geosequestration are intimately related. As an example of my own about the aspect of peer review, I wrote a paper called ‘Target aspect dependent radar cross-section: the effect on assumed beam angle’. Because I was not working for DSTO in my personal time, I sent the paper from my home address. But, with one of my emails, I also sent the return email address for DSTO. Guess what? Without my knowledge, the IEEE Magazine of Antennas and Propagation actually published the paper. This is a peer review journal, and they gave my affiliation as DSTO. This is the thing: there are all these elements that are intertwined with peer review. Let us have a look at the peer review system with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change—that is intergovernmental, Prime Minister, not international; and there are fewer than 1,000 scientists, not 4,000 scientists. There is an inherent problem with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The inherent problem goes right down to its mission statement, which is: The role of the IPCC is to assess on a comprehensive, objective, open and transparent basis the scientific, technical and socio-economic information relevant to understanding the scientific basis of risk of human-induced climate change, its potential impacts and options for adaptation and mitigation. This is a field of science that has had more than $50 billion pumped into it. The key words are ‘human-induced climate change’. Let us say that they proved human-induced climate change was not happening. What happens to that research money? What happens to the IPCC itself? By its own mission statement, it ceases to exist. We have the issue of data and transparency. I read out the mission statement; it includes ‘transparency’. Phil Jones, the head of the Hadley Centre—one of the major repositories of global temperature data used by the IPCC—said: Climate scientists should think about data quality more often, so that there is no opportunity for incorrect data to sow seeds of doubt in people’s minds about the reality of climate change. Steve McIntyre was looking at statistically evaluating the data, and he happens to be somewhat sceptical of anthropogenic climate change. Phil Jones, when asked by Steve McIntyre for data, said: ‘We have 25 or so years invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you, when your aim is to try to find something wrong with it?’ That is what science is about. It is about falsification. Phil Jones, in this instance, is not about science; he is about a religion, because he does not want to be proved wrong. Upton Sinclair, a great political writer in the early part of the last century, in a book called I, Candidate for Governor: and How I Got Licked, wrote: It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it. I think it is critical to also consider that in this argument. On the issue of the science being settled, we are so certain about climate science! We know exactly what is going on—no room for doubt! This is what CSIRO puts as a disclaimer on its climate change science: The projections are based on results from computer models that involve simplifications of real physical processes that are not fully understood. Accordingly, no responsibility will be accepted by CSIRO for the accuracy of the projections inferred from this brochure or for any person’s interpretations, deductions, conclusions or actions in reliance on this information. In other words, we will put out this data but do not hold us to it; but, by the way, this whole climate science area is absolutely beyond doubt. What we have with this issue is institutionalised group think. Where pay packets are concerned, that obviously has an effect. Have you ever wondered why so many scientists who question climate science have the title ‘emeritus’? It is because they do not actually have any pecuniary interests related to the output of such data. You get similar situations within defence, but that is entirely another story. The question is: where is the research funding for devil’s advocates who question whether this view is correct? The Noel hypothesis on this whole area of science should be that all of the climate change that we observe is natural, and then work should be done to prove that it is not. Instead, the Noel hypothesis has been distorted towards the view that the majority or all of climate change is human induced, and then try to prove that it is wrong. It is an incorrect assumption from the start. Some of the stuff that comes up is interesting. The World Wildlife Fund blame climate change for the coldest August in Sydney for more than 60 years. Yes, it is global warming because Sydney had a really cold August! They say that the freezing temperatures are proof of the urgent need to cut carbon pollution. Sir David King, who was the head of the British federation of scientists, said shortly after the tsunami that it highlighted climate change risk. What? It is quite interesting what you get. Global warming has been associated with so many things. If you want to get a research grant, put the terms ‘global warming’ or ‘climate change’ into your application. For instance, in relation to geophysical research letters, a group of scientists said that global warming will slow the earth’s rotation. In another issue of geophysical research letters, geophysicist Felix Landerer said that global warming will speed the earth’s rotation. Global warming is now being fitted into things like the earth’s rotation. What about the Australian experience? Dr Wendy Craik blames the low level of the Murray-Darling system on climate change. However, I have a time series graph, which I seek to table, from the Bureau of Meteorology—obviously a very biased organisation—showing average rainfall for the Murray-Darling Basin. Guess what folks? It is almost no different from what we have observed over the last 100 years. What we do have is overallocation and catchment mismanagement; it is not an issue of too little rain. What about other data? We see that, by all measures, temperatures have gone down since 2001. Ocean temperatures have gone down since 2004. So what are the scientists trying to blame it on now? Latent heat. We cannot measure it; it must be latent heat. It is called situating the appreciation rather than appreciating the situation. I will cut to the chase. The final thing—and I seek to table this document as well—is that the predictions are that there will be an upper tropos or tropical troposphere heating the atmosphere due to well-mixed greenhouse gasses. Observations show that there has been no such heating whatsoever. I could go to many more examples that clearly demonstrate that even within the IPCC there is considerable question—(Time expired) 1000 Sidebottom, Sid (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr S Sidebottom)—Are you seeking leave to table those two documents? DYN Jensen, Dennis, MP Dr Jensen —Yes. Leave granted. 7692 12:57:00 Neumann, Shayne, MP HVO Blair ALP 1 0 Mr NEUMANN —The contribution by the member for Tangney is one of the most extraordinary that I have heard since coming to this House. I thought that those on the opposite side had an almost lukewarm approach to climate change. But, obviously, there is not just scepticism but outright atheism on the opposite side of the House. It must make for interesting meetings in the party room when they discuss issues of this nature. I am here to speak about the government’s framework in terms of four bills that were introduced into this House on 18 June 2008. I am pleased to speak on them because it is critical to the future of our country that we get the issue of greenhouse gas storage right. The Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, the principal bill, establishes the whole framework for injection and storage of greenhouse gases into a stable subsurface geological reservoir more than three nautical miles offshore in Commonwealth waters. The second bill, the Offshore Petroleum (Annual Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, is about annual fees alone, and they are rising. The Offshore Petroleum (Registration Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 is about the registration that is necessary under the framework. The Offshore Petroleum (Safety Levies) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 is an ancillary bill to the principal bill, the greenhouse gas storage bill. The states have been involved in this type of process for a while. Several states have been involved in onshore carbon dioxide storage. South Australia has been involved in it through its petroleum legislation which provides for injection and storage of CO2. Victoria has introduced a bill into parliament to govern storage in its jurisdiction. Queensland is currently drafting a stand-alone type of legislation which will provide a separate tenure regime for onshore carbon dioxide storage in Queensland. The other states are in the embryonic stages of considering such legislation. This particular legislation deals with the Commonwealth jurisdiction and is important in terms of its features. It talks about the rights of precommencement petroleum titleholders being given a high level of protection where there is potential adverse impact on their operations. I am pleased there is a differentiation between precommencement petroleum titles and postcommencement petroleum titles in relation to exploration. The holders of certain tenure must obtain approval from the responsible minister in order to carry out key greenhouse gas operations. I am also pleased that it is left to the common law with respect to long-term liability arrangements. This particular piece of legislation, the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, is the main piece of legislation. It governs the injection and storage of carbon dioxide offshore and underground in stable subsurface geological reservoirs in Commonwealth waters. New titles will be located in the area more than three nautical miles offshore in our coastal waters and the outer limits of the continental shelf within the jurisdiction of the federal parliament and the Commonwealth of Australia. The amendments in these bills mean that the definition of ‘greenhouse gas substance’ will be carbon dioxide together with incidental substance derived from the capture or injection and storage processes—with the addition of chemical detection agents to assist in the tracing of the injected greenhouse gas substances. There is provision for the extension of the meaning of greenhouse gas substance to include other greenhouse gases. This bill effectively establishes three categories of storage formation—a potential greenhouse gas storage formation, an eligible greenhouse gas storage formation and an identified greenhouse gas storage. So the bill is about providing access and property rights for greenhouse gas injection and storage offshore and ensuring the security and safety of same. The minister is to be commended for resolving the really delicate and difficult balance between offshore petroleum industries and greenhouse gas storage industries offshore. There are different competing interests and the minister has done a fine job, in my view, to resolve potential conflict. We need certainty for those companies involved in producing so much wealth for this country. There are companies involved in greenhouse gas injection and storage which produce huge amounts of money for our economy; and the petroleum industry is crucial to our continued wealth and the lifestyle that we Australians enjoy, which is the envy of so many people in the world. The petroleum industry wants to operate and utilise its offshore rights to drill, and that is natural. The minister is to be commended for the consultation process he undertook with industry and also for the unusual step of referring the matter to the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Primary Industries and Resources so that it could conduct an inquiry into the wording of the draft bill, its objectives and its intentions. The House of Representatives committee believes that the bill does establish an effective framework for access and property rights, provides an appropriate regulatory regime for the management of greenhouse gas injection and storage, and provides a predictable and transparent system to manage the interaction between greenhouse gas re-injection and storage on the one hand and petroleum operations on the other. What does industry have to say about this? Well we have seen ExxonMobil endorse the framework established by the bill, albeit with certain caveats. They said, and this was reported to the committee: ExxonMobil believes that the Bill establishes a framework that is suitable for adoption on a national basis by using a regulatory structure analogous to petroleum regulation in Australia. In particular, we note and support the intent of the provisions of the Bill designed to protect the rights of existing petroleum license holders. Likewise, Chevron supported the use of offshore petroleum legislation as a model. They said: The proposal to establish a series of title rights equivalent to those applied to the upstream petroleum industry provides an effective mechanism for providing property rights for carbon dioxide storage proponents and for the regulation of activities related to the storage of greenhouse gases. This property rights model has provided certainty for the oil and gas industry and is an appropriate model for the establishment of a greenhouse gas storage industry. The House of Representatives committee, in its quaintly titled Down under: greenhouse gas storage report tabled in August 2008, endorsed the bill. There were a number of recommendations made, and I think the minister took up about 17 of the 19 recommendations. The amendments to the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 were developed to address the recommendations of the committee, and the minister has certainly consulted widely with the committee members. I am very pleased that so many submissions were tabled from so many interested stakeholders in this regard, because it is important that we get this right for our future. On 3 August 2008 the minister welcomed the report of the standing committee. He described as ‘exceptionally good’ the work the committee had done in its consideration and in the preparation of its report. I have read that report in its entirety. It certainly discusses the issues in detail—every issue was investigated. It was a bipartisan approach. I listened to what the previous speaker had to say, and his response was extraordinary compared to that of the members on his side who were clearly involved in the whole process and the preparation of the report. When the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 was discussed and introduced by the minister, along with the ancillary legislation, on 18 June 2008 in this House, he said that the offshore petroleum amendment bill was the most appropriate vehicle for the implementation of a greenhouse gas injection and storage regime offshore. The Offshore Petroleum (Annual Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 relates to the registered holders of petroleum titles held under the Offshore Petroleum Act who pay an annual fee for the term of the titles. The amending bills add greenhouse gas titles to the titles in respect of which annual fees are paid. Similarly, the Offshore Petroleum (Registration Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 adds greenhouse gas titles to titles in respect of which transfers and dealings will attract the imposition of registration fees. The Offshore Petroleum (Safety Levies) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 extends the imposition of a safety investigation levy, the safety case levy and the pipeline safety management plan levy in respect of petroleum facilities and pipelines in offshore waters to greenhouse gas facilities and greenhouse gas pipelines. It should be noted that the bills will have no financial impact on the federal government’s budget. Climate change is a really big challenge. The farmers in my area have told me they have seen climate change through many years of work on the land. The farmers in my area go back generations. There were mainly German settlers in the Lockyer Valley and they got on very well. Recently Bill Hayden, the former Governor-General, said to me that he thought that, in my area, the German Protestants and the Irish Catholics got on very well because they both hated the English! They had a rugged time when they were farming the land and clearing the Rosewood Scrub. It was a tough time in those areas. So they are tough people. They are really decent, honest, hardworking people in the Lockyer Valley and also in the Fassifern shire. They work particularly hard on the land. But they have said to me that they have noticed the change in the weather patterns. They have lived for a long time with dry summers and water shortages, and it is to be noted—notwithstanding what the previous speaker had to say—that the 12 hottest years in history have been recorded in the last 13. And certainly the farmers in my electorate of Blair in South-East Queensland have said that to me on numerous occasions. This legislation that we are dealing with today is about committing ourselves to addressing climate change and reducing Australia’s emissions, and the storage and injection of greenhouse gases in this way is crucial—it is part of a whole framework. Why should we act? Well, notwithstanding what the previous speaker said, we are acting and we are acting because it is responsible to do so, because it is real that humankind has made an impact on the climate in which we live. Our response is based on three pillars. It is about reducing Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions; adapting to climate change, which is really happening throughout the world and which we are experiencing all the time; and helping on an international basis to achieve global solutions to these problems. That is what we are doing and that is what we are all about. The government’s Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme will place a cap, a limit, on the amount of carbon pollution which an industry can emit, and this legislation we are dealing with today is all part of the same framework. We are doing this because it is necessary. We are doing this because it is good for us, it is good for our children and it is good for the planet. I have said before that if John Grey Gorton were here today—the former Liberal Prime Minister who once famously said that we were all socialists now—he would say, ‘We are all green now’—except some on the opposite side, who may not necessarily adopt the same view that we do and that, I believe, the Australian public and certainly the people in my electorate do in terms of climate change. The government recognise that there will be adjustment costs for industry, just as we recognise that there will be challenges for the petroleum industry and those who work offshore. But we will do things to assist households. We will cut fuel taxes on a cent for cent basis, to offset the initial impact on fuel associated with the introduction of our Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, and that will help people in my electorate when they are facing these challenges. We recognise that there will be a cost to businesses. We recognise there will be costs for businesses with the legislation that is before the House. We recognise there will be adjustment costs. But, as we move towards a low-carbon economy, we need to do these sorts of things. That is why we are establishing the Climate Change Action Fund and the Electricity Sector Adjustment Scheme. We cannot ignore the fact that 20 per cent of the total exports from our country are energy resources, and that proportion is growing. We account for 30 per cent of the world trade in coal. We are a clean coal supplier—and we need to be. We need to be at the higher end of the clean coal spectrum. We supply about eight per cent of the world’s liquefied natural gas. We provide almost a quarter of the world’s mined uranium. And that is why the resource sector is so crucial for our wealth and our future wealth. But we cannot just do nothing about these sorts of things. Eighty per cent of our electricity is generated by coal. So we have to respond to the challenges of coal, the challenges of oil and the challenges of natural gas. The legislation that is before the House will create an environment in which industries can invest in carbon capture and geological storage projects with confidence, and it will encourage the commercialisation of technologies which have a great potential to play an important role in reducing global greenhouse gas emissions. The bills provide those involved in these industries with the ability to develop further technologies which will assist future industry—industry that we do not even consider will be around. Many of us would not have dreamed that we would have computers on our desks every day. We cannot envisage the kinds of jobs that our grandchildren will eventually have. This sort of legislation will allow technologies to develop and industries to prosper which will help our future generations. And, contrary to what the member for Tangney said, science does tell us that continued high levels of carbon pollution have led to global warming. And if we go on, on a business-as-usual trajectory, the consequences for all of us will be significant. They will be significant for my part of the world because in Queensland we have the Great Barrier Reef. Just imagine the damage that global warming will do to that! The International Energy Agency estimates that CO2 capture and geological storage has the second largest potential, behind energy efficiency, to develop cuts in CO2 emissions. And this is because Australia has significant CO2 storage potential in offshore waters. We could store about 25 per cent of our annual CO2 emissions there. These amendment bills are required to enable the government to release areas offshore in which to store these types of emissions. Some people have said it takes courage to do what we are proposing to do, but I do not agree. I think it is really reckless not to act. It is reckless for us, for our children and for our grandchildren. I do not think we can delay when it comes to these sorts of things; we must act. That is why the Rudd Labor government has a comprehensive national plan to tackle climate change, from the development of renewable energy and energy-efficiency solutions to international action and initiatives such as signing the Kyoto protocol, which it did almost immediately upon taking office. The government is developing what we call the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, which is designed to bring down carbon pollution emissions with minimal impact on businesses, households and the economy generally. The previous government spent years arguing about whether climate change even happened, and the previous speaker verified everything that I have just said when it comes to that issue. It is not even clear today where the opposition stands. We know where the member for Tangney stands; he has let us know very clearly. The Garnaut report, as well as the experience of other countries, concludes that an emissions trading scheme is the best way to reduce our greenhouse pollution. This is why we are doing it and why this legislation is part of the whole framework. At present industry and business have no limit on how much they can pollute, and that is why we have global warming. An emissions trading scheme will require business and industry to buy pollution permits for each time pollution is contributed to the atmosphere. That is good. Our businesspeople are flexible, hardworking and dedicated to the pursuit of the national interest, but there is no cost-free option for tackling climate change. An emissions trading scheme is the best way to reduce pollution at the lowest cost to our economy, and the type of legislation we are debating today is important in the scheme of things. Accordingly, I commend the bills to the House. 7697 13:17:00 Chester, Darren, MP IPZ Gippsland NATS 0 0 Mr CHESTER —It is with pleasure that I join the debate here today. I thank other members for their contributions, which I have followed with a great deal of interest—quite thought-provoking contributions they have been. The Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 amends the Offshore Petroleum Act 2006 to establish a system of offshore titles. It will authorise the transportation by pipeline, injection and storage of greenhouse gas substances in deep geological formations under the seabed. I rise to express my general support for the bill and the process it seeks to facilitate—that is, the sequestration of greenhouse gases, primarily carbon dioxide. In supporting the process, I must report a growing level of scepticism in my own community about the issue of man-induced climate change and the government’s proposed response—particularly the emissions trading scheme. I certainly accept that climate variability is real, but how much of what we are experiencing right now in my particular region can be put down to permanent change and how much to a drought event is a subject of much debate within my community. I also seek to put on the public record the overwhelming need for better education and community understanding of the quite complex issues we are dealing with here and of terms like ‘geosequestration’, ‘carbon capture and storage’ and ‘climate change’ itself. I think we need to involve our communities more in this entire discussion, and there is a great deal of room for a more mature and robust debate around all of these issues and the possible solutions without the need to stereotype people as sceptics or true believers. There is a great deal of goodwill in my community for action to protect the environment. As a whole, Gippslanders are very passionate about our local environment. We have thousands of volunteers in groups like Landcare who are getting their hands dirty and doing the practical environmental work that is required in our region. We have farmers who are investing in nutrient reduction programs and whole-of-farm plans to improve water quality, which is such a critical issue for the people of Gippsland and the Gippsland Lakes themselves. We have many industries which are investing in technology to clean up their own operations. I still believe there is a great deal of confusion about climate change, and the government’s proposed response with the emissions trading scheme is cause for concern. We need a proper debate and we need to canvass all the possible solutions. A classic example is the issue of sequestering carbon in the soil. Briefings that I have received on this issue, from my perspective, demand further investigation because of the real prospect we have of improving our agricultural production through better soil conditions while achieving the government’s desired aim to deal with carbon emissions. That has some exciting possibilities for us, and I will be following that up with the industry involved. If the government were prepared to debate these types of issues in completely good faith, it would start by immediately withdrawing the climate change propaganda campaign which is currently screening on our TVs. This type of television advertising, with its graphic images, is purely designed to do the groundwork for the government’s climate change policies, and I think scaring the community and trying to dumb down the debate in the hope that there will be no resistance to an emissions trading scheme do none of us any great credit. The massive cost and the prospect of job losses that are related to the emissions trading scheme issue are coming at a time when Australia can least afford them. I am reserving my position on the emissions trading scheme for those very good reasons. We have not seen the economic modelling from the government at this stage and we have very limited knowledge of the direct impacts, particularly as they affect regional communities. I fear that in some regards we are running headlong into an economic disaster which will be most heavily felt in rural and regional communities like my own area, Gippsland. The industries that are going to be most affected by government policy on climate change are those that are primarily located in regional areas. I may return to that point in a few moments time, but first I want to highlight the potential opportunities that I believe this bill presents in the Gippsland situation. There is no doubt that Gippsland will need to be at the forefront of the research and development to successfully capture and store carbon in the future. We have a strong and vested interest in developing the technology and becoming a major player in this emerging industry. If we can make it work anywhere, Gippsland is going to play a major role in the future. The Gippsland Basin is obviously a major source of oil and gas for our nation. I am very much a layman when it comes to the issues of geology but, as I understand it, the very same geological formations which have produced the structures for trapping oil and gas beneath the surface make the Gippsland Basin a very attractive proposition for this type of activity. Studies have shown that the Gippsland Basin has the capacity to store very large volumes of carbon dioxide. It possibly goes without saying that the location of the basin, alongside the Latrobe Valley power stations, provides an obvious link for this type of activity. Indeed it is regarded by many in the power and oil industries as the possible solution to the issue of CO2 emissions from brown coal production in the Latrobe Valley. But I again make the point about the need to hasten slowly in relation to the emissions trading scheme, which is inextricably linked to this bill. Carbon capture and storage may be the big ticket item that provides the answer to the issues facing brown coal power generators, but we are several years away from achieving the desired result. It is in no-one’s interest to jeopardise the economic viability of power generators in the Latrobe Valley by moving too fast or placing too heavy a burden on their operations. I refer to comments this week from the Chief Executive Officer of Loy Yang Power, Mr Ian Nethercote, who has flagged his concerns about the future of his industry. I stress that Mr Nethercote does not oppose an emissions trading scheme, but he is seeking a balanced approach. Many in the industry and in the Gippsland-Latrobe Valley hold a similar view. Mr Nethercote is quoted in the Latrobe Valley Express this week, talking about Professor Garnaut’s supplementary draft report and the recommendation of a $20 per tonne fixed carbon price. He said: If we look at Loy Yang, we would need to find an extra $1 million a day just to cover permit costs. If we then take that a step further, that means for the Latrobe Valley brown coal sector you need to find about $1.2 billion, that’s if its $20 per tonne. If you take that across the national market, then it comes out to $4 billion a year, the numbers are huge, they’re massive. I add that to the debate as a point of caution. The people of the Latrobe Valley are just starting to come to terms with what we are saying about the emissions trading scheme and the impact it may have on them and their families’ futures. Mr Nethercote also cautioned that Professor Garnaut’s predicted 40 per cent rise in electricity prices could be underestimating the real impact. Many speakers have made the same point. This is an enormous challenge and the complexity of the issues requires broader community understanding before we progress too much further down this path. I certainly appreciate that the government is promising structural adjustment packages and compensation to affected households in its green paper. However, the sheer scope of the changes and the impacts are not properly understood in my community. As I said during my inaugural speech a few weeks ago, if we are prepared to give the planet the benefit of the doubt and we accept that climate change is real then we are going to need a strong and sustainable economy to deal with these challenges. We need to be tackling these challenges from a position of economic strength. I make that point in the context of the Gippsland Coastal Board report referring to the prospect of climate change and a 0.8-metre sea level rise. The board is forecasting events that would require the relocation of a range of highly valued public assets from the low-lying foreshore areas along the Gippsland coast. We will not achieve that unless we are in a strong financial position. If the Gippsland coast is exposed to inundation, large sections of the metropolitan coast will go under as well. It is a frightening prospect if these forecasts are accurate. All levels of government will have to work in partnership to address it. There is a lot riding on these very complex issues. As the member for Gippsland, my focus is on the Latrobe Valley coal industry. We must retain the commercial viability of the brown coal industry in the valley because we need these companies to work in partnership with governments to invest in the cleaner coal technology that we all talk so much about. It requires a practical, rational and steady approach rather than some of the overblown rhetoric that we have been exposed to throughout the debate in recent times. Having access to an extraordinary natural resource like 500 years of brown coal is a competitive advantage for our nation, one we must be very careful to nurture in the future. Access to low-cost energy has underpinned growth in my region, and I make no apologies for standing up for the industry and for jobs in my region. We need to keep a firm sense of perspective in this debate. Given that our nation’s contribution to global greenhouse gas emissions is less than two per cent, we need to be extremely mindful of the international effort and who we have on board in this process. Any policy that results in job losses in my region will have an adverse impact on every part of community life throughout Gippsland. I fear that regional communities like Gippsland are very much at the pointy end of government policy in relation to climate change. For us it is not an abstract debate about turning a few lights off or taking shorter showers. It is about jobs, families and the future of key industries like the power sector, agriculture and the oil and gas industry. As I mentioned, the Gippsland Basin is a major contributor to our nation and this bill has particular relevance to my region. The Longford gas plant, which is located about 10 kilometres from the city of Sale, is responsible for supplying most of Victoria’s gas requirements and about 20 per cent of Australia’s oil and gas supply. Gippsland has a long and proud history of providing resources for our nation, and the oil and gas industry is just one example. Speaking of the history of the oil and gas industry, I note that 2009 will mark the 40th anniversary of oil and gas production from the Gippsland Basin by Esso Australia. It will certainly be a time of celebration and reflection on the company’s major role in the social, economic and cultural development of the region. I add cultural development quite deliberately because Esso has been a major contributor to community facilities in Gippsland, including the Wellington Entertainment Centre in Sale. Esso is highly regarded as a good corporate citizen in my region and the company is respected for its contributions to Gippsland and our nation. There are now 21 offshore platforms and installations in Bass Strait which feed a network of 600 kilometres of underwater pipelines and keep the oil and gas flowing 24 hours a day. I digress for a moment to reflect on the fact that Gippslanders have not always enjoyed the direct benefits of the oil and gas industry. It does seem bizarre that many towns in my electorate, including my hometown of Lakes Entrance, have missed out on reticulated natural gas. It is an issue that I intend to work on hopefully in partnership with and with genuine support from the relevant state and federal ministers. This bill talks a lot about environmental issues. Natural gas provides a cheaper and more efficient energy source, which is particularly important for communities like Yarram in south Gippsland and Orbost and Lakes Entrance in the east. As we are all aware, we have an ageing population. The opportunity to provide cheaper and cleaner energy is a critical issue, particularly for older Gippslanders. Bottled gas is prohibitively expensive for those on pensions or low incomes and they are often left with the only alternative of wood heating, which obviously becomes a bigger issue in their advancing years. Natural gas reticulation to more towns in Gippsland is a challenge for the future that I hope the state and federal governments are willing to work with me to resolve. It is more environmentally friendly and has obvious economic benefits for my community. If we are able to build the eastern gas pipeline to take gas from Longford to Sydney, then we should be building the infrastructure to allow the economic and environmental benefits to flow to Gippsland communities along the route. I am certainly pleased to say, however, that the state Labor government has provided natural gas to Bairnsdale. Under that state government program, we have seen real benefit to businesses such as Patties Foods in Bairnsdale and to the Bairnsdale Hospital. There is still more work to be done to continue the rollout of this very efficient and effective form of energy. I think allowing Gippsland to share in the benefits of the oil and gas industry in our region is an issue for us all. Having said that, although the direct benefits from oil and gas have not flowed directly to every household in Gippsland, I must stress that there have been overwhelming positives for my community. Oil and gas production in Bass Strait has contributed over $200 billion to gross domestic product over its life, and ExxonMobil’s Bass Strait operations have been responsible for generating approximately $300 billion in federal government revenue in real terms. Another reason why I am standing here to debate this bill is that protecting the future of the oil and gas industry in Gippsland is so critical to us. I have had the opportunity in the past to view oil and gas production up close, and it is something I would encourage other members to do if they get the chance. The offshore platforms are quite remarkable places. They are both a work site and a home for up to 80 people at a time. The platforms operate in a hostile environment in Bass Strait but they are equipped with a few home comforts for the men and women when they are off duty—gymnasiums, rec rooms and those types of things. Having shared a meal with workers on a platform several years ago, I can attest to the fact that their kitchens are well equipped to meet the demands and the workers are well fed. Long may their vital work continue, along with that of their colleagues in the brown coal industry. I would like to take up some points made by other members in their contribution to this debate. This bill provides for access rights for the geosequestration process. We will need to have appropriate systems in place to protect the rights of existing users. That obviously includes oil and gas producers. They must have the security to continue to invest with confidence. I have followed the debate with interest and I am heartened by the assurance of those opposite that there is certainty for investment in the future for the oil and gas sector. But for me in the Gippsland electorate there is also the issue of certainty for the commercial fishing industry, which is already finding it difficult to access fishing grounds due to the excised areas around oil and gas platforms. There is a potential layer of friction there in the future, which we will need to resolve. Further activity in the region—it might be related to this bill or it might be in relation to the oil and gas industry itself—is going to have an impact on the important role played by the Lakes Entrance fishing fleet in helping to feed our nation. I agree with other members who have made the point that we really do need to get this legislative framework right and ensure that we do not discourage further investment in other industries with existing users in the offshore regions. I believe we are all very mindful of the need to act responsibly on this critical issue. In my mind, acting responsibly certainly includes protecting our energy security for the future. I commend the previous speakers and the Minister for Resources and Energy on the approach they have taken to this legislation. I also commend the previous minister for the work he undertook in this area. As I and many others have mentioned, there is no question that this is an incredibly complex area. I get the feeling that there will be many more debates on this and related topics in the months and years ahead. 7701 13:33:00 Marles, Richard, MP HWQ Corio ALP 1 0 Mr MARLES —I rise to speak in support of the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008. This bill seeks to amend the Offshore Petroleum Act 2006. Before I go into the substance of what I want to say about this bill, can I first acknowledge the presence here today of pupils from Glenbrook Public School and Martin Luther Primary School, who are on visits to Canberra to see how our parliament works. I welcome them to this chamber and I hope they are having a very educative, interesting and fun time in our nation’s capital and in this great building. This is an important debate for those children to listen to because it goes to the whole issue of climate change and the future they will inherit. This bill is part of a suite of legislation that the government has introduced to establish a carbon capture and storage framework. This suite of legislation also includes the Offshore Petroleum (Annual Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, the Offshore Petroleum (Registration Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and the Offshore Petroleum (Safety Levies) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008. The net effect of all of these bills will be to create a carbon capture and storage system in Australia that will ensure the long-term viability of our nation’s coal industry—and I want to come back to that in a little more detail in a moment. This suite of measures will also drive new technologies in our nation that will aid in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The principal bill relates to access and property rights for greenhouse gas injection and storage in Australia’s offshore waters. It also provides for a management system to ensure the safety and security of the greenhouse gas storage scheme. This legislation was put together acknowledging the need to balance the rights of the carbon capture and storage industry and those of the existing petroleum industry. It will also provide certainty to this fledgling industry, the carbon capture and storage industry. In providing that security, most importantly it will provide for a framework which encourages investment in that new industry. It will also assure the community that the techniques used for the capture and storage of carbon dioxide are safe and secure. The process of carbon capture and storage involves capturing greenhouse gas emissions before they are released into the atmosphere and storing them in geological formations which, in broad terms, are similar to the kinds of geological formations which have stored oil and gas for millions of years. This process, which is known as carbon dioxide geosequestration, is not new. For example, in Canada and Poland carbon dioxide injection systems are currently being used to enhance oil recovery and assist with coal extraction. In Algeria, naturally occurring carbon dioxide is being extracted from natural gas and then reinjected into gas reservoirs. For over 10 years carbon dioxide has been safely stored 900 metres under the North Sea in a deep saline formation. The monitoring of that project in particular has demonstrated the overall successful dispersion and trapping of gas within that formation and the safe means of doing that. As well, in our country we have afoot a pilot program of injecting carbon dioxide into geological formations of the type I have described. That is occurring not far from my electorate, in the Otway Basin. This is a project that was conceived in 2006, and the injection of carbon dioxide into that formation commenced in April this year. The project is being managed by the Cooperative Research Centre for Greenhouse Gas Technologies. What it seeks to prove, in a sense, is that there can be the safe transportation and injection of up to 100,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide into the depleted Waarre reservoir at a depth of approximately 2,000 metres. This project is principally about trying to prove the concept, so from that point of view it will involve a comprehensive monitoring regime to provide valuable information on how this technique can be applied and on the additional further development of this technology. The International Energy Agency predicts that carbon capture and storage will ultimately become the second most important means by which we can significantly cut greenhouse gas emissions globally. It will rank behind improved energy efficiency. So it is a critically important technology that we have to develop in this country to not only provide for the viability of the coal industry but to take our country into a postcarbon world. This bill forms part of the government’s overall climate change policy response. It is important that is placed on the record in the context of this bill. The Rudd government, unlike how the opposition has flipped and flopped on this issue whilst in government and then in opposition, clearly accepts that our climate is being changed as a result of human causes. For that reason, the first act of this government was to sign the Kyoto protocol. We have introduced water-saving measures, we have put in place emissions targets and we have announced a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme through the green paper which was announced a month or two ago. That scheme, which has now been outlined in some detail as a government proposition, is the subject of a very extensive consultative process with the community and business. This is a very difficult debate but it is a debate that our nation needs to have. I agree very much with the comments of the member for Gippsland when he said this is a particular issue affecting regional Australia. I think it is indeed right that in industrial regional Australia we find ourselves at the front line of the greenhouse and climate change debate. Industrial regional Australia is principally located around the coast of our country. In that sense, it stands to feel absolutely the effects of climate change in rising sea levels and a changing coastline. We in the south-east corner of this country are in a part of Australia—and indeed a part of the globe—where rainfall is predicted to decline as a result of climate change. While we are very much on the front line in that sense, we who live in industrial centres also feel the responsibility to contribute to any future emissions trading scheme. That is very much the case with the city of Geelong, in which there are very many carbon dependent businesses. We have refineries, aluminium smelters, cement works and car plants. All of these are carbon based industries and they would feel absolutely the effects of contributing to an emissions trading scheme. What flows from that is an acute understanding that we as a country must do something about climate change and that we must orientate our economy to a postcarbon world. But there is also a significant awareness that the way in which we do that has to be very careful, with a great deal of consultation, and that we must get it right. It is for that reason that I feel very secure over the path that has been taken by this government in outlining a proposed scheme and engaging in very significant consultation—and it has—with industry and community groups to take us to that point. Our stance on climate change is clear: we know it is happening, we need to change our economy and we need to orientate our economy to a postcarbon world—and we are walking down that path. By contrast, the opposition’s current stance on this issue is anything but clear. They have been flip-flopping on this issue for the better part of 12 years. There are still many on the other side of the House who are sceptical, firstly, about whether or not the climate is actually changing as a result of human causes and, secondly—if it is—about whether there are any consequences of that. They have no clear policy on whether or not an emissions trading scheme should be put in place and on when it should be put in place. We are all waiting with bated breath to see whether or not that policy is going to change again as a result of the recent change in the leadership of the Liberal Party—and they are still flip-flopping on the issue of nuclear power. The legacy from the time when they were in government is not much better. Over the last 12 years the Howard government did little to meet the challenges of climate change. They did virtually nothing to save our nation’s waterways. They did nothing to assist industry to transition to carbon-neutral technology and to a postcarbon world. Last year the then shadow minister for national development, resources and energy, Senator Chris Evans, asked the Department of Industry, Tourism and Resources about the total funding that had been provided between 2004 and 2007 for the purpose of research, development and demonstration of clean coal technologies. What he found in answer to that question was that a measly total of $3.4 million had been spent to that date on research, development and demonstration of clean coal technologies and that a further $2.27 million, to be spent by the end of this year, had been allocated for Commercial Ready projects. That stands in stark contrast to the half a billion dollar commitment that the Rudd government has made to put in place clean coal technologies. And that commitment has been made because the Rudd government understands the need for industry to meet the challenge of climate change and the transition to a postcarbon world. In terms of providing our energy in a postcarbon world, coal will inevitably play a critical part in Australia’s future energy needs and will be a key contributor to our nation’s future prosperity. The coal industry is Australia’s largest exporter, generating $22½ billion in export income in the financial year 2006-2007. In 2005 there were 105 coalmines in Australia; in 2006 there were 118 coalmines. In 2006 the coal industry employed at its peak 32,259 Australians, and new coal projects and expansions as of October 2007 in Australia are forecast to have capital expenditure of around $23 billion. Coal provides 80 per cent of Australia’s electricity, and coal generators globally provide 40 per cent of the globe’s energy needs. Indeed, the International Energy Agency forecasts that the global use of coal will increase by 44 per cent through to the year 2030. As I said, in Geelong we very much feel the significance that coal plays in our economy, particularly if we look at, say, the Alcoa smelter at Point Henry, which in large measure seeks energy from its own coal-fired power station at Anglesea. To ensure the continued viability of this industry in a postcarbon world it is essential that this industry comes to terms with carbon capture and storage. For that reason, the government has already established a $500 million National Low Emissions Coal Fund to support development of clean coal technologies, and in combination with that the coal industry itself has already funded a similar fund of $1 billion known as the COAL21 initiative. By developing emissions reduction techniques such as carbon capture and storage our country will ensure the future of the Australian coal industry. In relation to that, this bill provides for new offshore titles, which in turn provide for the transportation and storage of carbon dioxide and potentially other greenhouse gases in offshore geological formations. These titles will be located between the outer limits of Australia’s coastal waters; that is, three nautical miles off the coast and the Australian continental shelf. The legislation sets up a regime of precommencement titles and postcommencement titles. The commencement that is being referred to in those terms is of course the commencement of this bill. Precommencement titles, therefore, by definition will be only existing petroleum titles. Postcommencement titles will be both petroleum titles and titles for companies which are seeking to put greenhouse gases into these geological formations. The way the regime will work is that if, when a postcommencement greenhouse title is provided to a new developer to inject carbon dioxide into these geological formations, there is a significant risk or a significant adverse impact on an existing precommencement petroleum title, this will not be able to go ahead without the holder of the precommencement petroleum title’s consent. So in that sense the rights of existing holders of petroleum titles will be protected. In terms of postcommencement titles for both petroleum and greenhouse injection, before a licence is granted the minister will need to look at the potential impact of that licence and whether or not it might impact on the other kind of licence—that is to say, whether a greenhouse gas licence has a potential impact on a future petroleum licence or vice versa—and that will form part of the assessment by which the licence is ultimately given. In that sense the bill protects and balances the rights of existing licence holders with those of future licence holders. The bill also puts in place powers for the minister in the event that there are any future issues associated with the capture and storage of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. It does this by defining the term ‘serious situations’. ‘Serious situations’ is where there is a leakage of greenhouse gas substances from an identified geological formation or where the injected greenhouse gases are not behaving in the way which was predicted or where the injection of those gases is compromising the geotechnical integrity of the geological formation. When that occurs, the minister is given a range of powers, in essence, to deal with that serious situation. Those powers include ceasing or suspending the injection of carbon dioxide into the formation, or indeed requiring that it be injected into another formation, and any other orders or directions which are required of the licence holder to deal with that serious situation. Liability for any future issues which might arise out of this technology will be dealt with in the same way as liability is dealt with throughout our society—that is, through the common law. The suite of provisions within this bill does balance the rights of new carbon capture and storage industry licence holders with those of existing petroleum industry licence holders. It will provide some certainty to this new industry, which in turn ought to encourage investment, and it will assure the community that these techniques are safe and that the capture and storage of carbon dioxide in these formations is an appropriate and safe technique to use. As the Minister for Resources and Energy noted in his second reading speech on this bill, there are already businesses out there which are readying themselves to use this technology, and indeed they have been for some time. That highlights the importance one can attach to the seriousness of the Rudd government in assisting our nation’s industries in their transition to a postcarbon world. Now is the time for action on climate change, not the flip-flopping or half measures that we have seen for the last 12 years, and that is what this bill will do. There is a moral aspect to climate change but there is also a smartness about it. Putting in place carbon capture and storage is not only the moral thing to do but the smart thing to do. If we can reduce coal’s footprint in the long term then we will go a long way to securing out nation’s economy in a postcarbon world. 7705 13:52:00 Windsor, Antony, MP 009LP New England IND 0 0 Mr WINDSOR —It is with pleasure that I speak to the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and cognate bills. I was interested in some of the comments that the member for Corio made in his contribution. For his interest and the interest of others, I recently had a meeting with the Guyra tomato producers, and the Costa family, who are constituents of the member for Corio, are very much involved in that particular operation. How that relates to the bill is that in that particular greenhouse operation—I guess there is a bit of a play on the word ‘greenhouse’—they are capturing carbon dioxide and injecting it during the growth of the tomato, generating increased growth. I think there are a number of opportunities in relation to the so-called climate change-greenhouse gas issue. Coming from an agricultural area, I think that rather than looking at it and saying, ‘It’s a bit hard; it will not work unless the Indians and the Chinese are involved; why should we do anything when no-one else is?’ we should look at the opportunities that Australia has to be a pioneer in this area. I would rather be remembered as a parliamentarian who actually tried to do something about it than have my grandchildren look back in 50 years time and say—as we are saying about the Murray-Darling—‘Why didn’t they do something about it?’ I do not think the costs will be as great as many people believe, because I think there is a degree of ingenuity that we have not engaged in in respect of the research and technology of these particular issues. Irrespective of the costs it is something that we do need to address. We should be able to look back in 50 years time and say: ‘At least we got something right. We did try to address a particular issue.’ This legislation sets up a framework where, as the member for Corio said, greenhouse gases will be stored off the coast of Australia. Currently, we cannot do that. We do not have the technology to do that. I thought the member for Groom spelt out this morning some of the issues concerning the cost of initiating some of those programs. This is enabling legislation to ensure that, when we are able to sequester carbon or store carbon in some of the geological structures offshore, we have a process to do that properly. In my view, this is pioneering legislation. A number of people mentioned that. It is, essentially, a world first and there may well be problems. I am pleased that the Minister for Resources and Energy, Martin Ferguson, is here in the chamber. I know he listens to all the speeches. I congratulate him for being a pioneer in another way. Those in the gallery are probably not aware of this, and they probably think that the parliament, particularly in question time, is all about people arguing with one another and trying to pick holes in each other’s argument. But this minister actually brought some legislation into the parliament and then he referred it to a committee. The House of Representatives Standing Committee on Primary Industries and Resources is made up of members from the Liberals, Labor, the Nationals and me as an Independent. The minister asked the committee—in a sense, a microcosm of the parliament—to examine the legislation to see whether it could be improved, rather than what quite often occurs in this place whereby a bill is introduced, the arguments develop on how it could be improved and, if an amendment is accepted, it is then seen to be a failure on behalf of the minister, or the government may not accept it. So I congratulate the minister. It is the first time that that has happened since I have been in this parliament. I do not think it happens very often. If we do embrace climate change, perhaps the government would like to look at this process more often. I know other members of the AFFA committee who have made comments in the Main Committee have alluded to the minister’s initiative of asking a committee of the parliament to consider legislation and hopefully improve it. The minister has accepted some of the recommendations that are in the report entitled Down under: greenhouse gas storage. I thank the committee chair for the great work that he has done on carbon sequestration. I guess we all have a view on global warming and on how an emissions trading scheme will work. We all have a view on what should be in and what should be out. But one thing I would like to raise particularly is the role of agriculture as a potential solution to this issue. I know the Prime Minister, the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry and others in the parliament have raised it at times. But our soils—I am pleased the Prime Minister is here now—could well be part of the natural sequestration of carbon solution. DYW Burke, Tony, MP Mr Burke —Hear, hear! 009LP Windsor, Antony, MP Mr WINDSOR —The minister for agriculture says, ‘Hear, hear!’ as he goes past. I thank him for that endorsement. I would suggest to the minister that there is a lot more work that needs to be done on the potential role that agriculture has. Obviously agriculture is an emitter, and a lot of people are suggesting that, because of the Kyoto arrangements, agriculture should stay out of the debate. I would suggest it is important that agriculture does engage in the debate and that agriculture, given some further research et cetera, may well be part of the solution to the problem. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! It being 2 pm, the debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 97. The debate may be resumed at a later hour and the member for New England will have leave to continue speaking when the debate is resumed. 7707 Miscellaneous 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —On Monday I informed the House that I had received a return to the writ for the election of a member to serve for the electoral division of Lyne and that, by the endorsement on the writ, Robert James Murray Oakeshott had been elected. Mr Robert James Murray Oakeshott made and subscribed the affirmation of allegiance. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! On behalf of the House, I welcome the new member for Lyne. 7707 14:03:00 Questions Without Notice 7707 14:03:00 7707 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP 885 Wentworth LP Leader of the Opposition 0 Mr TURNBULL —My question is addressed to the Treasurer. Can the Treasurer advise the House of the risks to the Australian financial sector and Australian consumers from the severe financial distress of the world’s largest insurance company, AIG? 7707 Swan, Wayne, MP 2V5 Lilley ALP Treasurer 1 Mr SWAN —I thank the Leader of the Opposition for this very serious question. I can inform the House that earlier this morning our time the US Federal Reserve announced that it would provide AIG, the American International Group, with an $85 billion emergency loan. In exchange, the US government will take a 79.9 per cent stake in AIG. The Australian government certainly welcomes the actions by the Federal Reserve, which, of course, have the full support of the US treasury. This announcement will provide much-needed support to AIG internationally and, of course, to the broader US market. We do need to be very careful when we are commenting on the impact of these events on the Australian subsidiaries of AIG. We have to be very careful indeed. The relevant regulator, APRA, has strong prudential engagement with AIG—indeed, as it has all across the sector. The Australian businesses which are regulated by APRA are required to hold assets in Australia that exceed their liabilities in Australia. They are required to do that. But, nevertheless, because there could be flow-on effects, APRA is continuing to talk to the local subsidiaries. We do need to distinguish between the impacts on the international operations and on their Australian subsidiaries. The Australian subsidiaries are working within the framework that APRA has put out there. The regulators are doing everything they possibly can to ensure that the events internationally have minimal impact on policyholders, whether they be general insurance or the life insurance component. That is what APRA is doing as we speak. Of course, we will continue to see further volatility on global markets. There will be companies in this country which are investors in the international operations of that company, so we might expect some impacts on companies similar to the impacts we have seen, for example, from those that were investing in Lehman Brothers. What I can say—and I think this is very important and we should continue to shout it from the rafters—is that our banking system in particular is well regulated and it is well capitalised, as is our insurance industry. We have seen what happened in the past when that was not the case. That is why it is so important that we do put in a broader response to this international volatility that has been going on since last August. That is one of the reasons why the government committed to a financial claims scheme so promptly. That is why the government have been absolutely determined to implement all of the recommendations of the Financial stability review. We have been doing that. Part of that is encouraging firms with exposure to disclose those as quickly as possible and part of that has been to get a commitment to a financial claims scheme in this country should the worst happen to one of our deposit-taking institutions. As many people in this House might well recall, there have been recommendations to a recommendation to the previous government about establishing such a scheme. In fact, the original recommendation for a financial claims scheme came from the HIH royal commission. The member for North Sydney would, of course, remember that. We have acted on that recommendation—something the previous government did not do and did not follow through on. I am pleased to say there has been bipartisan support for the Financial Claims Scheme that we have put forward. It is currently out there for industry consultation. It has been through the cabinet, and it will be going to parliament in the not-too-distant future. Since August last year, and since we have been in power, we have been acutely aware of the danger to the Australian economy flowing from these events in international capital markets, and we have used every possible lever within our control to prepare our country to make sure that we can survive the situation in the best possible shape. It remains the case that, if you were in any country in the world in these circumstances, the country you would want to be in is Australia. 7708 7708 14:08:00 Hale, Damian, MP HWD Solomon ALP 1 Mr HALE —My question is to the Prime Minister. Can the Prime Minister update the House on developments in international financial markets overnight and on the government’s response? 7708 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr RUDD —The Treasurer has just referred to developments in the last 24 hours in relation to AIG. The government and the financial regulatory authorities in Australia continue to monitor developments closely. Of course, these developments in relation to AIG follow on from recent actions in other respects in the United States by the Federal Reserve. They injected another $70 billion in liquidity into the financial markets overnight, following $70 billion the previous day. They also announced last weekend that they would accept a wider range of collateral for cash loans as a means to calm financial markets. Of course, this follows action in recent weeks to take control over the mortgage institutions Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, pledging up to $200 billion to support them. However, it is important to note also that the Federal Reserve said in their statement of 16 September that ‘strains in financial markets have increased significantly’ and that they ‘will monitor economic and financial developments carefully’. What these developments point to is the fact that we are living in exceptionally difficult global economic times, and we in Australia are not immune from these developments. That is why it is important for all members to be focused on the fact that we the government have a plan to see Australia through these difficult economic times. Firstly, this is anchored in our approach to strong economic management, grounded in a $22 billion budget surplus as a buffer for the future. Secondly, there is our $76 billion nation-building plan for infrastructure in ports, roads, rail and broadband. Thirdly, there is our long-term economic reform agenda to lift long-term productivity growth through an education revolution and through our program of business deregulation as well as our policy of long-term tax reform. On the question relating to immediate developments in the financial sector, the government has also been acting in concert with its own monetary authorities and through international cooperation with the global economy and financial markets to ensure that sufficient liquidity is available. In the last few days there has been action by the European Central Bank to inject some €30 billion of liquidity, as well as parallel actions by other central banks around the world. Some months ago in Australia we injected further activity into the government bond market through an action taken with the support of the opposition to the tune of some $25 billion. As just referred to by the Treasurer, we have been in the business of implementing a financial claims scheme to ensure that eligible deposit and insurance policy holders have appropriate protection. These are important national measures which the government has taken in relation to our own financial markets, and we have been acting in concert with others in international financial markets through the Financial Stability Forum and also through the IMF and the G20. It is important to note what the Governor of the Reserve Bank said on this matter just a week or so ago. The governor, Glenn Stevens, said on 8 September: … what we see in the Australian financial scene is an order of magnitude less troubling than what we see abroad … Australian financial institutions continue to present a contrasting picture to their peers in the US, Europe and the UK … Some have had to make provisions for unwise exposures that had been accumulated earlier. But even in these cases, capital, asset quality and profitability remain very sound. Therefore, it is important that we keep the current challenges being presented to us from the global economy and global financial markets in appropriate perspective. As the Treasurer also indicated before, we in this country are better prepared than most to deal with the buffeting which is being presented to other national economies by recent developments in global financial markets. If you look at the continued positive growth generated in the Australian economy in the most recent quarter, you see that it is 0.3 per cent against what is a decisively negative set of numbers across most of the other major global economies. If you were also to go to our inflation rate: while still unacceptably high, it is nonetheless lower than that of the United States. For the first time in seven years we have interest rates that have been reduced by 25 basis points. On the question of employment and unemployment—and this has been the subject of some questioning in this House in recent weeks—the current rate of 4.1 per cent stands at almost the lowest of the other major economies, the US being 5.7 per cent; the UK, 5.3 per cent; Canada, 6.1 per cent; France, 7.3 per cent; Germany, 7.3 per cent; and Italy, 6.5 per cent. We have also had recent positive data in terms of the capital expenditure intentions of Australian private firms. But where I conclude is on the question of what underpins our confidence in the government’s policy directions for the future, and that is the strength of the government’s budget surplus. On the question of the surplus, we have worked hard through the budget process to ensure that we could deliver a 1.8 per cent of GDP surplus outcome for the year ahead. What I would draw the attention of honourable members to, however, is the fact that that budget surplus position again stands in stark contrast to what we see on the part of many other economies—the United States running at minus 2.4 per cent; the United Kingdom, minus 3.8 per cent; Japan, minus 2.8 per cent; France, minus 2.9 per cent; Germany, plus one per cent; and Italy, minus 2.8 per cent. Therefore our budget circumstances, relative to those which pertain in other major economies, are sound and strong indeed. In order to preserve this buffer for the future, against what is a set of quite challenging international and global economic circumstances, it is important that we do everything we can to preserve that budget surplus. My direct appeal to the new Leader of the Opposition is to unblock the budget in the Senate. My direct appeal to the Leader of the Opposition, as he says he is now in the business of providing economic leadership, is to demonstrate that leadership in the Senate and unblock the $6 billion worth of measures that are currently blocked in the Senate, in order to preserve the budget surplus—a budget surplus which is a necessary buffer in these uncertain economic times for Australia. 7710 7710 14:15:00 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP 885 Wentworth LP 0 Mr TURNBULL —My question is addressed to the Prime Minister. I draw the Prime Minister’s attention to comments by the Chairman of the Catholic Social Justice Council, Bishop Christopher Saunders, who said on ABC radio this morning: It seems to me that, if somebody is at your door and they’re in dire straits and they need help, it is better to help them there and then rather than say, ‘Listen, come next week when I’ve had time to write a letter about it.’ Prime Minister, why won’t you support the coalition’s plan to provide urgent relief to single age pensioners? 7710 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr RUDD —The one glaring omission on the part of those opposite in the measure which they propose is the two-million-plus pensioners they exclude from their proposal. I say to those opposite, in their newfound concern and compassion: what about all those people who are also in couple pensioner arrangements, all those pensioners who are widows, all those who are carers, and all those who are in receipt of the disability support pension? The point I would make to those opposite is: if we are engaged in the business of long-term reform of pensions and the retirement income system, then it must be across the board, not selectively picking out one element in order to demonstrate that there is a headline. That is the first point. The second point is this: the honourable member who is now the Leader of the Opposition barely a year ago sat in the cabinet when the then member for Longman brought forward a proposal to increase the base rate of the pension by $30—and it is reported in the national daily. My question back to the Leader of the Opposition, in his newfound interest in compassion, is: why did he not act then? Why did he not put his hand up, why did the member for Curtin not put her hand up and why did the member for Higgins not put his hand up to act on the matter when they had the opportunity to do so? 7711 7711 14:18:00 Dreyfus, Mark, MP HWG Isaacs ALP 1 Mr DREYFUS —My question is to the Minister for Foreign Affairs. Minister, is Iran complying with its obligations under international law with respect to its nuclear program? What is the Australian government’s approach to Iran’s uranium enrichment and reprocessing activities? 7711 Smith, Stephen, MP 5V5 Perth ALP Minister for Foreign Affairs 1 Mr STEPHEN SMITH —I thank the member for his question. It is a matter of some regret that there have been further troubling developments on the question of Iran’s nuclear program. I am deeply concerned by a report released by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the IAEA, on 15 September—16 September Australian time—that confirms that Iran is persisting with its uranium enrichment and reprocessing related activities in violation of four legally binding United Nations Security Council resolutions. Regrettably, this shows that Iran has yet again failed to provide the IAEA with the access it needs to give credible assurances about the nature of Iran’s nuclear program. The IAEA has comprehensive and detailed information which suggests that Iran has conducted studies into nuclear weapons and that Iranian military entities have been involved in nuclear procurement. Iran continues to dismiss this information as ‘forged and fabricated’ and continues to hinder the IAEA’s investigation into these issues. These actions are not those of a state seeking to address the international community’s concern about the nature of its nuclear program. Iran needs to comply immediately with its obligations and suspend its uranium enrichment and reprocessing related activities. It must grant the IAEA the access it needs to remove the international community’s justifiable doubts about Iran’s peaceful intentions. Australia supports the efforts of the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and Germany—the so-called ‘P5 plus 1’ group—to engage constructively with Iran and the generous incentives package that the P5 plus 1 group has offered Iran should it suspend its enrichment activities. It is in Iran’s interests to accept the incentives package, which represents the best way to resolve the nuclear issue to the benefit of all in the international community. Iran has a clear choice: to cooperate with the international community or to face further isolation from the international community. Australia has made a firm commitment against the spread of nuclear weapons. Australia strongly supports, and has implemented fully, United Nations Security Council sanctions against Iran which target Iran’s proliferation sensitive nuclear activities. Australia has also implemented sanctions into domestic law, including financial and travel restrictions as well as a prohibition on the supply of specific goods, services and financing which could assist Iran’s nuclear and missile programs. Australia welcomes the European Union agreement in late June to impose new travel and financial sanctions aimed at pressuring Iran to halt uranium enrichment. In light of Iran’s continuing failure to comply with its international obligations, the Australian government is considering what further measures it can take within the international community to bring further pressure to bear on Iran. I conclude by reiterating that Iran’s noncompliance with legally binding United Nations Security Council resolutions is of grave concern to the international community and remains of continuing and grave concern to the Australian government. 7712 7712 14:22:00 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP 885 Wentworth LP 0 Mr TURNBULL —My question is addressed to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to today’s Financial Review, which reports that government backbenchers have endorsed the immediate push for extra financial assistance to age pensioners. If the Prime Minister will not heed his own 83-page report, if the Prime Minister will not listen to his own backbench, if the Prime Minister will not listen to pensioners, then who will the Prime Minister listen to on pension fairness? 7712 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr RUDD —When the opposition delivered the budget reply, the then shadow Treasurer said: ‘We have not got a policy to raise the base rate of the pension.’ That is what you said. That was the formal response by the Liberal Party in response to the Australian budget of this year— A8W Pearce, Christopher, MP Mr Pearce —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order, which goes to relevance. The Prime Minister was asked who he will listen to. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The Prime Minister is 25 seconds into his answer. The Prime Minister will respond to the question. 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —I would say to the Leader of the Opposition, and he knows exactly what I am talking about, that, if he was really serious about pension reform in the 12 years that the Liberal Party was in office—and let us narrow it right down to the shorter period that he was in cabinet—why was the matter of pensioner reform raised only last year, 12 months ago? You did not do a thing to adjust the pension. 7712 7712 14:24:00 D’Ath, Yvette, MP HVN Petrie ALP 1 Mrs D’ATH —My question is to the Minister for Education, the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, the Minister for Social Inclusion and the Deputy Prime Minister. Will the Deputy Prime Minister outline to the House key elements of the government’s proposed workplace relations system? Will the Deputy Prime Minister advise the House of alternative views on workplace relations? 7712 Gillard, Julia, MP 83L Lalor ALP Minister for Education, Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations and Minister for Social Inclusion 1 Ms GILLARD —I thank the member for Petrie for her question, and I note her deep interest in the circumstances of working Australians and their rights at work. Can I confirm to the House that, before the end of this session, the House will consider the substantive bill from the government on the remainder of its workplace relations changes. Can I confirm for members in the House that this bill will deliver on the government’s election promises, the things that it took to the Australian people and which the Australian people endorsed at the last election when they rejected the extremism of Work Choices and endorsed the government’s Forward with Fairness plans. The legislation will deal with 10 national employment standards that every Australian worker can rely on—10 national employment standards that can never be ripped away in the way that basic entitlements were ripped off working Australians under Work Choices. The award modernisation process for the remainder of the safety net for workers who earn $100,000 a year or less has already been produced by the Australian Industrial Relations Commission. These parts of the safety net, the National Employment Standards and modern simple awards will protect working Australians at work and will be a fairer and simpler system. The legislation will deal with a fair bargaining system, enabling Australian working people to bargain in their workplaces with their employers, enabling them to unleash new productivity gains, which, of course, we have not seen under the divisive Work Choices policies of the Liberal government. The legislation will deal with a one-stop shop—Fair Work Australia—where employers and employees around the nation will be able to get advice, enforcement of industrial awards and agreements, and disputes such as unfair dismissals resolved. The legislation will deal with a new simple unfair dismissal system that gets the balance right, that enables small businesses in particular to get on with the business of managing their business but protects hardworking Australians from being unfairly dismissed. The legislation will include clear, tough rules for dealing with industrial action, because we want cooperation in Australian workplaces. This legislation will be a companion to the legislation already passed by the parliament earlier this year, which ended the making of Australian workplace agreements. Can I remind the House, in case anybody has forgotten, about the damage that those agreements did to hardworking Australians. We know from data collected in May 2006 that, of those hardworking Australians who were confronted with Australian workplace agreements under the industrial extremism still endorsed by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, 63 per cent lost penalty rates, 52 per cent had their shift work loadings cut and 51 per cent lost overtime. We know that the opposition, and particularly the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, like to sneer at people who shop for specials. Well, presumably, they were delighted when they saw hardworking Australians have these basic pay and conditions ripped off them. It seems remarkable to me that the Leader of the Opposition can come into the parliament today with concern about the circumstances of Australians when, as a cabinet minister in the Howard government, hardworking Australians would have been not just standing at his door but pounding on his door to tell him about the rip-offs under Work Choices. What did the Leader of the Opposition do about that? Absolutely nothing, except endorse industrial relations extremism. The Leader of the Opposition said: ‘Work Choices was the single most important reform to workplace relations in any of our lifetimes.’ The Leader of the Opposition might change in terms of who has the job, but one thing never changes about the Liberal Party: they are and always will be the party of Work Choices. 7713 7713 14:29:00 Pyne, Chris, MP 9V5 Sturt LP 0 Mr PYNE —My question is to the Prime Minister. Is the Prime Minister aware of the comments of the Attorney-General on Monday, when he described the terrorism trial of Abdul Nacer Benbrika and others as ‘the most successful terrorism prosecution that this country has seen’? Does the Prime Minister agree with the Attorney-General? 7713 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr RUDD —When we deal with terrorism in this country we, in the government—and I presume those opposite—believe in taking an absolute hard line. We support our law enforcement agencies, we support the independence of our judiciary and, on the question of terrorism, there should be no political rancour among us. 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —Do you agree with the Attorney-General’s comments or not? 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! I warn the member for Sturt! 7713 7713 14:31:00 Symon, Mike, MP HW8 Deakin ALP 1 Mr SYMON —My question is to the Minister for Education, the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, the Minister for Social Inclusion and the Deputy Prime Minister. Will the Deputy Prime Minister advise the House of progress in implementing its Forward with Fairness policy agenda? Are there any potential barriers to the timely delivery of the workplace relations system that Australians voted for less than 10 months ago? 7714 Gillard, Julia, MP 83L Lalor ALP Minister for Education, Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations and Minister for Social Inclusion 1 Ms GILLARD —I thank the member for his question and for interest in fairness at work. As I have just advised the House, we are now in the closing stages of a consultative process which has engaged business—both big and small—and trade unions in consulting on the details of implementation of the government’s Forward with Fairness plans, as taken to the Australian people at the last election. 83P Bishop, Julie, MP Ms Julie Bishop interjecting— 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —Of course, the Deputy Leader of the Opposition is calling out because she does not believe in telling Australians the truth when you go to elections on workplace relations policies. But this is the government that did tell Australians the truth. We took our Forward with Fairness plan to the last election. We have been consulting on its implementation and details. We are about to go through an intensive process through the committee on industrial legislation, where industrial experts will look at the legislation in draft over a 10-day period in order to give their advice on its improvement on the details of its implementation, and then the legislation will be in this parliament. I am asked about obstacles to the implementation of this legislation. I regret to advise the House that there is a clear obstacle, and that is the present policy of the Liberal Party in responding to the government’s legislation. We have been advised by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition that the Liberal Party’s test as to whether the legislation will be supported by the Liberal Party or opposed by the Liberal Party is whether or not it reintroduces Australian workplace agreements. That is the Liberal Party’s test for the government’s legislation which implements the policy we were elected on: whether that legislation has grafted onto it the heart of the Work Choices policy that the Australian people rejected at the last election. So presumably, unless the Liberal Party sees the heart of Work Choices—the policy rejected by the Australian people—grafted into the government’s legislation, it will deny the Australian people what they want, which is an end to the remainder of Work Choices. Presumably, the Liberal Party is going to thwart the Australian people’s desire for the policy that they voted for and instead continue the hated Work Choices legislation. A big decision is coming for the new Leader of the Opposition, and he has got only two choices. He can back in his deputy leader, stand by Work Choices and spit in the face of the Australian people, or he can dump the position of his deputy leader and acknowledge that the Australian people voted for Forward with Fairness and Forward with Fairness is what the Australian people should have. It is a big test for the Leader of the Opposition. He says he is concerned about Australians. He wants us to believe him to be a compassionate man. He supported rip-offs of Australian working families when they were in government. What we are waiting to see is whether he is going to support those rip-offs in opposition. I am not heartened, having looked at what the Leader of the Opposition has had to say in other circumstances about workplace relations. He said the following: You have to free the market to do its work and let the cost of setting the clearing price—be it for labour, shares, home units or loaves of bread—be as low as possible— A government member—Aha! 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —Exactly. He continued: and by that I mean with as few transaction costs as possible. Transaction costs like a minimum wage, transaction costs like an awards system, transaction costs like industrial laws that are fair, transaction costs like a fair bargaining system and transaction costs like unfair dismissals. He wants Australian working people to be treated as if they are loaves of bread. DK6 Hockey, Joe, MP Mr Hockey —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order that goes to relevance. We know that the Deputy Prime Minister was a transaction cost for the leadership of the member for Griffith. We know that. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The Manager of Opposition Business will resume his seat and I warn him. That was not a point of order. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —Isn’t it interesting? The man who defended every rip-off in this parliament is up to defend Work Choices. For every rip-off of every family, everybody who ever lost a cent—you were there at this dispatch box defending it. But the choice remains for the Leader of the Opposition: he dump his deputy, vote for what the Australian people voted for, or come clean on his plans to take Work Choices further and to make sure Australian working people are treated as if they are chattels; because that is clearly what he has said in the past. 7715 7715 14:36:00 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP 885 Wentworth LP 0 Mr TURNBULL —My question is addressed to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to his previous answer to the question from the member for Sturt where he defended the Attorney-General. Does the Prime Minister accept the criticism of the Attorney-General by the trial judge, Justice Bongiorno: It’s abundantly clear it would have been to the enhancement of justice in this country if these comments had not been made … They were unnecessary and had the potential to cause difficulties in this trial. 7715 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr RUDD —As I said in response to the question from the member for Sturt, the government’s view on terrorism is hard line, and that means through the prosecution agencies; it means in supporting the independence of our judiciary. Obviously members of the bench are going to take exception from time to time with statements from members of the government or members of the public or, for that matter, members of the opposition. I stand entirely by this government’s position, which is that we will take a hard line on terrorism in the future, without fear or favour. 7715 Distinguished Visitors 7715 14:38:00 SPEAKER, The 10000 PO N/A 1 0 The SPEAKER —Order! I inform the House that we have present in the gallery this afternoon members of a delegation from the Parliament of the Czech Republic. On behalf of the House I extend a very warm welcome to our visitors. Honourable members—Hear, hear! 7715 Questions Without Notice 7715 7715 14:38:00 Rea, Kerry, MP HVR Bonner ALP 1 Ms REA —My question is to the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government. Will the minister advise the House of any recent calls to boost investment in infrastructure? Is the minister aware of any threats to infrastructure funding? 7715 Albanese, Anthony, MP R36 Grayndler ALP Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government 1 Mr ALBANESE —I thank the member for Bonner for her question and for her ongoing interest in infrastructure, particularly in the growing part of South-East Queensland. This government has made infrastructure a key part of our economic reform program. We have established Infrastructure Australia and put $20 billion into the Building Australia Fund. Our recognition of the importance of infrastructure investment has been widely applauded by industry—people who, for years, were crying out for national coordination of infrastructure; people who were arguing for a pipeline of projects to be available on infrastructure in ports, in roads, in rail, in broadband and in energy. All of these areas have suffered from an infrastructure deficit. Just this morning I addressed a gathering of the Tourism & Transport Forum, members of which I welcome to question time today. The TTF this morning produced a compact. It is a document that calls for greater public investment in infrastructure. It is a document that talks about the need to deal with urban congestion in our cities. It is a document that calls for the need to unclog our ports. It is a document that is consistent with the principles being established by this government’s nation-building agenda. The Tourism & Transport Forum, many members of which are sitting up there in the gallery, are not affiliated with the Fabian Society! This is not some left-wing gathering. This is a gathering of Australia’s business leaders—the likes of Clayton Utz, IBM, Leightons, David Jones, ABN AMRO, Bilfinger Berger, Multiplex, Macquarie, Qantas, the NRMA, the Commonwealth Bank; I see many of them, the captains of industry, up there in the gallery—all supporting an infrastructure agenda and all arguing for the Building Australia Fund. But what do we have from those across on the other side of the chamber? What we had when this question was asked was an interjection from the Leader of the National Party, of all things, who interjected that it is just a slush fund—complete opposition; ignoring it for 12 years and then opposing the nation-building agenda of the government. Just yesterday the member for Calare said once again that public transport in Australia’s capital cities was solely the job of state governments; once again repeating the argument that it had nothing to do with the Commonwealth; once again repeating what they played out in action over 12 long years of neglect—that it had nothing to do with the Commonwealth government. But, of course, as the people present this morning at the seminar know, if the opposition succeeds in blowing a $6.2 billion hole in the budget, then what that means is less money in the long-term investment funds that were established as a part of the Rudd Labor government’s budget in May. So out of touch are the opposition—not only with working Australians but with people who, from time to time, would be seen as some of their traditional supporters—that they are ignoring their calls also. But as a reborn friend of the battler, the Leader of the Opposition, from Struggle Street in Point Piper, should ensure not only that he defends working Australians but that he gets in touch with the business community of this country. Opposition members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The minister will resume his seat. Opposition members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! Has the minister concluded his answer? SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr Tuckey interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —I indicate to the member for O’Connor that the minister has concluded his answer. SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr Tuckey interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for O’Connor has not got the call. SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr Tuckey interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for O’Connor! Opposition members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! When the House settles down— 7716 Distinguished Visitors 7716 14:43:00 SPEAKER, The 10000 PO N/A 1 0 The SPEAKER —Independent of the welcome given to certain people in the galleries by the minister, I note that we have in the gallery Bruce Baird, the former member for Cook and a former minister in the New South Wales parliament, and he is warmly welcomed back in his new guise. Honourable members—Hear, hear! 7717 Questions Without Notice 7717 7717 14:44:00 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP 885 Wentworth LP 0 Mr TURNBULL —My question is addressed to the Prime Minister. How can the Prime Minister credibly claim to be tough on terrorism when he has today defended the Attorney-General’s reckless remarks, which put at risk the outcome of an ongoing terrorist trial, and then brushed aside, as mere commentary, the grave criticisms of his own Attorney-General by the trial judge himself? 7717 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr RUDD —There is nothing like the member for Wentworth rising in high dudgeon, I always say. It is a piece of theatre from central casting as confected as the member for Wentworth’s recent discovery of compassion for pensioners—which did not exist as of four months ago. 885 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP Mr Turnbull —Mr Speaker, on a point of order: the question relates to an ongoing terrorist trial and the Attorney-General putting its outcome at risk. The Prime Minister might return to the substance of the question. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Before giving the Prime Minister the call, I will say that the Prime Minister is aware that he has to be relevant to the question. Independent of these things, I want to clarify if this is an ongoing trial. DK6 Hockey, Joe, MP Mr Hockey —On the point of order, Mr Speaker: I know where you are going and can assist the House by— Honourable members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! This is a serious aspect for the House. DK6 Hockey, Joe, MP Mr Hockey —The trial has concluded, but it may be subject to appeal and therefore the comments of the Attorney-General are very relevant and do not represent something that is sub judice. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —This is the matter that I wished to raise. I indicate to the House that they should be careful about transgressing the sub judice conventions of the House. As I have indicated to the House, I was trying to determine what stage we were at. So far I have been satisfied that, in the narrow way in which the answers have been directed to the question and the narrow way in which the questions have been put, it satisfies the convention so far. But the House should be careful. 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. The benefit of your intervention just now is to underline the absolute hypocrisy of those opposite. Here we are, debating a matter which they believe—or argue—is of such sensitivity that it should not be the subject of political comment, and what do they do? They make it the subject of political comment. I find it remarkable. The harder the question goes to whether the government is serious about terrorism— Opposition members interjecting— RH4 Kerr, Duncan, MP Mr Kerr —You weren’t defending civil liberties 12 months ago! 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The Parliamentary Secretary for Pacific Island Affairs might get the benefit of giving legal advice in the Pacific islands! 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —Mr Speaker, on a point of relevance: the question does not go to the outcome of the trial. It goes to the comments of the Attorney-General— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Sturt will resume his seat. The Prime Minister has indicated that he has concluded. Honourable members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! I appreciate that the hubbub might not be because the member for Leichhardt has a good following in this chamber, but the member for Leichhardt has the call. 7718 7718 14:48:00 Turnour, Jim, MP HVV Leichhardt ALP 1 Mr TURNOUR —My question is to the Minister for Finance and Deregulation. How is the government using fiscal policy to guard against uncertain international economic conditions? Are there any threats to the government’s approach? HWT Robert, Stuart, MP Mr Robert —It’s your crystal ball! 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for Fadden might get time to research that question himself. The member for Fadden is warned. 7718 Tanner, Lindsay, MP YU5 Melbourne ALP Minister for Finance and Deregulation 1 Mr TANNER —I thank the member for Leichhardt for his question. He certainly has a good following in Leichhardt—I am not sure about in the chamber. The government is committed to delivering long-term, sustainable growth for the future Australian economy, and all of the major domestic policy initiatives of the government are connected to this ultimate objective, whether in infrastructure, the Education Revolution, the national broadband network, the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme or, most particularly, delivering a strong budget surplus that puts downward pressure on inflation and interest rates. That is particularly important in the event that we have further problems in international financial markets like what we have seen over the past few days. That simply underlines the importance of having strong fiscal settings and a very strong budget surplus in this country. I note that the new Leader of the Opposition has described the international financial circumstances as ‘the gravest economic crisis globally in any of our lifetimes’. It certainly is a very serious financial crisis internationally, but some might debate whether the wider implications for the global economy are equivalent to things like the 1970s oil shock or the recessions of the early 1980s or early 1990s. Time will perhaps tell. I note the Leader of the Opposition is a bit sensitive on this point. There is no question that there are very serious challenges facing the global economy. Australia is not immune from the implications of these challenges, but we are well positioned—indeed, better positioned than almost any other developed nation in the world—to ride out these challenges. We still have reasonably strong economic growth, low unemployment, good regulators, strongly capitalised banks, a strong budget surplus and, of course, money continuing to flow from the mining boom and particularly strong business investment, as the most recent data indicates. We are well placed to deal with these problems, and it is very important that we take a balanced view of the nature of these challenges and do not talk down the Australian economy. I note that the Leader of the Opposition’s sole criticism of the Treasurer— Opposition members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The Minister for Finance and Deregulation has the call. YU5 Tanner, Lindsay, MP Mr TANNER —I note that the sole criticism, the sole point of any coherence made by the Leader of the Opposition, previously the shadow Treasurer, was the claim that the Treasurer was talking down the Australian economy. When we look at his current rhetoric, it would perhaps be pertinent if he took some of his own advice and gave a slightly more balanced perspective on the challenges that are facing the Australian economy, because there are real-world people out there who are making spending choices and investment decisions based on, amongst other things, where the Australian economy is seen to be heading by Australia’s political leaders. So it would be important if the Leader of the Opposition were to take a balanced perspective on these things, because it is extremely important that the true position, the balanced perspective on these things, is conveyed to the Australian people. We do have serious challenges, but we also have good settings to deal with those challenges. I note that the Leader of the Opposition has been seeking to cast a bit of cover on who he really is in recent times. He indicated that, because he lived in a flat for a time as a kid or something, he is the great representative of Struggle Street and the battlers. 00AMM Hartsuyker, Luke, MP Mr Hartsuyker —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order going to relevance. I would ask you to bring the minister back to the question. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The minister knows that he is required to be relevant to the question. YU5 Tanner, Lindsay, MP Mr TANNER —I am afraid this is entirely relevant. Unfortunately for the Leader of the Opposition, the Australian people are less interested in whether you come from privilege than whether you represent privilege. That is the truth of the opposition leader’s position. In spite of pretending to be the man from the battlers— 83P Bishop, Julie, MP Ms Julie Bishop —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I understand that the government is entirely intimidated by the new Leader of the Opposition—absolutely intimidated by him—but the personal denigration and attacks on successful Australians do not answer the question he was asked. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The Deputy Leader of the Opposition will resume her seat. YU5 Tanner, Lindsay, MP Mr TANNER —In spite of portraying himself as the new-found friend of the battlers, the Leader of the Opposition was very recently an integral part of a government that gave the Australian people Work Choices—an industrial relations regime that tore away their penalty rates, their overtime and all the protections that lower paid battlers rely on in the workplace to give them some bargaining power. He is also part of an opposition—as shadow Treasurer and now as the Leader of the Opposition—that is engaged in an exercise in the Senate to blow a very large hole in the budget surplus in order to fight for lower taxes for Ferrari buyers, Porsche buyers and Rolls-Royce buyers. He is also engaged in an action in the Senate to rip apart the budget surplus to defend the interests of big alcohol companies so that teenage girls can buy cheaper alcopops. He is also engaged in a vandalism exercise in the Senate to maintain a tax lurk that was put in place for big oil companies 30 years ago as a kick-start to new projects. So the man who says that we are in the biggest economic crisis globally in our lifetime is at the same time engaged in an exercise in the Senate to rip apart the budget surplus, which is one of the key buffers for the Australian government and the Australian people in dealing with the consequences of the international crisis. Why? Because he is defending the interests of privileged, well-off Australians. The issues that he is pursuing and that the opposition is pursuing ultimately come back to who they really are, and that is the representatives of the better-off in our society. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The minister will bring his answer to a conclusion. YU5 Tanner, Lindsay, MP Mr TANNER —The Leader of the Opposition has given nine major media interviews in the past 24 hours since becoming Leader of the Opposition. He has not once mentioned health. He has not once mentioned education. He has talked an awful lot about himself, but there has been no new significant policy initiative to deal either with the economic problems coming from the international crisis or indeed with the wider interests of working people in this country. The Rudd government is committed to looking after the interests of working people and to investing for the long-term future of the Australian economy. 7720 7720 14:57:00 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP 885 Wentworth LP 0 Mr TURNBULL —My question is to the Prime Minister. Has the Prime Minister sought legal advice on the consequences of the Attorney-General’s remarks and, in particular, on the possibility that those remarks will provide a ground for appeal against the convictions of Benbrika and his co-accused? 7720 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr RUDD —Obviously the matter raised by the honourable member is one that has been dealt with by the courts and, as the Attorney-General himself indicated on Monday, his comments were not directed at matters which were still before the courts. As Attorney-General, it is his role to assure the community that all agencies are working hard to protect Australians. Opposition members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The Leader of the Opposition has asked his question. 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —I would say to the barracking new Leader of the Opposition, the member for Wentworth, this: on the question of terrorism, this government makes no apology for taking a hard line. It makes no apology for making clear-cut statements to the Australian community that we will not brook— Opposition members interjecting— SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr Tuckey —I rise on a point of order relating to relevance. This parliament is entitled to know whether the Prime Minister has got a legal opinion or not, and he should just simply answer. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for O’Connor will resume his seat. The Prime Minister is responding to the question. 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —On the matters which went to the substance of the questions concerning the Attorney-General, I have responded to those, including the one that went to this government’s credentials in the fight against terrorism. I can simply say to those opposite that that has been a large part of what has been put before us. We take a hard line. We make no apology for it. 7720 7720 14:59:00 Hall, Jill, MP 83N Shortland ALP 1 Ms HALL —My question is to the Minister for Ageing. Minister, what is the government’s response to community concerns about the need to create more aged-care beds in areas of high need? 7720 Elliot, Justine, MP DZW Richmond ALP Minister for Ageing 1 Mrs ELLIOT —I thank the member for Shortland for her question and I note what a very strong interest she has when it comes to aged-care places and community care places. Australians have the second longest life expectancy in the world, which is great news, and currently there are some 2.8 million Australians, about 13 per cent of our population, aged 65 years and over. This number is expected to triple over the next 40 years, and an Australian born today can expect to reach 81.4 years of age, which is great news. To meet these challenges over the next four years, the Australian government is investing more than $40 billion when it comes to aged care, $28.6 billion of that on nursing homes alone. We acted because for the last 12 years the previous government neglected aged care. They were always talking down the aged-care sector. Well, we are committed to fixing that. In fact, no Australian government has committed more funding to aged care than the Rudd Labor government. A8W Pearce, Christopher, MP Mr Pearce interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! If the member for Aston would stay quiet, he might hear. DZW Elliot, Justine, MP Mrs ELLIOT —One of the major challenges of an ageing population is to find ways to help nursing home providers to set up beds in areas of high need. That is why we established the zero real interest loans and associated places round: to meet that specific need. Members of this chamber will be very pleased to hear that stage 1 has been a huge success. As a result of this plan, there will be 1,348 new nursing home beds and more than 100 community care packages in areas of high need. This is stage 1 of our election commitment. Honourable members interjecting— DZW Elliot, Justine, MP Mrs ELLIOT —I hear someone asking, ‘Where are they?’ I will outline that. This includes 375 new places in Western Australia, valued at $46.6 million; 154 new places in Tasmania, valued at $16.07 million; 293 new places in New South Wales, valued at $30 million; 246 new beds in Victoria, valued at $19.7 million; 259 new places in Queensland, valued at $24.7 million; and 128 new beds in South Australia, valued at $12.8 million. This is about providing nursing home beds through low-cost finance in areas where they were previously very unlikely to be established. We will now build on this very successful plan in developing stage 2 of zero real interest loans, and we will examine further ways to create more nursing home beds in areas of high need. As I said before, for 12 years under the previous government aged care was neglected. This government is committed to meeting the challenges of the 21st century, including our ageing population. 7721 7721 15:03:00 Pyne, Chris, MP 9V5 Sturt LP 0 Mr PYNE —My question is to the Attorney-General. I refer to the Attorney’s remarks on Monday regarding the trial of Benbrika and others, and I ask the Attorney: weren’t those remarks made prior to the conclusion of the jury finishing its deliberations, hence the criticism by Judge Bongiorno? Do you accept the criticisms of the trial judge? 7721 McClelland, Robert, MP JK6 Barton ALP Attorney-General 1 Mr McCLELLAND —I appreciate the member’s question. What I said at the outset in my press conference on Monday was: The jury is still deliberating on charges against two individuals and the court orders remain in place in respect to those matters, so, as such, it would be inappropriate for me to comment on detail relating to those matters. I went on: However, I welcome the convictions that have been handed down today. They were in respect of six individuals. For the record, might I say in respect of the Leader of the Opposition’s comments about reckless comments that, as I understand it, the defence counsel, in a submission that went to nearly two pages of transcript, challenged two of my comments. The first was where I said: Successful prosecutions are of course important, vitally important, in sending a clear message to those who may be influenced by violent extremism. That was one quote the defence counsel took objection to. The second statement the defence counsel took objection to was: The seriousness of the offences involved in this case highlights why we must do all we can to ensure the public’s security. They were the two comments that the defence counsel took exception to, in some two pages of transcript. In terms of the member’s question, can I say—and it should be put on the record—that we certainly appreciate the work of the court. There was tremendous pressure on the court, the judge, the staff and the jury. We recognise the tremendous work. The trial went from February this year, with over 50 witnesses and 6,000 pages of evidence—a tremendous workload undertaken by the court. But in my comments on Monday—and I will table the transcript shortly—I specifically stated that my comments were not directed at matters still before the court. While the defence counsel has a professional obligation to defend the interests of his client, my role as Attorney-General is to ensure public safety. In the face of six convictions being handed down, I saw it as my role to assure the community that all agencies are working hard to protect the safety of all Australians. The other point I made in my statement on Monday was that it is important to recognise the role played by members of the Muslim community in assisting with the investigation. In other words, while, yes, certainly individuals have been convicted of very serious offences in these proceedings, this does not reflect upon the Australian Muslim community generally. I thought it important to make those points in the context of the widespread media reporting that was inevitably going to occur. 885 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP Mr Turnbull —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The point of order is on relevance. The Attorney-General has been asked about the judge’s comments and the judge’s criticism of him, and he has not responded to that. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The Leader of the Opposition will resume his place. JK6 McClelland, Robert, MP Mr McCLELLAND —I will not be long in concluding, but it was important to reassure the community that it was also important to specifically acknowledge the assistance provided by Muslim Australians, a fact specifically acknowledged by— 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —What has that got to do with the question? JK6 McClelland, Robert, MP Mr McCLELLAND —What has it got to do with the issue? In the context where there was to be widespread media coverage of very significant, very alarming events, it was very, very important that we took steps to ensure that the integrity of our vibrant and multicultural society was protected, and it was important in both respects to reassure the community. Going back to comments made by the Prime Minister, our role is not to defend the accused; our role is to defend public safety. And, again, I would like to recognise the tremendous work of the Australian Federal Police, the Victorian police, ASIO and the Commonwealth Department of Public Prosecutions. Individually and collectively these agencies have done an outstanding job. Once again, let me for the record indicate the government’s respect and appreciation for the work of the court in managing this long and complex matter. 7722 Distinguished Visitors 7722 15:09:00 SPEAKER, The 10000 PO N/A 1 0 The SPEAKER —I inform the House that we have present in the gallery this afternoon members of the Australian men’s and women’s cricket teams. I warmly welcome them, congratulate them on deeds in the past and wish them well for the future. I feel like I am down here batting on a sticky wicket! Honourable members—Hear, hear! 7722 Questions Without Notice 7722 7722 15:09:00 Campbell, Jodie, MP HWC Bass ALP 1 Ms CAMPBELL —My question is to the Minister for Health and Ageing. Will the minister explain why it is important to pass the Medicare levy surcharge threshold changes? 7722 Roxon, Nicola, MP 83K Gellibrand ALP Minister for Health and Ageing 1 Ms ROXON —I am pleased to do that for the member for Bass because we know on this side of that House that this measure will provide tax relief to nearly half a million Australians, and unfortunately the opposition does not see fit to, at this stage, support that tax relief. We have a new Leader of the Opposition and he announced yesterday: I know what it is like to be very short of money … I know Australians are doing it tough and some Australians, even in the years of greatest prosperity, will always do it tough. Now he has the opportunity to put some substance behind that commitment and he could, if he chose to, direct his senators to vote for tax relief that would assist nearly half a million Australians who indeed are doing it tough. The new Leader of the Opposition has a chance to nail his colours to the mast. If he understands that some people are short of money and doing it tough, this is an opportunity for him to provide tax relief immediately to nearly half a million Australians. And, particularly for the benefit of the new Leader of the Opposition, I want to read out an email—one of many that have been sent to those of us on this side of the House and, I am sure, to some on the other side of the House—from one couple who said: I am writing to you to thank you for increasing the threshold on the Medicare levy surcharge. As you are aware, this threshold has been set for many years, not taking into account the rising cost of living. For the first time in 12 years we have a government that is looking after working-class families and does not seem intent on punishing us for not being able to afford a higher standard of living. I had to wait for two years to get surgery and still cannot afford to go to the dentist. We are not choosing to not have private health insurance; we simply cannot afford it. I say to the new Leader of the Opposition, after nine interviews yesterday that were all about this man sitting over here, there are half a million Australians who would actually like to know whether he is prepared to provide tax relief to those families. For average income families, many families, it is $1,000 or $1,200 that could go into their pockets straightaway, and the opposition is blocking this move in the Senate. It is a chance for the new Leader of the Opposition, instead of talking about himself, to tell those people what he will do to provide tax relief to them. 7723 7723 15:12:00 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP 885 Wentworth LP 0 Mr TURNBULL —My question is addressed to the Attorney-General. Isn’t it the case that, by rushing out to get a headline prior to the end of the Benbrika trial instead of waiting for its conclusion, he has put at risk the outcome of the biggest terrorism trial in our history and needlessly given a ground of appeal to those convicted? R36 Albanese, Anthony, MP Mr Albanese —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The question was in contravention of standing order 100(d)(ii), (iii) and (v). 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Many of the questions that are asked in this place contravene a number of subsections of that standing order. To the extent that the core of the question is in order, I call the Attorney-General. 7723 McClelland, Robert, MP JK6 Barton ALP Attorney-General 1 Mr McCLELLAND —For a start, in answering the Leader of the Opposition’s question, Mr Benbrika’s convictions had been confirmed at the time of my statement. If I can refer to the submissions from the Crown—these were made before his Honour: In our submission it is clear from the context of what was said by the Attorney-General that he was there speaking in respect to those counts in which a verdict of guilt had been returned, that is, concluded. In any event nothing in the passages where he expressed the views he has in our submission could reasonably be taken as being in any fashion an observation upon those counts which were yet to be decided. It is clear enough, we would submit, from the introduction of what he has to say, that he recognises the jury is still deliberating— Which I did. —and in respect of those ‘it is inappropriate for me to comment on the detail relating to those matters.’ That is the quote from me. The Crown went on: It is expressed from what he is saying that he is speaking in respect of counts that the jury have delivered. And that was most certainly the case. His Honour dismissed the application by the defence—who I might say had made a number of applications during the course of these proceedings for the discharge of the jury—and made, in all bar two pages of transcript, a submission here. I was asked about the purpose of my comments. I can simply repeat my answer: my comments were not directed to the matter before the courts. I specifically stated that. It was my role as Attorney-General to reassure the community that our security agencies were doing all that they reasonably could to protect their safety. I also saw it as very important that while, yes, individuals had been convicted of very serious offences, the blame for conduct of those individuals should not be sheeted home to the broader Muslim community. 7724 7724 15:16:00 Adams, Dick, MP BV5 Lyons ALP 1 Mr ADAMS —My question is to the Minister for Trade. At a time of global financial uncertainty, why does improving our trade performance matter and what is the government doing to achieve that? 7724 Crean, Simon, MP DT4 Hotham ALP Minister for Trade 1 Mr CREAN —I thank the honourable member for his question, and I know that he is a person who is absolutely committed to improving our trade performance. In the context of the financial uncertainty that surrounds us, it is timely that the government provide Australian business and the broader community with certainty and confidence on the way forward. That is why improving our trade performance has become even more important. There are two contexts for this. The first is that world trade grows much faster than world output—in fact, by a multiple of three—so improving our trade performance increases our options. The second context is what we inherited from the previous government. Not only did they bequeath us high inflation but they also bequeathed us a woeful trade performance—72 consecutive monthly trade deficits, record high trade deficits, record high current account deficits and record high foreign debt. In fact, during their 11 years of office, net exports only had a positive contribution to GDP in two of those years. Contrast that to when Labor were in office. We achieved that positive contribution to GDP from net exports on 10 occasions. That is why we do need to turn our trade performance around. Net exports must once again make a positive contribution to economic growth. In the time that we have been in office we have embarked upon a two-pronged approach to trade: trade liberalisation and structural reforms to make us more competitive. On the trade liberalisation front, we recalibrated our trade negotiation priorities to make Doha and a conclusion to that round central to our approach. In fact, this is a government that played itself back into relevance in the Doha Round. The fact is that we are 80 per cent of the way to a successful conclusion to the Doha Round. If successful, it will see tariffs on goods come down, agricultural tariffs come down by up to 70 per cent, domestic agricultural subsidies in the US cut to $14½ billion, tariff quotas increased and agricultural export subsidies eliminated. It is significant because it provides greater certainty to the business community and it is also an important platform for further liberalisation. On the question of free trade agreements, let me make this observation: the previous government said that that was its priority. In 11 years of office those opposite succeeded in achieving outcomes in only three FTAs. In the nine months that we have been in office not only have we concluded two FTAs but we have unfrozen the stalled talks that they got into with China and brought forward the free trade agreement with India feasibility study. Given the importance of both India and China and the strong domestic demand that they still generate, these are important developments. As for the ASEAN free trade agreement that we concluded, let me make this point: this is the fastest growing region of the world. It collectively has $71 billion in two-way trade and it is bigger than the US, bigger than China and bigger than Japan. It is a Labor government that brought conclusion to those negotiations. That is a demonstration of our commitment to turning around the trade performance. Our response to Mortimer will address those structural reforms, and I will have more to say about that at a later stage. But the Rudd government, after some very terrible years on the trade performance front from the other side, is providing greater certainty for Australian businesses, greater certainty for our exporters and greater confidence to our community. The government has a lot to repair from the mismanagement and sclerotic shape that those opposite left our trade performance in. 7725 7725 15:21:00 Chester, Darren, MP IPZ Gippsland NATS 0 Mr CHESTER —My question is to the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry. I refer the minister to his answer to my question yesterday in which he said: … I will not show any sympathy for … someone who, unlike his colleagues, refuses to engage in the process and decides he would rather get the headline and jump up and down here. Every day he— the member for Gippsland— delays in engaging with the process he leaves the farmers in his electorate out in the cold. I also refer the minister to the 35 separate occasions I have written to him on behalf of individual Gippsland farmers and my letters to his office and the Victorian government seeking a review of the decision. Given that I have not received a response to any of these representations, when will the minister engage in the process and when will the minister bring the farmers of Gippsland in from the cold? BV5 Adams, Dick, MP Mr Adams interjecting— 83E Ripoll, Bernie, MP Mr Ripoll interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Lyons and the member for Oxley are not assisting. 7725 Burke, Tony, MP DYW Watson ALP Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry 1 Mr BURKE —I am pleased to get the question on the day that the National Party have been reduced to single figures in the chamber. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The minister will get to the answer. DYW Burke, Tony, MP Mr BURKE —I also note that, among the different references that the member for Gippsland has just made, he did not refer to the conversations with my office today at the meeting that he had with my office today and the advice that he was given today in terms of the specific engagement with the process. I would also add that I met with the Chair of the National Rural Advisory Council the Sunday before last, and on that occasion we went through the issues with Gippsland. He made clear at that point that there would be a new assessment, that the original survey that was done was a desktop assessment and that they— E3L Morrison, Scott, MP Mr Morrison interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for Cook is warned. DYW Burke, Tony, MP Mr BURKE —would be going through and looking at a reassessment of the Gippsland area. The important thing on the process and on the engagement is to understand the pathway through. As I reminded the member for Gippsland, yesterday when I made that comment was when I was explaining the process, and he stood up in this place and said, ‘Oh, but what about the farmers in Gippsland?’ It is the process that delivers for them—it is by engaging in that. That is why he can look to his left, he can look to his right and he will find he is surrounded by members of parliament on that side of the chamber who have engaged in an entirely different way in making sure that they get the recommendations dealt with by the National Rural Advisory Council so that those recommendations come back to me to make sure that exceptional circumstances reassessments are done, and done in a timely fashion. 7726 15:24:00 Chester, Darren, MP IPZ Gippsland NATS 0 0 Mr CHESTER —I seek leave to table the correspondence. Leave not granted. 7726 7726 15:25:00 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 1 Mr PRICE —My question is to the Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations and Minister for Social Inclusion. Can the Deputy Prime Minister inform the House of the consequences to Australia of skills shortages? 7726 Gillard, Julia, MP 83L Lalor ALP Deputy Prime Minister 1 Ms GILLARD —I thank the member for Chifley for his question. Of course, Australians around the country know about the impact of skills shortages. Whether you are running a major project in the north-west of this country or trying to get a plumber or another tradesperson to attend to a small job at your home, the consequences of skills shortages are in your face. This is a skills crisis that has built up over 12 long years and which the government is urgently addressing. We have made available 42,000 training places under the Productivity Places Program of the government, and these training places provide job seekers with qualifications from certificate II level to diploma level. So oversubscribed has this program been, so popular has it been, with people taking the places and commencing training—and, indeed, some have completed training and they are now in jobs—that I have recently announced an additional investment of $45.5 million for an additional 15,000 training places to be available to job seekers. We are acting to address Australia’s skills crisis, and the skills crisis shows throughout Australian society. Indeed, it is somewhat bemusing to me that we have seen a bit of a skills crisis on display today in the House of Representatives. We have seen the Leader of the Opposition and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition morph into senior counsel and junior counsel. He is back in his spy catcher days; she is back in her days of defending CSR against claims by people who got mesothelioma in Wittenoom. And they think that that is leadership for the country—senior counsel and junior counsel! Well, it might make a difference if you were at the bar trying to earn money as a Queen’s Counsel, but what Australians actually want is leadership. So I would suggest to the Leader of the Opposition and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition they might want to think about those political skills— PK6 Randall, Don, MP Mr Randall —Mr Speaker, I raise a point of order. The ex ambulance chaser needs to be relevant. R36 Albanese, Anthony, MP Mr Albanese —Mr Speaker, on the point of order, there are standing orders which require points of order to actually be about points of order—not an opportunity in this chamber to say what they like. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The Leader of the House will resume his seat. The Deputy Prime Minister has the call. R36 Albanese, Anthony, MP Mr Albanese interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The Leader of the House is quite aware that the member for Canning’s behaviour was outside the standing orders, and he is quite aware that his own behaviour was well and truly outside the standing orders. I think that he would understand that occupiers of the chair have shown some flexibility in carrying out their duties. That is the point at this time. If he has some problem with this, he has whatever action is befitting him in his position as Leader of the House. I will now listen carefully to the response from the Deputy Prime Minister—perhaps with less flexibility. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —Can I just say on the question of skills shortages—and having been a lawyer in the past—that, if I were picking a side on CSR and Wittenoom, I am glad I picked the side of the injured workers. I am proud of that. I am proud I did not defend the company against those claims. I am actually proud of that. On the question of these skills we have seen on display today, can I suggest to the Leader of the Opposition that his job is not the Spycatcher trials but to outline some policy for the Australian people. He might want to start with skills shortages. He might want to move to health. He might try telling us what he is going to do when the Forward with Fairness legislation comes into the parliament. Will he be defending Work Choices, or voting the way the Australian people want him to vote? We are looking forward to a bit of exercise of political skills on those things. 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr Rudd —Mr Speaker, I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper. 7727 Documents 7727 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —I present the report for 2007-08 on the Commonwealth Ombudsman’s activities in monitoring controlled operations conducted by the Australian Crime Commission, the Australian Federal Police and the Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity. 7727 Documents Mr ALBANESE (Grayndler —Leader of the House) 15:30:00 —Documents are tabled in accordance with the list circulated to honourable members earlier today. 7727 Ministerial Statements 7727 7727 15:31:00 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP Minister for Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs, and Assistant Treasurer 1 0 Mr BOWEN —by leave—In June, I reported to the House on the important agreement that had been reached between the Commonwealth and the states and territories to move to a single national product safety regime. Today, I want to inform the House of another important milestone in the government’s consumer policy reform agenda which will be to the benefit of both consumers and businesses. These reforms will bring Australia’s consumer protection laws into the 21st century and reflect the Rudd government’s commitment to a seamless national economy. Business will also benefit from a reduction in compliance costs as nine sets of consumer laws are folded into one new single national consumer law. On 15 August 2008, the Ministerial Council on Consumer Affairs (MCCA) had an historic meeting in Hobart where it reached agreement on a range of policy initiatives aimed at providing national consistency in Australia’s consumer laws, the enforcement of these laws and the way in which these laws are developed. The centrepiece of these reforms is a single, national consumer law. On 3 July 2008, the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) agreed to a comprehensive set of reforms designed to create a seamless national economy. One of the key areas of reform was the development of an Australian consumer policy framework. COAG requested the Business Regulation and Competition Working Group, in cooperation with the ministerial council, to develop an enhanced national approach for Australia’s consumer policy framework, drawing on the final report of the Productivity Commission. The ministerial council has agreed to propose to the Business Regulation and Competition Working Group that all Australian jurisdictions agree to adopt a national consumer law based on the consumer protection provisions of the Trade Practices Act 1974. COAG will now consider the recommendation for an enhanced consumer policy framework at its October meeting. The new national consumer law will have the following features. It will be based on the current consumer protection provisions of the Trade Practices Act and also incorporate appropriate amendments that reflect best practice in state and territory legislation. The new law will be developed with the agreement of all Australian governments and made law through an application legislation scheme with the Commonwealth as the lead legislator. Amendments to the national consumer law must be agreed by governments according to an intergovernmental agreement, which will, among other things, provide for the amendments to be agreed to by the Commonwealth plus four other state and territory governments, of which three must be states. This is a similar voting mechanism to that which exists for making changes to the Corporations Act 2001. These new generic consumer provisions will apply to all sectors of the economy, with the exception of the financial services sector, which will need to retain a distinct legislative framework. However, the Commonwealth government is committed to maintaining consistency between these two sets of laws to the extent that it is practicable. There will be joint enforcement of the national consumer law by the ACCC and the state and territory offices of fair trading, as was recommended by the Productivity Commission’s report into Australia’s consumer policy framework. ASIC will retain responsibility for administering the consumer law that applies to financial services. This single national consumer law will also include a provision that addresses unfair contract terms, as was recommended by the Productivity Commission, and will adapt some features of the existing Victorian law. The ministerial council’s agreement on a national consumer law has been widely welcomed by both consumer and industry groups. The Director of Policy and Campaigns at CHOICE, Gordon Renouf, said: Under the new national consumer law, Australian consumers are set to enjoy some of the best and fairest markets in the world. New national laws banning unfair contract terms in consumer contracts will give consumers the confidence so desperately needed in today’s marketplace. The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s Greg Evans said: It’s an important step towards a seamless national economy. The Director of Corporate and Public Relations at Woolworths, Andrew Hall, said: It has been Woolworths’ experience that state legislation regulating specific activities has different and, at times, inconsistent requirements with no apparent consumer benefit. As one of the nation’s leading retailers, we applaud state and federal governments for agreeing to work together to reform consumer protection laws. The wide chorus of support for a new single national consumer law is not really a surprise. In much the same way as was outlined to the House on the government’s product safety reforms, it is essential that our consumer laws keep pace with developments in national markets. On the one hand, you have consumers who move across state and territory borders and also make purchases across these borders and, on the other hand, you have businesses with operations stretching across these same boundaries. So it is only right that we have a national consumer law that reflects these realities and can more easily and effectively respond to national challenges. I would like to take some time to outline to the House what a national unfair contract term provision will achieve for Australian consumers. An unfair contract term prohibition is certainly a concept that would not be familiar to many Australian consumers and businesses, but it has the capacity to provide important and overdue consumer protections for consumers and small businesses. Consumers face many challenges when making decisions about purchasing goods and services, not the least of which is the use of complex contracts that are difficult to read and to understand. The terms of agreements can contain the potential for considerable consumer harm—particularly when they are one-sided or seek to impose onerous conditions on consumers that are not reasonably necessary to protect the legitimate business interests of the supplier. A prohibition on unfair contract terms addresses this potential for harm to consumers and increases competition. It does this by improving the clarity and transparency of agreements, helping consumers understand them better and enabling them to make choices that are more effective. In its review of Australia’s consumer policy framework, the Productivity Commission recommended that a national unfair contract terms prohibition be included in a new national consumer law to address the inclusion of unfair terms in standard form contracts. Unfair contract terms regulation exists in the European Union and has applied in the United Kingdom since 1999. The Commonwealth has paid careful attention to the way in which the law operates in the UK. In Australia, Victoria already has an unfair contracts term provision, but there was evidence of other states and territories looking to go it alone, which made it all the more important that the Commonwealth take leadership and push for a national unfair contract term provision. In response to COAG and the Productivity Commission’s recommendation, the ministerial council has proposed that a national consumer law should include a provision that addresses unfair contract terms. This provision would include, amongst others, the following features. It would only apply to standard form contracts and, using the approach adopted with the United Kingdom’s Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999, would exclude the upfront price of the good or service from consideration. A remedy could only be applied where the claimant shows detriment, or a substantial likelihood of detriment, to the consumer. When a court considers an ‘unfair contract term’ it will be required to take all of the circumstances of the contract into account, including the broader interests of consumers as well as those of the particular consumers affected. Where these criteria are met, the unfair term would be voided only for the contracts of those consumers or that class of consumers subject to detriment, or the substantial likelihood thereof, with suppliers also potentially liable to damages for that detriment, along with other remedies available under the Trade Practices Act 1974. Under the new unfair contract term provision, there would also be potential for private and regulator-led representative actions for damages by a class of consumers detrimentally affected by unfair contract terms. Importantly, there should be transitional arrangements put in place after enactment, which would give businesses the time to modify their contracts, and there would be a review of the provision within seven years of its introduction. As I outlined to the House previously, when you take the new national consumer law with all of the changes to the consumer policy framework, the Productivity Commission estimates that the implementation of these reforms will provide a net gain to the community of between $1.5 billion and $4.5 billion a year in today’s terms. This is truly an agreement that will benefit both consumers and businesses and bring our consumer laws into the 21st century. I would like to thank my state and territory ministerial colleagues and their officials for the spirit in which they have conducted negotiations and moved along reform proposals in sight of yet another historic agreement. This agreement shows what is possible when you have a Commonwealth government committed to reform and to working cooperatively with states and territories. This agreement would not have been possible under the previous government, which did not even have a Minister for Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs to manage such an important reform. I commend the national consumer law reform to the House. I ask leave of the House to move a motion to enable the member for Cowper to speak for 10 minutes. Leave granted. DZS Bowen, Chris, MP Mr BOWEN —I move: That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent Mr Hartsuyker speaking for a period not exceeding ten minutes. Question agreed to. 7730 15:42:00 Hartsuyker, Luke, MP 00AMM Cowper NATS 0 0 Mr HARTSUYKER —May I say at the outset that we on this side of this House welcome the statement by the Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs, albeit with some reservations. Indeed, we welcome all practical and sensible measures to reduce the diversity of legislation currently operating in the states and territories. I have said many times that the Australian economy is handicapped by a lack of uniformity, particularly in legislation that affects business. Not only does it result in increased costs for companies that operate interstate—costs that feed through to the consumer—but it also weakens our competitive position internationally. There is also a cost to the taxpayer in maintaining separate bureaucracies in each state. The diversity of legislation makes it harder for companies to compete and grow their market share abroad. We do not have a large internal market in Australia, unlike the European Union, the United States, China and India. For our economy to prosper, we need to be competitive in export markets and competitive with those countries which have single national legislation covering the conduct of business. I note the estimate by the Productivity Commission that these reforms will produce a net gain to the community of between $1.5 billion and $4.5 billion. I would remind the Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs that, as long ago as 2006, the Productivity Commission calculated that a reduction in regulatory compliance costs would result in a saving of $8 billion a year, or 0.8 per cent of GDP, through developing a national approach to policymaking in a range of areas. This would be a significant bonus for the national economy, and I hope that the minister and his colleagues bear that in mind in their negotiations with the states and territories on other important matters such as workers compensation and occupational health and safety. In this case, it is not just business that benefits; consumers will also enjoy rights that are consistent across Australia. With the huge growth in e-commerce over the last few years, we owe it to consumers to deliver consistency within our national boundaries, even if we cannot guarantee it in international transactions. Consumers will, of course, also benefit from the ban on unfair contract terms and the provision for action for damages for classes of consumer affected by unfair terms. We also welcome the efforts made to ensure that, having adopted the single national consumer law, the states and territories stay in step with each other and that the law remains consistent across the land. I trust we will see this admirable approach followed when it comes to other parts of the government’s agenda on the seamless economy. After years of stalemate at the Council of Australian Governments, with the states and territories refusing on principle to agree to rationalisation, I sincerely hope that they continue to act in the national interest so the Australian economy and all Australians can benefit from greater consistency and efficiency. Talking of consistency, we are on the record as favouring the enforcement of consumer law being placed solely in the hands of the ACCC rather than the proposed joint arrangement with the state and territory fair trading offices. That remains the case. Not only would a single national enforcement body be more efficient with lower costs to the taxpayer but it would also ensure consistent enforcement. It is one thing to have a single national consumer law, but if that law is not consistently enforced then many of the benefits to businesses and consumers will be lost. Both groups need to know that the same interpretation of the law will apply on both sides of a state border. I would welcome further information from the Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs on how he intends to deliver consistent enforcement. Reform of the Commonwealth and state legislation has the potential for huge benefits. What we are really talking about here is nothing less than the modernisation of the Australian economy. Until recently the government has had the benefit of dealing with Labor administrations in all states and territories. I am sure that we can count on the new administration in Western Australia to do what is right for Western Australians and all Australians when it comes to practical and sensible reform. Consumer law may well prove to be the easiest of areas to rationalise and yet the government did not go far enough on the matter of enforcement. The next challenge for the government is to ensure that a single national consumer law and product safety regime is drawn up on the basis of best international practice and that consumers and Australian businesses are not left with a second-best or lowest-common-denominator approach. We welcome this first step. The government has laid the foundations for reform. We will watch closely in this and other areas what the states and territories allow to be built on those foundations. 7731 Matters of Public Importance 7731 10000 Burke, Anna (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Ms AE Burke)—Mr Speaker has received a letter from the Leader of the Opposition proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely: The Government’s failure to provide leadership on the great challenges facing our nation. I call upon those members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places. More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places— 7732 15:47:00 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP 885 Wentworth LP Leader of the Opposition 0 0 Mr TURNBULL —The great challenges that Australia faces are being avoided and abandoned by this hollow and empty government, this incompetent government. Only today we have seen the Prime Minister claiming that a sign of his government being tough on the great challenge of terrorism—and you would think all sides of this House would be united in the common cause of taking on terrorism—is the Attorney-General giving a press conference and commenting on a trial the day before the jury has concluded its deliberations and in so doing provoking the defence counsel to apply for the jury to be discharged, resulting in getting a caning from the trial judge and completely needlessly providing grounds of appeal to the convicted persons. This sort of incompetence is cited by the Prime Minister as an example of being tough on terrorism. Is it tough on terrorism to give appeal points to people convicted of terrorism? I do not think so. A government committed to taking on that challenge ensures that the security services and the police apprehend persons suspected of terrorism, bring them to trial and see them convicted and dealt with in accordance with the sentences handed out. What it does not do is provide appeal points for the accused persons having been convicted. Needlessly done so, out of pure incompetence, the Attorney-General put a headline ahead of taking on the challenge of terrorism and he has been defended today by the Prime Minister, who claims his government is tough on terrorism. They are not competent enough to be tough on anything. They are not consistent enough to provide leadership on the economy. The Prime Minister, the Treasurer and the Minister for Finance and Deregulation wander around the countryside spouting one incoherent and inconsistent line on the economy after another. Only today we had another great example of this from none other than the finance minister. I had said that the present global financial crisis was the most severe that most of us had seen in our lifetime. He denounced that; the finance minister said that that was wrong and it was exaggerated. He said I was taking things out of context and being reckless. Well, let us see where that observation came from. The International Monetary Fund in April this year in its World Economic Outlook wrote: The financial market crisis that erupted in August 2007 has developed into the largest financial shock since the Great Depression. The finance minister does look a bit careworn, but I think he was born after the Great Depression. Certainly, I think the IMF’s comments support what I have said, but perhaps the finance minister does not agree with the IMF. What a pity that he has not been speaking to the Prime Minister. What a pity he does not pay enough attention to the speeches of the Prime Minister. On 24 May this year the Prime Minister in a speech entitled ‘Building a modern Australia for the 21st century’ said: The global economy is going through what the International Monetary Fund has described as the greatest financial shock since the Great Depression. He has repeated that quote again and again. He did it again in June in Queensland. What sort of government is this? What kind of economic leadership can this government provide if on the one hand we have the Prime Minister reflecting the views of the International Monetary Fund on the gravity of the global economic crisis—this crisis in credit and financial markets which we are witnessing and which has been worsening—but they are then promptly abandoned by the Minister for Finance? What is the government’s position? What is the scale of the challenge? Is it or is it not a serious issue? Is the IMF right or wrong? Is the Prime Minister right or wrong? How would we know? We get one incoherent, inconsistent line after another. Of course, we have seen a transformation in the Prime Minister’s language about inflation, and indeed in the Treasurer’s. It is like Jekyll and Hyde, but I am not sure who is Jekyll and who is Hyde. However, there has been a complete transition. At the beginning of the year inflation in Australia was considerably lower than it is today. According to the Treasurer and the Prime Minister it was out of control—the genie was out of the bottle. The Treasurer, alone among the treasurers of the world, unlike any other person in his role in any other country in the world, chose to egg on his central bank to put up interest rates. He chose to talk down the economy and talk up inflation. He stood there the day before the Reserve Bank board met and said that inflation was out of control. He sent a message to the top of Martin Place: ‘Put up those rates.’ And interest rates did go up. I was criticised then for saying that the Reserve Bank should stay its hand. I feared that the global crisis would worsen and that money, which was already getting scarcer and dearer, would become even scarcer and dearer in the months ahead. And it has. That was the Treasurer’s line and he was consistently echoed by the Prime Minister for the first seven months or so of this year. Now we have the new, mild Prime Minister. He is no longer talking about inflation monsters wreaking havoc across the nation. He says that Australia should be proud that our inflation is lower than that of the United States. Really? It is a lot higher than it was in January, and it was lower than the rate in the United States in January, too. He says that we have to keep the economy in context. Where was the context in January? Where was context when they were running down the achievements of the Howard government while pursuing a cheap, shallow and hollow political agenda designed to score a few incredible political points? They were incredible because there is no-one in Australia—Labor or Liberal—who would not rather be living in John Howard’s economy than in Kevin Rudd’s. To that end, they talked up inflation and talked down the economy. But now they pretend that none of that happened. They want to put everything in context and speak reasonably. I was taking some notes while the Prime Minister was speaking during question time today and I thought he was actually reading from the book written by the former Treasurer, the member for Higgins. He was boasting about the size of our surplus and going on about the surpluses that Australia had accumulated over many years; many years of good economic management had given Australia a source of stability and financial strength. So they have. But that stability was established by the coalition’s economic management. That economic management was opposed at every turn by the Labor Party when it was in opposition. That is the economic management that was run down day after day after day for the first part of this year. They now see the consequences of their actions and what they have wrought. We have a strong economy, we have a national government with no net debt and we have a better regulated banking system than any other comparable developed country. The coalition has put in place over many years measures that make our economy relatively stronger than others. It is not immune, but no economy is. However, our economy is relatively stronger and relatively more resilient. That was not shouted from the rooftops earlier this year. For most of this year we have had our economy run down. Is it any surprise that we have paid a price? Consumer and business confidence around the world has declined. How could it not? But it has declined more in Australia than it has in most comparable countries. How can it be that consumer and business confidence has fallen more in Australia than it has in countries that are now in the depths of recession? How can that be? What is the differential? It is the government: if you change the government, you change the country. Australia has elected a government that does not have faith in the people of Australia; it has elected a government that instead of projecting confidence and leadership chooses to run down its own economy, talk up inflation and egg the central bank to put up interest rates. That is what happened in November last year and we are now living with the consequences. Our strong nation has lower levels of confidence than nations with economies far weaker than our own. As a result, we pay a price. When you lose confidence, you lose credit. When businesses lack confidence, they do not borrow, lenders do not lend and people are reluctant to hire and to invest. We are paying a heavy price today because of the government’s shallow political agenda for the first part of this year. This government had no economic strategy, simply a political one. In every respect of its policy this government has demonstrated an inability to come to terms with the real issues. Only yesterday, greeted with a new Leader of the Opposition, the Prime Minister, on the day after the fourth-largest investment bank in the world goes into bankruptcy, after a massive fall on Wall Street and after greater concerns than ever arising about global financial markets—we have just seen AIG being bailed out by the US government; these are events of enormous consequence—after all of that turmoil, seeks to work with me and collaborate with me on what issue? The economy? The Murray-Darling Basin? The environment? No. The republic. Really! There is no focus on the issues of today, no priorities and no commitment to the real issues of our time. We have seen again today the contempt that this government has for pensioners. This is a government that sends its ministers out to say that they could not live on the age pension. And they could not live on it. That is how bad they see the situation. We say: ‘Right. We know you’ve got your big review. That’s fine. But let’s do something now. There has been a massive rise in prices over the last 12 months since the last coalition budget—a very substantial increase in prices across the board. Let’s act now. Let’s give $30 a week to single age pensioners. Let’s do that. We can do it right now. It doesn’t prejudice a review. It doesn’t prejudice doing other things. Let’s take some action right here, right now.’ But what do we have? Just pathetic debating points from the Prime Minister. When we were in government, we acted to protect pensioners. We changed the indexation of the pension to the higher of either the CPI or 25 per cent of male total average weekly earnings. If we had not changed that indexation from the previous Labor system, single pensioners today would be $72.80 a fortnight worse off and couples would be $122.60 a fortnight worse off than they are today. So we took action in government to support pensioners. But do you know something, Madam Deputy Speaker? The Prime Minister should get out more, because there have been big changes. We have seen prices going through the roof. He should spend less time wandering the corridors of New York and more time wandering the aisles of shopping centres and supermarkets because he would see there what has happened to prices. He has seen what has happened to living standards. He has a report that tells him what has happened there, and he has the opportunity to act now, but he chooses to do nothing. Chauncey Gardner yet again. He likes to watch, but the watching has to stop. Watching is not helping the pensioners. It is not protecting the Australian economy. It is abandoning our nation to the lack of leadership from the hollow men that are this government. 7735 16:02:00 Roxon, Nicola, MP 83K Gellibrand ALP Minister for Health and Ageing 1 0 Ms ROXON —I have to say that the parliament and the public will be very disappointed with the first major speech from the new Leader of the Opposition in a debate with a title that promised so much more. It was a title that said that this matter of public importance was going to be about the government’s failure to provide leadership and deal with the great challenges of our nation. The new Leader of the Opposition, who wants to govern this country and who can speak in this debate for 15 minutes, did not mention infrastructure, health, education, broadband or climate change. How many issues are there that this new leader is going to address? I do not deny that it is important to talk about the economy. With the background of the Leader of the Opposition, that is an important thing for us to engage on. That is why the Prime Minister, the Treasurer, the Minister for Finance and others have been out there discussing the importance of our having a strong economy and of making sure that we are protected as much as possible from the international uncertainty. But what the Leader of the Opposition did not get to at all was why people want to worry about the economy. You know why people want to worry about the economy? They want it to be strong enough to keep people in jobs, to make sure that they can live productive lives and have enough money to be able to fund their healthcare needs, their education needs and their other needs. What we have seen, unfortunately, from the Leader of the Opposition is this determination to focus on such a narrow range of issues. In his first major speech as the Leader of the Opposition in this parliament, he chose not to deal with any issues, bar one, that actually have an immediate impact on the community. I think it was a strange choice. The Leader of the Opposition wants to continue with the issue of pensioners, following the toing and froing that occurred under the previous Leader of the Opposition—and that is fair enough. But I think there will be a lot of people in the community who will say, ‘If a new Leader of the Opposition has 15 minutes to talk about a topic of his choice, which is the great challenges facing our nation, and does not mention what we might need to do in education, health, infrastructure and even climate change—a topic for which we know the Leader of the Opposition has some fondness, given his previous job— 83P Bishop, Julie, MP Ms Julie Bishop —When you trash the economy there is nothing that can be done. 10000 Burke, Anna (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Ms AE Burke)—Order! The Deputy Leader of the Opposition is warned! 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —I am interested in the interjections from the increasingly shrill deputy leader, who is no doubt trying to make sure that she is going to hold onto her position on the front bench. No doubt all that positioning is going on. That is fine. Good luck to all of you. But it is particularly interesting that the Deputy Leader of the Opposition raises this issue, because one of the passing comments that the new Leader of the Opposition made was, ‘Can you believe the outrage of the Prime Minister wanting to engage the new Leader of the Opposition in a debate about the republic?’ That is just one of many things. We know from the Leader— 885 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP Mr Turnbull —It is the only thing he mentioned. 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —It is one of the many things that the Leader of the Opposition mentioned, and I do not think it is going to be— 885 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP Mr Turnbull interjecting— 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —I listened to you in silence, which was no doubt appropriate, and I am sure that you will be able to do that while I am speaking. We know that the Leader of the Opposition has a commitment to the republic. That is good, and there has been good cross-party work on it. But now that he is the Leader of the Opposition, he and even the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, whom we know has a committed public interest in this issue, want to walk away from that. So the reason I raise this is that I am now confused about what it is that you stand for. What is it that the new Leader of the Opposition stands for? SE4 Bishop, Bronwyn, MP Mrs Bronwyn Bishop interjecting— 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —Order! The member for Mackellar is also warned! 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —We can talk about this all-purpose motion. It was obviously put in at the start of the day, presumably when the tactics committee had not met or had not been able to give you any advice. The new Leader of the Opposition began this all-purpose motion, which is meant to be about the challenges facing our nation, by talking about being a senior counsel, showing off his legal skills and thinking that it will make the public want to vote for him. Then he spent some time talking about a very important issue, the economy, and some time on pensioners. But in 15 minutes— 885 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP Mr Turnbull interjecting— 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —All of the issues are important. What is staggering, and what the Leader of the Opposition will have to answer is: why is it, when we talk about the great challenges facing our nation, that we get an erudite lecture about the economy but nothing about what he wants to do as the leader to fix our health system, to fix our education system, to build broadband infrastructure or anything else like that? There is no point in the Leader of the Opposition coming in here and giving us a lecture on the economy when he is directing his senators to blow an enormous hole in every single measure that has been put forward in the Senate—particularly in health. If the Liberal Party is going to continue to oppose over $6 billion worth of expenditure in the Senate, you cannot expect people to take you seriously when you give us a lecture about inflation. Let us talk through some of the things in the health area in particular. Obviously none of them are significant enough for the Leader of the Opposition to deign to talk about. He is not interested in the way that we might rebuild our hospitals. He is not interested in dental care. He says he is interested in pensioners, but he does not care that he has instructed his senators to vote against $290 million for dental care, predominantly for pensioners. I do think it is fair enough for us to ask why, when you want to debate the great challenges facing the nation, we have absolute silence on health. Why have we had nine major interviews in the last 24 hours that have not mentioned health at all? We had a 15-minute speech from the Leader of the Opposition which did not mention health, education or climate change at all. 00AMX Johnson, Michael, MP Mr Johnson interjecting— 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —I can say it a lot more times, because it is pretty staggering that you can actually have a new leader rushed into this position, clearly not having given thought outside his comfort zone— 00AMX Johnson, Michael, MP Mr Johnson interjecting— 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —It is fine to have a particular comfort zone, but people are now looking to the new Leader of the Opposition to offer some leadership. That will mean that he will have to have some vision on whether he is prepared to back some serious reform in health and some serious reform in education. It is going to be a serious challenge as to whether he will do that. I want to go through some of the things that, in nine months, we have already done in health—none of them with the support of the opposition— 00AMX Johnson, Michael, MP Mr Johnson interjecting— 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —Order! The member for Ryan is warned. 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —and many initiatives that we want to keep, but, at this stage, we do not have any support from the opposition for them. Now that you are the new Leader of the Opposition you will have to think outside your comfort zone. You will, as the new leader, have to be able to talk to us and the community about what you are going to do in these areas. 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —I ask the minister to remember to speak through the chair, please. 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. The Leader of the Opposition will, of course, need to think about these issues. We are proud of the program that we have got on with. We are proud that, when you look at the great challenges facing the nation, we are moving on climate change. We are proud that we are moving on the education revolution. We are proud that we are getting computers into our schools. Your current deputy says that she has never seen a school that does not have computers, and does not think that there is any need for us to implement this program. As the new Leader of the Opposition, he has the opportunity to reshape the opposition into a constructive opposition. I am sure that there will be things that we will fight on, but there should be many that we will actually agree on. The reason that I raised the issue of the republic is that it seems that, even with things that the Leader of the Opposition has had a longstanding commitment to—more than decades long—he is now not so sure that he believes in them. This is someone who wanted to be in the Labor Party and ended up in the Liberal Party; he was a republican and he is now not sure if he is a republican. We do not know where the Leader of the Opposition stands on any of these sorts of issues. Until he starts addressing them—until some of these interviews are about more than the Leader of the Opposition himself—then we do not know where he is going to stand. He did not do anything on the first day of his leadership. I do not require this on the first day of assuming the leadership, but he did not direct his senators to support a dental care measure which would have supported hundreds of thousands of pensioners across the country—and he had the opportunity to do that. He did not revisit the completely ridiculous decision of the opposition to oppose our excise on alcopops. This is the measure that the previous Leader of the Opposition agreed with, then disagreed with and then thought he might agree with. They have had so many different positions, it would not be an embarrassment in this instance for the Leader of the Opposition to change the position. They have had so many that it would not be a surprise, but it would actually mean that they were taking the matter of passing the budget seriously and making sure we have finances to invest in preventive health care and other important measures. It would mean that we had some money to properly establish the $10 billion Health and Hospitals Fund, which the Liberal Party are putting at risk by refusing to pass billions of dollars worth of measures in the Senate. We have heard nothing from the member opposite about whether he supports us putting a billion dollars back into our public hospitals—after he was a member of the cabinet and sat around that cabinet table and let them pull a billion dollars out. We have to, step by step, rebuild these things. But if we are going to meet opposition every step along the way—even for important measures that will protect young people from binge drinking and give us finances to invest further in significant preventive healthcare measures—then we have just changed leaders but we have not got any new impact. Today’s presentation to the public—I was almost going to say ‘summing up to the judge’ because that is what the first bit of it sounded like—still gave us no information about what the Leader of the Opposition is going to pursue in these many other areas of great national challenge. We have to invite him to join us in seriously tackling some of these challenges. Health is my portfolio area, the one I am most focused on, where significant changes are needed to the way the states and the Commonwealth operate together, where new investments are needed, and where we have to look at Medicare differently. We want him to be able to engage in the education debate. There is an opportunity for the Leader of the Opposition to say that he is prepared to leave behind the Howard legacy. The previous Leader of the Opposition was not prepared to do that. Any time there was anything that challenged the last 11 years of history—mistakes from the Howard government, things that they did not do, opportunities that were missed, lack of investment—we had Dr Nelson, the member for Bradfield, when he was at the front table as the Leader of the Opposition, defending to the death every single decision that the Howard government made. The new Leader of the Opposition has a choice. Is he going to be just another defender of the Howard legacy, or is he going to be prepared to chart a new course? I thought we might see some of that today. I have a bit of time for the Leader of the Opposition. I thought that, if he was going to talk about great challenges facing our nation, we might have got a little bit of personal insight into what motivated him and why he wanted this job. 885 Turnbull, Malcolm, MP Mr Turnbull —She’s kept this to herself for a long time. 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —I am sorry that has come as a surprise to you, but it is true and I am prepared to admit that—at a safe distance across the table. I think there is an opportunity for the Leader of the Opposition to be prepared to step outside a mould which has just been vandalism in the Senate for the last period of time. There is an opportunity to say, ‘We can do things differently.’ But he will not be able to do it if he is going to trash everything he has ever believed in before—and that includes the republic. It is but one issue amongst many, but it is a sign that he is going to be a hollow leader. It is a sign that he is not going to be prepared to stand for anything seriously, and I think that is a real problem for us and for the country. I want to take this opportunity to ask the parliament to encourage the Leader of the Opposition to reconsider three measures: one that was rejected by the Senate yesterday, one that will be voted on by the Senate in the coming weeks and one that will be before the Senate in the next few months. These measures relate to dental care, the Medicare levy surcharge and the alcopops excise—a mixture of measures that (1) provide relief to working families’, (2) provide relief to pensioners and (3) help us battle the scourge of binge drinking in this country. I think if we are going to be serious about this, if the Leader of the Opposition wants to say that he comes from humble means and is not representing privilege, he has an opportunity to distance himself from industry. He has the opportunity to say, ‘I don’t have to take this view on alcopops just because the distillers tell us this,’ and ‘I don’t have to take this view on the Medicare levy surcharge just because the insurers tell us to do that.’ I am not sure who it is that is telling them to defend the dental program the way they are. I suspect it is just a hangover from 12 years of a determination to ignore our public dental schemes across the country. But there is an opportunity for the Leader of the Opposition to take a different view. He has not, so far, but there is time for him to do that. Over the next couple of days, the Leader of the Opposition will have had time to settle into his position and to decide who is going to be on the front bench. I did wonder whether those who were in here listening to the new leader were all jockeying to get their new positions and get a chance. I did see that the member for Ryan was here—perhaps hoping that this was his opportunity to move onto the front bench—and that everybody is sticking close to the Leader of the Opposition, just for this period of time. Unfortunately, I have more experience in leadership challenges than I would have chosen to have had, and I can tell the Leader of the Opposition that the next couple of days before he announces his frontbench will be the only period of time that everybody in his party will be happy with what he is doing. So he should make the most of it and actually announce a few of the policies that he as the leader believes in—actually stamp his mark now while he has a chance, before he has industry telling him what he has to do and before he has some of his frontbench saying, ‘Defend the Howard legacy at all costs.’ If we are going to deal with the great challenges that face us, I hope that we will hear from the Leader of the Opposition a little bit more about health and education and a little bit less about— (Time expired) 7739 16:15:00 Bishop, Julie, MP 83P Curtin LP Deputy Leader of the Opposition 0 0 Ms JULIE BISHOP —The Labor Party came to office last year having carefully cultivated the expectation that it would be a responsible economic manager. In fact, it went so far as to undertake an expensive television advertising campaign that proclaimed that Labor was the party of economic conservatives. Even the Deputy Prime Minister— 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms Roxon interjecting— 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —The minister was given the courtesy to be heard in silence, and I would expect the same courtesy to be shown. 83P Bishop, Julie, MP Ms JULIE BISHOP —This expensive television advertising campaign was to proclaim that Labor was the party of economic conservatives. Even the Deputy Prime Minister—the secretary of the socialist forum, the old leftie from Victoria—actually came out and said that she was an economic conservative. She would have the Australian public believe that she rushed to university to join the Young Labor movement because it was the party of economic conservatives. What a joke! The public were then led to believe that the Rudd government would not be like the great economic vandals of the previous Labor governments under Whitlam and Keating. The public were led to believe that the Rudd government would not be like the incompetent do-nothing state Labor governments which have so undermined the strength of the states in this country. It is safe to say that the Australian public were seriously misled. The Rudd government is in fact an old-style Labor government—anti-business, obsessed with the politics of envy, absolutely focused on spin and more concerned with ideology than the creation of opportunities and fairness for the Australian people. This is demonstrated by the actions of the Prime Minister and the Treasurer, who were so intimidated by the record of the Howard government that they decided to trash that legacy as their first action after the election. That is the first thing that they did. And we had the reckless language used by the Treasurer, as the Leader of the Opposition said. The day before a meeting of the Reserve Bank, the Treasurer of this country was historically claiming that the inflation genie was out of the bottle, that inflation was out of control—and that had a profound impact on confidence in the leadership of this government. Since the Rudd government came to power, business and consumer confidence has collapsed to lows not seen since the previous Labor government in the early 1990s. Declining confidence has been reflected in downturns in retail turnover, housing finance commitments, residential building approvals and demand for credit. There have also been large and well-publicised lay-offs from some larger companies and many others in manufacturing and financial services and from small business. Despite these signs of slowing growth, the fundamental strength of the Australian economy has continued due to the legacy of the Howard government. But this cannot be taken for granted—and it is the ongoing reckless language of the Prime Minister and the Treasurer that has the potential to cause further damage. In recent weeks, the resilience in the labour market has looked increasingly shaky. The Reserve Bank’s most recent statement on monetary policy, released on 11 August, forecast employment growth of only 0.75 per cent over the next year—well below the long-term trend of 2.5 per cent—and the National Australia Bank expects employment growth to slow dramatically. Of most concern is that forecasts for rising unemployment are getting worse. The budget forecast 134,000 job losses in the next 12 months, yet the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations cannot or will not say that figure. She refuses to confirm her own budget papers that forecast 134,000 job losses within the next 12 months—the forecast that dare not speak its name. The Reserve Bank has since forecast an additional 100,000 job losses, and there are expectations that unemployment will rise from 3.9 per cent earlier this year to six per cent in the next two years. Many Australians could be forgiven for believing that the Rudd government is on track to repeat the experience of the last Labor government, when unemployment reached 11 per cent and almost one million people were unemployed. So much for being heroes of the working class! Prime Minister Paul Keating presided over an economy that saw one million Australians out of work, and this government is on track to repeat that experience. The most recent Sensis consumer report revealed the increasing concerns of Australians about their financial future. In particular, the report’s author noted: Unemployment has not been on the nation’s radar for some time, but since May, it has risen more than any issue … This is the government’s own leading indicator of employment for September and this was released by the department of the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations. It confirmedemployment prospects are worsening. In fact, the indicator has now fallen for eight consecutive months. The downward trajectory of the indicator has become more pronounced in recent months. The continued low unemployment rate is a testament to the resilience of the Australian economy but also to the resilience of the Australian labour market. Before the election, Labor vowed to back the Liberal workplace relations reforms which had helped to deliver benefits such as low inflation and the lowest unemployment rate in more than 30 years. You will recall that Labor vowed to retain right-of-entry laws, secret ballots, prohibited content—all Howard government reforms that were designed to keep in check the job-destroying unfettered power of the unions. Today at the National Press Club the minister for workplace relations outlined how she intends to bring the unions back into as many workplaces as possible, hidden inside a trojan horse of so-called ‘workplace fairness’. The minister for workplace relations should be honest and admit that her plans are actually about the reintroduction of union power through pattern bargaining, giving unions the green light to freely enter any workplace and allowing content in agreements that will bring the unions back into every aspect of the workplace whether they are invited or not. This is about putting the unions in every negotiation in every workplace whether there are union members there or not. The minister can scaremonger about Work Choices as much as she likes, but the truth is that Work Choices will be in operation for longer under the Rudd government than under the Howard government—and doesn’t the minister for workplace relations hate it when she is reminded of that! When the minister does finally achieve her ideological goal, it will be at the expense of Australian jobs and real wages. What is at stake was made clear a few months ago by the Reserve Bank governor, Glenn Stevens, who commented about why 1970s-style stagflation—high inflation and low growth—should not occur today in Australia. He said: A key difference today, thus far, has been the behaviour of labour costs … If you go back to the mid-1970s, you had the government leading the charge in pushing wages up, you had a very different balance of power between the unions and business, a different quasi-judicial industrial relations system, and we had a serious wage-price problem back then. … We don’t have that at the moment, and we must make sure we don’t get it. The government is very fond of talking about Reserve Bank warnings, but you are not going to hear them repeating this warning. The balance between employers and employees in the workplaces of Australia is what is now at stake. The importance of efficient, flexible labour markets in achieving macroeconomic goals has been made clear in a series of OECD economic surveys during the years of economic success unde the Howard government. The coalition understood the central importance of workplace relations to the economic wellbeing of the country and the community. Real wages were increased by more than 20 per cent during the years of the Howard government. Inflation was kept between the band of two and three per cent as set by the Reserve Bank. During the years of the Hawke-Keating Labor governments, real wages fell by almost two per cent and inflation averaged more than six per cent. The very real danger, as the Rudd government winds back the gains and the benefits of the Howard years, is that we will enter into a wage inflation spiral the likes of which we have not seen since the last time Labor was in government. It is greatly concerning that the minister for worplace relations and her department have made it clear that, in the 10 months since she has been minister for workplace relations, no analysis has been undertaken on the effects of Labor’s workplace relations policy on unemployment, inflation or economic growth. The minister is like the fabled ostrich: she is burying her head in the sand, hoping to avoid any uncomfortable truths from the world around her. The minister has been negligent in her fundamental duty to the Australian people, which is to ensure that there are as many job opportunities as possible. What we have seen with this government has been nothing about fairness— (Time expired) 7742 16:27:00 Owens, Julie, MP E09 Parramatta ALP 1 0 Ms OWENS —When I read this matter of public importance today around lunchtime, I was a bit surprised. In every way it relates far more to the last government than it does to this one. When the election took place on 24 November last year, on this side of politics there was of course considerable elation towards the end of the night. I am sure for many of us, as we looked at forming government and the work that needed to be done, there was also a rather deep sigh and a slight depression that so much of the previous 12 years—and 16 years of unprecedented growth—had been wasted in such an appalling way due to a lack of leadership to address the challenges that faced our nation. Remember back to that time. The world did change very quickly overnight: a sense of optimism emerged and we moved very quickly on various issues. But remember back to the preceding weeks and where we were as a nation, thanks to the lack of leadership or any vision from the previous government. Climate change still largely did not exist as far as the government was concerned. There was no action on that. The relationship between white and Indigenous Australia was in a very sad state. Australia’s government spending on public education was the second lowest among developed nations. Innovation as a share of the economy over the past 15 years had dropped and was falling below developed and emerging nations. The Reserve Bank had warned over and over again that the capacity constraints around infrastructure were causing bottlenecks. Our trade performance was abysmal. There was growing pressure on families. It was hard to see any community infrastructure—either tangible or intangible—that had been left behind. There was very little to see after 16 years of unprecedented economic growth and 12 years of the Howard government—except, of course, Work Choices. However briefly, Work Choices was there. Perhaps there is a cultural difference between what we on this side of the House expect and what the previous government expected. There are great cultural differences in what we value. People sometimes think we are the same, but really we are not. We have quite different value systems. But I do not think it is that. I think that, over the last years of the Howard government, they just did not notice that so many circumstances had turned for the worse. They certainly did not notice—or, if they did notice, they denied—the effect of 10 back-to-back interest rate rises on working families. We certainly noticed it. We raised it and we talked about it. We certainly noticed the skill shortages that were growing over those 12 years. We noticed the 20 warnings from the Reserve Bank. We noticed them but those opposite did not. And now, they are not noticing the action that is being taken. They are just discovering that maybe they left some problems behind, but they are not noticing that anything is actually being done. But, in fact, things are being done. Unlike the members opposite, we believe that interest rates have been a problem for quite some time. I remember the former Treasurer, the member for Higgins, saying just last year, when the coalition were in government, that inflation was exactly where they wanted it. I remember the member for Wentworth, the current Leader of the Opposition, also saying last year, after one of the later interest rate rises, that a quarter of a per cent rise would not cause much of a problem because it was very small. I also remember the denial that there was any problem at all with inflation. I remember the Treasurer, in the last year of the government, saying that inflation was a good problem to have. We on this side of the House knew it was a problem. But what did they do? They spent like drunken sailors. They did nothing about the capacity constraints. While the screws tightened on working families, they spent like drunken sailors, putting upward pressure on inflation. We noticed; they did not. We are doing the work now—unlike the previous government. Just to put into perspective the claims from the other side, this is what we have done. We have brought immediate relief to working families through our $55 billion Working Families Support Package, which includes tax cuts for those most in need—unlike the two previous tax cuts, which were aimed at higher income earners. Those of us in this House did very well from the previous two tax cuts, but many working families will do well from the cuts we delivered in the recent budget. The budget also included an investment of $4.4 billion for a new education tax refund, which has benefited 1.3 million families, and lifted the childcare tax rebate for working families from 30 per cent to 50 per cent for out-of-pocket expenses of up to $7,500. And of course we are still working on raising the threshold for the Medicare rebate, which will also benefit working families. But those opposite, with their new-found concern for working families, are doing their best to block that. We have also built a strong surplus to keep downward pressure on inflation. We have reined in expenditure—unlike the previous government, who spent like drunken sailors. We worked incredibly hard in those first months to rein in expenditure and build a strong surplus. We made room in the budget to support working families and we built a strong surplus. We laid down the foundations for $40 billion worth of responsible investment to build our nation’s growth for the future. It is an extraordinary contribution to the future of this nation. We have already acted on this. Honourable members interjecting— Opposition members interjecting— E09 Owens, Julie, MP Ms OWENS —If I could actually be heard over the shouting from the other side, it would be rather pleasant. Infrastructure Australia was formally approved by the cabinet on 21 January 2008. We have set aside $20 billion for an arms-length infrastructure program—not a slush fund but a carefully planned and managed investment in the future of this country. About a month later, Sir Rod Eddington was appointed to head Infrastructure Australia. A month after that, the parliament approved the establishment of Infrastructure Australia. In May, 11 members of Infrastructure Australia were appointed. In June, Mr Michael Deegan was appointed as Infrastructure Coordinator. That is an extraordinary achievement over six months—and Infrastructure Australia called for public submissions on 31 August. So, eight or nine months after the election, we have already profoundly changed the capacity of this nation to build for the future. Similarly, Skills Australia was an incredibly important piece of work for us. It puts skills at the forefront. We will provide $1.17 billion over four years for a skills package. The first 20,000 training places were already available in April. Again, there is still an incredible amount of work to do in both of those areas, but work has been done very early, as we promised in the election campaign. Infrastructure and skills are two areas that the Reserve Bank—and the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and every credible economist—has said over and over again are bottlenecks which are putting upward pressure on inflation. Again, the last government did nothing about it. In fact, quite late in the picture, they were still denying that there even was a skills crisis. Another area on which we are moving in relation to the skills crisis is education. This is incredibly important not only because Australia is one of the lowest spenders on education as a percentage of GDP but also because retention rates have stagnated at 75 per cent for the last 10 years. That means one in four children in this country is not graduating from high school. After an unprecedented 16-year economic boom and 12 years of a Howard government that claimed to care for working families, one in four children of working families is not graduating from high school. That figure stagnated for the entire time of the Howard government. Kids who are now 16 were four years old when the Howard government came to power. Their entire education took place under the Howard government—and the retention rate had stagnated. 00AKI Dutton, Peter, MP Mr Dutton —Have you heard of state governments that have state education systems? E09 Owens, Julie, MP Ms OWENS —The interjection reminds me that something else was at an all-time low when the election came around on 24 November: the relationship between the federal and state governments. GT4 Truss, Warren, MP Mr Truss —Because they were all Labor! E09 Owens, Julie, MP Ms OWENS —Well, it is a condition in Australia that often happens. But it is your job when you are in government to actually work with state governments because they are elected by the people. It is your job. It is about what is called leadership—what this MPI is all about—when a government works with other governments that are elected by the people. (Time expired) 7744 16:38:00 Truss, Warren, MP GT4 Wide Bay NATS Leader of the Nationals 0 0 Mr TRUSS —Last November, the Labor Party was left with one of the strongest economies in the world—the ‘Wonder Down Under’. How quickly—and, sadly, how rapidly—that has all changed. The Rudd government, like all other Labor Party governments before it, both federal and state, cannot manage an economy. Give Labor something in good working order and it will not be long before it is broken: the stock market has plummeted, the budget says unemployment will rise by 134,000, consumer confidence has fallen to a level not seen since the recession of the early nineties—the recession that then Prime Minister Keating said we had to have—inflation is at a 17-year high and strikes are up by 800 per cent. This government is completely incapable of managing the economy that it inherited and delivering good governance for our nation. The reality is that Labor inherited a wonderful legacy. In 12 years the coalition’s policies had reduced tax and other such revenues by a net $214 billion. In the nine months under Labor, taxes have already risen by $19.7 billion. Opposition members—How much? GT4 Truss, Warren, MP Mr TRUSS —Taxes have gone up by $19.7 billion, after taxes had gone down by $214 billion under the previous government. Under 12 years of the coalition’s economic management, the Commonwealth budget net asset turnaround was $141 billion. We paid off $96 billion worth of debt and we passed over to the new government $45 billion in accumulated assets with probably another $20 billion on top of that from this year’s surplus. Labor have inherited an economy in which they do not have to pay $8.6 billion a year in interest and redemption. That is $8.6 billion that surely they could provide to help support people receiving $273 a week—the single age pensioners, the people who are being sympathised with by ministers who say they could not live on an amount like that. Yet Labor will do nothing for the people who are living in this sort of poverty. They said through the election campaign, when they were in opposition, that they would protect the aged, but they have ignored pensioners in the budget, they have cut benefits to self-funded retirees and, of course, there is something like $75 billion or more already gone from superannuation funds. That is the kind of support that Labor are offering to those who are most disadvantaged in the community. They have been unable to provide any kind of effective response to help these people. Where are Labor on all the big issues? It is spin, spinning and more spin. The Prime Minister was recently described as Australia’s ‘first federal premier’ because he is trying to behave like the state premiers. I think that is probably an apt description. He has been a champion of friendly failure. Labor were going to end the blame game. They have done that all right—the states and the federal government all agree that ‘we’ll do nothing and we just won’t blame anybody’. So the public just suffer, the pensioners do without and the people who need some support and help get nothing. What about the people of the Murray-Darling Basin communities like Mildura and Deniliquin and also the Riverland, in South Australia? They are facing a major economic depression. The number of homes and properties for sale has doubled in the past 12 months as a direct result of the drought and, more particularly, the uncertainty about this government’s water buybacks and its lack of structural adjustment funding. One irrigation district has offered itself for sale—lock, stock and barrel—because it is in so much despair over the way in which this government is responding to its needs. The government has stopped the coalition’s plan to refurbish the Murray-Darling Basin, it has stolen 75 gigalitres of water for Melbourne and there is nothing to help the people of those communities to rebuild in these difficult economic circumstances. The reality is that Labor is failing the people of Australia. Our economy has turned down dramatically in just nine months, and Labor has absolutely no answers. Don’t make the pensioners suffer! As the Prime Minister trips off again overseas, he will spend on his grog bill on the trip more than what pensioners will get in a week. He has no answers for the people of Australia. (Time expired) 7745 16:43:00 Collins, Julie, MP HWM Franklin ALP 1 0 Ms COLLINS —In this matter of public importance debate we have been talking about challenging times. It is interesting that we have had those opposite suddenly starting to say that the world changed on 24 November last year and that the state of the economy since then is all our fault, yet they have not looked at the legacy that they really left us. Because of their lack of leadership and their lack of vision, they did not spend on vital infrastructure to clear bottlenecks around this country. There was a lack of strategic investment by those opposite when they presided over 12 years of inaction. They did nothing about the skills shortage, unless you count the money they ripped out of the universities. They did nothing on climate change and nothing about broadband, but they did give us Work Choices, ripping money out of the pockets of working Australians. They also left us with underlying inflation at a 16-year high of 3.6 per cent. Australians did endure 10 interest rate rises in a row. The government’s real spending, when those over there were in government, grew at an average of four per cent a year over the last four years. They had $40 billion in new spending and not a single dollar of savings in their last budget. That was their leadership of and their legacy to this country. In stark contrast, this government is showing some leadership. We are acting to assist all Australians out there during this challenging time. We are acting now for the long-term future. We are showing strong leadership. We are preparing for our prosperous future and we are strategically planning for this country’s future, unlike those opposite. That is why we have put $41 billion into long-term nation-building funds. That is why we have put $20 billion into the Building Australia Fund, $11 billion into education infrastructure and $10 billion into health infrastructure. In addition, we are spending $26 billion on other road and rail infrastructure. We have ratified Kyoto. We are committed to introducing a carbon pollution reduction scheme. We are building a national broadband network. We are addressing years of neglect in our schools with an education revolution. We are acting. We are investing in trade training centres. We are putting computers in schools. We are investing in universities to help address the skills shortage. Yesterday the Rudd government announced a plan for some of Australia’s most disadvantaged children. This government wants to offer educational support to very young children from disadvantaged families, including in the community of Clarendon Vale in my seat of Franklin, and I welcome this vision and this leadership from our government. It really does beggar belief that the opposition leader, in only day two in the job, has the audacity to question this government’s leadership. Those over there are only worried about counting numbers in their own party; they are not worried about the numbers in the economy and the people of Australia. They failed to show any leadership in the 12 years they were in government, and in opposition they continue to show a lack of leadership. This can be clearly demonstrated by their recent actions in the Senate. They continue to be obstructive, and Liberal senators are failing to support the working families, the carers, the pensioners and those doing it tough by their actions in that chamber. They have blocked the Medicare levy surcharge, leaving nearly 500,000 Australians without tax relief, and this measure is worth around $1,200 for an average-income family. They have sided with luxury car makers, they have sided with the alcohol distillers and last night they let down the thousands of people who will now not be able to get access to dental care. Is that something to be proud of? Is that what they call leadership? I call it irresponsible politics. The Liberal Party is blocking legislation not for strategic policy reasons, not because it is something it truly believes in but for cheap political point-scoring. We want to maintain a strong budget surplus. We want to ensure we can invest substantially in Australia’s future, and the member for Wentworth, the new Leader of the Opposition, should show some leadership. He should break down those barriers in the Senate and support this government rather than continue to block important measures in the Senate and smash a hole of over $6 billion in the budget. That is not economically responsible. That is not leadership. This government is investing in health infrastructure, education and the economy. They are the great challenges facing this nation at this time. This government had the foresight to listen to the Australian people. We listened to what they wanted. During the election campaign we heard they wanted a party to show leadership in health, in education, in climate change, in broadband, in the economy and in a fair go for workers when it comes to industrial relations laws, and this is what we have done and we will continue to do. But the blocking by the opposition of our budget measures is not helping those people who voted for this government. (Time expired) 10000 Scott, Bruce (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. BC Scott)—Order! The discussion is concluded. 7747 Bills R3063 7747 Bill returned from Main Committee without amendment, appropriation message having been reported; certified copy of the bill presented. Ordered that this bill be considered immediately. Bill agreed to. 7747 Mr SNOWDON (Lingiari —Minister for Defence Science and Personnel) 16:49:00 —by leave—I move: That this bill be now read a third time. Question agreed to. Bill read a third time. 7747 Bills R3030 Cognate bills: 7747 Bills R3027 7747 Bills R3029 7747 Bills R3028 7747 Debate resumed. 7747 16:50:00 Windsor, Antony, MP 009LP New England IND 0 0 Mr WINDSOR —I spoke before question time on the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and congratulated the Minister for Resources and Energy on the way in which a parliamentary committee has been used to examine the legislation and make recommendations, and some of those recommendations have been accepted by the minister and the government and put in the legislation. I also mentioned the role of agriculture in relation to climate change, global warming and greenhouse gas emissions and my support for doing something about emissions into the atmosphere, particularly the greenhouse gases—carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and, to a minor degree, others. I also made the point that there are many opportunities in relation to this issue. I think we are tending to concentrate far too much in this place on the negatives. But there are some positives out there. I highlighted earlier the use of carbon capture in a greenhouse in a small town called Guyra in my electorate where from the heating processes within the greenhouse, the glasshouse—a very large one, about 50 acres—carbon dioxide is captured and reinjected into that environment, which actually has a positive and dramatic impact on plant growth. I was in Canada a few years ago looking at an ethanol plant that was being commissioned at the time. This plant had a carbon capture arrangement as part of the process. They viewed the carbon dioxide they were capturing from that plant as an asset to market. As I said earlier, particularly as the price of petroleum and other energy sources tends to move upwards, it will create opportunities for those with initiative and enable new technologies to move forward. There has been a lot of talk during the climate change debate in this parliament by the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts, the Minister for Climate Change and Water, the Prime Minister and others, and within the press, about the Murray-Darling system, which is under some degree of stress. Some of these people are suggesting that the crisis is caused by drought and climate change. Recently we had Professor Garnaut making recommendations on emissions targets and putting out reduction options of either five per cent or 10 per cent by 2020. The commentary on that sort of target seems to suggest that that will not save the Murray-Darling. The government should look at and quantify the climate change component of run-off loss within the Murray-Darling system. How much less water is flowing into the Murray-Darling system or is being assumed for the future will not flow into the Murray-Darling system because of climate change? I am not a climate change sceptic, but I think we have to get some consistency into the definitions and statistics. If climate change is having an impact on the Murray-Darling, and the reduction target that Professor Garnaut is recommending of either five per cent or 10 per cent will not be sufficient to ameliorate the climate change component of run-off loss, what is the difference? What is that figure? How many gigalitres of water is not flowing into the Murray-Darling catchment because of climate change? I think the Prime Minister and others have to come to grips with that figure, because you cannot raise the issue of the Lower Lakes and the Coorong or Cubbie Station or Toorale and blame climate change if you cannot quantify the figure for the difference. This is a very different debate from the overallocation issue that many others are talking about, but the two debates are being blurred. I ask the minister at the table, the Minister for Defence Science and Personnel, whether he would ask the Prime Minister, Senator Wong, Mr Garrett and others to quantify that number. How many gigalitres are being lost to the system from climate change? The reason I want to find out that figure—and their logic is flawed if there is not a number; everybody cannot run around saying that it is all happening because of climate change if they cannot tell us what it is that is happening—is that there is an unnatural climate-change-driven change in run-off. The Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government should look at funding an analysis into that issue. If a crisis is occurring in the Murray-Darling and we do not do enough about it through our emissions targets—as Professor Garnaut has recommended and which, it seems, the government might take up for other political reasons—we will do irreparable damage to the Murray-Darling system. If China, India and others do not enter the climate change debate and do something about their emissions, it strengthens the argument, but if those are the options I believe we should look very closely at bringing water into that system. Some people will say: ‘Here we go again, diverting water.’ Only last week this parliament, this government, signed off on a diversion of water out of the Murray-Darling system into the Melbourne system. So forget this argument that you cannot divert water from one catchment to another; it is occurring as we speak. I believe we should look closely at not only the costs and the obvious benefits of saving a food-bowl system but also the costs and benefits of potentially bringing water into that system out of Queensland, where we are also told that in some areas because of climate change there will be more water. Maybe there are some issues there of transference between the component of the overallocation process and the climate change component of inflow loss. There may well be, as technology advances, some means of transferring water from the east coast—whether that be in Queensland or in New South Wales—or there may well be some long-term means of desalinating water and pumping it inland. We are told the impacts of climate change, the polar meltdown et cetera, will in fact create more water on the coast. So I think it is important that we start to get some numbers around these issues, and it is important we do that before we spend billions of dollars buying back bits of paper, as occurred with the Toorale sale the other day, that will not in any real context have an effect on the crisis in the Murray because we have not reduced our emissions to an extent that the climate change component of the reduction in inflows is impacted upon. I think that is an important issue that the Minister for Climate Change and Water and others should have a look at. The other issue that I think is very relevant—and I know it is close to your heart, too, Mr Deputy Speaker Scott—is that of coalmining on very rich agricultural land, particularly alluvial flood plains. In my electorate the Liverpool Plains has some of the best cropping country in the world, and your electorate, Mr Deputy Speaker, has possibly the second- or third-best cropping country in the world. The issues are the same. With the advent of the high price of coal, exploration licences are being granted for major companies to look at coal deposits on these highly valuable agricultural lands. BHP is carrying out some exploration on the Liverpool Plains as we speak. There was a rally in Gunnedah yesterday that I attended—and that was the reason I was not in the chamber—that addressed this issue. There was also a meeting of the coal companies, which I addressed, on this issue. There has been a call for about two years now for an independent study into the potential impacts of longwall and open-cut mining not only on those alluvial flood plains but, particularly in relation to the Liverpool Plains, on the underpinning groundwater systems that extend for 250 to 300 kilometres in that system. We do not know—and the coal companies do not know but should know before they do anything—the impacts of slashing a groundwater artery that has got hydraulic pressures driving it not only through the other interconnected systems but also into the Murray-Darling system. I call again on the Prime Minister and the Minister for Climate Change and Water, Senator Wong, to look seriously at this issue. If you are really concerned about the Lower Lakes and the Coorong, if you are really concerned about climate change, global warming and the potential impacts of coalmining in these areas and if you are really concerned about the food argument that keeps being put up that we need to produce more food, we really need some more knowledge. Whether it is in the Darling Downs, the Liverpool Plains or other areas, you cannot allow these areas to be risked without full knowledge of the impacts. It is my view and, I think, the view of many others, particularly the farmers on the Liverpool Plains, that the state government has a flawed planning process in relation to the granting of mining licences. Part 3A of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act gives far too much discretion to the minister. The minister only has to take into account a whole range of other impacts and then, in a sense, can ignore them. I would ask you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and others in the parliament to take those words on board and request that the government at least partly fund an independent study into those potential impacts on our groundwater system and the Murray-Darling system generally. 7749 17:03:00 Grierson, Sharon, MP 00AMP Newcastle ALP 1 0 Ms GRIERSON —I rise to speak on the Offshore Petroleum (Annual Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and cognate bills. The main bill we are considering here today will establish a new range of offshore titles for the transportation by pipeline and injection and storage in geological formations of carbon dioxide and, potentially, other greenhouse gases. The government has chosen to amend the Offshore Petroleum Act because the types of geological formations that have stored oil and gas will likely be the same kinds of formations in which greenhouse gases can potentially be stored. Through these amendments we are seeking to balance the rights of those who seek to store greenhouse gases with the rights of those in the petroleum industry. The key aims of this legislation are to provide greenhouse gas injection and storage proponents with the certainty needed to bring forward investment, to preserve pre-existing rights of the petroleum industry as far as possible and to provide assurance to the community that CO2 is stored in a safe and secure way. The bill deals mainly with access and property rights for greenhouse gas injection and storage activities in Commonwealth offshore waters. The three associated bills deal with fees and charges in a similar fashion to the fees and charges associated with the petroleum and oil industries. Importantly, the legislation confers on the responsible Commonwealth minister a range of powers for dealing with situations where injection and storage does not go as planned. This means that, if something is going wrong or has the potential to go wrong, the minister has the power to direct an injection licensee to, for example, modify injection rates, undertake mediation work or cease injection. When it comes to liability, this legislation treats the issue in the same manner as existing offshore petroleum production activities—that is, this law will not immunise greenhouse gas titleholders, or other participants, from common law liability to persons who suffer injury or loss as a result of their actions. Participants in the industry, like those in any other industry, will need to make their own arrangements to cover any potential common law liability. The buck stops with them. The Commonwealth will not take over any long-term liability. However, if for some reason the damages were not recoverable—for example, after an extended passage of time—the community would effectively bear the costs of any damage. The amendments to the Offshore Petroleum Act in this bill are designed to establish a framework similar to that operating around the offshore petroleum industry. They are designed to give certainty to organisations looking to participate in a new carbon capture and storage industry—because there will be an industry developed around the storage of greenhouse gases. That is already arising. Our scientists are currently working on cutting-edge carbon capture and storage technologies, and several large-scale projects are already considering their requirements for geological storage. That is why this legislation is so important: to create a regime that gives certainty and puts in place arrangements that let these research and commercial projects continue. When a price is imposed on carbon by an emissions trading scheme, it may become financially viable for businesses to establish themselves as waste disposal services for CO2—that is, they will be able to charge CO2 emitters for collecting and burying their emissions. What we have in this legislation is a framework for the development of a carbon storage industry. To highlight why it is so important, we only have to look at the report Australia’s national greenhouse accounts. While the figures in that report show that we are on track to meet our Kyoto target, they also show that we still have a great deal to do to reduce greenhouse emissions. Our emissions in 2007 are estimated to have grown to 585 million tonnes—an increase of 1.6 per cent on 2006. Significantly, growth in energy use has seen energy related emissions increase by 12 million tonnes to 378 million tonnes. In 2006, our emissions were 4.2 per cent higher than 1990 levels. We have set a target of reducing emissions by 60 per cent of 2000 levels by 2050. Fortunately, the Rudd government takes its responsibility to fight climate change seriously. Carbon capture and storage is a very important part of the policy suite we have developed for this purpose. The International Energy Agency estimates that CO2 capture and geological storage has the second largest potential, behind energy efficiency itself, to achieve deep cuts in CO2 emissions. The storage formations in offshore waters made available by this legislation have the potential to securely store hundreds of millions of tonnes of CO2 for many thousands of years. We could store around 25 per cent of our annual CO2 emissions offshore. These are significant figures which would make a real difference in the fight against climate change, which is why it is so important to get this legislation right. I am pleased to note the tabling of the report of the inquiry into this legislation by the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Primary Industries and Resources. That report was presented on 1 September. I am also very pleased to note that the bipartisan report strongly supported the government’s approach to a carbon capture and storage framework. We are introducing amendments to the bill in the consideration in detail stage that will give effect to 17 of the committee’s 19 recommendations. These amendments will make the regulatory framework established by this legislation even more robust and effective. I must say that it is refreshing to see committee recommendations being seriously considered by this new government. It certainly was not something we saw much of under the Howard government. For their constructive approach and the contribution they made to getting this legislation right, I particularly commend the chair of the committee, the member for Lyons, Dick Adams, and the Minister for Resources and Energy, Martin Ferguson. A carbon capture and storage framework that helps reduce greenhouse gases while maintaining our nation’s competitive advantage in fuels such as coal and gas will be very good news for the future of my own region—Newcastle and the Hunter Valley. Eighty-three per cent of this nation’s electricity is generated from coal, so cleaning it up is essential for Australia. My region—the Hunter Valley, Newcastle and the Central Coast—is one of the centres of this electricity generation. It is also the centre of coalmining in New South Wales. Apart from some of the extremists in the climate change debate, people in my region know that the Hunter’s coal industry has a big role to play in our economic future, but we also know that we have to do it in a cleaner way. Carbon capture and storage technology is one of the most important avenues we need to explore if we are going to keep our coal industry viable in a carbon constrained world. By creating an environment in which industry can confidently invest in carbon capture and storage projects, we are encouraging the commercialisation of technologies that move us ever closer to our aim of a sustainable energy future for our region and our nation. The jobs of around 8,000 people in the coal industry in the Hunter depend on us getting it right. I think there are about another 20,000 jobs that depend indirectly on that coalmining effort. We exported 88 million tonnes of coal out of the Port of Newcastle last year. We are planning to reach 100 million tonnes of coal in the near future. This is vital economic activity. As Minister Ferguson pointed out in his second reading speech, if we can use the carbon storage framework to encourage local innovation in carbon capture and storage technology then we can export this technology to the world. China and India, in particular, are undergoing rapid industrialisation. Those nations are not going to stop developing. Indeed, there is a moral imperative for them to continue to develop and to do their best to lift their people out of poverty and underdevelopment. However, development is often accompanied by an environmental cost. Having been to China, I have seen firsthand the impact of carbon emissions and pollution on urban and rural environments. Exporting clean coal technologies to China will be of enormous benefit to the Australian economy, to the environment and to the people of China. I will just mention that White Mining Ltd trialled an ultra-clean coal project some time ago. I note that they have reactivated that project and the ultra-clean coal technology is being exported to the world. In Newcastle we are also a centre for the research and demonstration projects that are going to be the drivers of innovation in clean coal technologies in the future. In May, the Minister for Climate Change and Water, Senator Wong, visited Newcastle’s CSIRO Energy Centre with me to see firsthand the work that our scientists are doing there. We watched researchers who were in the laboratory testing which chemicals make the best binders for removing carbon from the other contents of electricity generated emissions. This is part of a wide range of work on clean coal being done by the CSIRO, looking at coal conversion and gasification processes. I also encourage the work of the University of Newcastle, which has set up a clean energy centre. I am pleased that the Rudd government is providing a $500 million National Clean Coal Initiative, which will keep moving us closer to the commercialisation of low-emission technologies. Commercialisation of these technologies is vital for the future of the Hunter Valley coalmining industry and the future energy security of our nation. But one of the major drivers of new, clean technologies is going to be the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. This is one of the key pillars of the government’s comprehensive and interconnected policy approach to tackling climate change. It is a refreshing approach after the denial and scepticism of the Howard government. At the heart of the CPRS is emissions trading designed to create incentives to look for cleaner energy options. Under the scheme, the market finds the most efficient ways to reduce carbon pollution. We believe this will be the lowest-cost and most economically responsible way to achieve this goal. I am pleased that every cent raised from the sale of permits will be used to help households and businesses make the move to a clean energy future. Tackling climate change cannot be without cost, but putting a limit and a price on pollution will drive the changes we need in what we produce and the way we produce it. This is a huge reform of the Australian economy and, once again, it is vital that we get it right. As I mentioned earlier, the House committee process has produced some good amendments to the carbon capture and storage legislation that we are considering today. In the same way, the careful and considered community consultation that is underway on the CPRS will, I am sure, also result in the right settings being implemented. Last month, a departmental consultation was held in Newcastle. It was very well attended by local community groups, environmentalists, scientists, business and representatives from all levels of government. The feedback given and the questions asked showed just how important the issue of climate change is in my electorate. I know that the government will be carefully considering all the feedback it receives from the community as the CPRS is developed and implemented. That is the best way to get it right, because it is under the CPRS that the new technologies we need for a clean future are going to be encouraged. Efficiency measures, green cars, solar and other renewables, and the clean coal and carbon capture we have been looking at under this legislation will all contribute to making a difference. Another wonderful Rudd government initiative that will encourage us to move forward in this area is the Enterprise Connect network. Specifically, the new $20 million Clean Energy Innovation Centre will help enhance the performance of Australia’s small and medium sized clean energy companies by providing a range of business improvement services. The centre is expected to provide a comprehensive review of the firm that will identify its strengths and weaknesses, strategic business issues, potential areas for business improvement and potential areas for growth. It will provide grants for addressing areas identified by the review for improvement and growth. It will find and adapt the latest research and technology to help firms improve their products and manufacturing processes and services. It will provide access to specialist facilities and advice to turn innovative ideas into new products or to test products for new markets. It will help in identifying export markets and understanding relevant regulatory, cultural and market issues. The centre will also help firms to become export ready, including through developing management and marketing skills. It will also identify sources of government support for the firm’s innovation and export activities. Last year, I visited David Mills in San Francisco and looked at the wonderful work he was doing there in solar research. I reflect on the fact that we lost David Mills’s wonderful work to another country. A call for expressions of interest went out earlier this year for organisations interested in running the Clean Energy Innovation Centre. I have discussed this at length with stakeholders in Newcastle, and an excellent proposal has been put forward from my region. As I have been telling everyone who will listen, the establishment of the Clean Energy Innovation Centre is a natural fit for Newcastle, as the future of our region lies very much in adapting our existing industrial base to a lower carbon future. It would be a great boost for us to fulfil the potential we already have here. The CSIRO’s Energy Transformed Flagship and Energy Technology Division and the University of Newcastle’s Clean Energy Centre are all doing great work on clean energy. Many of our SMEs, such as Corky’s Carbon and Combustion, are already developing new products and commercialising their ideas. Of course, we are at the centre of energy generation and have proximity to major energy users in NSW. We also have the talent and expertise to link with other organisations around the country as a part of the national Enterprise Connect network. This network is a great initiative of the Rudd Labor government and highlights the wide-ranging approach we are taking to fighting climate change. I congratulate the University of Newcastle, and Newcastle Innovation in particular, on leading the submission process. I know Ernst & Young are part of that submission as well, as are HunterNet, the collaborative manufacturing network. I know from the research that was done to put that submission together that over 50 per cent of business members of the Clean Energy Council in Australia are located in New South Wales. As they are the only bid from New South Wales, I remain optimistic. The network is a great initiative and it highlights the wide-ranging approach we are taking to fighting climate change. Another initiative I would like to highlight is the $500 million Energy Innovation Fund, which will boost Australia’s existing momentum in solar technology research, particularly solar thermal, which has great potential for augmenting baseload power and in which CSIRO Newcastle is a world leader. Solar photovoltaics will also benefit from the EIF, with $100 million being put towards solar technology research. This will be administered by a new body, the Australian Solar Institute. These initiatives build on the world-leading work already being undertaken at CSIRO in Newcastle. I have digressed a little because it is important to understand that encouraging carbon capture and storage technologies is part of a broad-ranging approach by the Rudd government to fighting climate change. The practical assistance on the ground is something that we value. Encouraging research is at the centre of our reforms and, particularly in this legislation, giving certainty to business and industry is something that we all wish to progress. Carbon capture and storage is an important part of our strategy, and I wholeheartedly support the endeavours underway. The technologies involved in carbon capture and storage are well advanced, and there are international pilot projects directly involving the injection of CO2 into rock in Canada, Poland, Norway and the Otway Basin in Victoria. I hear people say that this is unproven technology. It is commercially unproven at this stage but certainly not scientifically unproven. I note that in April this year a project announced by Peter Cook, now head of the CO2CRC—and I know the University of Newcastle is part of the CO2CRC—began in the Otway Ranges in Victoria with the injection of up to 100,000 tonnes of CO2 down to a depth of about two kilometres. I also note that in July: … the results of Australia’s first successful trials of the leading technology for capturing CO2, the most significant greenhouse gas, were announced. According to David Brockway, the head of CSIRO Newcastle’s Energy Division: … the jointly operated CSIRO-industry pilot plant at the Loy Yang power station in Victoria’s Latrobe Valley removed more than 80 per cent of the CO2, using so-called post-combustion capture. So the technologies are advanced and they deserve a great deal of support and encouragement. The world is moving ahead on this and, now under the Rudd government, so is Australia. This is important legislation that gives certainty for investment in carbon capture and storage technology projects. It gives us another avenue with which to pursue reductions in greenhouse gases, and that is, of course, something vital for our future. I commend the bill to the House. 7754 17:22:00 Haase, Barry, MP 84T Kalgoorlie LP 0 0 Mr HAASE —I thank the House for the opportunity to speak in this cognate debate on the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, a vital piece of legislation. Even though the science surrounding sequestration of carbon is well advanced, and even though we have a number of practical operating sites today, there remains a great deal of scepticism in the minds of the public about the long-term veracity of this process. First of all, as a parliament we need to pass this legislation because it is important for Australia. Australia has huge resources of natural gas and coal. If we are to survive in this world, we are told, we have to reduce the emissions of carbon in the generation of electricity. If we are going to do that in a meaningful way, we are going to drastically increase the cost of living or, on the other hand, destroy the standard of living. If we as a public are going to accept that we can increase the price of things by deriving our energy from more expensive sources and not impact on the cost of living, then we are in gaga land. That is not a path that politicians of this country ought to lead the public down. Professor Garnaut, in his latest statements, has suggested that the price of electricity will increase by 40 per cent. In industries where electricity is a major component, will it be business as usual? Will consumers continue to use that energy and, as a consequence—we are told—pollute the atmosphere with carbon? If their carbon emissions are so great, will they be compensated? If they are going to be compensated then why on earth will their behaviour change? Surely they will then use the same amount because the bottom line net effect will be the same financially. I have just heard the member for Newcastle say that she would like consumers to be compensated for the increased cost of their lifestyle because of the necessity to have a carbon pollution reduction scheme for the good of the world—although it would seem that the Rudd government do not care whether the rest of the world engages in that concern for the world. When we see Australian citizens having an increased cost of living because of a 40 per cent increase in the cost of electricity, for instance, the member for Newcastle would have us believe that the Rudd government will compensate for that increased impact on households. And with that compensation, when we have a 40-degree day in the Pilbara, I am sure that the householders will switch off their air conditioning. No, I do not believe that for a moment. They will leave their air conditioning on, especially if they are going to be compensated for the increased costs of electricity. I could go on about the illogical nature of this proposed scheme, but it simply strikes me as being so odd that intelligent adults can be hoodwinked in such a way; the hoodwinking is extreme. It makes no sense. If you introduce a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme by 2010 in an attempt to contribute to the reduction of carbon globally—without caring whether anyone else in the world does it, or whether by 2010 it will be a good system, or whether we understand it, or whether the public know what the impact is going to be—and then believe that the increased cost of living will somehow be compensated for by a charge on a tonne of carbon, won’t consumers simply keep the cycle going and spend the compensation money on more pollution, if it is to be called pollution? The logic escapes me. Those who moved into government at the last election have an ability to embrace such an illogical argument. When they were in opposition they were incredibly sceptical about any technology that might involve putting carbon dioxide underground. They could not possibly embrace that idea and that technology, but now they do; so there has been a transition in belief. Wouldn’t it have been a wonderful outcome if those same people could have embraced the absolute logic of nuclear energy? It is not such a magnificent step when you think about it. If you can reconsider the scientific evidence around sequestering carbon dioxide permanently, deep underground in rock formations where carbon dioxide and other gases have remained for millions of years without any surface detection, and if the government can go from a position of not believing in carbon sequestration to embracing carbon sequestration in a period of nine months, wouldn’t it have been a wonderful world had they, from their position of not believing in nuclear energy, had been able to embrace a belief in nuclear energy? But we in opposition today obviously expect too much. So we have a necessity for the continued use of fossil fuels and, therefore, the necessity to come up with a plan to dispose of the waste product of fossil fuels—which we all know is carbon dioxide, which is a perfectly useful gas that is very common on this earth but has now been demonised and has to be put away out of sight, out of mind where it will never return. Surely trees will form themselves from other substances in the future. I heard someone today talk about a post-carbon world. What a wonderful idea: no more steel, no more trees, no more grass and no more food. Such is the intelligence of the current government. We have this scheme which is necessary to sequester the nasty carbon dioxide and, because of it, a very complex document that will set up the guidelines for leases to be planned and processes to be undertaken so that those who are today engaged in extracting gases from deep under the earth—natural gas, hydrocarbon gas—will not be interfered with by those who are sequestering carbon dioxide. That is a perfectly logical arrangement. It is a realisation that we have to have this control in place. Of course, the smart way to do that was to modify existing acts, and the Offshore Petroleum Act was the perfect vehicle for these changes. Of course, as we have heard during this debate, the Standing Committee on Primary Industries and Resources has carried out an analysis of the proposed legislation and received numerous submissions—very solid and intelligent submissions—from various players in the industry. One such submission came from a firm favourite organisation of mine, Woodside Petroleum. I have the pleasure of being the member for the federal seat of Kalgoorlie and, of course, the majority of Woodside’s operations are offshore from my patch. Woodside supports a number of aspects of the bill. It supports the introduction of the legislation generally to accommodate greenhouse gas storage activities. It also supports the regime being included in the Offshore Petroleum Act given the synergies between the title systems and the need to manage the potential for conflict between petroleum activities and greenhouse gas storage activities. It also strongly supports the adoption of the proposed legislative model by states and territories to ensure a nationally consistent framework in both offshore and onshore areas to minimise the regulatory burden. However, Woodside stated quite clearly in its submission that it has strong reservations about the impact of this bill on the company’s ability to develop some of the largest resource projects in Australia—for example, the proposed Browse Basin LNG development, for which key terms agreements to the value of $A70 billion to $A90 billion in sales revenue have been signed. The company will be restricted by this bill in its ability and flexibility to dispose of the carbon dioxide that is produced with the reservoir gas. In Woodside’s view, the object of this bill should be to provide cost-effective carbon dioxide storage solutions without impeding the development of natural hydrocarbon resources. It should not constrain the ability of a project to dispose of carbon dioxide that arises from an integrated multiple field development, as would be the outcome of the current draft legislation, which prohibits disposal within a petroleum production licence area for carbon dioxide derived from outside the licence area. The bill introduces hurdles for accessing suitable low-cost disposal sites by making them subject to a new regime of greenhouse gas titles. Recognising that geosequestration of carbon dioxide from flue gas is unlikely to be commercially available for the coming 10 years, the ability of large gas developments to dispose of reservoir CO2 should not be compromised. Geosequestration projects, such as that considered by Woodside, should be recognised as fulfilling a crucial role in developing Australia’s LNG potential while at the same time achieving the objective of large-scale carbon dioxide disposal in Australia. Woodside is also concerned about the limited consultation on the bill and the absence of associated regulations and guidelines at this stage. The bill raises significant issues in relation to the sovereignty of existing petroleum operations as against the relative uncertainty posed by the entry of a new activity and supporting industry for greenhouse gas storage into the same areas. Given the significance of these issues, Woodside recommends that the bill be considered as a legislative regime in its entirety. Woodside mentioned in its submission to the standing committee that it was concerned about the sovereignty of existing petroleum operations. Of course, that leads me straight to my next point, which is that Woodside may well raise the issue of sovereignty and it may well be concerned about this government’s future intentions and any legislation it may introduce. Madam Deputy Speaker, you will recall that in the last budget, like a thief in the night, the Australian Taxation Office attacked Woodside’s bottom line to the tune of $2.5 billion over four years. That is hardly petty cash. I have spoken about that in this place previously. I am sympathetic to Woodside’s case and their very strongly stated belief that, when they were developing the North West Shelf gas project, one of the enabling factors was the agreement between the then government and the Woodside partnership that would allow condensate to become a cash crop. It would return revenue to the project and the project could proceed on an economic basis. That was, I might add, aided by the bold move of then Premier Charles Court—later Sir Charles Court—in signing a take-or-pay contract with Woodside for domestic gas for the people of south-west Western Australia. Those two components of negotiations allowed the Woodside North West Shelf project to proceed—and, in doing so, invited further exploration and further project development of that incredible wealth that we now know of today, which is earning billions of dollars for this nation and powering up Asia and Japan. When the budget measure was announced to renege on that agreement, it came as a great shock to Woodside. So it is not surprising that they should be concerned about sovereign issues. They will be concerned about legislation proposed by this government because I am quite sure there is a perception that this government believe that companies that are making a profit today ought not do so—because perhaps ‘profit’ is a dirty word—or they simply do not understand or they do not bother honouring long-term agreements. It is just as necessary for condensate to remain free of excise today as it was when the contract was first negotiated. To renege on that will mean that the increased costs—$2.5 billion over four years—have to be passed on somewhere. We cannot have this cost disappear into thin air. And who will be in the firing line? It will be the consumers of petroleum products in Western Australia. If nothing else, I think members of this House ought to be incensed by that action because, as I said earlier, it is comparable to the actions of a thief in the night: it came without warning. It is a dastardly act, and Woodside are quite right in being concerned about sovereign risk and deals that have been done in the past and whether they will be honoured in the future. Even though I have great faith in the science of carbon sequestration, there is no doubt that there are many who still have reservations about the permanence of the science. Unfortunately, because of that lack of belief or confidence—call it what you like—there will be an increased cost in any process of sequestration. And I refer, of course, to the issue of long-term insurance against eventuality into the future. The doomsayers would talk about leakage and incidents that have occurred on the African continent in the past, with carbon dioxide poisoning through natural events. Of course, as a displacer of oxygen, it can be a dangerous gas—as can many gases be. But the problem is that, because of the ‘what if’ nature of this sequestration and the minute doubt that exists in the minds of some people, the question of insurance will be a very large one indeed and has to be resolved. I believe the way to resolve that is for the Commonwealth to consider carrying insurance into the future. Companies may come and go but, if we are talking about hundreds if not thousands of years of storage of CO2 and the minute risk of that gas escaping, there will be necessary monitoring costs and we will have to decide who is going to carry the cost of insurance. The solution will be for the Commonwealth to do so. We have pleasure in allowing the passage of this legislation through the House, although I note that amendments will be proposed in the Senate. They will cover a number of issues: minister directing an outcome, potential overlapping of the greenhouse gas storage et cetera. (Time expired) 7758 17:42:00 Combet, Greg, MP YW6 Charlton ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Procurement 1 0 Mr COMBET —I rise to speak on the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 in this cognate debate. This bill is of relevance and of vital interest to the people in my electorate and in the Hunter region more generally—as well as, of course, to the nation. In my electorate there are quite a number of underground coalmines and there is also one of the largest coal-fired electricity generation stations in New South Wales. And, of course, in the Hunter region there is a very important aluminium smelting capacity. That is an industry that uses a lot of electricity in the manufacturing of aluminium. Greenhouse gas emissions and how the government deals with them is of immediate economic and social relevance to my electorate and the people of the region. The amendments contained in the bill will enable carbon dioxide to be stored safely and securely in geological storage formations deep underground in Australian offshore waters under the Commonwealth’s jurisdiction. The government is committed to comprehensive action—as the House has been informed on a number of occasions—to tackle climate change whilst also recognising the importance of supporting Australian jobs and the community. To bring it back to local and regional relevance in my area, the role of the coal industry and electricity generation distribution and retailing are extremely important for living standards and employment. That is why it is such an important issue, and close examination of the government’s policy responses is constantly under discussion. I think it is well appreciated now that climate change is one of the greatest threats that the nation faces. Carbon capture and storage, or CCS—which is the subject of the bill—holds great potential as one important method, amongst a number of strategies, for avoiding the damaging effects of the emission of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. That is why this is a significant bill before the House. Geological surveys have indicated that storage formations in offshore waters made available by these amendments have the potential to securely store hundreds of millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide for many thousands of years. If successfully developed, carbon capture and storage has the potential to significantly reduce Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions whilst allowing for the continued use of fossil fuel. This bill focuses on establishing a framework of access and property rights for greenhouse gas injection and storage activities in Commonwealth offshore waters. The bill also provides a management system for ensuring that storage is safe and secure. The types of geological formations—and I have some interest in this myself, having trained as a mining engineer—that have stored oil and gas for millions of years are the same as the logical storage formations for carbon dioxide. That implies that petroleum and greenhouse gas operations are therefore likely to operate in similar regions. It is important that this bill balances the rights of the new carbon storage industry with the rights of the petroleum and energy industry in particular. Accordingly, the legislation provides greenhouse gas injection and storage proponents with the certainty that is needed to invest, which is ultimately the key to enabling the technology, if it is found to be feasible, to work. Secondly, it preserves the pre-existing rights of the petroleum industry, as much as is practicable, to minimise sovereign risk to existing titleholders’ investment in Australia’s offshore resources. Importantly, the bill also provides for the release of areas for exploration in Commonwealth offshore waters for greenhouse gas injection and storage sites. Of course, this activity will have to be commercialised for it to be effective. The impact on other users of these areas will be considered. If the identified area is considered safe and secure, the legislation provides for the injection and storage of greenhouse gases at a rate and volume agreed by the responsible Commonwealth minister. It is very important to put the legislation into a broader context. The scientific consensus is that the earth has been warming and that the release of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere is the main cause, and that, if we continue on this course, we will run into dangerous climate change that may threaten the established patterns of life. If we do nothing, as we have been informed by the work of Professor Garnaut, the middle-of-the road impacts are in the region of a 4.8 per cent cut in GDP by the end of this century. That is a reduction of $400 billion in today’s money. There is also a projected 4.5-degree increase in Australia’s mean temperature by 2100. On these trends, 5½ million Australians may be exposed to dengue fever virus by 2100. There will be 4,000 extra heat related deaths per year by 2100. The value of irrigated agriculture grown in the Murray-Darling Basin by 2100 would decline by no less than 92 per cent. These are the projections referred to by Professor Garnaut in his research, and to this point in time I have not heard a credible argument placed against them. The central method of avoiding catastrophic climate change is to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. The government has set a goal of a reduction of 60 per cent in the 2000 level of emissions by 2050. The most efficient method of reducing these emissions is an emissions trading system or, as the government describes it, a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. It is understandable, I guess, that some people will ask why the Rudd Labor government is considering introducing a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme while some of the largest global emitters are not. In other words, why does Australia need to act early? This is another issue that was addressed by Professor Garnaut in his work. The short answer is that Australia is not that early at all. As Professor Garnaut argued, by number, more developed countries are already doing quite a lot more. That is not to say that there are more developed countries in Europe than elsewhere. Quite a lot of developed countries are doing a lot more. Even though the United States, at a national level, is not acting to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions, the reality is that some of the US states—some much bigger than Australia in terms of population and economic activity in some sectors, including states such as California—have in fact done a lot, and that has been reflected in greatly reduced greenhouse gas emissions in those parts of the US. Another important point is that it is unlikely that we will get the developing nations to commit to reducing their emissions unless the developed world and countries such as Australia begin this process. That, of course, was what the Kyoto protocol was all about. It is essential that China in particular becomes part of a serious international mitigation effort, and much earlier than the current international discussion currently contemplates. That, of course, is an important goal. Professor Garnaut was also right when he noted that our location, compared to other developed nations such as Canada and the northern areas of the United States, means that Australia has a bigger interest than many other developed countries in a strongly mitigative outcome. We are already a hot and dry country, and small variations in temperature and rainfall do have a much bigger impact here than in other developed countries. As important is the fact that, unlike other developed countries, our neighbours are mainly developing countries—in some respects some of the most fragile nations in the world. The problems of our neighbours in these circumstances would inevitably also become our problems. While a number of opposition speakers that I have heard contributing to the debate have pointed to Australia’s relatively small overall contribution to greenhouse gas emissions internationally, it is the case that whatever Australia does is important and that it does matter. Professor Garnaut made the point that Australia has been punching above its weight on climate change for the last seven years—however, not in a good way. Any discussion of climate change policy in the US over these years highlighted Australia more than almost any other developed country for the fact that we had not signed up to the Kyoto protocol and were not taking steps that others were taking. We were the reason why the Bush administration was able to say, ‘We’re not alone amongst developed countries.’ I think it is fair to say that that was a relevant factor in some of the US domestic debate. Fortunately, that situation has now ended. As Professor Garnaut said, without early and strong action some time before 2020, we will realise that we have indelibly surrendered to forces beyond our control. Delaying now will eliminate attractive lower cost options to reduce emissions. Reducing carbon pollution from fossil fuels has to be a central part of Australia’s efforts to minimise the impact of climate change. The burning of fossil fuels for power generation accounts for one-third of humanity’s total emissions of greenhouse gas to the atmosphere—no less than one-third. Most forecasts of Australian and global energy production and use predict heavy fossil fuel use continuing for many years to come. The Stern review, for example, forecast that fossil fuels would still account for a majority of energy production in 2050 and well beyond. This means it is essential that we decouple carbon pollution from fossil fuel based energy production. Carbon capture and storage technologies are the important mechanisms by which this decoupling can occur. Studies have found that carbon capture and storage can reduce emissions from fossil fuel use by 80 to 85 per cent. That is the sort of quantum leap that is required to achieve deep cuts in global emissions. The need to capture carbon has very important regional dimensions. For example, as I indicated in opening, the coal industry in the Hunter region has been the heart of economic activity since European colonisation in the area. The Hunter coal industry is now worth $6 billion a year, with nearly 90 million tonnes exported each year. With significant growth projections, the current level of exports is making up 90 per cent of the region’s exports—90 per cent gives a reasonable indication of its economic significance. The current level of exports also makes up nearly 30 per cent of New South Wales’ total exports. As I said, with increased port capacity in Newcastle and current levels of demand, the projections are that the level of coal exports is set to increase quite significantly in coming years. The industry in the Hunter directly employs 7,000 people, with another 21,000 in related employment. Many of these employees and their families live in my electorate. The region also produces over 35 per cent of Australia’s aluminium. Its four power stations in the Hunter and Central Coast regions generate 80 per cent of New South Wales’s electricity. It is evident from those statistics just how important the examination of the policy responses to climate change is for the Hunter region. This is why people in the region take a very keen interest in these issues and why the question of carbon capture and storage in a region heavily dependent on coal exports and coal-fired electricity generation is vital. Emissions from the stationary energy sector, of which coal-fired power stations are the dominant energy source, represent more than 50 per cent of our greenhouse gas emissions, and this share is growing. It is in this context that this parliament needs to consider this bill. The need for policy intervention is absolutely clear. In particular, I was very pleased that Labor took to the last election a commitment to establish a $500 million clean coal technology fund. The government has established two new bodies to drive the deployment of low-emission coal technologies in Australia. One is the National Low Emissions Coal Council and the other is the carbon storage task force. In addition, industry and state governments are committing more than $1 billion. I applaud the important initiatives of the New South Wales government as well, including a pilot project to capture postcombustion carbon dioxide from the Lake Munmorah power station. This power station is just down the road from my electorate. The Eraring power station is in my electorate. Furthermore, the coal industry, through the COAL21 program, has levied itself 20c per tonne of coal production per year to fund carbon capture and storage and related technologies. The levy is estimated to be worth $1 billion over 10 years. The CFMEU—the coalminers union—has proposed that the Australian coal industry, through this program, should increase its levy on itself from 20c per tonne to $1 per tonne. This would increase the COAL21 fund by a factor of five to around $5 billion over the coming decade. They have that view because they understand the necessity for investment in the investigation of carbon capture and storage and other technologies to address greenhouse gas emissions. These sorts of investments will complement investments in renewable energies. For example, the $150 million Energy Innovation Fund will boost Australia’s existing momentum in solar technology research, while the $500 million Renewable Energy Fund will accelerate the commercialisation of new renewable energy technologies. Australia also possesses amazing potential for geothermal energy production, and the government is committed to renewable energy representing a 20 per cent share in Australia’s electricity supply by 2020. If it can be developed and commercialised, geothermal energy production can play an extremely important role in achieving that outcome. The renewable energy industry can develop and invest with confidence in these circumstances. Nevertheless, for the reasons I have described, the government recognises the vital importance that the coal industry specifically, and fossil fuels in general, will continue to represent to Australia for some time to come. Again, I emphasise the importance of it in my region. As a former coalmining engineer, and with a strong commitment to the industry, I am particularly interested, as a member of parliament, to see this particular technology successfully evolved. This bill will help develop the carbon capture and storage industry. The successful development of the technology will massively reduce greenhouse gas emissions from coal and gas. As I referred to a moment ago, the CFMEU, the coalminers union, has done a lot of work in this area, for which I congratulate it. At times, unions are accused of not looking positively towards future policy positions. Certainly, the CFMEU has distinctly not had that approach in relation to the issue of climate change. The president of the union, Tony Maher, who I know well, has been a leader in the debate on these particular matters. He and his organisation have highlighted three positive outcomes of the industrialisation of carbon capture and storage technology, with which I concur. The three positive outcomes that can emanate from the development of this technology include, firstly, a substantial contribution to avoiding the risk of global temperature rises that would cause widespread species and ecosystem loss and extreme weather conditions that could threaten many human communities. The second outcome is that the development of carbon capture and storage technology will enable growth in energy use to continue in a carbon constrained world and thereby enable economic growth to continue. This is especially important for developing countries that have legitimate and appropriate aspirations for substantial economic growth to give their citizens a better quality of life. The third positive outcome is that the technology will allow Australia to maintain its coal industry, which is a major engine of economic growth and wellbeing in regional Australia, the source of significant exports and a key component of Australia’s competitive advantage in energy-intensive manufacturing. That is a critical economic imperative for the House to consider. I hope we can ensure the safe passage of this legislation through the parliament to provide secure rights in relation to the development of carbon capture and storage technology. Debate (on motion by Dr Kelly) adjourned. 7762 Business 7762 7762 7762 18:01:00 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 1 0 Mr PRICE —I apologise to the House that I am doing this a little later than expected, but I gleefully inform the House that I present the report of the recommendations of the whips relating to committee and delegation reports and private members’ business on Monday, 22 September 2008. Copies of the report have been placed on the table. I advise all members that this motion is supported by the Chief Opposition Whip, the honourable member for Fairfax. The report read as follows— Pursuant to standing order 41A, the Whips recommend the following items of committee and delegation reports and private Members’ business for Monday, 22 September 2008. The order of precedence and allotments of time for items in the Main Committee and Chamber are as follows: Items recommended for Main Committee (6.55 to 8.30 pm) PRIVATE MEMBERS’ BUSINESS Notices 1 Dr Jensen: To move— That the House encourages the Government to lift the amount that a person in receipt of an Age Pension can earn from productive employment to an amount equivalent to the senior Australian’s tax offset before applying a penalty that reduces their Age Pension payment. Time allotted —30 minutes. Speech time limits — Dr Jensen —5 minutes. First Government Member speaking —5 minutes. Other Members —5 minutes each. [Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 6 x 5 mins.] The Whips recommend that consideration of this matter should continue on a future day. 2 Ms Rea: To move— That the House: notes that: the insidious act of human trafficking is the second largest criminal activity in the world, and certainly the fastest growing; and the Australian Government is committed to a “whole of government” approach to tackling human trafficking; and recognises that the Australian Government, through its Asia Regional Trafficking in Persons aid project and contribution to UNICEF’s work, continues to play an active role in strengthening the key institutions responsible for identifying and addressing human trafficking; acknowledges the role of the Non Government Organisations (NGO), their unique expertise and the assistance they provide to trafficked persons; recognises that the Australian Government continues to work with AusAID, NGOs and foreign governments to ensure that the crime of human trafficking is continually brought to light, and that all Members and Senators continue to raise awareness of this international human rights violation; and applauds the Government’s establishment of a National Round Table on people trafficking as a measure to involve all interested stakeholders in the fight against this despicable crime. Time allotted —35 minutes Speech time limits — Ms Rea —5 minutes. First Opposition Member speaking —5 minutes. Other Members —5 minutes each. [Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 7 x 5 mins ] The Whips recommend that consideration of this matter should continue on a future day. 3 Mr Scott: To move— That the House: calls on the Federal Government to amend finance legislation so as to prevent credit providers from sending unsolicited letters offering an increased credit limit to credit card holders; and notes the amended legislation would stipulate that for a credit card limit to be increased, the card holder must make the first approach to the credit provider. Time allotted —30 minutes. Speech time limits— Mr Scott —5 minutes. First Government Member speaking —5 minutes. Other Members —5 minutes each. [Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 6 x 5 min.] The Whips recommend that consideration of this matter should continue on a future day. Items recommended for House of Representatives Chamber (8.40 to 9.30 pm) COMMITTEE AND DELEGATION REPORTS 1 PARLIAMENTARY JOINT COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC WORKS Update Report: The Christmas Island Immigration Detention Centre Project The Whips recommend that statements on the report may be made —all statements to conclude by 8:50pm Speech time limits — Each Member —5 minutes. [Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 2 x 5 min.] PRIVATE MEMBERS’ BUSINESS Notices 1 Mr Tuckey: To move— That the House recognises the energy, water and agricultural potential of the far north of Australia, and in particular the Kimberley region, and urges the Parliament to give priority to the development of northern Australia. Time allotted —20 minutes. Speech time limits — Mr Tuckey —5 minutes. First Government Member speaking —5 minutes. Other Members —5 minutes each. [Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 4 x 5 mins.] The Whips recommend that consideration of this matter should continue on a future day. 2 Mr Hayes: To move— That the House: Recognises and acknowledges the significant contribution that officers across all Australian policing jurisdictions make to our local communities as we approach National Police Remembrance Day on 29 September 2008; Remembers and comes together to commemorate the ultimate sacrifices made by all police officers who have been killed in the course of their duties; Honours the courage, commitment and memory of the many fine men and women who lost their lives in the execution of their official duty each made in serving our community; Pays tribute to the families and friends of those fallen police officers for the support they unreservedly provided during the career of their respective loved ones; Encourages all Australians as a sign of respect to those who have fallen, to attend a ceremony or wear or display the traditional blue and white chequerboard ribbon, officially recognised as the symbol of Remembrance Day; and Supports and thanks all serving police of Australia for their invaluable dedication and commitment to make a difference, defend our way of life and safeguard the peace. Time allotted —remaining private Members’ business time prior to 9.30 pm Speech time limits — Mr Hayes —5 minutes. First Opposition Member speaking —5 minutes. Other Members —5 minutes each. [Minimum number of proposed Members speaking = 4 x 5 mins ] The Whips recommend that consideration of this matter should continue on a future day. Report adopted. 7764 Bills R3030 Cognate bills: 7764 Bills R3027 7764 Bills R3029 7764 Bills R3028 7764 Debate resumed. 7764 18:02:00 Kelly, Mike, MP HRI Eden-Monaro ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Support 1 0 Dr KELLY —It is with great pleasure that I rise to speak in support of the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and associated legislation. The establishment of the carbon capture and geological storage, or CCS, framework is an important step towards supporting the development of low-emissions coal technologies. The carbon capture and geological storage framework allows for the containment of greenhouse gas emissions, predominantly from coal-fired power stations, before they are released into the atmosphere and allowed to contribute to climate change. Capturing and storing greenhouse gases allows Australia to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, reflecting the nation’s commitment to combating climate change, whilst maintaining the nation’s coal export industry. Australia is the world’s largest exporter of coal, which is also our largest exported commodity. Our coal products currently provide 80 per cent of Australia’s electricity generation, and coal generally provides 40 per cent of the world’s electricity needs. Our nation cannot afford to cease its coal industry, for economic and strategic reasons. With global trends towards declining fossil fuel resources and increasing demand for fuel and energy, Australia needs to maintain its competitive edge in the energy market. Should Australia cease exporting coal, countries such as China and India, which rely on our coal exports, would simply source their coal imports elsewhere. Clearly with the rate at which coal-fired power stations are being erected, our efforts to reduce Australia’s carbon footprint will be futile if we cannot also help provide solutions to reducing the impact of this expansion. China alone is building a new coal-fired power station every 10 days and over 500 in the next decade. As a signatory to the Kyoto protocol, and as a government committed to addressing climate change and reducing carbon emissions, it is our responsibility to endeavour to ensure that our use and the export of coal is supported by carbon abatement technology. CCS allows for Australia to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions whilst maintaining its international advantage in coal exports. I am aware there is scepticism in some quarters about the likely success in developing this technology and about its effectiveness, but we have no choice other than to make this work. The science so far shows that there is every prospect that it can work. The Geological Disposal of CO2, or GEODISC, program of the Australian Petroleum Cooperative Research Centre from 1999 to 2003 found that Australia’s geological storage capacity was likely to be sufficiently large and accessible to present a viable emission mitigation option. The program also found that we could potentially sequester up to 50 per cent of emissions from major stationary sources and up to 25 per cent of our annual net emissions. There are already three industrial scale projects underway in Norway, Canada and Algeria. Although the technology and science of geosequestration is still very much in progress, current understanding has led to the generally accepted conclusion that geosequestration can very likely effectively store CO2 at greater than 99 per cent efficiency for over 100 years, and likely for over 1,000 years. A recent comprehensive MIT study addressing the role of coal in a future carbon constrained world found that no knowledge gaps today appear to cast doubt on the fundamental likelihood of the feasibility of CCS. It is economically and strategically vital that Australia maintain an international advantage in the provision of energy products such as coal, whilst still maintaining its commitment to tackling climate change. As the Minister for Resources and Energy mentioned in his speech of 18 March 2008, ‘Energy: the state of the nation’, the two major themes of energy policy for the next few years are energy security and climate change. It is vital that this nation is protected from strategic or economic vulnerability arising from the global downward trend in the availability of cheaply won oil, coupled with an increasing demand for oil. The exponential rise in the global reliance on crude oil is of great concern. Oil production is in decline in 33 of the 48 largest oil-producing countries, including Russia, Iran, USA, Venezuela, India and Mexico, with all of these having reached the maximum rate of petroleum extraction. What is of much concern is that the increasing rate of demand and consumption is far outstripping the rate of supply. World demand for oil has increased on average by 1.76 per cent per year since 1994 and is projected to increase by 37 per cent over 2006 levels by 2030. The rise in demand has predominantly been driven by developing countries, with growth in industry and higher living standards driving up energy use. China and India are rapidly becoming large oil consumers. Although China has low per capita oil consumption, it is now consuming nine per cent of global oil. In 2003 China overtook Japan as the world’s second largest consumer of oil and is increasing its demand for oil at a rate of approximately 15 per cent per year. India’s demand for foreign oil has also increased as it continues to import 75 per cent of oil needs and is expected to triple oil imports by 2020. Even low increases in domestic demand in China and India will increase global usage considerably and affect other nation’s abilities to access oil. The impact of their consumption will be felt globally, particularly through adding pressure on oil prices. Australia’s demand for oil is over 750,000 barrels per day. This is projected to rise to over 1,200,000 barrels per day by 2030. Australia’s self-sufficiency in oil is expected to decline significantly as future discoveries are not expected to make up for the growth in demand and the decline in reserves as oil is produced. This situation makes our nation strategically and economically vulnerable. Like most nations, Australia does not have access to large domestic supplies of crude oil. It is estimated that, by 2010, Australia will be importing 60 per cent of its domestic fuel needs. With increased prices this will significantly detract from the terms of our balance of trade. Economic power will gravitate even more heavily to nations that have not yet reached peak oil and that are continuing to produce surplus oil for export, particularly in the Middle East. Given that oil production in the Middle East is subject to a high level of cartelisation and that there have been times when this has been used to achieve political leverage and, given the degree of political instability in the Middle East, it can be readily seen how our strategic vulnerability could be heightened. Domestically, problems are already arising as a result of higher fuel costs, which will only increase as global peak oil is reached. Domestic industries that rely on fuel will be most affected, including transport, mining, agriculture and tourism. Farmers and producers in my electorate of Eden-Monaro, as with the rest of the nation, have already been affected as production and transport costs increase. This, in turn, is passed on to consumers. With the lack of public transport in a region like Eden-Monaro and the considerable distance many people live from services, recreation, work and town centres, the social costs could also be great. Use of oil in transport also contributes somewhere between 14 and 17 per cent of Australia’s carbon emissions. I believe, therefore, that we must work hard to break our reliance on oil and invest in fuel efficiency and alternative renewable sources. In his acceptance speech to the Democratic National Convention on 28 August 2008, United States presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama announced that his goal for America was to end their dependence on oil from the Middle East in 10 years. Senator Obama committed $150 billion over the next decade to the challenge of renewable energy research and deployment. Similarly, in December 2005, the Swedish government appointed a commission to devise a program to reduce Sweden’s dependence on oil, with the intent of making Sweden fossil fuel independent by 2020. The Rudd Labor government has not been blind to this issue and is implementing appropriate risk management measures to help mitigate the threat I have outlined. The government has committed to a mandatory renewable energy target of 20 per cent by 2020. The government has also committed $1 billion towards the research and development of renewable and low-emission energy technology. Such measures will not only reduce Australia’s reliance on depleting oil stocks but also contribute to the significant emissions reductions needed to tackle climate change. We have set aside $500 million for our green car initiative to promote the development of hybrid, fuel efficient and alternative energy vehicles. My colleague the Minister for Resources, Energy and Tourism is bending every sinew towards broadening our energy resource base. I have made it a high priority to support the government’s national effort by becoming personally involved in working with my community in Eden-Monaro to make the area a centre for leading-edge technology and creative thinking when it comes to the renewable energy industry. The people of Eden-Monaro are keenly interested in contributing to the research and implementation of renewable energy options to both combat climate change and provide for fuel alternatives. Research and development is ongoing into potential biofuels, and I have discussed this issue with representatives of the oil industry. It has been well publicised that problems of food security can arise when food crops are used to develop biofuels, which also leads to rising food prices. Some potential biofuel options may circumvent this problem by using plants that thrive in more marginal land. Using biomass to create biofuels has been another area of discussion and research. The Swedes are moving ahead with wood cellulose research as part of their ambitious objective. Eden-Monaro has a thriving timber industry which could offer potential in this respect. I will soon be holding discussions with representatives from the industry in my electorate and scientists from ANU to consider options for using biomass from wood waste, which is currently not being utilised, for energy and fuel production. I also recently met with representatives from Bega Cheese, the Bega Valley Shire Council, our local community organisation Clean Energy for Eternity, and the Szencorp company to discuss a proposal I am pursuing that involves the establishment of a pilot project for harvesting the region’s livestock based methane emissions for biogas energy generation. This proposal uses an anaerobic digestion process that can not only be used to generate electricity, adding in any other available waste from the council and industry, but also result in an enriched fertiliser by-product. This is very important as methane emissions are the most serious of the carbon pollution problem. We will need to have a plan to neutralise or offset them by the time the agricultural sector is included in the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme in 2015, in line with our current thinking. Such processes are already being deployed in New Zealand and are in extensive use in Germany. I am committed to looking for fuel alternatives and renewable fuels, as I believe it is essential in combating the twin perils of the global peak oil crisis and climate change. I am delighted to be working on this agenda in my electorate with Clean Energy for Eternity, or CEFE. This is a truly community based organisation, which is striving to make our region and Australia a better place to live in by tackling climate change through all means that can be achieved at the local and individual level. In only two years the CEFE team has achieved a great deal. CEFE’s activities include their trademark human signs, with over forty events involving thousands of Australians. The combined schools human sign saw 5,000 school children spelling out their messages of concern and hope on more than 30 school ovals across south-east New South Wales and the ACT. Collaboration with local councils and surf clubs created Australia’s largest non-commercial human sign in an event involving over 6,000 people on North Steyne Beach, Manly. Initiating the LifeSaving Energy micro-generation project, they began with Tathra’s Surf Life Saving Club, installing solar panels and a wind turbine. This has now evolved into a national campaign with Surf Life Saving Australia and Coastcare committed to a two-year project to install renewable energy systems on all 305 surf clubs in Australia. Enthusiastic local support was generated by CEFE for the LifeSaving Energy Big Swim series, which have raised over $70,000 to get renewable micro-generation systems up and running on seven local south-east New South Wales surf clubs by Christmas this year. LifeSaving Energy has spread to church groups and emergency services. Merimbula fire station installed a grid connected solar system in February 2008, saving almost five tonnes of CO2 emissions and generating $500 of income a year. CEFE resolved to bring a one to two megawatt community owned solar farm into the Bega Valley, and I was delighted to obtain $100,000 for a feasibility study for this project from our Green Precincts program, with a further $1 million to contribute to the construction of the farm if the feasibility study demonstrates its viability. On 21 August 2006, CEFE was established when 400 people voted to set up a Clean Energy for Eternity working group and unanimously endorsed a motion setting local and individual targets for a 50 per cent reduction in our local carbon footprint and a 50 per cent transition to renewable energy by 2020. I have set the 50-50 by 2020 goal as an aspirational target for the electorate of Eden-Monaro. It should be understood that whatever national targets we settle on, that does not preclude local councils, businesses, community groups and individuals from achieving beyond this and in fact we would encourage initiatives at all levels in this respect. Since CEFE was established, the 50-50 by 2020 goal has been adopted by the Bega Valley, Eurobodalla, Cooma-Monaro and Snowy River shires. I am now calling on all successful new councillors assuming their positions as a result of the council elections in Eden-Monaro on 13 September to commit to working with CEFE and adopting the 50-50 by 2020 goal. CEFE had its second birthday on 21 August and is continuing to come up with innovative climate change solutions tailored to the different towns and communities in our region. Some of these include collaboration with the Transition Town movement to build resilience and prepare communities for the dual challenges of climate change and peak oil; energy clinics to assist householders to identify how to make their homes cheaper to run through energy efficiency measures; and community gardens and bioregional trade to assist communities to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions in order to have access to affordable and locally produced fresh food. The founder of CEFE, Dr Matthew Nott, and the team have recently received their second runner-up award in the 2008 IAG Eureka Prize for Innovative Solutions to Climate Change. This is a tremendous achievement for which we are all proud, and I am sure that they will be able to go one better in 2009. Other awards that have already come the way of Dr Nott and CEFE include the Nature Conservation Council of New South Wales award 2007 for most inspiring climate change group in NSW; the Green Globe Award 2007 for CEFE and Winner of the Energy Champion specifically for Matthew Nott; Australian Conservation Foundation Highly Commended 2008; and Dr Matthew Nott himself was awarded the Bega Valley dual citizen of the year for 2008. I want to commend the great work that Dr Matthew Nott, Philippa Rowland, Derek Povel and many others who have put in to continuing the vital work of CEFE in Eden-Monaro and beyond. I would also like to acknowledge the Mayor of Bega Valley Shire, Mr Tony Allen, who chaired the first meeting of CEFE in August 2006 and who has been at the forefront of the effort against climate change on the Bega Valley Shire Council. I would encourage people to visit the CEFE website at www.cleanenergyforternity.net.au and find out more information about how to get involved. I am pleased to say that I will be holding a climate change forum in Bega RSL on 5 November in conjunction with CEFE to harness the awareness and creativity of my community to comment on our Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme green paper. This will be preceded by one of the CEFE clean energy expos that have done so much to assist individuals to take effective domestic measures. The message from my community on climate change in the last election was loud and clear. In the Army we have a saying that goes, ‘Lead, follow or get out of the way’. My community saw a previous government that would not lead or follow and finally they told them to get out of the way. Now I am proud that in the Rudd Labor government they finally have determined and visionary national leadership, and a committed local partner as their member. The Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme that is now in development will also be a vital element in the government’s plan to reduce emissions without compromising the economy and with the lowest possible cost for families and businesses. It provides the market with a choice in how it chooses to meet emission targets. Allied to this massive project and policy undertaking, the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill and associated legislation will support a key element of the government’s plan to reduce emissions. The carbon capture and geological storage framework allows a power generator or gas producer to offset potential charges associated with carbon emissions. This framework allows businesses to reduce their carbon footprint whilst not compromising our coal industry, which is vital to Australia’s economic prosperity. This bill will support the Australian energy industry, which needs to remain strong in order to protect Australia from economic and strategic vulnerabilities associated with the global peak oil crisis, whilst ensuring that Australia remains committed to tackling climate change. I commend the bills to the House. 7769 18:21:00 Perrett, Graham, MP HVP Moreton ALP 1 0 Mr PERRETT —I thank the member for Eden-Monaro for his contribution to the debate on this most serious of topics that we have before the House, climate change. I would like to quote a paragraph from the poem The Cycads by Judith Wright, which I think provides a context for this. It is about how what humans do can have significant consequences for the earth: Take their cold seed and set it in the mind, and its slow root will lengthen deep and deep till, following, you cling on the last ledge over the unthinkable, unfathomable edge beyond which man remembers only sleep. I will springboard from that into the legislation before the House, because the poem talks about the things which endure and this bill before the House is to ensure that we as humans today in 2008 do all that we can to make sure that as many species as possible do not suffer from climate change. I am proud to rise in support of the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and the related bills before the House. This bill demonstrates the breadth of the Rudd government’s response to climate change, which, as I am sure the House knows, started only 11 minutes after the Rudd government was sworn in, when we ratified the Kyoto protocol—something which had been ignored for way too long. The Rudd government has already committed $2.3 billion to tackle climate change. This includes: $500 million for the Renewable Energy Fund; $500 million for the National Clean Coal Fund; $500 million for the Green Car Innovation Fund; $150 million for solar and clean energy research; and $240 million to establish Clean Business Australia, to tackle climate change through projects with a focus on productivity and innovation. ‘Productivity’ is a word that might not be that familiar on the other side of the House. Productivity is a very important part of the economy. When you total up all of those commitments, that is $2.3 billion, and counting. This is a major investment in research and development on low-emissions technologies and recognition that renewable energy will have a key role in Australia’s transition to a low-carbon economy. But we also need to turn to the low-hanging fruit. The Rudd government is also helping households and businesses to use energy more wisely. Through direct financial incentives, strengthened energy efficiency regulations and targeted information, households will be helped to use less energy while saving money. The key measures include: $10,000 low-interest loans for Australian households to implement energy and water savings; rebates for energy efficient insulation for 300,000 rental homes, so we are covering everyone—homeowners and renters; $8,000 rebates for rooftop solar power panels; $1,000 rebates for solar hot water systems; $500 rebates for rainwater tanks and greywater recycling; improved cost-saving energy and water efficiency standards for new homes and appliances; and making every school a solar school within eight years. These measures will help all Australians play a part in the fight against climate change. Even the climate change sceptics opposite can play a part in addressing climate change. I guess it is like what they say about paranoia, that just because you are paranoid does not mean that everyone is not out to get you—just because you are a climate change sceptic does not mean that you cannot do your bit to help the environment. The Rudd government is also setting up the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, which will be the central mechanism to meet carbon emissions reduction targets. As well as exploring ways to reduce carbon emissions, we are working with industry to remediate existing emissions through carbon capture and storage. Geosequestration, or permanently storing captured CO2 under the seabed, is a solution that complements the existing offshore petroleum industry. It will enable carbon dioxide, and eventually other greenhouse gases, to be stored safely and securely in geological storage deep under the sea in Commonwealth waters. The Rudd government is committed to providing a viable option for carbon capture and storage because, being a Queenslander, the Prime Minister understands how important the coal industry is to Australia. Anyone from Queensland would know that we have significant coal deposits, and high-quality coal deposits as well, unlike some of the Victorian stuff—with all due respect to the member opposite. In the world left to the Rudd government by John Howard and Peter Costello, coal provides around 80 per cent of electricity and it is our largest export commodity, generating around $24 billion in export revenue. That is why low-emissions coal technologies are so important. Carbon capture and storage will guarantee the long-term sustainable future of the coal power industry. The Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill sets up a framework for the safe and secure injection and storage of greenhouse gases far underneath Commonwealth waters. The bill establishes a new range of offshore titles to pipe, inject and store CO2 under the seabed. This will create an environment in which industry can invest in carbon capture and storage projects with confidence and it will be able to do so now, as soon as this legislation is through. It will also encourage the commercialisation of technologies which have the potential to play a vital role in reducing global greenhouse gas emissions in the future. These are opportunities that have been squandered over the years, because these will be the new technologies of the future. Like computers 30 years ago, these are the opportunities to lead the world. Unfortunately, we are starting a little bit behind the line because of some missed opportunities. As a member of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Primary Industries and Resources, I was pleased to be a part of the inquiry into this legislation. The Down under: greenhouse gas storage report came from that committee, a committee made up of Labor, Liberal, National and Independent members of the House. It was great as a new member of the House to see someone who has blue carpet in their room having the confidence to put all their faith into people who have green carpet in their rooms. Note there were only people with green carpet in the room—no-one with red carpet. It was great to be able to work together with the Labor, Liberal, National and Independent members to deal with this legislation. There should be a lot more of it. This inquiry strongly supported this carbon capture and storage framework. I am confident that it will enable this new industry to succeed and play a significant role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. This bill effectively balances the rights and interactions between greenhouse gas storage and pre-existing petroleum titleholders. It provides certainty for greenhouse gas storage proponents to invest, it preserves the rights of the petroleum industry to their existing titles and it provides assurance to the community that CO2 storage is safe and secure. Don’t get me wrong: offshore petroleum is big business. We understand that. The value of oil and gas produced in Australia in 2007-08 was more than $27 billion, with exports valued at around $16 billion. I am sure every Australian with a car or who does not grow their own vegetables knows how important fuel is. So it is important that this bill protects offshore petroleum titleholders. In fact, offshore petroleum operators are well placed to get involved in geosequestration in terms of technology and their industry know-how. I am pleased that the minister has accepted 17 of the committee’s 19 recommendations regarding this bill. This whole process was a credit to the chair, Dick Adams, the member for Lyons, and the deputy chair, Alby Schultz, the member for Hume. It also illustrates the faith and foresight of Minister Ferguson. The committee’s recommendations were about providing greater investment certainty, clarity regarding access and property rights and managing interactions between greenhouse gas storage and petroleum titleholders. This is obviously a very delicate balancing act. Australia is one of the first countries in the world to establish a framework to support geosequestration. I remain confident that this bill will serve as an example to the rest of the world on how we can reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. I commend the bill to the House. 7772 18:30:00 Cheeseman, Darren, MP HW7 Corangamite ALP 1 0 Mr CHEESEMAN —Madam Deputy Speaker, it appears that you are stalking me today. Every presentation I have done has been before you today. 10000 Burke, Anna (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Ms AE Burke)—Or you are speaking on many bills, which is a very good sign for your constituents. HW7 Cheeseman, Darren, MP Mr CHEESEMAN —The Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and related bills address one of the key aspects of the great challenge facing our generation: how to deal with human induced climate change. Labor is dealing with climate change with a suite of policies. One of our major policy initiatives is this bill, which is integral to Labor’s ongoing commitment to reducing carbon emissions. Before I get into the detail of the bill and what the issue of carbon capture is all about, I want to make clear that Labor sees the growth and fostering of renewable energies as central to our future. Renewable energy is our long-term future. We must be about moving our energy generation sector to long-term sustainability with the least environmental footprint. But we also have to be realistic about where we are today in our reliance on coal for our energy and in its contribution to our overall economy. Let us be clear that, even with a big effort to convert to alternative and renewable sources of energy, fossil fuels will be the main source of energy for Australia for some time to come. Coal’s share of future power generation in Australia will decline in favour of renewable energy. But coal will continue to provide much of Australia’s electricity generation requirements in the short to medium term. Today, one of only a few technologies available to make deep cuts in the greenhouse gas emissions coming from existing coal power generators is carbon capture and storage. This is new technology, so it is important to explain what we are on about. Through geosequestration, carbon dioxide that would otherwise be emitted into the atmosphere is compressed into a liquid and injected into deep geological formations for permanent storage. That is what this legislation is about. The government’s legislation establishes access and property rights for the safe and secure injection and storage of greenhouse gases into stable subsurface geological reservoirs. The legislation provides project developers with the certainty required to commit to major low-emission energy projects involving carbon capture. It also allows for the establishment of an effective regulatory framework to ensure that projects meet health, safety and environmental requirements. The bill will also put in place a new range of offshore titles providing for the transportation by pipeline and injection and storage into suitable geological formations. Both local and international interest has been growing on the issue of carbon capture and storage. International interest in carbon capture and storage has increased substantially in the past few years. I am very excited about what this industry offers my own region. I believe our region is already a world leader in carbon capture and storage. We have now stored 10,000 tonnes of CO2 in an underground depleted natural gas field just off Port Campbell, just out of my electorate. This is the biggest experiment of its kind anywhere in the world, and an important step in the development of this industry locally. So Australia leads the way in carbon capture and storage and we need to legislate to put in place a legal framework for this technology. A lot of work is happening in this area both here and overseas but it is important to acknowledge the fact that this is still very new science. There is still a lot of scepticism in the community. However, it is important we proceed to try to test the carbon capture and storage technology and for that we need a legislative framework. The Australian energy facts of life are very clear. Australia runs predominately on electricity generated by coal. Coal currently provides almost 80 per cent of Australia’s electricity generation capacity. Coal in fact provides around 40 per cent of world electricity needs. Globally our responsibilities are greater, as Australia is a net energy exporter. Emerging world economies such as China and India run on Australian coal. In 2004 Australia ranked second out of the OECD countries in energy exports. Carbon dioxide, primarily from the combustion of fossil fuels for energy, is the most common greenhouse gas emitted by human activities. It is the process causing the most adverse impacts on our climate. Australia’s carbon footprint is global. And decreasing greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere is the key environmental issue facing Australia and the world. These pressures are forcing interest in a wide range of technologies, not the least of which is carbon capture and storage. Projects and experiments with carbon capture and storage are increasing at a rapid rate around the world. The International Energy Agency, which monitors and forecasts global energy supply and demand, estimates that the world’s immediate future energy needs will be met primarily by fossil fuels. It forecasts coal will provide around 44 per cent of the world’s electricity needs in 2030—an increase on its current share. This may or may not be the case; it depends on how climate change impacts bite and the imperatives on government. It is therefore vitally important that we now develop domestic and international greenhouse gas abatement solutions. Today, these solutions include policies that support the development and deployment of low-emission coal technologies. In my own experience as a geology student, carbon capture and storage provides solutions as well as problems. To discount the public scepticism about carbon capture and storage would be foolish. Many people will argue that, whilst we can inject CO2 into one hole, it might escape from another. These difficulties are addressed within the legislation, recognising the need to provide assurance to the community that CO2 will be stored in a safe and secure manner. The coal industry is very significant to Australia’s economic prosperity. Our big long-term challenge is, no doubt, to find alternative fuels, but we also have to address the immediate realities of coal and find abatement methods. Carbon capture and storage is one of the most promising technologies to provide immediate relief from CO2 pollution by the coal industry. There is great potential to now undertake significant steps to effectively reduce carbon pollution through carbon capture and storage. This legislation provides an important legal framework that could underwrite Australia’s concerted efforts to reduce our carbon footprint. This is not a silver bullet that will solve the carbon pollution problem, but it may be an important step in helping with carbon pollution abatement for the period ahead, in which we will rely upon coal whilst we move to more sustainable energy generation processes. This legislation is integral in making sure the framework exists to develop and implement this important carbon capture and storage process. The risk of doing nothing—which perhaps the other side supports—is that it will threaten our economy very substantially. In my electorate, areas such as the Great Ocean Road, the Surf Coast and parts of the Bellarine Peninsula will be adversely threatened by rising sea levels. It is important that we contribute to reducing carbon emissions. This legislation provides a very important solution which I believe will generate additional jobs in my area. I commend the bill to the House. 7774 18:40:00 Adams, Dick, MP BV5 Lyons ALP 1 0 Mr ADAMS —I rise to speak on the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and related bills. Like my colleague the member for Corangamite, I hope the other side of the House will give its full support to this very important bill. I commend the Minister for Resources and Energy for the work he has done in getting the bill to the House. I thank the former Minister for Industry, Tourism and Resources, the member for Groom, who has supported this bill in the debate today. I think he was also endeavouring to make something like this happen in the previous government, but he probably did not have the support he needed. The world is certainly interested in this process and the bill that is before the parliament today. We know that coal is the world’s most dominant energy product. So, if we can produce clean coal, we can do a lot to get the greenhouse gas out of the atmosphere. Eighty per cent of Australia’s electricity needs and about 40 per cent of the world’s electricity needs are generated from burning coal. The International Energy Agency forecasts that global energy supply and demand will increase and that, by 2030, 44 per cent of the world’s energy will be generated from burning coal. To do something about this we need to deploy low-emission coal technology—and this bill gives us a legal framework to endeavour to do that. Clean coal technology is certainly coming together, and many people are very confident that we can achieve what is being aimed for. The capture of CO2 in the flumes of coal-fired power stations is being done in a good way. They believe they can find even better answers than they already have done and move to a full operation within some years. India and China, with their great size and their expansion and their industrialisation, are using more and more coal—hence the figures I quoted earlier. I am sure that, with new technology, we will be able to help the world to capture CO2 and re-inject into the very formations from which we presently take the gas and oil that the world uses today. There is a great need for this bill. I think that need has been well established as a result of the work that has been done. Australia has coal reserves that will last another 400 years, or even more, at the present rate of usage, so we can see the need for such a bill and for the new technology that will enable us to continue to take advantage of this energy source. Safe injection and storage of CO2 is, of course, what is important, and there is no doubt that the public must have confidence in the process. Of course, the process should be transparent so that people can have that confidence in it. I am confident that this bill and these processes will give us that. As Chair of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Primary Industries and Resources, I brought down the report Down under: greenhouse gas storage, a review of the draft Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill. It was an opportunity to see the great need for us to do that and also an opportunity to make recommendations that allowed us to do that. I was very pleased to say that, in— DZY Georganas, Steve, MP Mr Georganas interjecting— 849 Sidebottom, Sid, MP Mr Sidebottom interjecting— BV5 Adams, Dick, MP Mr ADAMS —Thank you to my colleagues for acknowledging the work of the committee. In that work, we received some evidence from Dr Cook, who is head of the CO2CRC project down in the Otway Basin. He gave us evidence that they have gone out and talked to the communities down in that area, and I understand that the shire down there in western Victoria voted on the project and gave it unanimous support to go ahead. I think that level of community support shows that people are thinking about these processes and the needs that we have in dealing with climate change. I know that the bill takes this into account and that the minister has given consideration to the work that was done by the committee. I also know that the process to allow community involvement and transparency has been considered and is there and that all the data that is pulled together can be made available to communities by the regulator that is monitoring these operations. Getting new industries up is never easy, and I guess that will be the challenge in this area. There is no doubt that the petroleum industry has the skills and the technology to store CO2, which it has done for many years in Australia and in other parts of the world. The Norwegians have had a process going for about 10 years; their operation in the Sleipner gas field in the North Sea has been very successful in capturing CO2 from a gas operation and reinjecting it back into the area where the gas came from. In looking at whether it is safe to put CO2 deep into the earth under seabeds, we should recall that CO2 at the present moment belongs to humanity; it is out there and everything that is generated in the world is being pushed out into the atmosphere. When we think that gas and oil have been held in those areas for millions of years, we know that this technology and this application of geology et cetera works. We have had enough experience. I know that, in other parts of the petroleum industry, CO2 is used to add pressure to very flat oilwells to help bring the oil up. This occurs in some wells in the US, Canada and other parts of the world. So this is something we have been doing for a long time. The petroleum industry certainly has the skills, the technology and the safety regimes to be able to play a big part in this area. I think there are great opportunities for that industry to be involved. The bill deals with other areas as well, such as petroleum operators who are in an area where there may be no new CO2 from sources other than those wells. I know that this is dealt with in the bill. There are different areas—up in the North West Shelf and around that area—where it does not look likely that we will find coal, so we will not have a stream of CO2 coming from power stations to inject back into any basins there. But, down in the important state of Victoria, CO2 used in power generation for the Latrobe Valley will be stored in the Gippsland Basin in the Bass Strait area. That is an important area to achieve results, and it is important to pull together these industries to make sure that we are achieving what is in the public interest. The report brought down by the committee that I chaired made strong recommendations that the minister should endeavour to bring parties together to do that, and the bill should have some mechanism to that effect. The minister has picked up some of those recommendations but not quite all. There are also some mechanisms in other parts of Australia which are encouraging people to come together. We certainly hope that the commercial imperatives will assist the two different industries, being the companies with a stream of CO2 that they need to inject into a storage area and the present petroleum operators who are extracting oil and gas from their present leases under the legal situation at the present time. So the need to negotiate in good faith is a very important one, and we certainly hope that can be achieved. Turning to other issues with the bill, it has a difference in respect of one of the key committee recommendations. The House committee recommended that government take over liability as to the CO2 after the closure of a well was concluded. That could be many years after the operation has started. The information gained from the evidence received by the committee was that the main risk in such operations would arise at the beginning of the operations, when you start injecting, and extend through the time of the first year or two, when you monitor the bloom of CO2 as it settles down into cavities. Lots of technology and monitoring processes enable you to make sure you know where the gas is. The evidence received by the committee was that the risk dissipates as the process goes on and that things will settle quite well. The committee believed that in 50 years time the company that injected the gas probably would not exist as an entity. I think that was the legal advice given to the committee. Of course, lawyers always want somebody to own something so that there is a liability. The government has chosen to put in its bill another direction, which is that common law application will stay with the company that has injected the gas. I understand why that is so and accept that position. The only difficulty is whether that will create a hold-up to companies becoming involved in this important new industry. So common law will be the process under this proposed act and will drive what becomes the legal position after the closure of a well. I think the bill deals with the issues that it needs to deal with. As I said, there is the enormous importance of the storage of CO2 to meet the obligations that the country is undertaking with emissions trading; otherwise the cost to us will be well above what we can afford. We need to keep coal as an energy source. We need to make sure that we look after the thousands of jobs that exist in that industry. As other industries gain technologies, maybe renewables will one day meet bulk load needs, but at this stage there is certainly no evidence of and no opportunities for those renewables to meet those. All of them—from wind to solar to wave power, which is starting to emerge—certainly play a role but they are still small players when you consider the overall energy figures for the world and Australia. I know that in my own state of Tasmania, which has hydropower, the energy that we now receive from wind makes it is an important source and player. It fits in with our hydroenergy in a very good way. When the wind stops, the water starts, so we have a very good link. I look forward to the government’s continuing action in increasing its renewable energy targets, which will assist us to get more wind farms in place. So this bill, part of the carbon capture and storage package of legislation, is an important piece of legislation. I congratulate the minister, for the work that he has done, and all the people who have been involved, including those in industry and the CRC, in that work. The science that is going on to meet the challenges is important. This is a big thing for our country, and the public interest is of great importance, so I commend this bill to the House. I certainly hope that it will pass through the Senate without too many difficulties. 7776 18:58:00 Zappia, Tony, MP HWB Makin ALP 1 0 Mr ZAPPIA —I too rise to speak in support of the Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and associated bills. Before I proceed with my main remarks, I add my congratulations and commendations to the member for Lyons and the committee that worked with him in going through this bill and reporting back to parliament. I will speak later on about some of the recommendations, but I believe their work has contributed to what is a very fair and balanced bill. This bill, as the Minister for Resources and Energy and others have said, will establish the world’s first framework for carbon capture and geological storage and establish a new range of offshore titles providing for transportation by pipeline and injection and storage in geological formations of carbon dioxide and potentially other greenhouse gases. Australia has the capacity to inject and store a substantial amount of its carbon emissions in offshore reservoirs. Geological surveys reveal that storage formations in offshore waters, accessible by this framework, have the potential to securely store hundreds of millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide for many thousands of years. The types of geological formations which have stored oil, gas and carbon dioxide for millions of years are similar to the storage formations proposed for greenhouse gas storage. Carbon capture and geological storage are vital for the long-term sustainability of coal-fired electricity generation and to realise the potential of new industries such as coal to liquids, which could improve Australia’s liquid transport fuel security. Nearly 80 per cent of Australia’s electricity is generated from coal, and so no serious response to climate change can ignore the need to clean up our coal. The establishment of a carbon capture and geological storage framework represents a major step towards making low-emissions coal a reality. As other speakers have said, the coal industry is highly significant not only to Australia’s prosperity but also to the world’s current and forecast energy supply. Coal provides almost 80 per cent of Australia’s electricity generation capacity and 40 per cent of world electricity needs. While coal’s share of future power generation in Australia will decline in favour of renewable energy and less greenhouse intensive fossil fuels such as gas, coal will continue to provide much of Australia’s electricity generation requirements well into the future. Carbon capture and geological storage offer potential for Australia to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions while maintaining its international competitiveness through its competitive advantage of low-cost and abundant fossil fuels such as coal and gas. It is one of the suite of technologies Australia is considering to meet its future greenhouse objectives. The International Energy Agency, which monitors and forecasts global energy supply and demand, supports this view, estimating that the world’s future energy needs will be met largely by fossil fuels and forecasting that coal will provide nearly 44 per cent of world electricity requirements in the year 2030. That is an increase on its current share. Therefore, it is critical that domestic and international greenhouse gas abatement solutions include policies that support the development and deployment of low-emission coal technologies. Australia is the world’s largest coal exporter, and coal remains Australia’s largest export commodity, generating $24 billion of income in the year 2005-06. The coal industry supports many rural and regional communities, employing about 30,000 people. Low-cost coal supports Australia’s high living standards and remains the foundation for Australia’s energy-intensive industries. The success of carbon capture and geological storage technology will guarantee the long-term future of the coal power industry and the job security for power industry workers. I heard a number of other speakers in this debate make reference to the importance of the coal industry in their local communities and I certainly endorse the remarks that they have made and recognise, as I have already said, that the coal industry is important to the economy of Australia. But in specific locations in Australia it is incredibly important and probably sustains many communities where the communities have essentially evolved from their coal industry. The government recognises that new clean energy technologies including both fossil fuels and renewable energy sources are the key to a sustainable climate change solution. As Professor Garnaut and the government have noted, it is in Australia’s national interest to ensure atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations are stabilised at the lowest possible level. Even a two per cent increase in global temperature above preindustrial levels is risky and would severely impact Australia, its neighbours and key trading partners in the region. Based on the latest science from the CSIRO and scientific experts commissioned by the Garnaut climate change review, if current emission trends continue, unmitigated climate change is likely to have catastrophic global impacts. Under this scenario, current estimates suggest that the world’s coral reefs would be lost and irreversible melting of the world’s great icesheets would lock in several metres of sea level rise. There is also a very high risk that many forests, grasslands and other natural sinks—or carbon stores, as they are sometimes referred to—will through stress, fire and desertification become huge new sources of emissions. In Australia, irrigated agriculture production in the Murray-Darling Basin would all but disappear, 2,700 additional temperature related deaths are projected annually and the Great Barrier Reef would suffer catastrophic impacts. Stabilising greenhouse gas concentrations at acceptable levels of somewhere around 450 parts per million needs a global response. Industrialised countries as a group need to reduce emissions by 25 to 40 per cent below 1990 levels by the year 2020. A 440 parts per million emissions target would substantially reduce the risk of large-scale global and Australian impacts. If we were to choose to stabilise greenhouse gases at high concentrations of around 550 parts per million we would leave future generations a legacy of high climate risks. Greenhouse gas concentrations at this level would mean about an 80 per cent chance of exceeding the two degrees centigrade increase in global temperatures. The world’s coral reefs would be unable to carry out important functions such as maintaining biodiversity and protecting coastlines, and there would be up to a 40 per cent chance of initiating irreversible melting of the Greenland icesheet. There would also be a 50 to 95 per cent chance of exceeding the estimated lower threshold above which land based carbon sinks could become carbon sources and push climate change out of control. For example, this could mean the temperatures rising to a point high enough to cause the collapse of Amazon rainforest, traditionally a carbon sink, which would then unleash billions of tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere, speeding up global warming. Only yesterday I was presented with a briefing in respect of the impact on natural vegetation and natural forests of absorbing carbon dioxide from the air. It appears from the latest reports that the amount of carbon dioxide absorbed by these natural forests, like those in the Amazon, is far greater than we ever allowed for. Therefore, the damage that we are doing and might do to forests in the future will exacerbate what is already a serious situation. One only has to look at the impact of climate change on Australia in recent years. Australia’s high vulnerability to climate change among developed countries is largely due to the dryness of the continent, the proximity of major population centres to the coast and our unique and highly adapted natural ecosystems. Australia’s climate has been changing over the last century. For example, overall temperatures have increased and recent droughts have been hotter than average and the southern and eastern regions of the country have seen declines in rainfall. The 2002-03 droughts wiped out an entire percentage point of Australia’s gross domestic product, worth the equivalent of US$7.6 billion, as well as reducing agricultural employment, mainly in rural and regional areas, by about 100,000 people. The impact of the drought was also felt outside rural Australia. Food prices increased, on average, by 4.4 per cent over 2002-03, compared with a general increase in the CPI of 2.7 per cent. The centrepiece of the government’s climate change policy is its commitment to establishing a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme by 2010. Other speakers have also made reference to this scheme. The scheme will establish a forward price for carbon within the Australian economy. Placing a cost on carbon will encourage industry to develop and deploy low-emission technologies over time. In addition, the government has established a $500 million National Low Emissions Coal Fund to support the National Low Emissions Coal Initiative and deliver breakthroughs in clean coal technologies, of which carbon capture and geological storage is a key part. The National Low Emissions Coal Initiative is being matched by the coal industry’s COAL21 initiative. The industry has set up a $1 billion fund to support clean coal projects to combat climate change and reduce our emissions. This bill will enable Australia to get on with the development of clean coal by enabling the carbon dioxide extracted from coal to be safely stored in Australia in suitable offshore locations. This is a complex bill which will affect billions of dollars of investments in Australia, our environment and future investments. Quite rightly, it has been the subject of intense scrutiny by state governments, by private enterprise, by non-government organisations and even a committee of this parliament, the committee I referred to earlier and which the member for Lyons chaired. In framing the bill, the Minister for Resources and Energy has listened to the diverse views and has proposed what I believe is a fair and balanced federal government response to a matter that requires immediate attention. It is interesting to note that in Canada, Poland, Norway and Algeria carbon dioxide injection projects are already underway for a range of applications. It is also worth noting that the South Australian, Victorian and Queensland governments have their own legislation either in place or underway with respect to carbon capture and storage in onshore locations or areas under state care and control. In addition, a number of sites have been identified in Victoria, Western Australia and southern and Central Queensland which are high-carbon emission areas which have adequate storage capacity onshore. Returning to the report of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Primary Industries and Resources on this matter, which was tabled on 1 September, the government has—as other speakers have rightly pointed out—adopted 17 of the 19 recommendations. The recommendation relating to the government taking over responsibility for long-term liability was rejected by the government, and I believe rightfully so. That was probably the most contentious recommendation that was not accepted by the government. It is my view, and obviously the minister supported this view because the recommendation was not accepted, that the government should not accept long-term responsibility for long-term liability where carbon gas is injected underground. It is the responsibility of the proponents and those who own the site. If, however, because of regulation and laws under which the process is carried out there is some level of government responsibility then obviously common law will apply and the government will be held accountable under whatever common law provisions exist at the time. So government responsibility is there in respect to common law, but the government should not specifically take on responsibility for what are essentially private operations. It is no different from the government taking responsibility for other private landfill operations that we see throughout Australia onshore. It is in fact a waste disposal facility. The fact that it happens to be offshore and underground in no way changes its obligations from the obligations for landfills above ground and onshore. I also note that the bill does not allow mining and drilling in the Great Barrier Reef for geosequestration purposes. Again, I commend the government for making that decision. As someone who has visited the reef and spoken about it in respect of another bill I am certainly very concerned about its future. I have already pointed out that if we do nothing and allow temperatures to increase, the loss of the Great Barrier Reef is likely to occur. We should in no way put the Great Barrier Reef at any further risk by allowing any types of activities which do that. The Great Barrier Reef is a world iconic area and is already under threat because of climate change. It should not be placed under any additional risks whatsoever associated with geosequestration activities. It is also appropriate that at this stage only carbon dioxide can be stored in the sites approved, and other greenhouse gases will only be permitted to be stored in approved sites if the protocol to the London dumping convention is amended. It may be an option further down the track but, at this stage, the only gases that we are talking about are carbon dioxide or other carbon gases which can be stored under this process. This bill is very much linked to the government’s proposed Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, as other speakers have rightly pointed out. As I said earlier in my remarks, there is an overwhelming body of scientific opinion that greenhouse gas emissions are contributing to the climate change that is occurring. It is my view that climate change, whether human initiated or not, is the greatest challenge facing our world. We have already seen many consequences of climate change. There is also a widespread view amongst the scientific community that reducing the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will slow down the global warming that has been occurring and reduce sufficiently, and perhaps even reverse, the dangerous trends that we are seeing. The government’s Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, as the name implies, has the specific objective of reducing carbon emissions into the atmosphere. Extracting carbon from coal and safely storing it underground complements all other measures that may be implemented as part of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. The critics of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme who are running a fear campaign about the increases in costs of living that might arise fail to acknowledge the cost to consumers of doing nothing. We have no better example to look to than the Murray-Darling system. Opposition members, when in government, did absolutely nothing about the Murray, even though there had been warnings for years that the health of the Murray was seriously declining. Those warnings have continued year in and year out for at least the last 20 to 30 years. We did nothing about it and today we are paying dearly for it. It is absolutely hypocritical of members opposite to come into this place now and demand that the Rudd government do something about the Murray and do it immediately when, for 12 years, they did absolutely nothing. It was because of their negligence that the Murray-Darling system is now in the state that it is. This is a responsible bill which, in addition to responding to the serious issue of climate change, also presents Australia with research opportunities, intellectual capital and investment opportunities. It is not simply about adding costs to our economy and it is not simply about responding to the requirements of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme; it is all about driving innovation in other areas that we need to pursue in the years to come. As a result of that, I see not only the opportunity to attract investment into this country but also an additional range of employment opportunities for Australians. It creates for Australia an entirely new industry with the economic benefits that come with it. For all of those reasons, and for the reasons that I have outlined in my address on this bill, I commend the bill to the House. I also congratulate the Minister for Resources and Energy for putting together what I believe is a very fair, balanced and responsible response to carbon capture and storage in this country. (Time expired) 7781 19:18:00 Gray, Gary, MP 8W5 Brand ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Development and Northern Australia 1 0 Mr GRAY —I rise to support theOffshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, which establishes the carbon capture and storage framework, the Offshore Petroleum (Annual Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008, the Offshore Petroleum (Registration Fees) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 and the Offshore Petroleum (Safety Levies) Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008. All of these bills create a legal and regulatory industry framework to operate an environment whereby carbon and other greenhouse gases may be captured and stored below the surface of the ground under the sea in Commonwealth waters. It sets up a process for creating titles for pipelines and the storage and geosequestration of greenhouse gases—gases that might be removed from source or removed from the flue of an industrial facility. Let me explain what that means. Australia is endowed with massive natural resources. One of the most significant natural resources which Australia has is gas. It is mainly found off the north coast of Western Australia and off the south-east corner of Australia. These reserves often contain large components of carbon dioxide, sometimes as low as four per cent, as in the case of the North West Shelf, and sometimes as high as 32 per cent. So there is carbon dioxide that is in situ below the surface of the earth that is brought out with oil and gas as it is brought to shore for processing. The Offshore Petroleum Amendment (Greenhouse Gas Storage) Bill 2008 presumes the capacity to take carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, recirculate them back out to sea and then pump them under pressure back down under the surface of the earth where they can be safely stored in massive volumes for geological time. It is a creative solution, it is an engineering solution and it is a solution to a pollution problem which is about adapting our economy and our manufacturing and industrial processes to the realities of our modern environment. There is a current debate—it has been taking place for 20 years—about climate change and its origins. Almost 20 years ago I was stupid enough to describe climate change as ‘pop science’. I was wrong. Climate change is real. It is also the case that our national response to climate change is at a number of levels. The level that this bill and its three associated bills addresses is how a modern, wealthy economy can continue to produce wealth while at the same time ensuring that emissions to the air, soil and water are kept as low as possible. Industry supports this sort of stuff. It supports it because it is good practice. It supports it because it is a good engineering solution. It supports it because increasingly the communities that live near and who are employed in the hydrocarbons industry require the cleanest possible standards of that industry. It was in about 2002 that the massive Gorgon Project in Western Australia presented a field development plan which included geosequestration. This was the first time ever in Australia that a company had proposed to remove carbon dioxide from the gas stream as it came from below the surface of the sea and lock it up underneath the surface of the earth in a geological formation that was safe. The Chevron Corporation, the American oil company that led that joint venture and still does, took this decision because it understood the very high environmental standards which are sought by our society and which can be achieved by our engineering standards and which are also affordable. At the time, I recall looking at that project and seeing a costing for geosequestration that was, in dollar figures, in the low 20s a tonne. So we had on that occasion a company voluntarily offering to geosequester its CO2 in what at that stage was a world-first piece of engineering. It should be noted by now that there are several very large commercially-operating geosequestration processes around the world. One of the most significant is operated in Norway by Statoil. Statoil runs several facilities at Snohvit and the Sleipner facility which geosequester CO2 from various sources. We also know that in Canada and Algeria there are significant commercially-operating CO2 geosequestration facilities. So our legislative process in Australia meets an engineering and hydrocarbons world that is prepared for the challenge of ensuring that these gases, about which there is significant community concern, can be locked away and preserved under the surface of the earth, never to bother the earth’s climate or our civilisation ever again. It is a tremendous solution. It is a solution that was being found commercially. This legislation was originally pursued by the former government. Many of the early considerations for technological solutions, a legislative framework and a regulatory framework to support geosequestration were supported by the former government and, in particular, by the former Minister for Industry, Tourism and Resources, Mr Ian Macfarlane. His work is significant and should be acknowledged. In Western Australia, where there are significant energy resources that are yet to be unlocked to fuel the raging economies in China, Korea and Japan, there is a massive amount of research taking place into how to best capture CO2 and how to best store it. That research is being carried out at various institutions, but some of the most interesting research is taking place at Curtin University of Technology. At Curtin university, technology was created to freeze gas in order to drop the CO2 out of the commercially available methane gas. It is a technology that we have seen before: it creates a substance called a hydrate. We have known of hydrates in the hydrocarbons industry for some significant period of time. Not so long ago, a massive offshore oil explosion took place in the North Sea at the Piper Alpha facility because a hydrates block in a pipe caused a build-up of pressure, an explosion and a massive fire, and many deaths. That same technology today can be used to capture CO2 and to drop it out of a production process where it can then be regassed and stored. As I say, Western Australia is a leader in this field. In my own electorate of Brand, Alcoa, the aluminium company, has been sequestering CO2 in mud lakes for the last few years. CO2 is taken out of a gas stream that is created by supporting industries around the Kwinana strip and is piped to a mud lake and then, in a chemical reaction, bonds with the substances in that mud lake. This changes the alkalinity of the mud, making it available for another production process. But most importantly, as we speak here today, 70,000 tonnes per annum of CO2 are locked away in this fashion. We have excellent research, we have the first step into a regulatory regime that is understood and supported by the hydrocarbon industry and we have a known technology that can lead us into the future and help Australia build an industry which is clean, is able to fuel economies in our region, is able to create great jobs—young people these days love the idea of being recruited to work in an industry which is safe, clean, environmentally sensitive and responsive—and, most importantly in this context, is supplying a fuel which, when used in the economies of China, Japan or Korea, burns in a clean way, thereby removing carbon intensive fuels from the economies where this fuel is being consumed. It is a great process, it is a great piece of technology and it is a piece of technology that has application for static energy generation in our coal industries once the technologies are better developed to capture carbon dioxide from flue pipes. It is also a technology that is able to be replicated over and over again wherever we find massive emissions of CO2 which we wish to take from the environment. You do not have to be a person concerned about climate change to support these technologies. You do not have to be a person convinced that the earth’s climate is changing as a consequence of human industrial activity to support these initiatives. It happens to be good business, it happens to be good environmental management and it happens to be something which industry supports and our community demands. If we are to be successful in unlocking the massive opportunity available to our nation through the oil and gas industry and through energy generation, this technology and these solutions point the way to the future. I commend the bills to the House. Debate interrupted. 7783 Adjournment 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! It being 7.30 pm, I propose the question: That the House do now adjourn. 7783 7783 19:30:00 Pearce, Christopher, MP A8W Aston LP 0 0 Mr PEARCE —Little Athletics is an institution in Australia. It provides invaluable opportunities for children to engage in regular exercise under adult supervised conditions. In an age of creeping childhood obesity, ‘Little Aths’ is more important now than ever before. In particular, I want to pay tribute tonight to an outstanding chapter of the Little Athletics community in my electorate of Aston. The Knox Little Athletics Centre will be celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, and I am delighted to be attending a function on Saturday to celebrate this auspicious occasion. Knox Little Athletics Centre is a chapter where local families and children all participate—the children compete in the sporting events and the families administer these events. This engenders a feeling of belonging and mutual responsibility amongst local families. Local families get to know one another and each other’s children. Friendships grow and flourish, and a feeling of community and kinship is nurtured. The children are also significantly advantaged, as the skills they develop provide superb platforms from which they can pursue other sporting endeavours. Little Athletics evolved during an era when organised out-of-school sport was not readily accessible for children attending primary school in Australia. There were objections to children participating in such sporting endeavours, ranging from the view that the intensity of the physical activity would be harmful for young children through to a lack of suitable equipment and facilities, compounded by a lack of experienced parents to administer track and field events. The success of the Little Athletics movement in Australia was in no small part due to the tenacity and leadership demonstrated by the Billingham and Triscott families—and, on behalf of all Australians, I place on record our thanks and appreciation. It was the success of the Little Athletics program that encouraged many other sporting organisations to devise junior programs for primary-school-aged children. The Knox Little Athletics Centre was started at the height of the Little Athletics phenomenon. The Little Athletics motto, ‘Family, Fun and Fitness’, has been the guiding light of the centre since its inception in 1968. The Knox Little Athletics Centre is made up of 11 clubs within the city of Knox. This is somewhat like a football league which is made up of its various clubs or teams, often competing against one another in healthy competition. The Knox Little Athletics Centre is a remarkable success story, made all the more impressive because reportedly 13,000 children have participated under the centre’s banner over the last 40 years. The Knox Little Athletics Centre was the result of a close collaboration involving the Knox shire; local primary schools; parents; the Victorian Egg Board, who were the Little Athletics sponsors; and the Victorian Little Athletics Association. A series of meetings were held at the then Knox shire offices during August and September in 1968. This resulted in the Knox centre being inaugurated as the 23rd centre in Victoria. This was during the lead-up to the Mexico Olympics, so honourable members can imagine the great enthusiasm amongst the community for athletic competition. The foundation clubs for the Knox centre were Bayswater, Boronia West, Dorset, Fairpark, Knoxfield, Rangeview, St Johns, St Josephs, Studfield and Wantirna. Today only six of these clubs survive, with a seventh, the Fields, made up from the merger of the Studfield and Eastfield teams. This first season started on 2 November 1968 at the old Boronia High School oval opposite the Knox Leisure Centre in Tormore Road, Boronia, which today is a housing estate. The running track consisted of a 200-metre lap grass track and a separate 100-metre straight grass track, with age groups from under eights to under 12s.  The Knox centre competed for the first time ever as a team at the Ringwood Highland Games, which was held at Jubilee Park on 1 March 1969. A new site was approved by the new Knox City Council, which had just been promoted from shire status, in July 1969. They allocated Chandler Park, Boronia, which was to be the Knox centre’s home for the next nine seasons. The Knox Little Athletics Centre has produced wonderful heroes through the years. One such hero is former Olympian Jane Flemming, of whom our community is very proud. While we celebrate athletes as they strive to become the best in the world, I think the greatest achievements are those that result in children developing an appreciation of healthy active lifestyles and in the sense of community and kinship that forms when local families work and play together. It is with this view in mind that I congratulate the Knox Little Athletics Centre on 40 years of community building and sporting endeavour and wish the centre all the very best for a long and continually successful future, not just on the field but also off the field. 7785 7785 19:35:00 King, Catherine, MP 00AMR Ballarat ALP 1 0 Ms KING —We are currently experiencing a time of global uncertainty. Much of this uncertainty has resulted from the instability in the US subprime market. Australia is well placed to tackle these challenges, but we are in no way impervious to them. That is why it is so important, so vital, that we have responsible economic management. That is why it is so important that the budget surplus not be put at risk. But that is exactly what the opposition is doing in its determination to block key budget measures in the Senate and with its reckless spending promises. On this side of the House we are committed to responsible economic management. We are building investment funds to give us the capability to invest in the future of our economy: the Building Australia Fund, the Education Investment Fund and the health and hospital fund. In total the Rudd government have invested $76 billion in building our nation. This is a reflection of a government who are taking action today to deal with the long-term challenges of this nation—challenges in health, national infrastructure and education. We are meeting all of our election promises, trying to rebuild faith with the Australian people that when a government say they are going to do something they actually do it, and rebuilding a trust that was so badly eroded under the previous government. But we have done all of that within a responsible economic framework, introducing saving measures in areas of wasteful government spending and directing revenue raised at serious public policy challenges. Every one of the measures in the budget is framed in that context. That is what is so disturbing about what the opposition is doing—blocking key measures in the budget, making a number of reckless spending promises that it knows it will never, ever deliver on, at the same time as trying to reclaim the mantle of economic management and talking the economy down. It is cherry-picking areas where it thinks it can grab a headline, raising expectations amongst vulnerable and financially stretched community members that it knows it will never have to deliver on and putting the economic prosperity of this country at risk. This economic prosperity was built—it may be news to those on the other side of the chamber—not from the Liberal Party’s hard work but from the hard work and determination of the Australian people. In a 20-minute press conference yesterday, the new Leader of the Opposition spent $20 billion. This included continuing the policies of the previous Leader of the Opposition by blowing a $6 billion hole in the budget surplus through blocking key measures in the Senate. This is absurd from a man who had been party leader for no more than a few hours. This is economic irresponsibility at its worst, especially at a time when our nation is fighting inflationary pressures. We inherited an inflation rate that was at a 16-year high from the previous government. This was from a government that increased government spending at over five per cent per annum in real terms. Responsible economic management requires restraint in good times as well as bad and, most importantly, it requires leadership. Leadership appears to be sadly lacking in the new Leader of the Opposition. The opposition in the Senate are continuing with their policy of blocking key budget measures. The Leader of the Opposition and the Liberal Party are keen to stand up for cheap luxury cars. The Liberal Party is supportive of increasing taxes to middle-income Australia through its decision to block changes to the Medicare levy threshold, measures that would put, in some cases, some $1,000 in the pockets of many families. And of major concern is the fact that the Liberal Party is supporting cheap alcohol for teenagers. On top of this, the new Leader of the Opposition is continuing the other ‘policy on the run’ decisions by the former Leader of the Opposition, including the empty pension proposal that forgets about 2.2 million pension recipients and seems to be trying to erase the 12 years in government where they did absolutely nothing to raise the base rate of pensions. There is all care and no responsibility from the opposition. The Leader of the Opposition faced more than a test of the party-room numbers yesterday. It was a test of his economic management credentials. In raiding the budget surplus and putting our economic prosperity at risk, it was a test which he failed miserably. 7786 7786 19:39:00 Hartsuyker, Luke, MP 00AMM Cowper NATS 0 0 Mr HARTSUYKER —I rise today to draw the attention of the House to a disturbing problem in the town of Maclean in my electorate. The community in Maclean is concerned about a large flying fox colony that may return to roost in the town over the next few weeks. This is an issue that goes back years and has once again become a major concern because of a decision by the Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts. Flying foxes make a significant amount of noise and leave a terrible stench, and their droppings damage vehicles and stain washing on clothes lines. Experts have also raised concerns about potential health risks associated with flying foxes. The recent case of Hendra virus in Queensland was believed to have been transmitted by a bat. For many years, these bats were legally protected from harassment, and the colony in Maclean grew to about 50,000 bats. The bats damaged many trees in the area known as ‘the gully’ and left the area in need of regeneration. There is significant concern among Maclean residents that the bats will move back into the gully for the nesting season, leaving them to face months of damage, odour and inconvenience—not to mention a health risk. The potential roosting area for the bat colony is next to Maclean High School, and the principal of the school is concerned that the bats will disrupt the upcoming HSC exams. Every year since 1999, the Department of Education and Training has received a licence from the New South Wales Department of Environment and Climate Change, DECC, to disrupt or disperse the bats. DECC recently commissioned a report into the situation. Dr John Nelson, a zoologist from Monash University, has advised that the bat colony could be moved if it returns to the gully. He believes that the colony would naturally return to the Yaegl Nature Reserve, its current location. Dr Nelson believes that the bats can be dispersed using sound equipment without killing any of the animals. This technique has been used effectively in the past in Maclean and other areas affected by flying fox colonies. However, action must be taken quickly because the colony cannot be dispersed if the bats move back into the gully and begin breeding. In the past, a licence has been granted to disperse a small number of bats. As soon as the first flying foxes start to appear in the gully, they are scared away using the sound equipment, and this discourages the rest of the colony from landing in the area. Because the bats are a protected species, the New South Wales department has decided to refer the licence application to the federal department, the Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts for approval. This is the first time since the initial licence was granted nine years ago that the licence application has been referred to the federal department. Against the considered view of the DECC, the federal department has decided that there is potential for the bats to be harmed and has requested that a public environment report be completed. The report may take up to six months and will cost up to $100,000. Even after the report is completed, there is still no guarantee that the community will be granted a licence to disturb the bats. That is $50,000 to $100,000 that would be better spent on educational resources for Maclean High School. The New South Wales DECC has no problem with the community’s plan. Expert opinion supports the licence application. There are already stringent controls in place to prevent harm to the bats. There is no reason that the licence should not be granted. The question must be asked: will the minister take responsibility for the health of Maclean High School students and staff? Common sense needs to prevail in this situation. The health and wellbeing of our young people must be put before a handful of bats. With the roosting season just around the corner, this issue needs urgent attention by the minister. I have written directly to him, requesting a speedy resolution of this situation. The people of Maclean have been able to disperse the bats in previous years. I urge the government to permit the same course of action to occur once again. 7787 7787 19:43:00 Rea, Kerry, MP HVR Bonner ALP 1 0 Ms REA —I rise this evening to express my real disappointment with the opposition’s decision to continue their 12 years of reckless and irresponsible spending by continuing to reduce and erode the government surplus in the Senate. It is a major disappointment to me—and, more importantly, to the residents of the electorate of Bonner and, in fact, to the residents of the whole of South-East Queensland—that we see an opposition who continues to irresponsibly throw away taxpayers’ money on issues that they think will get them a cheap political point or a quick headline. They have no support or respect for the desperate need for infrastructure and investment—particularly in our area, which is the fastest growing in the country. Having been a local councillor on the Brisbane City Council basically since 1991, I know how important it is that all levels of government work together to invest in important social and economic infrastructure for a community to grow and develop. I remember, as a very early member of the council, the JobSkills Program introduced by a federal Labor government that invested in not just creating skills and employment opportunities for many people who were otherwise on the unemployment line but also very important social and community infrastructure in and around the suburbs of Brisbane. I remember the great, far-sighted policy of urban renewal which effectively saw the city of Brisbane rise from a fairly sleepy country town whose inner city was dying to a very vibrant, modern and cosmopolitan city because it had a federal government that was prepared to invest in urban renewal, in new housing, including public housing as well as some very attractive and exclusive housing that built back the inner-city suburbs of Brisbane. Those suburbs were once industrial wastelands but they are now thriving communities that are the envy of many throughout the world and are a great drawcard for tourists and local residents alike. Instead, what did we get from the last 12 years? We got a government that thought that pens and mouse pads, advertising and ridiculous and exploitative industrial relations laws were a more appropriate way of spending. We had a government that thought that fridge magnets that taught you to be ‘alert not alarmed’ was a far more important use of taxpayers’ money than investing in basic infrastructure like public transport, roads and rail. I can tell you, Mr Speaker, that the residents of Bonner and the residents of South-East Queensland are not just alert anymore, they are alarmed. They are alarmed that their roads are congested; they are alarmed that their trains are passing them by because there has been no investment in public infrastructure. They are alarmed that basically balancing their work and family life is made so much harder because they do not have the infrastructure to get them around the city and to enjoy the quality of life that they deserve. So what do I tell them? What do I tell them when this opposition continues its reckless spending and is prepared to knock off over $6 billion in this year’s surplus? What do I tell the thousands of residents in the suburbs of Carindale, Wishart and Manly West? Do I tell them that broadband is not just a dream for them—it could well be an impossibility? What do I tell them when they are trying to simply educate their children and conduct their business in a modern technological world that relies on high-speed broadband? It is not just a luxury for playing games; it is in fact a necessary part of daily life, but thanks to the opposition’s measures they may not get it. What do I tell the Port of Brisbane, the fastest growing port in the country, potentially an area of employment for over 6,000 people? What do I tell the working families who rely on jobs at the port? That there is a chance that the much-needed money to upgrade their motorway will go because the opposition is prepared to allow their teenage daughters to get cheap alcohol, that it thinks it is more important that you can get a cheap Ferrari than it is for this very important industrial area of Brisbane to have safe and efficient access through its roadways. South-East Queensland, as I said, is fast growing. I refer the opposition to the South-East Queensland Council of Mayors document, which identifies $11 billion of infrastructure spending that they may not get because of the tactics of those opposite. (Time expired) 7788 7788 19:48:00 Markus, Louise, MP E07 Greenway LP 0 0 Mrs MARKUS —I rise this evening to support a motion that was presented today in the Senate by Senator the Hon. Chris Ellison. Today is indeed Citizenship Day. Over four million people have become Australian citizens since 1949, and as I stand here today over 95 per cent of Australia’s residents are Australian citizens. We have 95 per cent of Australians who want to look forward to the future, who have a vision not just for this nation but for their family and for future generations. It was in 2001 that the then Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, the Hon. Philip Ruddock, announced that 17 September would be Citizenship Day. Citizenship Day is a day we celebrate what it means to be Australian and reflect on the importance of Australian citizenship. It was the coalition that acknowledged the importance of celebrating our nation’s diversity and the wealth created by it. I speak on a daily basis with many people from many nations—in fact, over 140 nationalities are represented in my electorate. They have chosen to call Australia home. This is a huge decision for many of them. In the period 2006-07, over 169,000 people from over 176 countries became Australian citizens. I will mention the top 10 nationalities that chose to call Australia home. They include people from the United Kingdom, India, the People’s Republic of China, New Zealand, the Republic of South Africa, the Philippines, Sudan, Malaysia, Afghanistan and Vietnam. All these people have chosen to officially become part of the Australian family. Shawn Redhage is one such person who has become an Australian citizen. Shawn proudly represented Australia in the basketball at the Beijing Olympics. When Shawn was asked why he became an Australian citizen he replied: I think becoming a citizen makes me feel more a part of this country. It’s a huge honour to be able to help uphold the values Australia has created and what the country stands for. I am sure you will agree, Mr Speaker, that Shawn encapsulates what it means to be an Australian citizen. The coalition also believes it is important to pay tribute to all those who have made Australia what it is today and who have and will continue to contribute towards building its future. Australia is built on foundations that include respecting our cultural diversity, believing in the right to a democratic society, respecting the rights and liberties of fellow Australians, the commitment to upholding and obeying our laws and, most importantly, upholding the loyalty to Australia and her people. On Citizenship Day 2007 Australia’s new citizenship test was launched along with a resource book to help those wishing to become citizens understand our values, our history and our culture. So that new migrants had assistance when preparing for the test, $13.9 million was invested. The Minister for Immigration and Citizenship in April this year said the results of the latest snapshot of tests would be considered by an independent committee which would ‘examine all aspects of the content and operation of the citizenship test’. He went on to say: … the committee’s role will be to examine the experiences of people who sat the test and determine whether other potential candidates are being deterred from the test. There are some concerns. I am concerned because statistics show 95 per cent of all candidates pass their test whether it is their first attempt or an additional attempt. Watering down or scrapping the test altogether would not be beneficial for our nation, nor would it be helpful for people who wish to officially become Australian citizens, but I do call on the current government to ensure that all potential citizens are given every assistance that they require to be able to sit and successfully pass that test. Citizenship Day is extremely important for our nation and our citizens. It is a day when as Australians we come together to celebrate our Aussie uniqueness as well as reflect on our country’s diversity, democracy, values and responsibilities. As a coalition we believe that every Australian has the right to freedom of choice, an environment that will make their dreams a reality and confidence to build for their future. The coalition’s values are reflected in the values of Australian citizenship and they should not be taken for granted. 7789 7789 19:53:00 Rishworth, Amanda, MP HWA Kingston ALP 1 0 Ms RISHWORTH —I wish tonight to raise the serious issue of the economic irresponsibility displayed by the federal Liberal opposition. As of yesterday the Liberal Party has recommitted to conducting a $20 billion raid on the surplus over the next four years, projected in the forward estimates. In light of uncertain global economic financial markets, responsible economic management is in need now more than ever. In May the Rudd Labor government delivered an economically responsible budget that invested in the future and provided a buffer during global financial uncertainty; however, the federal Liberal opposition is determined to vandalise this budget surplus by blocking our key budget measures in the Senate. Instead of supporting the Rudd Labor government’s measures to build a strong budget surplus designed to put downward pressure on interest rates, the new Leader of the Liberal Party recommitted yesterday in his 20-minute press conference to blocking the Rudd government’s key budget measures. This economic vandalism includes blocking the tax on Porsches and Ferraris, blocking the tax on alcopops and blocking the tax on big oil. As a result, the Leader of the Opposition committed to blowing a $6 billion hole in the national surplus. However, the economic irresponsibility of the Leader of the Opposition did not end there. He then recommitted to additional spending, totalling $13.9 billion, although at the same time he did not identify any budget savings to offset this spending—therefore conducting a total $20 billion raid on the surplus in 20 minutes. Mr Speaker, imagine the economic damage that could have been done if the Leader of the Opposition’s acceptance speech had gone on for any longer. The opposition’s raid on the surplus not only jeopardises the buffer that the government has built to protect Australia from global economic turmoil but also puts into jeopardy our plans for future investment. This is of great concern to many people in my electorate of Kingston who eagerly anticipate the investment that the Building Australia Fund will provide for infrastructure. Investment in infrastructure in the outer metropolitan southern area of Adelaide is in desperate need. The most eagerly awaited infrastructure by many of my constituents is the rollout of the national fibre-optic broadband network. Productivity growth of local business in the southern suburbs is being constrained because businesses are not able to access fast broadband. Furthermore, many of my constituents have welcomed the Rudd Labor government’s commitment to invest funds to tackle urban congestion in major cities. The expanding suburbs in my electorate are particularly interested in the Rudd government’s plans to reduce urban congestion and have welcomed the $4 million urban congestion study which will investigate the complex engineering issues involved in extending the Noarlunga rail line across the Onkaparinga River. These are concrete examples of key infrastructure projects that are sorely needed in my local area. However, the obstructive antics of the Liberal Party in raiding the budget surplus could put in jeopardy the progressing of these and many other key infrastructure investments around Australia. In addition, the Liberal Party’s raid on the surplus threatens the two other investment funds that have been set up for the future. The health and hospital investment fund provides money for investment in health infrastructure, including the refurbishment of hospitals, medical technology and equipment, and medical research facilities. Two hospitals that service my electorate of Kingston that could benefit significantly from this fund are the Flinders Medical Centre and the Noarlunga Hospital. In addition, the Rudd government’s Education Investment Fund has been established to finance capital investment in higher education and vocational training, and could include investment in the Noarlunga and O’Halloran Hill TAFE campuses and the Flinders University of Australia. However, these investments in hospitals, education facilities and infrastructure can be made only if money is available to invest in the future. If the Liberal opposition were listening to the Australian community they would know that the public is concerned about the unstable global economic circumstances and wants the parliament to act responsibly when it comes to putting downward pressure on interest rates and inflation. The Rudd government is committed to the long-term national interests of this country and the long-term economic policy settings that we need to secure them. It is a pity that the Liberal opposition is not. Question agreed to. 7791 19:58:00 House adjourned at 7.58 pm 7791 Notices The following notices were given: PG6 Macklin, Jenny, MP Ms Macklin to present a Bill for an Act to amend the law relating to family assistance, child support and veterans’ affairs, and for related purposes. (Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Other Legislation Amendment (Further 2008 Budget and Other Measures) Bill 2008). 8IS Debus, Bob, MP Mr Debus to present a Bill for an Act to amend the Financial Transaction Reports Act 1988, and for related purposes. (Financial Transaction Reports Amendment (Transitional Arrangements) Bill 2008). 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms Roxon to present a Bill for an Act to establish the Australian Organ and Tissue Donation and Transplantation Authority, and for other purposes. (Australian Organ and Tissue Donation and Transplantation Authority Bill 2008). 2008-09-17 The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. DGH Adams) took the chair at 9.30 am. 7792 Constituency Statements 7792 7792 09:30:00 Johnson, Michael, MP 00AMX Ryan LP 0 0 Mr JOHNSON —The Gap suburb in the western suburbs of Brisbane and in the Ryan electorate is a very beautiful place to live. It is a family-friendly place where lots of business activities are going on. It is a community that is very proud of its involvement in civic affairs and takes a very deep interest in the politics of our nation and all that goes on in the state of Queensland today. I want to talk about The Gap because this year The Gap celebrates its sesquicentenary—that is, the 150th anniversary of settlement there, its 150th birthday. I am very proud to be the federal member for Ryan, which covers the suburb of The Gap, on this special occasion. It is not every day that any of our local suburbs celebrates such a milestone. It is 150 years since it was first settled, in 1858—of course, for those of us from Queensland, that is even before Queensland became a colony, which was in 1859. It was settled when the first land sales were conducted, in 1858, when the area was still part of the colony of New South Wales. Several years then passed before the next release of land for interested settlers, in the 1860s. The Gap remained a very rural community for almost a century, until the 1950s, when primary production diminished and land subdivisions for residential purposes began to appear in greater numbers. Today it is a very vibrant community. It is a community that takes a deep interest in its people, and, as I say, I am very proud to be its representative. On the weekend I had the distinct pleasure of speaking at a wonderful event organised by Jeff and Ann Hilder, who are respectively the president and secretary of The Gap Pioneer and History Group. They are well-known residents of The Gap, they are highly respected and they are the very best of Australia as local community activists go because they do all kinds of things of interest for the people of The Gap. They are the ones with the vision and they are the driving force behind a series of events in The Gap to celebrate its sesquicentenary. On the weekend I attended yet another of these events, a huge historical display of photos and maps held at the Uniting Church hall for the public to be part of and to celebrate and honour those who came before them—the previous generations who did so much to make The Gap what it is today. I take this opportunity to acknowledge all those significant community figures in The Gap who make it what it is, such as the local councillor and the principals of the local schools: primary schools Hilder Road State School, The Gap State School, Payne Road State School and St Peter Chanel School, and The Gap State High School—great schools in the local community. 7792 7792 09:34:00 Rea, Kerry, MP HVR Bonner ALP 1 0 Ms REA —This morning I would like to address the House on the centenary of the Holland Park Mosque. I was very privileged a few weeks ago to attend the centenary celebrations for the mosque, which is located on Nursery Road at Mount Gravatt. It is a significant achievement for any organisation by Australian standards: 100 years is a long time within the Australian community. But for a mosque in the suburbs of Brisbane to be celebrating its centenary I think marks a very important part of Australia’s history, which I wish to recognise. 1908 was a very interesting year for the Islamic community in Australia. In those days the vast majority of Muslims came from Afghanistan and the subcontinent of India. They had been camel traders in the late 1800s. It was the travels of those people, particularly through Brisbane, that saw a number of families become established in the Mount Gravatt and Holland Park area. They felt the need to create a place of worship and identified the house that was located on Nursery Road, Mount Gravatt, as the mosque. As you can well imagine, in those days establishing a place of worship—the pure hard physical labour of getting something organised, getting a small community together to create a place where people could gather—was difficult enough. But, in the context of the White Australia policy and the very unfortunate attitudes of the Australian community at that time towards people who were non-white and therefore perceived as being inferior, it is a great tribute to those families that they were able to do what they did. In particular, I would like to acknowledge Abdul Ghias Kaus, Abdul Futta ‘Fotth’ Deen and Abdul Hamid Howsan—three men who were on the original committee and whose commitment and drive made sure that the mosque not only was established in that part of Brisbane but indeed has remained there for 100 years, and I hope it will remain there for much longer. The Islamic community in that area is a very strong and diverse community. We now see many Muslims coming to Australia from all parts of the world, the latest being those from the Horn of Africa countries—in particular, Somalia. The mosque is a very recognised part of the Mount Gravatt and Holland Park communities. It is high up on the hill, it is visible from the South East Freeway, it is a very clear identifying marker of that part of Brisbane and, as a result, it is something that all of the community in that area acknowledge as being part of their local area. Indeed, the broader community know the mosque has always been a part of that area. I know that they fully support the Islamic community and wish them well in their centenary and for their future in the suburbs of Brisbane. 7793 7793 09:37:00 Hunt, Gregory, MP 00AMV Flinders LP 0 0 Mr HUNT —I rise today to speak in relation to the methane gas leak from the landfill at Cranbourne. I want to set out, firstly, my concern for and on behalf of the residents; secondly, my approach to the need for support for the residents; and, thirdly, the need for a national landfill inquiry. In relation to the residents themselves, the Brooklands Green Estate borders my electorate of Flinders. It is not actually within the electorate, but I know that many people who live near the border of my electorate have been affected. I have visited the site. I have seen the distress caused to families. These families first and foremost have a concern for their safety and, in particular, the safety of their children. The methane levels are dangerously high on two fronts: (1) the potential for explosion; and (2) the possible health consequences. The first thing we need for these residents is a package which is real and solid and which recognises the fact that in many cases their life’s savings have been tied up in houses the value of which, according to the residents, has been seriously and dangerously eroded. The second thing that we need to look at is a state inquiry as to how this was allowed to happen. Clearly the planning process has failed. The council opposed the creation of this new Brooklands Green Estate. The council stood squarely against it, yet it was passed through the state planning processes. We need an independent inquiry. It needs to establish responsibility for that which has occurred and for that which must occur—the clean-up process to ensure that, first and foremost, there is safety for residents and, second there is protection of the value of their properties. The economic losses to residents could flow into tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions, of dollars. An enormous amount of personal assets and family lifelong savings are tied up here. Third, we need a national landfill inquiry. I have written to the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts. I have said that we need to understand that if this can happen in Cranbourne it can happen elsewhere in Australia where there are urban based landfills with methane gas which may not be properly extracted. The consequence of that is very simple. We need to have total security and total reliability for residents around Australia. We need to ensure that urban landfills do not pose a risk. Therefore, we need an audit of existing landfills to assess the risk and to make sure that this does not happen. We need to make sure that there are common national guidelines for dealing with the future extraction of such gases. We need to make sure that these gases are turned, as they are at the Woodlawn bioreactor near Canberra and elsewhere, into clean energy sources. 7794 7794 09:40:00 Parke, Melissa, MP HWR Fremantle ALP 1 0 Ms PARKE —Today I wish to draw members’ attention to the Fremantle Children’s Literature Centre, which is located in the former hospital quarters of the old Fremantle Prison, a site which incidentally was nominated earlier this year for World Heritage listing. The Fremantle Children’s Literature Centre is one of a kind. The centre supports the teaching of literacy and the writing and illustration of children’s literature and it brings these things together in its provision of innovative workshops for school groups. The centre creates opportunities for young people to become excited about reading, writing and art. It is a place where even the most reluctant readers can discover the magic of books. The centre provides a place for authors and illustrators to loan their original artworks so that children, teachers and other authors can see the process of a book coming to life, from concept drawings to completed artworks. Successful authors and illustrators such as Shaun Tan, Marc McBride, Coral Tulloch and Markus Zusak have all worked with the centre to deliver workshops for students and educators. Books such as The Watertower by Gary Crew and Stephen Woolman and The Arrival by Shaun Tan are workshopped with children, who are then given the opportunity to discuss the books and participate in a range of activities that take them deeper into the text. Many of these books build our sense of national identity. I was lucky to attend the book launch of Simpson and His Donkey, written by Mark Greenwood and illustrated by Frané Lessac, a great book which tells a great Australian story. The Fremantle Children’s Literature Centre was set up in 1993 by the federal government as a project of national significance with a view to establishing similar centres around the country. To date there is no other centre in Australia that provides the special range of functions that the centre provides. The centre is located in the Fremantle electorate but it works across all of Western Australia, including in regional and rural areas and remote Aboriginal communities. Because of its uniqueness the centre’s expertise is in great demand, and it also conducts workshops outside of Western Australia, including in the Northern Territory, Adelaide, Christmas Island and even Bangkok. The Deputy Prime Minister visited the centre with me on 8 July. Students from Beaconsfield Primary School, Lance Holt School and Christ the King School quizzed the Deputy Prime Minister and me on our favourite books and on what we were currently reading. We were then given a demonstration of an interactive workshop, one of the teaching methods in which the centre excels. In 2009 the Fremantle Children’s Literature Centre is planning to host a summit of key people in the world of children’s literacy and literature to discuss the establishment of a network of children’s literature centres around Australia. I strongly support the Fremantle Children’s Literature Centre, its inspirational leader, Lesley Reece, and her wonderful staff in their efforts to extend to all of Australia the benefits they provide to young readers and writers, to authors and illustrators and to educators. 7795 7795 09:43:00 Billson, Bruce, MP 1K6 Dunkley LP 0 0 Mr BILLSON —I rise today to draw attention to what seems to be a lack of genuine forward planning by the Brumby state government when it comes to road and public transport provision in the electorate that I represent and for the broader Mornington Peninsula. There was much fanfare when Frankston was declared a transit city in 2004, but it seems that that may have been more a statement of name than a statement of purpose. If Frankston was truly a transit city then the Eastlink Tollway—remember this was the Scoresby Freeway, which was supposed to be without tolls—and the Frankston bypass would be built toll free. Then we saw on the front page of the Herald Sun yesterday and again in the voter poll in the Herald Sun today the great strength in support for a toll-free Frankston bypass. Imagine the surprise of the community that I represent, having been promised a toll-free freeway, to have the state Labor government completely change its mind just months after the election where it promised a commitment of that kind. Now we see with the Frankston bypass, a key arterial link feeding into Eastlink to relieve some of the enormous congestion that is happening through the city of Frankston, that it is being canvassed with Connect East, the builder of Eastlink, to see whether that too can be a tollway. Imagine our surprise. That would see, some 60 kilometres away from the CBD in Melbourne, people in the community that I represent having to pay tolls to use not only the arterial ring-road—and we in the south, south-east and east of Melbourne are the only community which pays to use the arterial ring-road—but a key bypass feeding into the ring-road also with a toll. You can imagine the frustration in the community that I represent when the decision was made to impose tolls on Scoresby and rename it Eastlink. Dandenong got a toll-free bypass, which just came out of the sky—a compensatory project, you might suggest, for the pain, hurt and anger of the tolls. There was an extension to the light rail at Knox—a great project but, again, a way of compensating for the harm of the imposition of the tolls. The Ringwood Bypass was toll free, but when you get down to Frankston on the Mornington Peninsula you see that, while the need for a bypass has been exacerbated by the toll road, that bypass is being canvassed as another potential toll road. If the state government were interested in Frankston as a transit city, it would tackle these transport bottlenecks. It would recognise that the Frankston railway line needs to be extended at least to Baxter. At Baxter we should have a comprehensive park-and-ride facility so that we can integrate our transport modes. The attractiveness of the Stony Point rail line could be improved through shorter distances and a greater frequency of service. We would have a CBD flyer, a metro flyer, that would bypass many of the stations along the way to Melbourne and establish Frankston as a genuine transit centre to attract new investment and to even be the Parramatta of Melbourne, a satellite city offering all that people would want. We are a long way from the CBD and such investments would be part of planning for the future of the region I represent. 7796 7796 09:46:00 McKew, Maxine, MP BP4 Bennelong ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Early Childhood Education and Childcare 1 0 Ms McKEW —15 August marked the 63rd anniversary of the end of World War II. That day has more recently been proclaimed a day of global action for the ‘comfort women’, with events taking place worldwide. A delegation of women from the Korean Council, which was established to support women drafted into military sexual slavery during World War II, recently visited Australia to raise awareness of this issue. I take this opportunity to recognise the human rights efforts of Friends of Comfort Women Australia and the Korean Council. For over a decade these groups have worked tirelessly to establish global recognition and justice for surviving ‘comfort women’, a phrase which tends to disguise the real nature of the sexual violation and exploitation that occurred. Friends of Comfort Women and the Korean Council endeavour to educate the international community about military sexual slavery and the devastating effects of past and present sex trafficking, as well as to advocate for preventive measures for the future. During the last 10 years, these groups have held press conferences and demonstrations, conducted research, gathered evidence and established and participated in international conferences concerning sexual slavery in war. They have presented the issue to, and have been supported by, the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, they have established memorials and learning centres and they have fundraised and advocated for history books which detail the point of view of ‘comfort women’ survivors. In honour of the efforts of these groups and of the Korean Australians who reside in my electorate of Bennelong, I acknowledge the atrocities that occurred during this period of history and recognise that approximately 200,000 women—predominantly Korean and Chinese but also Taiwanese, Indonesian, Filipino, East Timorese, Papua New Guinean and Dutch—suffered serious and enduring physical, emotional and psychological damage. I support the continued efforts of Friends of Comfort Women and the Korean Council to raise awareness and acceptance in aid of ‘comfort women’ survivors. I also support the efforts of previous Japanese administrations which have worked towards reconciliation, reparation and education on this issue, most notably Chief Cabinet Secretary Kono’s statement in 1993, Prime Minister Murayama’s apology in 1994 and the establishment of the Asian Women’s Fund in conjunction with that apology. For the ‘comfort women’, the pain and suffering of this experience did not stop with the end of World War II but continued, and continues, throughout their lives. It is to be hoped that the government of Japan and the soon-to-be appointed new Prime Minister will honour the original intentions of the Kono statement and continue a dialogue with the ‘comfort women’ in the spirit of reconciliation. 7797 7797 09:49:00 Robert, Stuart, MP HWT Fadden LP 0 0 Mr ROBERT —I rise to bring to the attention of the House some disturbing trends in the way that the Rudd Labor government is treating the institution and indeed the foundation of marriage. Mr Rudd said on 23 October last year: … on the institution of marriage itself, our view is this: it’s an institution between a man and a woman and that’s just been our traditional continuing view. He also said on the same day: The Marriage Act relates to a union between a man and a woman and that remains Labor policy, as it has been in the past and will be into the future. These are statements that, clearly, I support, as does our side of the political divide. But the question is: has Mr Rudd been true to these statements he made before the election? Have the Australian people who voted for a Labor government actually got what they expected, or have they been conned? I refer the House to a number of pieces of legislation that have come before it this year—firstly, the Same-Sex Relationships (Equal Treatment in Commonwealth Laws—Superannuation) Bill 2008, which is looking to remove the word ‘marriage’ from various acts of parliament and replace it with the term ‘couple relationship’, acknowledging the status of a homosexual relationship as a couple relationship and marriage in the terms of those bills as just another couple relationship. We agree with financial and property justice for people in same-sex relationships—indeed, all people should have access to financial and property justice. But changing the definition of ‘marriage’ is certainly not supported. Within the superannuation bill for same-sex couples, the Labor government is also looking to redefine ‘a child’ as ‘a product of a couple relationship’, indeed a product of a same-sex relationship. This is something out of a Monty Python skit. It is almost impossible for a child to be the product of anything other than a man and a woman. We agree with protecting the property and financial rights of children, but changing the definition of ‘a child’ is not satisfactory. In the same-sex relationship omnibus bill coming before the House there are amendments to the Migration Act which will likely permit homosexual marriages contracted overseas to be recognised for the purposes of couple visas under regulations to the act. The Labor government has put legislation through the lower house to allow pornography back into Aboriginal communities if indeed the communities want it. How does that protect marriages? They are looking at changes to regulations, or have in the past, to allow AusAID funds to be used overseas for abortions. How does that protect marriage? We do not and will not support any change to or devaluation of the traditional status of marriage as a foundation—indeed, the bedrock—of our society. Frankly, I am surprised at the Australian Labor Party. These five key pieces of legislation in the first seven months would seem to indicate a trend and a pattern, and it is disturbing. 7798 7798 09:52:00 Saffin, Janelle, MP HVY Page ALP 1 0 Ms SAFFIN —I rise to present a petition, with the certification letter from the Secretary of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Petitions, on behalf of a large number of Australian citizens, with many in my electorate of Page. The principal petitioner is Ms Bianca Urbina, a Northern Rivers resident and a passionate advocate for community not-for-profit preschools, or, more correctly, for our children. The Commonwealth childcare tax rebate and funding of $125 million per annum on a recurrent basis is the subject of the petition. I seek leave to table an accompanying letter signed by Ms Urbina on behalf of Children’s Choice, an advocacy organisation. Leave granted. HVY Saffin, Janelle, MP Ms SAFFIN —In Page, there are 38 preschools: three government and 35 non-government. I visited some before and after the election, beginning with a longstanding one, Ballina Fox Street Preschool, and I have a plan to visit them all. In New South Wales there are 936 preschools: 755 are non-government community managed, 81 are private and 100 are government. Average attendance hours are 17 per week. In New South Wales there is a shortfall in funding to preschools. The rise of $17.5 million they did receive in 2006 was a welcome one but it was the first in nearly 17 years. That is a long time between drinks. There is also a split between DOCS and the Department of Education and Training in their management. The DET ones are free or with nominal contributions; community ones of course have fees and, given the funding they receive, it is hard for parents to manage if they want their children to go to preschool—and who doesn’t? You usually have to send them to the nearest preschool to your home or your place of work. If every school had one, it would be ideal. In comparative surveys, Australia rates as one of the two lowest spending countries among 34 comparable countries, including our OECD partners. The Rudd Labor government made an election commitment to provide funding for all four-year-olds to attend preschool for 15 hours per week for 40 weeks per year. This was warmly received by parents, grandparents, carers and all those engaged in children’s and education services. Ms Urbina and a larger group of preschool management committee members and parents came to see me to discuss this and the other state issues. To implement its policy on preschools and child care, the government has established the position of Parliamentary Secretary for Early Childhood Education and Childcare, held by the Hon. Maxine McKew, and the Office of Early Childhood Education and Childcare. Implementing this commitment means that, by 2013, children will be accessing preschool for 15 hours a week for 40 weeks a year. The education will be delivered by degree-qualified early childhood teachers in public, private and community based preschools and childcare. I conclude by praising the wonderful work done by our preschool communities. The petition read as follows— To the Honourable the Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in Parliament: The petition of certain citizens of Australia draws to the attention of the House the funding crisis facing the not-for profit community based preschools in New South Wales. The State Government has failed preschool aged children—only 60% of four-year-old children in New South Wales attend preschool compared to 96% nationally. New South Wales has the highest preschool fees in Australia (average $33/day) whereas in other states preschool fees are less than $8/day or free. Your petitioners therefore request the House increase the affordability of preschools by extending the 30% Commonwealth Childcare Tax Rebate to the preschool system. Your petitioners also request that the Commonwealth intervene with an injection of $125m annual recurrent funding for community not-for-profit preschools in New South Wales. from 369 citizens Petition received. 7799 7799 09:55:00 Marino, Nola, MP HWP Forrest LP 0 0 Ms MARINO —I would like to talk on the inquiry by the Senate Standing Committee on Economics into the economic impact of the gas crisis in Western Australia. The economic impact includes but will not be limited to the extent of losses faced by business and industry failing to meet production targets due to the lack of gas supplies; the nature of contractual arrangements during the gas crisis and their status since the resumption of gas supplies from Varanus Island. The effects on subcontractors, small businesses, individuals and workers are all part of this process. The inquiry will also report on the government response to the Western Australian gas crisis, including but not limited to the adequacy of the crisis management response and the justification for any refusals to release relevant facts and documents publicly. There has now been a change of government in Western Australia. I want to strongly encourage those businesses and individuals in the south-west and in the rest of the state that previously may have been concerned about putting in a submission or appearing before the Senate economics committee because of potential concerns or issues relating to the previous state Labor government to do so. There is a capacity to provide confidential submissions and conduct meetings in camera. More particularly, given that we now have a new government in Western Australia, I strongly urge these businesses, contractors and individuals to be confident in providing submissions and meeting with the Senate inquiry members when they come to Bunbury, in my electorate of Forrest, in the south-west. The explosion at Varanus Island stripped 30 per cent of Western Australia’s gas supply. However, over 40 per cent of that gas supply is used by a diverse range of small, medium and large industries and business enterprises in my electorate of Forrest. These industries were forced to secure alternative energy supplies at premium prices that were three to five times the normal price. They had to cut back their production schedules or, in extreme cases, close their doors for the interim, stand down contractors and put in staff management processes. Larger businesses had the financial capacity to pay premium prices for alternative energy suppliers. However, small to medium-sized companies were very hard-hit. The WA Chamber of Commerce and Industry has estimated that the cost to the WA economy is at least $2.4 billion and may well be $6.7 billion by the time full gas supplies are returned in December. A survey by the Chamber of Minerals and Energy identified that 25 per cent of companies did not have the capacity to substitute diesel for gas and that 40 per cent of the companies had to alter staffing arrangements as a consequence of the shortage. Again, I urge all businesses, contractors and individuals to provide submissions and meet the Senate inquiry members when they come to Bunbury, in my electorate. 7800 7800 09:58:00 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP Minister for Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs, and Assistant Treasurer 1 0 Mr BOWEN —I would like to inform the House of a very significant award which has been presented to a high school in my electorate. On 19 August 2008 John Coates, the President of the Australian Olympic Committee, announced that Westfields Sports High School had been awarded the prestigious Sport and Youth trophy by the International Olympic Committee. The Sport and Youth trophy is aimed at rewarding organisations that have promoted or developed sporting or educational programs linked to the Olympics at a very young age. Westfields of course was the first sports high school in Australia. It has become recognised not only in Australia but in Europe and Asia as the best practice model for sports high schools. It has been classed a project of national significance by the Australian government. I was very pleased to be able to invite John Coates and Michael Knight, the former New South Wales Minister for the Olympics, to Westfields Sports High School a few years ago to show them the work that is being done by the school in producing future Olympians. It is fair to say that John Coates was extremely impressed. I was delighted that he nominated Westfields Sports High School to the IOC. I am delighted that they have received this award. John Coates said when he was announcing the award: Westfields has long been regarded as a great nursery for young sportsmen and women in Australia and the IOC has formally recognized this. He is right. A quick glance at Westfields Sports High School tells you what sort of Australians it has produced: from Harry Kewell, the international soccer player, to Australian cricket vice-captain Michael Clarke. I would like to inform the House that Westfields Sports High School produced no fewer than six members of the Olympic team in Beijing. I will be very surprised if there is any other high school in Australia that can claim six members of the Olympic team. They were: Dani Samuels and Fabrice Lapierre in athletics; Mark Bridge, David Carney and Trent McClenahan in football; and Kate Bates in cycling. As you can tell, I am very proud of Westfields Sports High School, as was Mr Coates when he announced the award. It is important to note that not only does Westfields produce excellence on the sporting field but, as I often say, the culture of excellence rubs off in other achievements. The 2007 HSC results are an indication of this, with the dux of Westfields Sports High School receiving an HSC score of 99.6 and two students receiving the Premier’s Distinguished Achievers award. This is a tribute to the students of Westfields Sports High School; to its founding principal, Phil Tucker, who is now retired; to its current principal, Roger Davis; to Helen Wilson and all the staff at Westfields Sports High School; and, of course, to the dedicated parents who contribute so much through the P&C and other fundraising activities. 10000 Adams, Dick (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. DGH Adams)—Order! In accordance with standing order 193, the time for constituency statements has concluded. 7800 Bills R3063 7800 Debate resumed from 4 September, on motion by Ms Gillard: That this bill be now read a second time. 7801 10:02:00 Billson, Bruce, MP 1K6 Dunkley LP 0 0 Mr BILLSON —The opposition certainly support the Australian Research Council Amendment Bill 2008 being read a second time, and we lend our support to the measures contained within the bill. In essence, it alters some of the funding arrangements that are supported through the ARC to help foster high-quality research activity as part of Australia’s national innovation system. As the second reading speech outlines, there are three key measures in this bill. The first is the establishment and resourcing of the Rudd government’s election commitment Future Fellowships. The second is the introduction of a new method of indexation to existing amounts that have been appropriated in the act. The third is to add an additional year to the financial forward estimates that already accompany this bill and were established and resourced during the Howard government years. The coalition supports each of those provisions. The ARC’s role is to administer those appropriations under the bill and to identify the priority areas for the allocation of research assistance. The bill in effect adds $326 million, being a new fourth year, to the funding and also to the Future Fellowships program. The Australian Research Council’s primary purpose is the administration of around $600 million in grants annually to the Australian science and research community, and this bill provides the mechanisms for that to occur. The coalition, the former Howard government, had a proud record when it came to science and research in Australia, and it is pleasing to see that this measure by the Rudd government simply carries forward and builds upon the positive work of the former government. In the Howard government’s 2001 white paper Backing Australia’s ability: an innovation action plan for the future,funds available to the Australian Research Council for science and research grants were doubled from roughly $300 million per annum to around $600 million per annum. While the Rudd government and Labor may claim that this bill appropriates $950 million for science and research, in reality about $600 million of it is merely a continuation of the coalition government’s policy. So the clarity that needs to be brought to this bill is not only that it is a step in the right direction but, more importantly, that it represents about the only positive thing that the Rudd government has done in the area of innovation and in research and development. It needs to be contrasted, I think, with the very worrying and short-sighted decision that saw the axing of the $700 million Commercial Ready program. That was a devastating blow to many people who found it not only an enormous surprise but a new impediment that they had to overcome to take innovations that had got to a proof of concept stage—that is, proven to do what it had been hoped they would do—into a commercial ready stage where they could be taken out into the commercial world and have that proof of concept innovation applied with a view to generating wealth and opportunity for our country. That $700 million cut to the Commercial Ready program has hit hard even in my own community, where companies involved in the information, telecommunications and communications area were doing all that was asked of them. They were achieving all of the benchmarks, fulfilling all of the requirements and making all of the progress that was expected of an innovative firm to take a concept, prove its functionality through that proof of concept stage and then to present its work to the government to see if support could have been available through the Commercial Ready program. With the abandonment of that program, a number of firms in my electorate are wondering where they turn to. We have been actively trying to assist them with other avenues of support. The work and the quality of it is something that was admired and valued by the previous government, but now we get to this Commercial Ready void. Taking that next step from validating an innovation and a new technology past that proof of concept stage into its commercial readiness position is an added challenge and burden. On top of that, the $63 million that has been ripped out of the CSIRO and the trimming in ANSTO as well as, in the area of my responsibilities, the changing of the tax treatment for software depreciation—all of those things—send a worrying signal about innovation. I note the Deputy Speaker raising his eyebrow. Thank you for that eyebrow-lift, Mr Deputy Speaker Adams. This bill is positive in that it is a positive contribution to the innovation, contrasted and, I suppose, juxtaposed with the things that are not so flash and have taken some of the wind out of the innovation sail of our country and our economy. The thing that the opposition is very interested in is the fact that these carefully ‘fully costed and funded’—I think that was the term before the election—initiatives around Future Fellowships actually come in at a figure quite different from what Labor said they would prior to the election, so perhaps ‘fully costed and funded’ was a slogan rather than an accurate validation of the estimates. But the funding is there for those new Future Fellowship programs. For those with an interest in those programs, that would see funding made available for what I think would be characterised as mid-career research experts—funding that provides for salary as well as on-cost and support for the host institution. We are quite optimistic that that will be a very positive step in the right direction. Those scholarships will be allocated against priorities that are to be established by the ARC. We in the opposition look with interest to see how those scholarships will in fact be targeted, how the ARC will formulate and articulate those priorities and the extent to which the scholarship allocations truly reflect those priorities. That is all ahead of us, and we look forward to seeing how that new scheme will perform. It will provide new opportunities for mid-career researchers of significant ability to undertake important research here in Australia. It recognises the connectedness between the research professional and the host institution and provides funding for both. I think that is a positive step in the right direction, with resources available for the host institution and for things that might not be immediately apparent such as relocations of a scientist—where not only is there research funding to support their salaries and their endeavours but the infrastructure that is needed to carry out that work is supported—and very practical things such as relocation expenses where there is a need for that. We think that is all encouraging news. We are hopeful and optimistic that the potential of that measure will be met and that those ARC priorities will be clearly articulated and reflected in the allocation of those scholarships, and we wait with interest to see the success or otherwise of the Future Fellowships program in action. The opposition lends its support. We view this as a non-controversial bill. We hope this is an early sign of a change of attitude in the government to a positive disposition towards innovation rather than those hostile cuts and actions that have been taken through the budget. We lend our support to this bill and encourage the parliament to have it passed speedily. 7802 10:09:00 Bidgood, James, MP HVM Dawson ALP 1 0 Mr BIDGOOD —The Australian Research Council Amendment Bill 2008 will provide funding to the Australian Research Council to support research schemes. It builds on the government’s commitment to an education revolution in Australia to support our nation’s best and brightest in research and in the development of their skills and their expertise in Australia, securing our nation’s future. Future Fellowships funding is open to all universities, medical research institutes and other publicly funded research agencies, including those in regional areas such as Dawson. As the Committee is aware, my seat of Dawson has an excellent university in the Central Queensland University, with opportunities in applied science, engineering, education, business, health, informatics, communication and human movement sciences. This scheme is surely good news not only for the university but for prospective researchers there as well. The fellowships will provide opportunities for mid-career researchers—that is, researchers at a pivotal point in their career—to further their careers in Australia. Mr Deputy Speaker Adams, as you know, over 11 years the Howard government failed to support Australia’s top researchers and as a result created a roadblock to innovation and productivity. The Australian people, for 11 long years, were used to a government that had core and non-core promises and core and non-core election commitments. But keeping our election commitments is something that we on this side of the Committee are very proud of. Education, training and getting the most out of our best and brightest are things we are very proud of. Specifically, this bill will, firstly, provide funding for the future fellowships; secondly, apply indexation to existing appropriation amounts in the act; and, thirdly, create an additional out-year financial forward estimate. Fourthly, the Future Fellowships program will offer four-year fellowships, valued at $140,000 a year, to 1,000 of Australia’s top researchers in the middle of their career. Surely this has got to be really good news for our research community. Fifthly, at least 10 per cent of federal Labor’s Future Fellowships places will be targeted to encourage outstanding Australian researchers currently based overseas to come home to Australia, which is a measure to alleviate the brain drain of our best and brightest which occurred as a direct result of the attitude towards this issue by those opposite for 11 very long years. The higher education sector is anticipating the commencement of Future Fellowships from early in calendar year 2009. This bill provides funding for the Future Fellowships scheme. The government’s Future Fellowships plans build on Labor’s plan to double—that is right, double—the number of Australian postgraduate awards available in our universities by 2012. Labor understands that overseas experience is important for our researchers, but it is unacceptable that our best researchers are being forced to stay overseas to do high-level research which is adequately supported and with no incentive to lure them home. So Future Fellowships will be targeted at researchers working in areas of national priority such as renewable energy, manufacturing technologies, the sciences, medical research and education. The Rudd Labor government is committed to supporting high-quality research in Australia. This program is keenly anticipated by the Australian research community and is being delivered, as promised, within the first 10 months of the Rudd Labor government. I commend this bill to the House. 7803 10:15:00 Thomson, Craig, MP HVZ Dobell ALP 1 0 Mr CRAIG THOMSON —Australia is positioned to become a vital player in one of the world’s most economically dynamic regions. But, to stand out, we must have a strong research base. The government have shown our commitment to a research revolution as part of our education revolution. We cannot let ourselves fall behind the rest of the world in investment research any longer. That is why we are providing more funding to the Australian Research Council to support research schemes. We are investing in schemes that will support our best and brightest mid-career researchers and will strengthen Australia’s position in the global research arena. We have committed almost $175 million to introduce the Future Fellowships program, funding fellowships worth $140,000 each, with each researcher’s institution to receive a $50,000 grant to support the purchase of related infrastructure equipment for their research projects. This new Future Fellowships scheme is part of the Rudd government’s education revolution and is keenly anticipated by the research community. The fellowships will provide opportunities for mid-career researchers—that is, researchers at a pivotal point in their career—to gain further career experience in Australia as our future research leaders. We want to keep our best and brightest here in Australia. The fellowships will also provide the capacity for the best researchers coming to Australia to conduct research, which is critical for building domestic research capacity. The promotion of research is vital in areas of critical national importance and that is why incentives must be put in place to retain research in this country. We understand that overseas experience is important for researchers, but it is unacceptable that our best researchers are being forced to stay overseas to do high-level research which is adequately supported and, up until now, with no incentive to lure them home. I want to tell a little story about a dear friend of mine who also happens to be related to the member for Werriwa. It is a school friend of mine whose name is John Cusick. John went to the University of New South Wales, where he did a chemistry degree and went on to get first-class honours in chemistry. John tried to look for work in Australia and, like many people who finish their degrees, he could not get any and was encouraged to do his PhD. He did his PhD at the University of New South Wales, doing groundbreaking research in his field of organic chemistry. Following the completion of his PhD, again he looked around for work in this area but there was nothing to keep him here in Australia. He travelled to the United States and worked at a university in South Carolina for a few years with his wife. But, like many young couples, they wanted to start a family and they wanted to do so in Australia, so there was a desperate need for Mr Cusick to find work back here in Australia. This is someone with a first-class honours degree in chemistry, followed by a PhD in groundbreaking work that had commercial applications. The United States system was happy to take him and to develop his ideas—Australian ideas—for the benefit of the American economy, but not Australia. So he ended up coming back to Australia and decided, as he was a very bright man, that there was no future in continuing in his field in Australia. As someone who has a law degree, I do not like to deride the profession that much, but Mr Cusick went on to do a law degree—and God knows we have enough lawyers in Australia at the moment! We do not need our best and brightest scientists not being encouraged to stay in this country to do their research and instead choosing to go to law. I know that he is a great success at Mallesons, where he is practising as a senior associate, but we have lost in Mr Cusick someone we should not have lost in terms of research that could have happened. And his story is typical of this area. If we do not put the funding in to make sure that our best and brightest in our key areas are encouraged and retained then we are going to lose them to other countries and to other jobs, because these are bright people who can work in any area that they set their mind to. Future Fellowships is targeted at researchers working in areas of national priority, such as renewable energy, manufacturing technologies, the sciences, medical research and education. Importantly, preference will be given to those researchers who can demonstrate a capacity to build collaboration across industry and research institutions and with other disciplines. At least 10 per cent of the government’s future fellowships will be targeted to encourage outstanding Australian researchers currently based overseas to return home. Again, this is exactly where Mr Cusick would have fitted in. These fellowships are part of our 10-point plan that places research and researchers at the centre of a national innovation system. This plan includes strengthened investment in creativity and knowledge generation; focused business R&D incentives to promote global competitiveness; accelerated take-up of new technology, so that Australian firms have access to the best ideas; support for international research partnerships and collaboration; strengthened publicly funded innovation and research infrastructure; improving industry access to the expertise of our universities and research agencies; and encouraging cross-disciplinary and cross-institutional collaboration. This government is committed to building the national innovation system and, over time, doubling the amount invested in research and development in Australia. We will bring responsibility for innovation, industry, science and research into a single Commonwealth department. We are developing a set of national innovation priorities to sit over the national research priorities. Together, these will provide a framework for a national innovation system, ensuring that the objectives of research programs and other innovation initiatives are complementary. The Rudd government will abolish the previous government’s flawed research quality framework and replace it with a new, streamlined, transparent, internationally verifiable system of research quality assessment, based on quality measures appropriate for each discipline. These measures will be developed in close consultation with the research community. We are also addressing the inadequacies in current and proposed models of research citation. This government’s model will recognise the contribution of Australian researchers to Australia and the world. We will give priority to the training of the next generation of researchers and nurture the talents of researchers at all stages of their careers. The Rudd government is committed to attracting and retaining high-calibre researchers in Australia. We are reinvesting in research infrastructure, establishing a ‘hubs and spokes’ model of research cooperation between universities and other research agencies to promote excellence, while providing access to the best possible facilities for the greatest number of researchers. We will reduce the fragmentation of our national research effort, build on our research strengths and encourage greater collaboration between researchers and research institutions. The government is also committed to the concept of peer review; to funding compacts with universities; to the guarantee of academic freedom; to the independence of the Australian Research Council, the National Health and Medical Research Council and other research grants agencies; and to reducing red tape and unnecessary interference in university research matters. Labor has long recognised the need for research funding agencies to coordinate their efforts more closely in order to deliver the best research outcomes in areas of critical public need, such as Indigenous health and climate change. Our plan, which we have started to put in place, is to revitalise our public research agencies and replace the culture of short-term commercialisation with an emphasis on public research and support for long-term sustainable economic growth. We are bringing forward the statutory review of the Cooperative Research Centres Program and removing the restrictions imposed by the Howard government that the Productivity Commission has identified as a brake on the effectiveness of the CRCs. The current government recognises the importance of basic research in the creation of new knowledge and the value and breadth of Australian research efforts across the humanities, creative arts and social sciences as well as the scientific and technological disciplines. In my electorate of Dobell, on the New South Wales Central Coast, I have recently been visiting many schools and have been impressed by the bright young students who are studying on the Central Coast. Our education revolution will help these young people realise their goals and dreams. They too will have the opportunities to join the country’s research community, attracted by the sorts of incentives that the government is putting in place to make a research career in Australia worth while. This is part of the Rudd government’s education revolution. It is why we are putting computers into schools. It is why we are having trade training at schools. I was recently at St Peter’s Catholic College at Tuggerah, on the Central Coast, and was able to see firsthand the benefits that computers in schools are delivering to that school, how well received by the kids and teachers those computers are and how they are changing the way in which the students gain access to educational resources. I was at Blue Haven Public School last week, where I talked to the primary school kids about their ambitions and what they wanted to achieve out of education. I was able to sit through a wonderful concert put on by them about the rock-and-roll history of our nation and the world. It was a wonderful experience to see such bright kids. One of the problems we have on the Central Coast is that we have very low retention rates—some of the worst retention rates in Australia—of people going from year 10 to year 12. That is why it is so important that the Rudd government is committed to the education revolution at all levels of education—to make sure that our kids get the right opportunities. Blue Haven Public School, on the Central Coast, is the type of school that this education revolution is aimed at. I also had the good fortune of being invited to address year 12 students at Tuggerah Lakes Secondary College, The Entrance campus, last week to talk about the sorts of aspirations they have, where they want to go and what they want to study. It was timely because they are four weeks out from sitting for the Higher School Certificate. On the Central Coast in the electorate of Dobell we have a unique tertiary education model in the Ourimbah campus of the University of Newcastle. Just by coincidence, the pro-vice-chancellor of that campus is visiting parliament today. The reason the University of Newcastle’s campus is unique is that it combines with a TAFE college and a community college to provide many pathways in education for young Australians, particularly young Australians from the Central Coast. It was pleasing to be informed by the pro-vice-chancellor last week, while we were sitting having a chat about the Rudd government’s great initiatives in education and higher education in particular, that the Ourimbah campus has seen a 17 per cent increase in enrolments in its TAFE, university and community college courses. It is because of the particular model it has that it has been able to attract them. The good news for the Central Coast is that the vast majority of the people enrolling come from the Central Coast, which has not always been the case with that campus. It is clear why this campus is the favoured choice for young school leavers in the region, with its unique TAFE and university systems coexisting in an academically stimulating environment that offers enhanced research resources such as large libraries, which are not always available at TAFE colleges. Hundreds of young people who have graduated from the Ourimbah campus have gone on to great careers. The Rudd government is doing a great deal to create the right incentives for these students of the present to become the top researchers of the future. The Australian Research Council Amendment Bill 2008, which I am supporting today, will increase spending on research by $942.9 million over four years. This is an appropriation bill which will provide funding to the Australian Research Council to support the research schemes that I have outlined. The bill provides foundation funding for the establishment of the 2008-09 budget measure Future Fellowships, which was an election commitment—and, as the member for Dawson pointed out before I rose to speak on this issue, this government, unlike the previous government, honours its election commitments. The Australian Research Council advises the government on research funding and policy and, through its management of the National Competitive Grants Program, promotes the conduct of research and research training that is of the highest quality for the benefit of the Australian community. The ARC is the primary agency responsible for administering Australian government competitive funding for research in universities. In 2007 and 2008, it administered a budget of $595.8 million for the National Competitive Grants Program, accounting for 9.5 per cent of the almost $6.4 billion Australian government financial assistance for science and innovation in that year. The National Competitive Grants Program consists of two elements: discovery and linkage. Within these elements are a range of funding schemes to provide a pathway of incentives for researchers to build the scope and scale of their work, and for collaborative partnerships. The National Competitive Grants Program’s funding is allocated competitively on the basis of research excellence and determined by peer review. Competition allows the identification and targeting of financial support to those activities that are likely to deliver outcomes of the highest quality. The ARC is the only Australian government agency that has the sole role of supporting research and research training across the broad spectrum of research, from the sciences and engineering through to the social sciences and humanities. In this way, the ARC has a watching brief on the state of Australian research within and across all disciplines. It is able to support multidisciplinary approaches to finding solutions to important research questions that are increasingly problematic rather than discipline specific. It administers national infrastructure and Australia’s participation in international ventures, such as the Gemma telescopes and the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program. All of this is part of the Rudd government’s education revolution that starts at preschool and goes all the way through to researchers who are mid-career, as is dealt with in this bill, to retain them here in Australia so that the Australian economy can benefit from their great research. Going back to last week, another of the schools that I visited was Tumbi Umbi High School, where I participated in the year 10 interview program. What we did there was sit down with year 10 students and pretend that we were employers. We assisted them in terms of how they prepare for jobs and work in the community and also encouraged them about future careers and staying at school, which I mentioned earlier in my contribution today as being absolutely vital. Again, to reiterate, on the Central Coast we have very, very low retention rates between years 10 and 12, and this coordinated education revolution that is linked and all-encompassing is so vitally important for electorates like my own that struggle to get people to continue in education and have better prospects for their lives. It is particularly important in electorates like my own to have all levels of education there, from preschool through to university campuses, to make sure that all of these are actually linked together. The Australian Research Council stands to become an even more important organisation in helping steer the research element of this country’s education revolution, and that is what this specific bill is about. But it is just one part of this government’s commitment to education, a commitment to make sure that Australia is at the cutting edge, is one of the best countries in the world in terms of the education that we provide to our children and to adults when they go on to higher education. We are doing that because that provides benefits to the whole country in economic productivity, the ideas that come out and the way in which these things can be generated and harnessed by our economy. Madam Deputy Speaker, I commend this bill. It is a very important bill, as it is a vital part of the education revolution, and it is one that should be supported by all sides and commended to the House. 7808 10:35:00 Dreyfus, Mark, MP HWG Isaacs ALP 1 0 Mr DREYFUS —I rise today to support the Australian Research Council Amendment Bill 2008. Breakthrough, world-class research is the backbone of the Australian knowledge economy. This bill will create 200 new ‘future fellowships’, providing $140,000 per year to Australian researchers from 2009 to 2012. The researchers will be what are called mid-career researchers. This is going to be a very important program to build on skills that already exist within Australian universities, to build on the human capital that Australia already has. The Future Fellowships scheme will add to the $326.3 million appropriated for in the current budget. It will be administered under the Discovery element of the National Competitive Grants Program, which is run by the Australian Research Council. The reason why these future fellowships are being legislated for by an amendment to the Australian Research Council Act is that it is the Australian Research Council that provides advice to the government on research matters and makes recommendations to the minister on the allocation of funds within the National Competitive Grants Program. There are two elements within the National Competitive Grants Program: Discovery projects, which fund individual researchers; and Linkage projects, which support cooperative research between higher education providers and industry, government and community organisations. The future fellowships are located, as I have indicated, within the Discovery projects part of the program, which is administered by the Australian Research Council. The Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, Senator Carr, has been working throughout this year to develop the Future Fellowships scheme, which gives effect to a commitment made some 10 days before the last election by the then Leader of the Opposition and now Prime Minister, Mr Rudd. That commitment was, as it was put by the now Prime Minister on 14 November last year, to keep ‘our brightest and best in Australia’ by means of this Future Fellowships program. The fellowships are quite valuable at $140,000 a year, to be available to some 1,000 of Australia’s top researchers in the middle of their careers. That was announced by the Prime Minister shortly before the election. That is the commitment that is being given effect to in this legislation. The fellowships provide funding to mid-career researchers in a critical stage in their research careers. It is funding which will foster the growth of Australian research output and build on what has to be recognised as the already outstanding calibre of Australian researchers. There is a long, long list over the last couple of centuries of Australians engaging in world-class scientific research. One can think of multiple Nobel laureates who have changed the world of science, such as Lawrence and William Bragg, Peter Doherty and Sir John Eccles. Perhaps a more recent example worth mentioning is Professor Ian Frazer of the University of Queensland, whose world-class work in the cancer area has discovered a vaccine that will assist in preventing a cancer that currently kills 250,000 women every year. If one is in any doubt about the value of research, that is a very concrete example which shows us all why research, and research at the highest possible level, is well worth supporting. This bill gives effect, in part, to the government’s commitment at all levels to supporting education, to funding education and to ensuring that Australia is not left behind in the very clear competition Australia is engaged in across the world in the development of the human capital of our country. It has been recognised for many years that investing in human capital will produce a return that will repay the investment many times over—a high rate of return. It is not simply something that sounds like common sense to anyone who has looked long and hard at education; it is this notion of human capital. Indeed, human capital economics is a discrete field of study. There are human capital economists like James Hickman at the University of Chicago—who won a Nobel prize for economics in 2000—who have been conducting research in this area for decades to show not simply as a matter of first principles or common sense but by hard research that public spending on education and skills produces high rates of return on investment for countries that go down that path. It is quite clear that there are many countries in the world that are well aware of the returns that are to be obtained by investing in education and skills. One has only got to look at the example in our region, Singapore, and, further afield, Israel to see that there are countries that almost entirely lack physical resources and are beset by various difficulties in the regions they are in, which, through measured and considered and consistent investment in skills and the human capital of their countries, have immeasurably added to the prosperity of the people of their countries. They are but two examples. Australia, which of course does not suffer from the disadvantage of being resource poor but has very many natural advantages and many other advantages as well, should build on those natural advantages and engage in investment in its human capital similar to that which Israel and Singapore have been engaging in for some time. Nations which compete with Australia are well aware of the need to invest in human capital. Those countries have been acting on that awareness. In stark contrast, Australia has not been acting on that awareness. You only have to look at the statistical work that has been published in recent years by the OECD to see just how accurate that statement is. I am going to use some of the statistics provided by the OECD, but I could not go past a very pithy introduction to the OECD’s Education at a glance: OECD indicators 2005 publication, which deals with the point I have been attempting to make about investment in human capital. It reads: Education and lifelong learning today play a critical role in the development of our economies and societies. This is true in the world’s most advanced economies as well as in those currently experiencing periods of rapid growth and development. Human capital has long been identified as a key factor in driving economic growth and improving economic outcomes for individuals, while evidence is growing of its influence on non-economic outcomes including health and social inclusion. If you go to what the statistics published by the OECD show, you see a shameful decline in public spending on education, particularly public spending on tertiary education, in Australia on the Howard government’s watch. Between 1995 and 2004, public funding of tertiary education increased by an average of 49 per cent across the OECD countries but declined by four per cent in Australia. So, in that period, very distinctly on the Howard government’s watch, Australia was the only OECD country where the total level of public funding of tertiary education decreased. One sometimes hears those on the other side speaking of an increase in private investment in tertiary education, which in Australia in the period that I am talking about—1995 to 2004—went up by some 98 per cent, but even that compares very poorly with the average OECD increase over that period of 176 per cent. Most of our competitor nations managed to increase their expenditure on tertiary education at both the public and the private level by very substantial amounts in this period. Regrettably, the policy adopted by the Howard government for its nearly 12 years in office seems to have been confined to an attempt to shift responsibility from the public sector to the private sector. So, rather than leveraging more private investment and having some kind of partnership with private investment in tertiary education, we saw a shift by the Howard government towards private investment, with a complete decline in public investment in education. What that has meant at a practical level is that there has been a shifting of the burden to individual students and their families, who are being required to pay more through higher tuition fees. I appreciate that people tend to tune out when they listen to statistics, but sometimes they tell a very important story, so I would like to mention one more. Australia is falling behind its competitors in the number of graduates in key scientific areas. In the period that I am talking about—1995 to 2004—we are way behind the OECD average for the number of engineering, manufacturing and construction graduates. We are much lower than the OECD average for the number of science and agriculture graduates. As well, one could look at the statistics for expenditure on research, which is the subject of this bill. Countries in our immediate region—Singapore, Korea, Taiwan, mainland China—have had a startlingly large increase in research output. Mainland China is now the second biggest investor in research and development in the world. But we are simply limping along here in Australia. We are, to put it directly, underinvesting in the human capital of this country not just in the long run; one suspects that in the medium term it is going to start to affect our global competitiveness, if it has not done so already. The Future Fellowships scheme will grow Australia’s research capacity. That is its purpose. It is a very welcome addition to the higher education sector. As I have attempted to show, it is a sector that was starved of investment of public funds by the coalition government in its 11½ years in government. The document that I have been referring to, the OECD’s Education at a glance report from 2005, is properly described as a report card on the coalition government’s education programs. Perhaps I will mention a couple of other statistics from that report. It showed that Australia’s public spending on education as a whole was 4.3 per cent of GDP compared to an OECD average of five per cent. It showed—and the Deputy Prime Minister spoke of this yesterday in the House—that Australia ranked 19th out of 27 OECD countries in education expenditure. The purpose of this bill is to establish these future fellowships, which are going to provide very important support to mid-career researchers who are recognised at that point as needing research support. We are all familiar with the tendency to promote bright young things, as it were, people who just come onto the scene, because they are the next best thing. I think we can accept that people who reach a certain level of eminence at the latter stages of their careers are also well supported. But this is the work done by Senator Carr over the course of this year to develop this Future Fellowships scheme and this program picks up something that is regarded as being something of a problem, that there is a lack of support for mid-career researchers, who often fall away and often cannot obtain the necessary funding for the research projects they wish to engage in. This program is going to fill that hole. I am very certain, if I can be a little parochial for a moment, that the influence of this Future Fellowships program is going to be directly felt by the tertiary institutions in the south-east of Melbourne where my electorate is located, most notably Monash University, which I can say with confidence is one of the premier research universities in the world, not merely in Australia. We see at Monash University some world-class facilities that have been built in recent years, some of them with the assistance of the Victorian state Labor government, notably the synchrotron facility but also the more recently constructed electron microscope. The electron microscope at Monash is one of only three in the world, the other two being located in Cambridge in the United Kingdom and Berkeley in California. It enables study of the atomic structure of materials. There are researchers in every field who are queueing up to use the $35 million electron microscope which has recently been constructed at Monash University. I do not have time in any sense to list all of the research activities that are taking place at Monash University. I mention, for example, the stem cell research that is being conducted at Monash or the recent program and facility that has been established for the study and production of monoclonal antibodies and a whole range of other research, particularly in the medical area, all of which is likely to be assisted by this Future Fellowships program, as indeed will be research that is being conducted at world-class facilities across our country. This bill is part of the Rudd Labor government’s education revolution. There are many other aspects to the education revolution, ranging from early childhood education programs to schools, to vocational education and training and this type of funding at the higher end of the research sector. One part of that is the investment of $11 billion in the Education Investment Fund, which is intended to provide a long-term source of funding to renew the capital of our higher education system, both university and vocational education and training systems. We will not be able to have $11 billion in the Education Investment Fund if the present opposition continues, as the Deputy Prime Minister described it yesterday in the House, its smash and grab raid on the surplus. The very newly elected Leader of the Opposition almost in his first press conference announced that the budget surplus which is needed to fund the Education Investment Fund is not going to be safe. He gave a long list of matters that apparently the opposition are going to use the surplus for. We want to invest in education. This bill is an investment in education, and I commend the bill to the chamber. 7812 10:54:00 Gray, Gary, MP 8W5 Brand ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Development and Northern Australia 1 0 Mr GRAY —I rise to speak in favour of the Australian Research Council Amendment Bill 2008. It amends the Australian Research Council Act to increase the funding limits in the special appropriation and insert new funding caps for the last year of the forward budget estimates. That is what we are formally doing here, but in reality what we are also doing is implementing a promise, a commitment made to Australians by the current Prime Minister, then opposition leader, on 14 November last year. One of the hallmarks of the new government is not just that throughout 2007 the opposition had thought carefully about what was needed to build our nation to the future but that now we are in government we are going about the process of building that nation. It is important for a range of reasons. It is important because it is how we want to act; we do what we said we would do as a government and we do it well. I will just quote from the original statement that we made almost a year ago, following all of that consideration put in by the then shadow minister, Senator Carr, in the course of 2005, 2006 and 2007. The statement from the then opposition leader read: A Rudd Labor Government will invest in new future Fellowshipsto keep Australia’s best and brightest mid-career researchers in Australia. Federal Labor’s Future Fellowships program will offer four year Fellowships valued at $140,000 a year to 1,000 of Australia’s top researchers in the middle of their career. In addition, each researcher’s institution would receive a $50,000 grant to support the purchase of related infrastructure and equipment for their research project. It goes on, but that is the simple commitment that we made. Without reading the detail of that statement—and I am happy to table it for those who are interested—I will read now from a statement made by the minister on budget night implementing this policy promise. The statement reads: The Rudd Labor Government today delivered on its election commitment of funding of $326 million over four years to create a Future Fellowships scheme for top mid-career researchers. The scheme will offer 1,000 talented Australian and international mid-career researchers four-year fellowships of up to $140,000 a year. Host organisations will receive up to an additional $50,000 a year to support related infrastructure and equipment for research projects. The outstanding work conducted by our best and brightest is the foundation stone upon which Australia is building a first-class, internationally competitive national innovation system. The remarkably identical nature of the promise and its delivery is the hallmark of a government that does what it said it would do. The importance of the science agenda to our nation has always been obvious. It has been obvious in our education and in our economy. For my generation, science has played a particularly important role, not just in the obvious area of health care but in the less obvious areas of inspiration. Throughout the 1960s we all grew up against the backdrop of the space race, of the attempts to land on the moon, of the technology that grew from the international collaborative efforts of like-minded nations and competitive efforts of not-like-minded nations to understand, interpret and grow the collective wisdom of mankind from the study of outer space. It was inspirational. Last week in Europe a massive experiment was commenced with the turning on of the Hadron Collider. My eldest boy is 12. The interest he took in the television coverage of that special scientific event is heartening, and the education that took place in our schools around that event is inspiring. But, most importantly, it brings home to our kids, to the next generation, that the pursuit of science is not only important in itself but also underpins the essential parts of our industry and supports our living standards for the future. In this bill, we commit $942.9 million over four years. As I said, it is an election commitment fulfilled. It is an election commitment that fits into the four pillars of the current government’s education revolution. We have early intervention in education to support the needs of young kids, especially young kids at risk. We have the digital education revolution. All of us in this place have had the opportunity to be in high schools at the moment that the principals receive computers, and we have seen on the faces of the kids in the schools in our electorates the passion about and the embracing of this great investment in technology and in the future of education for our kids. We have a massive program through our TAFEs in training the workforce to meet the skills challenges of the future. In my electorate of Brand, which encompasses the Kwinana industrial precinct, we can see a future where up to 40 per cent of our current workforce will retire in no more than four to five years. In six or seven years, the current workforce will have seen a 50 per cent reduction in its current numbers. Less than four per cent of our current workforce are aged under 24. Training forms an important part of our education revolution, but this particular bill relates to research and research in universities. Prior to coming into parliament, I spent a year as an executive director of the Western Australian Institute for Medical Research. In that role, it became apparent to me what great gains could be made out of medical research. Importantly, I noted some of the very good things that were being done by Michael Wooldridge, the then Minister for Health. Minister Wooldridge put in place significant investment in medical research and created what he referred to as a ‘virtuous cycle’ to put major medical research into public hospitals to create a health benefit that was more significant than almost any other direct investment that could have been made in modern medicine in our public health system. The equation went as simply as this: people involved in public health will, when exposed to the best possible science, lift their game. It means our doctors are exposed to better ideas. It means our nurses and our hospital administrators are more alert to scientific method. It creates a linkage between medical research and, most importantly, science based, evidence based medicine in our public hospitals. It is a legacy that Michael Wooldridge left to our nation through his occupancy of the health portfolio throughout those years in the late 1990s. It is a legacy that stands our public hospitals around the nation in good stead. We have seen since that time the massive growth of the medical research community in Queensland. Throughout the middle to late 1990s, former Premier Kennett in Victoria built a significant foundation of medical research off the back of existing institutions such as the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute in Melbourne. It may sound surprising that there is such a history and tradition in the last 20 years or so of support for science research. It is unfortunate that, in the course of the last five to seven years, science grants and research funding from the former Howard government in its latter years became hopelessly politically tainted. It is a reality that many of the secure principles that underpinned the initiatives of the Kennett government and of Michael Wooldridge as health minister became polluted by political interference in science research through the last five to seven years. This bill understands the importance of proper process, it understands the importance of peer review in creating excellent science, and it understands the importance of transparency in decision making around what good science is going to be funded. As we look forward over the next five or 10 years, Australia stands poised to make significant research investments in tropical science, an area where we can lead the world. In Western Australia there is a magnificent bid for a radio telescope that has the capacity not just to explore the far reaches of the universe but also to build an industry—a high-end science research based industry—around a magnificent piece of infrastructure that we all hope will actually be put in place. Importantly, there are massive investments that we can make in horticulture, in agricultural science and in social sciences. But, as we look at the ways in which our nation will make those investments, we need also to be aware that nations in our region are actually investing more than we do at this moment and more, even, than this bill will commit. Not even our $11 billion Education Investment Fund, which currently is at risk as the opposition parties in the Senate go about whittling it away, will put us on the same stage as nations to our north. In the course of the last 15 years, the Chinese economic miracle has been driven by a number of factors: human ingenuity, a capacity to capture resources, a willingness to educate the population and an understanding that investment in science is what drives good education and good industrial policy. I come from the state of Western Australia. Our agricultural dominance is that we create the nation’s export grain crop. We have done that on the basis of outstanding agricultural science, understanding what trace elements need to be added to our otherwise ancient and arid soils. That research has created a situation where this year our grain crop will probably top 10 million tonnes in a year that has seen indifferent, variable and scant rainfalls through our critical wheat belt. It is important to remember that the wheat belt in Western Australia has grown on the back of agricultural science and has grown to a dominant position from a period at the start of the last century where our farmers literally died of starvation because of a lack of understanding of what trace elements were needed to be added to our soils. If we fast-forward to the first decade of the current century, we see the Western Australian grain belt leading the nation in its productivity, its application of scientific method and its prospects for the future. Science in Western Australia goes even further than agriculture. We have all seen in recent years the celebration over our own Western Australian scientific Nobel laureates. The discovery of the heliobacter at Royal Perth Hospital in the mid-1980s created a scientific understanding of how ulcers were formed and how to treat and get rid of the problem of ulcers. At the time, in the early 1980s, it was generally accepted that, if you were a sedentary person, if you were aged over 40, if you had stress in your life, that is why you got ulcers. Barry Marshall and his team discovered that in fact the heliobacter created the ulcerous condition, and treatment of the heliobacter could easily remove the ulcers, in the main in the stomach and throat regions of the body. That research was done in a public hospital, with very little public funding. It was done against a prevailing view that said the research was nonsense. It was done in an environment where research was not peer reviewed, where grants were not transparently given and where, in effect, a mates system was in place. Australian science is better than that, and this bill aspires to and creates the preconditions to make our science better than that. This bill is therefore about good science. The bill is also about saying what you mean and doing what you say. Throughout 2005 and 2006, then Shadow Minister Kim Carr made clear that he wanted a better research environment, a better funded research environment and therefore better outcomes. It is important that in this place we acknowledge the great work of ministers of the past—and I have done that by mentioning the work of Michael Wooldridge—but it is important also as we look to the future to understand that, in science, transparency and funding go hand in hand. It is also important that we know, recognise and understand that the threats to the $11 billion Education Investment Fund, also created in the federal budget, are serious threats. Not just are they threats about politics; they are threats to our capacity to meet the world as we need to meet it and to build an environment in our schools, in our universities and in our research centres that allows us to grow, to obtain benefits for our lifestyles and to obtain benefits for our economy from outstanding research. I commend this bill to the House. 7815 Distinguished Visitors 10000 Bird, Sharon (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Ms S Bird)—I take this opportunity to let the chamber know that we have with us this morning members of the committee staff of the National Assembly of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. On behalf of the Main Committee, I extend a warm welcome to our visitors. Honourable members—Hear, hear! 7815 Bills R3063 Debate resumed. 7815 11:12:00 Symon, Mike, MP HW8 Deakin ALP 1 0 Mr SYMON —I rise today to speak in support of the Australian Research Council Amendment Bill 2008. This bill before the House is yet another Rudd Labor commitment that was promised at the last election and is now being delivered by the Rudd government. The Australian Research Council was originally established through the Employment, Education and Training Act 1988 but later it became an independent statutory body under that act. The functions of the ARC are to provide advice to the government on research matters, to administer the National Competitive Grants Program and to make recommendations to the minister on the allocation of funds for that program. The National Competitive Grants Program covers two main elements: Discovery and Linkage. Discovery projects provide funding for individual researchers of projects across many varied areas of research. Linkage projects are about getting government, industry, community organisations and higher education providers to support cooperative research. Future Fellowships will be administered as a new scheme under the Discovery element of the National Competitive Grants Program. This bill provides nearly $950 million over the forward estimates for ARC funding, both for the ARC’s existing research schemes and for the new Future Fellowships scheme as proposed in the bill. It provides funding for the establishment of the Future Fellowships scheme, which will provide opportunities for mid-career researchers of significant ability to undertake important research in Australia. The bill also provides indexation to existing appropriation amounts in the act—and these are quite substantial. It provides an additional out-year financial forward estimate, being the amount of $731 million for the financial year starting 1 July 2011. The Future Fellowships scheme will make available funding for 1,000 four-year fellowships over the next five years. At present, many highly qualified mid-career researchers find they have few options to work locally and have to go overseas to further their careers. The aim of the Future Fellowships scheme is to attract and retain Australia’s best and brightest international mid-career researchers, and Future Fellowships provides an incentive for overseas based Australian researchers to return home after gaining important and valuable international experience in their fields. The four-year fellowships will offer up to $140,000 a year to mid-career researchers, along with funding of up to $50,000 a year for the researcher’s administrating organisation to assist in the funding of travel, infrastructure and equipment. In recent months, as a member of the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Innovation, I have been privileged to be present at every hearing of the inquiry into research training and research workforce issues in Australian universities. As that inquiry has gone around the country there have been many submissions taken and some very interesting evidence put before the committee. Although the inquiry is not yet finished, I can certainly comment on some of the public submissions that have been handed up. Overall there has been great support for the Future Fellowships scheme coming from many universities and other organisations involved in research and associated fields. Universities such as Edith Cowan University in Western Australia commended the scheme as announced in the budget. The Curtin University of Technology, also in Western Australia, welcomed the new and exciting initiatives such as the Future Fellowships and the existing ARC fellowships. They applauded these, saying they will assist in attracting and retaining mid-career and senior researchers. The University of Sydney noted the difficulty in transferring from ARC research fellowships and QE2 fellowships to Australian professional fellowships and sees the introduction of the Future Fellowships scheme as a good potential solution to the issue, along with its helping to support the National Health and Medical Research fellowship system. The University of Sydney submission also noted that low salaries and esteem in Australia are an issue and that the federation fellowships were good in this regard. The new future fellowships should help in terms of attracting new researchers back. Victoria University’s submission calls for initiatives to be developed to encourage mid-career researchers and sees the launch of the ARC Future Fellowships as encouraging and a good start in an area where more needs to be and should be done. The University of Western Sydney submission notes that future fellowships for mid-career academics could play a strong role in providing opportunities for career advancement for research graduates and staff while calling for a priority in the allocation of these fellowships to attracting researchers to the sector rather than rewarding those already in it. The University of New South Wales submission welcomes the Future Fellowships program as the first step to providing an attractive entry back into Australia for overseas based researchers. And the submission from the University of South Australia describes the Future Fellowships scheme as an excellent initiative with the opportunity to recruit 1,000 outstanding international and national mid-career researchers to Australia, but calls for more investment to lift Australia’s international competitiveness in research. Monash University in my home state of Victoria in its submission also welcomes the announcement of a four-year investment of $326 million to be directed to funding future fellowships designed to attract and retain 1,000 talented mid-career researchers from both Australia and abroad. The inquiry submission from the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations also welcomes the scheme as a significant first step in addressing the urgent need for more opportunities for mid-career researchers whilst also noting that early-career researchers could benefit from a similar scheme. The submission from the Innovative Research Universities Australia group, which comprises Flinders, Griffith, James Cook, La Trobe, Macquarie, Murdoch and Newcastle universities, notes that Future Fellowships is a very welcome initiative aimed at enhancing career pathways through the provision of opportunities for mid-career researchers. If Australia aims to be a smart nation, we must invest in research and innovation to keep ahead of the world. Future Fellowships is an important funding component that will help us achieve this goal. The announcement on 3 September by Senator Kim Carr, the Minister for Innovation, Science and Research, of the Australian Laureate Fellowships scheme adds another important component to this investment. The Australian Laureate Fellowships will provide opportunities to researchers at the peak of their careers, thus providing a path beyond the mid-career funding we are talking about with this bill. With $239 million to be allocated over five years, the program will be run by the ARC alongside the Future Fellowships scheme. As I said before, in going around the country on the inquiry and talking to so many different people in different universities about their training and research and about what they see is wrong with the current system, it came through time and time again that the lack of a career path actually meant that many people missed out, were pushed out or lost interest. There is a hole where we need them in research. There are not enough people there; there is not enough attractiveness for some to stay in the system. They go out and work in industry—and I cannot blame them for that, because they have lives to lead and they do need to earn money to live—but we need to make sure that with proper funding we stay in front of the game. The introduction of both of these schemes demonstrates the Rudd government’s commitment to fostering research and excellence along with building a stronger and more diverse research community. I commend this bill to the House. 7817 11:21:00 Vamvakinou, Maria, MP 00AMT Calwell ALP 1 0 Ms VAMVAKINOU —I rise to speak in support of the Australian Research Council Amendment Bill 2008 currently before the House. This bill provides funding for the Rudd Labor government’s new Future Fellowships scheme—an initiative Labor first announced prior to the last election. This is a scheme that has been widely welcomed and much anticipated by Australia’s research community. I can attest to that anticipation because, as the chair of the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Innovation, I can confirm the comments that were made by the member for Deakin in relation to the evidence that has come before us in the many public hearings that the committee is currently conducting around the country. It is a much anticipated bill, from the research community’s perspective. It is anticipated because the Rudd government’s Future Fellowships scheme begins to tackle one of the key challenges we face in Australia in the area of research, and that is the continuing exodus of some of our best and brightest mid-career researchers. Whilst overseas exposure, international research collaboration and greater integration are all crucial to the continuing development and future of Australian research, we continue to lose many of our best and brightest mid-career researchers to lucrative job opportunities overseas that usually offer more money for research, better research infrastructure and more support. The allure of overseas positions is further compounded by the lack of distinct career pathways and adequate support for many early- and mid-career researchers in Australia. This is a problem that this government is determined to tackle in a definitive and decisive way. The value of research and the importance of expanding Australia’s research capacity cannot be overstated. Research is associated with innovation, new discoveries, new ideas, technological breakthroughs, critical debate, creativity and dissent, as well as new ways of seeing the world and understanding our place in it. This is true of the research that is undertaken across all disciplines, whether we are talking about traditional sciences, arts, humanities or social sciences. Failing to recognise the critical role research plays in driving progress and carving out new opportunities, and failing to support excellence in Australian research is simply not an option in today’s competitive global environment, where the demand for new and cutting-edge technologies has never been greater and the emergence of global challenges, like climate change, requires us to find new ways of doing things. Innovation is a pathway to progress and to optimising our competitive advantages, and quality research is the foundation on which innovation is built. If we are to go forward as a nation, confident in our ability not only to meet the challenges that lie ahead but also to take advantage of the opportunities that tomorrow is sure to bring, then boosting our support for Australian research and investing in Australian talent is crucial. That is why this bill and the Rudd government’s Future Fellowships scheme are so important. The Future Fellowships scheme will encourage mid-career researchers to stay in Australia and continue their research at Australian universities. It also provides an incentive for outstanding international mid-career researchers to conduct their research in Australia. Under the Future Fellowships scheme, the Rudd government will offer up to 1,000 four-year fellowships to some of our best and brightest mid-career researchers over the next five years. Preference will be given to those researchers who can demonstrate a capacity to collaborate across industry and/or research institutions and/or with other disciplines. Each successful applicant will receive up to $140,000 a year over the four-year period of their fellowship, and host organisations will receive up to an additional $50,000 a year to support related infrastructure and equipment for research projects. The Future Fellowships scheme is due to commence in early 2009 and will cost $844 million over three years. This is an $844 million investment that the Rudd Labor government is making in Australian research which will provide critical support to some of our most promising mid-career researchers, who are often at a pivotal point in their careers and whose most promising work often lies ahead. By encouraging more of our top mid-career researchers to conduct their research in Australia and by attracting top mid-career researchers to Australia from overseas, the Future Fellowships scheme targets a particularly important tier in the research cycle, one that Australia can no longer afford to ignore. The Rudd government’s Future Fellowships scheme is about fostering research excellence in Australia and expanding our research capacity, providing added incentive and offering additional support to Australian researchers at a time when research in Australia has been on the back foot. The last decade has not been kind to Australian research. In government spending and investment in research we have fallen well behind many of our international competitors. Under the Howard government, Commonwealth spending on research and innovation dropped 22 per cent as a share of GDP and, to our great shame, we became the only OECD country where public funding for tertiary education actually declined. Growth in the number of students commencing research degrees has stalled. For the first time on record, business investment in R&D actually fell between 1996 and 1997 and 1999 and 2000. It should be remembered that business accounts for a large share of spending on research and development in Australia. It is one of the core engine rooms driving innovation in this country, yet between 1995 and 2004 Australia was one of only three OECD countries to reduce its tax benefits for business research and development. Not only did we do so at a time when most other OECD countries were increasing their level of support for business R&D but, of the three countries to reduce R&D tax benefits, Australia made the deepest cuts. This is not a record that those sitting opposite should be proud of and it is certainly not one that the Rudd Labor government intends to repeat. It paints a stark picture of the challenges we now face in trying to turn around the fortunes of Australian research and breathe new life into research and development. This is not to say that Australian research has somehow dropped off the international radar, however. When it comes to research, Australia is blessed with enormous talent and creative drive. Despite the last decade of neglect, Australian researchers have continued to make significant breakthroughs in a number of areas. For all of us it should be a great source of pride that Australia produces three per cent of the world’s research papers despite accounting for just 0.3 per cent of the world’s population. It is our responsibility to match this commitment, drive and talent on the ground and in universities across the country by providing Australian researchers with the level of support they deserve. That is what the Future Fellowships scheme is designed to do. More importantly, the scheme is part of a broader program announced by the Rudd Labor government to invest in, and provide greater support for, Australian researchers and research institutions. In April last year, Labor released a 10-point plan to boost Australia’s innovation performance. The plan included a commitment to invest in knowledge creation. The Future Fellowships scheme is part of that commitment. The plan also identified the need to accelerate knowledge transfer, a goal that underpins the Rudd government’s new Enterprise Connect network that links Australian industry and business to new ideas, new research and the latest technologies capable of giving them a competitive advantage over their international counterparts. The 10-point plan also includes a promise to internationalise Australia’s innovations. Opening up Australian Research Council and CSIRO programs to overseas participants is one such example. It includes a promise to strengthen innovation infrastructure, which is precisely why the Rudd Labor government has announced its $500 million Better Universities Renewal Fund, as well as the $11 billion Education Investment Fund introduced by the Treasurer in the last budget. Labor also committed to investing in skills and training to combat the chronic skills crisis we have inherited from the previous, Howard government. Halving HECS fees to encourage more students to study maths and science at university, doubling the number of available undergraduate scholarships and investing in trades training centres in secondary schools across Australia are all part of that commitment. We promised to improve transparency in governance when it came to Australia’s innovation system, a motivation that underpins the Rudd government’s decision to establish industry innovation councils and appoint an ARC advisory board. Focusing incentives for business R&D, developing a set of national innovation priorities and improving government innovation programs were also included under Labor’s 10-point plan, with each of these recently the subject of Dr Terry Cutler’s review of Australia’s national innovation system. The government is due to respond to this review with a policy white paper by year’s end. While there is still a long way to go, the Rudd government has wasted no time in laying the foundations needed to foster research excellence in Australia and to take Australian research in a new and exciting direction. In addition to future fellowships, the Rudd government recently announced its $239 million Australian Laureate Fellowships scheme, a program that will provide Australian laureate fellows with funding of up to $3 million over a five-year period for research projects that promise to deliver significant national benefits to Australians. Each year, 15 new Australian laureate fellows will be identified for funding over a five-year period. By also funding postdoctoral and postgraduate researchers under this scheme, the Rudd government is helping to build world-class teams that will give rise to the next generation of research leaders. For a country like Australia, promoting international research collaboration is particularly important. As a net importer of knowledge, promoting the freest possible flow of information and forging stronger links in terms of overseas partnerships and research collaborations has obvious benefits for Australia. That is why the government is opening up Australian postgraduate industry awards currently available under the ARC linkage scheme and allowing them to be awarded to the highest calibre postgraduate students irrespective of nationality. It is also why we are the removing restrictions on the use of ARC funds for travel for international collaborators and making enhanced international collaboration a priority for all ARC fellowship schemes. Greater collaboration, connectivity and building stronger links are all vital when it comes to expanding our domestic research capabilities and better positioning ourselves to take advantage of the opportunities that exist in today’s increasingly integrated world. Not only does that mean building stronger links between research institutions in Australia and their counterparts overseas; it also means building greater partnerships between industry, the research sector and government within Australia. Indigenous researchers and Indigenous studies research also stand to benefit from the Rudd government’s raft of new research initiatives. Recently the ARC and the Australian Institute for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies concluded an in-principle agreement to enhance funding arrangements for Indigenous researchers and research studies. This includes a commitment to create new Australian research fellowships specifically targeting Indigenous research studies and Indigenous researchers. With a planned start date of 2010, these new fellowships will be available under the ARC Discovery Indigenous Researchers Development scheme and will complement, though be more senior to, Indigenous researcher fellowships. Earlier this year, the Rudd government announced the establishment of the Excellence in Research for Australia initiative, which is set to begin replacing the Research Quality Framework in 2009. These are all important initiatives and they all announce the Rudd government’s commitment to fostering research excellence and building a robust national innovation system in Australia. The Future Fellowships scheme is part of that future, so I am happy to recommend this bill to the House. 7821 11:35:00 McKew, Maxine, MP BP4 Bennelong ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Early Childhood Education and Childcare 1 0 Ms McKEW —I rise, as the last speaker, to speak in support of the Australian Research Council Amendment Bill 2008 and to sum up debate on it. I thank all speakers for their contribution to this important debate. This bill provides extra funding of around $950 million over the forward estimates for the Australian Research Council to implement the Future Fellowships funding scheme and for indexation and continued funding of the ARC’s funding schemes. It is a measure that underpins the delivery of the Future Fellowships scheme and, as such, provides much needed funding which will support researchers of high capability, particularly those classified as mid-career researchers. Commencing in 2009, up to 200 new future fellowships will be awarded per year. Over a five-year period, from 2009-2013, Future Fellowships will offer four-year funding of up to $140,000 a year to 1,000 top Australian and international researchers in the middle of their careers. In addition, each of the administering organisations will receive funding of up to $50,000 per year to support the related infrastructure, equipment, travel and relocation costs. The fellowships will be administered as a new scheme under the Discovery element of the National Competitive Grants Program. This is a significant initiative that sends the clear message to our best and brightest that we value their talents. We are saying, ‘You are our national treasures, the brains trust of the nation.’ In recent weeks, we have been captivated by the work of a group of researchers in Switzerland. On 10 September this year, the group sent the first beam around the 27 kilometres of the world’s most powerful particle accelerator complex, the Large Hadron Collider. While the recent work of these researchers has received worldwide attention, what is instructive to point out is that getting to this point has involved over two decades of preparation. Indeed, the basis of the research comes from the original work done by Isaac Newton on gravity hundreds of years ago. I, like many others around the world, will continue to follow the progress of this research with fascination. Indeed, it holds out the great promise of unlocking some of the secrets of the universe. Equally, when we come to the measures in this bill, the outstanding work conducted by our most talented researchers is the foundation stone upon which Australia is building a world-class, internationally competitive innovation economy and, of course, some of the attention-grabbing scientific breakthroughs that we all want to see. It is essential that we encourage, support and nurture generations of exceptional Australian and international researchers. The Australian government values the important contribution made by researchers to our community’s short- and long-term prosperity and is committed to fostering research talent at all levels. The Future Fellowships scheme will act as an additional incentive to attract high-calibre researchers in all disciplines across the spectrum of pure, strategic and applied research. All in all, the government has committed to a suite of improvements to ARC funding which will enhance international collaboration opportunities for our research community. Alongside the Future Fellowships scheme will sit the recently announced Australian Laureate Fellowships scheme, which will allow the best research leaders in the world to qualify, while ensuring that most of that work is done in Australia. In addition, under the ARC linkage scheme, Australian postgraduate awards are available for the highest calibre postgraduate students, irrespective of nationality. Other changes include removing restrictions on the use of ARC funds for travel for international collaboration and making sure that enhanced international collaboration is in fact a priority for all ARC schemes. Some of these changes put the ARC at the forefront of internationalism, in comparison with some of their overseas counterparts. In other instances, this new approach to publicly funded research in Australia will bring ARC schemes into line with the current best practice of agencies elsewhere. This approach is about investing in the creation of new knowledge and supporting the application of that knowledge for the benefit of the community, a community in which smart economies can do well. It will certainly be welcome in my own electorate of Bennelong, an area with an emerging technology corridor which is increasingly linked to the very fine research efforts of Macquarie University. We know that if we invest in knowledge it has spin-offs, not just for individual students, academics and institutions but also for the broader community as we build a knowledge based society to underpin both productivity growth and social inclusion. An important part of this is knowledge transfer and exchange between companies and universities, which is not just about commercialisation but also about the production of smart, reflective graduates with critical thinking and communication skills. Certainly, the emerging technology corridor that I speak of around North Ryde requires all of these skills as well as the technical capabilities to develop new products, new business models and markets. Interaction with local universities, as happens with Macquarie, is critical to that success. I am confident that as we see the rollout of these initiatives and the other points that I have made—the future fellowships and the laureates—innovation centres across the country will benefit. The higher education sector is certainly going to be a major beneficiary. This, as other speakers on this side have pointed out, is in stark contrast to what we have seen in recent years. We should not forget that the Howard government presided over a four per cent decline in public funding of higher education between 1995 and 2004. This compared with an average increase of 49 per cent among other OECD countries. Even taking into account private funding, total funding per student dropped by one per cent, as against a nine per cent increase across the OECD. As a result, Australia lags in the most recent OECD composite measure of investment in knowledge. These are the kinds of figures that are lamented by researchers and senior academics. The figures also help explain why, after strong productivity growth in the 1990s off the back of the reforms of the Hawke-Keating era, productivity growth in fact stalled completely after 2003. It is why the new Dean of Business at the University of Technology in Sydney, Professor Roy Green, has concluded that our good fortune in recent years has been due not to wise stewardship but, in fact, to being able to compensate for the productivity slowdown with the wealth effects of an entirely fortuitous commodity boom. What we need of course to reverse this mentality is, as I have said, an innovation economy, and that is embraced by the Rudd government. By investing more in our best and brightest, we will help achieve this goal and put in place the building blocks for a real transformation. As Professor Green further points out, we need to reconnect with the unfinished business of the Karpin review of 1995 and put a fresh focus on building innovative capability in Australia’s workplaces. All in all, it is now time to honour this effort and our researchers and provide them with the support they need. One of the country’s outstanding scientific talents, the Nobel prize winner Professor Peter Doherty, has said on many occasions that Australia cannot afford to waste its best and brightest; that they require decent long-term prospects if they are to make the discoveries and forge the high technology companies that we need. The development of excellent researchers is perhaps the single most important objective of any innovation system, and the returns from investment have been quantified. A 2003 Allen Consulting report said that the returns on investment in ARC funded research were high in absolute terms and high relative to the average returns associated with all publicly funded research. In conclusion I would again like to thank everyone who spoke on this bill. I appreciate the input of all. The bill will provide funding for the Future Fellowships Establishment budget measure. It will also apply indexation to existing appropriation amounts in the act and create an additional out-year financial forward estimate. The government intends to provide around $900 million over nine years for the Future Fellowships scheme. It is one of a number of initiatives that we have introduced to improve our research capacity. The funding will be through the ARC and will continue to provide significant and diverse benefits to the Australian community, which is why I commend this bill to the House. Bill read a second time. Message from the Governor-General recommending appropriation announced. Ordered that the bill be reported to the House without amendment. 7823 Bills R3053 7823 Debate resumed from 16 September, on motion by Mr Albanese: That this bill be now read a second time. 7823 11:45:00 Macfarlane, Ian, MP WN6 Groom LP 0 0 Mr IAN MACFARLANE —I am happy to rise today to speak on the AusLink (National Land Transport) Amendment Bill 2008. Not only is the AusLink program very important in my electorate but it remains at the front of mind for many people in regional electorates as well as urban electorates. The bill has several purposes. Most importantly, it extends the coalition’s popular and successful Roads to Recovery program. It also changes the definition of a road to allow for the funding of heavy vehicle facilities such as rest stops and parking bays and allows funds under the Roads to Recovery program to be preserved while determinations are made as to who is the most appropriate entity to receive them. AusLink, which was established by the Howard government, has been extraordinarily successful in delivering transport infrastructure on a national scale and, just as importantly, at a regional level. It has been a forward-thinking and forward-reaching plan that has provided crucial road and rail upgrades right across Australia. Some of those road and rail upgrades have not only made our communities safer but boosted our productivity and particularly our export ability. This was not a haphazard plan but a carefully detailed and implemented series of projects to provide for the needs of both city and regional residents. The AusLink program was so effective in providing for Australia’s infrastructure requirements that in May last year the coalition government announced a record amount of $22.3 billion for AusLink 2 to continue the work. That formed the centre of an overall $30 billion in roads and rail infrastructure that we took to the last election. AusLink has been a successful program because it is so comprehensive. It considers large-scale projects of national significance alongside smaller community projects under the Roads to Recovery program. With the Roads to Recovery program in particular, we are able to bypass the state governments, who, in the past, have squirrelled this money away and allocated it on a political seat basis rather than see local communities and local councils receive the money. As I mentioned, one of the features of this bill is that it retains the popular Roads to Recovery program. I am glad to see that on this issue the Rudd government has embraced the foresight of the previous government. This bill extends the Roads to Recovery program from 1 July 2009 to 30 June 2014, allowing for this good work to continue. The Roads to Recovery program provides for road upgrades right across this vast nation of ours. These are roads that workers and families travel on, day in, day out, to get to their jobs, their schools, their rural properties or to businesses or commercial operations the length and breadth of Australia. The Roads to Recovery program has made a real difference to people’s lives. That is not a theory; that is actually what has happened in practice. Upgrades and repairs made under this program have addressed priorities across Australia’s vast network of roads. This has been of great assistance to local councils. In my electorate of Groom we have seen real road improvements fast-tracked because this money was able to be delivered direct to the council. The council, the local people on the ground who are using the roads every day, are able to ensure that the money is spent in the right place. As I said, doing that bypasses the state governments, who have tried to use this money in the past for other purposes. It has also been able to address particularly—again, in my electorate but I know this is the case right across the nation—the neglect of Labor state governments of roads that are absolutely their responsibility, address the neglect that Labor governments have continued particularly in regional Australia. We have seen the final realisation of that in the backlash of regional areas towards the Western Australian government. That government, which was a terrible government in so many regards, luckily has been thrown out of office and replaced by a government which will be an alliance between the Liberal and National parties and which will, between the Liberal Party and the National Party, ensure that regional areas are taken care of. The Roads to Recovery program will be part of that but the funding will still, as I said, go directly to councils. It is concerning that as we look at roads in Australia we see that the Rudd government, as it is doing everywhere, is all talk and no action. If we look at the situation with roads, we see quite clearly that the Rudd government is not listening when it comes to the rest of the AusLink package. Instead, it is imposing shackles on motorists and families so that this government can use AusLink for its political advantage. I am disappointed that the member for Oxley has left the chamber, because he knows only too well the problems that his constituents face as a result of changes this Rudd government has made to the Howard government’s plans to build roads. I will come back to that in a moment. This government must live up to its obligations to deliver road and infrastructure funding, not just in capital cities but in regional and rural Australia as well. So far there have been alarming signs on this count as the government has overlooked the needs of regional Australia, not just on roads but practically on every service provision coming from the Commonwealth. While local communities may be relieved that the Roads to Recovery program has avoided the Rudd government razor gang, the Rudd government has shown that it is able to in fact even mess that up. It is disappointing that this government refuses to honour the other commitments made under AusLink. Along with providing millions of dollars to fix local roads, AusLink projects of particular significance in Queensland have been delayed or in some cases completely put off the page. In my area, the proposed Toowoomba Range crossing is a road that I accept has been very difficult to get past the bean counters. It is a $2 billion road that would service only 25,000 to 27,000 vehicles a day. If you compare that to Ipswich Road, which services 100,000 vehicles a day and is at capacity, or the Gateway motorway, which services a similar number, the investment required in the Toowoomba Range crossing is enormous. It had taken me 10 years—which I accept is 10 years too many—to get to the stage where we had government funding for that proposal, where we had $700 million allocated in last year’s budget as a result of my relentless efforts to ensure that the residents of Toowoomba do not have driving down their main street heavy vehicles like cattle trucks and what goes with them. I will not enlighten the chamber as to what falls out of cattle trucks while they are driving along: it is legal but smelly, and I am not talking about engine emissions. That sort of heavy transport, along with trucks carrying heavy freight, minerals and coal, are all traversing Toowoomba’s main street, not only endangering the lives of people who have to use that road to get to school but also creating an enormous cost for the transport industry as they negotiate the traffic lights up and down James Street and, as a result of that, add to our greenhouse gas emissions. The Toowoomba Range crossing has been on the drawing boards for probably 30 years, and now we are seeing the residents of Toowoomba taking up the issue themselves, because what we have seen from this government is a minister who is prepared to play politics now with the lives and the needs of the people of Toowoomba. On the previous sitting Thursday, the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government stood up in the House and said to the coalition members, including me, who had asked for funding for roads that if we did not support the new taxes that his government was trying to pass in the Senate then he would make sure we got no money. He would make sure that the coalition seats were not funded. In case anyone has any doubt about that, they can consult the Hansard, where the minister said: Well, they cannot have it both ways. If that is not him saying to me, ‘If you don’t pass our new taxes you will get no money,’ I do not know anything. That was not only a threat against the constituents of Toowoomba but a threat against the democratic processes of government. We have a Senate which is entitled to review legislation, but this government has quite dishonestly gone to the electorate not mentioning new taxes and then has said to the Senate, ‘If you don’t pass our new taxes, all of the people who have written to me aren’t going to get anything.’ He had a folder which was quite big, and I asked him to table my letter and he did. I was proud to have it tabled because it showed that as a local member I was standing up for my people. In doing that he said to all those constituents of all those coalition people, ‘You are going to get nothing unless they agree to our new taxes.’ That is an absolute disgrace. I sit here after having spent 10 years on this and having successfully got $43 million for the prefeasibility works on that range crossing, having successfully used my influence and my persuasive powers and, dare I say, my charm to get $2 billion out of the federal government, to get them to commit $700 million in the budget last May. Now that money has been ripped off the table and I have been threatened across the chamber by a minister who is only ever interested in politics and looking after his people in his seat in Sydney. The inner-city seats are important but they are no more important than all those other seats that make up this wonderful country of ours. Without this range crossing, not only will Toowoomba’s economic growth be affected but the economic growth of seats right across northern Australia will be affected. If the minister looked closely, he would see he is affecting the economic growth of Labor held seats, of seats like those of the members in the Northern Territory, seats like Solomon, as trucks pass through my city to take freight to Darwin. What the minister does not understand, as he plays politics at every opportunity, is that he is actually hurting people he claims to represent, not to mention threatening the people that I represent. Whenever we talk to the Rudd government these days about money for roads, we get a long litany of reviews and reconsiderations and buck-passing and blame—all the things we have got used to from this government. And at the same time the safety of motorists and the economic efficiency and growth of Australia and its people are stalled. As in so many areas of the Rudd government, we see a review taking place that kills the momentum that was already building up. AusLink was a program that was introduced by our government. Everyone would have liked to have seen more money in it but we cannot forget that we had to pay off $96 billion worth of debt. In doing that we set aside money to ensure that telecommunications and universities of the future were also funded and that the superannuation of defence personnel and public servants was also covered. But that is done. We gave this government a balance sheet which would be the envy of any government in the world. We gave them a balance sheet where they had the opportunity to honour the commitments that our government had made. In the case of the Toowoomba Range crossing, we provided the money for it in the May budget last year; we gave them the opportunity to do something. What have they done? They have cut the budget. They cut the budget so that they could build up an enormous slush fund. Probably next year and perhaps the year after—if they go that far—they will reallocate this money to urban seats that the Labor Party hold and want to win. The process has gone out the window. The certainty has gone out the window. The $43 million that has been spent on the Toowoomba Range crossing as a result of my efforts and the beginning of work on that new road, which was due to commence this year, have been put on the backburner while we have yet another review. Roads are very important, but we see the Rudd Labor government ‘announcing’ the scoping study of a project in my electorate which had already been given the green light by the previous Howard government. It was not just a green light: $700 million was allocated in last year’s budget. It is not just roads that are important under AusLink: there is a very strong need for the development of rail links in Australia to carry the freight task. This is a freight task which will double over the next two years, a freight task which will grow as we grow and prosper—and we can only hope that we grow and prosper; I must admit that the first 10 months are not too hopeful. We have seen real wages fall because inflation is eating up the gains made by the previous government. The government cannot do anything about petrol even though they said they could. They have admitted they cannot do anything about grocery prices even though they had said they could. They have admitted that they cannot do anything about just about everything unless they have a review. So we are seeing unemployment starting to go up. We see concerns out in the community amongst small business and amongst the investment community. But, if the economy keeps growing, we are going to see that freight task double and we are going to need more freight carried by rail. Depending on the foresight of the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government—and I hope that foresight is there—we will see in my electorate the establishment of an inland rail link, which initially may terminate at Toowoomba. That freight will then have to be moved to Brisbane by road, which is why the range crossing is so important. That inland rail link will link, predominantly by rail, Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane. By continuing that rail link up to Gladstone, we will have the opportunity to open up the resources of western Queensland. But this does need a coherent policy from government. It needs a government that is prepared to make the hard decisions. It needs a government that does not continually pass the buck and try to blame other people for the situation. In the last moments of this speech, I will also touch on an area that the current government is trying to ram through—increases in heavy vehicle registration fees—where it is making a $70 million heavy vehicle safety and productivity package dependent on parliamentary approval of the fee hikes. The transport industry in Australia plays an incredibly important part in servicing not only our economy but also the needs of people with goods and consumables. Making the safety package contingent on the passing of another tax grab against truck drivers shows again that this government is putting politics ahead of safety and ahead of the viability of the trucking industry. There are things that can be done in the trucking industry, things that both sides of this House should support. There is the technology now to use things like GPS and satellite communications to ensure that the performance of drivers is compliant with the rules and regulations in relation to truck driving. As one of the few people in this House who has a heavy vehicle licence, I am all for strong regulation and strong enforcement of that regulation, but I am not in favour of truckies being fined because they have forgotten to put a full stop or to cross a ‘t’ in their logbooks. We need to look at the opportunities. We need to work with the trucking industry to introduce and trial some of these technologies that will allow truckies to get on with the business—that is, driving these trucks safely—and will allow their driving to be monitored in such a way that the pedantry and pettiness that go on now over whether or not the logbooks are filled out correctly can be set to one side. Not only will we get a more accurate picture of how these trucks are being driven but we will enhance the safety of all road users. I recommend that members of the House look at proposals that are being put forward by the Australian Trucking Association and people like David Simon from Simon Transport, in my electorate, not only to have better and safer monitoring but to relieve truckies of the burden of paperwork that they inevitably find themselves tied up in by those who sit opposite. 7827 12:05:00 Bradbury, David, MP HVW Lindsay ALP 1 0 Mr BRADBURY —I am pleased to rise in support of this bill, the AusLink (National Land Transport) Amendment Bill 2008. I listened with great interest to the member for Groom. Through you, Deputy Speaker, I suggest that in future, when negotiating for better outcomes for his electorate, he rely on a little more than his own personal charm, but I think he acknowledged that in his comments. There are a number of elements to this bill that I wish to support. There are, of course, some elements that go to issues of heavy vehicle safety. I would like to begin by speaking to the allocations that are made under this bill for the Roads to Recovery program. I have to say that, whilst those of us on this side of the House will be the first to acknowledge the weaknesses of the former government, this is perhaps one of the initiatives of the former government that does need some acknowledgement. The efforts of the previous government to introduce the Roads to Recovery program were very widely welcomed throughout local government and local communities right across this country. It is pleasing to see that the new government, the Rudd Labor government, is not only continuing this program but delivering a greater commitment to the program in increasing the money available for expenditure under it. Indeed, this particular bill will extend the funding under the Roads to Recovery program, which was to come to an end in June 2009. It will extend the program from 30 June 2009 through to 30 June 2014, which will provide considerable certainty to local government authorities right across this country. We should not underestimate the magnitude of the challenge that local government authorities have in trying to confront the infrastructure challenges that they have within their local communities. I know that in my time as a councillor, part of it as mayor, of the City of Penrith those were issues that were very dear to my heart in that capacity. They continue to be matters of great interest and concern to me, but I know that the Roads to Recovery program, in providing funding directly to local government authorities, really does make a significant difference. Before I look at some of the specifics of what that means, we should acknowledge that the task that faces local government across this country can be understood by having a look at just the sheer size of the road network for which local governments are responsible. Approximately 810,000 kilometres worth of the road network is in the hands of or under the care and responsibility of local government. In my local area, the Penrith City Council for many years has been doing some great work in identifying the infrastructure needs of the community and developing strategies and robust funding models to address those needs in the medium and longer term. I know that this is something for which the council has developed a lot of resources. Mr David Burns, the director of city operations, has taken the council’s approach towards road funding to a much more evidence based and technical level than it had ever been previously in Penrith City. To acknowledge the scope of the challenge for the Penrith City Council, 1,018 kilometres of roads are within its responsibility. That is a significant size; the figures speak for themselves. The capacity of local government to deliver not only the new works, the reconstruction works, but also the vitally important remediation works is something that would be very difficult for local government to achieve without supplementation of their funding through the Roads to Recovery program. Indeed, the Penrith City Council in its management plan—the budget document governing the operations of the council—for the financial year 2008-09 has allocated $10.7 million for road reconstruction and road remediation. I talked to people in the community; they would probably like to see twice as much being spent, but that is a significant amount of money. A significant component of that, almost $1 million, is provided by way of funding under the Roads to Recovery program. Obviously, the financial assistance grants that the councils receive give them the capacity to undertake their operations more generally, but the specific allocation to Penrith council of almost $1 million for the purposes of roads under the Roads to Recovery program is a significant contribution that allows the council to address the very significant challenge of keeping its infrastructure up to scratch. I should say that, importantly, the technical and evidence based approach that the council has applied is based upon a measure of the council’s road assets called the pavement condition index, or the PCI. This index gives each road segment a score out of 10, and this is something that the council has done right across the city to undertake an audit of all existing roads and rank them, giving them a score out of 10 under the pavement condition index. The score is reduced for roughness, cracks, potholes, rutting and ravelling. The roughness deduction incorporates the annual average daily traffic volume, so it takes into account the anticipated wear and tear that those roads will endure in the future. Council’s average PCI, or pavement condition index, was falling at an unacceptable rate prior to 2001-02. Of course, that was shortly after the Roads to Recovery program, but this was a matter of concern to the council and had been identified separately. But, certainly, the Roads to Recovery program, through its earlier manifestations, has allowed the council to make some significant inroads on that. Indeed, all of the evidence is indicating that the average pavement condition index of roads throughout the council area has not only stabilised but is now starting to increase. That essentially means that the overall average quality of roads throughout the city of Penrith is increasing. As I said earlier, no doubt many people in our community would suggest that there is still a long way to go, and I think that is a fair comment, but it acknowledges the significant challenge that councils face, particularly in states like New South Wales where the ability of a council to raise its own revenue, to increase its revenue, to meet the increasing costs of governing are not within its control as a result of rate pegging. In terms of the some of the specific projects that have benefited from the Roads to Recovery program, I note that back in the 2007 financial year a number of roads of significance and roads that I know, through my contact with the community over many years, were roads that urgently needed addressing. Camellia Avenue in Glenmore Park was one that I received many inquiries about over the years. That was a project that was funded out of the 2007-08 Roads to Recovery program, along with other upgrades to Kenneth Slessor Drive at Glenmore Park, Grimley Close at Penrith, Kenny Avenue in St Marys and Thompson Avenue in St Marys. Under the 2008-09 program, there are a range of roads to be addressed, but probably the most significant ones, so far as I am concerned, are the intersection of Andromeda Drive and the Northern Road, particularly the area west of Goldmark Crescent, which is located in Cranebrook. That area will receive an upgrade that is well and truly overdue—but certainly that will be the case under the Roads to Recovery program. I reiterate my support for the Roads to Recovery program. I note that the bill also contains some provisions that deal with making funding available to state governments where there is no incorporated body within an area, and I think that they are sensible amendments that ensure that there are mechanisms for delivering funding to those areas. I turn my attention now to the very important issue of heavy vehicle road safety. There are measures currently before the Senate, which the opposition have indicated that they are intending to block. The bill before us foreshadows some changes that would be required in order to implement the legislation that is currently being blocked in the Senate. The extension of the definition of ‘road’ to include some of these other significant facilities that are of real interest in particular to heavy vehicle users is a fairly common-sense initiative and a change that in its own right should not really be the subject of any controversy. To extend the definition of ‘road’ to include rest stops, parking bays, decoupling facilities and electronic monitoring systems merely allows funding to be delivered into those areas which are essential components of the overall road network if we examine some of the challenges that face the people involved in the transport industry and in particular the heavy vehicle industry. My electorate of Lindsay has a very high proportion of truck drivers. In my electorate alone there are over 3,000 truck drivers. Many of them are employed drivers and the others are owner-operators. I know they are all doing it quite tough at the moment. The massive increases we have seen in the price of petrol, driven by the spike in world oil prices, really have had a crippling effect for many people in the transport industry, particularly those in the heavy vehicle transport sector. I have received delegations from local trucking groups and local drivers. They have taken me through in considerable detail the challenges that they face. In many cases the income that they have been receiving for some years now is either at the same level or in some cases lower. At the same time their costs have blown out considerably, given that fuel costs are such a significant component of the cost of doing business. A statement was provided to the National Transport Commission inquiry into safe rates and conditions for employees and owner drivers by a resident of my local community. Mr Maurice Girotto, who lives in Werrington in the heart of my electorate, set out some of the challenges that he is facing. His statement said: I am an owner driver and have worked in the industry for over twenty years. I drive a specialised truck and tanker trailer, carting bitumen locally, intrastate and interstate. I am paid a rate equivalent to tonnage per kilometre, plus waiting time and other services. The rate of remuneration I currently receive is just enough to cover my fixed and variable costs. I am able to cover these costs only because I am in a financial position where I own my equipment and do not have any finance owing. I am also in a position where I am able to do a lot of my own maintenance and repairs. Compared to a driver who has additional cost I’m in a better position. They have to cut down or cut out wages and vehicle maintenance. If you’re in trouble you’ll accept lower rates to get the work. The rate I receive is enough to cover my labour costs as long as I don’t pay myself more than $50 000 per year. If I paid myself accurately for all hours worked I could double this salary. By keeping my wages low I am able to keep the business running in a sustainable fashion. But with cost of living increasing it is becoming more difficult. I have previously been offered work at rates that would not cover my fixed, variable and labour costs. I rejected this work because I am financially not in a position where I am forced to accept this work. I agree there is a need to introduce enforceable safe rates and conditions for owner drivers. People need to earn a living, if they are going to go into business they need to come out at the end in a decent position. If not it goes from being about earning a decent living to keeping your home. These concerns and issues raised by Mr Girotto are frequently raised with me by members of my local community. The safety of those in the heavy vehicle transport sector not only is a concern for those individuals, the suppliers they work for and the contractors or the companies they are employed by but is an issue which affects every single one of us as fellow users of the road. The implications and consequences of having truck drivers on the road who are really struggling to make ends meet, to run their business and make a decent living, and who are forcing themselves to go to work and carry out their duties in conditions that would not be acceptable in any other sector of our community is creating more and more of a safety threat and more and more risk for other road users. It is imperative that we address these issues. This bill goes a very small way towards doing that by at least allowing the inclusion of some truck stop and rest stop areas, but there are some massive issues that are much broader than those contemplated within this bill. I certainly hope that we can continue to develop strategies to ensure that truck drivers not only are given the opportunity to earn a decent living for the many hard hours of work that they contribute but also are able to do that in a way that ensures safety on our roads. There are a range of other considerations that impact on our truck drivers. Mr Robert Ireland recently gave sworn evidence in proceedings. When I was provided with a copy of this document I was horrified to see some of the detail of his experience as a truck driver. In his statement Mr Ireland said: When I was at home I spent all the time I could sleeping or trying to sleep. Initially, my wife Sam, not understanding what I was going through, would always try to wake me up so that I could spend time with my children. One day I said, “You’re coming with me. I’m going to show you what it’s like on the road.” I wanted her to understand that it wasn’t that I didn’t want to spend time with our family but that I was so exhausted that I didn’t have a choice. So I took her on a trip up to North Goonyella mines. As we set out I said, “You are not to sleep unless I’m sleeping. You are going to stand out in the heat while I’m loading.” When we got to the mines however it was 55 degrees, so I let her stay inside the truck with the air conditioning on while I loaded. Also, I stopped the night at a motel rather than sleeping in the heat of the truck. I was loading salt the next morning and looked over at Sam. She was nodding off while standing up. From the salt mines I would usually drive 15 hours straight home however I could not do it to her and pulled up for a couple of hours for a rest. Sam never woke me when I said I was tired again. When I started driving, I was 6 foot 1 inch tall. When I stopped, I was 5 foot 10. One day, I stood up from playing with my daughter on the couch and collapsed from the sudden agony. I could not move the bottom half of my body. It turned out that all the joints in my spine had compressed. My doctors informed me that this was most likely caused by me spending so much time in a seated position. I was required to lie flat on my back to allow my spine to slowly return to normal. It took many weeks before I got any feeling back in my legs and I was not able to walk for many months. I had to go on anti-depressants to reverse the chemical imbalance that drugs had caused in my body Before the back injury I had to have an operation to remove one of my testicles. This was because of bad circulation from sitting down in the vehicle for long periods at a time in the vehicle. It took me almost 2 years to return to normal from those physical traumas. I have only just started to get close to my children over the past 18 months. I think all members would share in my horror at the details of that gentleman’s story, but Mr Ireland’s statement that I have just read out is representative of the challenges and consequences that end up flowing from working in the heavy vehicle industry. Whilst this initiative does contribute in a very small way to some of those issues, there is a much bigger agenda that this government needs to take up. The Deputy Prime Minister has announced a review to investigate issues such as safe rates of pay. I am hopeful that these huge challenges that people in the trucking industry face will be given a voice through that review. Hopefully, there will be responses that come forward that allow this government to give those involved in the heavy vehicle transport sector a fair go. 7832 12:25:00 Slipper, Peter, MP 0V5 Fisher LP 0 0 Mr SLIPPER —I am pleased to join in the debate on the AusLink (National Land Transport) Amendment Bill 2008. As the explanatory memorandum informs us, the main provisions of the bill seek to amend the definition of ‘road’ contained in the act so as to put beyond doubt that projects for the development of off-road facilities used by heavy vehicles in connection with travel on the road may be funded and to extend the Roads to Recovery program until 30 June 2014. When the Australian Constitution was framed, it was probably conceived by our nation’s founding fathers that roads, and land transport more generally, would be funded by the former colonial governments, which became the state governments, in Australia. I suppose that as the power of the purse has moved away from the several states towards the centre and as the Australian government became financially more powerful than the states, it has become necessary—and it is widely recognised and agreed on both sides of politics—for the Australian government to now involve itself, and, indeed, it should involve itself, in providing infrastructure in areas which, under our Constitution, might technically be the responsibility of state governments. The Liberal-National government recognised this obligation and responsibility and, through sound economic management whereby we paid back $90 billion of Labor debt, we were able to find the financial resources to establish AusLink way back in 2004. This was the first national land transport plan in Australia since Federation and is the means by which the Australian government, the state governments and the territorial governments work together to develop a single, integrated national land transport network. In other words, we are now thinking as a nation and we are funding important transport initiatives, as indeed a nation should, in the 21st century. Under the first AusLink program, from 2004-05 to 2008-09, the former Liberal-National government provided $15.8 billion in land transport infrastructure funding. For the second AusLink program, the Liberal-National government pledged another $16.8 billion over five years for national road and rail projects. That is a total of $32,000 million to improve Australia’s roads and rail. Madam Deputy Speaker Moylan, you would be aware that it was this money that built the Alice Springs to Darwin rail and that has resulted in the dramatic improvement of road systems throughout the nation. It is always a challenge for government in Australia, given our large land area and the fact that we have a small population, to fund desirable transport initiatives. In the area of public transport, such as rail, in Europe where countries have large populations concentrated in relatively small areas, it is quite easy to improve infrastructure dramatically in that area with user-pays funding by the travelling public. In Australia, with a small population and a large area—huge distances to traverse—we always have a challenge because we never seem to have enough money to provide the infrastructure needed for a country the size of Australia. The challenge of building a solid road network in Australia is simply a fact of life in this country. The challenges will continue, as it is estimated that road usage will increase, with figures suggesting a doubling in the amount of freight that is transported by trucks, semitrailers, couriers and trains over the next 12 years. This growth in demand coincides with our growth in population and the expansion of our cities and communities. I think it is a pity that the former Labor government killed off the coastal shipping trade, because if we did have a viable coastal shipping trade we would not need the highways that we now require as a country. I am privileged to represent in the Australian parliament the central and southern Sunshine Coast and also parts of the Caboolture region north of Brisbane. These areas are experiencing dramatic increases in population as people move from southern Australia to the sun belt to enjoy the wonderful lifestyle that we have in that part of Australia. One of the challenges we have got is that the infrastructure for the growing population never seems to be available when it is needed. It has been projected that the population of this area will double over the next 10 to 15 years, and that provides important policy challenges which must be met by state and federal governments. The population growth has been significant for some decades and will accelerate and continue as more and more Australian residents start acting on their wish, I suppose, to enjoy a wonderful lifestyle, beautiful scenery, a hospitable population and easy access to high-quality medical attention and also easy access to the capital city of Queensland. It really is important that the road infrastructure in areas like the Sunshine Coast and Caboolture is maintained, upgraded and added to to ensure that there is an adequate road network that is able to support these communities in their transport needs. For instance, 80 per cent of the people who visit the Sunshine Coast do so by road. Most people would accept that the Queensland state Labor government has fallen down in the area of infrastructure generally, including roads. That is one of the reasons why AusLink is so important: we are meeting an unmet need where the state government has vacated the field to a certain extent and in doing so has failed to meet its constitutional obligations. The bill being debated today is simple and non-confrontational and is supported by both sides of the chamber. I welcome the fact that the government is adopting a Liberal-National initiative, both with respect to AusLink and, as part of that, with respect to the extension of the Roads to Recovery program. It is important, however, in particular, that road infrastructure in the Sunshine Coast region, where population growth demands improvements to roads, including the widening of the Bruce Highway between the Sunshine Coast and Brisbane to six lanes, is addressed. The former government funded the upgrading of the Bruce Highway to six lanes from Brisbane to Caboolture, and that certainly removed the worst bottleneck between Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast, but there is now a desperate need to increase the number of lanes to and from Brisbane to six lanes all of the way from Caboolture to the Sunshine Coast proper.  The state government has highlighted some of these areas to have accelerated population growth, even above and beyond what we have come to expect, but it has not yet indicated adequately that it is prepared to fund the infrastructure required to meet the needs of the growing population. In fact, I went to a public forum at the Lake Kawana Community Centre recently which some hundreds of people attended. This was organised by the state member for Kawana, Steve Dickson MP. Representatives were there from the state Labor government, and also the Leader of the LNP in Queensland, Lawrence Springborg, was there to highlight just how important it is that infrastructure is provided if we are going to have increased population growth. The community present at that particular function made it absolutely clear that they are completely opposed to development without infrastructure being provided. During the election campaign last year the government promised some $50 million to keep the Bruce Highway safe and to fix up highway black spots in Caboolture and the Sunshine Coast. They also committed some $195 million to upgrade several road interchanges, including Pumicestone Road, which is in the electorate of Fisher. I anticipate of course that the government will meet those commitments and I look forward to seeing all of this work commenced and completed to ensure the highest level of safety possible. Just last week, on 4 September, further north on the Bruce Highway south of Gympie, three people lost their lives in a multivehicle crash in wet conditions. Sadly, one of those who died was 18 weeks pregnant at the time of her death. Less than a week later, on 11 September, two more people were killed on the Mary Valley Highway at Amamoor, also just south of Gympie. These road tragedies are devastating and are repeated far too often on the roads. I suspect, Madam Deputy Speaker, coming from Victoria as you do, that you could also highlight the fact that many people have lost their lives in unsafe conditions on roads in your state. We must strive for the best possible road network, and that is one of the reasons why AusLink is so important. It is vital that roads in Australia are maintained at satisfactory and safe levels while construction of new roads continues at an acceptable rate to ensure that our road network is able to meet the needs of our increasing population. The Roads to Recovery program was a particularly important initiative of the former Liberal-National government because it meant that we were able to reach over the heads of state governments and go directly to local authorities and local councils. I do welcome the fact that an amendment contained in the AusLink (National Land Transport) Amendment Bill 2008 does make it clear that funds can be allocated under the Roads to Recovery program for use in a particular state while the most appropriate entity to finally receive the allocation is determined. As the explanatory memorandum sets out, this will allow funds to be preserved whilst, for example, a decision is made on who should receive funds so as to provide roads in unincorporated areas where there is no local council or to provide bridges and Aboriginal access roads in remote parts of the state. AusLink is one of those initiatives that enjoys the support of both sides of politics. I do hope that the government will not focus on pork-barrelling and that it will make sure that AusLink funding gets through to communities where that funding is needed regardless of how the constituents in those particular communities voted at the last election. I appeal to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and also to the government to make sure that the government governs for all Australians and that AusLink funding goes to areas like the Sunshine Coast. Though it might well enjoy conservative representation, the needs of the Sunshine Coast are certainly very great given the fact that so many people are moving from Victoria, South Australia and New South Wales—the rust belt areas of southern Australia—to come to the sun belt. When they get there we do want appropriate levels of infrastructure; we want high-quality roads. Let us face it: there is no point in having large increases in population unless we are able to provide the services and infrastructure required by those people who choose to move to the best part of the best state in the best country in the world. I commend the bill to the chamber. 10000 Burke, Anna (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Ms AE Burke)—I thank the member for his contribution but will point out that Victoria is getting a lot of people back from Queensland! 7835 12:38:00 Cheeseman, Darren, MP HW7 Corangamite ALP 1 0 Mr CHEESEMAN —The AusLink (National Land Transport) Amendment Bill 2008 is perhaps one of the more simple bills that will be passed through this chamber, but it provides me with a good opportunity to talk about some important road related matters. There are essentially two parts to the bill. Firstly, it extends the Roads to Recovery program. This bill will continue the Roads to Recovery program until 30 June 2014. Secondly, this bill introduces some technical amendments to include related road infrastructure in the road funding mechanisms. The Roads to Recovery program is absolutely essential in providing good Australian roads. It provides certainty to local councils and their planning around road upgrading and maintenance programs. Local governments are responsible for more than three-quarters of Australia’s roads, almost a million kilometres of road. That is a huge cost for most councils and they need to plan over very long lead times. So many good projects have been delivered from this program in my electorate. Since 2005 the raw numbers of projects that have been delivered under this program are very impressive. Colac Otway Shire has had over 50 roads projects. The Surf Coast Shire has had over 60. There have been over 60 projects in Golden Plains Shire and 50 projects in the City of Greater Geelong. There is no way at all that these shires would have been able to deliver these roads projects without the assistance of the Commonwealth. Many of these projects have saved lives or prevented serious injury from road accidents. This amendment bill supports the government’s commitment to increase our investment under the Roads to Recovery program over the next five years. I would like to draw attention to the fact that, as a clear commitment to this program by the Rudd government, we are increasing the allocation from $300 million per year to $350 million per year. This means that, over the next five years, we will provide $1.75 billion directly to councils to fix local transport issues. This money, of course, comes on top of some very generous commitments to upgrade major highways and ring-roads in my region. What we are effectively doing, through a joint state and federal partnership, is building a whole new modern road network within our region. The federal government has committed $110 million to duplicating the Princes Highway between Geelong and Winchelsea. This is a critical commitment that will again save lives. It will also make life much easier for commuters and be a huge boost for the road transport industry within my electorate. This is a strategic commitment that will allow new industries to develop in Colac by bringing down the cost of road transport and reducing transport times. It gives Colac another competitive advantage. The duplication of this section of the Princes Highway will see Winchelsea transformed, with a big boost to the local economy as people and jobs come to the town. Between Colac and Lavers Hill we have a notorious road where there are constant road accidents. It is a perilous drive in a range of conditions every day, and the road is very, very important for the truck transport industry serving the Otway region. The federal government have promised $7 million to upgrade this road, a decision that has been joyously received by the people of this region. This is another project that will save lives. But perhaps the most important project in my region is the Geelong Ring Road. The Geelong Ring Road will benefit hundreds of thousands of people every week. We have promised to jointly fund the important next stages, stages 4A and 4B, of the Geelong Ring Road, which are the links to the Anglesea Road and the Princes Highway. We have promised $45 million to build stage 4B of the Geelong Ring Road, from Anglesea Road to the start of the Princes Highway West near Waurn Ponds, and $62.5 million for stage 4A of the Geelong Ring Road. This is critical for this area in my electorate. It means that the residents of Jan Juc, Anglesea, Moriac, Bannockburn and many other towns in the region, within roughly 100 kilometres of Melbourne, will be able to pull out of their driveway and hit the first set of traffic lights when they hit Melbourne. Geelong residents will be able to get around their city much more easily. Traffic in Geelong will be very significantly lightened. Car pollution in Geelong city and its surrounds will be lessened. What Labor is doing for roads in my region is absolutely tremendous. It will be profoundly important for saving lives, saving time and boosting industry. It is important to put on the record the opposition’s policies on roads in our region, because they are very significantly different to ours. At the last election, the Liberals refused to fund the last stages of the ring-road. They just bailed out of the project completely. They have also refused to match our commitment on the duplication of the Princes Highway. They have also refused to fund the Lavers Hill Road upgrade. These are very important projects for boosting my region’s economy and boosting safe movement of traffic within these regions, and I think they will give our region a competitive edge over many other parts of Australia. The opposition are obviously completely out of touch on the priorities within Geelong. I would like to put on record my thanks to the former shadow minister for transport, Martin Ferguson, for his commitment to and passion for our region. I would also like to put on record my thanks to Anthony Albanese, the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, for the follow-through that he has shown on these projects. I, and the whole region, did a whole lot of lobbying to achieve these projects, and the response to Labor’s initiatives by our community has been absolutely fantastic. These commitments were very warmly received by the people of Corangamite and Corio and they certainly will be tremendously important for the future prosperity of our region. I would also like to say that roads and building a modern road transport system are, I think, critical to building one’s economy. That is, of course, a very big statement, but I think it is absolutely true. For years Corangamite languished as a blue-blooded Liberal seat where nothing much happened for our roads within our region. I think the Liberal Party took the voters of Corangamite for granted. In contrast, we are transforming Corangamite’s road system and very much updating our capacity within our region. We are transforming the capacity of our economy to deliver to world markets. This bill, I think, changes the existing situation within my seat, but it also goes further. It gives us the capacity to fund rest stops, parking bays, decoupling facilities and electronic monitoring systems to increase the productivity of our road transport system. We are allocating $70 million for some of these purposes. This is an important reform that ensures that major road users will be able to make a contribution to our economy. Before I finish my comments I would also like to put on the record my hope that the new Liberal Party, under the new leadership of Malcolm Turnbull, will embrace the reforms that we are undertaking within my seat. This is an important initiative to get these roads within my region updated to be able to deliver for our growing area. I commend this bill to the House. 7837 12:48:00 Hartsuyker, Luke, MP 00AMM Cowper NATS 0 0 Mr HARTSUYKER —I welcome the opportunity to speak on the AusLink (National Land Transport) Amendment Bill 2008. I am pleased that the Roads to Recovery program will be continued for another five years. AusLink is one of the great achievements of the Howard government. The Prime Minister continues to make grand statements about his government’s so-called nation-building agenda, but the real nation-building agenda was pursued by the previous government. Prior to the AusLink white paper, Australia had never developed a comprehensive land transport strategy. It was the Howard government that initiated this plan, and Deputy Prime Minister John Anderson was instrumental in the development of AusLink. We should also remember that AusLink was possible only because of the coalition’s responsible economic management, which paid off Labor’s debt and established a culture of saving. If you drive north from Sydney, you will see AusLink at work. The New South Wales state government has been underfunding our roads for many years, and the AusLink program has been a godsend for the people up and down the coast of New South Wales, who have been enduring the substandard Pacific Highway for far too long. Great lengths of the highway have already been upgraded to dual carriageway, and there are significant lengths of dual carriageway under construction. Massive projects like the Bulahdelah bypass and the Coopernook to Moorland upgrade are currently under construction. But, despite the work currently underway, the completion of a dual carriageway from Sydney to Brisbane, a task that is urgently needed to be completed, remains absolutely daunting. Towns such as Kempsey, Macksville, Urunga, Coffs Harbour, Woolgoolga and Ulmarra are all in urgent need of a bypass. These communities have tolerated heavy vehicles in their main streets for far too long. I will continue to advocate on behalf of my constituents to complete these urgent projects. The Kempsey Bridge is a source of long traffic delays during busy holiday periods, and the Macksville bridge, which was built in the thirties, belongs in another era. The load limits which apply to this outdated piece of infrastructure are restricting the ability of firms on the North Coast to transport extremely heavy loads by road. The Macksville bridge is narrow, dangerous and way past its use-by date and it must be replaced as a matter of urgency. There is some good news, however. On the weekend, Bonville deviation was officially opened. It replaces the notorious Pine Creek section of the highway, which was responsible for the loss of too many lives. The New South Wales government was not interested in building this road until the federal government stepped in and forced the issue. In building Australia in the 21st century, we need to focus not only on road but also on rail. If rail were not upgraded our road system would choke under the weight of the massive increases in the freight task which is forecast to occur. Rail is the key to moving freight efficiently and AusLink has addressed this. Rail infrastructure around Australia benefited from the AusLink program. On 28 March this year the ARTC laid one million new sleepers on the Brisbane-Sydney-Melbourne rail corridor. Whilst rail has proven competitive on the east-west corridor, rail has performed far less favourably with road freight on the east coast corridor. In order to compete with road, AusLink has invested to make rail more efficient, to improve on-time running and to reduce journey times for trains. Of particular interest to the people in my electorate has been the investment in the upgrade of the line between Sydney and Brisbane, taking trucks off the Pacific Highway and out of the main streets of towns and putting that freight on rail where much of it belongs. Funds have been invested in extending passing loops, bringing the signalling system into the 21st century, reducing the radius of curves and replacing sleepers. This investment will allow longer and heavier trains onto the rail network and reduce the Brisbane-Sydney travel time by around three hours. One of the great programs within AusLink is Roads to Recovery. The program provides funding directly to local communities to pay for vital road improvements. For many years the New South Wales government has been chronically underfunding local government. Councils have also been expected to take responsibility for major regional roads without receiving the necessary resources from the state government to achieve that task. Many councils simply do not have the funds to conduct necessary road improvements and maintenance. Roads to Recovery requires limited administration and allows the money to be spent where it is needed most. This program provides real bang for the taxpayers’ buck. It bypasses the state government bureaucracy and sends the money where it is needed—to the front line, to local government. Put simply, it allows local people to make the decisions, instead of faceless bureaucrats in Macquarie Street. Local councils understand what local communities need in terms of infrastructure. If an old timber bridge is about to fall down, the council will know that first. If rain causes potholes on a road, the council will be first to know about it. Councils have the equipment and the knowledge to meet local needs but often do not have the funding to meet those needs. That is where Roads to Recovery steps in and fills this gap. So far councils have used Roads to Recovery funding on over 27,000 different projects. In my electorate scores of projects have been completed using Roads to Recovery. In 2007-08 alone, some $3.6 million has been allocated to Cowper’s five local government areas. To give you an example of the difference this program has made, in 2004 Bellingen Shire Council used Roads to Recovery funding to rehabilitate Lenehans Bridge on Darkwood Road. The mid-north coast is home to hundreds of small creeks and several major rivers. Many of these waterways are crossed countless times by ageing timber bridges. Over the decades many of these bridges have deteriorated to the point where they need to be replaced or significantly repaired. Most councils do not have enough money to replace the dozens of bridges under their control. Roads to Recovery allowed Bellingen council to repair this bridge and has assisted in the repair or replacement of other bridges on the mid-north coast and Northern Rivers. For some councils, even the most prominent of road developments are out of reach without federal assistance. In 2004-05, the Nambucca Shire Council used $100,000 in Roads to Recovery funding to help pay for improvements to the streetscape in the main street of Nambucca Heads. The development also improved traffic flow through the centre of the town. In Coffs Harbour the city council has used Roads to Recovery funding to upgrade the link road which connects Sawtell in the south with Park Beach in the north. Kempsey council faces the challenge of running a large area with a low socioeconomic base and ageing infrastructure. Roads to Recovery has allowed the council to undertake projects that are often taken for granted, like resealing residential streets and fixing potholes. I welcome the government’s decision to match the coalition’s promise to continue the Roads to Recovery program with $350 million for the next five years. This is good news, especially for regional Australia. I also welcome the clarification that AusLink funding can be spent in unincorporated areas. Although this part of the bill does not affect my electorate, remote locations around Australia have been abandoned by the Rudd government and I am sure that these areas are grateful for this consideration. The other major issue addressed in this bill is rest stops for truck drivers. I strongly support the move to use AusLink funding for heavy vehicle safety initiatives. The recent report by Austroads found that none of Australia’s major freight routes meet national guidelines for rest stop frequency and spacing. Sixty per cent of the routes surveyed were substantially deficient in rest areas. With the exception of Victoria, the states and territories lack rest stops for truck drivers. The situation was worst in Queensland and the Northern Territory. This lack of action by state and territory governments is placing at risk the lives of truckies. The Australian Trucking Association chief executive, Stuart St Clair, said that heavy vehicle driver fatigue is responsible for about 30 fatal crashes, 150 serious crashes and 3,200 minor crashes each year. This represents a huge human and economic cost. State and territory governments have recently introduced new, tough laws to combat fatigue. Unfortunately, they have rushed these plans into place without providing enough rest stops to meet the needs of the trucking community. Once again the Commonwealth has been forced to bail out the states, and provide funding to construct rest stops along our major highways. I am strongly in favour of improving safety for our truck drivers but I do not support the Rudd government’s attempts to slug the trucking industry with higher taxes and increased registration charges to pay for this safety campaign. The National Transport Commission has advised the government that Australia’s truck drivers are not paying for the wear and tear that they cause on our roads and infrastructure. The trucking industry dispute these findings and advise that these claims come from unverified data from the states and territories. The industry believe that they are already overcharged by some $130 million a year. Increased diesel excise and registration costs would impose an enormous burden on the industry, especially smaller operators and owner-drivers. Increased charges for truckies would eventually flow through to the consumer and have an impact on inflation. Even the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, Mr Albanese, admitted that this increase in taxes and charges would be passed on in the form of higher grocery prices. After all of Labor’s rhetoric on cheaper groceries for working families, this makes no sense whatsoever. Living in his taxpayer funded world, Mr Rudd does not realise that the papers he reads in question time were delivered by a truck; the food prepared by the chef at the Lodge was delivered by a truck; the petrol that powers the Prime Minister’s Comcar was delivered by a truck. The Prime Minister does not understand why increasing operating costs for truckies are a problem because he does not have to pay those bills. But ask young families in my electorate what they think of higher grocery prices caused by this tax hike; ask the small business owners in Maclean, Woolgoolga and Macksville what they think of high delivery charges. It just takes a quick look through your home or your office to see that almost everything we use has come to us on the back of a truck. Increasing a tax on trucks will only increase the cost of doing business and increase the cost of running a family. I certainly welcome this legislation, this increased or extended investment in the Roads to Recovery program and the investment in new truck stops for increased safety. These are both worthwhile programs and worthwhile initiatives, and I commend the bill to the chamber. Debate (on motion by Mr Marles) adjourned. 7840 13:00:00 Main Committee adjourned at 1.00 pm 7841 Questions in Writing 7841 7841 137 7841 Abbott, Tony, MP EZ5 Warringah LP 0 Mr Abbott asked the Minister for Education, in writing, on 18 June 2008: Does the Government intend to conduct an open tender process to determine who will run the new childcare centres announced in the 2008 Budget; if so: (a) how will the Government incorporate into any tender process her promise to take into account a potential provider’s “track record of providing affordable care”; and (b) will there be a definition of “affordable care” in the tender documents or will this criterion be left to the personal judgment of the tender assessment team. How will the Government ensure that these new centres do not have a competitive advantage against existing centres. 7841 Gillard, Julia, MP 83L Lalor ALP Minister for Education, Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations and Minister for Social Inclusion 1 Ms Gillard —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: and (2) The Australian Government is working with the States and Territories to determine how best to partner to deliver the 260 centres on the ground. In some cases, the relevant State may choose to provide the land, such as a school site, and manage the construction process, in which case the Australian Government will partner with the State for the delivery of that centre. In some cases, Local Government may also contribute. In other cases, including where the Australian Government is partnering with the relevant State, non-government partners will be sought via a competitive process. Selection criteria relating to the other Early Learning and Care Centres have not been finalised. For probity reasons all information relating to a tender process must be made available to all potential applicants at the same time. Therefore, it would be inappropriate to provide the details of specific criteria ahead of any future tender process. The Australian Government has traditionally delivered a wide range of programs offering support for the establishment and ongoing sustainability of child care services to address areas of market failure. 7841 7841 157 7841 Melham, Daryl, MP 4T4 Banks ALP 1 Mr Melham asked the Prime Minister, in writing, on 25 June 2008: What sum of money has been provided to the former Prime Minister, the Hon John Howard, since 3 December 2007 for, but not limited to: (a) facilities; (b) accommodation; (c) staff; and (d) travel arrangements. 7841 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr Rudd —I am advised that the answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has not provided any money to the former Prime Minister, the Hon John Howard, since 3 December 2007. The former Prime Minister remained in residence at Kirribilli House until 13 December 2007 as agreed with myself. The cost of this was met by the Department.