2010-06-02 42 1 8 REPS 0 0 2010-06-02 The SPEAKER (Mr Harry Jenkins) took the chair at 9 am and read prayers. 4897 Bills R4385 4897 Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Ms Roxon. Bill read a first time. 4897 4897 09:01:00 Roxon, Nicola, MP 83K Gellibrand ALP Minister for Health and Ageing 1 0 Ms ROXON —I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The National Health Amendment (Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme) Bill 2010 will amend the National Health Act 1953 (the Act) to achieve a more efficient and sustainable Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS), better value for money for Australian taxpayers, and policy stability for the pharmaceutical sector. The bill underpins the Rudd government’s commitment to reform of Australia’s health system, by ensuring that every precious health dollar is used as effectively as possible. The bill also embodies an historic level of cooperation and collaboration between the government and the pharmaceutical industry, represented by Medicines Australia. Through jointly negotiating these reforms, the government and the industry will help ensure the sustainability of the PBS for years to come. The bill sets out new PBS pricing arrangements aimed at reducing growth in PBS expenditure, ensuring access to quality medicines at a lower cost to the taxpayer, and providing certainty to the pharmaceutical industry in relation to PBS pricing policy. The PBS plays a vital role in Australia’s health system, particularly for the prevention and management of chronic disease, and for the treatment of life-threatening conditions. The PBS provides reliable and timely access to a wide range of medicines at a cost individuals and the community can afford. In the coming years, medicines will continue to be a significant and growing component of health expenditure. Since the previous major pricing reforms in 2007, the growth rate for PBS expenditure has increased from 4.3 per cent in 2006-07 to an estimated 10.5 per cent for the 2009-10 financial year. The report to parliament on the 2007 PBS reforms warned that the cost of the PBS is projected to grow significantly over the next few years. While those earlier reforms will provide more savings than originally estimated, these will be more than outweighed by higher growth in PBS costs. The PBS reform report estimates that PBS costs will reach $13 billion in 2018, compared to about $9 billion in 2010. For the PBS to continue to provide access to medicines, increases in costs need to be managed. The viability of the medicines industry in Australia also needs to be maintained. To this end, the government has entered into a four-year memorandum of understanding with Medicines Australia. Medicines Australia represents over 50 companies, which together account for 86 per cent of total annual PBS expenditure and nearly 60 per cent of sales of off-patent medicines. The memorandum of understanding (MOU) sets out the negotiated pricing reforms which are the subject of the bill, and the policy innovations that will be introduced to improve the pathway for subsidy of medicines under the PBS. Under the MOU, the government will provide the industry with pricing certainty over the next four years. In return for implementing new pricing arrangements that are the subject of this bill, the government will undertake not to introduce further new policy to generate price related savings from the PBS over the life of the MOU. This will provide stability to the industry, helping to foster investment and availability of new and innovative drugs in Australia, such as the $50 million biotech investment in Queensland recently announced by Eli Lilly. Further process and policy changes for the listing of PBS medicines under the MOU will reduce red tape and further foster the availability of new medicines in Australia. Under the MOU, the PBS will continue to support access to subsidies for new and innovative products. Price reductions are achieved as a result of competition between brands in the market, within a framework of policy certainty. These are good outcomes for all sectors of the medicines industry and for the Australian community in general. The amendments in this bill propose a significant broadening of current pricing arrangements which were originally introduced as part of the 2007 PBS reforms. The proposed changes to pricing policy recognise that competitive pricing already exists in the market for many PBS subsidised medicines. The changes acknowledge that Australian taxpayers should be benefiting from that competition and the lower prices that result from it. The principles which underpin existing price setting and maintenance mechanisms for PBS medicines will continue. In particular, the general separation of medicines between the pricing formularies for single brand drugs (F1), and drugs where there is competition (F2), will be maintained. The application of price disclosure will be accelerated and expanded to include all drugs in the F2 formulary. Price disclosure allows market forces to play a part in PBS pricing. Competition between pharmaceutical companies to gain market share for their products can result in significant discounting to pharmacies. The actual price of a brand of medicine may be much less than the government PBS subsidy price. Under price disclosure arrangements, pharmaceutical suppliers are required to advise the government of the price at which PBS medicines are sold into pharmacies. The information is used as the basis for possibly adjusting the price for all brands of a medicine to the weighted average price. Price disclosure ensures that, over time, government prices reflect more closely actual market prices. This is a fairer deal for taxpayers. Since it was first introduced in 2007, price disclosure has only been applied to medicines after a new brand lists. Under these further pricing reforms, price disclosure will become mandatory from 1 October 2010 for all drugs on the F2 formulary. This will increase the number of brands subject to price disclosure from 162 to over 1,600 brands. The bill also provides that, for the cycle commencing on 1 October 2010, an average price reduction of at least 23 per cent is to be achieved across all the brands in that cycle. These price reductions will occur on 1 April 2012 and represent a very large saving in PBS costs. In the event that the price reductions delivered under the normal operation of price disclosure do not yield an average of a 23 per cent price reduction across the formulary, prices for medicines in this cycle will be further reduced to achieve the required 23 per cent reduction overall. However, this provision will only apply to the price disclosure cycle commencing on 1 October 2010, and no medicine will be reduced to less than the lowest disclosed price for a brand of that medicine. Expanding price disclosure is a fair and equitable way of achieving value for money for PBS medicines. It allows competition to play a real part in pricing for the PBS and allows taxpayers to benefit from discounting practices in the market. Companies can continue to compete for market share for their products as prices are generally reduced to the weighted average price, and not the lowest price. In addition, under the further pricing reforms being introduced today, all medicines on F2 will experience a price reduction of two or five per cent on 1 February next year, 2011. The level of price reduction for each medicine reflects the level of discounting the medicine has been experiencing in the market. In a further reform, the price reduction that occurs when the first new brand of a PBS medicine is listed will increase from the current 12.5 per cent, to 16 per cent as of 1 February 2011. Medicines that have already taken a 12.5 per cent price reduction will not be required to take the balance of the 16 per cent price reduction. It is also important to note that the reforms embodied in this bill preserve features of the PBS that make it such a valued part of Australia’s health system. Under the new pricing arrangements, medical practitioners will continue to be able to prescribe PBS medicines that are clinically appropriate. The robust process for listing new medicines on the PBS will continue. Only medicines recommended by the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee, or PBAC, will be considered for listing by government. There will be no extra costs for patients. Some nonconcessional patients may pay less, for example, where price reductions cause the price of a medicine to fall below the general co-payment amount. My report to parliament on the 2007 PBS reforms estimated that consumers will benefit from those reforms via direct reductions in prices for some prescriptions by $600 to $800 million over the ten years to 2018. The additional direct saving to consumers from these new measures is independently estimated to double this previous estimate and to save general patients on average almost $3.00 per prescription. To support awareness of brand choice under the PBS, the government will invest $10 million, through the National Prescribing Service, to provide factual information to inform consumers that generic medicines are an equal choice in terms of quality and effectiveness, and that some brands of a medicine may cost less than others. The bill does not prevent the generic medicines industry from competing for a growing share of PBS scripts. In 2008-09, member companies of the Generic Medicines Industry Association had a share of 33.8 per cent of PBS scripts, up from 27 per cent in 2005-06. Generic manufacturers will also benefit from some $2.3 billion worth of medicines coming off patent over the next 12 years. The proposed amendments to the act will also streamline the way drugs are listed for supply under section 100 arrangements. Section 100 of the National Health Act applies to certain specialised medicines with specific supply arrangements, such as chemotherapy or HIV-AIDS medicines. The amendments will make clear how general PBS provisions apply to drugs supplied under those arrangements. The power to make special arrangements under section 100 will be clarified and broadened. The wider scope of section 100 will mean arrangements such as the revised Intravenous Chemotherapy Supply Program announced in the 2010-11 budget can be made. Under the new chemotherapy arrangements, the method for supply and pricing of combinations of vials required for single infusions will reduce unnecessary wastage of these expensive chemotherapy drugs. As a result, savings of around $75.4 million are expected over the next four years. In addition, the bill contains provisions that address gaps in the current PBS prescription data captured by Medicare Australia. Currently, community and hospital pharmacies supplying PBS medicines only provide data for PBS prescriptions for which the Commonwealth pays a subsidy. The changes being introduced will result in data also being provided for prescriptions when a subsidy is not paid—that is, under co-payment data. For these ‘under co-payment’ prescriptions, the cost to patients is below the co-payment amount, currently $33.30 for general patients. The collection of this information, in common with all other PBS prescription data, will give the PBAC and others a more complete picture of PBS medicine prescribing, dispensing and usage. Provision for this change is also included under the Fifth Community Pharmacy Agreement announced in this year’s budget. This bill also makes explicit price reductions related to the 25 per cent staged reductions that were put in place at the time of the 2007 PBS reform. Price reductions required on listing of a new brand of a drug affected by staged reductions are currently occurring administratively and through serial amendments to regulations. Including these reductions in the act will make the provisions clearer for industry and easier to administer. In conclusion, the reforms in this bill provide a firm basis for achieving a more efficient and sustainable PBS while, at the same time, providing a period of certainty to industry in relation to medicines pricing policy. The reforms have been collaboratively and closely negotiated with the pharmaceutical industry to provide benefits for taxpayers and stability for the sector. I would like to acknowledge the important role of Medicines Australia in developing this package of reforms for the benefit of all Australians. Consumers will pay no more for their medicines, and some may pay less. A choice of medicines and brands will still be available. Medical practitioners will be able to prescribe medicines that are clinically appropriate. Australians will benefit as consumers and taxpayers from a more sustainable PBS through lower prices for medicines and access to new medicines sooner. I commend the bill to the House. Debate (on motion by Mrs Gash) adjourned. 4900 Bills R4380 4900 Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr McClelland. Bill read a first time. 4900 4900 09:15:00 McClelland, Robert, MP JK6 Barton ALP Attorney-General 1 0 Mr McCLELLAND —I move: That this bill be now read a second time. Introduction The Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Bill 2010, together with the Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) (Consequential Provisions) Bill 2010, implements legislative elements of Australia’s Human Rights Framework, which was released on 21 April 2010. Members will recall that the National Human Rights Committee, chaired by Father Frank Brennan, was asked to seek the Australian community’s views about three fundamental questions: which human rights and responsibilities should be protected and promoted? are these human rights currently being sufficiently protected and promoted? how could Australia better protect and promote human rights? The committee was asked to report back to government on options to enhance the promotion and protection of human rights. There was no predetermined outcome. The only requirement in the terms of reference was that the options should preserve the sovereignty of parliament and not include a constitutionally entrenched bill of rights. Indeed, the committee reported back to government with a number of options to promote and protect human rights, and I specifically thank the work of that committee. I am proud of the government’s framework which reflects key recommendations of the committee’s report. The changes in the framework are aimed at enhancing understanding of and respect for human rights in Australia and ensuring appropriate recognition of human rights issues in legislative and policy development. The government believes it can implement these changes without enacting a charter of rights. What does this mean in practice? First, the committee emphasised the importance of human rights education as the highest priority. The framework implements a range of measures to enhance education in our community, including in schools. We have committed resourcing to the Australian Human Rights Commission to enhance its role in community engagement and education and we have provided resourcing for non-government organisations to engage and inform the community about human rights. We will also invest in education and training programs for the Australian Public Service. In terms of the public sector, most of the day-to-day interactions people have with the government of the day take place through our Public Service. We are fortunate to have a highly educated and competent Public Service. And I think that most people would acknowledge the importance of having a Public Service that is genuinely focused on the interests of the public that it serves. As a government, we are focused on influencing the culture and practice of decision makers, policy developers and law-makers at the starting point in the development of policy and laws and creating an appreciation as to how laws impact on the individuals to which the laws apply. This bill includes measures which will mean that the executive in proposing legislation and the parliament in considering legislation will have greater regard to the impact of laws on the rights of citizens. Broad aims of the bill The government believes that it is important to ensure that Australia’s domestic laws comply with our international obligations—particularly those that protect fundamental rights and freedoms. Australia is party to the seven core United Nations treaties that protect human rights. The government believes that Australia can and should live up to its obligations under these treaties not simply because this is the right thing to do but because the principles contained in those documents provide a protection against unwarranted, unjustified or arbitrary interference with the fundamental rights enjoyed by all people irrespective of their colour, background or social status. The bill contains two important measures that are designed to improve parliamentary scrutiny of new laws for consistency with Australia’s human rights obligations and to encourage early and ongoing consideration of human rights issues in policy and legislative development. Essentially the implementation of these two measures—that is, statements of compatibility on human rights and a new Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights—establishes a dialogue between the executive, the parliament and ultimately the citizens of Australia. First, the requirement of a statement of compatibility on human rights will establish a dialogue between the executive that is proposing the legislative action and the parliament that is considering the proposed action whereby members and senators will be specifically informed of human rights considerations so they are able to consider the impact of proposed legislation on the rights of people and families back in their electorates. And in turn, the new parliamentary committee will be able to establish a dialogue between the parliament and citizens of Australia whereby the members of the new joint committee will be able to canvass the views of the public as to how they will be affected by proposed legislation. In that sense, these measures incrementally advance the concept of participatory democracy in Australia by providing additional means for citizens to have direct input into the legislative process. It is appropriate at this point to provide a brief overview to set out more precisely how these measures will operate in practice. Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights The first of these measures is to establish a new Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights. As I have already indicated, parliamentary committees perform an important role in ensuring transparency and accountability in the legislative process. The Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights will be the first parliamentary committee at the federal level dedicated entirely to human rights scrutiny. The reference point for the committee will be the rights and freedoms recognised or declared by the seven core United Nations human rights treaties as they apply to Australia. The treaties are: International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment Convention on the Rights of the Child, and Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The new committee will examine and report to parliament on compatibility of bills and legislative instruments with Australia’s human rights obligations under these seven human rights treaties. It will also be able to examine existing legislation. Consistent with other committees, the powers and proceedings of the committee are to be determined by resolution of both houses of parliament. As I have already flagged, it is proposed that the committee will have broad powers to seek submissions, hold public hearings and examine witnesses. The committee will also be able to conduct broad inquiries into matters relating to human rights referred to it by the Attorney‑General of the day. Statements of Compatibility The second measure is to introduce a requirement for statements assessing compatibility with human rights to accompany all new bills and disallowable legislative instruments. Compatibility with human rights will be assessed against the rights and freedoms in the seven core human rights instruments to which Australia is a party and which I have identified. Statements of compatibility will ensure human rights analysis is undertaken by the executive at an early stage when developing legislation. It also provides a reference point for parliament’s consideration of bills and legislative instruments. The statements will alert parliament to the relevant human rights considerations in a particular bill or disallowable instrument and will inform parliamentary debate. As with explanatory memoranda, which assist in explaining the purpose and intent of the legislation, statements of compatibility will contextualise human rights considerations. Where appropriate, statements may justify restrictions or limitations on rights where such restrictions are in the interests of other individuals or society more generally as consistent with Australia’s responsibilities. For instance, citizens have a right to live free from fear, violence, intimidation or abuse, and the government has a corresponding responsibility to take all reasonable measures to ensure that occurs and that citizens receive that necessary protection. It is the case that in achieving that outcome of protecting citizens, clearly it may be necessary to take action against those who would abuse the rights of their fellow citizens. Statements of compatibility will also aid the consideration of relevant human rights issues by the Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights. After enactment, statements of compatibility may also be of assistance to the courts. Currently, in determining the meaning of provisions in the event of ambiguity, a court may refer to other material considered by parliament in the passage of legislation. This includes accompanying explanatory memoranda, second reading speeches and parliamentary committee reports. A statement of compatibility and a report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, while not binding on a court or tribunal, could be used by the court or tribunal to assist in ascertaining the meaning of provisions in a statute where the meaning is unclear or ambiguous. By these measures, the parliament will be empowered through its response to a minister’s statement and any committee report, to give more precise guidance to the courts as to the legislature’s intention in enacting legislation in the context of Australia’s human rights obligations. These statements do not create new rights. The courts will have no additional powers to strike down or amend legislation. Conclusion These measures are about ensuring that the business of government as a matter of practice and culture considers how its legislation impacts on the rights of the people of Australia. As mentioned, that is not to say that there won’t be decisions for government to make which require a balancing of competing interests. Individuals have rights and they also have responsibilities. Individual rights need to be contextualised against those responsibilities and the broader rights of a safe and effectively functioning society. Early and ongoing consideration of human rights issues in the policy and law-making process and informing parliamentary debate on human rights issues will make positive changes for the relevance of legislation and the parliamentary process to the lives of our fellow Australians. I commend the bill to the House. Debate (on motion by Mrs Gash) adjourned. 4904 Bills R4381 4904 Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr McClelland. Bill read a first time. 4904 4904 09:28:00 McClelland, Robert, MP JK6 Barton ALP Attorney-General 1 0 Mr McCLELLAND —I move: That this bill be now read a second time. Introduction The Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) (Consequential Provisions) Bill 2010, together with the Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Bill 2010, implements legislative elements of Australia’s Human Rights Framework, which was released on 21 April 2010. The Commonwealth has a comprehensive and extensive framework for independent review of administrative decisions. The Administrative Review Council is an independent body established to review and inquire into the Commonwealth administrative law system and recommend improvements that might be made to the system. The proposed amendments will ensure an appropriate human rights perspective is integrated in the views of the Administrative Review Council by including the President of the Australian Human Rights Commission as an ex officio member of the council. Much of the business of government is delivered through the Public Service, whose decisions are reviewable by administrative law. As part of promoting incremental change to enhance the responsiveness of our Public Service to the rights of citizens, it is appropriate to have human rights considerations taken into account in the further development of the administrative law framework. In addition, the proposed amendments will integrate statements of compatibility into existing procedures for tabling legislative instruments. This package of reforms, along with the other changes in the framework, will inform parliamentary consideration of human rights and enhance the understanding of and respect for human rights in Australia. I commend the bill to the House. Debate (on motion by Mrs Gash) adjourned. 4904 Bills R4384 4904 Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr Bowen. Bill read a first time. 4905 4905 09:30:00 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP Minister for Financial Services, Superannuation and Corporate Law and Minister for Human Services 1 0 Mr BOWEN —I move: That this bill be now read a second time. Today I introduce a bill which will amend the Corporations Act to reform the treatment of shareholder claims against companies that become insolvent. This bill gives effect to the government’s decision to reverse the outcome of the High Court’s decision in the Sons of Gwalia v Margaretic case. The bill also introduces reforms relating to notices to creditors and shareholder voting, and clarifies the position of shareholders bringing claims for damages against companies. To the ultimate benefit of both shareholders and creditors, this bill will remove an area of uncertainty that currently results in higher finance costs for business. It will also reduce the costs and complexity associated with running insolvency administrations. The bill contains three primary measures. Firstly, the bill amends section 563A of the Corporations Act to provide that all claims in relation to the buying, selling, holding or otherwise dealing with shares are to be ranked equally—and after all other creditors’ claims. In January 2010, I announced the government’s decision to introduce legislation to reverse the effect of the High Court’s decision in Sons of Gwalia v Margaretic. The High Court in Sons of Gwalia determined that section 563A, as it is currently worded, did not subordinate certain compensation claims by shareholders below the claims of other creditors. Prior to Sons of Gwalia, the common understanding was that all shareholder claims against a company in external administration that related to a shareholding, were made in the ‘capacity as a member of the company’ and were postponed by operation of section 563A of the Corporations Act. Investors make a conscious decision to invest money in a company in the hope of sharing in the company’s profits. In doing so, they are entitled to expect proper disclosure from the company. But they must also accept that they are taking a risk in making that investment. In contrast, creditors are not hoping to increase their wealth by gambling on the future profitability of a company. They are often small businesses or trade creditors who are simply owed money for work they have already done, or for materials they have supplied. Investors who have been misled into making that investment should rightly be able to claim redress. However, they should not be able to do so to the detriment of creditors in terms of receiving distributions when a company is insolvent. The provision, as it is currently interpreted, has the effect of undermining the traditional distinction between debt and equity. The decision in Sons of Gwalia has had the effect of shifting the losses suffered by shareholders (due to a company’s misleading conduct or non-disclosure) to the company’s unsecured creditors. By reducing the likely return to unsecured lenders in an insolvency, the Sons of Gwalia decision has had the effect of increasing the cost of unsecured debt and of reducing the availability of credit, particularly for less well-established companies. Secondly, the bill streamlines the treatment of shareholder claimants in an external administration. Persons bringing claims regarding shareholdings will not vote as creditors in a voluntary administration or a winding up unless they receive permission from the court. They will also not receive reports to creditors unless they first make a request for such to the external administrator. Thirdly, the bill eliminates certain residual common law restrictions on the capacity of a shareholder to recover damages against a company. The 1880 House of Lords decision in Houldsworth v City of Glasgow Bank determined that a person who has subscribed for shares in a company may not, while they retain those shares, recover damages against the company on the ground that they were induced by the company to subscribe for those shares by fraud or misrepresentation. Although case law in Australia has subsequently limited the reach of this decision, there are still situations where a shareholder may unfairly be prevented from suing for damages. The application of the old rule is limited, uncertain and difficult for stakeholders to comprehend. I note that, in the United Kingdom, the rule was excluded in all cases by the Companies Act 2006 (UK). The Ministerial Council for Corporations has been consulted and has approved the amendments contained in this bill. The global financial crisis highlighted the importance of addressing any impediments to companies accessing reasonably priced credit. These reforms restore the order of priority for distributions of assets in corporate insolvencies to the position that was understood to exist prior to the Sons of Gwalia judgment. In doing so, they improve access by companies to credit, ensuring continued employment, entrepreneurialism and economic growth. I commend the bill to the House. Debate (on motion by Mrs Gash) adjourned. 4906 Bills R4386 4906 Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr Brendan O’Connor. Bill read a first time. 4906 4906 09:37:00 O’Connor, Brendan, MP 00AN3 Gorton ALP Minister for Home Affairs 1 0 Mr BRENDAN O’CONNOR —I move: That this bill be now read a second time. The Royal Flying Doctor Service of Australia is one of the largest and most comprehensive aeromedical organisations in the world. The Royal Flying Doctor Service (the RFDS) delivers vital health care and emergency services to people living, working and travelling in rural and remote parts of Australia. As part of this service, the RFDS administers the medical chest program. These medical chests contain a range of pharmaceutical items, including pain relief drugs such as pethidine and morphine. The chests are an important tool, enabling the RFDS medical practitioners to treat people on site for many conditions and provide necessary treatment, including pain relief, for those requiring emergency evacuation. The availability of medical chests provides enormous comfort to those living in the outback. The RFDS and its agents currently supply and maintain approximately 2,600 medical chests across the country, including those located in national parks, remote homesteads, pastoral stations, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, outback schools and mining exploration sites. The RFDS regularly reviews the contents of the chests to ensure relevance and currency of pharmaceuticals. Without the supply and maintenance of these medical chests by the Royal Flying Doctor Service, pharmaceutical treatment, including pain relief in emergency situations, for people in remote Australia would be unavailable. Until recently, pharmaceuticals for these medical chests were distributed utilising Australia Post. These deliveries have ceased following the discovery, early this year, that this practice contravenes section 85W of the Crimes Act 1914. Section 85W of the Crimes Act makes it an offence for Australia Post or the Royal Flying Doctor Service to arrange for the distribution of pharmaceuticals containing prescribed narcotic substances. This is because section 85W contains an offence for intentionally causing to carry by post an article that consists of, encloses or contains a ‘prescribed narcotic substance’ within the meaning of the Customs Act 1901. Because ‘carried by post’ is defined in section 85E of the Crimes Act to mean ‘carried by or through Australia Post’, the offence in section 85W applies uniquely to persons arranging for the delivery of these articles by Australia Post. The government understands that there are no viable alternatives to Australia Post for supplying medicines for the RFDS medical chest program. Australia Post is the only delivery provider servicing many remote locations. Therefore, an urgent amendment will address the risk of emergency medicines not being available to treat serious illness or injury in rural and remote areas of Australia. This bill will allow Australia Post and the RFDS to lawfully provide for the supply of medicines through Australia Post under its medical chest program. The bill amends section 85W of the Crimes Act to insert an exception to the offence of ‘causing narcotic substances to be carried by post’. This exception will apply to Australia Post, the Royal Flying Doctor Service and their officers, employees, agents and contractors. The exception allows those organisations to arrange for the carriage of prescription and non-prescription medicine by Australia Post. The bill provides a specific requirement that the exception will only apply to conduct engaged in by any person for the purpose of enabling the Royal Flying Doctor Service to administer its medical chest program. This provides an important safeguard, ensuring that the exceptions to the offence of carrying narcotic substances by post are restricted to the purpose of the Royal Flying Doctor Service medical chest program. The bill also amends section 85W to apply the offence in subsection 85W(1) to the controlled drugs and controlled plants listed in part 9.1 of the Criminal Code, rather than to ‘prescribed narcotic substances, within the meaning of the Customs Act 1901’. The definition of the term ‘prescribed narcotic substance’ was repealed in 1990 and, due to an oversight, section 85W was not updated to take account of this repeal. This amendment will address this oversight by giving effect, as closely as possible, to the original policy intention behind the offence in section 85W. Applying the offence to the lists of ‘controlled drugs’ and ‘controlled plants’ in the Criminal Code will ensure that the offence has similar coverage to the domestic drug offences in the code, to which those lists apply, and to the original section 85W offence. This bill will remove any legislative impediments to the lawful delivery and maintenance of medical chests to rural and remote Australia. The retrospective application of the exemption will also ensure that those persons involved in administering the medical chest program are protected from prosecution under section 85W for conduct engaged in before the commencement of the amendment. I commend this bill to the House. Debate (on motion by Mrs Gash) adjourned. 4908 Bills R4378 4908 Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr Gray, for Mr Byrne. Bill read a first time. 4908 4908 09:42:00 Gray, Gary, MP 8W5 Brand ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Western and Northern Australia 1 0 Mr GRAY —I move: That this bill be now read a second time. I am pleased to present legislation to meet two of the government’s 2007 election commitments. This bill contains two schedules that will: restore the close of rolls period to seven days after the issue of the writ for an election; and repeal the requirement for provisional voters to provide evidence of identity. Schedule 1—close of the rolls Schedule 1 to the bill deals with the close of the rolls for an election. There is a deadline for every federal election after which the roll will be ‘closed’ for an election. This is known as the ‘close of the rolls’ and specifies the date after which no additions or deletions can be made to the electoral roll. The certified list of voters for an election is a list of persons who enrolled or updated their details before the close of the rolls deadline. The amendments proposed by schedule 1 implement one of the government’s pre-election commitments to restore the close of rolls period to seven days after the issue of the writ for an election. This amendment will provide sufficient time for new voters to enrol to vote for a federal election or existing electors to update their address details with the AEC. Schedule 2—evidence of identity and provisional votes Schedule 2 to the bill repeals the requirement for provisional voters to provide evidence of identity. Provisional votes are a type of declaration vote cast by an elector at a polling place on polling day. The Electoral Act and the referendum act currently specify that a person who needs to cast a provisional vote at a polling place on polling day must provide a polling official with evidence of identity at the time of voting or by the first Friday following the polling day. If the elector does not provide such evidence of identity by the deadline, his or her provisional vote will not be counted. The AEC estimates that over 27,000 provisional votes were excluded from the count at the 2007 federal election due to the operation of the existing evidence of identity provisions. In accordance with the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters recommendation 2, the bill will repeal the requirement for voters casting a provisional vote to provide evidence of identity and will instead insert the new requirement that, where there is any doubt as to the bona fides of the elector, the signature on the envelope containing a provisional vote be compared with the signature of the elector on previously lodged enrolment records. The amendments in schedules 1 and 2 to the bill implement recommendations of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters supported by the government as necessary to provide eligible electors with the greatest opportunity to enrol and vote in an election. Conclusion The government is committed to removing the barriers that prevent Australians from voting by: restoring the close of rolls period to seven days after the issue of the writ; and repealing requirements for provisional voters to provide evidence of identity. I commend the bill to the House. Debate (on motion by Mrs Gash) adjourned. 4909 Bills R4379 4909 Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr Gray, for Mr Byrne. Bill read a first time. 4909 4909 09:47:00 Gray, Gary, MP 8W5 Brand ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Western and Northern Australia 1 0 Mr GRAY —I move: That this bill be now read a second time. I am pleased to present legislation that will bring real reform to the key provision in the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 (the Electoral Act) and the Referendum (Machinery Provisions) Act 1984 (the referendum act). Three of the four schedules implement the government response to recommendations made by the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters following their inquiry into the conduct of the 2007 federal election (the JSCEM report). These amendments will: modernise enrolment processes to enable electors to update their enrolment details electronically; allow the Australian Electoral Commission (the AEC) to manage its workload more efficiently by enabling enrolment transactions to be processed outside the division for which the person is enrolling; enable prepoll votes cast in an elector’s ‘home’ division to be cast and counted as ordinary votes; and provide a legislative framework for people who are blind or who have low vision to cast an independent and secret vote. Schedule 3 deals with an issue that emerged at the 2009 Bradfield by-election and relates to multiple candidates being endorsed for a single division by the registered officer of a political party. This bill contains amendments that will prevent the registered officer of a political party endorsing more than one candidate for each division. The overriding aim of the amendments in the bill is to enhance the ability of otherwise eligible Australians to participate in the electoral process by removing obstacles to their enrolment. The Electoral Act currently contains a number of hurdles to facilitating modern and technologically up-to-date interaction between the AEC and eligible electors. Of particular concern are the estimated 1.4 million eligible electors currently not on the electoral roll, with up to two-thirds of the missing electors falling in the 18- to 39-year age group. It is intended that the amendments introduced in the bill will address declining enrolment rates and improve electoral participation in this age group, and more generally, by enabling flexible and modern interaction between eligible electors and the AEC. Schedule 1—‘home’ division prepoll votes as ordinary votes The amendments contained in schedule 1 to the bill will enable prepoll votes issued in an elector’s ‘home’ division to be cast and counted as ordinary votes, wherever practicable. The Electoral Act and the referendum act provide for prepoll voting to take place prior to polling day. This provides electors who have specified other commitments to meet their voting obligations by voting early. Recent elections have seen a large increase in the demand for early voting; at the 2007 federal election almost 15 per cent of the total votes were cast as early votes. The increase in demand for early voting has two major consequences. First, it requires the AEC to devote significant increased resources to deal with early voting as more resources are required to issue and count this type of vote. Second, the results of an election are more likely to be delayed as the counting of these early votes generally does not take place on polling night as the declaration envelopes containing the votes must go through a time-consuming preliminary scrutiny process. The bill provides for prepoll votes cast in an elector’s home division, prior to polling day, to be treated as ordinary votes wherever practicable. An elector’s home division is the division in which the elector is enrolled. For electors to cast prepoll votes in this manner, it will be conditional upon the electors to make a declaration at the time of voting indicating that they are entitled to a prepoll vote and each elector’s name being marked off the certified list. This will ensure that the integrity of this type of vote is maintained. Votes cast as ordinary votes in an elector’s home division will, for counting purposes, be treated in the same manner as ordinary votes cast in polling places on polling day. The AEC estimates that if this amendment had been in place for the 2007 federal election it would have resulted in an additional 667,000 votes being counted on polling night. Schedule 2—efficient management of AEC workload and electronic address update Schedule 2 to the bill contains amendments that can be grouped into two main themes. The first theme provides for the efficient and effective management of the AEC workload. The second theme enables electors to update their address details electronically. Recommendation 42 of the JSCEM report recommends that the Electoral Act should be amended to enable the AEC to manage its workload in non-election periods by allocating work, principally enrolment applications and enrolment changes, throughout the AEC divisional office network. The Electoral Act as it currently stands provides that such workload sharing can only take place during the election period. There is no apparent rationale for limiting the operation of the workload sharing to the election period. Expanding this ability will result in a number of benefits to electors and reduce handling times. Such changes will allow the AEC to manage its workload more efficiently by enabling enrolment transactions to be processed outside the relevant division. These amendments will provide the AEC with additional tools to maintain the electoral roll in a timely and efficient manner. These changes will ensure that the Electoral Commissioner has the obligation to receive and action any enrolment related transactions rather than only the divisional returning officer or the Australian electoral officer. The Electoral Commissioner will then use an enhanced delegation power to delegate the processing of the transactions to any AEC officer or member of staff, which may include divisional returning officers and Australian electoral officers. The second theme of amendments in schedule 2 provide for modern enrolment processes to enable electors to update their address details electronically. Despite recent trends encouraging Australians to communicate with government agencies electronically, the Electoral Act still requires voters to complete and sign paper forms when enrolling or updating their enrolment details. These forms are then required to be sent to the AEC by post to be entered into the electronic database used to maintain the electoral roll. These amendments give effect to recommendation 9 of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters report and will enable persons who are already on the electoral roll to update their address details by providing this information to the AEC in an electronic format. In addition to the requirement that the person is already on the electoral roll, the bill foreshadows the making of regulations which will prescribe minimum verification information that the elector will need to provide to the AEC before the Electoral Commissioner can act on the electronic communication. The regulations will enable the AEC to request prescribed information from electors, for example date of birth and drivers licence number, to ensure that the electronic transaction is authentic and is being undertaken by the elector to whom the information relates. These amendments will facilitate the maintenance of an effective electoral roll by enabling voters to communicate with the AEC by electronic means rather than by written hardcopy forms. Schedule 3—Limitation on the number of endorsed candidates per division Schedule 3 to the bill contains reforms which will restrict the number of candidates that can be endorsed by a political party in any one division. At the by-election in the division of Bradfield on 5 December 2009 there were 22 candidates, nine of whom were endorsed by a registered officer of a single registered political party. The ability for a registered officer of a political party to endorse candidates for an election was introduced into the Electoral Act in 1987 to provide a streamlined way for political parties to nominate candidates. If not endorsed by a registered political party, a person seeking to be a candidate for an election must obtain the support of 50 electors in the division in which the person is seeking to nominate. The current provisions of the Electoral Act do not prohibit political parties from endorsing more than one candidate in each division for an election. For a voter to cast a formal vote they are required to number a ballot paper from ‘1’ to the number of candidates on the ballot paper without errors in the numbering sequence. At the above mentioned by-election for the division of Bradfield the rate of informal votes was nine per cent. This is a record for any election for the division of Bradfield and more than double the informality rate for the division at the 2007 federal election. The average national informality rate at the 2007 federal election was 3.95 per cent. The practice of multiple candidates for a single division being endorsed by the registered officer of a political party has not emerged on this scale prior to the 2009 Bradfield by-election. Legislative amendment is required to prevent a similar rise in the informality rate in multiple divisions at the next federal election. Schedule 4—Electronically assisted voting for people who are blind or have low vision Schedule 4 to the bill will provide a mechanism for people who are blind or have low vision to cast an independent and secret vote. Without the amendments in schedule 4 there is no provision in the Electoral Act or the referendum act for such voters to cast a secret vote. The amendments in schedule 4 provide a framework for the making of regulations that will provide for a flexible regime of electronic voting while maintaining the integrity of the voting process. This approach provides the flexibility to amend the mechanics of the electronically assisted voting process as technology changes from election to election. The integrity of the voting process is ensured in the amendments as any regulations made under the amendment may include: a process for casting an electronically assisted vote; methods to ensure the privacy, secrecy and integrity of the vote; places, days and hours at which the electronically assisted vote will be available; recording of each person who has been issued with a vote; and recording of the vote and how this vote record will be treated. Conclusion The government is committed to restoring the integrity of our electoral processes and systems. The first step in that process was the introduction of the Commonwealth Electoral Amendment (Political Donations and Other Measures) Bill 2008, and the subsequent 2009 bill, which aimed to restore accountability, integrity and transparency to our system of donation disclosure. Unfortunately, those provisions have been blocked by the Senate. The reforms contained in this bill will continue the important process of updating the Commonwealth Electoral Act. I comment the bill to the House. Debate (on motion by Mrs Gash) adjourned. 4912 Bills R4388 4912 Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr Gray, for Mr Byrne. Bill read a first time. 4912 4912 09:58:00 Gray, Gary, MP 8W5 Brand ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Western and Northern Australia 1 0 Mr GRAY —I move: That this bill be now read a second time. I am pleased to present a bill that brings much needed reform to the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 (the Electoral Act) and the Referendum Machinery Provisions Act 1984 (the referendum act). The bill: repeals redundant provisions; gives the Electoral Commissioner flexibility rather than prescription; and places more technological tools at the Australian Electoral Commission’s (AEC) disposal so that the AEC can continue to deliver the best enrolment and election practices. The majority of reforms in this bill are based on unanimously supported recommendations of the report by the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters following its inquiry into the 2007 federal election (JSCEM report). Schedule 1—Publishing forms and information about places to vote The Electoral Act and the referendum act currently require information such as the location of polling places and the various enrolment forms to be published in the Gazette. The requirement to gazette this information is intended to provide transparency in the electoral process and ensure that members of the public have access to such information. In recognition of the trend for people to use technology and websites to interact with government, schedule 1 provides for the publication of electoral information on the AEC’s website. These amendments will give effect to recommendation 41 of the JSCEM report. Schedule 2—Evidence of identity for enrolment Schedule 2 amends the evidence of identity requirements for enrolment. The amendments require a person making an application for enrolment, or a person changing their name, to provide evidence of identity with their enrolment application. Such persons may provide any one of the following forms of evidence of identity: driver’s licence number; passport number; or the signature of a person currently on the electoral roll who attests to the identity of the person. If an elector is simply changing his or her address details then evidence of identity is not required. These amendments give effect to the unanimously supported recommendation 7 of the JSCEM report. Schedule 3—Age 16 enrolment Currently a person who is 17 years of age may provisionally enrol. These electors will automatically attain full enrolment on their 18th birthday. Provisional enrolment is voluntary. The AEC has found that provisional enrolment for such people allows the AEC to target enrolment of young people in schools, educational institutions and youth events. Schedule 3 reduces the age of provisional enrolment from 17 years to 16 years of age. Schedule 4—Electoral rolls, related lists and ballot papers Schedule 4 makes four sets of amendments relating to the use of technology in elections and election related matters. First, the amendments provide for senators and members to receive electoral roll information in electronic form. This amendment is based on the unanimously supported recommendation 50 of the JSCEM report. Second, the amendments provide for the use of electronic certified lists. An electronic certified list will be known as an ‘approved list’. The approved list will be required to be approved by the Electoral Commissioner and will contain the same information as the certified list. Electronic approved lists and hard copy certified lists may be used at the same polling place. This amendment implements the unanimously supported recommendation 43 of the JSCEM report. Third, the amendments remove the technical requirement for ballot papers to be ‘overprinted’. This requirement is replaced by the requirement for ballot papers to contain a feature approved by the Electoral Commissioner. This amendment gives effect to the unanimously supported recommendation 38 of the JSCEM report Finally, schedule 4 amends the process of authenticating ballot papers by a divisional returning officer. A divisional returning officer will be required to mark a ballot paper that he or she believes is authentic with the words ‘I am satisfied that this ballot paper is an authentic ballot paper on which a voter has marked a vote.’ This amendment implements the unanimously supported recommendation 37 of the JSCEM report. Schedule 5—Mobile polling The Electoral Act and the referendum act currently provide for mobile polling to be conducted at special hospitals, prisons and remote divisions, with specific provisions applicable to each type of mobile polling. To provide for consistent mobile polling arrangements, schedule 5 consolidates the various mobile polling provisions into a single mobile polling provision. In general, schedule 5 provides for mobile polling to be conducted on polling day and the 12 days prior to polling day. The Electoral Commissioner is given the power to determine the places at which mobile polling can be conducted. The Electoral Commissioner will publish information about the availability of mobile polling on the AEC’s website and by any other means deemed appropriate. The practical process of issuing ballot papers remains unchanged. These amendments are based on the unanimously supported recommendations 18, 20, 28, 29 and 30 of the JSCEM report. The amendments differ from the recommendations as they will provide for a single mobile polling provision that allows the delivery of mobile polling where and when it is needed. Schedule 6—Postal voting Schedule 6 provides four reforms to postal voting. First, schedule 6 removes the requirement that a postal vote application be signed by an applicant and a witness. This reform enables postal vote applications to be lodged online or electronically and reduces potential delays in the delivery of postal vote applications. The amendments require an elector making an application for a postal vote to make a declaration that he or she is entitled to make an application. Second, schedule 6 prohibits extraneous material being attached to, or incorporated into, a blank postal vote application form. It is currently common practice for political parties and candidates to undertake large-scale reproduction and distribution of their own version of the official AEC postal vote application. These amendments prohibit the inclusion of extraneous material, including political material, being attached to, or incorporated into, a postal vote application. However, extraneous material may be included in an envelope along with the postal vote application. Third, the amendments require a completed postal vote application be returned directly to the AEC. To avoid delays in the issue and return of postal vote applications, these amendments provide that postal vote applications must be returned directly to the AEC. This is intended to ensure that the application is not returned via a third party, including a political party. Finally, the amendments introduce a new requirement for both the elector and the witness to make a written declaration that the requirements for completing the ballot paper were completed before the close of the poll. The amendments also provide for the date of the witness signature on the postal vote to be the determining date for completion of the postal vote, rather than the postmark on the certificate. These amendments are based on the unanimously supported recommendations 5, 6 and 33 of the JSCEM report. The amendments differ from recommendation 33 as they require the completed postal vote application to be returned directly to the AEC and prevent extraneous material being included on, or affixed to, a postal vote application. The intention is for schedule 6 to commence at the default time of six months after royal assent. Schedule 7—Other amendments relating to rolls and enrolment Schedule 7 amends enrolment practices and the provision of roll information. The Electoral Act requires a version of the electoral roll to be publicly available for viewing. Schedule 7 clarifies that there is no right to copy or record by electronic means the publicly available roll. This amendment is based on the unanimously supported recommendation 53 of the JSCEM report. The AEC maintains the electoral roll for federal elections and also state and territory elections under ‘joint roll arrangements’. The AEC collects information from every eligible elector and then forwards that information to the relevant state or territory. Schedule 7 provides for a regime under which the roll information provided to the states and territories may be used for additional purposes. The regime provides for regulations to prescribe the purposes for which roll information may be used, for example, the compilation of jury lists. This amendment is based on the unanimously supported recommendation 44 of the JSCEM report. Finally, schedule 7 introduces specific provisions to facilitate enrolment and continued enrolment for people who are experiencing homelessness. A person experiencing homelessness will not lose their itinerant elector enrolment because he or she has been living in crisis or transitional accommodation for one month or longer. In addition, a person experiencing homelessness will not automatically be removed from the electoral roll if they do not vote at a general election. This amendment implements the unanimously supported recommendation 19 of the JSCEM report. Schedule 8—Eligibility for early voting Prepoll voting and postal voting are known as ‘early voting’. An elector who wishes to cast an early vote must apply and make a declaration that they are eligible for such a vote. Once the elector has made such a declaration the elector is issued with ballot papers. Schedule 8 implements the unanimously supported recommendations 25 and 26 of the JSCEM report. The amendments provide two additional grounds upon which an elector may apply for an early vote. First, throughout the hours of polling on polling day, the elector will be absent from his or her division. Second, the elector will be unable to attend a polling booth on polling day due to a fear for his or her personal safety or wellbeing. Schedule 9—Minor technical amendments Schedule 9 makes several minor technical amendments to: remove gender specific language; amend incorrect cross references; and provide for consistent use of terminology. The amendments in schedule 9 do not affect the voting or enrolment rights and obligations of electors. Conclusion Taken together these amendments provide the AEC with the necessary flexibility and technological tools needed to deliver modern electoral practices for the benefit of all electors. The reforms are significant, and they are overdue. This bill demonstrates the government’s continuing commitment to update the Electoral Act and the referendum act for the benefit of all electors. I commend the bill to the House. Debate (on motion by Mr Billson) adjourned. 4916 Bills R4387 4916 Bill and explanatory memorandum presented by Mr Gray, for Mr Byrne. Bill read a first time. 4916 4916 10:10:00 Gray, Gary, MP 8W5 Brand ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Western and Northern Australia 1 0 Mr GRAY —I move: That this bill be now read a second time. This bill implements two amendments relating to the important area of electoral advertising generally. First, it regulates the authorisation of how-to-vote cards to make it clear who will benefit from the preference flow suggested on the how-to-vote card. Second, the bill prohibits a person from causing to be printed, published or distributed including by ‘radio, television, internet or telephone’ anything that may mislead or deceive an elector in relation to how to cast a vote. Schedule 1—How-to-vote cards Schedule 1 to the bill expands the authorisation requirements on how-to-vote cards. As how-to-vote cards are a subset of electoral advertising they are currently regulated under section 328 of the Electoral Act. In general terms, this means that how-to-vote cards must contain the name and address of the person who authorised the card and the name and place of business of the printer. This authorisation information is currently required at the end of the how-to-vote card. The amendments proposed by schedule 1 will provide specific and expanded authorisation requirements for how-to-vote cards and introduce two new offences for a breach of the authorisation requirements. How-to-vote cards will be required to include at the top of each printed face the name and address of the person who authorised the how-to-vote card. If the how-to-vote card is authorised on behalf of a registered political party, the card must include the name of the registered political party. If the how-to-vote card is authorised on behalf of a candidate who is not endorsed by a registered political party, the card must include the name of the candidate and the word ‘candidate’ printed next to the name. The authorisation must conform to certain requirements in relation to the size of the characters in the authorisation. This amendment is intended to ensure that the authorisation is clearly visible and identifiable to electors. The amendments make it an offence for a person to publish or distribute a how-to-vote card that does not comply with the authorisation requirements. The penalty is 10 penalty units. There is a further offence for a person who publishes or distributes a how-to-vote card with false authorisation details. The penalty is 10 penalty units. The government is mindful of the views expressed by the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters in its report on the 1998 election. That report concluded that how-to-vote cards serve a useful purpose to inform voters, enable the franchise and minimise informal votes. Consistent with these views, the measures in schedule 1 to the bill are aimed at ensuring voters are clearly advised of the source of the how-to-vote cards before casting their votes. These amendments will make it clearer who will benefit from the preference flow suggested on the how-to-vote card and reduce the potential for voters to be misled. These amendments are important to give voters the means of making informed decisions when voting. Schedule 2—Misleading or deceptive publication Section 329 of the Electoral Act currently prohibits publications that are likely to mislead or deceive an elector in relation to how to cast a vote. Section 329 of the Electoral Act provides a definition of the term ‘publish’. Schedule 2 to this bill expands the definition of publish to include anything that is published by radio, television, internet or telephone. As the offence in section 329 is expanded to cover material published on the internet, the offence is amended to provide extended geographical jurisdiction for such offences. The extended geographical operation captures material published overseas by an Australian citizen or resident. Conclusion The government is committed to reducing the potential for voters to be misled and to give voters the means to make informed decisions about voting. I commend the bill to the House. Debate (on motion by Mr Billson) adjourned. 4917 Bills R4354 4917 Bills R4355 4917 4917 10:14:00 Ferguson, Martin, MP LS4 Batman ALP Minister for Resources and Energy and Minister for Tourism 1 0 Mr MARTIN FERGUSON —For the information of honourable members I present a correction to the explanatory memorandum for the Tax Laws Amendment (Research and Development) Bill 2010 and the Income Tax Rates Amendment (Research and Development) Bill 2010. 4917 Bills R4351 4917 Debate resumed from 12 May, on motion by Mr Albanese: That this bill be now read a second time. 4917 10:15:00 Truss, Warren, MP GT4 Wide Bay NATS Leader of the Nationals 0 0 Mr TRUSS —I am speaking today about the Airports (On-Airport Activities Administration) Validation Bill 2010. It is interesting that we are debating this bill so soon after the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government has introduced a correction to an explanatory memorandum. This bill proposes to rectify another administrative oversight dealing with the issuing of infringement notices at Commonwealth leased airports. The airports in question are Adelaide, Alice Springs, Archerfield, Bankstown, Brisbane, Camden, Canberra, Darwin, Essendon, Gold Coast, Hobart, Jandakot, Launceston, Melbourne (Tullamarine), Moorabbin, Mount Isa, Parafield, Perth, Sydney (Kingsford Smith), Tennant Creek and Townsville, although it is not clear that the problem being rectified has occurred at each and every one of those airports. Specifically, the bill will validate potentially invalid infringement notices issued by people who were not properly authorised under the Airports (Control of On-Airport Activities) Regulations 1997 to issue infringement notices. Whilst examining parking infringement notices issued at a number of airports, it became apparent that due to administrative oversight on the part of the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government and a number of airports some infringement notices were issued by individuals who were not ‘authorised persons’ under the regulations and were therefore not properly able to issue those infringement notices. To become an ‘authorised person’ under the regulations, an individual must be appointed by the secretary of the department or the secretary’s delegate. Authorised persons are empowered to issue infringement notices at airports when regulations on a variety of matters, including parking, are breached. In 2004, the list of authorised persons was up to date and accurate. However, since that time, individuals who were not authorised persons have begun issuing infringement notices for parking offences. For instance, airports often contract out their parking services, and some of these subcontractors have employed people who had not been previously appointed as authorised persons. I understand that, as of 25 March 2010, the problem of unauthorised persons issuing infringement notices has now been rectified and the department of transport list of authorised persons is now up to date and accurate again. Naturally, I welcome this development. As an observation, one wonders why the authorisation process is even necessary. We have a massive bureaucracy in this country and sometimes many of the approval processes are mere formalities. One wonders why there is a necessity to go through that kind of bureaucratic activity. Labor promised when it came into government that it would reduce the number of regulations in our country. It said, ‘One-on, one-off,’ but this is another broken election promise. Since Labor has been in office it has introduced 9,997 new regulations and it has abolished just 52. I am suggesting at the present time that maybe there are a few in this whole authorisation process that could be on the list for removal. To get to the detail of this particular problem, it seems as though there could be up to 100,000 infringement notices—mostly related to parking offences—issued since 2004 that may be invalid and without legal effect. Australians who have received and paid infringement notices over the last six years may feel aggrieved at this. It is, however, important to remember what an infringement notice is. Those who commit parking offences at airports and are issued an infringement notice can choose to pay the fine stipulated by the notice or they can choose to have the matter heard in court. If they choose not to pay the infringement notice, they are liable to have a much larger fine levied against them. This cost can be up to five times the amount stipulated by the notice. If an individual parks illegally at an Australian airport and is issued with an invalid infringement notice—that is, an infringement notice that is without legal effect—the option to pay a lesser fine is removed. The only option is to have the matter heard in court and risk having to pay the full amount and, of course, court costs on top of it. For the airports, invalid infringement notices cannot be used as evidence in any legal proceedings. The issuing officer can, however, still testify to what they witnessed. I also understand that invalid infringement notices could simply be reissued now that the list of authorised persons is once again accurate. Of course, this could be more administratively complicated for both parties than the solution proposed by this bill. Additionally, the invalid infringement notices also pose questions about immunity from prosecution. In addition to the implication that an individual has accepted culpability in an offence, paying the fine attached to a valid infringement notice makes that person immune from further prosecution. If, however, an infringement notice is not valid, there is some uncertainty that this immunity applies. As a result, thousands of individuals who paid invalid infringement notices in good faith could be prosecuted further. The bill will confirm immunity from prosecution by retroactively validating the infringement notices. Naturally, retrospective legislation arouses suspicion amongst many legislators, me included, and many Australians. In this case, however, no new offences are being created retrospectively. This bill is simply an administrative fix aimed at ensuring that the option of paying an infringement notice remains in play and guaranteeing that those who have paid infringement notices over the past six years remain immune from prosecution. Retroactively validating legal instruments in this way is not a new or unknown concept. Last year the parliament passed the Military Justice (Interim Measures) Bill (No. 2) 2009, which imposed disciplinary sanctions on persons corresponding to punishments imposed on them by the Australian Military Court after they had been declared unconstitutional by the High Court. The High Court decision was issued on 26 August 2009. The Military Justice Bill (Interim Measures) Bill (No. 2) 2009 was introduced in the Senate on 9 September, passed the next day and immediately sent onto the House of Representatives, which passed it on 14 September. The bill received royal assent on 22 September, less than a month after the decision of the High Court was made. The coalition and all other parties supported the bill and assured its swift passage through parliament. Obviously the matters under consideration in that case were of much greater substance than the parking infringements and other infringements that we are dealing with in this bill. So it sets a powerful precedent. The bill currently before the House was introduced earlier this month, and the government is keen for it to be passed quickly through the parliament. The Minister for Defence, Senator Faulkner, when dealing with the previously mentioned bill, pointed out that it is ‘critical that the ADF has a functioning military discipline system’. Retroactively upholding the decisions of the Australian Military Court was a transitional arrangement while the government worked out a new and permanent system that was impartial, independent and met the constitutional requirements. The bill before the House similarly seeks to deal with the question of retrospective validity. Given the example of the Military Justice (Interim Measures) Bill (No. 2) 2009, retroactive validation is not without precedent. Indeed, if retroactively validating the judgments of a military court is a legitimate exercise, retroactively validating infringement notices mainly related to parking offences seems to be a pretty small issue. Parking at airports is, however, a contentious issue, and nobody likes being issued an infringement notice for a parking offence. There are some who think that the airport operators adopt a very heavy-handed approach. On the other hand, those who arrive at an airport which is blocked up by people parking illegally are keen to see the laws enforced. I think the reality is that we need to see proper judgment and that the laws need to be both sound in the first place and enforced. I can appreciate that many Australians might instinctively find a bill that retroactively validates parking infringement notices that were improperly issued to be objectionable. Indeed, it would seem to offend against our notion of a fair go. This bill, however, will not impose new parking fines on the many Australians who park at Commonwealth leased airports. Instead, it will provide an administrative solution to the problem of invalidly issued infringement notices and guarantee immunity from prosecution for those who have paid the fines associated with those infringement notices. I resist the temptation to seek to make any kind of political capital out of the debate on this bill and am mindful that the problem has affected both the previous government and this one. It seems to me that there would only be losers if this bill were not passed, because even people who may think that they will be let off their infringement notice currently face a greater penalty than they would if this legislation were able to pass. So, whilst it may not appeal to our sense of fair play, this bill not only seeks to correct an administrative oversight but also delivers relief to people who might otherwise be picked up by an invalidly issued infringement notice which could lead to a greater penalty than would apply if this bill were passed. The opposition will be supporting this legislation before the House because we believe it is the best way to resolve an administrative flaw which obviously should not have arisen in the first place. There is a question as to whether the regulations themselves are even necessary, but the problem has arisen and needs to be fixed. 4920 10:26:00 Perrett, Graham, MP HVP Moreton ALP 1 0 Mr PERRETT —I too rise to speak in support of the Airports (On-Airport Activities Administration) Validation Bill 2010. I commend the member for Wide Bay—who I note was the transport minister back in 2004—for his contribution and I accept the spirit of bipartisan support for this legislation. This bill will address the uncertainty about the validity of parking infringement notices issued at Commonwealth leased airports prior to 25 March this year. It will validate potentially invalid infringement notices as well as other penalties imposed on activities not authorised under the Airports (Control of On-Airport Activities) Regulations 1997. This legislation applies mainly to parking infringements—that is how most Australians will interact with it—but also applies to some other matters, such as smoking and gambling, at Commonwealth leased airports, including Archerfield Airport in my electorate and Brisbane airport, which is close to my electorate. Airport regulations state that authorised persons, who must be appointed by the Secretary of the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government or the secretary’s delegate, are empowered to issue infringement notices such as parking fines. Authorised persons can also perform certain other actions and exercise certain other powers. For example, they have the power to tell someone to move their car if they are breaking any parking or vehicle movement regulations. Anyone who has visited Brisbane airport or many of the other airports covered by this bill will tell you that on occasions it can be bedlam at those airports. If one taxi does the wrong thing or one drop-off or heartfelt goodbye goes on for too long, it can throw the whole system into chaos—flights can be missed and loved ones left stranded at the other end. It is very important that airports exercise these powers, because if they did not all our airports would become traffic bottlenecks. There is also the security concern associated with having vehicles hanging around for too long in any one place. However, a recent review of parking infringement notices issued at certain airports found that the appointment of authorised persons had not been kept up to date. Unfortunately, as the member for Wide Bay pointed out, this goes back as far as 2004, long before the election of the Rudd government. In some cases this was an administrative oversight by the department and in other cases an oversight by the airport. Either way, technically and by the letter of the law, some infringement notices issued by persons without a valid authorisation may be invalid and have no legal effect. Payment of a parking infringement notice provides a person with immunity from prosecution for an alleged offence at the relevant airport. This significantly reduces the potential penalty which a driver may be required to pay for committing the parking offence. A driver may face a penalty five times the amount of the parking infringement notice should the matter be taken to court and the driver is found to have committed the offence indicated by the ticket. The bill before the House is needed to confirm immunity from prosecution for the relevant offences of persons who received infringement notices and paid the fine. It will also avoid the potential for the Commonwealth to reimburse fines—that is why it is important that we quickly pass this legislation, and I commend those opposite for their support for it. The bill will validate all actions performed and powers exercised under the regulation. The bill provides the necessary legal certainty that each parking infringement notice and relevant other action is valid and legally effective. The Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government has acted quickly to address this oversight. The Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government has consulted airports and ensured authorised persons are appointed at each airport. The department is undertaking a full review of all processes and procedures relating to its administration of the Airport Parking Infringement Notices Scheme and the regulations more broadly in order to meet the standard required by the government. I am advised that authorisations are now all up to date and all parking infringement notices issued since 25 March this year are valid for all airports. As I said earlier, my particular focus is on Brisbane airport, which I have the pleasure of travelling through 40 or 50 times a year, and Archerfield Airport, which is in my electorate. It is an interesting place. There is legislation in place providing for the Aviation Noise Ombudsman and in my last newsletter I put out a call to see how people have been affected by noise at Archerfield Airport in my electorate, both the small general aviation planes and also the bigger planes that fly quite low over some parts of my electorate—I see them every morning when I go for a walk. This bill ensures that the world of airport parking infringements is as it should be. I commend the bill to the House. 4921 10:32:00 Tuckey, Wilson, MP SJ4 O’Connor LP 0 0 Mr TUCKEY —It is amazing how often we find ourselves in this House correcting the mistakes of the previous or of this government—more particularly this government—where, as in this case, laws are passed without providing the appropriate authority. LS4 Ferguson, Martin, MP Mr Martin Ferguson —Have you read the bill? SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr TUCKEY —I have read the bill. Let me quote the purpose stated in the second reading speech: The Airports (On-Airport Activities Administration) Validation Bill 2010 will validate potentially invalid infringement notices … LS4 Ferguson, Martin, MP Mr Martin Ferguson —Read on—‘going back as far as 2004’. SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr TUCKEY —What did I just say? I said previous and present governments. LS4 Ferguson, Martin, MP Mr Martin Ferguson —You talked about correcting the current government. What do you think this is: a race? SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr TUCKEY —What I am saying is that it is a situation of fixing problems that should not have occurred in the first place and it has taken all this time to find out what they are. I do not have to worry too much about this particular government alleging that two wrongs make a right, which is its mantra. We get the Prime Minister doing it every day. We say, ‘Why have you let this happen?’ and he says, ‘Oh, but you did it worse.’ That is maybe why the people change the government—people change the government in anticipation it will be done better. The giggling that is going on over there is coming from the minister who, if he were me, would declare himself the minister ‘for’ resources, as I did ‘for’ forestry, when the Labor government of the day, particularly in Western Australia, was just decimating jobs in the forestry industry to pick up a few Greens preferences. LS4 Ferguson, Martin, MP Mr Martin Ferguson —Relevance, Mr Deputy Speaker! SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr TUCKEY —If you are worried about relevance, you started it. You—the minister at the table—raised the issue of two wrongs making a right, and it is with some pleasure that I am responding to those comments. The reality is that the Rudd government seldom even correct their own problems. They believe that, as long as they can put an alternative case or pick some example going back 100 years, they are justified in their mismanagement of the Australian economy. In that regard, we had a situation across the road just a little while ago where we saw a building erected in haste to demonstrate the dimensions of a school canteen which cost $600,000, when last Sunday in Perth a house with four bedrooms, two bathrooms, a home theatre, an office and air-conditioning was advertised to be constructed on your block for $160,000. This thing, which you could not park a car in, cost $600,000. The tragedy is that the Minister for Resources and Energy is in here every day defending the decisions that were made in his absence to add a huge financial burden to the mining sector so the government can pay off the losses of the Building the Education Revolution. Evidence was given of a guy who did $60,000 worth of work and cannot get paid. Where is the stimulus? Coming back to the issue of airports, I rose to speak recognising that this is a relatively simple matter. It authorises people to issue parking infringement notices, primarily. I believe that at our airports we still have security problems around the proper identification of people who work on the site. I well remember when the then Premier of New South Wales objected to the installation of surveillance cameras in the baggage areas because it might catch some of the union members having a sleep and/or breaking into people’s luggage to steal things! I think it was Bob Carr who objected strenuously to the upgrading of that service, and everybody knew that you could go through half of those areas and the CCTV cameras had cigarette packets stuck over them and no-one was game to take them off. There are other issues that we might debate on this matter, but my major concern is Perth Airport and its major role—and the minister at the table, Minister Ferguson, might be interested in this—with the fly out arrangements. Fly in, fly out is now a major component of the mining industry. It replaces the Charles Court mantra: if you want to get a mining lease in Western Australia then you build the township and you build the infrastructure and you build the railway lines—which they still do. Why they need to be taxed so the government can duplicate what the mines have done already in mining infrastructure, I do not know. Every time there has been a need to increase exports, the mining companies and the new entrants, like Forrest with Fortescue Metals, have built their own railway lines, built their own airports and made their own arrangements. Near the town of Ravensthorpe in my electorate, BHP, as part of their $3 billion development, built a very good 737 style airport. As a consequence, they could fly people in and out, notwithstanding that was a locality where a lot of people preferred to live. This is another serious matter arising out of the attack on the mining industry. I am surprised at times to find where I have a mine in my electorate, even under its present boundaries, compared to its new boundaries, where of course I move into the goldfields. In the present boundaries there is a major nickel mining project near a little town called Hyden. Hyden has been producing wheat and sheep for as long as I can remember. Hyden had a pretty bad year last year. Most grain growers did because, whereas typically you need a tonne of grain to pay your input costs, last year it was two tonnes. It was a dry finish and they did not get two tonnes and the region around there lost $1 billion. What the farmers have discovered, particularly the broader family, is that, regarding the cash flow of a family enterprise which is dedicated to farming, they can go and get well paid jobs just down the road. That particular company has dug two shafts and has decided not to dig the third one. It is the marginal one; it is marginal and the tax will make it impossible. We heard the Prime Minister going on yesterday about somebody who said, ‘Minerals are just sand in the ground until we in the mining sector do something about it.’ I presume the minister at the table knows what the meaning is of recoverable reserves. We in the mining industry never talk about ‘the reserves’ or the amount of minerals that are there at whatever grade. It is always a case, when you go to your banker, of recoverable reserves. In other words: in the present environment, how much can you extract at the available prices, which are usually set internationally, and make a profit sufficient to repay your tax and your debts? By any measure, if the government sequesters to itself a more significant amount of the available revenue then in fact the recoverable reserves are reduced as a matter of simple arithmetic. But the mining sector has built most of its own infrastructure and certainly does not need to be robbed by a government for the purpose of duplicating what is there already, or what they are quite prepared to build in their construction planning. Let me say that when you build an airstrip or you build a new mining project, the ratio of employment is probably 10 or 15 to one compared to the operation of that mine. Consequently, this new tax, which is an attack on new development, is going to hit the big side of employment in mining very hard. But nevertheless maybe this very mining debate has removed the problem that I came to this chamber to talk about—that is, congestion created by the fly in, fly out system at Perth Airport. It was claimed recently that because of the nature of the industry, and to keep with their work program, the mining companies want their crews to leave Perth at six o’clock in the morning, so you get a concentration of departures at that time. I thought, ‘Well I need a bit of information on this,’ so I put a question in writing to the minister’s office, thinking that no doubt he and his department would have given considerable thought to this problem and be able to provide me with a range of solutions already to hand. I should have brought the answer in and sought leave to table it, but I believe it is supposed to be published under the arrangements in this place. It is a farce. It was just another one of the answers we get here to questions without notice that are obfuscations; it virtually did not answer the questions, particularly those where I tried to make suggestions that might solve the problem. My first question was: in an environment where you have a high number of departures at six o’clock in the morning, how many arrivals do you have? Do you have to have a rule that there is a time interval between take-offs, to allow for an aircraft to land between each take-off? Obviously in Perth at six o’clock in the morning, the tourist flights are not coming in from the rest of the world. They come in at midnight, because we Western Australians, luckily, have no curfew on our airport. I asked: what is the time interval, and how does it compare with those of major international airports? That request was just ignored. That is a bit hard, isn’t it—they are the department of aviation and they do not know what goes on in major European or American airports. They do not know the time interval, the gap. I remember sitting some years ago in Denver airport. It was snowing and they were hosing down the wings of the airplanes. The airplanes were coming in to land almost nose to tail, and the snow plows were ducking out between them. I have had a private pilots licence, and the intervals that are legally applicable in Australia are just a joke. But why not tell me what they are, how they compare with those of other busy airports in the world and how, consequently, we could improve the productivity of Perth airport. There are no answers—no ideas. Some of my other questions were quite simple. Firstly, it is a productivity issue. Might I say to those who manage the airport: take a tougher line on no-shows, or people who have checked in and then do not turn up when the boarding call is made. I do not know how, in that environment, you could tolerate it. Presumably the mining companies have to say to their workforce: ‘If you’re not on the plane at the correct time so that plane can meet its slot for take-off, don’t come to work.’ I go to my electorate on similar early flights, sometimes the same flights, and I hear the call: ‘Will Bill, Jack and so-and-so please get on the plane?’ That is an administrative issue that would no doubt improve things in that regard. Acting Deputy Speaker Washer would be familiar with this, having quite a few fly-in fly-out people living in his electorate—typically, I might add, in the more expensive suburbs. They probably have a boat and go out and pinch his fishing spot from time to time. Their proximity to the RAAF Base Pearce is probably the same as their proximity to Perth airport. So I ask: why can’t we—as it is done at Richmond Airport in New South Wales, for example—have a FIFO operation at Pearce? ‘Oh, no, you could not do that; that is an air force base.’ Well, so is Richmond. And other air force bases around Australia could also quite easily accommodate some departures. They have the established structure, and they are ready to go for the relatively simple structure of a terminal. ‘Oh, no, you couldn’t do that’—in other words, there has been no thought, no recognition that it happens already and that that could be a solution to getting people out of the metropolitan area, and out of Acting Deputy Speaker Washer’s electorate in particular. Let’s travel all the way south. Some years ago the shire of Margaret River made the decision that they needed to be a tourist hub and that it was practical to have a, I think, daily air service to an airstrip for people flying from Perth. They built an airstrip for that activity. They then discovered that people did not take that option. People are rusted onto their motorcars. The journey is a bit short for that, and through the efforts of the member for Canning and through the pressure applied by the Howard government, the then Carpenter WA government and the then minister for transport—who now wants the member for Canning’s seat—were forced to put a dual four-lane highway to interconnect with the section of the Old Coast Road, which was just a death trap, and fix it up. I occasionally drive on that road to other parts of my electorate and it is a dream. It is another reason why that airport is not used by people who live in places like Margaret River. As we speak, there is an aircraft that leaves that airport, I am not sure on the frequency, as a FIFO. It flies to the Pilbara. It is a propjet and it can land on that airport. The good salaries that people are earning—and not just machine operators but young women working in the restaurant and catering area—are such that they choose to live in some of these lifestyle blocks. Compared to the salubrious suburbs of Perth, they are lower in cost, but they have room for kids and access to the beach, fishing and all the things they desire. Some of the newer areas of my electorate, like Bridgetown and Manjimup—which took a tremendous blow from the restriction of native forest harvesting—are seeing these people come in and buy the relatively small acreage blocks that were designed years ago. They are living there and spending money in the local community, and that airport is the logical place for them to depart for work. What is the problem? There is a curfew of 7 am in the morning on this airport for the local community. You would think there is a plane coming in every five minutes—even with an expanded role it might be two or three a day. That convenience should be there. It relieves the pressure on Perth airport. What was the answer I got when I asked about that? ‘That’s someone else’s problem. Don’t tell us about it’. There is a case for this minister to say to his aviation minister, ‘You’d better resume that airport, take control of it and put in some reasonable arrangements so that it can be made available to fly people into these airports. With the half a second I have, I ask: where are all these people coming from? There are two flights a week from Cairns, with 14 per cent unemployment, and we are going to strangle that off. Then, of course, every other state—(Time expired) 4925 10:52:00 Zappia, Tony, MP HWB Makin ALP 1 0 Mr ZAPPIA —Listening to the member for O’Connor, I was not sure if we were speaking about a mining bill or an airport bill, because it seemed to me that he spent more time talking about the mining industry than he did about the aviation industry and airports in particular. I say to the member for O’Connor that this side of the House certainly understands and values the mining sector in this country. We understand the contribution it makes and we believe that that contribution is significant. We also believe, however, that the mining sector ought to pay a fair share for resources which are owned by the Australian people and which can only ever be sold once. About a decade ago, one in three mining profit dollars were coming back into the Australian community; today it is about one in seven dollars. In addition, as you would well know, Mr Deputy Speaker Washer, coming from a mining state, the system of having royalties imposed upon the mining sector is not a very efficient system at all, because it is a volume tax: if the companies are not making any profit they still have to pay the royalties. Under the government’s resource super profits tax, to which the member for O’Connor was alluding a moment ago, all of the funds that will be raised will go into three key community areas. One is infrastructure, to which he was referring just a moment ago—infrastructure that ultimately will also benefit the mining sector. Secondly, funds will go into reducing company tax for companies around this nation. Again, that includes mining companies. Thirdly, funds will go into increasing superannuation for Australia’s working people from nine per cent to 12 per cent over the course of the next decade. It seems to me that it is all about fairness and nothing more. I repeat what I said earlier: this government certainly does understand and value the mining sector, but it also acknowledges its responsibility to the Australian people at large for resources which are owned by the Australian people and which can only ever be sold once. Returning to the essence of the Airports (On-Airport Activities Administration) Validation Bill 2010, I will make some brief comments. By way of explanation, the Airports (Control of On-Airport Activities) Regulations 1997 empower authorised persons to issue infringement notices for the breach of certain rules. These include parking infringement notices. It has become apparent that the appointment of authorised persons at some airports has not been kept up to date. This extends back as far back as September 2004—it goes back to the time of the previous government. This was an administrative oversight by the department and in some cases also by the airports. As a result, infringement notices issued could be invalid and may have no legal effect. This presents an issue for anyone who was issued with an infringement notice that was invalid and paid the fine. They may still be liable to prosecution for the alleged offence. This bill is all about trying to clarify the issue for these people and for the airports. It is about correcting an anomaly that has been brought to the minister’s attention. The bill will ensure that the rights and liabilities of all persons will be the same as if the infringement notices had been validly issued, it will avoid a potential requirement for the Commonwealth to reimburse amounts paid in respect of any infringement notices, it will confirm immunity from prosecution for the relevant offences of recipients of infringement notices who have paid the amount as per the infringement notice and it will ensure that all actions performed and powers exercised by an unauthorised person or a person purportedly authorised—or not authorised, through this oversight—to perform such actions and exercise such powers are legally effective. Confirmation of immunity is important, because a driver can face much steeper penalties should the matter be taken to court. Immunity from prosecution for an alleged offence is provided by payment of a parking infringement notice—in other words, a parking fine—which is generally about one-fifth of the maximum penalty for the associated offence if the matter is taken to court. Since 25 March this year, all infringement notices issued are valid and the authorisations are now all up to date. Clearly, the issue of authorising the personnel has been fixed up, but there is a lag period between 2004 and March this year during which the anomaly still exists. In its annual report on airport performances, the ACCC notes that there are concerns that the airports’ monopoly position could be used to exploit the public. Indeed, airports do have a monopoly over the businesses they are in. Consumers may have a choice of carriers, but they do not have a choice of airports. This is a matter that concerns communities wherever airports are located. It is not simply the case that airports have a monopoly over the business they are in. It goes much further than that. When the airports were privatised by the previous government, the operators of those airports were effectively given immunity from local government and state government laws. As a result, they not only have a monopoly but also have a free hand to do almost exactly what they want within the confines of the airport. Having said that, I accept that most airport operators are good corporate citizens and are prepared to work with the relevant state and local authorities. But that is not always the case, and it is an anomaly that, quite frankly, ought to be rectified. As we all know, airports today no longer simply provide aviation activities. What we have seen at most airports is the development of land which they considered to be surplus to their aviation needs. Those developments are generally commercial developments—commercial developments which, in my view, ought to be treated, approved and dealt with by local government authorities and state government authorities in the same way that any other commercial development within their jurisdiction is treated. Regrettably, that is not the case. I know that the minister has the right to approve the airport master plans, and this is a process that generally occurs every five years. But even within those master plans there is often not the detail, in terms of the development that is going to occur, that there ought to be and which would in turn enable local communities to have some input into what is occurring. It seems to me that that, as I said a moment ago, is an anomaly which ought to be rectified and which I believe was never, ever the intent in allowing airport operators to have immunity from state and local government laws. The immunity should have applied only to the direct aviation activities and to nothing else. I will digress for a moment and respond to something that the member for O’Connor said when he was speaking on this bill a few moments ago about the mining companies having to provide the infrastructure required to carry out their operations. In particular, he referred to the need for some of the mining companies to provide their own airport facilities. Can I say in response to that that it is not unusual for developers today to have to provide the relevant infrastructure for their developments, whether it is a mining operation or something different. In fact, there has been a huge debate in recent years across Australia in respect of the level of infrastructure that developers are expected to provide as part of their overall development. Today it is not unusual to see in the city areas a developer of either residential or commercial developments also provide the necessary roadworks, drainage works, electricity systems, gas supplies and the like as part of the overall development plan. So for the miners to have to do the same is simply consistent with what is expected of all developers wherever they may be throughout the country. I said a moment ago that the airports have a monopoly position over the airports that they operate. It is a concern that generally follows and is consistent with the privatisation of any asset. Wherever assets have been privatised we have seen concerns emerge as time passes. One of the concerns I will comment on is in respect of the level of car parking fees being charged by some of the airports around the country. In 2008-09 the five major airports generated around $278 million in combined revenue through airport car parking. This represents about 12 per cent of their total revenue. The highest car parking income generated was at Melbourne Airport, where $90 million or 20.5 per cent of total revenue raised was from car parking. It is estimated that Melbourne Airport makes about 75 per cent or $67 million of profit from its car parking operations. I would have thought that car parking should have simply been an adjunct service to the aviation activities. The 20.5 per cent compares with around eight per cent for Sydney, Perth and Adelaide airports. It is a fairly large discrepancy, and it is certainly not consistent with what is being charged at the other airports. Even the other airports, some would say, are charging more than they need to. According to a previous ACCC report, passenger numbers increased by 41 per cent since 2002, but parking revenues grew by 77 per cent—almost double. There was a time that business operators provided parking for their customers, but it seems that providing parking at a cost is now core business of many airports and there to be exploited. It would be interesting to know if the number of infringement notices issued has also increased as the cost of car parking increased and the revenue to the airports increased. It would be only human nature, if you can avoid to pay for the car parking, given the cost that you are confronted with, to probably do so. And in trying to avoid the car parking fees you are more likely to be issued with an infringement notice, particularly today, where at most airports you can barely stop for a moment without someone coming along and telling you to move on. I recall that at the Adelaide Airport, before the new airport was built, there was at least an area for very short-term parking for anyone who simply wanted to unload their luggage, take it into the airport counter and then come back to the car. You cannot even do that today unless you have a driver with you that stays within the car at all times and effectively keeps the car motor running. That kind of service simply does not exist, and I believe that is something that has been a loss to the people that use the airports. It was not about necessarily avoiding car parking fees; it was simply part of the convenience and service that was provided to customers at airports. In fact, when you consider some of the car parking charges at airports today and then look at some of the discount fares you can get to travel from one capital city to another, the car parking charges are almost as high as what you can sometimes get an airfare for—but that is another matter. This is a bill that tries to rectify, as I said earlier on, an anomaly relating to the authorisation of the people who issue infringement notices and in turn ensures that those people who have been issued with the notices are also protected by not being charged a second time or taken to court as a result of this anomaly. I certainly, as I have said throughout the course of this speech, would like to see a total review of the way that airports do charge their fees for car parking. It is a matter that, frankly, I would like to think might be included in the airport master plans, and have the authorisation of the minister in terms of the level of charges that they can apply. But that is something that I will obviously need to take up with the minister. Having said that, this is a bill which, as I said throughout the course of this speech, overcomes an anomaly. I commend the bill to the House. 4928 11:07:00 Randall, Don, MP PK6 Canning LP 0 0 Mr RANDALL —The Airports (On-Airport Activities Administration) Validation Bill 2010, while being technical in nature, gives me the opportunity to speak about the more substantial commercial nature of airports. Before I continue, I would just like to say I agree with many of the sentiments of the member for Makin. Obviously, we who use the airports get a lot of feedback from constituents on some of the negative aspects of trying to get through and use the airport car parks in any sort of friendly way. This bill before us corrects an administrative error regarding the issuing of parking notices at Australian airports, and validates those tickets issued in error. Again, we are fixing up a problem which, as I said, the airports themselves have generated. In some respects I do not really like being associated with a retrospective validation of parking tickets, but it was an unintended consequence that I suppose requires the support of this parliament to correct. There have been some 100,000 parking tickets that have been issued at airports around the country by people who were not authorised to issue them. I am sure that those 100,000 drivers who received the tickets would be delighted to hear that they were not validly charged, and that they will be getting their money back, but you can appreciate that this would result in a huge administrative nightmare—so, as I said, it falls upon the parliament to correct this problem. Of course, there are legal ramifications of failing to validate these tickets. The issuing of a ticket by an unauthorised person does not result in the offence being invalidated—the person has still parked illegally according to the rules—so this precludes any challenge. It means the tickets cannot be used as evidence if a fine is challenged in court. Prior to the realisation of the error the list of authorised persons had not been updated since 2004. Now we can be confident that this list has been corrected up until March 2010. Unfortunately for the tickets issued during that time, this is, as I said, retrospective in its nature. We do not like anything in this place that is retrospective in its nature. Obviously, there is an interest by airport lessees to pursue commercial developments around airports. It is no secret that Australian airports make a significant proportion of their income through non-aviation means. It is important to note that large developments on airport land require government approval. It is commonplace now that factory outlets, parking, shopping, hotels, conference facilities, transport hubs and a whole range of industry are now to be found on leased airport land. Last year master plans for nearly all of the nation’s airports were approved, including plans for commercial expansions. The development approval process is extensive and has become more stringent in recent years. It is important to note how important the commercial aspect is, because it allows investment in aviation infrastructure. Privatisation of airports by the previous government has resulted in more than $2 billion being invested in federal airports, with billions more committed. The industry supports this case, saying that the commercial development is good for the economy: every $1 billion of capital investment generates something like $800 million in wages, and we have seen the employment of 19,000 workers as a result. In 2006 the Productivity Commission reported—so these figures are reasonably old, but they give an indication—that 61 per cent of Canberra Airport’s revenue was generated from non-aeronautical activities. For Perth the figure was 53 per cent and for Sydney it was 39 per cent. So we are talking about large percentages of profit being generated by commercial operations on airport land. Particularly in times where revenues have fallen, airport operators are looking to make their money through other means. Last year, Olivia Wirth, the then Executive Director of Tourism and Transport Forum, said: Air services will always be Australian airports first priority. However, with a recession bearing down— which it was at the time; it never happened but it was bearing down— it is time to remove the stigma about non-aeronautical development. Airport’s leases can easily be seen as a licence to print money. Recent figures show that Sydney Airport’s profits are 80 per cent of operating revenue. Whilst the debt of most operators is huge, Sydney Airport makes $5 for every $1 it spends on its operations. More and more airports are generating revenue from the development of leased land that is not subject to aviation reserve, as they are well within their rights to do, as long as they comply with their conditions. Major developments of over $20 million require the approval of the minister. The heart of this bill, the parking fees, are a great source of revenue. Last year, for example, Melbourne Airport brought in $95 million in parking fees—in fact, it was 20 per cent of its revenue. Perth is much the same. While I am on the subject of Perth, Mr Deputy Speaker Washer, as you and I are both from that fantastic, resource-rich state, we know that the shambolic nature of parking at Perth Airport has been an issue for some time. In fact, as you drive into the Perth Airport you will see cars parked in the evening up and down Brearley Avenue, because they either cannot or will not go into the car parks at the Perth Airport. They will not or cannot either because the car parks are full or because they are too expensive to use. This huge amount of parking up and down the road reserve is a problem that needs to be addressed. In some respects it is dangerous. It is certainly opportunistic by those who want to sit there with their engines running, waiting for somebody to get off a plane and to duck into the airport to pick up the person getting off the plane. The problem is further exacerbated by the fact that the entry into the airport parking apron is now becoming so congested. Just the other day my own experience was that I had to get out of the car and cut across the car park to make sure I was not late for the cut-off time on the plane, because there was a huge queue to get into the parking and drop-off areas of the Perth Airport. I will address this issue a bit further in my speech here today when I talk about the parking problems for fly-in fly-out workers. In 2008-09, Perth Airport generated $29 million from parking—double what it made in 2004-05. With airport revenue of $165 million in 2008-09, that means that 17.2 per cent of Perth Airport’s revenue came from parking—up from nine per cent in 2004-05. Perth Airport added almost 1,500 car parks last year, predominantly in the new long-term car park. While car park operating expenses have risen—including the need for CCTV security and shuttles—they remain well below the revenue, meaning there is always a tidy profit. Again, I go to the fly-in fly-out workers and those wanting long-term parking at the Perth Airport. If you live in the vicinity of the Perth Airport, from five in the morning you will see a succession of planes heading out of Perth every five minutes, generally to the mining centres like Leinster and Pannawonica, on their regular shuttle of workers to these areas. And you will see a massive number of taxis picking these people up in the suburbs beforehand. The problem is that if you do not get a taxi and you want to park around the Perth Airport not only will you find it expensive but you will find that this parking is well away from the airport terminal. So then you have the problem of catching a shuttle bus. It really is an issue that the owners of the airport have not kept up with. Through my office—because I have a lot of fly-in fly-out workers in my electorate of Canning—I receive regular complaints from people who have to make use of the long-term car park and are not happy with the service they get. There is huge amount of buffer land surrounding Australian airports, and with that comes opportunity. For example, Brisbane has the largest buffer zone with 2,700 hectares, and 1,000 hectares of this is available for non-aviation commercial use. Sydney, in its 99-year lease, leases 907 hectares—three times smaller than Brisbane. Perth has quite a large buffer zone of 2,100 hectares. Adelaide has only 785 hectares. Melbourne has quite a large buffer zone of 2,379 hectares, but this is set to increase with land acquisition underway to enable the construction of two more runways. We have recently seen the release of the aviation white paper, which focused some attention on the commercial nature of airport operations. The white paper recommended the government make the move to prohibit residential development projects, such as housing adjacent to runways. This happened recently in the Jandakot Acourt Retreat development. Of course it is only sensible not to encourage residential development in close proximity to an airport because of the noise contours which surround airports. As soon as you allow a residential development close to an airport you can rest assured that offices like mine and those of the member for Swan and the member for Perth will receive lots of phone calls from people about aircraft noise over their houses and in their neighbourhoods. I really think we have to be very strong on this because we have seen what happened with Sydney, where insulation and double glazing was needed for those who lived close to the airport. Anyone who allows new residential development close to an airport is just begging for trouble in the future. Another of the main issues addressed in the white paper was the increasing trend of investment in non-aviation related developments at major airports. Since 1998 there have been 48 major development plans on leased airports throughout the country. Sixty-five per cent of these were for non-aviation related development. In the last five years non-aviation related development has far exceeded investment in aviation related infrastructure. One of the major concerns was the $20 million threshold, because large shopping centres and the like could be completed for under $20 million and therefore fell under the level required for public consultation, despite potentially having a major impact on the lifestyle of those living near airports and having a major impact on other commercial operations near airports. I will now refer to this concern about some of the commercial developments on the airports. When I was the member for Swan in 1996 there was a huge campaign, which went under the acronym RAGE—Retailers Against Government Enterprise—at Perth airport. A champion of the media—a guy called WW Mitchell—led the charge on this. Because it was on Commonwealth land developers did not need to seek local planning approval, state government approval or even the Belmont City Council’s approval for construction. This would have had a huge impact on other commercial suburban shopping centres in the area. It was thought at the time that it would have a detrimental impact. As a result, this campaign attracted the interest of the state government of the time. They were talking about cutting off roads to the airport and utilities like electricity and water if they were not allowed to be involved in consultation about this development on Commonwealth land. In some respects the state and local governments brought this upon themselves because of their rather tortuous approval processes for similar developments in the state or in their neighbourhoods. So, of course, people thought, ‘At least we can go to the Commonwealth jurisdiction—land owned by the Commonwealth—in the airport buffer zone, because we will not have to go through this massive and tortuous process that has been afflicting us.’ They did that, and they are continuing to do so, because it seems to be far easier to build on airport buffer zones than in the suburban areas, where state and local governments make things difficult for them. As a word of caution, there needs to be a greater consultative process so that there are not future concerns like this. Perth Airport has 2,100 hectares of land in its reserve. Passenger numbers have increased by almost 50 per cent since 2004. Revenue from aviation purposes has increased by eight per cent between 2004 and 2009. It is a really good money maker and they had their master plan approved last year. In the financial year to June 2008, Perth Airport recorded a profit of $84½ million—an increase of more than 45 per cent on the previous year because of the huge growth in not only international and domestic airfares but also in the number of fly-in fly-out workers in the resource industry. As an aside, Jandakot Airport Holdings wanted to clear bushland half the size of Kings Park at its lease site, largely for business use, which caused a fair bit of concern to those people surrounding the airport. The $1 billion redevelopment of Perth Airport has been shrouded in uncertainty and it has been no secret that I have been pretty critical of leaseholders, the Westralia Airports Corporation. The reason is that before the last federal election the Labor government, then in opposition, had endeavoured—and this is from an article by Geoffrey Thomas—to offer $80 million as an incentive for them to do a billion dollar redevelopment, but they rejected it. I suspect that this might have had something to do with trying to save the federal seat of Swan, which did not work. The fact is, they had an opportunity to make a huge quality investment in Perth Airport. The aviation guru Geoffrey Thomas wrote at the time: The economic landscape has changed since last May when WAC promised a two-stage makeover that would deliver one of the best airports in the Asia Pacific region …. However, WAC later conceded that rather than a showcase airport, such as at Singapore, Perth would get a ‘minimum standard Class C airport’, similar to most in Australia, as rated by the International Air Transport Association. This was an opportunity lost, because one of the reasons the Westralia Airports Corporation have a problem is they paid too much for the airport in the first place and they have been struggling ever since to make it a commercial operation. Even though they are making good profits, they have always struggled with the fact that they paid too much. The cost of borrowed money has always been an issue for them. They have actually been very, very slow in the delivery of many of the promises around Perth Airport. Yes, there have been some improvements, but they are glacial in nature. They are so slow. Look at airport parking. They have reneged on the second runway even though there is a very good case now about aircraft movements. The second parallel runway would take a lot of pressure from the aviation industry and aircraft arrivals and departures, and they have shelved this. One of my contentions is that, realistically, we should be putting more pressure on the Westralia Airports Corporation to deliver this world class airport and to deliver the infrastructure to be ahead of the game rather than be behind the game. They have even been criticised by the previous Labor Premier of Western Australia, Alan Carpenter, for what they have done about the lack of infrastructure at Perth Airport. We used to laugh about the Adelaide Airport once, but Adelaide now is one of the showcases. Perth Airport is probably the worst of the major capital cities of this country in what it delivers. One day someone is actually going to decide, at a government level, that they are not doing the job and maybe they will want to re-bid the lease, if they cannot come up with funds to provide the airport that is appropriate for Western Australia’s growth—particularly as there is a massive amount of increased aviation related activity going through Perth Airport. They have suggested that the work in Terminal 3 is going ahead, but it is going ahead slowly and is not meeting the needs. I think they need to be held far more accountable in the future because it is a showcase for Western Australia and they need to deliver, as they should, on any revised master plan for Perth Airport. 4933 23:27:00 Lindsay, Peter, MP HK6 Herbert LP 0 0 Mr LINDSAY —In the time of the former government there was a landmark decision made in relation to airports: airports were leased out to the private sector. There have been some good outcomes with that and there have been some not so good outcomes. At my own airport in Townsville we have had a fantastic outcome. The local operator who took over completely redeveloped the airport—something that would not have happened under the custodianship of the old FAC. Townsville was the big winner out of that particular privatisation. The downsides, of course, are the fees and charges that we are seeing and what people are being asked to pay and so on. Some of the parking charges are extortionate. Some of the things that the current airport operators do to force you to pay the fees are just amazing. I will get onto that in just a moment. I appreciated the contribution of the previous speaker, the member for Canning, in relation to Perth Airport. Deputy Speaker Washer, Perth Airport would not be unknown to you. I was there very recently and the redevelopment has made the outside look like a train station. You would expect trains to be coming down, not cars and taxis. It just seems very puzzling to me that that design was used. We have had a bit of a problem with the Townsville airport for some time in relation to the pick-up and drop-off area and the roads that go to that. I am pleased to tell the parliament that Townsville airport is now addressing that, and in the next month or so we will see the final work done to tidy that up. Traffic is always a problem, and of course this bill is about traffic and validating tickets that have been issued to drivers who have not done the right thing. Where are some of the good airports for traffic? I guess you have to say that, if you are catching a taxi, Singapore is among the best. It is very good indeed. In Australia, Melbourne and Brisbane are good for catching taxis, but Perth is horrible for catching taxis—just awful. Canberra airport probably takes the cake for being the worst airport at the moment in relation to pick-up and drop-off, and I think we all have experience of that. Brisbane drop-off is very difficult. Those issues really do need to be addressed. There is a great need these days for areas where people coming to airports just to pick up an arriving passenger can pull up and wait until the passenger rings them up and says they have arrived and will wait at the kerb to be picked up. In the United States they are called mobile parking areas, the connotation being that you just wait by your mobile phone and when it rings the passengers arrive and you can start your car and go into the pick-up zone and pick them up. We do not do that in Australia, and we should. I appeal to airport operators to make that provision for passengers who need to be picked up, who do not need short-term or long-term parking. Brisbane airport actually works against that philosophy, because on the four- or five-kilometre approach to Brisbane there is no parking all the way along. The idea seems to be to feed cars into the short-term car park so you can charge them money. I reckon that is pretty short-sighted and unfortunate. The travelling public should have somewhere they can just wait until the plane lands and the passenger comes out of the terminal and they can just be called when the passenger is ready to be picked up. It seems eminently sensible to me, and I appeal to the airport operators to have a look at that. This bill fixes the administrative oversight that occurred in a former bill in relation to parking notices, and it addresses the question of the status of notices issued prior to 25 March to make them all valid. It is a non-controversial piece of legislation. I support it and the opposition supports it, and I thank the House for the time to make this contribution. 4934 11:33:00 McKew, Maxine, MP BP4 Bennelong ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government 1 0 Ms McKEW —I thank members of the House for their contributions to the debate on the Airports (On-Airport Activities Administration) Validation Bill 2010. The government is certainly keen to ensure the administration of regulatory requirements is effective and valid. That is why it has been necessary to pass this legislation to remove any uncertainty introduced by the potential invalidity of infringement notices issued and any other actions performed by persons not validly or lawfully authorised under the regulations. Effective traffic control arrangements are of course essential for the efficient operation of airports. Accordingly, members of the community are required to comply with the traffic management arrangements in place at the airports. The legislation addresses a defect in the formalities of the authorisation dating back to 2004, and it in fact confirms immunity from prosecution to persons who received the infringement notices and paid the relevant penalty. Certainly in the future the government will ensure that administrative arrangements for this program are strengthened so that this sort of oversight will not occur again. I again thank members for their contributions and commend the bill to the House. Question agreed to. Bill read a second time. 4934 Ms McKEW (Bennelong —Parliamentary Secretary for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government) 11:35:00 —by leave—I move: That this bill be now read a third time. Question agreed to. Bill read a third time. 4934 Bills R4272 Cognate bills: 4934 Bills R4278 4934 Bills R4277 4934 Debate resumed from 4 February, on motion by Mr Tanner: That this bill be now read a second time. 4934 11:36:00 Hartsuyker, Luke, MP 00AMM Cowper NATS 0 0 Mr HARTSUYKER —I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010, the ComSuper Bill 2010 and the Superannuation Legislation (Consequential Amendments and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2010. These three bills taken together seek to merge three trustee boards and authorities into a body which will then become the trustee of the main civilian and military superannuation schemes. The boards which will be amalgamated concern the Australian Reward Investment Alliance board, for civilian schemes; the Defence Force Retirement and Death Benefits Authority; and the Defence Forces Retirement Benefits Scheme, which is administered by the Military Superannuation and Benefits Scheme board, for military schemes. The particular schemes to be administered by the new body include the Commonwealth Superannuation Scheme; the Public Sector Superannuation Scheme; the Public Sector Superannuation Accumulation Plan; the scheme provided for under the Papua New Guinea Staffing Assistance Act; the Defence Forces Retirement Benefits Scheme; the Defence Forces Retirement and Death Benefits Scheme; the Military Superannuation and Benefits Scheme; and, finally, the scheme established under the Superannuation Act 1922. These schemes will be amalgamated into the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation, which is established by the governance bill and which will operate as a body corporate with a separate legal identity from the Commonwealth. The ComSuper Bill establishes ComSuper as a prescribed agency under the Financial Management and Accountability Act and as a statutory agency under the Public Service Act. The government is introducing these bills to find efficiencies in the management of government administered superannuation schemes. The amalgamation of all Commonwealth civilian and military superannuation boards is intended to provide administrative efficiencies, as well as secure financial gains through the amalgamation of all investment funds. The total amount for investment across the funds is approximately $19 billion. This includes $16 billion which is currently managed by the ARIA board and $3 billion which is managed by the MSBS board. It is estimated that an additional $10 million per annum will be generated due to the type and size of the amalgamated investment funds and the opportunity to consolidate investments. The bills stipulate that the board of the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation shall consist of 10 members and a chair, five of which will be appointed by the minister for finance, three of which will be appointed by the President of the Australian Council of Trade Unions and two of which will be appointed by the Chief of the Defence Force. Here lies the first problem that the coalition has with this legislation. Why should the President of the ACTU be allowed to nominate three members of the board of ComSuper governance? The last time I checked the ACTU was not a government body and the President of the ACTU was not employed by the Commonwealth. Whereas decisions made by the minister for finance and the Chief of the Defence Force can be held to account in the parliament, the President of the ACTU seems to be able to appoint any person to the board without any oversight whatsoever. Clause 10(4) prevents the minister from questioning the decision of the ACTU President in making an appointment. The explanatory memorandum explains that it is not intended that the minister have any obligation to satisfy himself or herself that the appointment has been properly made. Clauses 16(5) and 16(6) go even further. These clauses prevent the minister for finance from dismissing an appointment made by the President of the ACTU without first receiving permission from the ACTU. The bills list a number of reasons why a board member can be dismissed. These include misbehaviour or physical or mental incapacity; or if a director becomes bankrupt; or if a director fails to attend three consecutive board meetings and does not have a leave of absence; or if a director does not disclose interests to the board. So we could have a mentally incapacitated, bankrupt director who cannot be sacked by the minister for finance because the ACTU President will not allow the dismissal. This creates the extraordinary situation where the minister for finance cannot overrule the ACTU President on board member decisions. When did the ACTU President become more important in managing Australia’s financial investments than the minister for finance? What happens if the ACTU President disagrees with the minister for finance? The bills contain no measures whereby such a conflict can be managed, although, the department of finance explicitly stated to the Senate inquiry that the minister can only remove a board member with the ACTU President’s permission. This is an important point because we know that this government has some differences of opinion with the ACTU from time to time. For instance, I refer to comments in February this year by ACTU President, Sharan Burrow, who reiterated the ACTU’s long campaign to increase the superannuation guarantee and called on the government to increase the super guarantee rate to 12 per cent by 2012. Now let us contrast those comments with the position of the Prime Minister and of the former minister for superannuation, Senator Sherry, before and after the 2007 election. The Prime Minister told Radio 4BC in Brisbane before the election that he would not make any changes to super—‘not one jot, one tittle’. This was followed by remarks from Senator Sherry, who said: We won’t be increasing the nine per cent superannuation guarantee for a number of reasons. I’ve said time and time again at many conferences to many people in the financial services sector, privately and publicly, that nine per cent is enough from the employer, it would be unfair to increase that nine per cent any further and we won’t be doing it. The then minister for superannuation, Senator Sherry, also had this to say after the election in March 2008: The 9 per cent superannuation guarantee contribution that employers pay for their employees—again, we’ve committed that we could not increase that and increase the payment burden on employers. But, as we all know, in the 2010 budget the government listened to union demands and decided to increase the superannuation guarantee to 12 per cent. Senator Sherry is right: the policy certainly will be a burden on employers. It will increase payroll costs by around $20 billion per year when the 12 per cent is phased in. This includes around $10 billion from the two million small businesses in Australia. But the ACTU are not famous for considering the interests of small businesses over union interests. Here is what the ACTU’s secretary, Jeff Lawrence, said about the government’s policy: “The pathway to a 12 per cent superannuation guarantee is a big win for … Australian unions …” So when it comes to superannuation policy, the government does not listen to the former minister’s commitments. It does not listen to the Prime Minister’s commitments. It does not even listen to the recommendation from its own Henry review, which specially recommended against lifting the superannuation guarantee. Instead, the government listens to an ACTU campaign. And these bills formalise that position. They prevent the minister for finance from overruling the ACTU President with regard to the ComSuper board. This is an unacceptable position. No wonder the defence community want their own administrative board for superannuation when this government has been proven to be so incompetent at managing superannuation policy and has been putting the ACTU’s interests ahead of commitments by the Prime Minister and the former minister for superannuation. Since these bills were released for comment, the veteran community has argued very strongly that the amalgamation of all civilian and military Commonwealth superannuation boards will have negative consequences on the future of military superannuation schemes. A Senate inquiry on these pieces of legislation reported on Monday, 15 March and allowed the defence community to voice their anger at the proposals. The Defence Force Welfare Association submitted to the inquiry that it strongly contends: … military superannuation schemes require a board and management structure that is separate from, and is seen to be separate from, Board and management structures applying to the Commonwealth’s civilian superannuation schemes. The proposed Board merger will seriously disadvantage military superannuation contributors and beneficiaries and, in turn, the wider Australian community because: The unique conditions of military service will be subordinated to, and subsumed by, civilian conditions of service even though the two are fundamentally and materially different. The Australian Veterans and Defence Services Council Inc. said: There is not now in the government function the interest that came with earlier parliaments … with people who had the experience to be able to recognise the uniqueness of military service and therefore had an objective approach to military superannuation as a feature of conditions of service. The coalition agrees that military superannuation is unique. As my colleague the shadow minister for Defence Science and Personnel will explain, military superannuation is offered as part of a broad remuneration of Australia’s defence personnel. The defence community believes that these bills are another step that will erode the unique position given to military superannuation. Military personnel make a huge sacrifice for the Australian people and they deserve to be rewarded through a generous and unique superannuation scheme that provides for them in retirement. The defence community should be rewarded and not punished. The amalgamated superannuation board will allow the Chief of the Defence Force to choose two board members, compared to the ACTU’s three. What this government is effectively telling the defence community is that they are less important than the ACTU, and the ACTU has appointed board members who will have more say on the unique position of military superannuation than the defence force members. The coalition agrees with the defence community. It is an outrageous proposition that the ACTU should have more say on the management of military superannuation than the Department of Defence. Furthermore, the proposals will require a quorum to be formed by a board consisting of nine of the 11 members. The coalition is concerned that the three ACTU appointed board members could prevent a meeting from taking place merely by refusing to attend the board meeting. The ACTU could hold the board to ransom if ever an issue were to arise that the ACTU disagreed with. This is unacceptable. The coalition will not support these bills as they are currently drafted. The coalition concurs with many from the defence community who believe that that the Defence Force Retirement and Death Benefits Authority, the Defence Forces Retirement Benefits Scheme, and the Military Superannuation and Benefits Scheme should be amalgamated under one board. However, this board should remain separate from the administration of civilian superannuation. The amalgamated military board should have oversight and control of all matters relating to the management of military superannuation schemes. It is appropriate that the military and civilian boards have a common chairperson, but no person can be appointed as a director on both the civilian and military boards concurrently. Importantly, the veteran community needs to be represented on the military board. Any board should contain a sunset clause so that the operation of the two boards can be reviewed after either three or five years to ensure that the interests of both military and civilian persons are being managed appropriately and in their best interests. The bill should also ensure that the Minister for Finance and Deregulation always has the final say over decisions made by the ACTU president with regards to board membership. The coalition cannot support these bills in their current form and will be looking to introduce amendments in the Senate. 4938 11:49:00 Ripoll, Bernie, MP 83E Oxley ALP 1 0 Mr RIPOLL —I have to say at the outset of this very important Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010 and cognate bills that I am quite disappointed in the shadow minister and some of the grand rhetoric that he has put forward and some of the misleading words and views in terms of what this bill is about or, more broadly, military superannuation. As we all understand and know, these are big issues in the community, the military community and all of our electorates. We all work very hard to make sure that our veterans’ community are well looked after, that all their entitlements are properly maintained and managed over a period of time and that any government looks after the best interests of our military personnel. We all support that. What I find offensive and wrong in these debates is when our military folk are used as political tools for an opposition that is in the business of opposing rather than looking at the substantive good work that has gone into the reforms that have been put forward here today in the bill before us. There is also the very simple fact that the extensive and wide consultation that has taken place was done with the military community and with ex-service organisations and has the full support of all of those organisations, including the RSL. That is a little yet important point I would have thought the shadow minister might have taken just a brief moment to talk about. Who supports this bill and the reforms we are putting on the table? Military people do. Who opposes it? A bunch of opposition politicians do. I think that says a lot about the calibre and character of the people who oppose this in the House, like they oppose many other things. They oppose reform in the Medicare and health areas, they oppose reform in the stimulus packages, they oppose a whole range of other areas—very important infrastructure bills and so forth. I will not dwell on those points. I want to concentrate on some very important issues that are before us. I also make the point that these are complex matters for many people to deal with. It involves their retirement incomes and what is a very emotive issue for many people in the defence forces, particularly those who have retired or those who are retiring sometime in the future because of the benefits that they believe they are entitled to, and which they are entitled to—there is no question of that. Everything this government has done in the 2½ years since it was elected has reflected the fact that we are looking to put the best interests of military personnel first, to improve the superannuation schemes that are available to them and to make those schemes reflect the 21st century and not the bygone eras of 20, 30 or 40 years ago. The commitments of past governments are no longer relevant when considering what military personnel should receive today. We are very committed to ensuring that military personnel have a proper, fair, equitable and indexed set of superannuation arrangements in place, and we are no less committed to modernising the government’s arrangements around military superannuation schemes. That is what these bills are about and that is what they do. They do it to improve efficiency, to ensure the sustainability and longevity of those schemes and to make sure that future governments are not caught out when it comes to what are in most cases ostensibly defined schemes where the liability is met by government out of consolidated revenue. It is a very important point that in the scheme proposed in these bills, as in any defined benefits scheme, the contributions going in do not necessarily accumulate to a point where they can fund the liability of the schemes; rather, these schemes are funded out of consolidated revenue by the taxpayer and the contributions made by military personnel. It is very important that we get the governance arrangements right, that these schemes are efficient and that they reflect the changing environment in superannuation. I make a couple of other points before going to the specific details of a couple of other areas relating to superannuation. The shadow minister, the member for Cowper, raised these issues when he talked about the increase from nine per cent to 12 per cent, and again the opposition seem not to be supportive. Those opposite talk about the ACTU and how this legislation represents win for unions. I would have thought that it was a win for the people receiving it—ordinary people and workers. Unions do not receive the superannuation. The ACTU as a body does not receive the superannuation. The individual people—the mums and dads and the workers of this country who are the productive people creating the wealth in the economy—receive the suparannuation. It is not the ACTU that receives the superannuation but the workers. So I find it bizarre and offensive that those opposite come in here and say this legislation represents a big win for the ACTU or the unions. I think it is just ridiculous. It is very important to note here that the superannuation system in this country—our national savings—was one of the biggest reasons why we went through the global financial crisis in better shape than did most other countries. We had this really great and sound fundamental base, and I think that important point is lost on those opposite. Making governance improvements and efficiencies and pulling these schemes together under a single trustee body is the right direction to go. I did hear the shadow minister saying that it was the right direction. Of course it is, and for that reason alone the opposition should be supporting these bills rather than going off at tangents about the control of superannuation, a subject I will come back to. The community, though, certainly understands that the Labor Party is the architect of superannuation in this country. That big step forward in superannuation reform was a brave move. If you look back 20-plus years from now, you will see the benefits of that, and here we are again with some simple and straightforward though involved reforms on which you would at least expect the opposition to come on board. These reforms are not about politics; they are about military personnel having a win and the best possible arrangements the government can find. The government has gone through an extensive consultation process and had a lot of work done to make sure that it is robust and sound and about proper governance, which are all things that this country is renowned for. So I find it completely odd that the opposition oppose this. Perhaps they are a little bit embarrassed that the government has done more in 2½ years than they did in 12 years—perhaps it is as simple as that. There has been more reform and more good things done on issues of concern to military personnel in the 2½ years that we have been in government than there were in the 12 years that the Howard government was in control. I highlight that point because it relates directly to military superannuation. When the Podger review—which was commissioned and done under the Howard government—was finished and the report delivered, the Howard government refused to release it. We made a commitment in opposition that, should we be elected, we would release that report, and we have done that. I think it needs to be noted that, while the other side put together that review, they would not allow it to become a public document and we did. These bills go to a range of very important matters. They aim to modernise the government’s arrangements in the Commonwealth military superannuation schemes without altering those schemes—and this is another point that has been missed by the opposition—or altering the entitlements of members under those schemes. They are retained in full. The purpose of these bills is to follow through on government decisions that were made in 2008 and 2009 to merge the existing trustees of the main Commonwealth civilian and military superannuation schemes to form one single trustee body, which is the correct way forward. The changes that these bills make to both the government’s framework and the administrative arrangements for these schemes will make the system more efficient. There are cost savings in making them, and those savings can be passed onto the beneficiaries of those schemes, be they civilian employees of the Commonwealth or military personnel. The bills are about improving efficiency and improving the management of the schemes. They will allow the benefits of the improvements to flow through to everybody involved in those schemes. It is well understood—it is a matter of fact—that small superannuation schemes are less efficient than larger schemes. With Jeremy Cooper doing his review of superannuation, it is also clear that the movement towards larger superannuation schemes is part of the operation of a better system. It protects members, gives them higher efficiencies and better governance and means that they get higher returns from those schemes. While consideration was given to a single trustee body in the arrangements put forward in this bill, the greatest degree of consideration was given to the unique nature of military service and military personnel. The bills should not be treated as though they were put together only in the light of superannuation and then tacked on without consideration of the unique nature of military service and military personnel when they were in fact put together in the opposite way. They were put together to look very specifically at how we preserve, maintain, improve and enhance the schemes for military personnel as well as for people from Commonwealth civilian services. This government would not have set about this process without that being a primary focus and without ensuring that it was the focus by undertaking wide-ranging consultation. These amendments complement the existing features of military superannuation and reflect the special nature of military service. They are completely consistent with the views that have been put forward by military stakeholders, including, as I said at the outset, key ex-service organisations and their members. The unions of military personnel have been consulted and have been supportive. So again it is another big win for military personnel. They are the beneficiaries, not their representative bodies or the unions that represent them. The amendments affect the process for nomination of directors, amongst a range of other things, as you would expect for a governing body under a single trustee. The governing board of the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation, the CSC, will consider matters that relate solely to the military schemes and there is a special provision made to ensure integrity around its operations. In particular, the consolidation of the scheme funds will allow members of the Military Superannuation and Benefits Scheme, who comprise the bulk of the serving Defence Force personnel, to gain substantial benefits from the merger. As I said earlier, industry experience has shown that size does matter—it matters a lot—when it comes to superannuation. By bringing these together you combine what are essentially very small schemes, almost boutique schemes in some cases, into a much larger, much more robust and fundamentally sound system without changing the schemes themselves. This brings on board the weight of confidence that is created in going from 50,000 or 60,000 members, as in one particular scheme, to 650,000 members—that weight of support of having all those members in those schemes. The merger will bring more than 650,000 members together for the first time under one trustee. This will mean that there will be around $19 billion of funds under this new body. That is a much more workable number in terms of governance and efficiency, and this is enhanced by having a large superannuation governing board. It is not about changing the schemes; the particular features and benefits of the schemes remain the same. I cannot stress that enough because I know for a fact that the opposition will go out there, as they have in other areas, and mislead people about the benefits, the entitlements and the governance provided for in the bill and the outcomes of the amendments. We just heard it from the shadow minister. He just came in here and told everybody, straight out, that the opposition are going to oppose these very good reforms that are supported by the military. They are going to oppose them because it suits their political agenda to do so; unfortunately, military and ex-military personnel will have to pay the price, as will Commonwealth civilian personnel. These bills were developed with a particular priority of maintaining and protecting the features of those military superannuation schemes. As I have said—I cannot say it enough in this debate—specific additional issues were raised, considered and dealt with by key ex-service organisations, including the Returned and Services League. We have evidence of a strong commitment to recognise that unique military service and we have the backing of those organisations. The amendments make changes to a range of things. I took particular note of what the shadow minister was saying and his concerns about the powers of the Minister for Finance and Deregulation or perhaps the Chief of the Defence Force and others who are members of the board. The reality is that the finance minister can only make certain changes if he consults with the Minister for Defence in relation to the appointment and termination of employer directors on the board. I do not see how anybody could argue against the finance minister having to consult. I would have thought that consultation with the defence minister in relation to specific appointees to the board is the sort of shared power you would want in a military superannuation scheme. I think that is a worthy aim. If this provision were not included in the legislation, I bet you anything you like that the opposition would come in here and say, ‘There’s no consultation by the government. They’re wielding power. They’re going to do this of their own volition and not consult with anybody.’ We actually are consulting. The finance minister must consult with the defence minister, which is a very sound move. Having more insight and expertise in the area of defence, the defence minister should be consulted by the finance minister in these very important matters. The changes go a few steps further. The Chief of the Defence Force also needs to consult with one or more relevant organisations in nominating member directors for appointment to the board—so there is another consultation process that needs to take place. These relevant organisations include organisations that promote the interests of the beneficiaries under the scheme, such as the RSL and other service and ex-service organisations. We have ensured that that consultation process involves not just the executive of government but also the executive of defence and the representative bodies of serving and ex-service personnel. That is the right way forward—these are the sorts of consultation processes needed to improve the system. We also ensure that there is a requirement for at least one of the employee directors nominated by the Chief of the Defence Force to be present when the board is deliberating on an issue that relates to military schemes, which is an arrangement that does not exist at present. This is to ensure that they cannot be excluded and that the voice of the military is always present—it must be present. I cannot understand the kind of waffle that we got from the shadow minister about how the military voice would somehow not be there when the military voice is clearly there through the Chief of the Defence Force, the structure of the board and the consultation process, as well as ensuring that at least one of those board members must be present in relation to any issue that relates to the military schemes, and also a change to the membership of the dedicated defence committee to prescribe to the chair of that committee that one of the directors also be on the board of the CSC. So not only is that taking place at a broader level but specifically on the board for the military superannuation schemes. These are consistent changes to what takes place in the broader community and what takes place in Commonwealth Public Service superannuation schemes and are reflective of best practice. They are reflective of the best opportunity for military personnel to maintain and improve their access to superannuation and also their termination payments, to make sure that those are the maximum they possibly can be under the schemes. There are also a number of technical matters, but, having dealt with the substantive matters, I will leave the technical matters to one side. Unfortunately, and also a bit sadly, there has been a misinformation campaign by some in the community about changes to superannuation and the old DFRB Scheme, the DFRDB Scheme and the more recent MSB scheme. I just want to make a couple of quick notes. One is that none of those schemes have disappeared. While there are no new entrants into those schemes, they still exist for those people who are members of those schemes. The issues that are being raised in a number of forums are misleading and are not based on fact. The government has gone to some lengths with the best interests of the military—serving and ex-military—personnel at heart and will continue—(Time expired) 4942 12:09:00 Baldwin, Robert, MP LL6 Paterson LP 0 0 Mr BALDWIN —I rise today to speak on the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010 and cognate bills. Simply put, the bills set out to combine all current Commonwealth civilian and military superannuation trustees, namely the Australian Reward Investment Alliance, the Military Superannuation and Benefits Board and the Defence Force Retirement and Death Benefits Authority, into one body. The new trustee, which is to be named the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation, or CSC, will be responsible for the administration of the following schemes: the Commonwealth Superannuation Scheme, the Public Sector Superannuation Scheme, the Public Sector Superannuation accumulation plan, the scheme provided for under the Papua New Guinea (Staffing Assistance) Act, the Military Superannuation and Benefits Scheme, or the MSBS, the Defence Force Retirement and Death Benefits Scheme, or the DFRDB, the scheme established under the Superannuation Act 1922 and the Defence Force Retirement Benefits Scheme. This bill will impact on approximately 650,000 members of the various civilian and military superannuation schemes. Furthermore, the proposed CSC would be responsible for managing approximately $19 billion worth of combined military and civilian funds, which would include approximately $16 billion currently managed by the ARIA board and $3 billion currently managed by the MSBS board. It is therefore critical that this bill and its potential impacts on the members of the various Commonwealth superannuation funds be properly examined. I note that my colleague, the shadow minister for superannuation, the member for Cowper, has focused on the broader impacts of this bill as it relates to Commonwealth superannuation schemes. During my time today, I will be speaking specifically on the effects that this bill will have on members of the various military superannuation schemes, namely the MSBS, the DFRDB and the DFRB. Fundamentally the government believes that increased returns for members can be generated through streamlining the administration of the schemes and creating a larger singular pool of investment funds, thereby increasing benefits and financial returns to the various scheme members. Importantly, however, whether or not members will receive any benefit remains to be seen, and no guarantees have been made by the Rudd Labor government. All that has been indicated by the Rudd Labor government is that by merging the military and civilian schemes, the additional investment returns would, if based on 2008 figures, be about $10 million in the first year, $15 million in 2018 and $19 million in 2028. I agree that the funds from the ARIA managed schemes and those schemes managed by the MSBS board should be combined. In fact, if we are to believe the government, which is becoming harder and harder by the day, then most ex-service organisations would agree with that logic. However, this is not the sticking point with regard to this legislation, even though the government has tried to paint it as such. The real sticking points are the governance arrangements and, more importantly, the fact that this bill fails to take into account the unique nature of military service. On the matter of governance arrangements, this bill stipulates the CSC will have a board consisting of 10 directors, plus one chairperson. Three of those directors will be nominated by the president of the ACTU, five will be nominated by the Minister for Finance and Deregulation, but only two will be nominated by the Chief of the Defence Force. It becomes very clear very quickly why the coalition and indeed the ADF community oppose this bill. The coalition cannot support the inclusion of three trade unionists on a board that is responsible for managing military superannuation. The coalition does not support these arrangements because, by the sheer weight of numbers under the CSC governance structure, the two votes of the CDF nominated directors will be rendered insignificant. I acknowledge the finance minister’s eleventh-hour amendment, which would mandate that all matters relating specifically to the interests of military members must have a quorum of a least one CDF nominated director in attendance. But that simply does not go far enough, and the weight of numbers on the CSC board will significantly disadvantage military members. Just why the Rudd Labor government believes there should be three ACTU appointed directors and only two CDF appointed directors remains unclear, but given that the ALP is at the helm, it is hardly surprising. The coalition also takes considerable issue with the arrangements that give the President of the ACTU the determining voice in the dismissal of ACTU directors. The effect the regulation contained in subclause 10(4) has on governance arrangements is best illustrated through an example. If an ACTU appointed director who is responsible for making decisions that affect hundreds of thousands of people and who is responsible for managing tens of billions of dollars worth of investment funds was himself to become bankrupt, for example, they should be removed from the CSC board. However, this legislation stipulates that the minister for finance is unable to remove that person. In fact the only person who can remove an ACTU director is the President of the ACTU. I find it quite extraordinary that the minister for finance is subordinate to the President of the ACTU. In fact, it is not extraordinary—it is downright preposterous. What makes matters worse is that this issue was raised directly with the minister for finance by the coalition and the ex-service community, and yet he has still failed to rectify this glaring legislative problem. The minister for finance has failed to appreciate the implications contained within subclause 10(4) because this minister believes consultation is a one-way street. The minister believes that a single meeting and a follow-up brief a couple of months later—but no earlier than 24 hours before reintroducing the amended legislation—constitutes meaningful dialogue. I met with the minister for finance regarding this bill in good faith. I did so on behalf of the coalition and on behalf of the veteran community, who raised many of their objections directly with me. Unfortunately, all that resulted from this was a commitment by the government to ensure that the amended legislation contained strengthened provisions for consultation—which is somewhat ironic because consultation is the exact thing that this government failed to do before drafting this legislation. The proposed amendments contained in this bill are as follows: a requirement for the CDF to consult with relevant organisations on the appointment of two military directors; a requirement for the minister for finance to consult with the Minister for Defence on appointing the five employer representatives; a requirement for the minister for finance to consult the Minister for Defence on the appointment of the ComSuper CEO; a requirement for a quorum on matters relating specifically to the interests of military members to include one CDF nominated director; a requirement for decisions made by the board to include one CDF appointed director when issues relate to the interests of military members; and a requirement that the chair of the Defence Force Case Assessment Committee is one of the CDF nominated directors. Interestingly, there is no mention of the composition of the board—with three ACTU appointed directors and only two CDF appointed directors. There is no mention of how only the President of the ACTU can dismiss ACTU appointed directors. There is also no mention of the coalition’s proposed amendments. Furthermore, there is no mention of the unique nature of military service and how this bill and the amendments are supposed to safeguard the issues of current and former ADF personnel. Having canvassed the major governance issues that remain in this flawed legislation, I would now like to turn to the matter of the unique nature of military service. The Defence Force Welfare Association, the DFWA, has a long history of representing the interests of current and ex-service personnel and their families on a range of issues. Most notably, the DFWA is vocal on issues such as service conditions, including health care and family support. But they are also vocal, as I am sure Minister Tanner is aware, on matters such as military superannuation reform. It is appropriate, therefore, that I raise one of the core issues the DFWA has identified in this bill, and not simply because I appreciate those concerns but because the DFWA in this instance best encapsulates the sentiment emanating from the service and ex-service communities. The view of the Defence Force Welfare Association and, I might add, the vast majority of those who have written directly to me regarding this bill, is that, by combining the military and civilian schemes, the unique nature of military service will be further eroded. The DFWA has said: Unique service requires unique solutions, not ones which further blur the distinction between the uniqueness of military service and civilian norms. Those that know of the DFWA’s views on such matters will be more than familiar with their stance regarding the uniqueness of military service. I do not think there would be any opposition from those in the House when I say that I too believe that serving in the military equates to a very unique type of national service. Of course, I can understand why veterans and those organisations that represent them believe that the unique nature of military service is under threat. It must be remembered that the Rudd Labor government promised, in the 2007 Labor election policy document, that it would: … maintain a generous military superannuation system in recognition of the importance of the ADF and the immense responsibility placed on personnel in securing and defending Australia. Of course, the veteran community now know that the Rudd Labor government took them for a ride. They know that they were used purely for political reasons and that they can no longer trust the Rudd Labor government. It is little wonder, then, that the DFWA believes that this bill will lead to the further erosion of their benefits, even in the face of assurances offered by the minister for finance. After all, this is the same minister who declared that the Rudd Labor government was satisfied that the consumer price index was the most suitable indexation method by which to index veterans’ superannuation pensions. I want to reiterate my words from only a week ago, when I spoke on a private member’s motion regarding the uniqueness of military service: I and the coalition have always considered and will always consider service rendered by our military personnel as unique. Although I have not served in the ADF, I have had many opportunities to experience the many facets of service life through, for example, my work as the shadow minister for defence science and personnel, through my participation in the ADF parliamentary program and most recently by spending a week with Australian troops on the ground in Afghanistan with my colleague— shadow parliament secretary— Stuart Robert. But, then again, I would argue that one need not have served in the military to understand the unique nature of that service. Simply ask the spouse of a current serving member and they will, I have no doubt, convey to you the uniqueness of their husband’s or wife’s service. Serving in the Australian Defence Force is unique not only for what members are asked to give for their country; it is unique for all that they forgo in the name of that service—for example, missing the birth of their son or daughter because they were deployed on operations in the Middle East, or missing out on Christmas with family and friends because they were assisting in a diaster relief effort at home or abroad. Perhaps one of the finest summations of the uniqueness of military service I have read to date comes from David Jamison, President of the DFWA who said: In volunteering for military service, the individual accepts the surrender of his or her basic rights under Article 3 and places his or her life, liberty and security of person in the hands of the State. This surrender is not unconditional, though in extremis, it is absolute. Given the unique nature of military service—so eloquently encapsulated in Mr Jamison’s quote—it is not surprising that both current and former ADF members take acute opposition to the proposed composition of the new CSC board and the effect that this legislation will have on further blurring the distinction between military and non-military service. In fact, these issues were raised in almost every submission to the Senate Finance and Public Administration Committee hearing on this bill and have been raised in every piece of correspondence that I have received from concerned members and ex-members of the ADF. The coalition is opposing this legislation because it is flawed in its current form. The legislation is being opposed because it ignores the central tenet that military service is unique and it is being opposed because the Rudd Labor government failed to consult with the very people whom this legislation will affect the most: those men and women who are currently in or were in the Australian Defence Force. It will probably come as no shock that the Rudd Labor government failed to consult with those affected. They did not bother to consult with any of the organisations that represent past and present members of the ADF. Organisations like the Defence Force Welfare Association or the RAAF Association were simply not included in the lead-up to the development of this legislation. That is symptomatic of this Rudd Labor government. It attempts to introduce new legislation without even consulting with those it will affect. The new mining supertax is but another example in a suite of examples. It was only after the coalition flagged concerns with the current legislation and pushed for a Senate committee enquiry that organisations like DFWA and the RAAF Association were given the chance to have their collective voices heard and to express their views. Only then were individuals able to submit their personal views on this flawed legislation—legislation which would directly affect them. Even as late as yesterday, when the Rudd Labor government thought it was appropriate to inform the coalition of its amendments to this bill, they still had not consulted widely. In fact, the briefing note did not mention who the Rudd Labor government supposedly consulted with within the ex-service community, only that those in the ex-service community generally agreed with their amendments. It will come as no shock, but I take issue with such an assessment, particularly when ex-service organisations and veterans continue to tell me exactly the opposite and that they remain opposed to this legislation. Furthermore, the Defence Force Welfare Association has said that the Rudd Labor government’s reference to the view of all the ex-service organisations at an ESO roundtable were ‘disingenuous’ and that: Most of what are outlined as the outcomes of the discussion came from ESO leaders comments who had not had the chance to be fully briefed on the issues and were unprepared for substantive discussions on the topic. In complete contrast with the Rudd Labor government’s approach to this legislation, the coalition has listened to current Australian Defence Force members, veterans, ex-service people and ex-service organisations. The coalition consulted widely, and we had the common decency to listen to those who will be affected by these legislative changes. If the Rudd Labor government had bothered to engage with the veteran community and current serving members before drafting the legislation, they would have quickly realised that merely gaining administrative efficiency is not a sufficient reason for the introduction of this bill. While this bill may help streamline the administration of Commonwealth superannuation schemes, that alone is not a sufficient justification for the amalgamation of all Commonwealth civilian and military schemes. While the bill may provide some financial benefits to members, the Minister for Finance and Deregulation, Mr Tanner, has not done enough to convince past and present ADF members that financial benefits alone will be worth the diminution of their status on an amalgamated military and civilian board. The coalition has raised its concerns directly with the minister for finance and has discussed alternatives to the current proposed legislation, including the introduction of separate civilian and military boards. The coalition’s proposal would see the continuation of a single civilian board but would introduce a single military board that would administer all the military schemes, including the DFRDB and MSBS boards. Such a construct would simplify administration arrangements—an aim of the proposed legislation—while also helping to ensure that the unique nature of military service is recognised. The proposal would also provide the potential for additional financial gains for members through the amalgamation of all civilian and military invested funds. Furthermore, whilst it is envisaged that the two boards would have a common chairperson, no director would be able to be appointed to both the civilian and the military boards. Lastly, the coalition proposes a sunset clause in the legislation that would allow for the review of the proposed construct after three to five years in order to ensure that both military and civilian investment funds are being managed appropriately and in the best interests of their members. Unfortunately, Minister Tanner did not take on board even one suggestion put forward by the coalition. Instead, as I have previously mentioned, he thought it best to simply present the government’s amendments to the coalition at the eleventh hour. Mr Speaker, that is not consultation but merely an illusion designed to give the impression of consultation—and we all know that this government receives top marks for its smoke-and-mirrors campaigns right now. The Rudd Labor government is being not only obstructionist but also obstinate in its lack of willingness to come to the table and negotiate acceptable outcomes with the coalition. We have said to the minister for finance that we have no problem with combining the investment funds in order to increase financial returns, but we have also said that our first responsibility is to govern in the national interest, which includes defence interests and the interests of current and former defence personnel. The coalition remains committed to ensuring that their interests and assets are protected, and they simply will not be when only two members of a 10-person board represent the interests of military members. We do not believe that the safeguard measures proposed by the finance minister are enough. Our discussions with ESOs as late as last night have shown that there will be a great amount of concern regarding this legislation. The finance minister should not misrepresent what the ESOs have said and should not claim that they have agreed to his amendments—because, simply put, they have not. The reality is that fundamental deficiencies remain with this legislation, and the coalition will not be supporting these bills in their current form. 10000 Sidebottom, Sid (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr S Sidebottom)—Thank you for your contribution. I point out to the member for Paterson that, as much as I would be honoured to be elected to be the Speaker of this great chamber, I am in fact only a lowly Deputy Speaker. Thank you! 4948 12:28:00 Griffin, Alan, MP VU5 Bruce ALP Minister for Veterans’ Affairs and Minister for Defence Personnel 1 0 Mr GRIFFIN —Mr lowly Deputy Speaker, humble as you are, I have known you for a long time and a fine Deputy Speaker you are. The Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010 and related legislation is legislation that ought to be supported. It ought to be supported by the entire parliament and it ought to be supported across the defence community, because it is actually in the interests of those it seeks to represent. It is in the interests, overwhelmingly, of those who are superannuation scheme members, particularly in the military sector, and it is overwhelmingly in the interests of the government of this nation, the governance of these schemes and the performance of these schemes with respect to those for whom they seek to provide support. There are some things we can agree on with the member for Paterson. He made mention of the fact that there has been misrepresentation going on. I agree, but I think the agreement stops there, because there is then the question of who has been doing the misrepresenting. In the context of superannuation, a lot of that misrepresentation has in fact been by the coalition in terms of misinterpreting commitments made by this government and acted upon by this government in government and also about the way this debate has developed in the broader community. I will pick up on a couple of points he made as I go through. I will not go to the detail of the amendments, because the member for Paterson outlined some of the key components and we will be dealing with the detail of those amendments in the consideration in detail stage. As a starting point I will pick up on the issue of consultation. Firstly, and I will make it very clear, I apologise—and I have apologised publicly—to the ex-service community for the way that consultation on this bill initially occurred: it was not sufficient. In fact, it should have been better and there is absolutely no doubt about that. However, having said that—and I will make this point in more detail in a second—when this legislation was explained to members of the ex-service community at the Ex-Service Organisation Round Table, at which some 13 national ESOs were represented, one particular member there described the changes as a ‘no-brainer’. So, frankly, one of the reasons why there was not consultation to the degree that people have sought on this bill and on the aspects of the bill that have been up for discussion is that it just makes sense—that is, the changes that need to be made to the governance of superannuation schemes that we are here to deal with today. The opposition have tried to separate out issues and say, ‘We’re happy with the good things in terms of the increased performance of investments—we think that’s all fine—but what we want you to do is throw the rest out and just concentrate on that,’ without, I think, taking into account the fact that that does not get you the reforms you need to ensure you have a modern and viable superannuation scheme in place for the ex-service community and the serving service community into the future. I, of course, will concentrate my comments on the military because that is where my responsibilities lie and that is where the concerns have been raised about the operation of the system. Having made a mistake with the consultation—and I accept that—we took action. We pulled the bills to allow discussions to occur. We went out and started talking to people. I want to particularly thank Ken Doolan, the National President of the RSL, who was the first person to raise with me the concerns the ex-service community had about elements of this legislation. I want to thank him for his constructive involvement as we considered the amendments and tried to work on a way through some of these issues. Those ex-service organisations and, overwhelmingly, those individuals who have expressed concerns about this legislation frequently used the term ‘symbolic’. They say there are symbolic issues here which go to the issue of how military service should be treated. Many of those people have said to me that in fact it is symbolic. The point about symbolism is that it is often very important, and I understand why. But it is symbolic and in that context it does not go to the central question of how these systems will operate and the sorts of benefits they will deliver to those who are members of these schemes. Following the concerns that were raised, the government launched itself into a consultative process to ensure we got the views of the ex-service community. There were several things that were done. They were individual discussions with some of the ESOs that have been mentioned about what their concerns were, to endeavour to find a way through to ensure that those concerns were accommodated in the final version of the legislation that is before us today. There was also a discussion around these issues and a briefing of the Prime Ministerial Advisory Council on Ex-Service Matters, which is made up of a range of representatives selected from across the nation to represent to the government issues of concern within the ex-service community. As mentioned by the member for Paterson, there was also a discussion at the Ex-Service Organisation Round Table, or ESO Round Table, which is another consultative mechanism that this government has for dealing with issues within the ex-service community. I might add that it is one of the consultative mechanisms this government has in place, because when the opposition were in government they never had anything like it to provide the same sort of feedback because they did not want to know. They did not want to know what those organisations thought or cared about. In the briefing that occurred at the ESO Round Table, there was a wide-ranging discussion, and a couple of the points—and I will pick up on what the member for Paterson said—need to be made very clear. Apart from comments like, ‘This is a no-brainer,’ there were concerns expressed by particular organisations. At the conclusion of that discussion, I said—and I know I said it; I was there—very clearly to those present that any organisation there that had concerns and wished to consider the matter further should contact the adviser responsible in the minister for finance’s office to discuss those concerns and that we would happily give them several weeks to provide us with the details and sorts of concerns that they believed should be dealt with in any amendment process. So what we have heard about what occurred at that meeting is a canard; it is rubbish. The assertion that that was the full story is wrong. I inform the House that, of those 13 ex-service organisations that were represented, three of them felt the need to come back and make representations to the government about the concerns that they had and seek amendments to address those concerns—three out of 13. They were: the DFWA, as has been mentioned; the AVADSC, the Australian Veterans and Defence Services Council; and the RSL. They were the three organisations. I suspect it will be argued that several other organisations may have tasked one of these organisations with conveying their concerns. I can say to the House that, from the discussions I have had with many of those people in the time since, they certainly believed that following those briefings and their consideration of the details they felt much more comfortable about going forward. As I said, three came forward—three—to say, ‘We want to put forward more views about what should be dealt with here,’ and, overwhelmingly, the concerns that those three organisations raised have been addressed in these amendments. It is fair to say that in terms of the DFWA I suspect that not all their concerns have been addressed, but I can say that the concerns of the RSL have been addressed, as I believe also have been the concerns, as far as they can be, of the Australian Veterans and Defence Services Council. The other 10 organisations represented at that ESO Round Table did not even feel a need to come forward with further details with respect to what needs to be done. The changes being proposed through these amendments address those sorts of concerns. Much has been made by the shadow minister, and I know will be made by other members on the other side, about that question of uniqueness of military service. I agree with the concept of the uniqueness of military service. I had the privilege of speaking at a DFWA seminar last year which was related to that very issue. The point I made at that time—and it is a point that I will make today—is that I frankly and genuinely believe that the concept of the uniqueness of military service is accepted and agreed across this chamber. The question is: what do you get for it? What are the particular conditions and aspects that need to be taken into account, and to what degree, to ensure that we fully recognise, fully compensate and fully honour that uniqueness of service? I think the arguments from the other side continually coming back to those particular points are, frankly, rhetoric rather than questions of actual detail. I will use a couple of examples, given the way this debate has developed under the comments from the member for Paterson. He quoted from our policy, Labor’s Plan for Defence, at the last election, and again I will quote that policy. It said: A Rudd Labor Government will maintain a generous military superannuation system, in recognition of the importance of the ADF and the immense responsibility placed on personnel in securing and defending Australia. There is a key word there—‘maintain’. Is the system of military superannuation as it currently stands the same as it was under the previous government? Yes, it is. We have maintained it. When those on the other side now say that it needs to be changed, I guess the questions are: in what way, how do they intend to do it, and why didn’t they do it over 10 years? What may well then be raised is the fact that of course they had a review. They did have a review, and I had a bit to say about that review at the time. Frankly, those on the other side have on occasions endeavoured to verbal me about the policy document and what it says in respect of some of these matters. They had the Podger review into military superannuation and it reported to the then minister in July 2007. The circumstances then were that it was hidden from public gaze. It is fair enough to say that quite often with a substantive report the circumstances are that a government will want to consider it before they release it and then release their response at the same time. But, frankly, this particular report was causing quite a bit of concern within the ex-service and military communities. We did not know what was in it and the circumstances were that we were heading up to an election. I called for the report to be released. I acknowledged that there might not be sufficient time for a substantive government response but my view was that it ought to be released so that people would be aware of what was under consideration. They would have the opportunity to consider what those recommendations were and to provide a view to government about whether that was the way to go forward. In those circumstances, in the lead-up to an election, that is the least that the government of the day could do. But, no, the previous government sat on the report. It refused to release it. It held off until they got into the caretaker period and then that was the end of it. We made a commitment to release it within a month of becoming the government and to consult publicly about the detail of that report. And that is what we did. We released it publicly on 24 December, I think, just short of the month, and we then set out a process under the then Minister for Defence Science and Personnel, the member for Lingiari, Warren Snowdon, to consult with the broader ex-service community and the military community about whether the recommendations from Podger were the way they thought superannuation should go. Do you know what? Minister Snowdon conducted that consultation and review, and the overwhelming response through that consultation process was that the military community and the ex-services community did not want Podger because the changes involved were not in line with what they saw as the best way to maintain the uniqueness of military service and a proper beneficial system for military superannuants into the future. That produced a problem for this government. We had a report from the previous government outlining a set of recommendations which clearly, once we consulted, the community did not want. And, frankly, we have been struggling with that issue ever since. I guess my question to the other side is: are you going to do Podger? Is that what you think we should be doing? Frankly, those recommendations did not maintain the sort of beneficial system that you say we should have. Some of the organisations you have talked about—and I mention the DFWA in particular—made it very, very clear to us that they did not want Podger. In fact when I raised this point at that ESO Round Table just the other month, the national president of the DFWA made it very clear that they did not want us to act on Podger. So there is a point there. When I talked back then about the need to clarify the situation around military superannuation, I made very clear that it was about the intentions of the then government around the changes they were going to make. It was particularly on the issue of where their secret report was, what they intended to do with it, and why they had not released it. Surely, if they were going to be fair dinkum with the defence community, they would have that information out there. They did not. They were not interested in ensuring that there was consultation then. I want to pick up on a couple of other points about that. Quite often what is being said about the government’s position in this area uses selective quotations out of the policy documents that we had at that time. In fact, words have been used based on a heading in our policy document on veterans’ affairs which talks about ‘restoring the value of compensation entitlements’. But there was not just a heading; there was a series of commitments that were outlined and then spelt out very, very clearly. One of the things that I was continually being told was that the ex-service community and the defence community were worried about what was not said. Well, we said what we would do, we made it very specific and, frankly, we have actually implemented overwhelmingly the commitments that we made. But we did not commit to changing the indexation methodology around the question of military superannuation, and neither did the previous government. The difference is that we said we would have a look at it and would review it; the previous government refused to, for over a decade. But now, apparently, in opposition—and as with so many issues—all of a sudden they think that maybe they have some ideas in this area and maybe there is something they can do. There have been recent comments made by the opposition. I quote the member for Paterson from Hansard on 24 May: … I want to assure that the veteran community that the coalition remains committed to introducing a fair, equitable, financially responsible military superannuation system and that we will pursue these reforms when in government … I say to the opposition: you remain committed to it, you are clearly making it clear there that you expect changes to be made, and yet when you were in government you did not. You commissioned a report, which you then refused to release. Then we released the report and consulted with the ex-service community, and they do not want it. So what are you really saying you are committed to? The Leader of the Opposition, the member for Warringah, made comments on this issue in a recent speech, on 23 April, when he said: The Government has also reneged on its commitment before the 2007 election to restore the value of military superannuation by rectifying indexation arrangements. No such commitment was made. Once again, it is Phony Tony off on another sound bite. He then said, in the same speech: … it will be important to tackle this issue as soon as the budget is back in surplus. I could go on about ‘gospel truth’ and the issue about prepared remarks and all of that. But what I would say about that is: if they were not prepared to act on this issue over a 10-year period with a series of surpluses that were records, why would anyone think they would act upon it some time in the future when they may be back in government again and may be in the situation of having a surplus to deal with? The bottom line is that their record in government is not that long ago—a matter of less than three years—and their record in government is very clear. I note the member for Herbert has come into the chamber. He is a recent convert—publicly at least—on the question of the indexation issue. I also know he has quoted from a press release of mine when he has talked about this issue and publicly circulated documentation. Of course, if he had read the full press release he would know it does not relate to the issue as he maintained at the time—and he knows that because it has been raised with him from other sources. In those circumstances, he ought to think about what he has to say when he gets chance to speak. These bills are important. They deliver significant benefits to the ex-service community and to serving personnel, particularly those who are members of the MSBS. The actuarial service provider Mercer has considered the potential improved net investment return as a result of merging these funds. On the estimations, we are talking about significant differences for individuals. In certain circumstances, depending on their time in and their rank, it can be as much as $20,000 to $50,000 for quite a few. For some at very senior ranks after very long careers, on normal investment estimations it can be up to as much as $200,000. These bills should be passed. (Time expired) 4953 12:49:00 Lindsay, Peter, MP HK6 Herbert LP 0 0 Mr LINDSAY —The members of the Australian Defence Force are becoming increasingly concerned and increasingly cynical about the current government’s approach to and support for the Australian Defence Force. There was a commitment at the last election that the government would not cut funding for defence. As with so many other issues that we see with the government, what they say before an election and what actually happens in practice are two different things. On the last list that I saw there were 47 broken promises of the Rudd government. The community is waking up and finally beginning to understand that what they saw at the last election was not what they got. It is very concerning indeed. Members of the Defence Force are no different, because a promise not to cut the defence budget in real terms has resulted on the ground in cuts all over the place. The defence community is saying, ‘How could this be?’ Of course, it is related to the strategic review program, which is to make $20 billion worth of cuts over the next 10 years. We have seen this very recently in the cuts in things like training days for reserves. There have been cuts of 50 per cent for reserve soldiers’ training days. Reserves form a very significant part of our operational deployments these days. We cannot go overseas without having reservists fill places in the system. We depend on them, so their training must be up to scratch. But you cannot have that if you cut the training days. We also heard questions of Defence in Senate estimates this week about family reunion travel, which particularly applies to soldiers in Townsville and Darwin. They have an entitlement to a number of trips to return south to their homes to re-engage with their families. The suggestion was put to the CDF that this entitlement was going to be removed. Surprise, surprise—the CDF said no, there had been no move to do that, but then a public servant told estimates that a committee under General Craig Orme was already looking at this. You do not establish a committee if you do not intend to come up with a recommendation to actually make cuts. I am saying to the parliament that the soldiers in 1 Brigade and 3 Brigade would be extraordinarily angry if Defence tried to make any changes to the family reunion travel entitlement that they currently enjoy. You will say this is not related to the bill, so why have I said it? It is because it underlines how you cannot actually trust what the government says. This is a bill to amalgamate a number of Australian government superannuation schemes, and of course two defence super schemes are involved. I remain deeply suspicious about what this means for those who will be the beneficiaries of these superannuation schemes. The coalition cannot support the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010 as it is presented today. Merging of all of the civil and military boards into one Commonwealth super corporation will have a negative impact on how military superannuation schemes are administered. I can tell you that the veterans out there, when they heard of this proposal, went berserk. They could see a takeover of their schemes by people not related to the military who did not understand the nature of military service. Certainly in Townsville there is universal rejection of what the government is proposing in this respect in this bill today. The defence community want a separate board to be responsible for military superannuation. We certainly heard this in their submissions to the Senate inquiry on this bill conducted by the Senate Standing Committee on Finance and Public Administration. I note that the Australian Veterans and Defence Services Council Incorporated said: What is happening to military superannuation amounts to a scaling back of conditions of service to conform to what is provided in civilian employment. …            …            … The merger of military superannuation boards with civilian superannuation boards are seen to submerge Defence Force interests in a culture that would have difficulty in accepting the circumstances of military life in the structure of conditions of service. Of course, the Defence Welfare Association, led by David Jamison, also has serious problems with this bill. They gave the same evidence to the Senate committee. Specifically, the board of the new corporation will be made up of 10 people, five of whom will be appointed by the minister for finance, three by the President of the Australian Council of Trade Unions and only two by the Chief of the Defence Force. As soon as you see the Australian Council of Trade Unions on the board of military superannuation schemes, it rings alarm bells. People on the board of a military superannuation scheme should be military people and the like or professional people who have the expertise in relation to the management of superannuation schemes. The veterans community and members of the ADF will not accept this proposal from the government. We firmly believe that clauses 16(5) and 16(6) should be removed from the legislation. We will not support the bill as it stands with the provisions requiring the consent of the President of the ACTU to remove a director. Additionally, the coalition feels that important amendments need to be made to ensure that those covered by military superannuation schemes are not disadvantaged. These changes include having separate civilian and military boards. A military superannuation board can include the Military Superannuation and Benefits Scheme, the Defence Force Retirements and Death Benefit Scheme and the Defence Force retirement benefits schemes. The military superannuation board would have control of all of the matters of governance relating to military superannuation. A person would not be able to serve as a director on the board of the civilian and military schemes at the same time; however, the boards would have the same chairperson. I want to make it clear in representing Australia’s largest military base, in Townsville, and RAAF Townsville and the veterans in Townsville that they and I will not accept the proposals being put up to the parliament today by the government, and I will vote accordingly. I thank the parliament for the opportunity to make this contribution and to make the feelings of my electors known in no uncertain terms. 4954 12:57:00 Markus, Louise, MP E07 Greenway LP 0 0 Mrs MARKUS —I rise to speak on the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010 and associated bills, which seek to amalgamate the management of Australia’s military and civilian superannuation schemes into one new authority, the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation. At the outset I would like to indicate my and the coalition’s opposition to these bills. I commend the words of the shadow minister for superannuation and the shadow minister for defence personnel, the members for Cowper and Paterson respectively, in this debate so far. In February this year the Rudd Labor government introduced legislation to merge the management of the boards of six superannuation authorities into one new super authority, the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation. The CSC is to be managed by a 10-person board comprising five nominees of the minister for finance; three nominees of the President of the Australian Council of Trade Unions, the ACTU; and two nominees of the Chief of the Defence Force. Already the government has announced the preferred choice of the CDF for his nominees on the board as well as the proposed chair of the 10-person board. One of the characteristics of the way this issue has been handled is the lack of consultation initially between the government and the ex-service community. At the time of the tabling of these bills, not one of the leaders of the major ex-service organisations had spoken to the government about the reforms proposed in these bills. It was only after the coalition applied pressure to the government that an inquiry was held by the Senate Finance and Public Administration Legislation Committee into the measures proposed. During the short Senate inquiry, some 197 submissions were received from ex-service and veteran organisations and individuals, the majority of which strongly opposed the proposed reforms. Most of the submissions highlighted the unique nature of military service. Service in the military is indeed unique and both sides of the House support this concept. It is reflected in the fact that military superannuation has always been separately managed and legislated for. There are currently two superannuation management boards: the Defence Retirement and Death Benefits Authority and the Military Superannuation and Benefits Board. Together with the Australian Reward Investment Authority, ARIA, which manages civilian public service superannuation, these three boards are scheduled to merge into one new authority. The merging of the military and civilian superannuation boards will forever blur the distinction which exists currently and in the past that defence service is unique service. Military service is unlike any other service in our nation. The government argues that the consolidation of trustee arrangements is aimed at strengthening governance and providing opportunities for increased efficiency in trustee operations, yet there is no evidence that there will be any improvement provided under the merger proposed by the Rudd Labor government. After tabling the legislation in February, the government began what it called ‘consultations’ with the ex-service community. At an ex-service roundtable, the government warmed—we are told—to the concept of making some amendments which the ex-service community would find agreeable. I am informed that both parties departed reasonably pleased, with the ex-service community of the view that it would receive some concessions from the government at the very least over the way the boards were constituted. This week, however, the government indicated it would make only minor amendments to the bills, simply legislating for consultation in the way nominees are appointed to the board. While the increased level of consultation is a first step, it does not deal with some of the more fundamental issues associated with the bill. This bill legislates a powerful role for the President of the ACTU in the management of future superannuation liabilities for Australia’s civilian and military superannuants. Under these rules, it will be the President of the ACTU who will have the final say on the appointment of three of the 10 board members on the new board. The three ACTU nominees will be unable to be sacked for poor performance by the Minister for Finance and Deregulation unless the President of the ACTU agrees. It seems the President of the ACTU will have an almost greater say than the minister in how the board is run, especially given at least one of the ACTU nominated board members is required to be in attendance at all times for a quorum to be present. The only guarantee that defence superannuants have in their superannuation being managed with someone with even a sliver of prior knowledge of the unique nature of military superannuation is a requirement that at least one of the two defence nominees is present at any meeting which determines matters about defence superannuants. There is little protection in reality for defence interests when just one defence representative goes up against three trade unionists. The coalition is determined to be the voice for the veteran and ex-service community on these bills. The sheer number of submissions from the ex-service and veteran community opposing these bills only confirmed our resolve to oppose these bills. With the government indicating that they are not prepared to negotiate and amend these bills in line with the broader wishes of the representatives of the ex-service community they say they consulted with, the coalition will continue to stand firm. The member for Cowper has already indicated the opposition of ex-service organisations such as the Defence Force Welfare Association and the Australian Veterans and Defence Services Council. The President of the DFWA, David Jamison, said just yesterday: Reference to the reviews of all ex-service organisations being canvassed at an ESO round table meeting and the purported summary of the outcomes of the discussion is somewhat disingenuous. Mr Jamison goes on to say: Unfortunately, despite moving a long way from our original position of total opposition of the amalgamation of the governance structure to try to accommodate the Government’s stated objectives, there has been insufficient recognition of our points in the proposed amendments for us to remove our objections to these Bills as they now stand. The defence community is understandably very concerned about the erosion of veterans’ and Defence Force personnel entitlements. In their submission to the Senate inquiry, the Defence Force Welfare Association stated: The special nature of military services makes it necessary for the ADF to design conditions of service that will continue to attract and retain personnel despite the hazards and hardships of military life. The need to compensate members of the ADF for the unique nature of military service through their superannuation, invalidity and death benefits as with their other conditions of service. Further, the submission states: It is important to maintain that relative distinction so that people considering joining the ADF and those already serving can recognise the adequacy of their conditions, given the additional hardships and risks inherent in ADF service. A diminution in the relative value of these benefits could have adverse effects on the ADF’s ability to recruit and retain the personnel it needs to fulfil its functions. This could affect the viability of the ADF workforce as a whole, which would have significant implications for the Government’s ability to maintain its national security policies. Any alleged administrative savings, indicated at $1 million over four years, or increased returns on investments are welcomed and supported by the veteran community. Equally, ex-service leaders saw value in the pooling of funds to create higher returns for members. But some in the ex-service community wanted additional guarantees that the nature of military service would be protected in these reforms. Amending the bills to ensure consultation has not gone far enough. There is no guaranteed military superannuants subcommittee with appropriate military representation to deal with the unique nature of military claims. The issue of military superannuation is very close to the heart of the veteran community. There are almost 180,000 veterans and current serving personnel upon whom these bills will directly impact. They are not an insignificant number of Australians. From opposition, the only pledge that Labor made to military superannuants was: To restore the value of compensation and prevent further erosion due to unfair indexation. Labor scowled at the then Howard government’s refusal to release the findings of the Podger report, the Report of the review into military superannuation arrangements. When Minister Griffin released the report on Christmas Eve, of all days, in December 2007, he said: The Rudd Government will provide further opportunity for public comment about the review’s findings and recommendations and will consider its attitude to the report after the consultation period, which concludes on 31 March. The minister did not say which year that 31 March would be—2008, 2009, 2010 or 2011. Incidentally, the last update of the webpage which refers to the review was on 1 April 2008; the last review of the website was 19 June 2009. We are all left wondering: what is the outcome? The Podger review was an extensive examination of the military superannuation arrangements in this country. The previous coalition government commissioned the review. At the outset, the review’s terms of reference stated: Two interconnected principles should guide the conduct of the Review of Military Superannuation Arrangements and form the philosophical context within which the Terms of Reference are addressed. These are the ‘unique nature of military service’ and the need to compensate members of the … (ADF) for that uniqueness in their superannuation, invalidity and death benefits, as with other conditions of service, thereby ensuring that joining and staying in the ADF remain attractive propositions. With this guiding principle in mind, the report made a number of recommendations. Recommendation 9 stands out, particularly in the context of what we are discussing today. Recommendation 9 says, inter alia: A single governance structure should be put in place for the DFRDB and MSBS … along the following lines: …            …            … There should be a seven member board of trustees comprising two employee representatives, two employer representatives and three independent representatives, including the chairperson. A committee structure is to be determined by the Board to assist with … the Board’s responsibilities for the DFRDB, MSBS … Podger goes on to say on page 45 of his report: For military superannuation … the board needs a blend of experience and knowledge to best serve the military environment, including understanding the unique nature of military service. Therefore, a central consideration of the Review Team is to ensure military superannuation trustees collectively have the legislated skills, knowledge and abilities, as well as an appropriate knowledge of members, ex-members and Defence interests. This, combined with increasing training and development requirements, suggests there are advantages and efficiencies to be gained in forming a single board of trustees with responsibilities for all military superannuation schemes. Further, he states: … a unique feature of military service is the denial of the right to belong to a union. To overcome this, Podger recommended that the Chief of the Defence Force appoint two employee trustees. The report says: The Head of Defence’s Personnel Executive is best placed to nominate trustees with appropriate skills and experience and knowledge of issues impacting Defence— with the Minister for Defence appointing the two remaining trustees and the chairperson. Podger says nothing about the ACTU being involved with military super. Further, Podger noted that the Uhrig review’s best practice principles noted that board composition should comprise between six and nine members. This board has 10 members plus a chair. Podger’s proposal was seven including the chair. Here we have a review specifically conducted to consider the unique nature of military superannuation. Andrew Podger’s review is probably the most comprehensive and contemporary analysis we have of the issues confronting serving and former ADF members. It makes more sweeping recommendations, which the Rudd Labor government has not responded to, including the establishment of a new military superannuation scheme which would be independently managed in the manner described earlier. Labor’s response to military superannuation appears to be the Matthews review. The veteran community is deeply concerned about the findings of the Matthews review and the decision of the Rudd Labor government to largely adopt Trevor Matthews’s findings as they relate to military super. Superannuation is an issue of great importance to all Australians, and particularly to those in the Australian defence forces. Again referring to the Podger review, at least two in five of all serving Defence personnel believe that military superannuation arrangements influence their decision to remain in the ADF at least partially. This is a powerful reason to maintain an appropriate level of Defence Force influence in the management of defence superannuation. If the Rudd Labor government are using this bill as a means of avoiding making other tough decisions for military superannuants, I fear they will face very stiff opposition indeed from the veteran community. The coalition does not support the inclusion of ACTU appointed delegates on a board managing civilian, and particularly military, superannuation. We will oppose these measures in the House of Representatives. In conclusion, I extend my thanks to the leaders of the ex-service community who strongly encouraged participation by their members in the Senate inquiry—in particular, the leadership of the DFWA in explaining their opposition to the bills and coming before the Senate committee. Our ex-service community is well served by the leaders who represent them. It is disappointing that the Rudd Labor government picks and chooses when to listen to them and take them into its confidence. It seems that, just as with the resource super profits tax, which involves postannouncement consultation and $38 million in after-the-fact taxpayer funded advertising, the Rudd Labor government is unable to appropriately consult with key stakeholders to negotiate a mutually beneficial outcome for all concerned. The amendments proposed by the government to these bills do not go far enough. Had the government’s amendments responded more fully to the concerns of all in the ex-service community, debate today might have taken on a different flavour. Once again I indicate my opposition to these bills. I call on those members and senators who believe that military service is unique to similarly oppose these bills. The Rudd Labor government has provided no justification for the measures in these bills. They have not consulted widely enough with the ex-service community on these bills other than a bit of shadow-boxing around the edges. After the release of the proposed amendments this week, the coalition asked the ex-service community for their views. They remain concerned about the bills even in their amended format. On this basis and in support of our original view, the coalition will stand up for veterans and oppose these bills. 4959 13:15:00 Robert, Stuart, MP HWT Fadden LP 0 0 Mr ROBERT —I rise to speak on the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010, which is being debated cognately with the ComSuper Bill 2010 and the Superannuation Legislation (Consequential Amendments and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2010, and to not lend my support to the bill. These bills seek to establish a single trustee board responsible for the bulk of government superannuation schemes. The new entity will be called the Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation, the CSC. It will assume, under this legislation, responsibility for the following schemes: the 1922 scheme established under the Superannuation Act; the Commonwealth Superannuation Scheme, the CSS; the Public Sector Superannuation Scheme, the PSS; the Public Sector Superannuation Accumulation Plan, the PSSap; the scheme provided for under the Papua New Guinea (Staffing Assistance) Act; the Military Superannuation and Benefits Scheme, the MSBS; the Defence Force Retirement and Death Benefits Scheme, the DFRDBS; and the Defence Force Retirement Benefits Scheme, the DFRBS. The ComSuper Bill establishes ComSuper as a prescribed agency under the Financial Management and Accountability Act and as a statutory agency under the Public Service Act 1999. The core of the issue is the amalgamation of all Commonwealth civilian and military superannuation boards. The government would have us believe that the merger is intended to provide administrative efficiencies as well as secure financial gains through the amalgamation of all investment funds. On the surface it sounds fine, perhaps even laudable. The government says, although without any supporting documentation, that an additional $10 million per annum will be earned by the funds due to the type and size of the amalgamated investments. The total amount of investment is approximately $19 billion. This includes approximately $16 billion from the Australian Reward Investment Alliance, the trustee for CSS, PSS and PSSap, and $3 billion in funds managed by MSBS. The DFRDB, DFRB, 1922 and PNG schemes are essentially not funded and are paid out of consolidated revenue. I contend that there are two fundamental issues that will stop this bill being supported. Firstly, this is not about efficiency but about control, notably ACTU control. Secondly, this will not assist military members. There is nothing in this bill that will substantiate the assistance to military members and veterans. In relation to the first issue, that of control, the bill contains certain regulations relating to the constitution of the CSC Board. These regulations are unacceptable. There is a 10-person board, plus a chair, consisting of five directors appointed by the Minister for Finance and Deregulation, three appointed by the ACTU—odd, since military members are not allowed to be part of a union—and only two appointed by the Chief of the Defence Force. We believe strongly that the composition of this board will not advantage military members. Only 20 per cent of the board, excluding the chairman, are actually representatives of the military, and 33 per cent of the board come from the Australian Council of Trade Unions. It is worth noting that the veteran community believe, for the most part, that the CSC Board should include a suitably qualified representative from the ex-service community, and this recommendation from the veterans community has merit. In addition to the above, under clause 16(5), any of the three directors appointed by the President of the ACTU cannot be dismissed by the minister for finance unless the President of the ACTU agrees. I never thought I would see the day where the minister for finance would emasculate himself by not being allowed to dismiss members of the board but having to go with a begging bowl to the President of the ACTU and say, ‘Please, sir, may I have some more?’ to dismiss incompetent directors, noting there are reasons whereby the President of the ACTU cannot disagree. One has to ask about the legitimacy of the legal advice the minister for finance has got, because there are specifications in the Corporations Act 2001 which govern the removal of directors and there are areas under the act where directors would have to be removed that are not reflected in clause 16(5). There may well be areas where a director has become bankrupt or insolvent or there may be some other area where the Corporations Act may require their dismissal, but clause 16(5) does not actually allow that. The minister for finance would have to go begging to the union master to say, ‘Please, sir, could we have them removed?’ I note that similar provisions apply to directors who are appointed by the CDF under clause 16(6). The issue is that five members of the board cannot be removed by the minister for finance unless he gets permission for the removal of three of them from the President of the ACTU and for two of them from the CDF. The coalition believes that the amalgamation of civilian and military Commonwealth superannuation boards will not have a positive effect on the future administration of military superannuation schemes. The Defence Force Welfare Association and the vast majority of those members of the Defence Force and the veteran community who I have spoken to share that view. The DFWA has said, ‘Unique service requires unique solutions, not ones which further blur the distinction between the uniqueness of military service and civilian norms.’ It is true that military life is a unique life. It is a unique form of service. Bundling all of their superannuation and some of the unique requirements of that into all of Commonwealth government superannuation does not reflect that at all. I would have thought that the Rudd Labor government, under their 2007 election manifesto, would have got this. They said that they would ‘maintain a generous military superannuation system, in recognition of the importance of the ADF and the immense responsibility placed on personnel in securing and defending Australia’. I fail to see how lumping them in with every other public servant maintains something and recognises that importance and immense responsibility. I can only suggest from this bill and looking at the 2007 budget manifesto that the Labor Party got its verbs confused. I believe the member for Paterson, on behalf of the coalition and on behalf of many in the veteran community, met with the Minister for Finance and Deregulation regarding these bills. I believe what resulted was a commitment by the government to ensure that the amended legislation contains strengthened provisions for consultation. I am led to believe that the proposed consultation outlined in that discussion includes the requirements for the CDF to consult with relevant organisations on the appointment, for the minister for finance to consult with the defence minister on appointing the five employer representatives and for the minister for finance to consult with the defence minister on the appointment of the ComSuper CEO. Quorums on matters relating to the interests of military members are to include one CDF nominated director and decisions made by the board are to include one CDF appointed director when the issue relates to interests of military members. There seems to be no mention at all there of the composition of the board—no mention of the three ACTU appointed directors. There is no mention of how only the President of the ACTU can dismiss an ACTU appointed director. There is no mention of any other issues the member for Paterson raised with the minister for finance. In light of the intransigence of the finance minister to address the composition of the board, his inability to dismiss members of the board other than by begging the ACTU to remove them and the failure of the government to identify how military members will benefit from the amalgamation, I cannot possibly lend support to these bills. 4961 13:24:00 Tanner, Lindsay, MP YU5 Melbourne ALP Minister for Finance and Deregulation 1 0 Mr TANNER —in reply—It is a great disappointment that, with what is essentially an important administrative reform to improve the administration of superannuation for both civilian and military employees, the federal government is hit with loopy conspiracy theories and complete ignorance and stupidity from the opposition. I will go through the key elements in the appropriate order to indicate to the House exactly what is involved here. The Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010, theComSuper Bill 2010 and the Superannuation Legislation (Consequential Amendments and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2010 modernise the governance arrangements for the main Commonwealth civilian and military superannuation schemes without altering the schemes or members’ entitlements under the schemes. In particular, they enable the Commonwealth to deal with some problems in the existing administrative arrangements that we inherited from the previous government and that need to be addressed. The bills were developed with the priority of maintaining the features of military superannuation that reflect the special nature of military service and that differentiate military service from civilian employment. In further developing the package of bills the government welcomed the opportunity to hear the views of military stakeholders, particularly the ex-service community, on the proposed new governance arrangements. I wish to thank those organisations for their input. The views of the ex-service organisations were canvassed at a roundtable and a summary of the outcomes of the discussion is as follows. The investment related benefits to military members arising from the merger were generally accepted in that there was the potential for significant benefits to Military Superannuation and Benefits Scheme members and no impact on Defence Force Retirement and Death Benefits Scheme members. It was also generally agreed that, in terms of concerns about any supposed dilution of the military voice in the merged trustee board, the protection afforded by benefits and entitlements and scheme rules that are contained in separate acts of parliament and the fact that trustees have a duty to act in the interests of all members were sufficient. There was consensus that a strong military voice did need to be maintained in the area of death, disability and reversionary spouse and children’s benefits where there is discretion vested with the trustee to consider and decide on individual cases. There were differing views expressed on the question of whether the proposed the Defence Force Case Assessment Committee should be established by statute or whether there should be flexibility, as is reflected in the bill, for the trustee board to decide whether such a committee should be established. In the end it was agreed that it was desirable to retain the existing flexibility, hence the phrase ‘may establish such a board’ is in the legislation. The government has responded to the issues raised in the consultations and made a number of changes to the proposed bills that are consistent with the views put forward by the ex-service community. These include a change to the process for the Chief of the Defence Force to nominate member representatives to the governing board of the single trustee, which will provide for ongoing consultation with the ex-service community. There is now support from the military community for the merger of the boards, subject to these amendments being adopted which address some aspects of the governance arrangements but do not compromise the integrity of the reforms. The bills do not change the existing features of military superannuation that reflect the special nature of military service. The bills complement these features while providing opportunities for members of all of the schemes, civilian and military, to benefit from better practice trustee operations and administration services and better investment returns. Implementation of these governance reforms will improve efficiency in the management of the civilian and military schemes and will allow the benefits of these improvements to be passed on to all members in the form of reduced costs and higher investment returns. In particular, the ability of a single trustee to consolidate scheme funds will allow members of the Military Superannuation and Benefits Scheme, which comprises the bulk of serving Defence Force personnel, to gain substantial benefits from the merger. I emphasise this point for the opposition and suggest to them that they are standing in the way of military scheme members, both current and future, achieving higher levels of superannuation return. This is because of the relatively smaller size of the existing military scheme compared with the civilian schemes. When they are pooled, it is anticipated that investment returns will be higher in the pooled funding arrangements than would have been the case with separate arrangements. There is clear industry experience that members of smaller superannuation schemes have the most to gain when their scheme funds are consolidated into a larger pool of funds that are typical of bigger superannuation schemes. Overall, the implementation of these bills will better secure the superannuation arrangements for Commonwealth civilian employees and military personnel for the longer term. They will also enable substantial additional benefits to flow to members while retaining the existing individual scheme benefits and entitlements. These bills are evidence of the government’s ongoing commitment to providing efficient and sustainable superannuation arrangements for Commonwealth employees and military personnel, together with its strong commitment to protect those features of military superannuation that recognise that military service is unique and different from civilian employment. The amendments that have been circulated in my name, in summary: first, require the Chief of the Defence Force to consult with relevant organisations on the appointment of two military member representatives; second, require the minister for finance to consult with the relevant defence minister on the appointment of the five employer representatives to the board; third, require the minister for finance to consult with the relevant defence minister on the appointment of the CEO of ComSuper; fourth, ensure that the quorum requirement includes at least one nominee director from the Chief of the Defence Force, when a matter before the board relates specifically to the interests of military members; fifth, ensure that any decisions taken by the board must include at least one Chief of the Defence Force nominee when the decision relates specifically to the interests of military members; and, six, require that the Chair of the Defence Case Assessment Committee be one of the Chief of the Defence Force’s nominee directors. I will conclude with two things. One is by giving a couple of illustrations that the opposition may want to think very carefully about—that is, advice from my department about the likely beneficial impact of longer term superannuation returns arising from this merger that will flow to new military members. A new MSBS member, under the new arrangements, who joins the Air Force at 18-years-old as an officer cadet, and retires at the rank of group captain after serving 37 years, would be expected to have approximately $95,000 additional superannuation. A new MSBS member, under the new arrangements, who joins the Army at age 21 as an officer cadet, and retires at the rank of colonel after serving 34 years, would be expected to have approximately an additional superannuation payment of more than $60,000. And a new MSBS member, under the new arrangements, who joins the Navy at age 18 as a seaman and retires as a warrant officer after serving 37 years, would be expected to have an additional superannuation payout of approximately $70,000. Can I respond to the points raised by the member for Paterson and echoed by one or two of the other opposition speakers. First, the suggestion that was put to me by the member for Paterson with respect to the prospect of continuing two separate boards but with some kind of pooled arrangement for investment. Contrary to the suggestions of some, we did actually explore this proposition very seriously and did examine it very closely. That did indicate that, although there would be some benefits as compared with the status quo from this approach, the new approach would be costly to establish and administer, there would still be duplication of some operational costs and there would be some degree of loss of prospective benefits to members. In other words, it would be an inferior outcome compared with the government’s proposals. There would be increased costs to civilian schemes if this approach were taken compared with current arrangements. We know that the opposition hates public servants, but this is a matter that the government does have to take into account. It would not be possible for trustees to agree to this arrangement on behalf of their existing members and fulfil their obligations to members. Where similar arrangements have been tried in the private sector they have given rise to significant practical difficulties, including the relationship between the two boards that are connected through their investment activities, and that can come as a cost to members. Finally, I will refer to the loopy paranoia about the ACTU—perhaps predictable; perhaps I was giving the opposition too much credit for the possibility that they might actually treat these issues on their merits. I would remind the opposition that the role of the ACTU here is in representing hundreds of thousands of people who are employees of the Commonwealth. These are representative bodies. Not all of them are members of trade unions, but equally not all ex-service personnel are members of ex-service organisations either. The ACTU had a role in this process that existed under the former government, so there has been no substantive changes made to the role of the ACTU in nominating directors for the board. I would point out that the whole purpose of the minister for finance not being able to dismiss an employee representative, be they a military or civilian representative, is to ensure that they are genuinely representative of employees. If I, or any minister for finance, can arbitrarily dismiss somebody who was appointed there to represent employees, then they are no longer representing the people they are purported to be representing, because they are subject to my dismissal at a whim. What the opposition is failing to note is that there is piece of legislation called the Superannuation Industry (Supervision) Act, which actually provides that people who contravene the fitness and propriety standard under the SI(S) Act, who fail to comply with the material personal interest provision under the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act, or who are a disqualified person under the SI(S) legislation, will either not be eligible for appointment or will, if they are already appointed, have their appointment terminated—not as a matter of discretion or arbitrary whim on the part of the minister, but as a matter of existing legislation. So where there is misbehaviour there are existing provisions that ensure that that misbehaviour will be met with by termination of the appointment. For example, a person who is bankrupt would be disqualified under the existing provisions of the Superannuation Industry (Supervision) Act. The issue here is that these bills, together with the amendments that have been adopted following consultation with the ex-service community, will strengthen the administration of the superannuation arrangements for both military and civilian personnel employed by the Commonwealth. Strengthening that administration means that the risks of problems, the risks of mistakes, the risks of damaging things that harm the interests of members of the scheme will diminish. That is a critical thing: better administration benefits members—that means people currently receiving pensions, as well as people who are currently employed by the Commonwealth and are contributing to the schemes. Even more significantly, by combining the investment pool and getting the benefits of economies of scale, those sections of the schemes that involve investment income returning to the individual members will, over the long haul, on balance, return significantly stronger returns to the individual members. I have mentioned the examples. That is something that I would urge the opposition to think very carefully about, because the stance they are proposing to take means that they are seeking to stand in the way of military personnel getting better superannuation payouts. That is something that I would urge them to think very, very carefully about. They can scoff at that proposition, but that is the professional advice that the government has received, and I think it is a very courageous position for the opposition to take to be seeking to prevent that from occurring. I commend the bill to the House. Question put: That this bill be now read a second time. 13:41:00 The House divided.     (The Deputy Speaker—Hon. BC Scott) 76 Adams, D.G.H. Albanese, A.N. Bevis, A.R. Bidgood, J. Bird, S. Bowen, C. Bradbury, D.J. Burke, A.E. Burke, A.S. Butler, M.C. Byrne, A.M. Campbell, J. Champion, N. Cheeseman, D.L. Clare, J.D. Collins, J.M. Combet, G. Crean, S.F. Danby, M. Debus, B. Dreyfus, M.A. Elliot, J. Ellis, A.L. Ellis, K. Emerson, C.A. Ferguson, L.D.T. Ferguson, M.J. Fitzgibbon, J.A. Garrett, P. Georganas, S. Gibbons, S.W. Gray, G. Grierson, S.J. Griffin, A.P. Hall, J.G. * Hayes, C.P. * Irwin, J. Jackson, S.M. Kelly, M.J. Kerr, D.J.C. King, C.F. Livermore, K.F. Macklin, J.L. Marles, R.D. McClelland, R.B. McKew, M. McMullan, R.F. Melham, D. Murphy, J. Neal, B.J. O’Connor, B.P. Owens, J. Parke, M. Perrett, G.D. Plibersek, T. Price, L.R.S. Raguse, B.B. Rea, K.M. Ripoll, B.F. Rishworth, A.L. Roxon, N.L. Saffin, J.A. Sidebottom, S. Smith, S.F. Snowdon, W.E. Sullivan, J. Swan, W.M. Symon, M. Tanner, L. Thomson, C. Thomson, K.J. Trevor, C. Turnour, J.P. Vamvakinou, M. Windsor, A.H.C. Zappia, A. 54 Andrews, K.J. Bailey, F.E. Baldwin, R.C. Billson, B.F. Bishop, B.K. Bishop, J.I. Briggs, J.E. Broadbent, R. Chester, D. Ciobo, S.M. Cobb, J.K. Coulton, M. Dutton, P.C. Farmer, P.F. Fletcher, P. Gash, J. Georgiou, P. Haase, B.W. Hartsuyker, L. Hawke, A. Hawker, D.P.M. Hockey, J.B. Hunt, G.A. Irons, S.J. Jensen, D. Keenan, M. Laming, A. Ley, S.P. Lindsay, P.J. Macfarlane, I.E. Marino, N.B. Markus, L.E. May, M.A. Morrison, S.J. Moylan, J.E. Neville, P.C. * O’Dwyer, K Oakeshott, R.J.M. Ramsey, R. Randall, D.J. Robb, A. Robert, S.R. Ruddock, P.M. Schultz, A. Secker, P.D. * Simpkins, L. Slipper, P.N. Smith, A.D.H. Somlyay, A.M. Stone, S.N. Truss, W.E. Vale, D.S. Washer, M.J. Wood, J. * denotes teller Question agreed to. Bill read a second time. Message from the Governor-General recommending appropriation announced. 4965 Bills R4272 4965 Bill—by leave—taken as a whole. 4965 13:52:00 Tanner, Lindsay, MP YU5 Melbourne ALP Minister for Finance and Deregulation 1 0 Mr TANNER —I present a supplementary explanatory memorandum to the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010. I seek leave to move government amendments (1) to (12) together. Leave granted. YU5 Tanner, Lindsay, MP Mr TANNER —I move: (1)    Clause 3, page 2 (after line 27), after the definition of CSS Fund, insert: Defence Minister means the Minister who administers the Defence Act 1903. (2)    Clause 3, page 3 (after line 16), after the definition of governing deed, insert: military schemes means:               (a)    the DFRB, DFRDB or MSB; or               (b)    the DFRB, DFRDB and MSB. (3)    Clause 3, page 4 (lines 3 to 14), omit the definition of relevant organisation, substitute: relevant organisation means:               (a)    an organisation:                     (i)    a substantial number of whose members are members of a superannuation scheme administered by CSC or eligible employees within the meaning of the Superannuation Act 1976; and                    (ii)    whose principal purpose is to protect and promote the interest of its members in matters concerning their employment; or               (b)    an organisation that has as one of its principal purposes the protection and promotion of beneficiaries under a superannuation scheme administered by CSC in matters concerning their entitlements as beneficiaries. (4)    Clause 10, page 8 (line 28), after “consult with”, insert “one or more”. (5)    Clause 10, page 8 (after line 28), after subclause 28(4), insert:       (4A)    Before nominating a person, the Chief of the Defence Force must consult with one or more relevant organisations. (6)    Clause 10, page 9 (lines 3 to 7), omit subclauses 10(6) and (7). (7)    Clause 11, page 9 (after line 23), after subclause (3), insert:       (3A)    In the case of any other director, the Minister must consult the Defence Minister before making an appointment. (8)    Clause 16, page 11 (after line 27), after subclause (3), insert:       (3A)    In the case of a director (other than one covered by subsections (5) to (7)), the Minister must consult the Defence Minister before terminating the appointment of the director. (9)    Clause 17, page 12 (after line 22), after subclause (2), insert:       (2A)    In the case of an appointment under subsection (1), the Minister must consult the Defence Minister before appointing a person to act as a director. (10)  Clause 20, page 14 (after line 18), at the end of the clause, add:          (3)    For the purposes of subsections (1) and (2), if a matter being considered, or about to be considered, at a meeting of the Board concerns only the military schemes, the quorum must include a director nominated by the Chief of the Defence Force.          (4)    If an issue arises about whether a matter being considered, or about to be considered, at a meeting of the Board concerns only the military schemes, the Chair must determine the issue.          (5)    A determination made under subsection (4) is not a legislative instrument. (11)  Clause 23, page 15 (lines 23 to 25), omit paragraph (1)(b), substitute:               (b)    either:                     (i)    if the proposed decision concerns only the military schemes—all directors were informed of the proposed decision; or                    (ii)    in any other case—all directors were informed of the proposed decision, or reasonable efforts were made to inform all directors of the proposed decision. (12)  Clause 35, page 26 (table item 1), omit “of that Act”, substitute “of the Defence Force Retirement and Death Benefits Act 1973”. 4966 13:53:00 Hartsuyker, Luke, MP 00AMM Cowper NATS 0 0 Mr HARTSUYKER —The coalition supports these amendments to the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010 and we thank the government for taking into account some of the concerns expressed by the veteran community. The coalition is of the view that defence service is unique and that the concerns of this very important sector of our community need to be taken into account in relation to superannuation. The amendments will require the Minister for Finance and Deregulation to consult with the Minister for Defence before nominating a person to the board. We think it is a very worthwhile amendment that the defence minister be consulted in this matter. Also, if a meeting of the board concerns only military schemes, the quorum for that board must include a director nominated by the Chief of Defence. This will ensure that a defence representative will be present on matters relating to military schemes. We also think it is a very important improvement that persons who have defence experience and knowledge will be involved in that deliberation. However, the amendments do not address concerns about the powers of the President of the ACTU over the minister for finance. The ACTU will still be able to block a meeting by holding back its three members and denying a quorum. The coalition will support these amendments in the House and will consider the legislation again in the Senate. 4967 13:55:00 Baldwin, Robert, MP LL6 Paterson LP 0 0 Mr BALDWIN —The speech of the Minister for Finance and Deregulation earlier that the coalition’s opposition to these measures in the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010 would not deliver the same amount of return to those that are paid from these funds is factually incorrect. The $16 billion that is held by the Commonwealth Superannuation Scheme and the $3 billion that is held by the MSBS will be put together to tender for financial administration, with the successful tender looking at where the best investment opportunities are. It will not be the board—whether it be one board or two boards—that will be making individual investment decisions. These investment decisions will be made by the people who, through the application in the tender and proving they are the best qualified, will administer the money. The minister has said that unless there is this amalgamation, this consolidation, into one board there will be financial disadvantage. That is incorrect, because the money, whether it is $16 billion plus $3 billion or $19 billion as one parcel of money put out to tender, is still the same amount of money. Those returns will be divided back to the appropriate bodies. What we are saying and what we maintain is that there is a uniqueness in military service, which seems to be failed to be recognised by this government. This service needs to be recognised by two separate complete boards. As I said earlier in discussions with the minister, you can consolidate all of the defence boards—the MSBS, the DFRDB and the DFRB into one board—for administration purposes. Remember that the DFRDB and DFRB have no funds. They are unfunded superannuation liabilities. They can be brought together, consolidated, whereby our veteran community and our current serving defence community can have a direct say because they have control of their board. They have control of their affairs. The minister has alluded to administration costs. We fail to see that there will be any huge increase in administration costs if all of the defence boards are consolidated into one. In fact, there will be a reduction. What the coalition opposes is the idea of it all being put together where defence people lose out—and they will lose out under these arrangements being proposed by the government. This is the government who talks about consultation and yet did not come to see us despite requests to have further discussions on this matter. The government just decided that it would send a note through the night before. The only change to this legislation is that people must consult. Consultation is not a big thing for this government, as we have witnessed. Whether it is the mining supertax or whether it is a whole raft of programs, consultation has not been one of the hallmarks of its governance. We say to the people and we say to the defence communities that the coalition is standing by you—the coalition recognises your uniqueness of service. Most importantly, we want to make sure that the financial fortunes of those past and present serving members are preserved and preserved in a manner whereby they have a direct input. The minister is quite aware of numbers in boards and politics—that is the nature of the game. Let me put it to you this way: when you have a board that is made up of five public servants, three ACTU members and only two defence people, eight beats two every time. Therefore, to say that defence persons would have a solid representation on this board is wrong. If the minister wanted solid representation on this single board, then why are there not at least three ADF present or past members represented on the board to match the three ACTU members on the board? We cannot support the legislation. We will not oppose the amendments, but we cannot support the legislation in its present form. I said that during my speech in the second reading debate and I maintain that position right now. 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. 4968 Ministerial Arrangements 4968 14:00:00 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 0 Mr RUDD —I inform the House that the Treasurer will be leaving question time early today— Opposition members—Oh! 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —There is great sadness over there, Joe! He will be absent as he is travelling to China and then Korea for the G20 finance ministers meeting. The Minister for Finance and Deregulation will answer questions on his behalf. 4968 14:00:00 Questions Without Notice 4968 4968 14:00:00 Abbott, Tony, MP EZ5 Warringah LP 0 Mr ABBOTT —My question is to the Prime Minister, and I ask it on behalf of the working families of Australia that he has so badly let down. Prime Minister, if the government is such a good economic manager, why are Australian families paying more for their food, more for their housing and more for their power, water, education and health than when the Prime Minister promised to ease the pressure on working families prior to the last election? 4968 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr RUDD —I thank the Leader of the Opposition for his question. His one script for working families is to bring back Work Choices. Our script for working families is to abolish Work Choices. That is the difference. With Work Choices, which he regards as his key mantra for the future: number one, it strips away basic working conditions for working families; number two, it undermines such things as penalty rates; and, number three, it damages a whole series of additional basic conditions which working families need to ensure that family incomes are held up. When the Leader of the Opposition stands up here in an exercise I can only describe as rancid hypocrisy on the interests of working families, I say to him two words: Work Choices. The Leader of the Opposition referred to education. This government prior to the last election said we would bring in an education tax refund. We have brought in an education tax refund for working families with primary school kids and with secondary school kids. Secondly, we also said that for working families dealing with childcare costs we would increase the childcare rebate from 30 per cent to 50 per cent. We have increased the rebate from 30 per cent to 50 per cent. The Leader of the Opposition refers to health costs. I refer him to the government’s pre-election commitment to bring in a teen dental scheme. The government has brought in that very scheme, which has benefited, I am advised, some 400,000 or more across the country. The Leader of the Opposition refers more broadly to health costs. Can I say to the Leader of the Opposition on the question of health costs and the effectiveness of the health system that what he did as health minister for five years was reach his long hand into the health budgets of the nation and take out $1 billion from the public hospital system of Australia. What he has now said, further, is that if he were elected to the office of Prime Minister at the next election he would reach his hand in again and take out nearly another billion dollars from the health system of Australia. On housing, I remind the Leader of the Opposition that interest rates now are some percentage points lower than they were when he left office at the end of 2007. So whether it is on interest rates, whether it is on housing, whether it is on education, whether it is on health, whether it is on hospitals, but most of all whether it is on Work Choices, the Leader of the Opposition’s record on working families is clear to each and every person listening to this debate today. 4969 4969 14:03:00 Bevis, Arch, MP ET4 Brisbane ALP 1 Mr BEVIS —My question is to the Prime Minister. Will the Prime Minister update the House in relation to the incident yesterday between the Israeli navy and a flotilla of vessels attempting to make its way to Gaza? 4969 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr RUDD —I thank the member for Brisbane for his question. Last night I spoke to the Prime Minister of Israel, Prime Minister Netanyahu. He had just returned from his visit to Canada and was about to go into a cabinet meeting to discuss the incident that the honourable member’s question refers to. I set out the framework in which Australia views this tragedy in my discussion with the Prime Minister, and reflected Australia’s deep concerns over the recent military operation off Gaza. Consistent with the public remarks made both by myself and by the foreign minister yesterday, I indicated that the Australian government was deeply concerned at the loss of life and injuries that had occurred as part of the IDF operation; furthermore, that deaths in these circumstances are deeply disturbing and of deep concern to the Australian people; and, furthermore, that Israel should mount an independent inquiry into the incident so that all the facts can be established and an informed judgment made about the events surrounding the incident of Monday. Furthermore, I reiterated that the Australian government’s position was that more needs to be done to ensure a reasonable continuing supply of humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza. Australia recognises the unique security challenges that the government of Israel faces from the government of Iran, the state of Iran, and the terrorist organisations which the Iranians support. Australia remains sensitive to the security concerns of Israel. Australia is nonetheless deeply concerned by the loss of life in this most recent military action off Gaza. The government gives the highest priority to the welfare of Australians caught up in this incident. The Australian embassy in Israel has been in close contact with Israeli authorities concerning the welfare and safety of the Australians who have been involved. I can advise the House that Australian officials have been granted access to all known Australians from vessels in the flotilla and that officials have provided consular assistance to those Australians. Yesterday embassy officials visited the three Australians and one permanent resident currently at the Beersheba detention centre, where people on the flotilla have been taken. Also yesterday an Australian embassy official made a second consular visit to an injured Australian man in an Israeli hospital. We have been advised that consular access will be provided again to the Australians at the Beersheba detention centre today, 2 June. We have also been advised that all those detained can request access to lawyers. Our embassy officials are working with detained Australians and Israeli authorities on the appropriate way forward for each Australian given their specific circumstances. We continue to seek confirmation that no other Australians were on board. Furthermore, I requested of Prime Minister Netanyahu last night that he personally engage on the matter concerning the wellbeing of these Australians and these Australian permanent residents. The Prime Minister indicated he would do so. The events of Monday have generated protests in a number of countries around the world. Australia has been no exception. Australia has a deep commitment to the right of Australians to protest and to express their views on subjects of their choice. Whatever the issue Australians have that right. That protest, however, needs to be undertaken peacefully and in a manner which does not incite or provoke violence or lead any community to feel under threat within our country, Australia. At times like this, when passions are aroused, it is important that our communities understand that protest activity needs to be peaceful and undertaken in a way that does not fray the threads that make our society the strong fabric that it is. This is Australia. All protest activity must be undertaken peacefully, and in relation to individual communities within Australia none of those communities should be left feeling under threat. Australia has a very strong relationship with Israel, a relationship that goes back to the founding of the Israeli state and Australia’s vote at the United Nations in 1947, which was the first cast in support of the establishment of the state of Israel, under the Chifley Labor government. We are friends. At times, however, the role of friends is to speak plainly, and that is what Australia has done on this occasion in relation to this matter. 4970 4970 14:08:00 Hockey, Joe, MP DK6 North Sydney LP 0 Mr HOCKEY —My question is to the Treasurer. I refer the Treasurer to the testimony of Treasury officials last night in Senate estimates which confirmed that Treasury had supplied the raw data used in the Treasurer’s economic note of 9 May. Will the Treasurer confirm that the pie charts used extensively by the markets in his economic note were actually constructed in his office? 4970 Swan, Wayne, MP 2V5 Lilley ALP Treasurer 1 Mr SWAN —I stand by the accuracy of all the figures in the economic note—absolutely. Let us just go through what this is all about, because the member for North Sydney has been very, very sloppy yet again. I know people on this side would find that probably hard to understand, but of course he has! Now what does this relate to? This relates to the fact— 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order on relevance. The question was extremely specific, and that was whether the pie chart was constructed in his office. It was not whether he stood by the data in the note. It was whether he constructed the pie chart himself. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The Treasurer will relate his material to the question. 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr SWAN —You always laugh when Joe’s asking you about pies. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The Treasurer will refer to members— Honourable members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The Treasurer will withdraw and the Treasurer will refer to members by their titles—and I cut my own microphone off, which was not too good. The two ministers are not quite the closest ministers to me but they would have heard it anyway. So the Treasurer will withdraw, the Treasurer will refer to members by their titles and in his response he will relate his material to the question. 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr SWAN —I withdraw, Mr Speaker. Around the start of the decade the Australian community received about $1 in royalties and resource charges for every $3 of resource profits. In 2008-09 that figure had fallen to $1 in $7. This goes to the very core of the embarrassment of those opposite. Opposition members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! HWD Hale, Damian, MP Mr Hale interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Solomon is warned. DZS Bowen, Chris, MP Mr Bowen interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The parliamentary secretary is lucky not to be warned. 00AKI Dutton, Peter, MP Mr Dutton —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Going back to your point and clarification that you provided to the Treasurer, which he is now in complete defiance of, the issue is relevancy. The Treasurer was asked to confirm whether the pie charts were constructed in his office. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Dickson will resume his seat. The preamble to the question talked about the testimony in Senate estimates and then went on about what action was taken in the Treasurer’s office. I am assuming, even though I have not read the testimony in Senate estimates, that the remarks that the Treasurer is making relate to that. But, as I have said to him, he must relate his material to the question. 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr SWAN —Yes, Mr Speaker, because the pie chart shows and the data that it is based on— IYU Briggs, Jamie, MP Mr Briggs interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Mayo will withdraw. IYU Briggs, Jamie, MP Mr Briggs —I withdraw. 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr SWAN —The pie chart—and the data it is based on—shows that the Australian people have not been getting their fair share. The member for Dickson is only interested in shares. He is not interested in a fair share for the Australian people. Not even the mining industry thinks that there should not be more paid by most companies so the Australian people get a fair share. The only people in Australia who believe that are those opposite. The Leader of the Opposition thinks the mining industry is paying too much tax. I stand by all of the data in the economic note, so I stand by that. There was a discussion about this last night in Senate estimates and of course that will be responded to in the normal way by the department. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —I call the member for Solomon. 4971 4971 14:14:00 Hale, Damian, MP HWD Solomon ALP 1 Mr HALE —Thank you, Mr Speaker, and I feel most fortunate to be given the call. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —You are very fortunate. HWD Hale, Damian, MP Mr HALE —My question is to the Prime Minister. What do the national accounts figures show about the Australian economy? 4971 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr RUDD —I thank the member for Solomon for his question because the strength of the Australian economy also rests on the strength of the region’s of Australia, including the Northern Territory, which the honourable member so effectively represents in this chamber together with the member for Lingiari and senators as well. I believe there is nothing more fundamental to the responsibilities of a government than to keep the economy strong, because, if you have a strong economy, you can then deliver on the aspirations for working families. You can also then build a fairer Australia and put in place the measures you need to secure Australia’s future. Today we had revealed and released the national accounts. They point to a strong performance for the Australian economy. Australia’s GDP has grown by a solid 0.5 per cent in the March quarter. The Australian economy continues to be the envy of the developed world. Notwithstanding our strong national economic performance, we should also be mindful of the fact that many families in the Australian community and many Australian small businesses are still finding it very tough, given the nature of the global economic forces still at work on Australia. The Australian economy, as I said before, continues to be the envy of the developed world. Australia’s growth over the past year has been 2.7 per cent. This compares to 0.4 per cent for New Zealand, minus 0.2 per cent for the United Kingdom, 2.5 per cent for the United States and 0.5 per cent in the Euro area. This becomes an even more stark comparison if we compare Australia’s economic growth performance since the crisis began some two years ago. These figures are worth reflecting on. Australia’s economy since this crisis began has grown by 3.5 percentage points. In the United Kingdom, GDP has fallen by 5.5 percentage points. In Germany, it has fallen by 5.3 percentage points. In the United States, it has fallen by 0.9 percentage points. But the model for the Leader of the Opposition—remember—is New Zealand. I would ask him to reflect on the fact that in New Zealand they have had something like five consecutive quarters of negative economic growth. That is his recommended economic model, from the man who says that economics bores him, from the man who the previous Treasurer Peter Costello said he could never make Treasurer and whose colleagues have now said, in various publications around the country, would not understand the meaning of the concept of being a fiscal conservative. His model is New Zealand and I would suggest he reflects on New Zealand’s performance. On the question of the strength of Australia’s performance, I would also draw to the attention of those opposite that this government will be bringing the budget back to surplus in three years time, three years ahead of time, and we will be halving net peak debt. That is this government’s record of achievement. Had we gone the other way and taken the recommendation of the Leader of the Opposition and not had any stimulus, you would have had Australia in recession, you would have had taxation receipts collapsing completely and you would have had very large outlays for unemployment benefits. Had Australia performed like so many of the other economies around the world which generated double-digit unemployment we would have had something like half a million more Australians out of work. That was the script being put on offer by those opposite—tens of thousands of businesses closing their doors and our budget under greater pressure. The core difference that we made relative to other economies was the size and construction of our economic stimulus strategy. That is what has made the difference in this Australian economy. DK6 Hockey, Joe, MP Mr Hockey interjecting— 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —The member for North Sydney continues to loudly interject. I would ask him to examine the national accounts figures today in terms of the contribution of public final demand to the overall growth performance of the Australian economy and ask him then to reflect upon the wisdom of his interjection that stimulus had nothing to do with it. Can I say to those opposite and to the House more broadly that stimulus has helped pick up the slack in critical areas of the economy. For example, in the building industry, private activity contracted by 0.6 per cent in the March quarter and is now over 15 per cent below the level it was a year ago. That is why programs such as Building the Education Revolution, the school modernisation program, have been of fundamental importance, together with the social housing program, in providing work for tradies, sparkies, chippies and builders right across the Australian economy. If any of those members opposite were being honest about this and looking in the faces of the builders and the subcontractors in their electorates, including the Leader of the Opposition’s electorate, they should have the courage to front them and say that they would pull the plug from under each and every one of those projects. This has therefore been a core element in Australia’s strong economic performance. The stimulus measures that we have embarked upon are already in the process of being withdrawn. The first homeowners boost has been reduced, the tax breaks to small business have come to a conclusion, and there is the guarantee scheme for large deposits and wholesale funding and the state guarantee scheme. Over time the withdrawal of fiscal stimulus is anticipated to subtract around one percentage point from GDP growth over 2010. Here is the core point: those opposite are calling for the cancellation of stimulus now. That is their position. Reflect on that as it would occur and roll out across the ground. The cancellation of stimulus would result in the cancellation of 175 road and rail safety projects right across Australia. It would result in construction being stopped midway on 7,000 major school buildings. It would result in the construction being stopped midway of more than 533 science and language centres across Australia. It would leave 12,500 new social dwellings unfit for occupation, without plumbing or even walls. It would lead to the cessation of the construction of 380 defence homes across Australia, something I would have thought the member for Herbert might take a particular interest in. Further, 130 projects across our universities would be stopped and work also brought to a halt on 125 community infrastructure projects, all backed by Australian local government. That is the practical consequence of what the Leader of the Opposition says would happen if he cancels—as he says he would—stimulus projects across the country. The question for each member opposite is to front their local P&Cs and their local P&Fs and tell them which of those schools is not going to be brought to conclusion. This government is proud of its achievements in terms of the management of the economy in the worst global economic downturn that the world has faced since the Great Depression. We are proud of the fact that the Australian economy has emerged as the only major economy which has not gone into recession. It is one of only two economies of the 30-plus economies across the OECD not to have gone into recession. This should be cause for confidence on the part of Australians, but it should not be cause for complacency on the part of Australians. That is why we are engaged in long-term economic reform as well—building productivity growth, investing in infrastructure, investing in skills and implementing microeconomic reform. That also includes taxation reform, and that is what we are doing with the resource super profits tax in order to provide long-term reform and a basis for growth for this country into the future. This side of the House welcomes positive news on the Australian economy. We welcome positive growth numbers for the Australian economy. Is it so far beyond the capabilities of the Leader of the Opposition to stand up today and welcome the fact that this has been the strongest-growing economy of all the advanced economies in the world? 4973 4973 14:23:00 Hockey, Joe, MP DK6 North Sydney LP 0 Mr HOCKEY —My question is to the Treasurer. Will the Treasurer confirm that concerns have been raised with his office by Treasury officials as to the accuracy of the pie charts contained in his economic note of 9 May? 4974 Swan, Wayne, MP 2V5 Lilley ALP Treasurer 1 Mr SWAN —He is at it again. I confirm and stand by the accuracy of all of the data supplied to my office which appears in the pie charts. I have made that very clear. The government and the department are very happy to supply all of the data in the normal way, as was requested in Senate estimates. That is entirely a matter for the department, and they will do that in the normal way. But let us just go through what the opposition are upset about here. Last night on Lateline, we had the shadow Treasurer. He showed absolutely conclusively on Lateline that he does not understand the purpose of royalties. 00AKI Dutton, Peter, MP Mr Dutton —Mr Speaker, a point of order, again on relevance—and I make reference to your earlier ruling: this is as specific as a question can get. Will the Treasurer confirm that concerns have been raised with his office by Treasury as to the accuracy of the pie charts contained in his economic note of 9 May? There was no preamble. There was no addition to it. That was the question. R36 Albanese, Anthony, MP Mr Albanese —Mr Speaker, on the point of order: I refer to your rulings of 28 May 2008 and 23 June 2009 and a number of other rulings that you have made where you have indicated to the opposition that, to quote your good self in a fine ruling, ‘a point of order is not just an opportunity to repeat the question’. The opposition continue to do this as a strategy, which is a waste of time. If the point of order is on relevance, it should be made directly and then you should be able to rule on it. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —I note the comments of the Leader of the House. The member for Dickson has raised relevance as a point of order. I will listen carefully to the Treasurer’s response, and I remind him again that he must relate the material he is using to the question. 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr SWAN —It is a question about royalties, it a question about data— Opposition members—No, it’s not. 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr SWAN —The whole chart is about royalties. It just shows that they have not the faintest idea why royalties are important, what role they play and why we have to have a superprofits tax to replace royalties. They simply do not get it, and they do not think that it is a problem that the Australian people have not been getting fair value via the royalties system. They have bought this line from the Mining Industry Council hook, line and sinker that, because the mining industry pays company tax, it does not matter what they pay in terms of royalties. They have bought that line hook, line and sinker. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Has the Treasurer concluded? HK5 Andrews, Kevin, MP Mr Andrews —Mr Speaker, a point of order on relevance: if the— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Menzies will resume his seat. The Treasurer will relate his material to the question. 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr SWAN —I most certainly am, because this is an argument and a discussion about royalties—whether the Australian people are getting their fair share and the data on which that is based. So I am very, very clearly relating my answer to the question. What they are trying to deny is that the Australian people have not been getting a fair share, and they are seeking to cast some sort of doubt on the accuracy of the figures. 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —Mr Speaker, a point of order on relevance: the Treasurer is ducking and weaving and slipping and sliding— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Sturt will resume his seat. The member for Sturt will resume his seat! The Manager of Opposition Business displays another tactic which is used and which is outside the standing orders. I am happy for him to raise—even on a continuing basis, given that it is the third time the opposition has risen on a point of order in this answer that has gone for a little over a minute and a half—the issue of relevance. But it is not for him to add the sorts of comments that he makes by interjection continually by way of debate. That is the point that I was trying to make by going a little over the top with the decibels. I am in the difficulty that there was reference in the question to whether there had been concerns raised with the figures. I have to say that in the past I have been in this place when some people whom I think some would be surprised that I describe as very good parliamentarians were able to pluck the eyes out of a question and then try to say that their answer was relevant. I say to the Treasurer that he must go directly to where he believes he is talking about a matter directly contained in the question. I will listen carefully. 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr SWAN —I stand by the accuracy of all of the figures in the economic note. Regarding the figuring on which it is based, I have said in relation to Senate estimates—which was also asked about in one of the questions—that the department would be supplying all of that material in the normal way. This was a question about royalties and how they are calculated. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! I think the Treasurer has now completed his answer. 4975 4975 14:29:00 Melham, Daryl, MP 4T4 Banks ALP 1 Mr MELHAM —My question is to the Treasurer. What do today’s national accounts say about the success of Australia’s economic policies, the need for ongoing reform and the prospects for our economy into the future? 4975 Swan, Wayne, MP 2V5 Lilley ALP Treasurer 1 Mr SWAN —I thank the member for Banks for his question. As the Prime Minister said before, the Australian economy grew by a solid 0.5 per cent in the March quarter and 2.7 per cent through the year. I think all Australians should have confidence in this very solid outcome and confidence in the fact that we do have one of the best economies in the developed world. We can see that again in these national accounts today. It is an economy which is gradually in transition from support provided by policy stimulus to support provided by private demand. Of course, as the Prime Minister also said before, that stimulus is withdrawing at a rate that ensures appropriate support remains targeted at softer sections of the economy. Infrastructure projects in particular have helped plug the hole in private sector building activity, while stimulus payments and tax breaks for business have been unwound. Stimulus projects contributed 12.5 per cent to the increase in new public investment in the quarter. Public investment has now risen by more than 40 per cent over the past year. As the Prime Minister also said before, this is keeping tradies in employment and it is keeping the doors of small business open. FU4 Robb, Andrew, MP Mr Robb interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for Goldstein! 2V5 Swan, Wayne, MP Mr SWAN —But, on cue, we get the shadow finance spokesman over there saying that somehow this did not play an important role in our economy and it is not important as we go forward. I can tell you that this pipeline of activity is absolutely essential to employment in this economy, is absolutely essential to confidence in small business and is keeping the doors of small business open in circumstances where it is quite difficult and remains very difficult for many small businesses out there. It is indeed ironic that the party opposite, which claims to be a party of small business, does not understand that essential fact—the ongoing importance of that infrastructure stimulus to support demand in our economy as the rest of the stimulus is being wound down. The national accounts today are an important reminder of what Australians have achieved over the past year. Certainly the greatest achievement was that we did avoid recession when many other countries faced recession. The consequence of that has been the creation of something like 235,000 jobs in the past year. Other nations were shedding jobs. Other nations have unemployment rates of nine and 10 per cent; if you go to Europe, unemployment is as high as 16 per cent in some countries. That in itself is a fundamental drag on growth and a cause of great concern. You would think that in this House today they would be celebrating this very important outcome for all Australians—the fact that we have been successful in supporting small business and supporting families. One of the lessons that this country has learnt through the experience of the last couple of years is that we do need to take the hard decisions to support our economy. They were not capable of taking the hard decisions to support us when we put in place fiscal stimulus, which is responsible for the outcome that we are seeing today. They squibbed it. They came into this House and they voted it down and they voted it down in the Senate in the first passage. That fiscal stimulus was absolutely important to the financial security of every Australian. On that occasion they did not display any understanding of the threat. Equally, they have no understanding of what we need to do now to build on that success to put in place the essential economic reforms that can create prosperity as we move forward. They were wrong about stimulus and they are wrong about tax modernisation because they are simply out of touch and have no grasp of economics whatsoever. 4976 4976 14:33:00 Hockey, Joe, MP DK6 North Sydney LP 0 Mr HOCKEY —My question is to the Treasurer. Will the Treasurer confirm that the pie charts in his economic note were constructed in his office? Honourable members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! R36 Albanese, Anthony, MP Mr Albanese —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. As you know, a question which has been asked cannot be asked repeatedly. This question has been answered by the Treasurer and it should be ruled out of order. Honourable members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! I have duelling points of order! 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —Mr Speaker, on the point of order, I am sure I do not need to point out to you that under standing order 100(b) the order is that a question ‘fully answered must not be asked again’. The Treasurer did not answer the question; that is why it is being asked again. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The question is in order. The Treasurer has the call. 4976 Swan, Wayne, MP 2V5 Lilley ALP Treasurer 1 Mr SWAN —Mr Speaker, I am happy to say that the economic note from my office was from my office. 4976 4976 14:35:00 Jackson, Sharryn, MP 00AN2 Hasluck ALP 1 Ms JACKSON —My question is to the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government. How is the government supporting investment and infrastructure in the Pilbara and across Australia? DK6 Hockey, Joe, MP Mr Hockey interjecting— YU5 Tanner, Lindsay, MP Mr Tanner —Mr Speaker— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! If I have been approached by the minister for finance because an unparliamentary remark has been made by the member for North Sydney, the member for North Sydney will withdraw. DK6 Hockey, Joe, MP Mr Hockey —I withdraw. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —I think everybody should calm down a little. The member for Hasluck has asked her question. The Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government has the call. 4977 Albanese, Anthony, MP R36 Grayndler ALP Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government 1 Mr ALBANESE —I thank the member for Hasluck for her question and for her ongoing interest in the economic future particularly of the west. Today I granted major project facilitation status to the West Pilbara iron ore project. This recognises its economic significance to Australia and it shows that the government is getting on with the job of supporting investment so that Australia can take full advantage of the global recovery. This is a $4 billion project which will commercialise 500 million tonnes of iron ore. It will generate some $2 billion every year in export revenue and create 4,000 jobs during construction. I spoke with the project manager yesterday, who confirmed that, with today’s announcement, they are on track to start construction on this iron ore project next year, with production to begin in 2013. This is good news for the Pilbara and it is good news for the nation. As we all know, a project of this scale needs infrastructure. In this case, the West Pilbara iron ore project will construct a 275-kilometre heavy haulage railway and a new deep-water port at Anketell Point, both with opportunities for third-party access. This is an issue right across the country. We need not just private sector investment in infrastructure; we also need to have a capacity to leverage with public investment in infrastructure. Only this morning, the member for Maranoa was calling for an urgent upgrade of the Landsborough Highway to cope with the pressure from the Galilee Basin coal projects. The Rudd government’s tax reform plan will support more sustainable growth across the economy by helping to build infrastructure capacity around Australia as resource projects come on line. That is why the Rudd government wants to establish the infrastructure fund as part of its proposed resource super profits tax. We stand for a stronger economy. We recognise that even in areas where there has been a substantial mining boom—such as Port Hedland or Karratha or Newman—you see, in spite of the extraordinary wealth that is being generated, a lack of infrastructure, whether it be export based infrastructure restricting our capacity for growth, or whether it be social infrastructure, such as education, health and childcare facilities. And, frankly, I am surprised that the announcement of a project such as this, with major project facilitation by the federal government, is not welcomed by all in this parliament. I assure the parliament it has been welcomed by the company concerned. 4977 4977 14:39:00 Abbott, Tony, MP EZ5 Warringah LP 0 Mr ABBOTT —Mr Speaker, my question is to the Minister for Education. I refer the minister to an interview today on the Ray Hadley program with Mr Brad Orgill, the head of the government’s implementation task force. Mr Orgill admitted that he does not have access to cost data at schools. How can the task force charged with determining whether schools have received value for money do its job if the chairman does not have access to this data? 4977 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 Leader of the Opposition for his question. I have not seen the transcript of Mr Orgill’s interview, and of course I will check it now. I understand that those opposite have very little to do with their days other than sit by the radio, but I have not seen the transcript of Mr Orgill’s interview. What I can say to the Leader of the Opposition is that Mr Orgill is able to get every document that can be accessed by the federal government, the Commonwealth government. As the Leader of the Opposition may be aware, under the arrangements for Building the Education Revolution, including the guidelines, we are able to access documentation by education authorities relating to Building the Education Revolution. For example, documents held by state governments or education authorities relevant to the rollout of the program and compliance with the guidelines can be accessed. I will have a look at Mr Orgill’s transcript, and if I can assist the Leader of the Opposition further then I will. 4978 4978 14:41:00 Cheeseman, Darren, MP HW7 Corangamite ALP 1 Mr CHEESEMAN —Mr Speaker, my question is to the Minister for Resources and Energy and Minister for Tourism. How will the tax reform and the resource super profits tax in particular provide for Australia’s long-term prosperity? 4978 Ferguson, Martin, MP LS4 Batman ALP Minister for Resources and Energy and Minister for Tourism 1 Mr MARTIN FERGUSON —Mr Speaker, tax reform in this country is both necessary and long overdue. That is especially the case in the resources sector, the objective being to make it more efficient. That effectively means a very serious debate, one which the government is engaged in, about removing royalties and introducing a profit based system. A profit based system will provide fiscal stability compared to the current situation, where state governments can and do lift royalty rates when they need to boost their bottom line, as is currently occurring in the state of Western Australia. It will also turn the lose-lose situation of the royalties based system around, which means the same revenue is paid in the good times as in the bad. I remind the House that during the good times, when prices are high and profits are high, a profit based system provides the Australian community with a fairer return on the nation’s non-renewable resources. Equally, during the bad times, when prices are low and profits are low, a profit based system provides timely tax relief for miners. And on many occasions, the minerals industry has sought that relief from state based premiers and treasurers. That is not just my view; it is also the view of the Minerals Council of Australia. They have set out a case for a profit based system in their submission to the Henry review. I was fortunate today to be amongst friends at the Minerals Council of Australia annual meeting. I want to bring to the attention of the House what the CEO of the Minerals Council of Australia said today. Perhaps the Leader of the Opposition ought to take some interest in this; he might learn something about the minerals sector in Australia. This is what Mr Hooke had to say this morning: We certainly do want to see a profits based system. He went on to say: All the economists who say moving to a profits-based system is the way to go are right. The CEO of the MCA went even further: We’re the ones that said let’s move to a profit based system. Ipso facto, you pay more tax when you earn more profit. I only wish that the Leader of the Opposition would pay a little bit of serious attention to what is a complex debate. Yesterday we had the Leader of the Opposition suggesting that what we are talking about is an extraction tax. We are actually talking about a profit-based tax. He clearly showed, again, that he is focused on the politics of the debate rather than the current hard policy options for the Australian community. That comes as no surprise to me, because—as we all know—he finds economics boring. When it comes to advice on the minerals industry, he turns to the patron saint of the coalition—one Clive Palmer. We saw a cameo appearance by Clive Palmer at the National Press Club today. I only wish that the Leader of the Opposition had had time to watch that rather than delivering his political diatribe to the Minerals Council at lunchtime today. Let’s think about Mr Palmer. A fortnight ago he was making threats about walking away from investment in South Australia. Well, we are still looking for that project. Last week we had him running around saying that the resources sector in Australia pays a tax rate of 70 per cent. When he was questioned about that at the Press Club today, he was all over the shop like a dog’s breakfast. He could not support his previous claim that the resources industry pays a tax of 70 per cent. One should not be surprised, because Mr Palmer is used to throwing his weight around. I think the Australian community is fast coming to the conclusion that you cannot take Mr Palmer or the Leader of the Opposition seriously. Only a matter of a couple of weeks ago he was making similar threats to another very important section of the Australian community—one that is pretty important to a lot of ordinary people because of their love of sport. I go to his endeavours to stand over the Football Federation Australia and his claim that he was going to walk away from the sponsorship of the North Queensland Fury. If you listened to Mr Palmer at the National Press Club today, you almost came to the conclusion that the poor bloke was walking around with his backside out of his pants. This is what he had to say a couple of weeks ago, and this really goes to the question of his credibility and the credibility of the opposition. When asked about his support for the Fury and whether or not he had the financial resources to meet those commitments—and he now says that the resources sector cannot afford to pay more taxes—he was quoted as saying: “I can afford to lose eight million every day of this year and still be alright, you know,” he laughed. Well, this is no laughing matter. This is a serious debate about the future of the Australian resources industry. I simply say that this government is committed to getting the balance right—the appropriate balance between attracting investment in the resources sector of Australia and ensuring that the Australian community get a fair return on the development of the resources that they own 100 per cent. You can have Mr Palmer and his advice, because your credibility is about as good as his— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The minister will refer his remarks through the chair. EP5 Ferguson, Martin, MP Mr MARTIN FERGUSON —Take his donations and sell your soul. We will stand up for the national interest of Australia. 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. With due respect, we did believe the minister for resources was better than this grubby performance. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! What is the point of order? 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —I would ask you to ask the minister to withdraw the slur against all members of the opposition. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —As I have said before, I am reluctant to intervene when comments are made that are, yes, hard-hitting, but are things that we confront day to day. My problem is that they would not be said if debate was not allowed in answers. That is the real problem because, in the preamble to his point of order, the Manager of Opposition Business used fairly over-the-top statements as well. Is the Manager of Opposition Business rising on a further point of order? 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —Mr Speaker, the difficulty the opposition has is that, as the government received $100,000 from mining companies at the last election and we received zero, we find it rather peculiar that they would be making— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! This is not a point of order. 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —outrageous claims against the opposition. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —There is no point of order. DK6 Hockey, Joe, MP Mr Hockey —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Mr Speaker, did you sell your soul, because that is what the minister suggested— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for North Sydney will resume his seat. There is no point of order. 4980 4980 14:51:00 Wood, Jason, MP E0F La Trobe LP 0 Mr WOOD —My question is to the Minister for Education. I refer the minister to a report by Melbourne quantity surveying firm Swift Construction which found that the template buildings being delivered to hundreds of Victorian schools for $3 million are only worth $2 million. With reports such as these and evidence mounting every day, why won’t the minister do the right thing and suspend the remaining billions left to be spent, at least until after her own task force reports in August? 4980 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 La Trobe for his question. I understand that the source material, if you like, for his question relates to an issue he has raised in this parliament before about a school in Berwick—he is indicating that he has raised it before—and some complaints raised by the school principal. I am therefore somewhat familiar with the matter he raises. I am advised— 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —Mr Speaker, on a point of order: the member for La Trobe has indeed asked about Berwick Lodge Primary School before— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —What is the point of order? 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —but this question was about Swift Construction’s estimate that the buildings are costing $2 million rather than $3 million. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The Manager of Opposition Business will resume his seat. The Deputy Prime Minister is responding to the question. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —Let me explain. It is the principal of Berwick Lodge Primary School who raised the costings by Swift. Consequently, when I indicated to the member for La Trobe that I am familiar with this matter— 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —Not just one school—all the schools. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The Manager of Opposition Business cannot continually defy standing order 65(b). In this case the Deputy Prime Minister is responding to the question. She should be heard in silence. I take it that the member for La Trobe is actually listening to the answer. He should be able to hear it. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —You have to be careful of those interjections that show your ignorance. Swift Construction has been contacted by the Victorian Department of Education and Early Childhood Development. I am advised that, following those contacts, Swift Construction has actually advised the Victorian department that the template that is being used cannot be delivered for under $3 million using the BER processes. That is my advice from the Victorian department. On the question of suspending this program, about which I was asked—and I presume that there is some level of interest in an answer to the question asked, which is not being exhibited at the moment—can I explain to the member for La Trobe that I think there has been an apprehension that money being conveyed by the Commonwealth to education authorities on 1 July is somehow immediately expended on 1 July and, consequently, any recommendations in Mr Orgill’s report in August cannot be actioned. I say to the member for La Trobe that this apprehension is not right. Let me take this opportunity to explain to the member for La Trobe, given that he has asked me directly about it, that what is happening is as follows. Payment is being made on 1 July in accordance with our education agreements—that is true. There are two more instalments of funding due to education authorities, one in November 2010 and the second in March 2011. These payments amount to around $3.5 billion and relate only to Primary Schools for the 21st Century. When amounts are paid by the Commonwealth to education authorities they are not immediately expended; they are held by those education authorities and they are drawn down when projects reach appropriate milestones. Consequently, even with money being conveyed on 1 July, there are payments to come in the future, and the money paid on 1 July will be held by education authorities and drawn down in relation to project milestones. Consequently, the report we will receive from Mr Orgill in August and any recommendations that he makes can be actioned. I have also said—and I am happy to repeat to the parliament very, very clearly—that Mr Orgill is at liberty to make recommendations earlier if he chooses. Of course, I am all ears in relation to those recommendations. Finally, and in conclusion, the member for La Trobe asked me about the question of a suspension. I refer him to today’s national accounts data, particularly to the fact that private non-residential building investment fell further in the quarter and remains at a depressed level. Without the substantial ongoing support provided to the sector by the Building the Education Revolution program, activity and employment in this sector would be at an even lower level. Opposition members interjecting— 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —Consequently, what I say to the member for La Trobe and those interjecting is that they should understand—and they may still advocate a suspension— Mr Wood interjecting— 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —Is the member for La Trobe interested in the answer or not? Opposition members interjecting— 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —Obviously not. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The Deputy Prime Minister is responding to the question. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —My point from today’s national accounts is this: it is clear from the national accounts that Building the Education Revolution is vital at this stage to supporting non-residential construction—that is, it is vital to supporting jobs. Members opposite may believe that there should be a suspension in doing so; they believe people should lose jobs. If they want to advocate that, that is a matter for them. 4981 4981 14:58:00 Georganas, Steve, MP DZY Hindmarsh ALP 1 Mr GEORGANAS —My question is to the Minister for Environment Protection, Heritage and the Arts. What action is the government taking to end whaling in the Southern Ocean and around the world? 4981 Garrett, Peter, MP HV4 Kingsford Smith ALP Minister for Environment Protection, Heritage and the Arts 1 Mr GARRETT —I thank the member for Hindmarsh for his question. I know he has a strong interest in the Rudd government’s actions in opposing so-called commercial whaling—scientific whaling—in the Southern Ocean and globally. The member asks me what actions the government is taking and I am pleased to report to the House on a number of actions that this government has taken in opposing commercial whaling and continuing to seek a permanent end to whaling worldwide, particularly in the Southern Ocean. Since coming to office the government has embarked on a comprehensive diplomatic engagement on this issue, including the appointment of a Special Envoy on Whale Conservation. Additionally, we have advanced a strong reform agenda focusing particularly on conservation and science at the International Whaling Commission, which is the body that regulates these issues, a proposal that was widely supported and discussed and will continue to be the subject of deliberation in the IWC process. The Rudd government has also launched the largest research partnership of its kind in the world, the Southern Ocean Research Partnership, a $32 million non-lethal whale research partnership open to all nations of the International Whaling Commission, so that we can prove once and for all that we can have whale research without needing to kill a single whale. In the run-up to the IWC we have also brought forward our own reform agenda which sets out our compromise proposals, including a phase-out of Southern Ocean whaling within five years and specifically no targeting of endangered or threatened species. Of course people listening will know that the government has taken the additional step, on 28 May, of announcing that Australia will initiate legal action in the International Court of Justice in The Hague against Japanese scientific whaling in the Southern Ocean, and that application is now lodged in the court. This is not a decision that is taken lightly. The government have been patient and committed in our efforts to find a diplomatic resolution to this issue. We have remained in intensive discussions in the IWC and bilaterally with Japan, and we will continue to work hard in the lead-up to and at the IWC meeting in June to pursue our objectives. We judge that the chance for an outcome at that meeting which meets Australia’s fundamental conservation objectives is slim, but Australia will continue to engage constructively in the diplomatic effort. Importantly, we have enjoyed support for our proposals broadly from other IWC members who share Australia’s concerns and goals, but the fact is that recent statements by whaling countries in the commission have provided little hope that our commitment to conservation of the world’s whales will be reflected in any potential IWC compromise agreement. Having been unable to make the necessary progress we said we wanted to see, we now move to the next stage: legal action. I noticed some remarks from non-government organisations once that announcement was made. The International Fund for Animal Welfare said: The Australian government is the leading voice in whale conservation and today’s announcement demonstrates that they are willing to put their words into action by taking this unprecedented step. The Australian Marine Conservation Society said on 28 May: It is about time a government stood up for the whales and we commend the Rudd Government for showing backbone. The fact is that this government has done more in just over two years on whale conservation than the coalition did under government in 12 years. It is a fact that the whale conservation efforts of the coalition, when they were in government, were miserable, were full of cliches and, critically, despite much table thumping, saw a doubling in the number of whales targeted in the Southern Ocean. That is the critical point here: in the entire period of time the coalition had carriage of this issue, the success of their activities can be judged by the fact that the number of whales targeted in the Southern Ocean doubled. That is because they have been confused over a number of matters in relation to taking re-election. Mr Hunt demanded that the government take international legal action, in August last year: We think Australia should put together a coalition of nations to proceed legally against Japan under the International Law of the Sea. In January the Leader of the Opposition said that legal action was not coalition policy. He said: Coalition policy is not to take Japan to the International Court. Then last Friday he had a bob each way with a hybrid model: ‘We do support appropriate action, but we are not sure if we support this specific action.’ The opposition leader should make it clear specifically whether he does support, or not, the government’s action to initiate legal action in the International Court of Justice. In the meantime, the government remain absolutely opposed to commercial whaling, including so-called scientific whaling, and we will continue our efforts and our actions to ensure that these majestic creatures are not killed in the name of science. 4983 4983 15:05:00 Johnson, Michael, MP 00AMX Ryan IND 0 Mr JOHNSON —My question is to the Leader of the House and the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, representing the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy. Could the minister update the people of Ryan, but especially the people of Bardon in the Ryan electorate, which postcodes are covered by the four land access and activity notices, or LANS, issued in 2009 for the installation of wireless facilities onto residential apartment buildings? Further, were any land access and activity notices issued prior to 2009 and, if so, in which Australian postcodes? 4983 Albanese, Anthony, MP R36 Grayndler ALP Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government 1 Mr ALBANESE —I thank the independent member for Ryan for his question and indicate to him that this data is not held by the government; it is held by industry. The member should therefore seek the information from industry. The government does, however, appreciate that there is substantial community concern, and legitimate concern, around these issues. I know that the issue of Bardon has created some controversy, as has, indeed, one particular tower in my electorate. There is community concern. The government is conscious of that. The Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency, within the health portfolio, sets the mandatory limits on public exposure based on safe international best practice guidelines. I note that these arrangements were put in place by the previous government. Under these arrangements, carriers must issue notices responsibly, and there are rules on safety, consultation and compensation. We believe it is important to balance the community need for good communications infrastructure with community concerns on this issue. Communities that believe a carrier has not complied with its obligations should contact either the carrier or the Australian Communications and Media Authority. The industry code is currently under review, and it is appropriate that the government consider the findings of this review. But I will convey the member’s question directly to the minister for communications and suggest that, if he has anything directly to add, he convey that directly to the member. 4983 4983 15:07:00 Fitzgibbon, Joel, MP 8K6 Hunter ALP 1 Mr FITZGIBBON —I too have a question for the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government. Minister, why is certainty and long-term planning important in delivering major road and rail infrastructure projects? Are there any risks to these investments, particularly in the Hunter region? 4984 Albanese, Anthony, MP R36 Grayndler ALP Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government 1 Mr ALBANESE —I thank the member for Hunter for his question. He indeed is a member who understands that, when it comes to delivering transport infrastructure, long-term planning and certainty is vital. That is why the reckless statements over the last fortnight by the coalition are so alarming. They are attempting to say one thing here in the parliament but then another thing completely in their electorates. Indeed, the shadow minister for finance released a statement, as part of the budget response, when pass-the-parcel had ended. He said: Given the commitment to release the costings of already announced policies following is a table of costings relating to our $4.8 billion spending commitments— and then that table was included. He then stated in a press release, distributed after the famous press conference here, cut short by his advisor, that: Any other past commitments have been discontinued. It was a very clear statement from the person responsible for providing a finance position which was a part of the budget response. However, they are continuing to say something different out there in their electorates. Indeed, in a letter to the editor of local papers, Mr Robb, the member for Goldstein, said—wait for this quote: The claims by Mr Albanese that this commitment has been discontinued are completely and utterly false. Well, I am sorry if we have quoted the shadow finance minister, in a carefully scripted and written down comment we thought was gospel truth! That is all we have done. But they are continuing to say one thing in here, around Canberra, one thing to the press gallery about their being concerned about debt and deficit, and that they are not going to make any irresponsible promises, but something else out their in the electorates. The other thing they have done is that the shadow finance minister, when asked how he would fund roads, said that he would use Roads to Recovery funding—a big ‘woops’ moment from the member for Goldstein. The 565 local governments around Australia that receive untied funding to fund their local roads now know that all of that funding is under threat. The coalition will pillage that funding, in the words of the shadow finance minister. In the electorate of Paterson, in the Hunter: Dungog Shire Council, $2 million—gone; Gloucester Shire Council, $2 million—gone; Great Lakes Council, $3.7 million—gone; Maitland City Council, $2.8 million—gone; and Port Stephens, $2.7 million—gone. But it gets worse, because they cannot get enough cash to pay for all their promises simply by plundering local government. They have also drawn up a separate infrastructure hit list. In the same letter to local papers the shadow minister for finance said: There’s still many projects worth billions of dollars in the Rudd Government budget which have not started … So all of the infrastructure projects, if they have not commenced—and the Leader of the Nationals has said the same thing—are up for grabs. In the Hunter, that means the $1.65 billion Hunter expressway, due to commence construction in 2010— LL6 Baldwin, Robert, MP Mr Baldwin —It’s already started, you goose! R36 Albanese, Anthony, MP Mr ALBANESE —Construction has not started, because this mob opposite had not even purchased the properties along the route, and that had to be done, or had the planning put in place. So that will commence in 2010. GT4 Truss, Warren, MP Mr Truss —You stopped it! R36 Albanese, Anthony, MP Mr ALBANESE —We stopped it? They did nothing for 12 years, we provided funding but they say we stopped it. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The Leader of the Nationals will not make interjections and the minister will ignore them. R36 Albanese, Anthony, MP Mr ALBANESE —So the shadow minister for finance said today, to the Newcastle Herald, ‘Oh, no, we’d let that one go through’—but we do not have it in writing yet, so we do not know what will go ahead and what will not. What the opposition now have to do is go through the $37 billion nation-building program and say which projects will proceed and which ones they will attempt to stop—even though all of them are subject to memoranda of understanding with state and territory governments. We know that when they last came to office they cut $2 billion from the roads budget. We also know that it is symptomatic of their attitude to infrastructure across the board. In the Hunter region, right up there at the top, the election of Paterson, the trade training centre at Bulahdelah Central School—$ 1½ million under threat; the trade training centre at Great Lakes College—$4½ million under threat; and the 577 computers in Paterson that kids will miss out on as a result of this opposition’s reckless position. We need to know exactly what they stand for. We will be holding them to account—on the ground, in each and every electorate between now and election day. They will not get away with saying one thing in Canberra and another thing in their electorates. 4985 4985 15:14:00 Gash, Joanna, MP AK6 Gilmore LP 0 Mrs GASH —My question is to the Minister for Education. Can the minister explain why, under her school hall program, a toilet block and walkway like this one at the Quaama Primary School on the Far South Coast, has cost taxpayers $813,000 when a brick house—I will show you another photo—with five bedrooms, three living areas, two bathrooms and a granite kitchen in the same area, costs only $470,000? Does the minister understand why people like Debbie Platts, the Vice-President of Quaama Primary School P&C, who has recently built such a house, say that the waste and mismanagement at her school’s project is absolutely mind-blowing? 4985 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 Gilmore for her question, though I view it to be a great pity that she will not stand up for the trades training centre in her electorate or the delivery of computers—a matter I raised with her in the parliament during the course of the last few days. At the next election voters in Gilmore will have a choice about getting someone who will stand up for the local electorate and their trades training centres and computers in schools— AK6 Gash, Joanna, MP Mrs Gash —I rise on a point of order. I do not think I have ever called a point of order since I have been in parliament. However, I would like to remind the minister to go and look at her correspondence, where I have actually supported— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Gilmore will resume her seat; there are other avenues available to her. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —Can I say, on the question of school infrastructure in the member’s electorate, I absolutely acknowledge that she has written to me supporting the Vincentia Trades Training Centre. You had better ask the Leader of the Opposition why he wants to cut the funding, member for Gilmore, and why you are supporting a man who would prevent that going ahead if he was elected as Prime Minister. That is what I mean by standing up for your electorate, member for Gilmore. SE4 Bishop, Bronwyn, MP Mrs Bronwyn Bishop —I rise on a point of order. I refer you again to page 553 of the House of Representatives Practice, where it says that an answer, to remain relevant, must maintain a link to the substance of the question. I refer you also to page 527, which you have referred to in recent times. It says that question time is a useful time to elicit important information which is valuable and is clearly— 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Mackellar will resume her seat. I will deal with her point of order. The member for Sturt will not be allowed one iota of latitude from now on in question time. He only knows that that is because of other things that he is responsible for. Holding up that picture was very silly, in the circumstances. On the point of order of the member for Mackellar, after the interruption by the member for Gilmore—I am not saying that in any way to criticise the member for Gilmore—the Deputy Prime Minister showed that she knew that she had to relate her remarks to the question. I invite her now to rise and to respond to the question from the member for Gilmore. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —In response to the question, the member for Gilmore has raised with me an individual school. I assure the member for Gilmore, I want to get value for dollars spent on schools. On this side of the House we value education. That is why we are allocating money to Building the Education Revolution, trades training centres, computers in schools and teacher quality. We understand that the Leader of the Opposition—and maybe the member for Gilmore has a different view but she is not standing up for it—does not value this expenditure and wants to cut it all. Can I tell the member for Gilmore the appropriate course in relation to the individual school she raises: I have specifically created the Building the Education Revolution Implementation Taskforce, led by Mr Orgill, to deal with these matters. If she chooses, she can refer this matter to the taskforce. Then, on the matter of what the taskforce can do next—it was suggested in a question to me today that the taskforce cannot get documents—I refer the member for Gilmore to the agreements we have with education authorities that require, in clauses 3.2 and 6.4, the provision of documents, when requested, which can go to the taskforce. I also indicate, in response to the member for Gilmore, and on the question of the Building the Education Revolution Implementation Taskforce generally, that a little earlier today the Leader of the Opposition suggested in a question to me that Mr Orgill had said to Ray Hadley on his show this morning that he had admitted he does not have access to cost data in schools. That is not correct and I table the transcript which indicates, as usual, that claims made by the Leader of the Opposition are absolutely phoney. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! Just before giving the call to the member for Cunningham I say to the member for Sturt that before his display of the object, behind the person at the dispatch box, I was checking on a word that he had been using. I ask him to withdraw the word that he used in interjecting upon the Deputy Prime Minister. 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —What was the word? 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —I ask him to get up and withdraw, because he is on thin ice. 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —I withdraw, Mr Speaker. 4986 4986 15:21:00 Bird, Sharon, MP DZP Cunningham ALP 1 Ms BIRD —My question is to the Minister for Health and Ageing. Will the minister update the House on the government’s initiatives to tackle cancer in our community? What risks are there to those initiatives, particularly in the Illawarra and New South Wales South Coast regions? 4987 Roxon, Nicola, MP 83K Gellibrand ALP Minister for Health and Ageing 1 Ms ROXON —I thank the member for Cunningham for her question. It was very appropriate, because I know that she enthusiastically welcomed the government’s announcement of a regional cancer facility in her electorate—$12 million for the Illawarra. It is something that has long been needed and is one of a number of regional cancer centres that have been announced across the country. Today, the 20th announcement was made—$1.8 million to the ACT. It is one of the smaller investments but is a very important one. It will fund accommodation facilities, particularly for those people travelling from the broader south-east in the electorate of Eden-Monaro and those surrounds, for people that have to come to Canberra for services and often struggle with finding accommodation. These are very important projects that the government has been proud to announce. The member for Gilmore would be interested in this question as well, because a $23 million investment is being made in establishing a Shoalhaven regional cancer centre. This project will fund a linear accelerator, a CT scanner, eight chemotherapy chairs and 10 patient accommodation places. Opposition members interjecting— SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr Tuckey —When is it going to happen? 83K Roxon, Nicola, MP Ms ROXON —I have not noticed, despite the overwhelming support for the need for these investments, any support coming from those opposite. In fact, I can hear members opposite yelling out, ‘When will this happen?’ It did not happen under the previous government for 12 years. We have now invested $560 million in more than 20 projects across the country. What we fear, and I think the member for Gilmore should fear, is that we have no promise from those opposite that this money will be honoured, that these commitments will be honoured, under a Liberal government. We have reason to be dubious about whether they will be honoured, because the Leader of the Opposition pulled a billion dollars out of our hospital system. He already in the budget reply has promised to pull another $800 million out of the system. The shadow minister for health, on Friday, committed to withdrawing another $450 million from the budget because they do not support our diabetes initiatives. So members like the member for Gilmore need to be standing up and committing to these projects, need to be standing up for their communities and need to be making sure that the Leader of the Opposition, who was a risk to health expenditure when he was in the portfolio, allows these important projects to continue. There is a legitimate question about when these investments will be delivered. Cancer investments take a very long period of time. The member that wants to interject will remember that in 12 years his government did not commit to any of these investments. I would be surprised if the member for interjecting—he probably is the member for interjecting; nevertheless, I do not think that is the name of his seat—the member for O’Connor, would not welcome $22 million going to regional cancer services in Albany, Northam, Narrogin, Geraldton and Kalgoorlie or $23 million going to the St John of God Hospital in Bunbury. I would have thought the member for Forest would also be welcoming this. We could go through the very long list. The point I am making, however, is that the Leader of the Opposition has not committed to protect this expenditure. He has already on his tab—his snatch and grab list of what he is going to do with our health expenditure—pulled $1.2 billion out of the system. We fear that these important cancer investments are next. If those backbenchers who stand to benefit from these investments do not get on quick smart to the Leader of the Opposition to tell him that this money should be protected, these long-term vital investments may not be made. That would be a tragedy, because the reason the government is making these investments comes down to one very important fact: if you are an Australian who lives in rural and regional Australia and you get the dreadful news that you have a diagnosis of cancer, your chance of surviving is three times worse than if you are a person in the city who gets that same diagnosis. That is not good enough. It is an embarrassment for a country like Australia. It is the reason that $560 million is being invested in regional cancer centres. We would like to see those opposite standing up for regional Australia for once and agreeing that this money will be protected by any future government. 4988 4988 15:27:00 Markus, Louise, MP E07 Greenway LP 0 Mrs MARKUS —My question is to the Minister for Education. I refer the minister to reports that the Mount Victoria Public School will under the BER receive a Colorbond demountable classroom for $850,000—something the school P&C are not happy with. I also refer the minister to www.domain.com.au where, just down the road from Mount Victoria Public School, there is a ‘truly unique custom-built and designed home for sale for $485,000’. This home has a ‘generous outdoor area, spa, sauna, flowing stream, fish pond and potter’s studio’. Minister, can you explain to the P&C of Mount Victoria Public School how their demountable classroom will be value for money, when just down the road this substantial home is for sale at almost half the price? 4988 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 Greenway for her question. Can I say this to the member for Greenway: when we see comparisons made on building costs, sometimes in the media and sometimes in this parliament, it is very important to be comparing like with like. I am not sure that in the member’s question we have really seen a comparison of like with like. However, can I say to the member that if the P&C at that school is concerned about value for money on their Building the Education Revolution project, then so am I. We are concerned to make sure that dollars spent on schools make a difference for schools, that dollars spent on schools go to maximum effect. As a government, and the member for Greenway might want to contemplate this, we have prioritised the education revolution and school education because we inherited a system that was groaning after more than a decade of neglect. That is why we are investing in trades training centres, to give kids an opportunity to get the skills they need for life and work, and the opposition wants to cut that back. That is why we are investing in computers in schools, so kids can learn with the learning tool of the 21st century, and the opposition wants to cut that back. That is why we are investing in teacher quality, to bring the best teachers to the classrooms that need them the most, to pay the best teachers more to go to the classrooms that need them the most, and the opposition wants to cut that back. And it is why, during this difficult economic period when we have needed to support jobs particularly in non-residential construction, as shown by the national accounts today, we have chosen to invest in schools. HK5 Andrews, Kevin, MP Mr Andrews —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. This was a serious question about rorting and wastage in her program, and she should take responsibility. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Menzies will resume his seat. There is no point of order. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —I am a bit amazed to get an interjection from a man whose proud track record in government was making sure people’s pay could get cut—Work Choices written all over him, and I am still trying to get rid of his propaganda. It will come in handy for the Liberal Party in the next campaign, when they will be out there telling working families to take a pay cut, because that is what they believe in. Here is the member for Menzies back—tell us about Work Choices. HK5 Andrews, Kevin, MP Mr Andrews —Mr Speaker, I rise again on a point of order. How can this possibly be relevant? 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The Deputy Prime Minister has the call. She understands the responsibilities she has— PK6 Randall, Don, MP Mr Randall interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Canning is warned. The Deputy Prime Minister is responding to the question. She understands the requirement to relate her remarks to the question. It would assist if the interruptions and interjections ceased, and if ministers ignored those interruptions and interjections. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —On the question of the Building the Education Revolution project that the member for Greenway has raised, can I give this commitment to the member for Greenway, and I will seek one in return: my commitment to her is that I will have this matter referred to the Building the Education Revolution Implementation Task Force for inquiry about value for money questions, and the commitment I seek from her in return is that she be honest with every school and every P&C in her electorate about the cutbacks that will be visited upon them if she is re-elected as the member for Greenway and the Leader of the Opposition is elected as Prime Minister of this country. The people who vote in Greenway are entitled to know the member for Greenway stands for cutbacks to local schools. 4989 4989 15:34:00 Parke, Melissa, MP HWR Fremantle ALP 1 Ms PARKE —My question is directed to the Minister for Finance and Deregulation. Why is economic certainty important for our long-term prosperity? How are government initiatives supporting communities? And are there any risks to these initiatives, particularly in Western Australia? 4989 Tanner, Lindsay, MP YU5 Melbourne ALP Minister for Finance and Deregulation 1 Mr TANNER —I thank the member for Fremantle for her question. Certainty is very important for the future of the Australian economy, particularly with respect to longer term investment that will deliver more jobs and particularly with respect to ensuring that investment can produce higher economic growth in a low-inflation environment. Underneath those issues, there are critical questions of economic capacity that face Australia that the government, when in opposition, pointed to time after time and that the Reserve Bank pointed to time after time when the Howard government was failing to address them. These issues of course are issues of skill shortages and inadequate infrastructure, and therefore central to the Rudd government’s economic strategy has been an obsessive focus on improving Australia’s skills and improving our infrastructure. It is important to note that this is occurring at a number of levels, and one of those levels is through local communities. I want to draw the attention of the House to the impact of the position being taken by the opposition on these issues at a slightly more local level, in this case the electorate of Swan in Western Australia. The coalition proposes to abandon the trades training centres that the government is putting in place in schools all around the country, and that means that St Norbert College would lose $1.4 million for its trades training centre; Belmont City College, sharing with Canning College, would lose $3 million for its trades training centre; and Kent St Senior High School, sharing with Como Secondary College, would lose $3 million for its trades training centre. Schools in the electorate of Swan would also miss out on 710 computers for secondary students. The point about this is that these trades training centres and computers are all about providing school students with the early steps to developing the skills that will serve them and the Australian economy so well in the future. It is about giving people access to opportunity to develop skills at an early age so they can move on into the work force and earn good pay, do good jobs, and contribute high incomes for their families and high economic growth for Australia—and non-inflationary economic growth, because there is economic capacity to absorb higher investment. Now the attitude of the opposition on these things does not just extend to the vandalism of getting rid of these vital trades training centres and computers—critical facilities and 21st century tools for young people to learn skills in our schools. It also extends to improving roads in local communities, roads that are important infrastructure—both economic and social infrastructure. So in the electorate of Swan the Roads to Recovery program is now under threat because of the approach being taken by the shadow finance minister, the fifth shadow finance minister—‘Andrew the Fifth’. As a result of the approach being taken by the shadow finance minister on behalf of the coalition, the City of Belmont will lose $1.25 million; the City of Canning will lose $2.85 million; the City of Gosnells will lose $3.38 million; the City of South Perth, $970,000; the Shire of Kalamunda, $2.28 million; and the Town of Victoria Park, $871,000. All of these investments are about improving Australia’s infrastructure and that means huge projects and it also means local projects. It means our local roads as well as our major freeways and highways, and it means our local schools as well as across-the-nation programs. This is simply economic vandalism by the coalition. It is vandalism of the highest order because these are critical parts of ensuring that the Australian community can enjoy long-term sustainable growth and prosperity for its future by investing now in the things that drive that prosperity: skills and infrastructure—the very things that when in office the coalition failed to invest in and therefore created big inflationary pressures. These are the things that the Rudd government is committed to investing in and these are the things that are critical to Australia, both at the local community level and at the national level. 4990 4990 15:39:00 Pyne, Chris, MP 9V5 Sturt LP 0 Mr PYNE —My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to a letter from the group of concerned builders and parents who gathered outside the parliament today to draw attention to the endemic waste and mismanagement in the school hall stimulus program. In particular I quote: We require you to initiate a judicial inquiry into the spending of all moneys thus far on the BER and withhold the release of the final $5½ billion until an independent audit has been carried out on the remaining projects. I ask the Prime Minister: will he overrule his minister and do what every commonsense Australian knows needs to be done and stop the reckless spending? 4990 Rudd, Kevin, MP 83T Griffith ALP Prime Minister 1 Mr RUDD —I welcome the question from the member for Sturt. The member for Sturt has stood in this place and sought to pretend that they are opposed to investment in the education revolution projects on the ground but out there—right across Australia—has sought to say the opposite. Well, member for Sturt, the truth is out. You cannot have it both ways: standing here in the parliament pretending that you are going to abolish a program, on the one hand, and going out there and saying that you are going to continue with the construction, on the other. EZ5 Abbott, Tony, MP Mr Abbott interjecting— 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —Now the Leader of the Opposition interjects and says they are not going to abolish the program. Well, I would be very interested to hear from the Leader of the Opposition what he will do with this program. What will he do with this program? Honourable members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The Prime Minister has the call. 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —He will pay the money to the schools and cut out the public servants? EZ5 Abbott, Tony, MP Mr Abbott interjecting— 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —What else are you going to do? I heard it was sort of ‘stop the funding, restructure it’ and enable yourself to slip and slide through each of the seats represented by those opposite and have members pretend, on the one hand, that they are not opposed to an investment in their local school and, on the other hand, pretend here that they are in fact doing something exactly the reverse. The member for Sturt twists and turns on this matter. Watch his correspondence and look at his behaviour on the ground as one after another of those opposite have stood up in front of their public schools and said, ‘We welcome this investment.’ Mr Speaker, do you know something: those opposite, if they have any integrity on this question, need to actually list by name, by school in each one of their electorates which project they support and which they oppose, because there are many of these projects underway at present—7,000 of them—and a large number would be in the electorates represented by those opposite. Which will you stop and which will you allow to continue? That is the core question which will be asked in each and every one of your electorates as this year progresses. But I make one further point to the member for Sturt in response to his question. If he bothered, as those opposite may have bothered, to listen to the exposition on the national accounts earlier today or read the reports associated with the national accounts, he would understand one thing: what has stood between Australia and going into recession is this government’s stimulus strategy. What has stood between this country going into recession is this government’s stimulus strategy. What has prevented 200,000 more people going out of work is this government’s stimulus strategy. What has enabled tens of thousands of small businesses to continue to operate is this government’s stimulus strategy. In each and every one of the regions represented in this place there are small business men, chalkies, subcontractors and the rest, all of whom— DK6 Hockey, Joe, MP Mr Hockey —Chalkies? 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —chippies and those who are responsible for the building industry— Opposition members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —You said it about chalkies. And those who are in the classroom want the Building the Education Revolution as well. Those opposite pretend that the stimulus strategy has had no effect on the overall state of the Australian economy. Opposition members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The Prime Minister will resume his seat. The Prime Minister now has the call. He should be listened to in silence. 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. Each and every one of the teacher representatives welcomes these school buildings. Each and every one of the building subcontractors welcomes these school buildings. They welcome new language centres. They welcome new science centres. They welcome also, on top of that, new state-of-the-art learning centres for primary schools. Each and every one of these is welcomed by local communities. But the Leader of the Opposition sits there and guffaws. He sits and guffaws because he knows nothing about economics; he has no interest in economics. He has been described by the previous Treasurer as being unfit to occupy any economic portfolio in the government, most particularly that of Treasurer. His colleagues in the previous cabinet said he could not be described remotely as a fiscal conservative, that he had one attitude to every proposal, which was to run to the office of the former Prime Minister and seek intervention. The Leader of the Opposition knows full well that, had we prosecuted his recipe, which was to implement the New Zealand solution for the Australian economy, this economy would have gone into recession, this economy would have seen the loss of hundreds of thousands of Australian jobs and those opposite know that full well. So the sanctimonious performance by those opposite as they stand here and pretend to be interested in macro-economic questions on debt and deficit and the impact of these investments in their schools is all one paper tissue of untruths and misrepresentations. Those opposite know the truth on the ground. They know that these investments are critical to the future of school communities. TK6 Southcott, Dr Andrew, MP Dr Southcott interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Boothby will leave the chamber under 94(a) for one hour. The member for Boothby then left the chamber. 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr RUDD —This government defends the Building the Education Revolution program. It is the right program for the future and we stand by it 100 per cent. 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —Mr Speaker, I seek leave to table the letter from the Taxpayers Action Group that I referred to. Leave not granted. 4992 4992 15:46:00 D’Ath, Yvette, MP HVN Petrie ALP 1 Mrs D’ATH —My question is to the Minister for Education, Employment and Workplace Relations and Minister for Social Inclusion. Will the Deputy Prime Minister inform the House of the government’s efforts to support trades training and computers in schools, and are there any risks to these programs? 4992 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 very timely and perceptive question. She is a member who is dedicated to her electorate and stands up for her electorate, unlike those opposite. I am sure she and her electorate are very, very glad that her electorate is benefiting from a $1.3 million trades training centre at the Redcliffe State High School—and we had the opportunity to have a look at that—and the benefiting of Clontarf Beach State High School. I am sure she is very pleased too that the students in her electorate are benefiting from 2,136 computers funded under the digital education revolution. I am sure she is very concerned that the Leader of the Opposition wants to prevent 851 computers being delivered to her electorate. It is apparent at this point in question time, and particularly as a result of the conduct of the opposition during the Prime Minister’s last answer, that the Leader of the Opposition is so bored by economics— IYU Briggs, Jamie, MP Mr Briggs interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Mayo will leave the chamber under 94(a) for one hour. The member for Mayo then left the chamber. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —so unable to deal with figures and economics that he seems not to understand that, when he instructed his shadow finance minister to rip money out of education, that meant cutbacks. He is in here rolling his eyes, going, ‘Oh no, no cutbacks; none from me.’ He does not even seem to understand that, when you instruct your shadow finance minister to cut back money from schools, it hurts and it hurts school communities. He does not even seem to get that. The fact that the Leader of the Opposition is so bored by economics—so uninterested in education that he just has not got a view about providing things to schools, having been a member of a government that neglected education for more than a decade—is to be expected. What is harder to explain is the compliant attitude of members of the opposition as their local communities get ripped off. I asked the member for Dunkley whether he would stand up for his electorate. The answer has been no. I asked the member for Bradfield whether he would stand up for his electorate and the answer has been no. 1K6 Billson, Bruce, MP Mr Billson interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Dunkley will resume his seat. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —Let the record show that the member for Menzies obviously thinks the trades training centre in the member for Dunkley’s electorate is a rip-off. We will make sure that every school student and school community member knows that is the view of the member for Menzies. Let us have a look and see if the member for Canning, who is gesturing so wildly, is a man— Opposition members interjecting— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The Deputy Prime Minister has the call. 83L Gillard, Julia, MP Ms GILLARD —I am asked about threats to funding for schools. Let me direct the House’s attention to the threats for funding to schools in the electorate of Canning. That would cause members to inquire: why isn’t the member for Canning standing up for his local schools? Because when we look at the electorate of Canning and the things that are at risk as a result of the Leader of the Opposition’s cutbacks, there is a $4.4 million trades training facility that is at risk. This is a facility that is a consortium between Boddington District High School, Armadale Christian college and others. Can I say to the House, because it is a convenient opportunity: the member for Sturt and the opposition consistently misrepresent the trades training centre program, pretending somehow that schools choosing to come together indicates there is a cutback in the program. Of course, that is completely untrue, completely phoney. This is a program running out exactly as promised. School principals, including those in the electorate of the member for Canning, have chosen to come together to get a bigger facility, to make a bigger difference to the kids—real skills for real jobs; $4.4 million—and the member for Canning will not stand up as the Leader of the Opposition rips that out of his electorate. At the next election voters in the electorate of Canning will have a choice to get a member who will stand up for their electorate. On the question of choice, there will also be a choice in the electorate of Sturt, because obviously the member for Sturt does not want his schools to benefit from the more than $93 million that they have had under Building the Education Revolution. I have been to the electorate of Sturt and to a local school there. Let me tell you: the member for Sturt is not there saying, ‘I voted against this project.’ The member for Sturt is not there saying, ‘I consider all of this to be a waste.’ The member for Sturt is not repeating his grabs on radio that this is about flushing money out the door to schools. That is not what he says there locally, of course. When he is there locally he does not criticise this funding to schools—$93 million in Building the Education Revolution money. But the member for Sturt will also be called to account by his local electorate as to why he supports the Leader of the Opposition’s cuts to computers in schools. That means he is a shadow minister for education and a local member who wants to rip 112 computers away from Charles Campbell Secondary School. He wants to rip 143 computers away from Norwood Morialta High School. He wants to rip 69 computers away from St Ignatius College. This is what is under threat because of the Leader of the Opposition and the policies of the shadow minister for education and member for Sturt. Let us be absolutely clear: on this side of the House, we believe that schools are important; on this side of the House, we are proud to be delivering Building the Education Revolution, trade trading centres, the digital education revolution and money for teacher quality. The hunt on the other side of the House for a member prepared to stand up for their electorate will continue. We have not found one yet. 83T Rudd, Kevin, MP Mr Rudd —Mr Speaker, I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper. 4994 Miscellaneous 4994 15:53:00 Smith, Stephen, MP 5V5 Perth ALP Minister for Foreign Affairs 1 0 Mr STEPHEN SMITH —Mr Speaker, on indulgence: I draw the attention of members to developments in Japan today. Prime Minster Hatoyama has announced his intention to stand down as Prime Minister. This follows the departure from his ruling coalition of the Social Democratic Party over the Futenma base issue. I make these very brief remarks to the House because Prime Minister Hatoyama has been a good friend of Australia both during his period as Prime Minister, where we have seen the strategic and security aspects of our partnership deepen, and before becoming Prime Minister. He would be known to members of the House, including your good self, Mr Speaker. I recently had the good fortune to meet, together with Defence Minister Faulkner, with the Prime Minister in Tokyo following the two plus two defence and foreign affairs meeting between Australia and Japan. He again referred to the importance of the Australia-Japan relationship and underlined its comprehensive nature, and we wish him well for the future. I am advised that the Democratic Party of Japan, Prime Minister Hatoyama’s party, will elect a new prime minister and leader in the next few days. We very much look forward to working closely with the new prime minister. In conclusion, the relationship—the comprehensive economic, strategic and security partnership—that Australia has with Japan is one of those relationships in which, irrespective of which political party is governing in Canberra and which political party is governing in Tokyo, the strength and importance of the relationship continues. 4994 15:55:00 Bishop, Julie, MP 83P Curtin LP Deputy Leader of the Opposition 0 0 Ms JULIE BISHOP —Mr Speaker, on indulgence: Japan is one of our longest-standing friends. We have many matters of mutual interest and shared values. We have longstanding trade, diplomatic and security ties. Japan was governed by one political party for about 50 years, yet it remains a vibrant democracy. Political history was made last August when the Liberal Democratic Party was defeated by the Democratic Party of Japan led by Mr Hatoyama. Soon after the election, I took the opportunity to visit Tokyo and met with ministers and government officials. They recognised the enormous challenge that the government would face being a new party in government after 50 years and were mindful of the difficulty in implementing a number of their election promises. It is always a difficult time for a country when the national leader resigns. Mr Hatoyama is clearly a man of enormous integrity. He has accepted full responsibility for his inability to honour an election promise that he made to the people of Japan regarding the US military bases in Okinawa. While he has resigned as the Prime Minister of Japan, Mr Hatoyama’s legacy will be one both of enormous achievement in winning the election for his party in 2009 and also of his dignity and integrity over this issue. 4995 Questions to the Speaker 4995 4995 15:57:00 Dutton, Peter, MP 00AKI Dickson LP 0 Mr DUTTON —Mr Speaker, I refer you to standing order 150(b) and ask that you write to the Minister for Health and Ageing to seek reasons for her delay in responding to question No. 1281 on the Notice Paper regarding GP superclinics. 4995 SPEAKER, The 10000 PO N/A 1 The SPEAKER —I will do as required under the standing orders. I thank the member for Dickson. 4995 Personal Explanations 4995 15:57:00 Tuckey, Wilson, MP SJ4 O’Connor LP 0 0 Mr TUCKEY —Mr Speaker, I wish to make a personal explanation. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Does the honourable member claim to have been misrepresented? SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr TUCKEY —Yes. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Please proceed. SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr TUCKEY —Today, the Minister for Health and Ageing made allegations in this place that I would oppose Australian government funding for a number of hospitals in my electorate. The hospitals she referred to have been announced as funded in the state budget with funds hypothecated from available Western Australian mining royalties which the minister means to appropriate along with Western Australia’s— 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for O’Connor will resume his seat. 4995 15:58:00 Pyne, Chris, MP 9V5 Sturt LP 0 0 Mr PYNE —Mr Speaker, I wish to make a personal explanation. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Does the honourable member claim to have been misrepresented? 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr PYNE —I do. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Please proceed. 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr PYNE —In question time, the Prime Minister claimed that the coalition’s policy as represented by the member for Sturt—me—was that we would cancel the school halls stimulus program. That is not our policy. Our policy is to pay the money directly to the government schools so that they can manage the projects themselves and achieve value for money in exactly the same way as the non-government sector has done. Further, in question time today, the Minister for Education claimed that I wanted to rip the computers out of the Norwood Morialta High School. I point out to her that there are no laptops in operation at the Norwood Morialta High School because there is no infrastructure to make them work. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —Order! The member for Sturt will resume his seat. 4995 Privilege 4995 15:59:00 Johnson, Michael, MP 00AMX Ryan IND 0 0 Mr JOHNSON —on indulgence—Thank you, Mr Speaker. Earlier this week, on Monday, 31 May, the Leader of the House raised a matter of privilege. I wish to expand on the Leader of the House’s remarks. I wish to confirm that the Leader of the House and I had a discussion earlier that morning prior to his raising the matter of privilege. I wish to confirm that, in his role as Leader of the House, it was appropriate for Mr Albanese to raise the matter of privilege. After receiving further advice, it is also entirely appropriate and necessary for me personally to substantiate the basis of the Leader of the House’s initial remarks on Monday, 31 May 2010. It is entirely appropriate for several compelling reasons, but, fundamentally, the attempt to pressure, bully, threaten, intimidate or exert improper influence upon any federal member of parliament or federal senator to resign from the Australian parliament against the wishes of that federal member or senator is, in my view, an extremely serious act. It is an act of political corruption upon the integrity of our democracy. This culture of bullying and intimidation must have no place in any political party. This culture of harassment and pressure must be stamped out of the Australian body politic. Individuals in political parties must not be laws unto themselves, as is evidently the case, in my view, in the highest echelons of the Liberal National Party in Queensland. I wish to read into the record a letter I wrote to the Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police, Mr Tony Negus, prior to my expulsion from the LNP: Dear Commissioner Negus, …            …            … I am writing to raise a very grave and serious issue concerning whether or not certain conduct by Mr Bruce McIver, President of the Liberal National Party (LNP) in Queensland, might constitute improper influence—if not illegal pressure and breach of Federal criminal legislation—upon a Member of the Australian Parliament. On the morning of Thursday, 25 th February, 2010, Mr Bruce McIver, President of the Liberal National Party (LNP) in Queensland, and I had a meeting in my Canberra Parliamentary office. Mr Brian Loughnane, the Federal Director of the Liberal Party, was also present during the entire meeting. During that meeting, Mr McIver expressed certain language towards me that I personally took to be extremely intimidating and of an entirely improper character. During this meeting, Mr McIver called upon me in no uncertain terms to resign from the Federal Parliament at the next election otherwise, he informed me, he would present certain material in his possession to the police. During this meeting, Mr McIver produced a large “black folder” which he alleged contained material and documents that was evidence of alleged criminal behaviour on my part and could see me “go to jail” if he personally instructed the LNP to conduct further investigation into me. Immediately after the meeting, I informed one of my staff members who was in the adjacent room of the tenor, tone and content of the meeting. Subsequent to this meeting, a second meeting was held in my Canberra Parliamentary office on Thursday 11 th March, 2010, Again, both Mr Bruce McIver and Mr Brian Loughnane were present. During this meeting, a Canberra based lawyer from the national law firm, DLA Phillips Fox, was also present at my request, as well as an actual member of my staff. It was at this meeting that Mr McIver produced an email off my Parliamentary account for me to read. 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr Pyne —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I do not wish to interrupt my colleague the member for Ryan, but this is a very unprecedented use of indulgence and I am concerned that the information that he is providing to the House is information that he should be giving as evidence to a Privileges Committee inquiry, not placing on the record at the end of question time. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —The member for Ryan was adding to the submission that had been put to me by the Leader of the House as to the reasons that I should investigate certain circumstances to determine if I would indicate to the House that there was a prima facie case for it to be referred to the Standing Committee of Privileges and Members’ Interests. That is the point that we were at. The member for Ryan is reading into the record a letter. It would have been usual for that letter to have been tabled by him to form part of the material that I would consider to ascertain whether, in my report back to the House, there was a prima facie case. The difficulty is that I have allowed him to start reading it into the record. I have to admit that this letter was referred to me by the member for Ryan and I did not recall how long it was—it is a lot longer than I recall. I will allow him to complete reading the letter into the record, but if he has other material I would advise him to table it and not read it into the record. That is the only aspect of this that is a bit out of the ordinary, because we are only at the stage of my consideration of a report to the House about whether it should be referred to the Privileges Committee. I call the member for Ryan in conclusion. 00AMX Johnson, Michael, MP Mr JOHNSON —Thank you, Mr Speaker. The letter continued: He indicated to me that this was evidence of why his demand for me to resign from Parliament was justified. The means by which Mr McIver came to be in possession of this email has never been explained by Mr McIver, either to myself or to my lawyers. There is absolutely no doubt at all in my mind that Mr McIver’s language and his conduct at both meetings was designed to bring enormous pressure upon me to resign my Federal seat of Ryan from the Australian Parliament—directly and specifically against my wishes. The crystal clear and indelible impression was left in my mind—due to his words and his conduct—that unless I agreed to resign my Federal seat of Ryan, there would be severe political and legal consequences for me personally. The intent to force me to resign—against my wishes—was clear, deliberate, unambiguous and unequivocal. In the hours, days and weeks that followed, I have written extensively to various stakeholders (party political, parliamentary, and private) confirming the two meetings and in my view, the highly improper threats that followed at each meeting. As you will appreciate the profound sensitivity of this matter, it is not appropriate for me to expand in depth in this letter. However, in my capacity as a sitting member of the Australian Parliament, I am formally calling on the Australian Federal Police to commence an investigation, including interviews with all relevant parties, and to consider whether a substantive investigation into whether or not Mr Mclver’s conduct was improper at law and breached any Federal legislation. I would, of course, be willing and able to provide further information to trigger such investigation. The improper influence by any individual person upon a Member or Senator of the Australian Parliament is a most serious occurrence. To that end, I would of course personally be willing and able to co-operate with the Australian Federal Police. I would also be willing and able to be interviewed at length and to present more detailed information and material to a relevant Australian Federal Police Officer who might be assigned to this case. I am certainly of the view that a meeting between a Federal Police Officer and myself is entirely appropriate and an urgent meeting would be prudent. Thank you for your time Commissioner and I look forward to hearing from you at your earliest convenience. Yours sincerely Mr Michael A.. Johnson MP Federal Member for Ryan Mr Speaker, I end my remarks by again supporting very strongly the remarks of and the call for privilege as it was raised by the Leader of the House, and I do so again in my own name. I seek leave to table the document. Leave granted. 10000 SPEAKER, The The SPEAKER —As I indicated, I will report back to the House at the earliest opportunity. 4997 Ministerial Statements 4997 4997 16:09:00 Bowen, Chris, MP DZS Prospect ALP Minister for Financial Services, Superannuation and Corporate Law and Minister for Human Services 1 0 Mr BOWEN —Almost a year ago to the day, I outlined to this chamber the government’s progress on advancing Australia as a financial services centre. The Financial Services Hub Summit convened by the Prime Minister and me in July 2008 recommended regular updates to the House on progress in promoting Australia as a financials services centre, and I am very pleased to provide this update. Our financial services industry is one of the most sophisticated and stable in the world. Financial services is Australia’s largest industry, contributing 10.8 per cent to growth and employing 400,000 Australians. We continue to come across new opportunities for job creation and examples of resilience in the sector. In fact just this week, ING officially opened a new superannuation and investments operations centre in Wollongong. The centre will support an additional 250 jobs over the next three years—bringing the centre’s workforce to 600 in the Illawarra. The ING centre will predominantly focus on operational administration and call centre roles. Other roles to be recruited could include IT development and project related roles. The centre’s 4½ star green rated building cost $41 million, took two years to build and employed 1,100 workers during construction. I mention this as an example of the types of benefits that flow from our ambition to promote Australian as a financial services centre. Beyond these more immediate contributions to the economy and employment, a well-functioning financial system is vital for broader economic prosperity and in addressing future challenges including the need to grow and manage our retirement savings as our population ages. Australia has always had a lot to offer in terms of its quality of life, the integrity of its corporate governance system and the quality of its workforce. The financial crisis has also highlighted the strengths of our financial sector and of our regulatory framework. This government has long recognised that the Australian financial services sector has a great deal of untapped potential. Our exports and imports of financial services are low by international standards. For example, while Australian based investment managers manage $1.1 trillion of assets on behalf of domestic investors, they source only about $53 billion from overseas sources. Remedying this situation requires a government that is willing to make a commitment to sensible ongoing reform. On 26 September 2008, the government announced the establishment of the Australian Financial Centre Forum to recommend ways we can position Australia as a leading financial services centre. The forum consisted of a diverse and highly experienced panel of industry experts headed by Mark Johnson AO, a retired deputy chairman of Macquarie Bank, and supported industry reference groups and a dedicated secretariat. The forum engaged with a broad range of stakeholders including regulators, professional service groups, education providers, union representatives and international and domestic financial services companies. On 11 May, as part of the 2010 budget, the government announced its response to the recommendations in the Australian Financial Centre Forum report (the Johnson report). Our response provides in-principle or direct support for nearly all of the 19 recommendations in the report. These include: the introduction of an investment manager regime, providing greater certainty around the tax treatment of foreign funds managed by Australian investment managers; the establishment of an online regulatory gateway, providing domestic and international investors with a one-stop shop for basic information about the Australian market; and the development of an Asia region funds passport, which would involve a multilateral framework to enable a complying retail investment fund in a country that signs up to the passport framework to offer its products in each of the other signatory countries. We have already made progress on the recommendations in the report, in addition to introducing other initiatives to enhance our international competitiveness. For example, on 31 March, I announced support for competition between markets for trading in listed shares in Australia and in principle approval of the market licence application of Chi-X Australia. This announcement is in line with a Johnson report recommendation, which encouraged competitive, efficient and innovative equity markets, and is a vital step in the development of Australia as a financial services centre. The government also announced the release by ASIC of class order relief allowing listed entities which meet ASIC’s criteria to issue bonds to retail investors using a simplified process. This initiative will help to further develop our retail bond market, and is in line with a key recommendation of the Johnson report. As the Johnson report notes, Australia’s equity market is well developed and significant on a global scale—being seventh largest globally and the second largest in the region behind Japan. However, our debt market is relatively small. A deeper and more liquid Australian corporate bond market will make it easier for Australian businesses to diversify their funding sources as an alternative to borrowing from the bank. Over time, this is expected to put competitive pressure on bank lending rates to business, and also reduce the amount of wholesale funding which our banks are required to raise in international capital markets. We also announced the decision to phase down the interest withholding tax paid by financial institutions, including local subsidiaries and branches when they pay interest on borrowings from their overseas parents. This reform also extends to Australian-owned financial institutions borrowing from related parties overseas and any financial institution accessing offshore retail deposits, which they on-lend to Australian business and consumers. These changes will provide an extra boost to banking competition, as well as promoting Australia as a financial services centre, and represents action on another Johnson recommendation. To ensure we continue to make progress, the government has appointed an ongoing Financial Centre Task Force. The task force will comprise Mr Mark Johnson AO as Chair, Mr Paul Binsted, Ms Jo-Anne Bloch, Mr Alf Capito, Mr Phil Chronican, Mr Jeremy Duffield, Mr Craig Dunn, Mr Shane Finemore and Mr Paul Schroder. The task force will continue its work in promoting Australia as a financial centre for the region and facilitate industry input into the design of a range of proposals, including the Asia region funds management passport and the investment manager regime. Response to the reforms The government’s response to the Johnson report united a wide range of stakeholders in their praise for the reforms. On 13 May 2010, the Australian Bankers Association said the following: This demonstrates the Government’s continuing commitment to enhancing Australia as a financial services centre—the Government’s response is a first good step to addressing some of the market and regulatory barriers to building Australia as a regional leader in financial services. On 26 May 2010 the Finance Sector Union noted: The Federal Government’s plan to position Australia as a major financial services hub is widely supported by finance sector workers, and the Johnson Report recommendations should be adopted to ensure growth in the industry, and flow-on benefits to the economy. Unfortunately for current and prospective workers in our financial services sector, the coalition has abandoned Australia’s strategy of becoming a major financial services hub. In a speech to the Financial Planning Association in March, the shadow minister for financial services, the Member for Cowper, declared that the government should be ‘taking the Johnson Report more seriously, because it contains some innovative measures to encourage international financial trading in Australia’. Just two months later, the coalition announced its opposition to the government’s proposed reduction in interest withholding tax, which is consistent with a key recommendation from the Johnson report on Australia as a financial services centre. So dismayed were the Australian Bankers Association that bipartisan support for a sensible plan for growing Australia’s financial services sector was being abandoned, they issued a press release declaring: The banking sector expects the Australian Government to take a strategic and coordinated approach towards further developing Australia as an international Financial Services Centre. These tax changes were a good first step in that direction, and that’s why opposing the changes is short-sighted. It is disappointing that the coalition has so little to say about the future of the financial services industry that their May 2010 policy manifesto devoted more space to past policy announcements than their future plans for ensuring Australia becomes a more significant financial centre. For a long time, the previous government had a slogan of promoting Australia as a financial services centre, but they backed this up with little policy action. Unfortunately, recent events show they are still strong on rhetoric but very light on action. Centre for International Finance and Regulation But the government is committed to real action to promote Australia as a financial services centre even if the coalition is not. As part of the 2010 budget, I was also pleased to jointly announce with the Prime Minister a further measure which is consistent with these aims—the establishment of a Centre for International Finance and Regulation in Australia. The government will provide funding of up to $25 million for the centre over the next four years. As a regional centre for excellence in financial system regulation and innovation, the centre will provide tertiary education and training for financial regulators from Australia and the Asia-Pacific. It will also undertake research into innovation in the financial sector, and best practice financial regulation. One of the key themes underlying the work of the centre will be to address ways to foster financial sector innovation, while ensuring the risk inherent in the financial system is appropriately managed through best practice regulation. The centre’s work will inform government, regulators and financial industry practitioners in Australia and the region. It will contribute to regional financial system stability by developing and supporting students, academics and researchers from the Asia-Pacific region and by building regional capacity. The establishment of the Centre for International Finance and Regulation will complement the government’s response to the Johnson report and will help to advance regional engagement. A university or consortium of universities will be selected by tender to host the centre. This selection is expected to take place by the end of this year. Policy reform The government is committed to promoting Australia as a financial services centre, not as a noble ideal but because of the many benefits it would bring to our nation. I am very pleased with the fact that each one of the Rudd government’s three budgets has included measures to promote Australia as a financial services centre. Our first budget included cuts in the withholding tax for distributions from Australian managed funds to offshore investors—a significant reform, long called for by the financial services industry. As a result of gradual reductions in our withholding tax rate from 1 July this year, Australia will have one of the lowest rates in the world. Last year’s budget included the abolition of the Foreign Investment Fund provisions, again a very significant reform that will make a contribution to Australian being a financial services centre. And of course this year’s budget contained the measures I have already outlined. Superannuation and financial advice reforms The primary motivator of our superannuation policy is—and must always be—a comfortable retirement income for Australians. This has not, of course, meant that improved retirement incomes for Australians have been the only benefit of our superannuation system. The skills that Australia has built in terms of wealth management as a result of our superannuation system are, in my view, the single most important factor in our competitiveness as a financial services centre. And the sheer size of our retirement savings pool means that Australia is regarded as a serious player in the world’s wealth management sector. Australia’s superannuation pool was projected to grow to $5.3 trillion by 2035. The superannuation reforms we announced on 2 May will add another half a trillion dollars to that amount. Growing our pool of funds under management can only have positive implications—very positive implications—for our ambition to be a significant financial centre. These reforms, together with the Future of Financial Advice reforms are vital to the development of Australia as a financial services centre. In relation to the reforms to financial planning, I would argue very simply that it would be impossible to ask those in other countries to place their trust and confidence in our financial planning industry if Australians do not. This point was made very clearly by the Johnson committee, which observed that the realisation of opportunities to attract overseas capital to Australia is ‘dependent on, amongst other things, the reputation and integrity of Australia’s financial advisory sector being maintained and, where necessary, improved’. To this end, the report argued that resolving conflicts of interest in the financial planning industry is ‘consistent with ensuring that the reputation of Australia’s financial sector, in particular funds management and financial planning, is maintained overseas, a prerequisite for greater international engagement’. Sadly, and almost inexplicably, this government’s reforms to financial planning are being opposed by the opposition, as are our improvements to superannuation. Beneficiaries of the reforms Increased trade in financial services will increase Australia’s growth prospects and standard of living. Through improved economies of scale, this would reduce the costs of financial products for Australian consumers and businesses. And by encouraging competition and efficiency, it would improve the range and choice of financial products available to consumers and promote increased exports of financial services. Positioning Australia as a financial services centre in the region would also mean that we would be able to increase job opportunities for a range of skilled workers in the financial sector. This is one area where the government sees so much scope for improvement. The opportunities for leveraging our financial services skills and expertise in the region and beyond are potentially enormous. With these decisions and reforms well advanced, I do not want anybody to be under the impression that we feel we have done all there is to do—that there is not more to be done. Reform to promote Australia as a financial services hub is an ever-receding finishing line. As we reform, so will other nations. And we will need to respond. Australia’s advantages, along with this government’s ongoing commitment to sensible reforms, will lay the foundation for the next wave of jobs and growth in the industry and for greater competition and choice for Australian consumers and businesses. I ask leave of the House to move a motion to enable the member for Cowper to speak for 15 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 in reply to the ministerial statement for a period not exceeding 15 minutes. Question agreed to. 5002 16:24:00 Hartsuyker, Luke, MP 00AMM Cowper NATS 0 0 Mr HARTSUYKER —I welcome the opportunity to respond to the statement of the Minister for Financial Services, Superannuation and Corporate Law relating to Australia as a financial services centre. The coalition welcomes this debate and we support responsible efforts to build Australia’s standing as a global financial centre. However, we disagree with the government’s broad approach on spending and taxation priorities and we are greatly concerned about how this approach is hurting Australia’s standing as a financial centre here and now. It was the coalition which started the process of dedicating significant government resources to establishing Australia as a financial centre, with a particular focus on Asia. The current shadow Treasurer, the member for North Sydney, had the honour of becoming Australia’s first Minister for Financial Services and Regulation in 1998 and it was the member for North Sydney who launched the coalition’s economic principles on 19 May—just two weeks ago. In that document the coalition detailed how we remain committed to boosting Australia’s attractiveness as an international financial centre and expanding our exports of financial services. We welcomed the Johnson report and urged the government to respond to its recommendations, which the government has now done. The Johnson report states that its recommendations build on the work of the previous government, which made some significant regulatory and taxation reforms to expand Australia’s standing as a financial centre. Firstly, as I have mentioned, the coalition appointed Australia’s first minister for financial services in 1998, providing a dedicated advocate and voice for the financial services industry in the Howard government ministry. Through disciplined fiscal management and commitment to placing the budget in surplus, the coalition in government was able to abolish a range of inefficient financial services taxes, including financial institutions duty and stamp duty on marketable securities and the interest withholding tax on Australian sourced interest paid to offshore investors. These reforms saved investors billions of dollars in taxes and compliance costs. The coalition also overhauled Australia’s treatment of offshore banking units, an area discussed in the Johnson report. For the first time, fund managers, life insurance companies and custodians were given full tax treatment under the offshore banking units regime, whereas the previous arrangement only allowed banks and authorised foreign exchange dealers to benefit from the concessional 10 per cent tax rate. The coalition is proud to have launched the Centre for Global Financial Services, which was formerly named Axiss Australia, in June 2000. Axiss had a charter to enhance Australia’s position as a provider of global financial services. In particular, it created the role of Australia’s global financial services ambassador and used this position to highlight Australia’s credentials as a centre for global financial services in the Asia-Pacific time zone. Of course, the current Australian Financial Centre Forum, responsible for the Johnson report, grew out of the coalition’s efforts to implement a dedicated government body to expand Australia’s standing as a financial services hub in the region. The coalition is proud of what we achieved in extending Australia as a financial services centre, and we are proud of our successes. Between 2003 and 2007, Australian investment in foreign stock grew from $998 billion to $1.724 trillion, an increase of 72 per cent. The number of people employed in the financial services industry increased by over 100,000 workers between November 2000 and November 2007 to over 410,000 employees. This growth has gone backwards under the Rudd government, with employment falling by about 10,000 workers to June 2009. Overseas investors and institutions had faith in the coalition’s ability to provide a stable and progressive investment environment. The coalition has this ability to provide this environment, because we believe in four foundations for expanding Australia’s position as an attractive investment base, which I will outline. Firstly, the coalition believes in the quality of Australia’s financial markets. Australia possesses transparent and liquid financial markets which encourage investment from abroad. Secondly, the coalition believes in the governance structures we implemented in the Wallis reforms to provide stability and resilience against global turmoil. These reforms by the coalition made us the envy of the developed world in the area of financial services. This government is ruining our position—and I will get to that shortly. Thirdly, our personnel are a huge advantage for Australia’s financial services industry. We have the population, the language skill and a high level of education—all  attractive to global market operators. Finally, Australia has the infrastructure—modern communications and IT systems, as well as legal and accounting systems—to provide efficient market services. These foundations are why the coalition believes Australia is well placed to expand its financial services industry on a global scale. The Johnson report was only made possible because of the coalition’s reforms to financial services. And, as I have said previously, the coalition is broadly supportive of those parts of the government’s response to the Johnson report which have not been linked to Labor’s great big new tax on mining. I think the government and the minister need to ask themselves why the coalition in government could achieve responsible measures to expand Australia’s financial services industry. The answer goes toward the different approaches of the current Labor government and the coalition. The coalition is committed to building Australia’s attractiveness as an international financial centre. We can achieve this responsibly because, unlike the Rudd government, we are committed to budget surpluses and spending restraint. Now let us look at the government approach. The Rudd Labor government inherited a $20 billion surplus from the coalition and no net debt—and it blew it all. Within less than two years, we had spending on overpriced school halls and pink batts. We spent money putting pink batts in and we spent money taking pink batts out. The government is out there borrowing $100 million a day to continue buying fraudulently derived school building projects and to pay for blowouts in poorly managed programs. They are out there competing in the debt markets with small business and financial institutions, pushing up inflation and pushing up interest rates. Today I had the pleasure to attend a presentation from the Tottenham Primary School in front of Parliament House. I saw the minister could not be bothered turning up. She would not show her face. We saw a presentation from Tottenham Primary School and we saw a replica of a canteen which cost the taxpayers $600,000, which should have been built for less than 10 per cent of the cost. There are many more examples of overpriced school halls in my own electorate of Cowper, which I have detailed on previous occasions. This incredible waste and mismanagement is why businesses are crowded out of debt markets and why the cost-of-living pressures are increasing as a result of interest rates and inflationary pressures. But the minister who presided over the spectacular failures of GroceryWatch and Fuelwatch knows all about waste and mismanagement. And that is the key to this issue. The government has wasted so much taxpayer money that it needs to find extra taxes to fund its policy agenda. The Rudd Labor government does not have the courage or the commitment to make the tough decisions and get the budget back into surplus, so it taxes and taxes and taxes and promises and promises to cover the cost of its waste. So whilst the coalition support some of what the government is trying to achieve with regard to financial services, we certainly oppose their approach. We oppose their unfair new taxes. In particular, we oppose taxes which threaten Australia’s standing as an international investment option. We oppose new taxes which are going to increase the sovereign risk of this nation. How can this minister and this Labor government be serious about relieving the tax burdens on financial services when they are massively increasing taxes on the biggest industry that those financial services rely on? Labor’s great big new tax on mining is actively destroying Australia’s reputation as a strong and stable country in which to invest. The $90 billion, approximately, that has been lost in share value since this tax was first mooted is an indication of the very low confidence that global financial institutions now have in this government. Why would international investors have continued confidence in the future of Australia as an investment centre, when our biggest investors are claiming this government has now dramatically increased the sovereign risk profile of Australia? Here is what CEO of Rio Tinto, Mr Tom Albanese, said on Lateline on Wednesday: It’s as if they’re— that is, the government— coming to us saying we want to be your 40 per cent partner, ignore the fact you’ve taken all the risks, ignore the fact you’ve taken all the lumps we want 40 per cent of your pre-tax profits. That’s sovereign risk and that’s why … it’s the number one priority on my plate, globally, around sovereign risks. Now, the government like to claim that comments such as these are just talking down Australian investments. But it is the Prime Minister who wanted a fight on the tax and the government who are eliciting these comments. It was Prime Minister Rudd and the gang of four who wanted a fight with the mining companies because they thought the tax would be popular. And it is the government—not the miners, not the opposition—who are damaging Australia’s reputation as an investment destination. Let us consider what those investors actually operating in international markets think about the government’s approach to taxation and economic reform. International law firm Freehills is issuing the following advice with relation to its international investors: Project proponents benchmark their developments by a variety of factors including sovereign risk and internal rate of return. Inevitably Australian projects will be re-ranked as a result of the imposition of RSPT.  Citigroup analyst Paul Brennan says that his discussions with investors in Singapore and Britain make it clear that there was considered to be greater political risk in investing in the Australian market. The Commonwealth Bank research provided to investors says: … increased sovereign risk is an issue not just for the resource sector but for the entire private sector in Australia. PricewaterhouseCoopers says that there is a risk the government’s new mining tax will see investment dollars flow to resource rich countries such as Africa, South America and Canada. No wonder the Canadian government are actively advertising their resource sector in contrast to Australia, telling investors that Prime Minister Rudd’s tax gives Canada a competitive advantage. The Johnson report states: Our well educated and mobile workforce, along with our political stability … have encouraged some multinational financial services companies to set up businesses in Australia. Well, what has the government done to Australia’s political stability? It is telling the world not to invest here because the government will tax investments in one of our best performing industries at the highest effective tax rate in the world. That is one way to foster international investment! That is one way to attract international capital! This was confirmed yesterday by KPMG, which released a report and said that the government had caused a ‘lack of certainty in the debt market’ and that this means miners ‘will not be able to price in meaningful reductions in the cost of debt, and access to debt will be challenging.’ So international financial institutions will find it challenging to invest in Australia’s resource sector, and surely this will flow to every sector. But the government are happy to mislead the public and distort the facts on the impact of that great big new tax on mining on Australia’s financial services sector. The Labor government was happy to mislead the sector by providing statistics, from a student paper from good old North Carolina, that the mining industry was only paying 17 per cent tax— SE4 Bishop, Bronwyn, MP Mrs Bronwyn Bishop interjecting— 00AMM Hartsuyker, Luke, MP Mr HARTSUYKER —Even though it didn’t include profits, it did include a couple of Australian companies, but it mixed in New Zealand as well, just for a bit of added confusion. The statistics from the KPMG report prove that this government have been misleading the public and prove that they simply cannot be trusted to follow through on their proposals in response to the Johnson report. The KPMG report shows that the effective tax rate on iron ore producers is currently 43.6 per cent, for coal it is 41.1 per cent and for nickel it is 34.3 per cent. Yet we have the Treasurer running around with his pie charts, of uncertain accuracy. This government are working on destroying industry and destroying mining, which will effectively have tax rates of up around 55 per cent. How could this possibly help Australia’s standing as a financial services centre? How could this possibly help our standing as an international destination for investment capital? The KPMG report figures are not figures taken out of some sort of student’s report from North Carolina. These are figures from a very reputable Australian organisation that knows Australia—not a report that revolves around four companies and is focused not only on Australia but on Australia and New Zealand. It seems absolutely outrageous that this minister can come here and claim credentials in relation to making Australia a centre for international financial services. It seems absolutely incredible coming from a government that is deterring international capital, that is driving away investment opportunities, that is working on reducing the level of employment and investment in the mining sector—a vitally important sector, the sector that got us through the recession, as opposed to the government’s claim that some overpriced school halls got us through the recession. This is an absolute outrage. It is an embarrassment to the government that the minister would attempt to parade his credentials in relation to a quality-of-investment destination, when the government is working exactly to the reverse effect. 5006 Matters of Public Importance 5006 10000 Bevis, Arch (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. AR Bevis)—Mr Speaker has received letters from the honourable member for Kennedy and the honourable member for Sturt proposing that definite matters of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion today. As required by standing order 46(d) Mr Speaker has selected the matter which, in his opinion, is the most urgent and important; that is, that proposed by the honourable member for member for Sturt, namely: The urgent need for the government to effectively manage the Primary Schools for the 21st Century Programme. 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— 5006 16:40:00 Pyne, Chris, MP 9V5 Sturt LP 0 0 Mr PYNE —The school hall stimulus program, otherwise known as the Julia Gillard Memorial School Halls Program, or the school halls rip-off program, is a tale of rorting, rip-offs, duckshoving, substitution by state governments, blow-outs, over-inflated costings, deception, disappointment and the misleading of parliament and of the people. But, ultimately, it is a failure of responsibility by the minister to do her job. There is no untruth that the minister will not tell to avoid taking responsibility for her failure. SE4 Bishop, Bronwyn, MP Mrs Bronwyn Bishop —The queen of failure! 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr PYNE —As the member for Mackellar has said, she is the queen of waste and the queen of deception. Let us take the $1.7 billion blow-out in the school hall stimulus program as the first example. The minister tried to blame the department of finance for making a mess of the costings. She misled the parliament and the people on 10 September and 6 May when she said, on 10 September, that more money was ‘going into this program because it is going gangbusters, because more schools want to be in this program’. She said: Our Finance Department produced a costing of 90 per cent, assuming that the uptake by schools would be 90 per cent. But the truth, of course, was put on full display in the Auditor-General’s report a few weeks ago, when the Auditor-General reported: Ultimately, the need for the additional funding provided by the Government in August 2009 arose from most schools having sought the maximum payments available. It did not flow from any deficiencies identified in the procurement processes or other activities of Education Authorities in delivering the program But, more importantly—and this is the key quote: … nor was it the result of more schools seeking to participate than had originally been forecast. So the Minister for Education in September last year said: More money is going into this program because it is going gangbusters, because more schools want to be in this program. But, in fact the Auditor-General put the lie to that statement to this parliament by specifically reporting that there was no truth to the suggestion that there was a $1.7 billion blow-out because of more schools taking up the program. But instead of taking responsibility for her failure, for her inbuilt blow-out, which she knew from the beginning was going to be a blow-out of $1.7 billion in magnitude, she attempted to blame the department of finance—because this minister can never be wrong. She always has to duckshove responsibility to someone else—it’s the principals’ fault, or it’s the P&C’s fault, or it’s the state government’s fault, or it’s the department of finance’s fault. No wonder the minister for finance briefed Glenn Milne’s column of last Monday, outlining in stark relief for everyone to see how it was the Minister for Education’s fault and her mistake and that she had misled parliament. I can tell the House that for certain, because I know that Glenn Milne did not even contact me about that column—he only needed to speak to Lindsay Tanner, the Minister for Finance and Deregulation, to get all the information he needed to be able to lay it out for all to see that this minister was more than prepared to mislead the parliament rather than take responsibility herself for her failure. Let us take a look at the evidence that has stacked up against this government’s claims about the school halls stimulus rip-off. Tottenham Central School, in the member for Parkes’ electorate, just today came to Canberra because they are so angry and so outraged that their cubbyhouse canteen cost $600,000—that much for a canteen that they cannot even fit a fridge into, a pie warmer into or an oven into; a canteen that has not even got a preparation area. That is according to Rick Bennett, the P&C chairman, who attended the rally—as did the member for Cowper, who is quite rightly also outraged by the waste and mismanagement. They have not even got a preparation area in their cubbyhouse canteen; they have to use the counter to prepare the sandwiches for the kids at their school because they have wasted $600,000 on a canteen that is not up to being used for the purpose that it was built for. What really makes the parents, friends and principals in government schools angry is that they know that if they went down the road to the local Catholic school or the local independent school—the non-government schools—where the program was essentially run in the same way as the previous government’s Investing in Our Schools Program, they would find that those schools did get value for money. However, the government sector has been ripped off blind, and the person who is supposed to be standing up for them—the minister, who is sitting at the dispatch box—has done nothing except duckshove, avoid responsibility and accuse either the Australian or the opposition of making up or fabricating examples of waste and mismanagement. They know that what this minister has really done, ironically, is preside over a widening of the gap between the non-government and the government sectors in terms of infrastructure and facilities. The government sector is rightly furious, because when parents send their children to government schools they believe that their infrastructure is not as good as the non-government sector. They hoped that, when the government announced that it was going to spend $16.2 billion of taxpayer money on new infrastructure, they might get value for money and they might get better resources, but what they really got were cubbyhouse canteens. Down the road at the Holy Trinity School in New South Wales they used $800,000 and they got a canteen with cold rooms, many counters, necessary fridges, pie warmers and heaters—everything you could possibly need in a canteen—for one tenth of the cost that they achieved in government schools. The issue of the Quaama Public School was raised today by the member for Gilmore. That school has spent $800,000 on walkways and breezeways for their local school but there are homes in the electorate of Eden-Monaro where, for $480,000, you can get a full family home. As the member for Gilmore pointed out, that is half the cost of the rip-off that occurred in Quaama Public School. No wonder the Vice-President of the P&C, Debbie Platts, has said that the waste that has occurred under this scheme is mind-blowing. All the minister needs to do is get out of her ivory tower and go and speak to the angry parents and friends. She should go and speak to principals like Henry Grossek and the principal and P&C chairman at the Hastings Public School, or go to Berriedale, where I have been with the Leader of the Opposition, to find out what the people really think about the rip-off that is part of the school hall program. The Hastings Public School has become emblematic, because in 2003 they managed to build a covered outdoor learning area for $78,000. In June last year, they were told a covered outdoor learning area which is slightly bigger would cost $400,000. By December it was going to cost $954,000. The New South Wales department of education’s audit office found that there was nothing untoward about this contract. Sure, it was taken off the drawing board because of the campaigns by the opposition and the parents and friends, but if it wasn’t for that campaign, $954,000 would have been spent building a covered out-door learning area which experts say should not have cost any more than about $200,000. And we do not need to rely just on parents, friends and principals; the Rawlinsons construction handbook points out that a public school—a government school or non-government school—building should cost about $1,350 per square metre, and yet this government is costing the same buildings out for $4,500 per square metre. And that is not even comparing canteens; that is just comparing general buildings. We know that the minister keeps insisting that fees cannot be charged at more than four per cent by state governments and contractors, yet time and again stories have appeared in the media—particularly in New South Wales, which has released the data, unlike the other states—where some contractors like the Reed construction group are charging 20.96 per cent of the contracted price in management fees and site fees on every single site. Even when the same building has been built in dozens of places across New South Wales for upwards of seven years they are charging the same fee for drawings, architects plans and site management at every single site. They are ripping the taxpayers off blind. We have seen state substitution at Yankalilla Area School in South Australia, Stirling East Primary School, Basket Range Primary School and Macclesfield Primary School. The schools are being told to use their BER money to build water tanks for their schools although that is the responsibility of the state government. The state government is shifting those responsibilities to the federal taxpayer. There is still billions to spend on the school hall rip-off program—$5½ billion—and yet the minister is committing that $5½ billion before her handpicked taskforce has handed down its recommendations in August. If we needed any more evidence that the Orgill taskforce is simply window-dressing, and another opportunity for the minister to duckshove responsibility to someone else, then this is it. The taskforce is reporting in August. The minister is rushing the money out before the taskforce reports, making a mockery of her claims that she is in the least bit interested in how to make sure that taxpayers get value for money. Brad Orgill has already admitted, on the Ray Hadley program today, that he cannot access the costs for every contract unless there is a complaint made about a school. On this side of the House, we expected that when the task force was established—instead of our, preferred judicial inquiry—Brad Orgill would be given all the costings in all the schools for all the contracts— Opposition members—He should have! 9V5 Pyne, Chris, MP Mr PYNE —And he should have, as my colleagues say, so that he could examine every contract and work out for taxpayers whether they were getting value for money. As members said during question time, what is the point of a complaint being made about a COLA or about a canteen being built after the bricks and mortar—or, in more cases, the prefabricated buildings—are in place and the money has already been spent. What is the point of Brad Orgill investigating money that has already been wasted. We expected, and this minister needs to explain, how it is that a task force that should be recommending improvements has not got access to every contract in every school before a complaint is made. This is no way, Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, to run a country. Here is a minister who thinks that she can giggle and toss her hair on Channel 9 on a Friday morning into the Prime Minister’s job, supplanting Kevin Rudd, having only ever delivered in her portfolio abject failure and expensive underperforming programs. There is no better example than the school hall rip-off program, where only recently in estimates the Auditor-General was able to say that it was not possible for the government to claim that they had achieved value for money. He answered Senator Mason’s questions by saying that he was correct when he said that there was no way the government could guarantee it had achieved value for money. Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, being Prime Minister takes a lot more than having a cosy relationship with the press gallery. It takes hard work, it takes having runs on the board, and if the government believes that its answer to the sinking approval ratings of the Prime Minister is to replace him with the Deputy Prime Minister what it will find is that the public will soon discover that all this minister has done is deliver failure and duck shoving. The school hall program was supposed to make the Deputy Prime Minister look good, but it will hang around her neck like a rotten carcass, leaving nothing but the stench of failure behind her. 10000 Bevis, Arch (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. AR Bevis)—The member for Sturt, particularly in his role as Manager of Opposition Business, should be aware that the correct way to address the chair, when there are occupants other than the Speaker, is Mr Deputy Speaker. There is not a position of acting Deputy Speaker. There is, from time to time, an Acting Speaker. You might just like to adopt the proper forms of the House in future. I did not interrupt him when he was speaking, but he would be well to remember that. I call the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Education. 5010 16:55:00 Gillard, Julia, MP 83L Lalor ALP Minister for Education, Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations and Minister for Social Inclusion 1 0 Ms GILLARD —Thank you very much, Mr Deputy Speaker—I hope I have done that right! I rise in this matter of public importance debate to introduce something we have not heard so far—and that is the facts. First and foremost, let us just reflect on why we are here today with this matter of public importance, in which the member for Sturt has not even shown the basic courtesy to sit and listen to the reply. That is because he does not want to know the facts. That would puncture his argument—what he says publicly every day. He prefers to pretend, prefers to go by, the watch word of this opposition, which is being phoney. We are here today because the member for Sturt’s ego has been stirred. On the day that the Auditor-General’s report was delivered into the public demain, the Leader of the Opposition and the member for Sturt went out for a press conference and they promised a forensic examination of me over Building the Education Revolution. They were full of huff and puff and vim and vigour. Oh dear, dear, it was such a scandal! Oh, they were so upset! Then we came to the parliament. Budget week came and went. Last week came and went. Monday came and went. Tuesday came and went. Anyway, we are finally here trying to save the member for Sturt’s face, to make it look like he is playing some role in the coalition—although we know that the discontent on the coalition’s backbench at his inept parliamentary tactics is the subject of regular discussion in the corridors. So we are here trying to save the member for Sturt’s face. After promising this hard-hitting attack, here we are with an MPI. I believe he asked me one question today, and that is it. Anyway, this MPI is about effective management of the Primary Schools for the 21st Century program. So let us talk about the question of effective management, which I believe the member for Sturt at no point—amidst a spray of personal abuse—managed to get his way to in any real sense. Fact 1: if you are going to effectively manage a program, you have to support it and you have to believe in it. Of course, the opposition do not support this program and they do not believe in it. You do not need to take my word for that; just dial up Hansard where all of their votes against this program are recorded. Every member of the coalition voted against every dollar to every school. So you cannot effectively manage a program you do not believe in. And then, of course, to effectively manage a program you have to be committed to its continuation, and the opposition are not committed to its continuation. The member for Sturt, the Manager of Opposition Business, took a personal explanation after question time today and he claimed to have been misrepresented when this side of the chamber indicated that the opposition was threatening the Building the Education Revolution. I understand that there are substantial political and factional differences between the member for Sturt and the Leader of the Opposition, but the position of the coalition going into the election is defined by the Leader of the Opposition. Let me record for Hansard so no Australian is under any misrepresentation the threat that a coalition government elected under the current Leader of the Opposition—the fourth Leader of the Opposition in far less years—would mean to Building the Education Revolution. These are the words of the Leader of the Opposition. This is the policy of the coalition going into the election. The Leader of the Opposition was on AM on 14 May. He was being interviewed about Building the Education Revolution. After a series of questions, the journalist asked him: But the pot of money will be the same, the pot of money in Building the Education Revolution? The Leader of the Opposition answered: Well, look, um, ah, I’m not going to give you that absolute commitment. There we go—case closed. The money for Building the Education Revolution is under threat from an opposition led by the current opposition leader—that is the fact. Fact three is that in order to effectively manage a program you have to understand what the outcomes being sought for the program are. A key outcome of the Building the Education Revolution is supporting jobs, and day after day, because of their complete inability to understand the macro economy, to absorb the nature of the global financial crisis, to understand what it was going to mean and continues to mean for this country, the opposition cannot seem to understand that Building the Education Revolution has as a key outcome supporting jobs—and it is supporting jobs. There was a very important set of economic statistics released earlier today, and they were the national accounts. They are telling us about growth in the economy, telling us about the growth that sustains jobs. It is abundantly clear from the national accounts that private non-residential building investment fell in the quarter and remains at a depressed level, and, without the substantial ongoing support provided by the Building the Education Revolution program, activity and employment in this sector would have been lower. So a key outcome of this program is supporting jobs. The opposition say to suspend it; the opposition want to cut it. They need to understand, and acknowledge in doing that, that they would be chucking people out of work, with everything that means for their families—the ability to put food on the table, the ability to keep a roof over your head because you can pay the mortgage. We know the Leader of the Opposition would prefer our economy was like New Zealand’s; we know he would prefer a deep recession; we know he is unconcerned about the prospect of people being out of work. Well, the government is not. Building the Education Revolution is so important to supporting jobs. Day after day—we heard it from the member for Sturt today—in order to mischaracterise Building the Education Revolution they dismissively come in here and refer to Julia Gillard memorial halls and that kind of thing. It is political spin; we expect no substance from the opposition. We expect them to be all talk, with no real political action, and that is what we hear day after day. They come in with this phoney political packaging to try to make people believe somehow that what is happening in schools under this program is somehow inconsequential. Let us listen to the words of educators, of people who care, of people who know—not those sitting opposite but people who actually understand schools. Geoff Pelling, from Cooran State School, says: We identified what the school needed and we look forward to sharing the facilities with the wider community … …            …            … I think we got an excellent result. It’s given us a 21st century approach to education to use with traditional learning. At the Cowra South Public School, the principal has said: Two years on we are now looking at a modern, permanent library for our students. You never hear the opposition talk about libraries. Libraries—better for learning. He goes on: The students all agree the new library looks fantastic and makes our school stand out. Students look forward to their library lessons each week because it is a comfortable, refreshing place to sit back, relax and read. What about Principal Jane Warren—I have met her myself—at Bellaire, a state school in Geelong. She is an award winning principal. The multipurpose, flexible learning space that has been constructed in that school has transformed the way they are able to teach; they can now teach the way this award winning principal wants to teach. What about East Marden Primary School in the electorate of the member for Sturt? I have been there; I have seen their Building the Education Revolution project, and let me tell you they were delighted by the result. In order to effectively manage a program, you need to understand it—and clearly, from their dismissive rhetoric and their inability to understand anything about jobs, the opposition, each and every day, shows that they are disrespectful towards this investment in schools. Let us look at another fact. In order to effectively manage a program you need to understand the kind of oversight it has been under. Today the member for Sturt is calling for a judicial inquiry; he has been out in the media saying we need a judicial inquiry and that it is very important. Around a year and a bit ago, he was out calling for an Auditor-General’s inquiry—it was absolutely vital; it would sort the whole thing out. And the Auditor-General did inquire. And we have received his report. I know what the member for Sturt wanted from the Auditor-General’s report—he wanted something that looked like the kind of report the former government got into regional rorts. That is what he was hoping for—he was hoping for a report as bad as that. Let us remind ourselves of it—20 recommendations made by the Auditor-General, and the Auditor-General said about regional rorts: The manner in which the program has been administered over the three-year period to 30 June 2006 examined by the ANAO had fallen short of an acceptable standard of public administration. That was a program of the Howard government. The member for Sturt, all pumped up, wanted an audit report just like that one. Of course, he did not get it. What he got was an audit report in which there are no recommendations made; an audit report in which the Auditor concludes in respect of the Primary Schools for the 21st Century program: There are some positive early indicators that the program is making progress towards achieving its intended outcomes. This is an audit report that included surveying school principals and it records the finding: … more than 95 per cent of school principals saw the program as providing ongoing value to their school and their school community. So, having received that audit report from the independent watchdog, now the member for Sturt wants a judicial inquiry. If he got a judicial inquiry I do not know what he would then want. Presumably he would want an International Criminal Court of Justice action. He is just forum shopping because the answer he has got from the independent watchdog is not the answer he wanted. The member for Sturt should think about the Auditor-General’s report and the findings of that audit report. Then he is on about ‘90 per cent’ and me supposedly misleading the parliament. If he genuinely thought that, wouldn’t he have moved a substantive motion ages ago, sometime near when he started to make the public claims that I was going to be under forensic examination in relation to this matter? But of course all of this nonsense about ‘90 per cent’ has been fully dealt with in Senate estimates and I would refer people to the transcript of the secretary of finance, David Tune, on 26 May 2010. So once again we have another phoney claim from the member for Sturt as he runs around. Then there were claims made during the member for Sturt’s address, and a claim made before that during a ministerial statement on financial services—go figure!—that somehow I was unconcerned about the circumstances of the Tottenham Central School. I am not. That is why I have spoken to the principal today. That is why I have made arrangements to speak with the head of the P&C of that school. I understand that that school community is unhappy with their Building the Education Revolution project and I will be more than happy to talk to them about it. As has been a matter of public record for a number of weeks, reported in that great journal of record, the Daily Liberal, the Building the Education Revolution Implementation Taskforce is seized of this matter and Mr Brad Orgill, or a member of the task force on his behalf, will be visiting the school in the next few weeks. But I am concerned to speak to people associated with the Tottenham school. Indeed I have already spoken to the principal. I want to get value for money and they want to get value for money. On the question of value for money, obviously what we have done is create the Building the Education Revolution Implementation Taskforce. The member for Sturt today criticised me—I get that—but impliedly criticising Mr Orgill is disgraceful. This is a leading Australian businessman leading this task force, which of course can get the documents it needs and is focused on value for money. It was a completely disgraceful attack. All of this is about covering up the cutbacks that they want to make to education: ripping out trades training centres—so no more—including ones promised to schools, with no more computers in schools, including those for kids who are waiting for them, no more teacher-quality money—that will end programs like Teach for Australia, getting the best graduates into the schools that need them the most—and no more productivity places, so jobseekers cannot get an opportunity to get a training place and get a job. We on this side of the House stand for better schools and a better education system. The coalition stands for neglect and ripping money out of schools. (Time expired) 5013 17:10:00 Cobb, John, MP 00AN1 Calare NATS 0 0 Mr JOHN COBB —The Deputy Prime Minister forgot to mention quite a few things. One which stands out is: why did the Catholic schools and other non-government schools in New South Wales get value for money while no other school in New South Wales did? The reason is they managed it themselves and the New South Wales government and the federal government were not running it. The New South Wales government did not get the opportunity to rip it off. To my amazement I just heard the Deputy Prime Minister say she was happy to talk to Tottenham. Well, Tottenham invited her to come out this morning and talk to them. They even built out on our front lawn a replica of their $600,000 canteen, a canteen that, at about eight metres by three metres, cost $26½ thousand per square metre, with no amenities inside it. A local builder quoted it at $80,000 but it cost the taxpayer $600,000. I notice, Deputy Prime Minister, that you do not want to stay to listen to this. It is getting a bit rugged for you, isn’t it? I think it is quite incredible that, earlier, the Deputy Prime Minister, the Minister for Education, could stand there and tell us what great value the Australian taxpayer got, particularly in New South Wales, when the taxpayer was totally ripped off. In recent months the Australian public have become used to hearing about money being wasted by the Labor government. Pick up any newspaper and you see the pages are lined with literally billions of dollars worth of mismanagement, budget blow-outs and waste. There really are not very many stories as good as the BER program. Week in and week out in the Central Western Daily in Orange, and not from the Daily Liberal, there are stories about the Australian public not getting value for money. Let me start this speech by saying that my colleagues and I are completely behind education, public or otherwise. However, we are behind sensible, well-planned and well-managed investments—totally unlike what we are seeing out of this program with the public school system. This morning on the lawns of Parliament House we saw the construction of a replica canteen based on the one being built at the Tottenham public school. At eight metres by three metres it is not big enough for a drinks fridge, a meat slicer, a pie warmer or a freezer but it is still costing the Australian taxpayer $600,000. It was no accident that the taxpayers association was down there with the parents of the Tottenham school. If the Deputy Prime Minister did ring up the headmaster of Tottenham, I dare say he would have got muscled like all of the headmasters, headmistresses and principals in my region have been. I have been called by them. They are not game to say who they are as their jobs are at risk. I feel very sorry for them. They are embarrassed. They are angry, as angry as the parents. But what can they do? Their jobs are on the line, especially those at schools of under 50 people which were guaranteed $250,000 buildings or whatever. I have had them ring me and say, ‘If we get 100 grand out of this we’ll be doing well.’ At one stage they were being charged about $30,000 for plans that were drawn up in 2003, plans that were six or seven years old. I think this is almost worse than the pink batts scheme. You must wonder if the Deputy Prime Minister did not say to the Premier of New South Wales: ‘We know you are doing it pretty tough. We can’t just hand you over money. Have a go and see what you can get out of the BER scheme.’ But let me take you on a BER tour of my electorate, always remembering that the one I just mentioned, Tottenham School, were so angry that they drove for five hours to get here to present their case to a Deputy Prime Minister who refused to face them. So she should not stand here talking about how she will talk to them. She had her opportunity today. There was $19,000 on the breakdown of the costings of Tottenham School—$19,000 for a demolition and there was no demolition of anything done. But what does that matter? The Deputy Prime Minister says this is a great program. It is a great program if you have a construction company on the coast and you transport the workers in, because they certainly are not giving any money to anyone locally unless it is a non-government school where they do get the locals to do it. As I said, a local would have built this canteen for $80,000, not $600,000. In the east at Mount Victoria, where the school was allocated $850,000, the original plan was to build a hard court cover and large brick classroom—reasonable goals without much money on offer. What they received is a Colorbond classroom, and even that is struggling to stay under the $850,000 mark. Cooerwull Public School, where their brand new hall described by a local councillor as a ‘giant boatshed’, cost the taxpayers $2½ million and only one local contractor got a cent out of it. In the middle of Calare, at the Claregate School, $250,000 of taxpayer funds paid for another modular design building that included $60,000 worth of design. I wonder whether that was also a plan they pulled out from 2003. Mullion Creek School received what was described by a P&C member as a ‘lined tin shed’ and this was just transported there. The original $250,000 price tag blew out by $24,000. Spring Hill’s modular classroom arrived with cracks in the wall and a sagging veranda and, despite all that, it was still over budget. Errowanbang Public School would be comical if it did not represent a huge waste of taxpayer funds. The school, which currently has 22 enrolled students, received a modular classroom. The problem is that there are two buildings in the school and the modular building cannot hold any more students as it houses the computers as well. Under the department’s guidelines, the school will not qualify for a second teacher until it gets at least four more students. So they can either opt to cram in any new students into the room or use the other classroom, which would leave the students unsupervised. Nashdale Public School is one of the great examples of the Deputy Prime Minister’s BER scheme. When the school community received a quote from Bathurst based builder Bruce Hackett, it seemed this money would really provide the revolution that was promised—a library, staffroom, principal’s office, sick bay, interview room and toilets at a quote of $740,000. When the school could not raise the required deposit to self-manage—they don’t like them self-managing these things—they were forced to go with the Labor government’s option. They got a modular double classroom, no toilets, no disabled access, no air conditioning, no staffroom or entry. The cost blew out by another $150,000 over what would have been a totally new school from the local builder to $907,000. Why were they so against locals managing their own thing? We would have got the kind of value the Catholic and the other non-government schools got. Do you think there are not any businesspeople on the P&Cs of these schools? They told the headmasters, ‘If you want to self-manage, you have to be personally responsible for the insurance.’ What headmaster could go ahead with that? It was designed to stop them doing it, having to go with the New South Wales education department, which brings us to this rubbish. This is just a quick selection of the schools in my part of the world that have been let down by the Deputy Prime Minister’s BER spendathon, and there are more. I know blokes who got $2,000 a day to go and just erect some of these sheds that have been built on the coast and elsewhere instead of being built locally, simply because they were told they had to be done by a certain date—‘Don’t worry what it costs, we will foot the bill.’ There are principals and P&C groups who are too scared to talk about this because they worry about the consequences for their principal, their teachers and their chances of future funding, because there is one thing this government is—it is vengeful. We have seen many cases before where after the Deputy Prime Minister makes a phone call all signs of resistance fade into the nether. The Deputy Prime Minister continues to spruik schools that are happy to receive the funding and happy with what they are getting, but it does not change the fact that the Australian taxpayer has been cheated. It was no coincidence that the Australian Taxpayers Association were here with Tottenham School today, because they are so incensed about the wastage. (Time expired) 5015 17:20:00 Clare, Jason, MP HWL Blaxland ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Employment 1 0 Mr CLARE —This matter of public importance debate is about three things: jobs, infrastructure and value for money. And one more thing: what would happen if the opposition was elected later this year? First to jobs. Tomorrow is 3 June. On 3 June last year we found out that Australia did not go into recession. We did not go into recession because of the stimulus. That is what Treasury says. Treasury’s advice is that the Australian economy grew by 1.4 per cent last year. Its modelling shows that, without the stimulus, the economy would have shrunk by 0.7 per cent last year. In other words, the Australian economy would have gone into recession. What is the retort from the other side? What is the retort from the Leader of the Opposition? The stimulus was not necessary. What this data shows is that if it was not for the stimulus Australia, like other economies, would have gone into recession and we would have lost over 200,000 jobs, thousands of them in the construction industry, which is at the moment working to build classrooms, libraries and halls in our primary schools. I was talking last year to a builder from Sacred Heart Primary School in Cabramatta, which is in my electorate. They told me that earlier last year they were planning to lay 50 workers off. Instead, because of the BER, they put 100 workers on, including two blokes who had been unemployed for 12 months. I have heard the same story all around the country. According to the Master Builders Association, the stimulus is protecting 50,000 jobs in the building industry that would otherwise have been lost, but the Liberals in question time today called for a suspension to these projects, which inevitably means job losses. However, it is not just jobs in the construction sector that the BER is protecting, because for every construction job in the BER program there are other jobs that are also being protected in other parts of the economy. The Australian newspaper reported the effects of this on the same school—Sacred Heart Primary School—in my electorate in September last year. The article tells the story of those builders: It’s not only Mr Zuma and his men— they are the builders— who benefit from the weekly wage; the crew buy their morning coffee from the Gloria Jeans up on John Street, the main drag in Cabramatta, buy their lunch every day at the milk bar around the corner, shop for basic groceries at the Cabramatta Woolworths, buy their paper from the local newsagent and their breakfast muffins from the McDonald’s. That may not be the best breakfast in the world, or the perfect diet, but jobs are being protected. And it is not just that service industry that benefits, because the construction industry spends more than $2 billion every year on steel. They spend a lot more on IT and even more than that on accounting and legal services. This is what is called the multiplier effect—making sure that the benefits are felt all across the economy. I was in Ballarat last month, and I was told by the local council that the BER was keeping local steelmakers and cabinet makers afloat. They have lost about 1,000 jobs in manufacturing in Ballarat over the last year, and they told me that they would have lost a lot more without the construction work that we are doing in schools. Cairns has one of the highest levels of unemployment in the country, but, in the Cairns Post of 11 May 2010—a couple of weeks ago—Mr Ron Bannah, the Master Builders Association’s Far North Queensland regional manager, said: It’s been the survival of the industry, particularly in Far North Queensland, and it will continue to be in coming months. There is a reason for that: the BER program accounts for about a third of the total non-residential building approvals in the year to March 2010. The next point is about infrastructure. We are building infrastructure that a lot of schools have waited decades for. Bass Hill Public School in my electorate has been waiting for a school hall for 80 years. In 12 years, the Howard government directly invested $4 million in schools in my electorate; in two years, this government has directly injected $114 million. Carramar Public School in my electorate has been waiting for a library for almost 90 years. Under the previous government, they got a flagpole; under this government, they get a library. But that is just one school. Let’s look all around the country. Under the Howard government, 3,000 schools got flagpoles; under this government 3,000 schools get libraries. Let’s have a look at a few electorates. La Trobe got 39 flagpoles, but they are getting 26 libraries under us. Bowman got 11 flagpoles, but they are getting 19 libraries under us. The electorate of McEwen got 50 flagpoles, but they are getting 19 libraries under us. Stirling only got four flagpoles, but they get 16 libraries under us. Patterson got 18 flagpoles, but they get 13 libraries under us. In the former education minister Ms Julie Bishop’s electorate of Curtin they got 10 flagpoles, but they are getting 16 libraries under us. In Deputy Speaker Bevis’s electorate of Brisbane they got 14 flagpoles under the Howard government, but they get 19 libraries under us. In the electorate of Calare they got 31 flagpoles, but they get 33 libraries under the Rudd Labor government. In the electorate of Bradfield they got 14 flagpoles, but they get 14 libraries under us. In the electorate of Berowra, they got 11 flagpoles under the Howard government, but they get nine libraries under the Rudd government. There is the record: flagpoles under the Liberal Party, libraries under the Labor Party. None of this means that the program is perfect—no program is—and where there are problems it is important that they are identified and fixed. That is why we have set up an independent task force. But let’s get to the next point. There are 3,000 schools where projects have not started yet, and, if you listen to the words of the Leader of the Opposition, there is a good chance that those 3,000 schools will not get libraries and classrooms if the Liberal Party is elected next year. In the electorate of Bowman they could miss out on eight libraries and 11 halls, and one school could miss out on classrooms. In the electorate of McEwen they could miss out on seven libraries and eight halls, and 34 schools could miss out on classrooms. In the electorate of Paterson they could miss out on two libraries and three halls, and seven schools could miss out on classrooms. In the electorate of La Trobe they could miss out on 11 libraries and two halls, and seven schools could miss out on classrooms. In the electorate of Cowper they could miss out on six libraries and four halls, and 13 schools could miss out on classrooms. In the electorate of Cowan they could miss out on two libraries and one hall, and 15 schools could miss out on classrooms. In the electorate of Calare, they could miss out on five libraries, 12 halls and 13 classrooms. 00AN1 Cobb, John, MP Mr John Cobb —Let them build their own. HWL Clare, Jason, MP Mr CLARE —Let them build their own! That is the response from the opposition. A government member—Let them eat cake! HWL Clare, Jason, MP Mr CLARE —Let them eat cake! That is the Liberal Party’s view. They can all get stuffed as far as you are concerned. That is not the Labor Party’s view. That is not the Rudd government’s view. If we are re-elected, I can assure you, member for Calare, that these infrastructure projects will go ahead. We have heard from you and your colleagues today. We have heard from the Leader of the Opposition, saying, ‘I can’t guarantee any of this’—no more halls, no more libraries; they can build them themselves; they can go and eat cake. That is the view of the Liberal Party. Rest assured, member for Calare, that we will be telling everyone who lives in your electorate all about it: we will be telling everybody in all those electorates about the halls, the libraries and the classrooms that they will miss out on. The BER is just one part of what we are doing in education. More important is what is going on inside the classrooms and the libraries that we are building. These include national testing; a national curriculum; the My School website, which gives parents the basic information that they want; and extra money for schools that need it—things that were too hard for the Liberal Party to do in 12 years. There is a program called the Smarter Schools program. It is all about giving extra money to schools so they can have extra classroom teachers and break kids into smaller groups to help them with reading, writing and maths. It also makes sure that you give the best teachers more money to go to the schools that need them the most—schools like those in Blaxland. Under this program my electorate gets $80 million for 42 schools. It is the equivalent of one dollar in 10 for New South Wales. This is money going not to pork-barrel marginal seats but to seats like Blaxland—not often considered a marginal seat—where the money is needed most. I tell you what: this is one of the programs that will be cut or will have some of its money cut under an Abbott Liberal government. So there you go. We have already done more in two years than the Liberals did in 12. We are building libraries where they built flagpoles. We are putting more money into literacy and numeracy in the schools that they ignored. And, if they get re-elected, you know what they are going to do. (Time expired) 5018 17:30:00 Fletcher, Paul, MP L6B Bradfield LP 1 0 Mr FLETCHER —This MPI debate is about one thing: whether or not the BER program Primary Schools for the 21st Century is being administered effectively. It is about whether the program is delivering value for money and it is about whether schools are getting what they want. Given the program is there, we now have a very clear focus on whether it is being efficiently administered and delivering value for money. We have heard story after story of parents and school communities who are surprised and concerned by the poor value that they are receiving. For example, at Pymble Public School, in the electorate of Bradfield, there are two buildings being built. One is being built to replace a classroom that was burnt down in a fire, and the price that has been quoted for that building is roughly $1,700 per square metre. The other building, under the Building the Education Revolution program, is costing twice as much. This was reported by the Australian last week, and the president of the P&C association, Mr Peter Feather, while acknowledging that there were some differences between the two buildings that might contribute to some of the cost difference, said: … he could not see why these two factors would more than double the square metre cost of what is essentially the same building. The question is: how is the program being administered—is it being administered properly to deliver optimal value for money? When we hear comments about stimulus and jobs, none of that is a response in any way to the question of whether effective value of money is being delivered. After all, if we were getting better value for money, we could get more projects delivered for the same amount and we could get more jobs added to the economy. So the argument, ‘It’s economic stimulus so let’s not worry about value for money,’ frankly, makes very little sense. It is clear when you look at the process that it is seriously flawed in a number of ways. The normal procurement disciplines you would expect when spending significant amounts of money are, sadly, not present—that is, the normal procurement disciplines designed to get the best value for money. We have seen the evidence of that in the materially better value for money that private and Catholic schools have been able to get. I have seen it myself in my own electorate, in schools like Holy Family Catholic Primary School in Lindfield, Our Lady of Perpetual Succour Catholic Primary School in West Pymble, Highfields Preparatory and Kindergarten School, Newington College Preparatory School, Abbotsleigh in Wahroonga and others. The Catholic and private schools have been able to administer the money themselves and they have driven the dollar much further. The other aspect of poor process that is very concerning is the linkage between the Commonwealth government and the state government. At a meeting of the Northern Sydney Regional Council of P&C Associations which I attended on 29 March, Mr Angus Dawson, Program Director of the BER for the New South Wales government, said that their challenge was to spend $3.5 billion in 24 months and he gave some very interesting examples of the way that this is driving up the prices being paid for these projects. For example, he said Laminex had run out of product and ‘we have cornered the market in the Southern Hemisphere for whiteboards’. In other words, basic procurement disciplines cannot be achieved because so much money has been dumped into the system in such a short time that, naturally, the prices of inputs have gone up very significantly. What we have is poor administration of this program and poor value for money that is letting down schools. It is also letting down taxpayers. It is very disappointing that the response that we get is simply a referral to the Orgill inquiry, even though there is lack of clarity about when that inquiry is actually going to report and, more importantly, what actions will be taken in response to that inquiry should it find that there has been the poor value for money that is just so evident from the complaints that are coming in from parents and school communities. I certainly want to pay tribute to the concerned parents and school principals who have raised these issues. We have a program which, sadly, does not reflect good procurement practices and good procurement disciplines, and an enormous amount of money is being wasted. (Time expired) 5019 17:35:00 Bird, Sharon, MP DZP Cunningham ALP 1 0 Ms BIRD —This MPI today is not about the administration of a program; it is about the fact that those opposite have always hated the program—Primary Schools for the 21st Century. They are absolutely infuriated by the fact that we have put into the schools across this nation the long overdue and long desired capital infrastructure they have been crying out for for decades. As a former schoolteacher I have probably spent more time in classrooms than many who have contributed to this debate, and the one thing that I know is that we had primary schools that were not designed for a modern teaching environment. Most primary schools did not have halls, for example, so assemblies and special events were held in the outdoor areas. So many primary schools have been crying out for new halls to be put in, because our curriculum today requires the provision of all sorts of activities that these sorts of multifunction learning centres are critical to. I am a passionate supporter of libraries and the importance of modern libraries that can incorporate not only the printed information of a modern world but also online information. Indeed, it is something that I think we would be very much failing our young people in if we were not committed to it. I am very disappointed to see the opposition also attacking the digital education revolution, which is, I think, the most short-sighted thing I could possibly have heard from those opposite. The reality is that the opposition voted against the program. They do not support it. It is significant not only in the educational sense but also in its context, and that is what those opposite never want to talk about. The member for Bradfield talked about so much money in such a short time. There is a reason for that. This is actually about intervention in the economy when private money and construction in all of our communities, including the communities of those opposite, were being withdrawn. I, like many of my colleagues I have spoken to on this side, had building companies in my local area, at that time when the global financial crisis rolled out and private building construction in our regions start to be withdrawn, ringing me saying, ‘When is the government going to put these contracts out for this school building work? I have got staff I am keeping on simply waiting for these contracts. If these contracts don’t come out, I’ll be laying staff off.’ They were the conversations I was having at the time and the critical infrastructure that we were putting into schools was a significant part of sustaining employment in regions right across the country including in my own area. I was not going to say to those building companies, ‘Let’s not rush this. Let’s just wait and see how we can roll this out in an extended way.’ The reality was that an important component of this was that it was stimulus work to underpin jobs, which it was profoundly successful in doing in all sorts of communities including mine. So I think it is one of the more outstanding programs put in place by this government. I will passionately defend it. It is very easy on any program of this size to be critical. Let us not forget that it is a bigger school capital program than the Obama administration put in place across the whole of the US. It is a program that this country should take pride in. If you want to go and nitpick and find a few examples here and there, you can do it—of course you can. But if you have problems in schools in your area—like those in my area where people come to me with particular issues—then you get them solved. You do not destroy the whole program that has been so profoundly significant for all of our schools and for employment in all of our regions. It is a disgrace that the opposition have merely taken the opportunity to foster and build up the problems rather than resolve them and get behind supporting the program. This will be a legacy that schools will remember for generations to come, because the capital works that they will be using to transform the curriculum that they can develop and implement in their schools are invaluable. I look forward to all of those in my own area, and I would think anybody in this place would support and look forward to new facilities for schools in their area and support the impact that has on jobs for so many people in their regions. It is not a motion before us about management; this is a motion about the fact that they have consistently tried to pull down this program. 10000 Saffin, Janelle (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Ms JA Saffin)—Order! The discussion is now concluded. 5020 Bills R4279 5020 Bills R4308 5020 Bills R4274 5020 Bills R4295 5020 Bills R4163 5021 Bills R4164 5021 Bills R4254 5021 Bills R4253 5021 Messages from the Governor-General reported informing the House of assent to the bills. 5021 Bills R4272 5021 Consideration resumed. 5021 17:42:00 Tanner, Lindsay, MP YU5 Melbourne ALP Minister for Finance and Deregulation 1 0 Mr TANNER —We were in detailed debate with respect to proposed government amendments (1) to 12). At this point I simply reiterate the government’s position that this legislation is designed to improve the administration of government superannuation both for civilian and military personnel and, of course, for existing and future members. I will respond at some greater length to the points raised by the opposition in detail and allow them to continue. 5021 17:42:00 Robert, Stuart, MP HWT Fadden LP 0 0 Mr ROBERT —With respect to consideration in detail, the Minister for Finance and Deregulation has hung the premise for the legislation on the coathanger that this will have increased returns for defence members. Indeed, he indicated in his address to the House that to vote against this would be to vote against increased returns for defence personnel. He then cited three examples of two officers and a warrant officer, a young apprentice coming in at age 18 and after 34 years service having something like $80,000 more super in their pocket. What I find simply astounding is that this minister can look 34 years down the track and say, ‘This bill will guarantee that you are going to have an extra $80,000 in your superannuation at the end.’ His modelling is so precise that his department can get it right on the head: it will have this amount of money and that is the reason why we are doing this. This is not about ACTU control; this is not about the fact that even if there were two boards and the funds were put out to tender—notwithstanding that it is highly likely that an industry super fund would win the tender, Minister, but of course we will wait and see what the result of that is—the results would not change. One board is not needed to ensure that the bulk of the $18 billion to $19 billion is actually put out there in the market for a return, because the trustees would not be investing it. They would put it out to tender for a professional firm to invest on their members’ behalf. Whether there were two boards, a military and a civilian board, or whether there was one, that process would still follow. The minister’s premise that only this way could achieve superior results is false. Two trustees, one for the military and one for civilian, using the same tender process for funds under management, would achieve the same result. 5021 17:44:00 Baldwin, Robert, MP LL6 Paterson LP 0 0 Mr BALDWIN —I do not intend to take up too much of the House’s time, and the comments I am about to make in this consideration-in-detail stage relate to all three bills: the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010, the ComSuper Bill 2010 and the Superannuation Legislation (Consequential Amendments and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2010. I want to restate for the benefit of the House and those who will read these speeches—and there are a lot of vested interests in these speeches: a lot of serving and ex-serving ADF people whose financial position depends on the decisions we make in this parliament—that this is the minister and the government that say they consulted. The fact is they did not. One meeting with the coalition, followed by a couple of months of dodging phone calls, is not consultation, it is a joke. YU5 Tanner, Lindsay, MP Mr Tanner interjecting— LL6 Baldwin, Robert, MP Mr BALDWIN —Yes, Minister, we rang your office many times looking for what your position was after our discussions, when you and I sat down in my office, and where we were going. We got no response at all. If Minister Tanner or Minister Griffin were serious about this reform, why didn’t they begin the process with consultation? Why is it—and this is an apparent trait of this government—that it is always after they put the legislation to this House that they then want to do the consultation? If you want to get bills through that are at all contentious, you consult before, not after. A hollow apology today from Minister Griffin regarding his failure to consult is absolutely meaningless. The veteran community see right through it, just as they see right through this failed minister. The government have assumed that, just because one ex-service organisation agreed with their amendments, all veterans and all ex-service organisations agree with their amendments. I have some real bad news for Minister Griffin and Minister Tanner: not everyone agrees. To believe that silence equals agreement is a very dangerous assumption; to state otherwise is a deliberate act of deceit. The legislation is failing because it was never properly thought through. They have not listened to well-thought-out different opinions on how to achieve the same goal. They have just gone blindly forward, to the detriment of those fine men and women of the Australian Defence Force, past and present, whose retirement income depends on the actions and representations of members in this House. The amendments being put forward by the government are not being opposed, just the bills themselves. The bills do not go far enough in protecting the interests of our military men and women. Merely legislating to consult is not good enough, and it is not an answer in itself. But that is what can be expected from a government that is all about talk and no action and that has not made a single hard decision during its time in office. It would rather talk than produce outcomes. Does anybody remember any outcomes from the much-vaunted 2020 conference? That conference was the great media event in this House. Where are the outcomes? There are none. I reiterate that three trade union directors on a board which contains only two CDF appointed directors is not in the interests of military members. Perhaps the minister needs to explain why there are only two CDF and three ACTU appointees, not three and three. Nor is it in the best interests of those members that the said ACTU appointed directors can only be removed by the President of the ACTU. Talk about leaving the fox in charge of the henhouse! I and my colleagues in the coalition considered the amendments that we discussed with the minister in some detail. The coalition’s amendments are not radical, nor are they difficult to implement. They simply seek to gain the best outcome for military members. We recognise the uniqueness of their service and we understand that we must act in their best interests. The Minister for Finance and Deregulation and the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs are simply too obstinate to admit they got this legislation wrong. They are too proud to admit that the coalition’s proposed changes ensure better financial terms for military and civilian members while ensuring the unique nature of military service is retained. For the minister for finance to stand here and lecture the coalition on the financial benefits to members is also very disingenuous. The minister never provided the Treasury briefing to the coalition on how much extra members would accrue. He did not reveal the data because he is playing politics with this issue, whereas the coalition are fighting for a better outcome for military members. Furthermore, we have said time and time again that the amalgamation of investment funds is agreed upon; it is the governance structures that need to be changed. But, no, the finance minister simply dismisses that point out of hand. And what of the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs? (Extension of time granted) When he came into this House to address this legislation he spoke for 20 minutes and barely addressed the bills. He said he was sorry for failing to consult the veteran community. You would think that the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs and his office would be in almost daily consultation with the veteran community, but he has underestimated the impact this legislation has on the financial position of many men and women who are fighting for an increase to their DFRDB. The minister dismisses outright that they have a genuine case or need. The Minister for Veterans’ Affairs also failed to articulate one reason why this legislation should be passed, showing again that he has absolute disdain for veterans and veterans issues. I do not wish to delay the House any further, but let me say this: this issue will not go away, nor will the issue of DFRDB indexation. The government, when in opposition, made a clear and unequivocal promise to members of the veteran community that they would address the issues of indexation of military superannuation. After they came to government, on 24 December 2008 they tabled the review. Then it sat there until the coalition made them publicly release it. The comments are yet to be released. They conducted another review and that review was responded to by the minister for finance. In that response, he said that the defence community did not deserve to have their superannuation indexed at the same rate as people on a pension or indeed at the same rate as members of this parliament. He thinks so little of the men and women of our Australian Defence Force that he denied them fair indexation. Again, as I have said, this was a rolled gold commitment from the Labor opposition prior to coming to government. If you cannot take their word and you cannot trust as ironclad what they said in their election manifesto that they were going to do when they came in, how can we trust them when they say that all will be well with just two ADF appointments but three Labor ACTU appointments? How can we trust that the best interests of the veterans community will be served? The Minister for Veterans’ Affairs came in and made an apology to this House, but he needs to do more than just make a simple apology. He needs to spell out very clearly why our veterans community, past and present serving members, do not deserve the support of their government—support that they demand, support that they were promised and support that this government has failed to deliver. 5023 17:53:00 Robert, Stuart, MP HWT Fadden LP 0 0 Mr ROBERT —I rise to speak on the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010 and cognate bills. I think the nation has had a bit of a gutful of ministers coming in and saying sorry. I know that in my state of Queensland, whenever Labor stuffs something up, which seems to be all too regularly, someone comes out and says: ‘I am sorry. I will fix it.’ Peter Beattie made a career out of saying: ‘You know what? I am sorry I stuffed up, but I will fix it. I will do better next time.’ He would do it again and again, and when the Queensland public got tired of him saying, ‘I am sorry,’ he left parliament, saying, ‘I will take no government job,’ only to take a $300,000 tax-free job just six or nine months later. When Labor ministers come out and say, ‘I am sorry,’ it is simply indicative that they are working on the premise that it is better to seek forgiveness than to ask permission. This government only started consultation with the veterans’ community— YU5 Tanner, Lindsay, MP Mr Tanner —On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker: this is entirely irrelevant to the bill. I am as keen as anybody else to get this concluded. I suggest you call the speaker back to the bill. HWT Robert, Stuart, MP Mr ROBERT —Consultation with the veterans and defence communities only started once there was an issue. It only commenced once the coalition and other organisations and groups out there started saying: ‘Hang on. There is a problem here. Veterans and military personnel are not being treated in line with the uniqueness of the service they operated. They are not being treated as a group that is distinct and different, with different conditions of service and different expectations upon them. They are just being lumped in with every other superannuant, with a board over the top that gives them 20 per cent representation but gives the ACTU 30 per cent representation.’ That is when consultation began. This Minister for Veterans’ Affairs and, indeed, the Minister for Finance and Deregulation knew this would be contentious. They knew there was an opportunity for, and an expectation of, consultation, but they only took it up once the rubber hit the road. Looking at the amendments the finance minister has put before us with respect to consultation, he has now put in that he will consult with the Minister for Defence and with the CDF, but there is no discussion about consultation with respect to the three ACTU members. There is no consultation process with any parties about those bodies. We reiterate that the inability of the minister for finance to remove anyone without the permission of the CDF or the President of the ACTU remains unacceptable. We reiterate that standing up and saying that we need to move this forward because it will deliver veterans $80,000 or $90,000 more in 34 years time is just completely ludicrous. I ask the minister: is he prepared to table the Treasury financial modelling that backed up his assertions in the House? Is he prepared to release the modelling that shows that there will be these great benefits for military personnel if this bill goes through? Is he prepared to table that modelling so the defence community and the veterans community can look at it with some degree of rigour? Right now the nation has little faith in Treasury forecasting and models. We learnt today, when the Treasurer was bringing out his pie graphs, that they were an invention of his own mind and his own office and not in fact from Treasury. I simply ask the minister for finance: sir, are you willing to table the forecasts and the modelling and the premises behind them? 5024 17:57:00 Markus, Louise, MP E07 Greenway LP 0 0 Mrs MARKUS —I would like to get some facts on the table in this debate on the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010 and cognate bills. I can say with utmost clarity that, when I called a number of ex-service community leaders after these bills had been tabled, they had not received a call from either the Minister for Finance and Deregulation or the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs. They had not seen the bills nor had they been consulted. As soon as I contacted them, I made sure that they had access to the bills. We then consulted about it. The coalition made sure that we heard what their concerns were. As a result of that and the coalition calling for a Senate inquiry, we saw over 190 submissions from the ex-service community, from ex-service organisations and from individuals. This is a concern of every serving member of the Defence Force. These bills are going to impact their future and current superannuation payments. It is also going to have a serious impact on the veterans community. This is a critical issue that impacts not just veterans but current serving members of the Defence Force. From my consultation with the ex-service community, my understanding is that, while some may agree with the amendments that the government has put forward and feel that those amendments go some way towards addressing their concerns, many feel that the amendments have not gone far enough. They feel that the amendments have not gone far enough in acknowledging the uniqueness of service of our current personnel, who lay their lives on the line on a daily basis and continue to do so as we speak, or in recognising the service of those who are currently receiving benefits from the Department of Veterans’ Affairs or those who are relying on their superannuation to sustain them in their retirement. We need to get some facts straight here. While there have been some improvements, they do not go far enough. While there may have been some consultation, it was not before these bills were on the floor of the House. In addition, the issues raised in the consultation that has taken place have not been responded to 100 per cent. Not everything the ex-service community has asked for has been met. So I have to stand with my colleagues. It is important that we stand and fight for each individual digger, for each individual sailor and for each individual airman and airwoman who is currently serving or will be serving in the future. 5025 18:00:00 Tanner, Lindsay, MP YU5 Melbourne ALP Minister for Finance and Deregulation 1 0 Mr TANNER —Let me just quickly run through a number of points. What is the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Bill 2010 about? It is about improving the governance and administration of Australian government superannuation with respect to both civilian and military personnel and about providing increased economies of scale to enable better investment returns on the funds that belong to those personnel, military and civilian, to produce better superannuation outcomes for them. What does the legislation not do? It does not change the rules of any superannuation scheme, civilian or military; it does not change anything with respect to the benefits or entitlements that prevail; and there is no change to the existing features that reflect the special nature of military service in the Australian Defence Force—for example, special death and disability arrangements. The schemes for Australian Defence Force members will retain their own legislation, which of course will continue to be the responsibility of the Minister for Defence, not the Minister for Finance and Deregulation. So the legislation that actually determines entitlements and arrangements for members of the Defence Forces will remain the responsibility of the Minister for Defence. There are quite a number of furphies that are being put forward by the opposition in this debate. I am quite happy to provide the detailed calculations that underpinned the assessment provided to me by the Department of Finance and Deregulation, not Treasury, about the implications of combining the two pools of funds. Those details have previously been provided to the ex-service organisations. The key thing that I point out here is that the whole aim of this exercise is to get the benefits of scale both in administrative efficiencies and in investment outcomes. My department advises that the advice from APRA is that, over a 10-year period, large funds outperform small and medium funds by at least half a percentage point of returns. Their calculations are based on that conservative assumption and up to one percentage point. The military fund is a small fund, currently with about $3 billion in it. The civilian schemes have $16 billion in them. We did look genuinely at the proposition put forward by the member for Paterson about the prospect of two separate boards with a pool fund and came to the conclusion—this is the advice I have received from my department; this is not some sinister conspiracy by evil government ministers but the advice from the same people who provided advice to the Howard government on these issues when they were in office—that this was impractical and that it would be unduly costly. Think about it for a minute. If you have got two amounts of money that are pooled into a single investment strategy but there are two separate boards answering to two separate constituencies and making decisions, getting some degree of unanimity on every single point when they are answerable to different constituencies and have different responsibilities is a highly unlikely scenario. The only way to ensure that you can get genuine efficiency about individual investment decisions, which is ultimately exactly the same process irrespective of whether the member is a civilian or military person, is to have a single structure. That is the advice we have received from the department of finance and that is the advice on which we are acting. There are conspiracy theories about the involvement of the ACTU on the trustee board. There are three ACTU representatives and two ADF representatives. Apart from the fact that that is the current level of representation in each case in the existing schemes, what that also reflects is the relative size of the constituencies involved here, and in particular that is evidenced by the amounts of the funds: $3 billion on the one hand versus $16 billion on the other. Because there are special restrictions on decisions that specifically affect military members having to have, as part of them, one of the ADF representatives supporting that decision, that acts as protection for the military members against any of the kinds of conspiratorial possibilities that have been dreamed up by the member for Paterson and other members of the opposition. (Extension of time granted) I am somewhat bemused that the opposition seem to be so keen for me or future ministers for finance to have the power to arbitrarily sack representatives on the trustee board who are nominated by the ACTU that they are prepared to give me the same power to do that with respect to representatives who are there representing the defence forces. It strikes me, frankly, as bizarre that on the one hand they are suggesting that there is inadequate representation and inadequate separation for people who are involved in unique activity, which we all agree is military service, and on the other hand they are prepared to let the minister for finance have the life or death say over who represents military interests on the board. I find that very strange, given that we have got in place legislation, the Superannuation Industry (Supervision) Act, which governs all people, whether on existing superannuation arrangements or other superannuation arrangements, and which sets requirements that ensure that, where things such as bankruptcy or other things make it inappropriate for people to continue, they therefore do not continue. We believe it is inappropriate for the minister for finance to have the arbitrary power to dismiss members who are there in a representative capacity. Those representatives, be they representatives of employees of the Commonwealth or representatives of military personnel, have to have comfort in knowing that they cannot be arbitrarily dismissed by me or a successive finance minister because they are standing up for the interests they represent. I will let you in on a little secret, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am not the most popular person in Canberra amongst civilian personnel in the Australian Public Service. Frankly, if I were the most popular minister in Canberra, I would not be doing my job. If I were an ordinary rank and file public servant, I would not want the minister for finance to have the capacity to arbitrarily sack my representative on my superannuation scheme board, and I do not think members of the Defence Force would want me to have the power to sack their representatives either. Finally, I turn to something which has no connection with this legislation but was raised by the member for Paterson—that is, the Matthews report into the indexation methods for existing superannuation arrangements, which covered both civilian and military personnel. For many years these pensions have been indexed to the consumer price index. There has been a campaign for quite some time for the indexation to be changed to average weekly earnings. The member for Paterson told a blatant untruth when he claimed that Labor prior to the election promised we would make that change. In fact, what we promised and what we followed through on was to have an independent expert inquiry into this issue. That expert inquiry by Trevor Matthews, an unimpeachable world ranked expert on these issues, found that the existing arrangements should continue. We have followed that advice. Had he found the opposite, had he said to the government, ‘You should make that change,’ and had we rejected it, there would be more validity in the criticisms being made by the member for Paterson. But our commitment was to an independent expert inquiry. The unimpeachable expert, who is Australian but has extensive experience in these matters internationally as well, found that changes should not be made, and that is the decision we took. The thing that makes all of this most amusing is that for most of the 11½ years the opposition were in government this was a significant issue and they did nothing to address it. They now come in here and suggest that the fact that the Rudd government, after being in government for 2½ years, have not made this change means we are reprehensible. They had 11½ years to do something. I think the ex-service organisations and the ex-Public Service organisations they talk to know precisely who they are dealing with here and realise that there is not much integrity and not much sincerity in the promises and commitments now being made, because they are being made by people who did not do anything about this issue for 11½ years and now have the hide to criticise this government, which has been in office for 2½ years, for doing nothing. That concludes my observations. I indicate again the government’s strong support for this bill. We would like to think this is a matter that could be dealt with on a bipartisan basis. We have no political agendas here other than to make the system work better for its members. (Time expired) 5027 18:10:00 Baldwin, Robert, MP LL6 Paterson LP 0 0 Mr BALDWIN —I did not think I would be speaking on this again, but there were a couple of issues in the Minister for Finance and Deregulation’s summation that concern me. Firstly, he implied that, by having two separate boards, agreement may not be reached on investment decisions. Whether the two boards sit separately or sit as one board, there may be differences of opinion on investment decisions. This goes to the very point of what the coalition is saying—that is, if the CDF people are outnumbered three to two, or eight to two, then they would be overruled anyhow on what they consider to be the best way forward. The minister spoke as though the board is sitting there almost on a daily basis deciding whether to buy or sell Telstra shares—you would not buy those at the moment with the way the government is handling the NBN—or mining shares—and you would not buy those either with the way the government is dealing with the resources super tax. Members of the board will not be handling individual investment decisions on what shares or stocks to trade or invest in. The minister advised me that the management of the money and investment of the portfolio will be done by an investment house or a brokering firm—and the minister can advise me of the exact terminology. As I understand it, the management of the portfolio is going out to tender and it will be the successful tenderers who will be managing the investment portfolio, deciding what to buy and when to sell. There is no difference whether one cheque goes out for $16 billion and another for $3 billion to the same recipient. The money will be divided amongst the members on a ratio of $3 billion to $16 million. An amalgamation of the board will not mean that all of a sudden—and perhaps this is what the minister is implying—people on the MSBS will get a greater financial return. That is simply not the case, because the percentages of revenue in there determine how the profits, or the return on the investment, will be divided. The minister has just alluded to the greatest concern that we have—that is, that members of the ADF will be bullied, bludgeoned and voted down by the decisions of others, which may not be what the Defence Force considers to be in their best interests. The minister was asked by Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Robert to table the document. The minister has said that the information is freely available. My office contacted the minister’s office on a number of occasions for more information following the discussions that we had. I have to say that the minister was very generous after the bill was initially put. We had some discussions, and I thank him for that time. But the key point is there has been a request for financial details and the minister is expecting us to give him carte blanche approval to steam ahead without him having provided any financial details so we can better understand the position and where these great savings and great financial benefits for individual members, past and present, of the Defence Force will be. I find the government’s view very hard to believe. We as members of this parliament are elected by people to represent their best interests. Ministers and members of the executive government are elected by their caucuses to serve in this House, and their key role is the accountability of the government processes to this parliament. To devolve that responsibility to the head of the ACTU is not on. In this House, if I want to ask a question about the performance of that superannuation fund, I do not think I would be able to ask direct questions of the President of the ACTU at the bar of the chamber—and from opposition we would not have the numbers to cause that to happen. The minister would just say, ‘Sorry, all the power lies with the President of the ACTU.’ The minister has quite correctly said that there are forms (Extension of time granted) in legislation by which those who no longer hold the qualification to serve as a director would be dismissed, but in that case it still has to go to the President of the ACTU for approval. Last time I looked, while the President of the ACTU might be elected by union members, I cannot remember there ever being a public ballot nationwide for them to be a representative of all people in this House. In summing up, our key issues are, firstly, the implication that ADF members’ interests will be best served by this legislation—that is not the truth. Secondly, the statement by the minister that having two separate boards is unworkable because they will have differences of opinion just confirms the concerns of people on this side who actually understand veterans issues, perhaps none better than Stuey Robert, the shadow parliamentary secretary, who is a former serving officer of the Australian defence forces. He knows because he has been there, done that, bought the T-shirt and worn it out, as they say. Thirdly, the statement by the minister that there will be a financial disadvantage by this not all coming together is untrue as well. But the greatest concern that we have is this abrogation of ministerial responsibility by placing the power with others. Three times the minister has been asked to table documents—and not just for the coalition to see; by being tabled, documentation pointing out the financial advantage and benefit would enable members of the gallery and, indeed, members of the public at large to see for themselves exactly where these proposed financial benefits are. Again we call on the minister to table those documents to make them a public paper, free for all to see. There is nothing to hide in this investment decision. There will be no forecast allocation of money to any individual fund or any individual portfolio that would in any way create a commercial-in-confidence issue. So we call on the minister to table the documentation. The coalition has finished its debate. We are very disappointed, but we will not be discussing the other three bills any further; we have said what we had to say in this debate. We will be opposing the legislation here and in the Senate. Question agreed to. Bill, as amended, agreed to. Bill read a second time. 5029 Mr TANNER (Melbourne —Minister for Finance and Deregulation) 18:19:00 —by leave—I move: That this bill be now read a third time. Question agreed to. Bill read a third time. 5029 Bills R4278 5029 Debate resumed from 4 February, on motion by Mr Tanner: That this bill be now read a second time. Question put. 18:25:00 The House divided.     (The Deputy Speaker—Ms JA Saffin) 76 Adams, D.G.H. Albanese, A.N. Bevis, A.R. Bidgood, J. Bird, S. Bowen, C. Bradbury, D.J. Burke, A.E. Burke, A.S. Butler, M.C. Byrne, A.M. Campbell, J. Champion, N. Cheeseman, D.L. Clare, J.D. Collins, J.M. Combet, G. Crean, S.F. D’Ath, Y.M. Danby, M. Debus, B. Dreyfus, M.A. Elliot, J. Ellis, A.L. Ellis, K. Emerson, C.A. Ferguson, L.D.T. Ferguson, M.J. Garrett, P. Georganas, S. Gibbons, S.W. Gray, G. Grierson, S.J. Griffin, A.P. Hall, J.G. * Hayes, C.P. * Irwin, J. Jackson, S.M. Kelly, M.J. Kerr, D.J.C. King, C.F. Livermore, K.F. Macklin, J.L. Marles, R.D. McClelland, R.B. McKew, M. McMullan, R.F. Melham, D. Murphy, J. Neal, B.J. Neumann, S.K. O’Connor, B.P. Owens, J. Parke, M. Perrett, G.D. Plibersek, T. Price, L.R.S. Raguse, B.B. Rea, K.M. Ripoll, B.F. Rishworth, A.L. Roxon, N.L. Shorten, W.R. Sidebottom, S. Smith, S.F. Snowdon, W.E. Sullivan, J. Symon, M. Tanner, L. Thomson, C. Thomson, K.J. Trevor, C. Turnour, J.P. Vamvakinou, M. Windsor, A.H.C. Zappia, A. 53 Andrews, K.J. Baldwin, R.C. Billson, B.F. Bishop, B.K. Briggs, J.E. Broadbent, R. Chester, D. Cobb, J.K. Coulton, M. Dutton, P.C. Farmer, P.F. Fletcher, P. Gash, J. Georgiou, P. Haase, B.W. Hartsuyker, L. Hawke, A. Hawker, D.P.M. Hunt, G.A. Irons, S.J. Jensen, D. Keenan, M. Laming, A. Ley, S.P. Lindsay, P.J. Macfarlane, I.E. Marino, N.B. Markus, L.E. May, M.A. Morrison, S.J. Moylan, J.E. Neville, P.C. * O’Dwyer, K Oakeshott, R.J.M. Pyne, C. Ramsey, R. Randall, D.J. Robert, S.R. Ruddock, P.M. Schultz, A. Scott, B.C. Secker, P.D. * Simpkins, L. Slipper, P.N. Smith, A.D.H. Somlyay, A.M. Southcott, A.J. Stone, S.N. Truss, W.E. Turnbull, M. Vale, D.S. Washer, M.J. Wood, J. * denotes teller Question agreed to. Bill read a second time. SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr Tuckey —Madam Deputy Speaker, I rise on a point of order. You gave the order to lock the doors, and the bells then continued to ring for at least 30 seconds. I suggest that, therefore, the vote should be taken again or I should be able to record my vote in the negative. But you might explain how you can lock this place up while the bells are still ringing. 10000 Saffin, Janelle (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Ms JA Saffin)—To the honourable member’s point of order, the bells rang for four minutes and the sand had run through the hourglass. The Clerk did not turn the bells off immediately. SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr Tuckey —The bells were still ringing and there are— 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —There is no point of order. SJ4 Tuckey, Wilson, MP Mr Tuckey interjecting— 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —The honourable member will take his seat. There is no point of order. Message from the Governor-General recommending appropriation announced. 5030 Bill—by leave—taken as a whole. 5030 18:34:00 Tanner, Lindsay, MP YU5 Melbourne ALP Minister for Finance and Deregulation 1 0 Mr TANNER —by leave—I move government amendments (1) to (7) together: (1)    Clause 2, page 2 (table item 2), omit “section 3”, substitute “section 2”. (2)    Clause 3, page 2 (after line 17), after the definition of CSC, insert: Defence Minister means the Minister who administers the Defence Act 1903. (3)    Clause 9, page 7 (after line 4), after subclause (1), insert:       (1A)    Before making an appointment, the Minister must consult the Defence Minister. (4)    Clause 18, page 9 (line 12), before “The Minister”, insert “(1)”. (5)    Clause 18, page 9 (after line 27), at the end of the clause, add:          (2)    Before terminating the appointment of the CEO, the Minister must consult the Defence Minister. (6)    Clause 23, page 11 (line 28), omit “by making a”, substitute “without making a real or”. (7)    Clause 24, page 13 (line 5), after “report”, insert “for presentation to the Parliament”. Question agreed to. Bill, as amended, agreed to. 5031 Mr TANNER (Melbourne —Minister for Finance and Deregulation) 18:35:00 —by leave—I move: That this bill be now read a third time. Question agreed to. Bill read a third time. 5031 Bills R4277 5031 Debate resumed from 4 February, on motion by Mr Tanner: That this bill be now read a second time. Question put. 18:38:00 The House divided.     (The Deputy Speaker—Ms JA Saffin) 76 Adams, D.G.H. Albanese, A.N. Bevis, A.R. Bidgood, J. Bird, S. Bowen, C. Bradbury, D.J. Burke, A.E. Burke, A.S. Butler, M.C. Byrne, A.M. Campbell, J. Champion, N. Cheeseman, D.L. Clare, J.D. Collins, J.M. Combet, G. Crean, S.F. D’Ath, Y.M. Danby, M. Debus, B. Dreyfus, M.A. Elliot, J. Ellis, A.L. Ellis, K. Emerson, C.A. Ferguson, L.D.T. Fitzgibbon, J.A. Garrett, P. Georganas, S. Gibbons, S.W. Gray, G. Grierson, S.J. Griffin, A.P. Hall, J.G. * Hayes, C.P. * Irwin, J. Jackson, S.M. Kelly, M.J. Kerr, D.J.C. King, C.F. Livermore, K.F. Macklin, J.L. Marles, R.D. McClelland, R.B. McKew, M. McMullan, R.F. Melham, D. Murphy, J. Neal, B.J. Neumann, S.K. O’Connor, B.P. Owens, J. Parke, M. Perrett, G.D. Plibersek, T. Price, L.R.S. Raguse, B.B. Rea, K.M. Ripoll, B.F. Rishworth, A.L. Roxon, N.L. Shorten, W.R. Sidebottom, S. Smith, S.F. Snowdon, W.E. Sullivan, J. Symon, M. Tanner, L. Thomson, C. Thomson, K.J. Trevor, C. Turnour, J.P. Vamvakinou, M. Windsor, A.H.C. Zappia, A. 51 Andrews, K.J. Baldwin, R.C. Billson, B.F. Bishop, B.K. Briggs, J.E. Broadbent, R. Chester, D. Cobb, J.K. Coulton, M. Dutton, P.C. Farmer, P.F. Fletcher, P. Gash, J. Georgiou, P. Haase, B.W. Hartsuyker, L. Hawke, A. Hunt, G.A. Irons, S.J. Jensen, D. Keenan, M. Laming, A. Ley, S.P. Lindsay, P.J. Macfarlane, I.E. Marino, N.B. Markus, L.E. May, M.A. Morrison, S.J. Moylan, J.E. Neville, P.C. * O’Dwyer, K Oakeshott, R.J.M. Pyne, C. Ramsey, R. Randall, D.J. Robert, S.R. Ruddock, P.M. Schultz, A. Scott, B.C. Secker, P.D. * Simpkins, L. Slipper, P.N. Smith, A.D.H. Somlyay, A.M. Southcott, A.J. Stone, S.N. Tuckey, C.W. Vale, D.S. Washer, M.J. Wood, J. * denotes teller Question agreed to. Bill read a second time. Message from the Governor-General recommending appropriation announced. 5032 Bill—by leave—taken as a whole. 5032 18:49:00 Tanner, Lindsay, MP YU5 Melbourne ALP Minister for Finance and Deregulation 1 0 Mr TANNER —I present a supplementary explanatory memorandum to the bill. I ask leave of the House to move government amendments (1) to (4), as circulated, together. Leave granted. YU5 Tanner, Lindsay, MP Mr TANNER —I move: (1)    Schedule 1, item 58, page 11 (line 24), before “The Committee”, insert “(1)”. (2)    Schedule 1, item 58, page 11 (after line 24), before paragraph 101(a), insert:             (aa)    a director of CSC nominated by the Chief of the Defence Force under the Governance of Australian Government Superannuation Schemes Act 2010, as determined by CSC; and (3)    Schedule 1, item 58, page 11 (after line 30), at the end of section 101, add:          (2)    The director of CSC determined by CSC under paragraph (1)(aa) is to be the Chair of the Committee. (4)    Schedule 1, item 128, page 22 (line 24), at the end of the definition of decision of CSC, add “or the regulations”. Question agreed to. Bill, as amended, agreed to. 5032 Mr TANNER (Melbourne —Minister for Finance and Deregulation) 18:50:00 —by leave—I move: That this bill be now read a third time. Question agreed to. Bill read a third time. 5032 Bills R4370 5032 Debate resumed from 26 May, on motion by Ms Kate Ellis: That this bill be now read a second time. 5032 18:51:00 Stone, Dr Sharman, MP EM6 Murray LP 0 0 Dr STONE —I rise to speak on the Family Assistance Legislation Amendment (Child Care Budget Measures) Bill 2010. The bill is so that the Labor government can amend A New Tax System (Family Assistance) Act 1999 by setting the annual childcare rebate limit at $7,500 for the four income years starting from 1 July 2010. Further indexation of this amount will not then occur until 1 July 2014. It was part of the 2004 election campaign commitment, when the Howard government gave a rock-solid guarantee of further extra assistance for families. The childcare tax rebate, as it was then called, was introduced by the Howard government in 2005 and backdated to 1 July 2004. We did this because we understood that being able to have affordable and accessible, and good quality, child care was an essential part of a family being able to manage its work and family commitments. Unfortunately, in seeing this reduction in childcare funding, we see a government that has no concern whatsoever for the affordability of child care, especially given the recent COAG national standards changes—and I will come to those in a minute. The childcare tax rebate, as it was called then, was introduced by the Howard government in 2005 and backdated to 1 July 2004. We did this because we understood that being able to have affordable, accessible and good-quality child care was an essential part of a family being able to manage its work and family commitments. Unfortunately, in seeing this reduction in childcare funding, we see a government that has no concern whatsoever for the affordability of child care, especially given the recent COAG national standards changes—and I will come to those in a minute. In their 2007 election platform Labor committed to increasing the childcare rebate to 50 per cent, lifting the maximum amount of rebate from $4,054 to $7,500 per child. They also said the payment was to be made quarterly, in arrears, and there was to be indexing. By 2010 this cap had reached an amount of $7,778 per child per year. The cuts that the amendments in this bill introduce will see some $278 per child per year having to be found by families in addition to what they are currently paying. This is a serious impost on a great many families. Of course, the point about all of this is that women’s workforce participation rates in our country are extremely low. Ours is amongst the lowest in the OECD in terms of women aged between 25 and 44 years, the prime childbearing years, participating in the workforce. There are reasons for that. We do not do very well at all as a nation in offering flexible workplace arrangements, job sharing and working from home—but, in particular, we do not offer enough support for families, who are having to pay up to $100 and more per day for child care. The Henry tax review highlighted the issues and problems associated with the workforce participation rates of our 25- to 44-year-old women. The government had asked Mr Henry to make coherent recommendations to ensure appropriate incentives for, among other things, increased workforce participation. So, when the Treasury department working paper was delivered in April 2010, it said: … in contrast with previous Australian estimates, the cost of child care does have a statistically significant and negative effect on the labour supply of married mothers. This finding supports policy that reduces the costs of child care to encourage maternal labour supply … On average, a gross price increase of one per cent in child care would be expected to reduce the hours worked by married women with young children by at least 0.7 per cent. This finding from the Treasury department completely contradicted the 2009 Access Economics report, which suggested that in fact there was no relationship between the costs of child care and, if in fact there were to be increases in fees as a result of the COAG reforms, they would not impact on a mother’s decision to return to the workforce. Clearly, that was nonsense; and now we have the Treasury department working paper of April this year overturning that previous, erroneous Access Economics report. For working families, anticipating that there will be up to a $22 per day increase in childcare fees as a result of the National Quality Standard for Early Childhood Education and Care changes, you can imagine the blow that this reduction in childcare support will deliver. For example, in a National Child Care Alliance Australia survey, in which 1,000 parents were surveyed, over 79 per cent of parents of children attending long-day care centres said that, if there were any higher fees at all, they could not afford to have their child continue at a childcare centre. And we know what the consequences are for families not being able to afford professional child care. Mothers have to quit their jobs or contract their working hours, or they turn to their parents, the grandparents—typically the grandmother, and ask her to take over the informal care. When that means the grandmother has to leave her paid employment to take up that childcare responsibility, so we have two victims of the Labor government policies—we have the mother herself, who is no longer able to be earning superannuation and salary in order to build her savings for her retirement, or to build her career; and we have the grandmother, also with a contracting capacity to earn for herself, to have an independent retirement. It is no surprise that over 73 per cent of people on the aged care pension are women, and that problem is increasing under Labor. So we have to argue very strongly against this business of reducing the support for families who must buy their child care. Minister Ellis said at the time of the announcement of these reductions that it was not a real problem; it was only the rich families who would be affected—fewer than three per cent of families would be impacted. Those families, she implied, did not deserve any support anyway, because they were, in her words, ‘rich’. Well, I am afraid she got it very wrong on a number of counts. In particular, if you are a working family with a child having to attend a high-cost inner-city long-day childcare centre for four or five days a week, you will almost certainly be over the current rebate cap level. And, of course, any child in regional Australia who has to attend long-day care centres for more than three days a week incurs fees that also come out at or above the threshold. It is not a matter of being rich. It is not about this government penalising or punishing the rich by reducing the rebate cap. That is just a bit of an attempt to invoke some sort of ancient concept of class wars that I thought Australia got over long ago. The freezing of the rebate indexation for four years will see thousands of families forced to pay 100 per cent of any increases in fees that occur. And we know that those increases in fees are in the pipeline because, as I said, we have the COAG National Standards Quality Assurance Program coming down the line. We do not object to improved quality in child care and early childhood services, of course. But we do object to the higher costs having to be met by families who cannot afford to pay. We also know that the new COAG quality standards agenda, which has been fully endorsed of course by this federal government, will also reduce the number of childcare places, particularly for smaller children, the nought- to three-year-olds. In Queensland, for example, they have calculated there could be a loss of up to 8,000 places in child care as a consequence of reducing the ratio of children to staff and requiring smaller groups to be supported in childcare centres. So it is a bad news scenario for those working families who aim to balance their working lives and family commitments by accessing affordable, quality child care. The childcare rebate should also ideally have been made payable to parents weekly in arrears. This government made a commitment to change the way that the childcare rebate would be paid. That was an election commitment, but we have seen none of those changes. Given that the childcare rebate can be accessed when an account is rendered but not necessarily paid a number of families are finding themselves in very embarrassing situations, with the rebate in their pockets but the fees not paid—and that rebate having to be used for other essential household costs, including the mortgage and buying food. The whole business is getting more and more difficult all the time. You might think this is the only thing that this government has done. Perhaps it was an oversight—perhaps the minister was not as influential as she should have been around the budget table—but in fact the reduction of this childcare rebate is just part of a long list of attacks upon working families and on their access to affordable, decent childcare services. Let us go to a few more of the problems on the list. We know that the first of the 260 childcare centres that were to be built—that were promised in a campaign commitment by Labor—hugely blew out their budgets. They came in at almost double the initial expected costs. It was shades of the incompetence of the Building the Education Revolution program in handling tenders and in handling the building of public infrastructure. Because of the blow-outs in costs in the first couple of multipurpose childcare and early childhood education centres, this government has run away from their commitment at a million miles an hour. We will be lucky if we will see 38 centres built but the excuse used by the minister when she sadly told us about this outcome was that, ‘There is a surplus of childcare places around the country.’ Well, talk to some people in inner Sydney or in the electorate of Murray and tell them that although they have been waiting two years for a place in child care for their child or children this government believes there is a surplus of childcare places. The truth is that in a few parts of Australia—in some outer suburban areas—due to the abolition of proper planning processes by this government, there has been an oversupply of childcare centres. But you cannot claim that there are no problems at all across Australia in obtaining a place and then cancel a commitment to build 260 new centres. That is just a nonsense and no-one is swallowing that line. Then we had very recently the announcement of the loss of federal support for occasional care. Occasional care is another professional option for parents who perhaps want their socially isolated children to have some playgroup experience. This is particularly important for rural and remote areas. And occasional care is essential for families who suddenly have a medical appointment, for example, or some other family crisis, and they do not have a mother or mother-in-law or some other relative living within easy reach. They need that access to occasional child care. This federal government has chosen to walk away from funding support for that very important childcare option. This government has decided to abolish the access to the start-up grants for family day care. Each grant was worth about $1,500. They were essential for women—they were almost universally women—to modify their homes so that they could offer professional child care. Often for these women it was a first step for them back into the work force or into a small business. These women often had to change or modify their homes, with different safety measures—different doorways perhaps or different locks on gates—and so on. So that $1,500 start-up grant was very important. It often made the difference between the woman being able to start the business or not being able to. That grant has been abolished. We have also had the abolition of the rural and regional version of that long day care grant. That was worth substantially more but it has been abolished. We have been told that long day care centres with part-time child care in the more remote parts of Australia are under threat because Minister Ellis does not like the idea of part-time childcare centres being opened. She is only granting them six months of registration or accreditation at a time. SE4 Bishop, Bronwyn, MP Mrs Bronwyn Bishop interjecting— EM6 Stone, Dr Sharman, MP Dr STONE —She does not seem to understand, or perhaps she does not like children. I have to say that now small towns, across the wheat belt of Western Australia in particular, are not able to attract professional staff because they just have a six-month lifeline in terms of federal support. The minister has suggested that such part-time centres would be at greater risk of closing. She has made sure, absolutely sure, that these centres will close. The point about these small centres in places like Corrigin, Darkin and so on, is that they are in very small communities. But the women in those places still often need to have a salaried job beyond the farm to supplement their husbands’ income. And they do not have, just because they are rural women, any great access to a mother, a mother-in-law or some other neighbour who will take on their children out of charity or because of a sense of family responsibility. These families need professional, accessible, affordable child care in the same way that suburban and metropolitan families do. But they are small communities so they cannot have, and do not want, seven-day-a-week or five-day-a-week, eight-hour-a-day child care. They only want a part-time service. That is what they want; that is what they need; and that is what we, when we were in government, supported. This government does not understand. They are simply saying, ‘You’ll have to live with six months accreditation, and if you are not happy then you know what to do about it.’ We even had new centres that were hoping to start up, particularly in the wheat belt of Western Australia. They are now saying that they cannot afford to start up if they will not have ongoing accreditation as part-time centres. This is just shameful. I am so saddened to think of those communities having a contraction of essential services because this government either does not care or does not understand. It is a very sad circumstance. We also have a problem with our children with special needs. As we all know, special needs children often need more attention, and at the moment we only have a subsidy set at $15.74 an hour. Most childcare centres have a cost of at least $25 per hour to support the special skills and experience required of the employee who will look after those special needs children. So how are these centres going to continue to offer the special inclusion support for special needs children when there is that huge differential between what is offered, $15.74 per hour, and, on average, the cost of $25 per hour? Those same families are also going to find their rebate slashed. This is the sort of problem we are facing with this government, which is absolutely out of touch and not caring about the future. We have to say that child care is not a luxury. It is not an option for a mum who wants to play some tennis instead or go to the bingo halls. Perhaps that is what the minister thinks it is all about. Well, it is not about that at all. It is about women who have a need, because of their own career development or because of the financial pressures of their own households, to access professional and affordable child care. Such women should not be forced to ask their mothers, the grandparents, to sacrifice their earning capacity to fill the need that this government has now created. It is not fair to the grandparent—the grandmother, typically—nor to the family. We just have to look at Labor’s Paid Parental Leave Scheme to see how little they actually think of working families in Australia. We have waited so long for a paid parental leave scheme in Australia. We now only have the USA without a mandated universal scheme for its families. You would think that having beaten their chests and said that they are all for working families and women, this government would produce a paid parental leave scheme equal to world best—at least. No, what they have put on the table is a disgrace. We have already said that women often have a fractured working life because of parental responsibilities, particularly those women in the key child-bearing age group between 20 and 34. They drop in and out of the workforce. They go into part-time work and then back into full-time work while they juggle their family responsibilities. One of the problems that that produces is a fractured superannuation history and a fractured time in which they can accumulate savings or even something like long-service leave. What has this government done in relation to superannuation for women taking paid parental leave? They have ignored the issue altogether. They have said ‘We will think about it in a couple of years, maybe.’ I suppose that is code for: ‘We are sending the country broke with our debt and deficit. We are busy chasing our biggest growth generator in the country, the mining industry, offshore.’ But, sadly, the sector that is to take the brunt of that miscalculation and shambolic government is the working women of Australia. They are not to have superannuation during their paid parental leave. We know too that six months is an optimal time for a woman who has just given birth to establish exclusive breastfeeding if she wants to and can. Six months is the optimal time of bonding with that newborn and six months off work is also the optimal time for that woman to recover from that pregnancy. Labor itself acknowledged that during the time of the Productivity Commission’s report. So what did this government put on the table for paid parental leave? What time frame? A miserable 18 weeks. Not even five months. Just a bit over four months—how disgraceful. But they said: ‘That’s all right. We are just making that short-term offer because women can go and access private paid parental leave schemes or the schemes in the public service to top-up our miserable offering.’ Women who currently have access to paid parental leave, and many women in the Australian economy do have access to paid parental leave, are the higher paid women with over $1,200 salary a week, women in the public service, women in the defence forces and women in the finance and banking sector. You ask the woman serving in a shop, in the retail sector, in hospitality and tourism and the seasonal worker; you ask my fruit-picking women or women working in dairies as milkers; you ask the casual woman and the self-employed woman if they have access to an alternative paid parental leave scheme to top-up Labor’s miserable cheapskate offering. I am sorry. They do not have that alternative. So Labor’s scheme simply perpetuates the haves and have-nots amongst women in our society right now. What a mean thing to do. I have to say that I am, quite frankly, disgusted by it. I am disgusted that the trade union movement is not up there screaming about this problem, marching outside Parliament House, demanding a better deal. Then we have the problem that it is only to be paid at the minimum wage—this is Labor’s Paid Parental Leave Scheme. If you are on more than the minimum wage your mortgage is going to reflect that, as are your other household expenses. So, quite simply, using the calculator—very deliberately supplied by the Labor government on its website—the woman over the minimum wage will do the calculations and realise, sadly, that she is not able to take that parental leave. Financially, she will be better off staying on the baby bonus. This is the baby bonus that we introduced as a coalition. What a sad, sad day. I have to say that this government stands condemned for that miserable performance. They have also made it so difficult for small businesses and other businesses to manage the pay process for their employees on paid parental leave that I am somewhat fearful that some of our small businesses will say: ‘I have to manage her pay, and we are still not sure what the payroll implications of that are and we are still not quite sure what it means for workers compensation and other add-on costs that employing people generates in this country.’ Those small businesses, when they are faced with two equally talented people applying for a job with them, may then choose the older woman, which will be fine—or the man—but not the woman of childbearing age. What a terrible indictment of this government and what a sad impact of their Paid Parental Leave Scheme, which is so miserable, so inadequate, that that could be the consequence. Of course Labor has realised that they have stuffed this up and that they have a shambolic piece of legislation in the form of the Paid Parental Leave scheme. They somehow have not managed in their two years to liaise sufficiently with the states in relation to the payroll tax implications. As a government they are so concerned about the impacts of the extra red tape and cost burdens of their scheme on small business that they are giving businesses six months off while the Family Assistance Office does the job for them. The Family Assistance Office will continue on, and handle the payroll issues for casual women employees and women who are self-employed. So why could you not have the Labor government engage the Family Assistance Office to manage the payrolls for women on the Paid Parental Leave scheme right throughout the economy? What a ridiculous way to have gone. The coalition has a superb scheme on the table—it will be world’s best practice, but we will have to wait until we are in government to implement it. It will deliver superannuation and it will deliver, in addition to six months leave, two weeks for the non-primary carer, who will typically be the father, so he too can engage in those precious first months of the baby’s life. It will also include replacement of the primary carer’s wage or the minimum wage, whichever is greater, capped at $150,000. Most importantly, to ensure there is no further discrimination against child-bearing age women, the Family Assistance Office will take care of payments under the Paid Parental Leave scheme. We will completely leave that extra burden and red tape and administration cost off the business sector. Many parents and potential parents have said to me just how disappointed they are with the Labor scheme, and I know that they are simply marking time until we are in government and can fix it all. This brings me back to this particular bill, which is part of the horrific series of difficulties that Labor is visiting on working families, particularly women with children and childcare needs. It is going to reduce the childcare rebate by some $270 a year—this is the cap—despite the fact that we all know childcare fees are going to substantially increase under the new quality standards regime. If parents are looking forward to the time when their children go off to school and think that will be a relief in terms of childcare needs, we all know childcare needs continue on in terms of holiday care program needs or after- or before-school care. There is no surprise if I tell you that Labor has just defunded the active community school care programs, which engage 150,000 children across Australia in more than 300 schools. Just when you thought it might have been a relief for you, when the children move from up-to-four-year-old child care into preschool and then into the school system where there might be a better prospect for them that they could afford, no, Labor has made sure that that is also going to be a time of extraordinary ongoing difficulty for families who must have that care. It seems that families, particularly families with younger children, are bearing the brunt of this government’s failure to manage our economy, its failure to understand that you must get value for money when you throw billions of dollars into something like a frenetic building program aimed at schools in particular and when you throw billions of dollars at something like the Home Insulation Program, which has endangered lives, and has in fact led to four deaths, and put honest workers out of jobs. It is a tragedy to think that one part of our community which is hurting most as a consequence of all of that are our families with young children, particularly as they reach out to try and juggle their working lives with their family responsibilities. We want our families to feel secure in where they take their children in their younger years. We want them to access an affordable childcare service but, sadly, this government is making sure there is nothing but chaos and heartbreak. I certainly feel that this childcare budget measure is ill-conceived. It only saves $83 million over four years, and when you think about it that is not very much when you are inflicting so much damage and so much distress on so many families. 5039 19:20:00 Rea, Kerry, MP HVR Bonner ALP 1 0 Ms REA —I rise to support the Family Assistance Legislation Amendment (Child Care Budget Measures) Bill 2010. I acknowledge the comments made by the previous speaker, the member for Murray, in so far as I have never heard a half an hour of such breathtaking hypocrisy in my life. She was a member of a government that sat on the executive benches for 11 years and did absolutely nothing to support working women in this country. We heard a 15-minute diatribe about paid parental leave, which I should remind her was actually voted on yesterday. My understanding is that it was actually supported by the opposition; nonetheless, her disinterest in what is really happening in child care was such that she spent half of her speech attacking the government’s Paid Parental Leave scheme on the basis of some hypothetical policy that her leader dreamt up somewhere between other activities, and he used it as a sound bite. He had given it no thought; he had no understanding of the needs of working women, and he certainly had no understanding of a fair and equitable paid parental leave policy. So we had 15 minutes of her attacking something that we have achieved in just under three years and that they had 11 years to implement. But let us get back to the substance of this legislation. If you listened to the bit of the speech of the member for Murray that referred to child care, you would think that this legislation is a piece of doom and gloom and that it is apparently a sad indictment of the government’s approach to child care. I offer a couple of fundamental facts that she did not actually acknowledge and some very important principles. The first fact is that we are looking at an implementation of the government’s election commitment. We went to the election with a policy of a 50 per cent rebate up to $7½ thousand. Under the previous government it was a 30 per cent rebate with a cap of $4,354. So it means that a significant number of families in this country are far better off under this government’s childcare policy. I accept that the measures contained within this legislation do introduce a cap and do put a stop on indexation for four years. It is a saving of $86.3 million. The overall budget that has been delivered by the Rudd government on child care is in excess of $16 billion. The family assistance that is direct support for child care is $14.4 billion. That is an increase of $8 billion over the last four years of the Howard government. So anyone who was a member of that government, who sat on the government benches, and who now gets up to say that this legislation is an indictment of the government—a government that has increased childcare funding by $10 billion on top of theirs—can be nothing more than a hypocrite. What are also really important are the principles under which the Rudd government’s childcare policies and legislation have been developed. I believe that in fact the legacy of the first term of this Rudd government will be its commitment to the working families and, in particular, to the working women of this country. We see a $10 billion increase in childcare funding and we see paid parental leave for the first time in this country. No wonder, as the previous speaker said, the workforce participation rates of women of child-bearing age in Australia are abysmal. It is because we have never had a paid parental leave scheme before and we have never had real funding to support families in terms of child care. Eight hundred thousand families benefit from direct assistance through our childcare scheme, through the childcare rebate of 50 per cent with a $7½ thousand cap. I acknowledge that there will be families who will have to pay a bit more on their childcare bills as a result of these measures. It is about three per cent of the families that receive childcare assistance. On average their bills will go up by something like $5 a week. But I would say that the families who are seeking childcare assistance will also understand the current economic context—the current financial situation that the globe is in, not just Australia—and there will be an acceptance that we are being responsible with our budgeting. I think that if we can find $86 million with a very small but responsible cut which actually honours our election commitment a lot of families will accept that, because they support this government not only halving peak debt but in fact committing to then pay off the debt three years earlier than was first expected. So I think there will be a level of understanding, because I give working families out there in the community much greater credence than the member for Murray does when it comes to understanding the balance between services and the need to be financially responsible. What is also significant about this government’s approach to child care is that we do not just talk about child care as babysitting or child care as a support for working women. We have actually said that child care is a valuable and essential part of a child’s development in itself. It goes to the fact that early childhood is in the Education portfolio. That is the second prong of our approach to child care. I would say that the Rudd government’s approach has actually been visionary, because not only do we put significant dollars into affordability but we put significant dollars into quality. We have said that it is no longer a babysitting service, that it is a fundamental part of a child’s development and education and that, whilst we want to support working women and we want to make their contribution to the workforce properly valued and recognised, we also want funding to go to child care as a service that is important for the child itself. So we do seek support for national data collection, for an index which actually gives us the data we need to appreciate how important that service is for a child’s development and how it can be improved. We also support the reducing of the staff-to-children ratios. Whilst affordability is fundamentally important, every single working parent knows that if you have confidence in the quality of the centre that your child goes to it makes an enormous difference to you and to the wellbeing of your family. The pressure and concern as to the quality of the service is taken off your shoulders because you know that your child is enjoying, and learning from, the service that they go to and is not simply there to be babysat while you are working. It is also fundamentally important that the Rudd government has put money into Indigenous early childhood development. We have put money into the home interaction program for disadvantaged children. We have put money into rolling out universal access to early learning, so that by 2013 all Australian children will have access to preschool or kindergarten. What this government is doing with child care is revolutionising it. It is showing that we will put our money where our mouth is when we talk about financial support and assistance for those families who need it. I remind you, Madam Deputy Speaker Burke, that we are increasing funding by $10 billion over and above the last four years of the Howard government. On top of that we are acknowledging child care as a fundamental part of a child’s development and education. We are actually putting money into the quality of the service that is provided. We are acknowledging the needs of rural and regional Australia. We are acknowledging the needs of disadvantaged children. Debate interrupted. 5041 Adjournment 10000 Burke, Anna (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Ms AE Burke)—Order! It being 7.30 pm, I propose the question: That the House do now adjourn. 5041 5041 19:30:00 Fletcher, Paul, MP L6B Bradfield LP 1 0 Mr FLETCHER —I rise to speak about the recently released implementation study into the Rudd government’s proposed National Broadband Network. That report reveals the huge financial risk to which this project exposes taxpayers. But it also reveals how the National Broadband Network threatens the longstanding objective of telecommunications policy in Australia, which is to unleash the power of competition to serve the long-term interests of end users. Competition has delivered significant price reductions. According to the ACCC, in the decade to 2008, average real prices for fixed line services fell by 32.3 per cent, but it now seems that the objective of stimulating competition comes second to building the National Broadband Network. NBN Co. is designed to be the monopoly wholesale supplier with all retail companies purchasing services from that company. This has worrying implications for competition and for end users. For one thing, it could mean that people who today take the basic voice service—a monthly line rental of around $30 for Telstra’s most popular home line plus plan—are facing a significant price increase. In fact, the average price is slightly lower than $30; it is around $28. The implementation study on page 268 proposes a wholesale price for a voice-only service of $25 to $30. When you add on to that the extra costs that a retailer will need to incur—including sales and marketing, billing, switching—this implies a retail cost of at least $35 to $40 a month. There is no convincing explanation in the implementation study of how the existing pricing of basic voice services will be maintained in a world where all retailers are supplied by NBN Co. as the monopoly wholesale provider. So a policy designed to deliver high bandwidth services to all may have a nasty side effect: those who do not want such services may be forced to pay more for the basic services they do want. What is more, the implementation study recommends that the wholesale price charged by NBN Co. should increase every year in real terms. This will feed through into rising retail prices, a sharp reversal of the long-term trend of falling prices shown in the ACCC’s work which I mentioned earlier. Can we rely upon the government to prevent such price increases? That seems very unlikely, given that the government will be the 100 per cent owner of NBN Co. and will therefore face a severe conflict of interest, because as the owner it will want that company to do well financially and that will conflict with its stated policy objective of stimulating competition in telecommunications. This conflict is not new. It was the desire to resolve such a conflict which was a very significant reason for the Howard government pursuing its policy of privatising Telstra. Now that problem is going to come back again under the Rudd government’s NBN policy. We are already seeing that conflict play out with scope creep and efforts to expand the role of NBN Co. This company was supposed to be wholesale only, but legislation introduced into parliament recently would permit it to serve retail customers if the minister authorises that. The long-term market structure implications are equally troubling. By establishing NBN Co. as the dominant player in fixed line telecommunications, the Rudd government will make it harder for competition to flourish. New entrants will be very reluctant to take on a company with generous financial support from government and, even if they do, they face another remarkable recommendation in the implementation study, which is that new entrants should be burdened with an additional impost if they do enter—all designed to protect the position of NBN Co. This is not a set of policy approaches which is likely to maintain the current trend of downward retail prices. It is not in the interests of competition and it is not in the interests of end users. It is a regrettable consequence of an ill-thought-through policy and one which will not serve the interests of telecommunications users in Australia. There are many other aspects of the implementation study which raise similar concerns and Australians are entitled to ask: what is going to be the impact of the National Broadband Network on competition and on pricing for basic services? (Time expired) 5042 5042 19:35:00 Bradbury, David, MP HVW Lindsay ALP 1 0 Mr BRADBURY —I rise to express my anger at the proposal from the opposition to rip away funding that has been allocated for computers for schools in relation to the digital education revolution—the computers in schools program. This has been a wonderful program. In my community this has delivered enormous benefits to local students. The first round of computers that were allocated under this program went to those schools which had less than one computer for every eight students. They were the first round of students that received funding under this program. They were given priority because they were the schools that were in greatest need. There were a large number of schools in my electorate that received funding under that first round, which meant that in their schools there was, on a ratio basis, less than one computer for every eight students. As a consequence of the Rudd government’s efforts in relation to this policy, we have reduced that ratio right across my electorate to one computer for every two students and we are determined to go all the way to achieve a 1:1 ratio for all students from years 9 to 12 in the various schools in my electorate. I was outraged to see that the opposition has come forward with a proposal to rip away the heart of the digital education revolution, the computers in schools program. This will mean some 120,000 kids across Australia will be robbed of their opportunity to have a computer. It will be ripped away before they even have the opportunity to log on. That is a retrograde step. It will rip away the opportunities that this government has worked so hard to provide. What will that mean in my local community? I think it is important that each and every school in my community which is to be robbed of these computers knows exactly how many computers it is going to miss out on. Penrith Christian School will miss out on 23 computers; St Paul’s Grammar School, 60 computers; Nepean District Christian School, five computers; Penrith Anglican College, 44 computers; Wollemi College, three computers; St Dominic’s College, 82 computers; Caroline Chisholm College, 72 computers; McCarthy Catholic College, 64 computers; Xavier College, 57 computers; Colyton High School, 60 computers; Chifley College Dunheved, 28 Computers; St Mary’s Senior High School, 102 computers; Cambridge Park High, 40 computers; Kingswood High, 58 computers; Nepean High, 41 computers; Penrith High, 72 computers; Cranebrook High, 62 computers; Kurrambee School, seven computers or their equivalent—Kurumbee is a special school; Glenmore Park High, 54 computers; Jamison High School, 73 computers; and Putland School, six computers. After 3,000 computers have been delivered in my electorate, we now have a situation where every one of those schools I have just listed will have those computers taken away. The funding will be taken away before the students even get the opportunity to log on. This is a disgrace. I do not yet have an opponent running against me in my electorate, but I am determined to make sure that every parent and student at these schools knows what a travesty they are being subjected to. Money that has already been allocated to provide funding for computers in their school will be ripped away if there is a change of government, as those on the other side propose, and that would be a backward step. As I said, we have already made such great gains in my local community. There were so many schools that could not even meet that ratio of one computer to eight students, and we have made the massive improvement of now achieving a ratio of at least one computer for every two students. We need to go further. We need to make sure that every student between years 9 and 12 has a computer. That is the commitment that we made at the last election. I hear a lot from those on the other side about the failure of the government to deliver on its commitments. We have delivered on this commitment, and we will deliver on it in full by the time that we set. But the most significant threat to that is the intervention of an election and the possibility that people might be left with an Abbott government, which will rip away that funding and deprive people in my electorate. (Time expired) 5043 5043 19:40:00 Scott, Bruce, MP YT4 Maranoa NATS 0 0 Mr BRUCE SCOTT —I rise in this parliament to bring to the attention of this government an issue that is plaguing the people of Blackbutt and Benarkin at the eastern end of my electorate of Maranoa. In fact, Blackbutt and Benarkin are in the region of the South Burnett. The issue is their postcode. It may sound minor, but it is causing major problems, which I will outline to the House. The Blackbutt-Benarkin region is a small rural area of maybe 1,000 people, and it has been given the same postcode as the city of Ipswich, which has around 150,000 people and is about 130 kilometres south of Blackbutt. Because of the four numbers of their postcode—4306—the people of the region have serious problems getting a fair deal for their insurance, with employment arrangements and even when using the internet to find local providers or services. A Blackbutt constituent came into my office just yesterday because this postcode issue is making it difficult for him to retain employees. He and his wife run a horticultural farming enterprise. They employ six to 10 backpackers, as well as locals, to help run their business. The backpackers are on 12-month visas and some want to stay, but to do this they must be considered to be working in a rural area. However, because Blackbutt has the same postcode as Ipswich, it is considered to be part of a metropolitan area and therefore these backpackers cannot stay. Another employer from Benarkin visited me. Because of the postcode, he was entitled only to a $1,500 apprenticeship payment, not a $4,000 payment from the federal government’s apprentice employment incentives program. We have had numerous complaints about how the postcode has pushed up insurance premiums because Blackbutt’s perceived level of risk is associated with the much larger city of Ipswich, with which Blackbutt and Benarkin share the same postcode. Blackbutt and Benarkin locals have to use Yarraman’s postcode to get accurate data on things like Elders’ weather website or when searching the internet to find a local business. Yarraman is about a 15-minute drive from Blackbutt. Its postcode is 4614. Blackbutt’s is 4306, which is the same as that of Ipswich. Australia Post has said that insurance companies, which base their policies on postcodes, are to blame for Blackbutt-Benarkin’s plight. It says it will only change a postcode if there is a significant benefit to the processing and delivery of mail. So, in essence, Australia Post says it is not its problem. It recommended that residents talk directly with their insurers. So, on behalf of my constituents, I wrote to the Banking and Financial Services Ombudsman. I was told that the issue was beyond the powers of the ombudsman to investigate. I then wrote to the Insurance Council of Australia. Their best advice: ask your constituents to shop around for a competitive insurance product. Not wanting to give up, I then wrote to the ACCC explaining that it was unfair that people in a small rural area should be lumped in with the people of a large city 130 kilometres away. The ACCC responded with a friendly letter that basically told me I had no chance of getting the postcode changed through their channels. I have exhausted almost every possibility to try to get the problem rectified. I am calling on the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy to intervene. I will be submitting a private member’s motion. However, I wanted to bring this issue to the attention of this parliament now because I am not sure for how much longer we will be in this place before an election. I will also be writing to the minister in a last-ditch attempt to get a fairer go for the people of Blackbutt and Benarkin and the many other communities such as Bedourie and Yaraka in very remote parts of my electorate of Maranoa which are experiencing the same difficulties with their postcode. The same issues affect them as affect Blackbutt and Benarkin. 5044 5044 19:45:00 Symon, Mike, MP HW8 Deakin ALP 1 0 Mr SYMON —Volunteers make a significant contribution to our community in so many different ways. Many services that our community relies upon would just not be there if it were not for volunteers, who take the time out of their busy lives to help other people. In my electorate of Deakin we have numerous organisations that are reliant upon a band of committed volunteers. Recently, as part of National Volunteer Week, I contacted each of these groups asking if I could provide volunteers with a special certificate and, where possible, I have personally handed out many of the certificates. It is important that people receive recognition for all their work; it helps for them to know how appreciated their efforts are. When I visit local community organisations I am always so impressed with the passion and commitment shown by local volunteers, who just love what they are doing. In all, I have prepared more than 500 individual certificates for local volunteers, thanking them for all their work and recognising their importance to everyone in our community. I am very happy to be part of recognising their efforts. On 20 May I visited the Lionsbrae aged-care facility in Ringwood East, where at a ceremony I presented certificates to 25 volunteers to personally thank them for their efforts. Volunteers at Lionsbrae perform a large range of duties, assisting people in community housing and serving meals to people in the associated soup kitchen. Volunteers facilitate a quilting program, manage the newly opened Men’s Shed, drive the bus and provide tutoring in computing, and a local schoolteacher helps residents who need assistance to continue their education. Volunteers awarded the certificates at Lionsbrae include: Pat Banner, Rose Spada, Edward Wilkinson, Colin Turpee, Lyn Milewczyk, Greg Lacey, Grant Moss, June Wells, Geraldine Joseph, Bob Donsen, Pam Myers, Barb Moss, Julie Groves, Margaret Curmi, Patricia Hird, Christine Grace, Grant Moss, Sue Breese, Dennis Kay, Pam Richards, Lesley Cooper, Margaret Downes, Bill Port, Beryl Port, Helen Maywald, Coral Boyle, Tony Christodoulou and Peter Middleton. This is just one example of what volunteers contribute to a local organisation. Red Cross emergency first aid volunteers were active during the 2009 bushfires in Victoria helping to support those who had lost so much. Many of the local groups in my area travelled to those fire affected areas for long periods of time. Heathmont Scout Group volunteers are refurbishing a water tower and turning it into an abseiling tower for the local scouting group. Pope Road Kindergarten in Blackburn has a wonderful band of volunteers who form the committee and do all the hard, ongoing, grinding work that is needed to keep a local kinder operating. Certificates have been presented to: Rhonda Allen, Megan Kneebone, Danielle Johnson, Susan Werner, Justin Whitehead, Danny Lee, Vicki Carroll, Marissa Sprout, Nickie Scriven, Natalie Zaibak, Jo McKenzie and Justine Mansell. At Meals on Wheels, volunteers Kevin Southey and Margaret Keert have received volunteer certificates of recognition. Margaret has been volunteering with Meals on Wheels for over 30 years. Volunteering delivers amazing local outcomes and nationally it also makes a huge impact. According to the most recent available data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, in 2006-07 the estimated value of volunteer time was $14.6 billion. The federal government is aware of the importance of volunteering and provides volunteer grants to assist local organisations train and support volunteers. In last year’s volunteer grants round, over $160,000 was granted to local volunteer and community organisations in my electorate of Deakin. Those grants went towards purchasing small equipment such as computers, shade sails, air-conditioners and tools, as well to cover the cost of training and petrol. These grants make a huge difference to the organisations, as they provide extra resources to support the efforts of volunteers who are giving up their time. I wish to commend the efforts of all the local volunteers not only in Deakin but right across Australia. Without their commitment, dedication and passion for what they are doing, so many people would miss out. I am glad to have been able to play my part in making sure those efforts do not go unrecognised. I congratulate the federal government on helping volunteer organisations and I look forward to the distribution of the next round of volunteer grants and seeing the impact at the local level of this investment. 5045 5045 19:50:00 Lindsay, Peter, MP HK6 Herbert LP 0 0 Mr LINDSAY —Kirwan State High School has done it again! Last week the school continued its tradition of outstanding musical entertainment with an astonishingly good production of The Pirates of Penzance. All performances deservedly received standing ovations from enthusiastic audiences. This was the best school production that I have ever attended—and I have seen many. It was an ambitious production, but the school pulled it off—and then some. Reminiscent of the Simon Gallaher and Jon English production of the mid-90s, these high school students wowed audiences for each of their three performances. There were always three areas which needed to be tackled to make this show such a success—firstly, the comedy. Gilbert and Sullivan is no easy task and requires innovative staging and phenomenal acting, both of which Kirwan provided. The cast were so very believable in their respective roles and all played the part as well as any seasoned Broadway actor. Secondly, there is the music. The music in Pirates is challenging for many reasons. Whether it be the operatic range it requires of the lead female, Mabel, or the tricky harmonies of the three sisters and the chorus, or just the sheer tempo of the Major-General’s song, it was obvious on the night that the kids had rehearsed relentlessly. Coupled with a fantastic orchestra made up of teachers, ex-students and students, Kirwan musically delivered the production. Finally, there is the cast itself. With around 100 students from ages 13 to 17 in the cast, it was amazing that the stage never seemed too crowded or busy. It is also important to note that I think no student ever felt insignificant in the cast, with everyone taking on the role of a daughter, pirate or police officer with great conviction. The Kirwan High tradition was established in 1984; 23 shows later, young second-year drama teacher Daniel Last has excelled in his first job as director with an outstanding production of Pirates. The chief architect of the show was Andrew Higgins, a maths teacher and year 12 coordinator, who has now produced a show for Kirwan High annually for the last 13 years. Andrew was ably assisted by vocal director and teacher Suellen Johns, who was a Kirwan High student herself in 1996. Musical director and Head of the Arts at Kirwan High, Dale Hosking, is also a Kirwan High graduate from 2000. Of course a great show like Pirates needs a great choreographer. Dance teacher Chris Davis did this job to perfection. Many parents also supported the production. Anne Sperring’s son Adam was in Dazzle in 1998. She became involved in hair, make-up and costumes and has continued every year since. Her last child Rebecca graduates at the end of this year. Her contribution every Sunday for three months of the year epitomises the contribution of many parent supporters. Pirates of Penzance provided the perfect vehicle for outstanding student talent. It was led by superb soprano Samantha Coleman whose pure voice was perfect for the role of Mabel. Debonair Matthew Ritchie was charismatic as Frederick while Eli Thaiday, a young Torres Strait Islander man whose brother Sam has made a name playing for the Broncos, was a swashbuckling Pirate King. No-one in the audience will forget his chest! The comical James Gilbert played the eccentric Major General role to perfection while Tula Clutterbuck was a feisty Ruth. It is rare for the actors, music, dance, lighting, set and costumes to complement one another to produce such an outstanding result. This was a great testament to just how good state schools can be and it inspires confidence in our youth and our future. After the show a parent of one of the students proudly said this: From a parent’s point of view, our son put in hours and hours night and day—before school, after school, sometimes all day. All the kids did, and it was just an extraordinary effort by all of them. Just talking to our kids after the show, it was just one of those productions where the people who played the characters made them their own. And the ability to draw the entire auditorium, the entire theatre, into the show was extraordinary. Even the band was included in the stage theatre, which was really quite amazing. It was a one in a million production, and a one in a million experience for the kids. Tops to the teachers and tops to the students, Pirates of Penzance was a production which reinforced the fact that music is a language which breaks all barriers, bringing students from all demographics to participate, and brought anyone who saw the show to a side-splitting chuckle! Well done, Kirwan High! 5047 5047 19:54:00 Jackson, Sharryn, MP 00AN2 Hasluck ALP 1 0 Ms JACKSON —When I was previously in the parliament I had the good fortune to become acquainted with local couple Bruce and Bronwyn McDougall. They operate a small family business in Kenwick in my electorate called Uggs-N-Rugs, which has manufactured and distributed ugg boots for more than 30 years. The story, as you may recall, Madam Deputy Speaker, was that two days before Christmas 2003 they, along with most of Australia’s ugg boot manufacturers, were threatened with legal action by US corporation Deckers Outdoor Corporation for calling their products uggs or ugg boots. Deckers had acquired an Australian company, Ugg Holdings, in 1995 and its trademark. This put huge pressure on many small businesses throughout Australia that manufacture ugg boots. Indeed, the threats went to all manner of legal action being taken against them. I am pleased to say that Bruce and Bronwyn retaliated and took on the legal fight—very much a David and Goliath struggle—and some three years later they won. On 16 January 2006 the Australian trademark office handed down a decision that the words ‘ugg’, ‘ugg boots’ and ‘ugh-boots’, all spelt differently, were all interchangeable and the evidence showed that overwhelmingly the words were common generic terms for sheepskin boots in Australia. So in Australia we can still call them uggs. Deckers corporation had the right to appeal that decision by the Australian trademark office, but chose not to do so. Imagine my dismay when I received an email from Bruce and Bronwyn McDougall this week that Deckers ‘were at it again’, now seeking to register the trademark for a stand-alone stylised word ‘ugg’ in class 25 for and on behalf of their corporation. Many people in the industry and the Australian Sheepskin Association have written to IP Australia protesting against this particular application. I know they have also written to the Minister for Trade. The three-year struggle in Australia had a significant impact on these small businesses. They saw substantial job losses; they saw a downturn in their trading and their business turnover, especially with the internet trade becoming more prevalent. And this has been an increasing and ongoing issue for them as only in Australia are we allowed to refer to these products as ugg boots generically. Deckers still have the trademark in most other countries in the world, and have threatened legal action against people like Paypal and eBay and others who trade on the internet for allowing ugg boots to be sold by and from Australian manufacturers. No matter what IP Australia may think, and I hope they see the light when dealing with this particular application by Deckers Outdoor Corporation, I am convinced that ugg boots are an Aussie icon and it is a generic term that is used for sheepskin boots. I would urge the House and the relevant ministers to support these Aussie battlers throughout Australia. And I want to assure the Australian Sheepskin Association, and in particular Bronwyn and Bruce McDougall at Uggs-N-Rugs in Kenwick, that I will be there again for this round against Deckers corporation. It is wrong that an organisation like this is able to use its strength and size to try to force an Australian industry out of business, and it is quite wrong for them to be able to have exclusive use to the word ‘ugg’ in all countries except Australia. For them to be granted the trademark to the term in Australia would allow a deception to go full circle. I urge people, and I particularly urge the registrar and those who deal with these applications for Australian trademarks, to consider the status of the Federal Court case dealing with the Deckers original application and to consider this iconic Australian industry. They also brought to my attention that Australian trademarks have been granted to foreign parties. A number of companies in China have also been able to trademark the words ‘ugg’ and ‘Australia’, and this is interfering with the sale of local products here in Australia. This seems to me an extraordinary thing to do, and I urge the minister responsible for IP Australia to consider how this can be possible. (Time expired) 5048 20:00:00 House adjourned at 8.00 pm 5048 Notices The following notices were given: HRI Kelly, Mike, MP Dr Kelly to move: That, in accordance with the provisions of the Public Works Committee Act 1969, the following proposed work be referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works for consideration and report: HMAS Penguin and Pittwater Annexe Redevelopment, Mosman and Clareville, NSW. B36 Neal, Belinda, MP Ms Neal to move: That this House: congratulates the Australian Women’s Football Squad, the Matildas, for its spectacular victory in the 2010 Asian Football Confederation Women’s Asian Cup over its rivals from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea on Sunday 30 May 2010, specifically: captain Melissa Barbieri, and players Casey Dumont, Lydia Williams, Emma Wirkus, Danielle Brogan, Ellie Brush, Kim Carroll, Clare Polkinghorne, Karla Reuter, Thea Slatyer, Laura Alleway, Joanne Burgess, Tameka Butt, Lauren Colthorpe, Heather Garriock, Elise Kellond‑Knight, Aivi Luik, Collette McCallum, Caitlin Munoz, Ellyse Perry, Sally Shippard, Emily Van Egmond, Amy Chapman, Lisa De Vanna, Kate Gill, Samantha Kerr, Leena Khamis, Kyah Simon, Servet Uzunlar, Sarah Walsh, and coach Tom Sermanni; praises the Matildas for its inspirational leadership to young Australian women and encouraging them to participate in football; and acknowledges the Matildas’ role in the growth of the sport. UK6 Thomson, Kelvin, MP Mr Kelvin Thomson to move: That this House: notes that: Australia needs to reverse its current trend of increasing carbon emissions if it is to contribute to efforts to reduce the risks of climate change; a significant proportion of Australia’s energy use is represented by energy waste, with estimates by researchers suggesting that cost-effective (ie, budget neutral) opportunities exist to reduce energy use in residential and commercial buildings by 30 to 35 per cent; and energy cost are increasing and will continue to do so, placing a growing burden on industry and households; and resolves to: work multilaterally with industry, the community, the government and all opposition parties to ensure that reducing energy waste is considered as a policy opportunity commensurate with its potential for environmental and economic benefit; publicise the findings of the Prime Minister’s Energy Efficiency Task Group and support action for far‑reaching recommendations to create a step change in energy efficiency implementation at the earliest opportunity; and work with the Australian Alliance to Save Energy to ensure that Members of Parliament are well informed on the opportunity that energy efficiency presents to improve Australia’s economic competitiveness and the large contribution that it can make to reducing greenhouse emissions. 2010-06-02 The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Ms AE Burke) took the chair at 9.30 am. 5050 Constituency Statements 5050 5050 09:30:00 Morrison, Scott, MP E3L Cook LP 0 0 Mr MORRISON —As I have regularly stated in this House, the single most important transport issue for the Sutherland shire is the future extension of the F6 freeway. The F6 tunnel extension is the missing link in Sydney’s road system. The F6 extension is simply not on the radar of Labor at a state or federal level, and last week we found out why. Last week we learnt that the New South Wales Premier personally altered a New South Wales transport blueprint to remove all reference to the F6 in order to appease her southern Sydney MPs. It was mentioned with other projects beyond the government’s 10-year funding guarantee, but the Premier ordered transport officials to delete the F6 from the final document. She said it was removed because its development is a long way into the future and will need federal funding to happen. This has always been a state road and the New South Wales state government has delayed work on the F6 to appease the member for Miranda, Barry Collier, who has remained opposed to the project throughout his entire term in parliament. This is a state road. It is not a federal road. It is a state responsibility. There is no more pressing road issue in southern Sydney or in the Illawarra region when you consider the expansion of port activity at Port Kembla and Port Botany, and the growth of the airport and the associated businesses connected with this economic infrastructure. The F6 freeway was planned more than 60 years ago, in a reservation corridor set aside for the purpose of building the freeway, in 1951. To date it has only been built as far as Waterfall just outside of Sydney. North of Waterfall the corridor remains as it has for generations, largely vacant land. In 2007 the coalition went to the federal election with a promise to spend $20 million for a preliminary planning study into the extension of the F6 to ensure it could be shovel-ready at some point in the future. I have not seen any announcements from the Rudd government or the New South Wales Labor government matching this commitment. The people of southern Sydney and the Illawarra have been short-changed by Labor in terms of transport planning in southern Sydney. When Infrastructure Australia and the Labor Party released their list of national infrastructure priorities in May 2009, the F6 was ignored again. This is a project that should be given high priority, especially in terms of the significant economic benefit it would bring to the region. The road extension would connect Sydney airport and Port Botany to the Illawarra region and the expanded Port Kembla. Without this improved rail link, trucks will continue to roll from the Illawarra through the streets of the Sutherland shire heading towards destinations such as the M5 motorway, the airport, Port Botany and the commercial-industrial areas in central and northern Sydney. It is important to get these trucks off these roads and the commuter traffic off suburban streets in the shire, and the F6 extension is a way to do that. The NRMA have been strong supporters of the need to build this road and have formed a task force, of which I was one of the foundation members, which is arguing the case for this road extension to be built. A thousand direct jobs and $3.4 billion in economic benefits would flow from the project, costing $2.3 billion. It is a state responsibility. The coalition in the past has championed this issue over many years and it is time for the Labor Party to get serious about southern Sydney’s road needs. 5051 5051 09:33:00 Price, Roger, MP QI4 Chifley ALP 1 0 Mr PRICE —Firstly, Madam Deputy Speaker, I think you said that it was your melancholy duty to inform the House about how well the Building the Education Revolution program is going in your electorate. I must confess that I suffer from the same problem. There has been $140 million worth of investment in our schools and we have principals that are able to manage the program and manage it very, very well. I think it is true to say that whether it is a Christian school, a Catholic school or a public school, there has been a real air of excitement in my electorate about this unprecedented construction program that is delivering for our students. Of course, for Labor members education is core to our DNA. We sincerely believe in the absolute importance of a good education for our younger generation to be able to achieve their dreams and aspirations. Today I want to talk about computers in schools. It will not come as a shock to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, to know that in Chifley we are information poor—that is, many more households will have Foxtel connected to their TV than will have access to computers for students in their homes. That is why the digital revolution was so important, because it meant that students in years 9, 10, 11 and 12 would have access to computers to further their education. In the age of the information revolution, young people who are not savvy in relation to computers and all that they are capable of delivering really do not face good prospects in the world of work. I am very pleased to say that in the electorate of Chifley we have already funded 3,100 computers, and they have made such a profound difference not only to the students but in fact to the teachers—the teachers are still learning how to take advantage of them to enhance the learning of their students. But, sadly, $700 million earmarked for the Digital Education Revolution has been cut by Tony Abbott. So the rollout of 974 computers, which would ensure every student in my electorate in those years has a computer, has sadly been earmarked by the coalition to be cut. That is going to disadvantage these students, and these students, more than those on the North Shore, more than those in the eastern suburbs of Sydney and perhaps even more than those in the southern suburbs of Sydney, really do need to have access to computers. This is an absolute tragedy for all the schools in my electorate. Whether they are Christian schools, Catholic schools, Coptic schools, public schools—whatever the school—there would be a price paid with such a savage cutback by Tony Abbott. (Time expired) 5051 5051 09:36:00 Jensen, Dennis, MP DYN Tangney LP 0 0 Dr JENSEN —Much of the attention surrounding the government resource super profits tax has been on the impacts of the big new tax on our large mining companies and also on the immediate future of the resource industry. The discussion about the tax has been very Rio, BHP and FMC centric and, as far as the tax is concerned, this is rightly so, as they will stand the most to lose from their investments. There is also a wider issue, though, that the government and the mining industry have yet to identify or address. The issue is the lack of world-class mining discoveries in Australia over the past two decades caused by the soaring costs of exploration. According to those who were involved in initially opening up these great mining assets, long gone are the days when a geologist could simply throw a swag into the back of his four-wheel-drive and trek into the great unknown looking for their next big project. This rising cost of exploration is directly attributed to the level of government regulation implemented at both state and federal levels over the last two decades. While Australian companies can for the moment use existing tier 1 projects to gain a windfall from existing international economic momentum, the question still needs to be asked: why is government regulation impeding exploration and the discovery of new tier 1 projects? A 2009 Geoscience report said the lack of new discoveries is more than compensated for by the discovery of additional resources. But the same report also notes the lack of world-class discoveries in Australia over the last two decades. The report notes that our inventory has been sustained largely through additional resources in known mineral fields, as I mentioned previously. It does not say, however, how long we can maintain the mining industry with relatively high levels of production from existing projects and no new major tenement discoveries. Australian minerals projects are being increasingly ranked by multinational companies against investment returns from other projects worldwide. This has resulted in a number of recent mine closures in Australia. The new mining tax will hurt all Australians. While Australia’s resources stocks are healthy overall, the country’s position as a premier mineral producer is dependent on continuing investment in exploration to locate high-quality resources and to upgrade known deposits to make them competitive on the world market. We need to investigate all of the possible causes in the rise of exploration and discovery costs. If exploration is the backbone of the mining industry, we need to ensure that it is still a relatively easy and cheap process to discover new mineral deposits and ensure Australia remains a competitive mining nation. 5052 5052 09:39:00 Marles, Richard, MP HWQ Corio ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Innovation and Industry 1 0 Mr MARLES —Two weeks ago the Prime Minister came to Geelong to announce federal government funding for the Australian Future Fibres Research and Innovation Centre at Deakin University. It was Mr Rudd’s fifth visit to our city as Prime Minister and his third visit in less than two months. In these visits there is a clear message about the Labor Party in Geelong. Labor has put Geelong firmly on the national agenda. There is no doubt about it. We may have once considered ourselves to be a city that was easily overlooked because that is what happened during the Howard years—but not anymore. The Prime Minister’s first visit was to open Deakin University School of Medicine at Waurn Ponds, and then he was in Corio to chair the community cabinet at Corio Bay Senior College. He has visited Geelong Hospital and seen the progress of the new GP superclinic in Belmont. Two weeks ago, he announced government funding of $37 million towards future fibres research, which will put Geelong in a unique global position to grab the huge opportunities to come with the projected growth in demand for carbon fibre. Rudd government policies are driving investment, developing infrastructure, creating jobs and securing an enviable quality of life for all of us who proudly call Geelong home. Mr Rudd’s visits also tell us that this commitment by the Labor government to secure the best outcome for Geelong is backed up with unprecedented personal support from the Prime Minister. It is support we did not see from John Howard when he was leader of this country, and we have yet to see it from the current Liberal leader, Tony Abbott. While the Prime Minister has taken the time to visit our region five times since the election, Tony Abbott has come but once. This speaks volumes for the contempt that Tony Abbott is showing the people of Geelong. He expects their vote but does not deign to come in person to seek it. Mr Abbott’s only visit to our region created headlines when his car was involved in a near miss on the Princes Highway. The ensuing debate was all about road safety but there was no word from Mr Abbott about what the Liberal Party in government would do for Geelong. It appears that not even a cent has been promised to improve the road he had brought to national attention. We have come to expect this from the Liberal Party in Geelong. Geelong’s Liberal candidates cannot even bring themselves to feign support for the raft of funding cuts their leaders propose for the Geelong region because they know those cuts will drive a knife through the lifeline of support and investment that is currently being provided by the federal government. Out would go the education and health reforms, school and hospital improvements, the Corio Bay Senior College trade training centre which is giving our kids workplace skills, the green car fund, the renewable energy fund and the climate change adaptation fund. The Rudd government is about growing Geelong into a regional city with a liveability ranking that is the envy of the nation. It means our kids are able to find a satisfying local job when they finish studying at Deakin. Kids will be getting the best possible schooling at Chilwell Primary School with its new classrooms, at Newcomb Secondary College with its new language centre and at St Patrick’s School with its new library. They along with students at the 126 other schools are feeling the full benefit of new school facilities. But do not expect the same from the opposition. Vision requires courage and commitment, and they clearly do not have either. 5053 5053 09:42:00 Hawker, David, MP 8H4 Wannon LP 0 0 Mr HAWKER —Today I want to highlight a petition that has been collected in my electorate by two young school students, Leticia Harrison and Matthew Spencer from Terang. The petition read as follows— To the Honourable The Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives This petition from students who lost their work after school at the Terang Home Timber and Hardware Store and other citizens of South West Victoria draws to the attention of the House of Representatives the decision of the Rudd Government to introduce a National Retail Award requiring a three hour minimum of work each day leading to the loss of work by students after school at the Terang Home Timber and Hardware Store and across Victoria. We therefore ask the House of Representatives to call on the Rudd Government to support changes to the National Retail Award which would allow an employer to employ after school employees for less than 3 hours where the employee agrees and where business circumstances require. They have been put in the awful position of having taken on after-school work at the Terang Co-Op only to be told that, because of Labor’s new awards which forbid anyone to work for less than three hours, they, along with a number of other people, have lost their jobs. Frankly, I find it extraordinary that we have a government that is now setting about quite deliberately to stop young students getting work experience. There is no excuse for it. It seems that Labor do not care two hoots about young people who are trying to better themselves by getting work experience after school. All Labor do is toady to the union bosses who say that there has to be a minimum of three hours work. This petition, which has over 1,600 signatures, has been collected by these two young students—and good on them. They have been working very closely with the Liberal candidate for Wannon, Dan Tehan, who has been helping them in a number of ways to try and highlight the problem. The Prime Minister said on 2 February when this issue was raised: … the Office of Fair Work will have their officers speak with the employer and the young people later today. We’ll try and work it through … He went on to say: … we also want to have a fair and balanced system which has got flexibility attached to it. That’s why … the Office of Fair Work, will have its officers deal with these folk, employer, employees, and see what we can work out. That was in February and nothing has happened. There is a hearing, which will hopefully report at the end of this week. But these young people have not even been spoken to. This is absolutely outrageous. But what is extraordinary is that—surprise, surprise—as soon as this matter was raised, the Terang hardware store, the employer of these young people, was hit with a complete audit to search for breaches of the store’s regulations. Unbelievably, the media knew about this before the manager of the store. It is just such an extraordinary coincidence, and I think it speaks volumes about the way in which this Labor government works when it comes to helping young people and, more importantly, working with small business. A survey by the Australian Retailers Association has found that almost 40 per cent of retailers will stop employing students to work after-school shifts and almost 20 per cent will stop employing them altogether. I have many examples in my electorate and I think it is an absolute scandal. Clearly, Labor’s claim that no worker will be worse off is an insult. In fact, Labor is all talk and no action. I commend these young people for getting this petition together. I have great pleasure in tabling it because I believe it highlights the real injustice that has occurred under this Labor government. 5054 5054 09:45:00 Adams, Dick, MP BV5 Lyons ALP 1 0 Mr ADAMS —I believe this government is doing the best thing for Australia with the resource super profits tax. We want to restore the balance to give all Australians a fair return on our resource wealth. Before the last mining boom Australians in my state of Tasmania received $1 in every $3 of mining profits through royalties and charges, but at the end of the boom our share is down to just $1 in $7 because of the super profits that miners are making. Mining profits grew to $80 billion over the decade from 1999 to 2008. At the same time governments around Australia collected an additional $9 billion in revenue. The mineral wealth of each state is not the property of a handful of very rich Australians or overseas corporations and investors; it belongs to us all. So let us share its benefits fairly. We want the Australian community to receive a fair return from the one-off development of its non-renewable resources. This reform is needed to ensure our future. The Australian government should look beyond the windfalls and the booms; we want this industry to be profitable for the long haul. To get the value of our assets, we need to harness the revenue so that we can prepare for the future. We need to keep our economy growing sustainably and do everything we can to create long-term mixed economic opportunities. We need to have the infrastructure to ensure that we can keep all our industries investing and operating here. We only get one chance to make our non-renewable resources work for the nation. Now is the time to talk, to prepare forecasts, to argue the case, to resolve the issues and to get back to our core business of growing this industry safely, sustainability and profitably. We want to reform the tax system so that we can restore the balance to give all Australia’s a fair return from our resource wealth. This reform will enable us to cut company tax by two per cent and improve superannuation for low-income earners. These are very good reforms in our tax system using the super profits to get the best possible return for the Australian people. We need to build the infrastructure that people are calling out for and we need to do it well. We can only dig up these resources once. 5055 5055 09:48:00 Simpkins, Luke, MP HWE Cowan LP 0 0 Mr SIMPKINS —On 14 May I attended a performance by the Woodvale Senior High School symphonic wind orchestra and senior guitars. The performance demonstrated the full range of the students’ orchestral musical capabilities and it was simply outstanding. There was not just music but also dancing and singing. This was part of the full range of performing arts which typifies Woodvale Senior High School’s position in the local community. The school’s senior musicians undertake a tour each year. This year, between terms 1 and 2, the students went to Tasmania. Their tour started in Hobart and included a performance at the Hobart Town Hall. They also performed at the Gaiety Concert Hall in Zeehan and then in Launceston. At a time when teenagers are often looked upon with concern and society so often judges them based upon the actions of a few, it is these sorts of events, the performing arts in particular, that highlight the very best in our young people. Although I am very much a fan of competitive team sports, the performing arts also demonstrate the dedication it takes to be truly successful in this country. But the success that can be achieved by technical ability, training and overall commitment is not a five-minute job. It cannot be achieved on a whim or by luck or by waiting for it to be delivered by someone else. It is only through one’s own hard work, facilitated by teachers and supported by parents, that it can be achieved. I have listened to the musicians from Woodvale Senior High School on many occasions. I have seen them at Waneroo Show each year, as well as at other venues. On every occasion, they have done well. At the Observation City Ballroom on 14 May they were spectacular. Having just returned from their Tasmanian performance, morale was high—and it showed. With the MC work of head girl Aimee Chappell and the solo efforts and the group efforts, it was an excellent performance and highly entertaining. As I listened to the musicians of Woodvale Senior High School I thought for a moment that the northern suburbs of Perth are known more for their strong sporting clubs than for these great musical performances. Then I remembered that three of the musicians in the Australian Youth Orchestra here in Canberra last year were from Cowan—more than any other electorate could claim. The reality, therefore, is that there is a great tradition of music in Cowan and the northern suburbs of Perth. Certainly, from what I have seen, Woodvale’s music program and its musicians are very much at the forefront of that tradition. I congratulate Phil Mullane, of the music department, Principal Paul Leech and all those who have been part of the very strong music culture at Woodvale. I know that the young musicians of Woodvale Senior High School will not all continue with their music to the extent of one day making it into the Australian Youth Orchestra and beyond, but I am certain that the skills, dedication and commitment they have shown so far are the building blocks that will ensure them future success in whatever fields they pursue. I congratulate the staff and students for the Tasmanian tour and the encore performance on 14 May. I wish the students all the best for their futures, whether it is in music or another endeavour. I look forward to the next time I hear Woodvale’s musicians perform. 5056 5056 09:51:00 Turnour, Jim, MP HVV Leichhardt ALP 1 0 Mr TURNOUR —The multi-million-dollar upgrade to the Bruce Highway south of Cairns is now under threat, with the Liberal opposition admitting that, if elected later this year, they will have to cancel projects like this to fund the many road and rail promises they have made elsewhere in the country. The people of the southern suburbs of Cairns have been waiting too long to have this road upgraded to reduce congestion and improve safety. A study, involving extensive consultation, was undertaken 10 years ago to look at this road. All options were considered and the upgrade of the Bruce Highway was considered to be the best option. The Howard government was in power at the time and the then member, Mr Warren Entsch, ignored the study and did very little upgrading of the road during his time in office. Prior to the last election I secured $150 million in funding to undertake works between Sheehy Road and Ray Jones Drive as the first stage of this upgrade. In the last two years, detailed planning for the project has been underway. Three options were released last year for further consultation. The options outline plans for a multi-use transport corridor including public transport, a cycleway and motor vehicle transport. The Queensland Department of Main Roads undertook extensive consultation and I visited businesses and members of the community who may be impacted. We are releasing the final option in the next month or so. We have boiled the options down to one. I want to see work started on this project later this year. We have a multi-billion-dollar upgrade planned over the next 30 years, but $150 million has been secured in this budget. We know that unemployment in Cairns is too high. It was at 10.4 per cent last month, a drop of two per cent from 12.4 per cent in the previous month. We need projects like this to support jobs. This project will support 400 jobs. But the Liberal opposition and the LNP candidate do not support this project. In the Weekend Post on 13 February Mr Entsch was reported as saying that the highway upgrade was not the answer to Cairns’s future traffic needs. Mr Entsch had 10 years to upgrade the road or build an alternative access road and now he is looking to deny families and tradies in the southern suburbs of Cairns a decent and safe road. We know that Mr Abbott and the Liberal opposition support the cancellation of this project, because they have said they would reprioritise the Rudd government’s road plans to pay for their own promises. Asked to explain how they would do this, they said that they would reallocate the $10 billion that we have in our Nation Building Program into other things. A spokesman for their shadow finance minister, Mr Robb, said: ‘You would reprioritise. We would obviously consider all the programs as a whole over the coming months. We will release our details.’ This road is desperately needed. There are schools on either side of this highway. There are tradies trying to get around the place. If there is an accident on this road there is a bottleneck for hours. People desperately want this upgrade. The Rudd government is committed to it and I have money in the budget going forward. But the Liberal opposition are opposed to it. Mr Abbott has said he is going to reprioritise this funding. The people of Cairns will have a real choice later this year. 5057 5057 09:54:00 Oakeshott, Rob, MP IYS Lyne IND 0 0 Mr OAKESHOTT —I start with a quote from a report released this week by the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations entitled Regional participation: the role of socioeconomic status and access. It reads: The Bradley Review of Higher Education observed that three groups remain significantly under-represented in higher education: students from low socioeconomic backgrounds; students from regional and remote areas; and Indigenous students. It is the second of these groups that is the focus of this study. Of the Australian population aged 15-64 years, 27.9 per cent live in regional or remote areas, whereas only 19.2 per cent of the higher education student population indicate that they are from regional or remote backgrounds. Critically, and I complete the quote: Regional and remote access and participation rates, as measured by administrative data, have deteriorated over the last five years. For all we have heard in this place about mining tax and about CPRS, if there is a crisis of confidence on our hands right now it is from regional students and their inability to access, for whatever reasons, education pathways within Australia. I urge all members to treat this as the emergency item that we have to deal with, because the data from government is quite clearly saying that over the past five years there has not just been a decline but a deterioration in access for regional and rural students into education pathways. I make a point I have made before, that place matters. I urge the department of education and everyone here to consider the importance of place for regional students. If you need an example, the Attorney-General’s Department is doing some excellent work in regard to place based thinking. I do not think at the moment the department of education has got the firepower in relation to place based thinking. There is still silo thinking around what vocational education and university education are and how they work in with FaHCSIA and other departments like A-G’s. I would urge greater drive for place based thinking. This report generally starts to rule out access and proximity and the importance of regional student engagement. It does matter. Bricks and mortar campuses do matter in regional areas and there is data to support that that is counter to this report. The third point I would like to make is that I thank the minister very much for the funding in regard to our area starting to lead the nation on this pathway question around vocational education and university access. We are happy to play that lead role for the nation but it is concerning that we are now doing it in the context of a crisis of confidence from regional students disengaging from the education process over the last five years. That should be the talking point today in this parliament. (Time expired) 5057 5057 09:57:00 Hayes, Chris, MP ECV Werriwa ALP 1 0 Mr HAYES —On 22 May I had the opportunity to attend a monument unveiling and celebrations commemorating 35 years that the Vietnamese community have been in Australia. It presented us with an opportunity to remind ourselves of the considerable contributions to Australian cultural achievement that the Vietnamese community has made. The colour, the vibrancy and the diversity have all combined to produce an overall richness of spirit in this country and something that we, particularly in the south-west of Sydney, should be particularly proud of. Prior to 1975 the Vietnamese community in Australia hardly existed. It was not until the fall of Saigon to the North Vietnamese communists on 30 April 1975 that the wave of refugees escaping that regime began. Many of them are resettled in the West, predominantly here in Australia. In fact, approximately 80,000 Vietnamese-speaking Australians live in New South Wales, particularly in the south-west of Sydney. In terms of the monument, special mention must go to Mr Tri Vo, the project manager, who was directly involved in the construction of this monument and its unveiling. It is a very emotive monument that honours the lives and memories of the many fine Australian as well as Vietnamese service men and women who lost their lives so tragically in that conflict. It is also an opportunity to remind ourselves of the human rights challenges still remaining in Vietnam. We pray for the human rights activists currently being prosecuted in Vietnam, and particularly Father Van Ly and the three other activists, Thanh Thuy, Thanh Nghien and Thi Cong Nan. It reminds us that people are still being arrested and detained for their religious and political views. The memorial also commemorates and remembers those hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese people who, whilst escaping the regime in search of freedom, tragically perished in the seas and jungles. It serves as a link between those who survived the conflict in Vietnam and those who unfortunately did not. I trust the memorial will take pride of place in our community and be a national symbol of reconciliation, peace and healing, offering itself as a lesson for all. I also congratulate all involved in the production of the book about the Vietnamese Australian community. In particular, I recognise its project manager, Tien Nguyen. The Vietnamese community is well led in the south-west of Sydney and in New South Wales by the very professional leadership of Thanh Nguyen. I congratulate all involved in this very—(Time expired) 10000 Burke, Anna (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Ms AE Burke)—In accordance with standing order 193 the time for constituency statements has concluded. 5058 Bills R4361 Cognate bills: 5058 Bills R4360 5058 Bills R4359 5058 Debate resumed from 1 June, on motion by Mr Swan: That this bill be now read a second time. 5058 10:01:00 Hawke, Alex, MP HWO Mitchell LP 0 0 Mr HAWKE —I rise this morning to speak about a budget that is threatening the wellbeing of all Australians. The longer the Rudd government are in existence, the more it is apparent that the underpinning of their fiscal and economic strategy is that they are seeking to exploit a myth in Australian culture. This myth in Australian culture is built on the very popular myth of Robin Hood. At every budget opportunity since 2007 Mr Rudd and Mr Swan have cast themselves in the role of Robin Hood. I went and saw the movie the other week, and I want to speak about this myth and how it strongly affects ordinary Australians. That movie does a very good job of showing what is really going on with Robin Hood. In 2007 we saw that it would be the big Robin Hood budget, that somehow we would take from the rich and give to the poor. This was the myth that was cast in modern day Australia. But what is really going on in the current budget is not that the Rudd government are seeking to take from the rich and give to the poor but that they are seeking to take from people who have earned their wealth in Australian society and to use what they take to pay off a mountain of debt, a debt that will peak at $90 billion, with reckless cash splashes, sometimes handed out on completely illogical bases. The Rudd government tell us that now we need to tax the most productive sector of our economy 40 per cent more than we currently do because they are not paying their fair share, that somehow the mining sector has gotten away with a massive rip-off of the Australian people over a long time. In using this popular myth, Mr Rudd and Mr Swan are trying to cast themselves as heroes against the injustice of mining companies escaping fair rates of taxation. In Australia today, the mining sector is the most productive sector of our economy. It already pays substantial rates of taxation, as it should. It already pays good money for the right to prospect and mine minerals and to turn them into commodities. This is not a simple process. The process of production is always a difficult process. The process of successfully investing your capital and making a return on it—and, in the process, producing wealth, employment and growth in our society—is a difficult process, fraught with many dangers. So for the government to say that somehow the mining companies are simply pulling rocks out of the ground on our behalf is a complete and utter furphy. They are indeed producing wealth and it is a difficult process that we ought not to confuse with the days of Robin Hood. Wealth in almost all cases in Australia today is earned. It is earned through hard work. The days of inherited wealth are largely long gone. In modern Australia individuals pay taxation and companies pay taxation. There are myriad laws, taxes, charges, red tape and bureaucracy throughout our state and federal governments that ensure that all the fair and just amounts of taxation are claimed from our corporations and from our individuals. Indeed, many would argue that we have too-high rates of taxation, and it is something that I would endorse—that individual taxation is too high, that other levels of taxation on our corporations and other businesses are still too high today and we need to do more to rein in the level of taxation in Australia. One way that you do not do that is to continue to increase your spending as a government, especially on the basis that we have seen from this government. The government promised a great deal before it came to office in 2007, and now we understand that there are at least 47 identifiable broken promises, including things like takeovers of public hospitals, GroceryWatch, Fuelwatch, the ETS, delivering no budget deficits, delivering GP superclinics—and the list goes on and on. The government is backflipping on the basis that, as it says, ‘The global financial crisis came along, therefore we had to change our entire outlook and of course the budget changed substantially.’ There was a global financial crisis, but as a defence of the government it is very odd. I listened to the appropriations debate yesterday, to Labor member after Labor member, and the member for Solomon said, ‘We are a lucky country; this is how we got through the global financial crisis.’ The member for Solomon says it is pure luck that we got through the global financial crisis. The reality is that we got through the global financial crisis in better shape than many others because of the hard work and preparation by the previous government in setting the fundamentals of the Australian economy in such a way that it prevented us from being sucked down. If members opposite are being honest, they will acknowledge that that was absolutely the case. What is happening around the world right now? What is going on in all the major countries, including Greece and other troubled states of Europe, is that governments are desperately trying to cut spending and reduce deficits in a desperate attempt to claw back their positions. Yet what is the Australian government doing in this budget? They are trying to scramble back from the $315 billion debt they were going to send us into in the last budget; they are trying to desperately claw it back in. The answer that they perpetually get up in here to rant about is that debt and deficit are somehow our salvation, saying that, ‘If we did not spend, spend, spend as a government in the last year, we would be in a worse position.’ I saw a great graph from Treasury about the projected impact of the global financial crisis and the actual impact of the global financial crisis, and the impact of the stimulus spending in averting the global financial crisis. For the amount of money that we as a country and as a government spent on these handouts, it was not worth it for that small change that happened. Why was it not worth it? Because you do not govern from year to year. You do not govern for a political cycle. You govern for the long term; you govern for the future of Australia. When this government came to office it inherited future funds, zero net debt and finances that were stable and secure and would allow for long-term planning and investment, including things like the funding of all Commonwealth superannuants. One of the great difficulties that the Howard government inherited when it came to office in 1996 was not just $96 billion of debt. It was not just a deficit budget; it was the fact that the unfunded liabilities of the Commonwealth were enormous, including Commonwealth superannuants. One of the little-understood achievements of the Howard and Costello years was the funding of the Commonwealth’s ongoing liabilities, and that is something that is now under threat from this government. Indeed, for the Prime Minister and the Treasurer, it is as if profit, success and self-reliance have become part of the problem and not part of the solution to our economic woes. There is this hideous attack on profit. Now, what is profit, Madam Deputy Speaker? I stand here in this House today and say that profit is a good thing for Australian businesses. Profit is a good and necessary function of our economy; it is something that allows for ongoing growth and investment. Would I rather that the mining companies made a substantial profit so that they can reinvest in their business and grow their enterprise, invest in new infrastructure, new mines and do the things they need to do, or would I rather that the government had the money? I am here today to say that a dollar in the hands of the private sector is a dollar that will be spent on growing the economy, on creating and building jobs, on establishing a livelihood for so many Australians. Taking a dollar from a company and giving it to the government is not a way of producing prosperity. Governments often say that they are responsible for jobs growth in society. This is a complete and utter furphy. It is the corporations, it is the businesses—the small businesses, the medium enterprises and the large enterprises—that create jobs and wealth in our country, and they ought to be free to do so. If people do well, we ought not put a super tax on it. Why do we have taxes in a society? One reason is to create a disincentive to do things. We quite often tax things to reduce that activity in our economy or society. We tax cigarettes on the false premise that that will reduce smoking—but, over time, rates of smoking have declined, because taxes continue to rise. Whenever you put a tax on something you create a disincentive to do things. One of the arguments from the last government about putting a tax on spending was to reduce spending and increase levels of income. One of the ongoing arguments about high rates of income tax is that it is a disincentive for people to earn money. In taxing profits over six per cent—and this is the government’s whole ethos and rationale for doing this—you create a disincentive to earn profits. I want to quote the Premier of Western Australia on the super mining tax, because I think this is very important. In a speech that he gave on 21 May, he spoke about visiting New York with a whole bunch of mining and petroleum industry executives put together from some of the world’s leading companies. They passed around a list of about $170 billion of projects that were expected to proceed in Western Australia—$170 billion. The Premier of Western Australia made an excellent point, saying: ‘My guess is that we’ll probably lose 25 per cent of those $170 billion of projects. I’m not suggesting the mining or petroleum industry is going to collapse or even decline. It will continue to grow but it won’t grow at the pace it could have.’ Why is this important? It is important because the government is saying—even the member for Blaxland today was saying loudly on television—that we are running around saying the mining industry will collapse. We are not saying that at all. But, when you put a massive, major new tax on an industry, you will reduce its growth, you will stunt future opportunities and you will slow down wealth creation. This constant and ongoing process of the government to put higher taxes in place and slow down wealth creation will create a poorer society. It will create higher costs for goods and services, it will create fewer opportunities for investment, and 25 per cent of $170 billion in terms of new investment projects in Australia is a lot of money to be threatening. I think this idea of taking from the rich and giving to the poor is really kind of a furphy as well in modern-day Australia. It is the case in Australia today that the government collects in this budget $137 billion in individual income taxation. That is the biggest slice of incoming revenue for this year’s budget—$137 billion. I always ask members and people I meet in the street: what is the biggest item of expenditure in the federal budget? Most people do not know. Some people guess defence, some people guess health. Actually, the single biggest item in the federal budget is the $115 billion for welfare and social security. That is the biggest item. It is double the health budget. It is five times the defence budget. To put it another way, we collect $137 billion in individual income taxation and we have already spent $115 billion of that redistributing wealth—paying the pensions and other social security, sending it back to people who we think need a hand up. But that means almost every single dollar collected from individuals is returned to other individuals in the form of income redistribution. But this government says that is not enough. This government says we have to redistribute wealth because people are unfairly being taxed or unfairly being charged or ripped off by companies who are earning and producing the wealth. It is true to say, as the Leader of the Opposition has said, that the tax represents a dagger at the heart of the Australian economy. You do not put such a yoke on your most productive sector and you certainly do not perpetuate this myth that, in modern-day Australia, people who are wealthy, people who have produced, people who earn, and people who have grown a small business into a big business are somehow outside of legitimate and lawful processes. It is the right of every citizen to work hard. It is the right of every citizen to earn money. It is the right for them to accumulate wealth and to improve the lot for themselves and for their families. We ought to congratulate those people who have done well, not perpetuate this envious approach to politics and government that says that if you do well you ought to be taxed more, and if you produce more wealth and more jobs you ought to be yoked and burdened and harnessed until you are unable to compete properly. The reality is that the ministers of this Labor government, and the Prime Minister and the Treasurer in particular, have tried to cast themselves as Robin Hood as a desperate smokescreen for their inability to manage the nation’s finances. They are exploiting the natural egalitarian instinct of Australians. That egalitarian instinct is a good thing, but it is not an instinct that we should promote in order to hold people back from succeeding. We ought to reject the premise that governments unjustly redistributing wealth will produce a better society. It will not. It will make all of us poorer. I also want to speak today on some of the realities of infrastructure funding as well in Sydney and in my electorate in particular. The reason I want to raise this is because in successive budgets now we have seen the government laud its infrastructure credentials. In fact one of the reasons for this mining super tax is of course that it is going to build infrastructure. The entire budget for national infrastructure building this year is only $12 billion, which is very much down the order of priorities for the federal government’s expenditure this year. In particular in Sydney, the biggest city in Australia, once again we have seen a complete lack of funding for key infrastructure projects. In last year’s budget there was a mere $40 million for a study for a western metro line, which was to go through the minister for infrastructure’s electorate, funnily enough. But with the worst New South Wales government in the history of our state—and I know the member for Werriwa will agree with me on that—we were unable to complete the western metro line and of course the money has to be returned to the Commonwealth. The $40 million for a study now has to be returned to the Commonwealth government. So Sydney ends up with not a single dollar of infrastructure spending—the biggest city in Australia. Every resident of Sydney—and I know the constituents of Werriwa, Blaxland and Lindsay in particular—will know that when the minister for infrastructure speaks of the great infrastructure spending of our time and the improvements in infrastructure that this government is making, there is not a dollar for Sydney infrastructure, even though we have the worst New South Wales government in history and even though they are cancelling key rail and other key infrastructure projects almost on a weekly basis in Sydney. Today I also want to speak on some factors that affect young people in Australia. One of the promises that the Rudd government has broken in relation to young people is that of a mandatory internet filter. Prior to coming to office the government announced its intention to filter the internet on a mandatory basis at the ISP level. I think this is very important, because a very revealing story came to light about the federal government’s budget just in May this year. On 15 May this year Rick Feneley from the Sydney Morning Herald revealed in an article that buried in the budget papers—not this week’s bundle of course; he is not referring to this year’s but to the 2008-09 budget papers—is a ‘small set of ugly numbers’. In his article he said: The Coalition had boosted funding to the Online Child Sexual Exploitation Team, a unit of the Australian Federal Police. But now New Labor was quietly giving this team of paedophile hunters a $2.8 million haircut. Kevin Rudd and his Communications Minister, Stephen Conroy, apparently reckoned it would be better spent on an internet filter. With $44 million, they would take on the world wide web and create a ‘‘clean feed’’. They would impose their filter on the net’s greatest horrors … and succeed. I want to record, as a member of the Cyber-Safety Committee and deputy chair of that committee, that this is exactly what is wrong with the Rudd government’s approach to government. The government thinks that somehow, by moving a law or imposing a mandatory filter on everybody, it can protect us from all the bad things and the risks of life that are out there. I want to reject that notion. The way to protect our children and the way to protect people online is to enforce the law—to have laws that are there to protect people. That article is very revealing: at the same time that they are proposing a filter that will allegedly protect everybody—which we of course know it will not do—they are cutting the budget for the Federal Police to target online predators. It is an absolute outrage. I know that young people around this country feel betrayed by this government. We knew that Kevin07 was something new. He was trendy. He was going to relate to young people. He used to go on Rove and make very bad jokes—I never thought they were very funny but obviously other people disagreed with me—but he was going to relate to our young people. I speak to a lot of young people aged 18 to 25 and they know that a mandatory internet filter is not a solution to the problems of the internet. They know it will slow it down. They know it will allow the government to monitor and filter views that they disagree with—something which in a free society we should absolutely reject. That is another example of what is wrong with this government. By stealing the image of Robin Hood in a modern-day society, this government is trying to claim the role of hero. But I want to record very strongly here today in this House that they are taking money unjustly from the most productive sector of our economy because they have recklessly spent the budget surpluses they inherited. They were looking for any industry they could find, and they went for the most productive sector because they thought they could get away with it. But even the very simplest person in this country, ordinary Australians, people on very low incomes, can understand that a 40 per cent tax hike is a tax grab to cover up reckless mismanagement of our nation’s finances. 5063 10:21:00 Gibbons, Steve, MP 83X Bendigo ALP 1 0 Mr GIBBONS —I would like to start my contribution to the debate on the appropriation bills by congratulating my colleague the Treasurer on this budget. This is the third time in three years that he has brought down a budget for its time, the third time in three years that he has responded appropriately to the dramatically changing economic circumstances and the third time in three years that he has demonstrated economic management skills that are the envy of those opposite. The tax reforms announced in the budget will strengthen the country’s economy and make the tax system fairer and simpler for working Australians and businesses. The Howard government failed dismally to capture the benefits of the previous commodity boom for the nation, but Labor’s reforms have been carefully designed to make the most of the opportunities presented by the current boom. There is help for small business in the form of a cut in the company tax rate, down to 28 per cent. The many small businesses in my electorate will welcome the head start they will be getting with this new rate cutting in from 2012-13. They will also benefit from the new instant write-off for assets worth up to $5,000. The simplification of other depreciation rules will also cut red tape and provide more upfront tax relief. The budget provides the biggest package of incentives for Australians to save since the Keating Labor government introduced compulsory superannuation. These measures will help ensure that, instead of us squandering the benefits of the current commodity boom in the short term, we will save for the longer term and for more secure retirements. The progressive increases in the superannuation guarantee will mean about 3½ million lower paid Australians will receive concessions on their superannuation guarantee contributions for the first time. And it will be easier for those over 50 with smaller amounts in their super accounts to make catch-up contributions. A decade of inaction by the Howard government allowed the nation’s infrastructure to become a bottleneck for our resource companies. The new resource state infrastructure fund will now make infrastructure spending a permanent feature of Commonwealth and state budgets. It will invest $700 million in 2012-13 and more than $5.6 billion over the next decade in improving our ageing infrastructure, particularly in the resource-rich states. And there is further encouragement for small resource companies to seek new mineral deposits with a resource exploration rebate, which will benefit the many gold exploration companies operating in my electorate. The mining sector is now enjoying the benefits of a second commodities boom in little more than a decade. In particular, the big end of the industry has benefited from soaring world commodity prices and the billions of dollars of tax concessions they get from other Australian taxpayers. These include generous tax breaks available for mining investment. Other companies have to depreciate their capital equipment over its expected life, but mining companies can deduct the full cost of exploration immediately. There is preferential treatment for oil and gas companies that effectively increases depreciation rates for assets like oil rigs. While all companies pay company tax, these concessions mean that the effective rate of the tax that resource companies actually pay is well below the headline rate of 30 per cent. And then there are the fuel tax credits. While working Australians pay about 38c per litre in excise when they fill up, the likes of BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto get nearly all of this back through tax credits. In fact, the mining industry is the largest beneficiary of the fuel tax credit scheme and gets about $1.7 billion per year back from the taxpayer. Independent analysis and some of the more informed media are starting to see the campaign by the Minerals Council and the opposition for just what it is—a great big bag of hot air. In fact, as I said in the MPI debate, I think it represents the greatest con job since the Fine Cotton ring-in scandal all those years ago. Last week in Senate estimates, the Secretary to the Treasury exposed the miners’ misleading claims about the rate of tax they are currently paying. This week one of the world’s most respected energy consultants, Wood Mackenzie, revealed that the combined earnings of Australia’s coalmining companies between 2012 and 2016 would fall just 15 per cent, from $97 billion to $82 billion, under the new tax. Dear me, they will only make $82 billion in the midst of a global economic downturn instead of $97 billion! Also this week Reuters reported: … it’s still business as usual in the booming Pilbara where the plans aren’t expected to result in significant losses of future production. The reality is that the resources sector gets very generous benefits from Australian taxpayers when compared with other companies. Paying company tax does not entitle mining companies to extract the nation’s natural resources free of charge. Entirely separate from company tax is the amount that the resource companies pay the nation for the right to extract and sell its natural resources. These royalties are the price at which the nation sells its resources to the mining companies. If you like, they are the mining companies’ costs of raw materials. The amount they are paying the nation for those raw materials has not kept pace with the soaring prices at which they are selling them to China and other developing nations. In fact, a decade ago the taxpayer received about $1 for every $3 of profit that mining companies made from selling our natural resources. Today that has fallen to $1 in $7. The nation is clearly not receiving anything like the same benefits from the resources boom as the mining companies and their executives. The resource super profits tax will ensure that Australians get a fair share from our valuable non-renewable resources. Despite all their misleading claims, miners will not pay this new tax on top of existing ones. Not only will they receive a full rebate for the state royalties they pay but the RSPT will be deductible for company tax purposes. The Henry review recommended this as a better way to tax resources because it only taxes profits and fully recognises the large investments made in resource projects. The significant reforms in this budget will build sustainable growth with low inflation. They will address potential capacity constraints in our economy and ensure that the proceeds from our mineral resources are dedicated to the best outcome for our economy and for all Australians. The budget changes are expected to increase the GDP by 0.7 per cent and real wages by 1.1 per cent in the long run. This reform dividend will be equivalent to an extra $450 per year in the pocket of a full-time worker on average weekly earnings. The changes are consistent with Labor’s conservative management of the economy and will not detract from our ability to return the budget to surplus and repay the debt. Of course we have seen the expected scaremongering—the sky will fall in on the mining industry as a result of the RSPT. We saw much the same scare campaign over 20 years ago when a similar four per cent profits based tax was introduced on petroleum. Of course, that industry went on to grow and flourish. We saw a similar scare campaign over the repeal of Work Choices legislation and the abolition of Australian workplace agreements. We saw a similar scare campaign over the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. Let me reiterate a few points in response to the claims of the scaremongers. The combined figures for company tax and royalties that the mining lobby are bandying around are essentially meaningless. All companies in Australia are required to pay company tax and very few, as I said before, receive such generous treatment as our resource companies. The amount the resource companies pay the nation for its non-renewable resources has not kept pace with the soaring prices that the commodities are sold for. As I said before, no other industry would have the nerve to argue that just because it pays company tax it should get its raw material for free. I have already said that mining companies operating in Australia get a big discount on the company tax they pay because of the very generous tax concessions they get at the expense of Australian taxpayers. In our current tax system an ordinary Australian who earns an extra dollar through their hard work pays higher tax, but a mining company that earns massive amounts of profits pays the same flat low rate of company tax. 10:29:41 Let us look at some of the other wildly inaccurate claims that are being made. The first is that the RSPT will reduce investment. This is absolute rubbish. Replacing an inefficient tax like royalties with an efficient tax like the RSPT will drive future investment, growth and jobs. OECD Secretary-General, Angel Gurria, has said that Australia would remain an attractive destination for investment because: …what drives investors is not necessarily that they are going to pay higher or lower tax but the availability of raw materials. The Commonwealth Bank has produced some interesting analysis of the RSPT: … the key factor in a project getting backing is whether it generates a sufficient rate of return. …            …            … Banks and other financiers know that there are risks of failure, and take account of those downside risks in deciding whether to provide finance. Some projects don’t generate enough return to justify their riskiness, and they are the ones that don’t get financed. But the RSPT will help more marginal projects get off the ground. The Commonwealth Bank’s analysis shows that the RSPT: … reduces the rate of return that a mining project needs to generate for it to be a viable investment. This means that more mines will be able to get financing under the RSPT than under royalties and that mining output will be higher under the RSPT than under royalties—at any commodity price level. This should benefit the many prospective goldmining ventures in my electorate. The Commonwealth Bank’s economists concluded that the RSPT promotes growth and more productivity in the economy by more equitable and efficient taxation of resources. There are claims that the RSPT will harm existing projects but, as the Treasurer stated, mining companies will receive due recognition of their past investment costs and there will be generous transitional arrangements to the new system. There is also a scare campaign that the RSPT will cause consumer prices to rise. However, independent modelling by KPMG Econtech shows that the RSPT will not increase prices, largely because the vast bulk of the minerals subject to the RSPT are shipped overseas at prices set by world markets. The Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism has also advised that it expects there will be no significant effect on electricity prices from changed tax arrangements under the current contracts between coalminers and electricity generators. In fact, KPMG modelling shows that the government’s tax reform package, including the RSPT and the cuts to company tax, will actually reduce the price of food and housing over time by making our economy more competitive. Finally, there is the outrageous claim that the RSPT is a triple tax on mining, coming on top of royalties and company tax. The fact is that the RSPT effectively replaces royalties as companies will receive a refundable tax credit for the amount they pay in royalties. If a miner’s royalty payments are higher than its RSPT liability, it will actually get a cash refund of the difference. This is one of the reasons why the less profitable projects, including those marginal projects where there is some uncertainty as to whether they go ahead, will be better off under the new arrangements. Who is running this latest scare campaign from the resources industry? Who exactly are these people who are arguing that they should not pay the nation a reasonable price for its natural resources? It will come as no surprise to learn that they are some of the richest people in Australia. At a time when many working Australians are facing financial uncertainty and struggling to make ends meet, BRW magazine revealed in March that the 200 highest paid executives of Australian companies saw their personal wealth increase by 72 per cent in just 12 months and that 47 of these 200 executives are employed in the resources sector. One of the loudest voices against the proposed new mining tax is Fortescue Metals Group, whose chief is Andrew Forrest. He is the second richest executive of a public company in Australia. According to Business Review Weekly, he is now worth $4.79 billion—twice as much as the year earlier. The figures in the Business Review Weekly survey are only the value of the shares that executives own in their own companies. They do not take into account the obscene salaries they are paid. For example, Marius Kloppers, Chief Executive of BHP Billiton, was paid more than $12 million last year according to the company’s annual report. Tom Albanese, CEO of Rio Tinto, was paid $10.7 million according to Bloomberg Businessweek. Another vocal opponent of the RSPT, Woodside Petroleum’s Don Voelte, saw his remuneration leap from $6.9 million to $8.4 million last year. What have they done to earn these obscene amounts of money? Really, not very much. They have ridden on the back of the demand from China and India for raw materials, something over which they have no control. They have benefited from the Rudd government’s economic management that has shielded Australia from the worst effects of the global recession and they have continued to take millions in handouts from the public purse. These overpaid Gordon Gekkos of the Pilbara and North Queensland have to realise that the party is over. They have to front up to the hangover and learn how to be good corporate citizens. They have been profiteering while their fellow Australians do it tough, doubling their personal wealth during a global recession and awarding themselves long-term employment contracts worth millions of dollars while they whittle away the job security entitlements of their employees. You only have to read an article in the Age newspaper early this week to see what is happening in the real world. There has been a 200 per cent explosion in personal bankruptcies among working Australians. As a financial counsellor at Uniting Care told the Age on 24 May: I thought in the past we were seeing a lot of people with mortgage stress, but it’s just gone through the roof this year … Every second client has mortgage stress. He said that casualisation of the workforce is a major contributor to mortgage stress. What he calls casualisation is what the leaders of business and the Leader of the Opposition call flexibility—the flexibility to hire and fire at a moment’s notice when the business cycle temporarily changes, the flexibility that was the Howard government’s euphemism for a return to employment conditions of the 19th century and the flexibility that was enshrined in Work Choices and the individual workplace agreements that the mining industry lobbied so hard for. Those are the same Work Choices that former finance minister Senator Nick Minchin said did not go far enough and the same Work Choices that the Leader of the Opposition has made clear he will bring back if the coalition is returned to government. Why is the opposition dancing to the tune of the wealthy mining executives? For years we have seen the mining industry and executives pouring money and resources into political lobbying and other activities against the interests of ordinary Australians. They have funded extreme industrial relations lobby groups like the HR Nicolls Society. They have funded the arch climate sceptics at various societies, and for many years the likes of BHP Billiton, Western Mining, Caltex, Esso, Shell and Clough Engineering have funded the Institute for Public Affairs and have poured money into the coffers of the Liberal Party. To understand why the first port of call after the announcement of the RSPT was the Leader of the Opposition’s office, you need look no further than the financial disclosures published by the Australian Electoral Commission. These show the biggest donor to the Liberal Party last year was none other than billionaire Queensland miner and scaremonger-in-chief, Mr Clive Palmer. Now these paymasters want a payback on their investment. They had the opposition dancing to their tune, a tune designed to benefit some of the richest people in the country at the expense of every working Australian. Fortunately, there are more reasonable voices in the resources industry. The government promised there would be genuine and mature consultation with the mining companies within the framework announced in the budget and the Resource Tax Consultation Panel has been engaging with the industry since the announcement of the RSPT. The Rudd government will not be deterred by the scare campaign from getting the best outcome for both the mining sector and the Australian community. No-one should doubt the government’s resolve to make sure that the community gets a fair share of the mineral resources that belong to the Australian people, not the mining companies. The government has determined to manage this next mining boom better than our predecessors managed the last. That is why we have started down the long road to tax reform, with a resources super profits tax that will ensure all Australians get a fair share from our valuable non-renewable commodities or resources. The proceeds from this tax will be used to increase superannuation savings on behalf of working Australians, including older workers; lower the rate of company tax for all companies to 28 per cent by 2014-15; give small business a head start, with a cut in their tax rate to 28 per cent in 2012-13 and an immediate depreciation write-off for assets costing up to $5,000; and invest in Australia’s pressing infrastructure needs, particularly in the resource-rich states. This budget is fiscally responsible. It builds on the Rudd government’s recognised achievements in shielding Australia from the worst effects of the global recession and it is another significant achievement by the Treasurer. I commend it to the House. 5068 10:39:00 Simpkins, Luke, MP HWE Cowan LP 0 0 Mr SIMPKINS —I speak to a lot of people across Cowan, whether that is in the local shopping centres, at sporting venues, at their front doors or just in the street, and it is a good way to understand the way people see the big issues and the local ones. It was, therefore, not surprising to me when we saw that over 75 per cent of Western Australians oppose the Prime Minister’s big new tax on mining. Western Australians remember the big handouts, they remember how badly the insulation scheme blundered and they remember how much it costs to fix up the many problems. They have seen the blow-outs and the wastage in the Deputy Prime Minister’s education portfolio areas, such as the school halls and the computer programs. It is, therefore, little wonder that there is real recognition by Western Australians of the true nature of this Rudd government. It is characterised by program after botched program, defined by wastage and no value for money. Western Australians are not surprised when we see ineffective and wasteful spending followed by—surprise, surprise!—increased taxation and, of course, the latest backflip by the acrobatic Prime Minister: a $38 million advertising campaign. This merely reinforces the very accurate stereotype of waste and mismanagement. I remind the government that it is blowing the taxpayers’ money in their record spending. We need to remember that the Rudd government is borrowing $700 million a week for a financial year that will see a $57 billion spend beyond its receipts. It shows that there is nothing economically responsible or economically conservative about the behaviour of the government, despite its claims to the contrary. Indeed, the government is like a washing machine stuck on the spin cycle. It is incredible that the government has always said that it has made the tough decisions in spending big. Recklessly handing out money is not courageous, it is merely irresponsible. With regard to irresponsible spending and financial waste, no-one can doubt that the Rudd government has been tragically successful. Now we are back in the position where someone has to pay and, as usual, the great tradition of Australian politics is that the Labor Party spends and the coalition actually has to make the hard decisions to put the nation’s books back in order. When we think back to the economic circumstances of incoming governments, in 1996 we were faced with a $96 billion debt. When the Rudd government came in they had over $20 billion in surplus handed to them, as well as other funds incorporating some $50 billion. The coalition prepared for the future; our nation was positively in the black in every regard. What would have happened if the coalition had followed the great Labor tradition of exorbitant spending? How much would the Keating government’s $96 billion debt have blown out to? We would be in the Third World by now. What actually happens is that the tough decisions have always fallen to the coalition, because we know that wasteful spending has always had an impact on interest rates and the cost of living for ordinary Australians. Big government and the interventionism of Labor have always stifled economic growth. I will speak about a number of issues in the time I have. However, first and foremost is the Rudd government’s big new tax on mining. I have many fly-in fly-out families in Cowan who depend on mining for their future. Many of them have come from other states, moving away from family and friends to make a new and better life for themselves in Perth. They know that future opportunities for their families depend on a strong and competitive resources industry. These are the real families; the men, the women and the children, who make their lives in suburbs such as Madeley and Ashby or other suburbs within the Cowan electorate. The parent who works away sacrifices the time they have with their children in order to achieve a secure financial future. They are the ones who depend on Australia remaining competitive in the world economy, and so need the current projects to keep going and each project to get off the ground. It is their future that is at risk as the Rudd government seeks to undermine Western Australia’s future and the future of families in Cowan. I was recently contacted by my constituent Glen from Ballajura. Glen was at the time an IT company employee. He initially contacted me some weeks ago regarding the internet filter issue, but also to express his concern about the mining tax. Glen told me at the time that his job certainly was under threat from the Rudd government’s: … flawed policies on internet censorship, national health scheme and now the push for a 40% on the mining sector; all of which have made my core base of clientele very nervous and suspending their usual capital expenditure on IT/Communications requirements for their homes and small businesses. I received that email on 17 May 2010. I responded, of course, indicating the coalition’s position on these two issues. Unfortunately, just 13 days later on 30 May, Glen emailed me again saying that he had lost his job, along with two other employees in the Western Australian branch of the IT business. Glen went on to tell me that the company’s financial officers had specifically given reasons for the downsize; they listed continuing interest rate rises, ineffective targeting of the national stimulus packages and job uncertainty within the mining and kindred industries. Glen has concerns that he may even lose the house that he bought with 15 years of savings. He also said: … this event has further disillusioned us all regarding the truth of the Labor Party’s conviction to look after the stability of Australia’s economy leading into the future. Yet it would be wrong to say that it is only the fly-in fly-out workers and their families whose future is at risk, as this clearly shows in the case of Glen. I think of the great supporting industries and companies that have been established in Wangara, Landsdale and Malaga, three suburbs with industrial activity within Cowan. These supporting businesses also depend on the expansion of existing projects and the establishment of new projects in Western Australia. Therefore, it is also those employees and their employers that I worry about. Yet it goes on, because every family that depends on the resources sector is spending across the retail sector in Cowan, whether it is in Steve’s Bakers Delight in Wanneroo Central, Len’s newsagency in Ballajura or maybe Charlie’s fish and chip shop in Landsdale. Perhaps it is in Kel’s Menswear at Warwick or with Sue at the British Lolly Shop in Woodvale—the point being that the impact of a successful resources industry strengthens every sector of the economy. More specifically and beyond outer metropolitan Cowan, just think of some of these towns in country Western Australia that exist in many cases to support mining projects. Every business owner and their employees depend on a strong mining sector. Although this is crystal clear, the line being spun by the government is that the mining sector does not pay its fair share. The Rudd government are trying to sell the line that the resources sector is ripping off the rest of the country. They imply to the distant capital city residents that mining is as simple as just walking out into the bush in the Pilbara, clearing off the topsoil and then pulling the bag of cash out of the ground. It is, of course, a false premise. This false premise is borne out by the government suggesting that the 10-year government bond rate is the acceptable level of profit and then beyond that it is all, as they say, a super profit. The reality is that mining requires massive investment and huge risk. This is absolutely bizarre. I do not have a significant background in areas economic but, from my limited time working for a merchant bank in the 1980s, I know that government bonds are a low-return but highly secure investment. I called the government’s threshold bizarre in this regard and now I call it ridiculous. How would anyone equate the resources sector, a very high risk investment, with government bonds? Clearly the profits above the bond rate of 5.7 per cent are not a super profit but a normal profit which reflects the risks involved. This is exactly the sort of example that depicts the Rudd government’s poorly thought through detail in so many areas. It is no wonder they decided to arrange the $38 million advertising campaign before this fiasco became public. I suppose that this shows that they understand the concept of hedging, but that is all they understand. I should also mention that apart from all the buying that mining companies undertake from supporting businesses in Cowan and elsewhere, and apart from the money that employees put back into retailers in Cowan, they also pay taxes. They pay royalties to states, there is no doubt, but they also pay company taxes. This is the part that the government will not admit to. The reality is that an effective tax rate of 57c in the dollar will apply to miners if the Rudd government gets its way, making Australia the highest taxed nation in the world. It is little wonder that this decision by the Rudd government has been treated with such concern by the industry and indeed the employees and shareholders. An important aspect of this great big tax is also consultation. The Rudd government did not consult, they did not foreshadow changes, and there was no green paper and no white paper. The government decided on this tax completely without industry meetings. It was only after the fact that the government even tried to create the facade of consultation. I have been informed, firstly, that the government leaves the meetings to its officials and, then, that the government has directed that the bond rate threshold and the 40 per cent not be on the agenda. This consultation is not even a good facade. It is clear that this tax was nothing more than a unilateral act of the government, born out of self-interest and desperation to get cash rather than out of any commitment to the national interest. Symptomatic of this egotistical self-interest, it was also recently revealed that the government was planning its advertising campaign to do with its mining tax before its public announcement—which actually took place before the budget. This really does make a mockery of the government’s previous suggestions that the advertisements were only rolled out to respond to the position put forward so strongly by the mining sector. Yesterday the Prime Minister said that it had always been planned to advertise the tax, but that it had been brought forward in response to the campaign by the miners. This whole line is becoming more and more suspicious, as the clear implication was that the advertising would come some months later. Some months later would put us into, without doubt, the period within three months of the election, and this is something the Prime Minister had previously campaigned so strongly on with his unparalleled yet traditional sanctimony. How quickly the Prime Minister has sold out his principles—although one would question whether he has ever had any higher principle than self-interest. Mark Latham certainly saw through him. Even worse, this advertising campaign, paid for by the taxpayer and contributing to the budget deficit, revolves around a tax which the Prime Minister yesterday said would not involve legislation coming before the parliament in this session. Presumably, that means not before the election. Why then is an election campaign necessary? There is one more thing I would like to question about the Rudd government’s whole plan: the exploration rebate. I find it incredible that the government is buying into risk like this. How many multi-million-dollar cheques using taxpayers’ money will be written for risky or shonky exploration failures? This is just another example of the recklessness that typifies the government’s approach to other people’s money. I used to think that this Prime Minister was an enemy of the state of Western Australia, but clearly with his mining tax he is the enemy of the entire nation’s future prosperity. The next issue I would like to take up is the matter of signage. I know that, with this government, signage is the only thing that has gone up and stayed up. Signs have been erected in front of schools around the country. Recently, whilst on committee business in Launceston, I was on my way to meet with the committee chair when I saw two signs about the Rudd government school halls funding on a major road on the western side of the Tamar River. The signs were not in front of the school but on private land and angled to face the oncoming traffic. This government is very good at signage. You could almost say that their signage is revolutionary or historic, but perhaps it is really just signage at record levels. The government is keen to keep calling their record spending blowouts an education revolution, but their revolution is nothing but spin. The reality is that buildings are not a revolution by any interpretation. Fundamental change or radical innovation could be a revolution but just because you say it enough times does not make it true. Certainly, the programs in this area have been characterised by mismanagement, by giving big cuts to the middlemen. Instead of asking what the school communities actually need, the government just gives them a list of options to choose from. Contrast this to the Howard government’s highly successful Investing in Our Schools program. In this program the school communities actually got to decide what they wanted to do with the money granted. There is a lot to speak about in this debate. There is so much waste and mismanagement but so little time. In the limited time I have left I would like to turn to the issue of border security. It is certainly a big issue in Western Australia. In fact, it is another area where Western Australia carries the can for the Commonwealth. Just about all the crews of the suspected illegal entry vessels are imprisoned in Western Australia, at a cost to WA taxpayers. This has led the Attorney-General of Western Australia to call the federal government to account for their inability to halt the boats. Certainly, Western Australian jails are under some pressure, but that is what happens when you crack down on crime and make sure that those who are convicted actually do their time. I know that the state Labor opposition in Western Australia objects to that personal accountability, but there is no doubt that crime levels are down. A local councillor from the City of Swan told me that the crime level in the light industrial area of Malaga is at its lowest level on record. The trouble is that, while the Liberal government in Western Australia is cleaning up crime, the boats are continuing to arrive under the watch of the Rudd government. I have spoken in the parliament on many occasions about the issue of boats. The coalition was faced with challenging international circumstances when we were in government, but we dealt with the problem and stopped the boats. The Rudd government changed those arrangements and the boats have been coming more quickly now. I believe the latest count is 128 boats and almost 6,000 arrivals since August 2008. Indeed, since the government froze its assessment of Afghan and Sri Lankan asylum applications, 22 boats and 987 people have arrived—as the Deputy Prime Minister said when Labor were in opposition, ‘another boat arrival, another policy failure’. But she said that before we stopped the boats from coming by having the right policies. It might be helpful if I spend some time looking at the effect of policy change on the arrival of boats. It is certainly true that from 1999 to 2001 there was a surge in illegal boat arrivals. That corresponded with a period in which there was a high number of global asylum applications. The current Prime Minister has suggested that the higher number of boat arrivals now is due entirely to ‘global push factors’. This is no excuse. The government has failed to secure our borders, just as it has failed in so many policy areas. Global asylum applications were 55 per cent higher in 2001 than they are now. The Howard government introduced temporary protection visas in 1999 and the Pacific solution in 2001. These measures saw the average number of boats arriving per month fall from 7.2 in 1999 to 4.3 in 2000 and 3.6 in 2001. In 2002 the figure had dropped to just 0.1 and it continued at that level in 2003 and 2004. It was 0.3 in 2005, 0.5 in 2006, 0.4 in 2007 and 0.6 in 2008. But that all changed in 2008. The Rudd government abolished temporary protection visas and the Pacific Solution. This saw the boat numbers per month rise to 5.1 in 2009 and an average of 12.6 so far in 2010. Apart from temporary protection visa and Pacific Solution changes, the difference between 2009 and 2010 was defined by one big factor. At the end of 2009 we had the Oceanic Viking fiasco. That was the special deal done by the government that saw the government give guarantees to those on the Oceanic Viking. This was a sorry state of affairs that cemented the Rudd government’s reputation as the soft touch in the region. On 9 April 2010 the Rudd government froze the assessment of asylum applications from Afghanistan and Sri Lanka for six months and three months respectively. The additional 22 boats and 987 people that have arrived since then demonstrate that this has not had any effect on the boats coming. It should also be noted that since 1 January 2010 to as late as 7 May the number of people in detention and related accommodation on the mainland has gone from 329 to 1,126, an increase of 240 per cent. What is also of great concern is that the cost of this failure in border protection is an extra billion dollars. The fact that the reopening of the Curtin detention centre has not been budgeted for is also evidence that the budget blow-outs in this area will continue. Before going on to speak of the coalition’s solution to this problem with real action, I would like to restate my own position and my concerns. I know that Australians acknowledge the need to assist refugees with resettlement. I have said it again and again in Cowan. Yet what we must question is the difference between those that arrive on boats and those that languish in refugee camps without the finances that the boat passengers have. Firstly, the UNHCR is present in their origin countries, so they have bypassed the opportunity to apply to join the queue. Then we must accept that it is true that every Afghan arrival by boat has utilised aircraft before hopping on the boat. It is also true that many of those from Sri Lanka have also used aircraft. They then pay the people smugglers to hop on a boat, whereupon so many of them destroy their identity papers or throw them into the Timor Sea. They then intercept Australian vessels that ensure they complete their journey. Mission accomplished. I share the view of so many of my constituents that have a problem with this, the fundamental points being that they bypass legitimate application opportunities, they have a lot of money and so many then attempt to conceal their identities. Meanwhile those in refugee camps who apply and join a queue may miss out or spend additional time in those refugee camps because the Rudd government changed the rules and let in these people who jump the queue. There are three main aspects of the coalition policy direction statement of 27 May, restoring sovereignty and control to our borders. The first is to turn back the boats where circumstances and vessels can be safely secured to their point of departure and alternative third-country destination. This includes where a person who is seeking asylum and has arrived illegally or with a valid visa seeks asylum but they have residency in a third country then they will be returned to that country. The point is that transiting through a secure country and moving on to Australia should undermine the legitimacy of the claim, and I support this measure. The second part of our policy is that there will be no compromise on offshore processing. Given the disastrous border control failure of the Rudd government in filling Christmas Island, this means there will be a need to enter into discussions with another country for alternative offshore processing and detention arrangements. The final aspect of the policy goes to temporary protection and mutual obligation. We will bring back temporary protection visas. TPVs will apply where those who have successfully sought asylum have arrived illegally by any means or where persons entering Australia on a valid visa were in breach of their visa conditions at the time of their application. As well as these arrangements, I also mention the mutual obligation for those TPV holders unable to find a job and also the restoration of the 45-day rule requiring those seeking a protection visa to apply within 45 days of arriving in Australia, stopping those who have been in Australia for long periods suddenly applying at the end of their time to drag out their time in Australia. Unfortunately, 20 minutes is not enough to cover all the topics I would wish to, considering the failures of the Rudd government. What is certain, however, is that of all these failures the mining tax and border security are the two issues that my constituents have raised with me more than any other. What is clear is that the interests of Western Australia, Australia and the people will best be served by nothing less than the defeat of this big spending, big taxing and big talking but low delivering failure of a government. 5074 10:59:00 Kerr, Duncan, MP RH4 Denison ALP 1 0 Mr KERR —On her retirement from the position of Anti-Discrimination Commissioner in Tasmania, Dr Jocelynne Scutt was asked to reflect on her experiences. One of her responses was: Well, I would say that throughout the term of my life as Anti-Discrimination Commissioner the Anti-Discrimination Commission has received the most appalling, brutal, rude and, in my opinion, unprofessional correspondence, from a number of quarters but from one in particular. At the conclusion of this speech I suspect there will be little doubt as to whom Dr Scutt was referring. Last week I gave a short speech in the House of Representatives based on Justice Heydon’s recent observations that all litigation is capable of causing immense harm unless its use is properly controlled and unless those who institute it are subject to legitimate pressures generating a measure of discrimination. I observed that is particularly true of the power to prosecute. The conduct of the prosecution power of the state is a legitimate matter of public debate not simply by parliamentarians but by every citizen, but many are fearful and intimidated. That is not surprising when a short set of serious minded observations about notoriously failed prosecutions and suggestions for reform in a speech to this parliament were described in articles by the Tasmanian DPP published in major newspapers as cowardly, lazy, self-serving and elitist. Senator Eric Abetz, a legal professional colleague but hardly a supporter of mine in the normal course, had his support for my remarks dismissed as ‘political grandstanding’ and a matter of concern. I was also abused by Mr Ellis personally in the street in vituperative terms. So a private citizen might feel somewhat abashed at the prospect of risking entry into a debate regarding what is fundamentally a matter of importance that is entitled to be entered into by every citizen. Mr Ellis in published articles has said this of my contributions, describing me as cowardly: I chose to misuse my last days of access to parliamentary privilege for an attack on him. This surprised me, not because such an approach of shooting the messenger is uncommon in political discourse in Australia. I remember well watching a program on TV just the other day that went back over the matter of the Wood royal commission, in which then police commissioner Tony Lauer said to the cameras: ‘It is a case of fervent political imagination. We have dealt with organised corruption. There are two ways I look forward to the royal commission. The first is seeing Mr Hatton away from parliamentary privilege in the witness box at the royal commission and the second is my opportunity to clear my name.’ So, when a serious critique is made that reflects on judgments people may have made, their management of an organisation or decisions they have made in public office, it is not uncommon for people to resort to shooting the messenger. But the sheer hypocrisy in this particular instance of referring to a member raising a matter in parliament under parliamentary privilege comes ill from the mouth of a director of public prosecutions who, under section 17 of the Director of Public Prosecutions Act in Tasmania, is provided with immunity from personal liability. That provision says: No personal liability attaches to the Director or a person assisting the Director under this Act for an act done or omitted to be done in good faith in the performance or exercise, or the purported performance or exercise, of any function, power or duty under this Act. The responses that have been made in published articles are not those of Mr Ellis, private citizen; they are published as the responses of the Director of Public Prosecutions. If others are too intimidated to enter into debate, that is the reason why parliamentary privilege exists. It exists so that there is one forum where, no matter how difficult a subject is, a parliamentarian can address matters of serious importance for their constituents and their state. It is one place where no-one can be bullied, and I refuse to be bullied. In addressing this matter, Mr Ellis also made other critiques. He observed of me that not once in his time as DPP had he been approached by me, whether in respect of a constituent or otherwise, concerning any prosecution. Setting aside the irony of Mr Ellis describing an intervention as a political stunt when I make a responsible critique of the circumstances that I described in my speech whilst inviting me to be involved in the management of his office by critiquing it on a daily basis, it is also false. There was one instance where I wrote to the DPP, not in relation to whether he should prosecute or otherwise, but in respect of a constituent who had raised with me matters which, if I recall correctly, though I do not have my files to immediately to hand, were about the delay in a particular matter. I received a response from Mr Ellis that could only be described in the language that was used by Ms Jocelynne Scutt—‘most appalling, brutal, rude and, in my opinion, unprofessional’. I turn to what Mr Ellis says about the statutory framework under which he operates. He refers to the late Mervyn Everett as a giant figure in the law in the state of Tasmania and he proceeds to say that one of his remarkable legacies was the removal of the Attorney-General’s ability to interfere in criminal prosecutions by creating the then Crown Advocate. If I might just interpose, I found this particularly galling, because the late Mr Justice Everett was my particular mentor. He recommended me for appointment to the Solicitor-General and later I became a crown counsel in the state of Tasmania conducting and carrying on prosecutions and representing the state not only in the Supreme Court but also in the High Court of Australia. So I find it particularly galling, when I had a personal friendship with the late Mervyn Everett and his wife, that he is used in this manner. Although it was an important step forward, the legislation that was introduced was described by the former DPP, Damian Bugg, in an address to the Judicial Conference of Australia in these terms: The Crown Advocate Act provided little direction as to the relationship between the Attorney-General, the Solicitor-General and the Crown Advocate and the Act did not provide the Crown Advocate with a power to publish or issue guidelines and in its original form imposed a statutory duty upon the Crown Advocate to advise and represent Police. It is true that the act has changed slightly with the change of name to the Director of Public Prosecutions Act, but the fundamental critique remains. It still does little to define the relationship between the Attorney-General, the Solicitor-General and the Director of Public Prosecutions. The act still does not address those crucial issues that were raised by Damian Bugg. It has removed the duty of the Director of Public Prosecutions to advise and represent police, but the complexities of the legal framework can be seen, for example, by the Criminal Code defining crown law officers in Tasmania as: … the Attorney-General or Solicitor-General, or any person appointed by the Governor to institute or prosecute criminal proceedings in the Supreme Court. Section 3 of the DPP act confers on the Director of Public Prosecutions the status of a crown law officer. But it remains uncertain as to those relationships and so I proposed that we should modify the law to reflect better the standards that have now evolved at the national level and reflect the procedures and rules that govern the relationship between the Commonwealth DPP, the Commonwealth Attorney-General and other officers. For that, I received the chastening that my observations were disingenuous. Mr Ellis in his reported remarks said: … the attacks— —they were not attacks; they were descriptions— were politically motivated to coincide with an investigation by the Legal Profession Board into complaints lodged by former police commissioner Richard McCreadie. That is a very bland account of what was put to me by the journalist from the Mercury. He said that Mr Ellis had alleged that I had conspired by working together with Mr McCreadie and Mr Herr regarding matters that they had complained to the Legal Professional Board about. I responded—and this is the truth—that that suggestion is totally untrue and a conspiracy theory of the first order. It is one thing for a person in private practice to jump to conclusions so rapidly and to put them on the public record; it is another thing entirely for an officer holding the status of the DPP to do so. Mr Ellis has said that his task is to prosecute breaches of the law wherever it applies when it seems to him to be on available evidence such a breach. He has also accused me of seeking to impose double standards. He said of me, ‘The attempt by Mr Kerr to politicise the decision to prosecute’—the number of people that I referred to—‘seems motivated by a desire to protect high-profile office holders from equality before the law.’ This is simply untrue. Search in vain what I said and you will not find it. He sets up a straw man to attack. It is true that Tasmania has suffered through failed prosecutions after failed prosecutions, each attracting front page headlines, and it is true, in my view, that that has diminished the social cohesion of my state. But that flows naturally from a failure to take into account proper matters of judgment that the DPP’s own prosecution guidelines refer to. On the front page of the prosecution guidelines of the state of Tasmania is this statement: A wrong decision to prosecute or, conversely, a wrong decision not to prosecute, tend to undermine the confidence of the community in the criminal justice system. That is why Mr Ellis’s representation of his duty, which he has set out on a number of occasions, represents a fundamental refusal, a wilful refusal, to address material relevant to his judgment, because it is not true that each matter on which there is a possibility of prosecution should proceed. The DPP guidelines first published in the Commonwealth begin with a quotation from Sir Hartley Shawcross QC. The guidelines state: In a statement to the House of Commons Sir Hartley Shawcross QC, the then Attorney-General of the United Kingdom stated as follows: “It has never been the rule in this country and I hope it never will be that suspected criminal offences must automatically be the subject of prosecution. Indeed the very first regulations under which the Director of Public Prosecutions worked provided that he should … prosecute ‘whenever it appears that the offence or circumstances of its commission is or are of such a nature that a prosecution in respect thereof is required in the public interest”. That is still the dominant consideration. Mr Ellis is resolutely and wilfully blind to the third component of his own prosecutorial guidelines, because they say: Having satisfied himself or herself that the evidence is sufficient to justify the institution or continuation of a prosecution, the prosecutor must then consider whether, in the light of the provable facts and the whole of the surrounding circumstances, the public interest requires a prosecution to be pursued. It is not the rule that all offences brought to the attention of the authorities must be prosecuted. That sets out a view largely following the prosecution guidelines of the Commonwealth but omitting crucial ones. A number of considerations are: the seriousness or, conversely, the triviality of the alleged offence or that it is of a “technical” nature only; This is a point I raised in relation to a number of the matters on which I addressed the House. They also have to take into account the ‘obsolescence or obscurity’ of the law and, in the Commonwealth guidelines, the ‘effect on community harmony and public confidence in the administration of justice’. The latter is a matter omitted in the Tasmanian guidelines, whether inadvertently or advertently. There is another provision that is in the Commonwealth guidelines which is omitted and which was supposed to be national in scope. It says: A prosecution should only proceed in accordance with this Policy. A matter which does not meet these requirements, for example, a matter which tests the law but which does not have a reasonable prospect of conviction, should not be proceeded with. Mr Bugg, in the speech that I referred to, said that it was the greatest step forward for prosecutorial function in Australia of the last century that the DPPs had agreed a common framework for controlling the discretion in relation to these matters. But Mr Ellis ignored that responsibility and that discretion in his response that was published. On those specific remarks, I find it galling and appalling that, while I have not suggested in any way that there should be a different standard for those in public office or anywhere else, that assertion should be made. I am concerned wherever it is. But I think it is a fair point to say that where the prosecutorial function is conducted in a manner which misfires on some very large occasions, in matters of high public profile, on front pages of the newspapers and repeatedly, it is important to note that the ordinary citizen will lose their confidence in the system and will be asking, ‘What about me? What about me as a small person?’ Mr Ellis says I did not look at all 5,500 or so prosecutions that his office is conducted. Of course I did not. Where was I supposed to start: when the first failed prosecution began, when the second fell over, when the third fell over or when the fourth fell over? Or was I supposed to intervene after the most extraordinary and odd circumstance where Mr Ellis intervened, saying that there were close and continuing connections between the Premier of Tasmania and former commissioner Mr McCreadie which prevented Mr McCreadie’s appointment on an acting basis. Those matters are the subject of existing proceedings and I will not go further in relation to them. In relation to all those other issues, they are concluded. In Mr Johnson’s case, although he was pursued through the courts, the judge in the first instance said that the prosecution was fundamentally misconceived and that success was impossible. The matter was taken by the DPP to the High Court, seeking review. That was set aside. The matter was then pursued as a disciplinary complaint. In the end, those matters were abandoned and Mr Johnson got a payout and thanks from the state. One has to ask: what was achieved by the process? I will conclude by going to the law reform issues that I have touched on. I will only do so briefly. Firstly, I think it is completely inappropriate for the civil functions of the state to be undertaken by the DPP. A citizen who is dealing with the state, finding that their civil proceedings are instigated by a person with the name of Director of Public Prosecutions, I think is entitled to feel intimidated. Secondly, we should have common prosecutorial directions that cover both the Commonwealth and the states, and the omitted provisions should be reinserted. Thirdly, the balances that exist in other states, such as Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia and Queensland, and the Commonwealth, should be looked at. I said in my speech that prosecutorial independence is crucial, but it is not to be confused with immunity from criticism. It is possible to provide legitimate balances to the otherwise absolute power of a DPP while preserving the office’s necessary independence. That is so. It remains so. (Time expired) 5078 11:19:00 Keenan, Michael, MP E0J Stirling LP 0 0 Mr KEENAN —I rise to talk about Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 and cognate bills and the government’s recent budget, which was brought down at the beginning of the month. The Labor government inherited perhaps the strongest economy in the Western world when it came to power in 2007. It inherited an economy with no government debt and close to $50 billion worth of reserves. It inherited an economy with an unemployment rate of four per cent—a near historic low. Our banking system was well regulated thanks to the reforms of the coalition government. Because of those reforms, our banking system had a very small exposure to subprime lending and it was, in every respect, financially stronger and more secure than its counterparts in America and Europe. This sound economic management, which was instituted by the previous Howard government, provided the basis from which the Rudd government could deal with the unexpected global financial crisis. Faced with the inherent uncertainties of the circumstances we were in, and in the knowledge that we were better positioned than almost any comparable country, a prudent government would not have embarked, of course, on the reckless spending that we have seen. A prudent government would have better targeted spending and would certainly not have expended the exceptional quantum that the Rudd government have expended since coming to office. Indeed, this stimulus package is characterised by some of the most wasteful and mismanaged spending in our country’s history. The pink batts program has wasted billions of dollars. The school halls program, known as Building the Education Revolution—one of the Orwellian titles that the government give to their programs—has wasted literally billions and billions of dollars. This Labor government should hang their heads in shame for the way they have mishandled taxpayers’ money and, more particularly, for the way in which they panicked and responded over the last 2½ years to the challenges that have been thrown up by the global economy—spending money like drunken sailors. Sadly, this budget does nothing to address those issues. I want to talk about a few things today. As a Western Australian, I want to talk particularly about the mining tax, because it threatens to drive a stake through the heart of my state’s prosperity. I also want to say something about how this budget fails my electorate of Stirling and to touch on my portfolio area of justice, customs and border protection. I think one of the biggest of the issues that overhang this budget is the great big new tax on mining. Not long ago the government had another great big new tax, the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, which was the Prime Minister’s response to what he considered the greatest moral challenge of our time. Now that that scheme is in abeyance, Labor has invented another great big new tax on Australians. This tax will destroy Australian jobs, it will encourage Australian industry and international industry to move offshore and it will increase the cost of living for all Australians. It is a big new tax on the mining sector and astonishingly the government has been selling this big new tax on the mining sector as being something that is designed to make the mining industry bigger and stronger. Sadly, it cannot find anyone within the mining industry to support that case. On a very basic level, of course, it just does not make sense. This is a government that has been reduced to the worst form of propaganda to sell this tax and it is a government that has been punitively attacking mining figures who have dared to disagree with it. Labor’s resource profits tax is destructive and it is a tax that changes the rules of the game for all investors, particularly those who have invested billions of dollars in the industry based on the fact that Australia was a country with very low sovereign risk and not liable to such arbitrary changes in policy. This was a tax that was designed without any industry consultation whatsoever. If the government had cared to consult the industry, they would have been given a much better idea of the destructive nature of what they proposed to do, and I just want to go through some of the responses of some of the larger mining companies. In a letter to shareholders on 17 May, BHP Billiton chairman Jac Nasser said: The risk is that Australia could now be seen by the rest of the world as a less stable and less competitive place for long term investments. Xstrata chief Mick Davis spoke to the Bank of America-Merrill Lynch Global Metals and Mining Conference on 11 May. He said: This is the biggest assault on the mining industry I have witnessed in my now long involvement in the sector. I am troubled both at the magnitude of the tax impact on mining companies in Australia but also its retroactive nature and the total absence of consultation in the run-up to the announcement. This is much more reminiscent of countries perennially trapped in a spiral of mercurial populist actions, followed inevitably by dwindling foreign investment and ever-poorer populations; not of a country like Australia. All of the Western Australian members and senators represented in this place, in fact all members of the opposition, stand resolutely opposed to this tax. Sadly, and although the Western Australian members of parliament have called on them to do so, Western Australian Labor MPs and senators remain silent or endorse this attack on our state. Nothing but a resounding rejection of this great big new tax will stop mining projects in Western Australia and around the country being put at risk. The respected economist Dr Henry Ergas recently said: The bad news on the death and taxes front is that death is still certain. The worse news, in a world where investors value predictability, is that taxes are not. As reported in the Australian on 19 May, Fortescue Metals group have put their $10 billion Solomon hub and their $7 billion Western hub projects—which were together set to employ as many as 30,000 people in construction and operation—on hold to examine the financial impact of the tax. If we just dwell on that for a second, that is an incredible amount of investment and tens of thousands of jobs just from one company alone that have been put at risk by the ramifications of this great big new tax. If this tax was such a good tax, as the government has been trying to sell it to the Australian people, why aren’t other industries lining up to be taxed in the same way? The reality is that it is a very bad tax. This is a tax that has not been introduced at the same magnitude anywhere else in the world. It is a tax that will make mining companies in Australia the highest taxed compared with any of our competitor nations. We know that it was the mining industry that underpinned us in two global economic downturns over the last decade and that we rely for growth to get more income tax in the normal way on the way in which we will allow this sector to grow. By introducing this big tax on mining profits, the Prime Minister is killing the industry that has served us so well over the past decade. The impact, of course, will mean that foreign countries will win new investments with money that could have been invested here in Australia. As an article in the Business Spectator on 20 May said: The big resource companies—and indeed the internationally active juniors—would weigh up the respective returns through investing within an Resource Super Profits Tax environment or putting their capital to work in lower-taxing jurisdictions offshore. Virtually overnight, for instance, BHP’s 75 per cent-owned Indonesian coal project—the 774 million tonne Maruwai metallurgical and thermal coal—would appear higher up the development pipeline than it did before the announcement of the Resource Super Profits Tax. As would the Jansen potash project in Canada, with its effective tax rate of 23 per cent versus the 57 per cent BHP faces under the Resource Super Profits Tax. Of course, the windfall that foreign countries will be receiving because of this ill-conceived tax was confirmed by a Canadian MP—a Conservative MP by the name of Brad Frost—who came on Australian radio to say: Well, money goes where the biggest profits are and when you raise taxes profits tend to go down. So I’m sending out the message—Canada wants Australian business. The dollars are going to move. People are scared because their profits are going to go in taxes so they should come to Canada—a low taxed, mining friendly jurisdiction. This resource super profits tax, if it is not halted, will destroy the very industry that has saved Australia from recession. I would urge the government to reconsider its plans before they do even more damage to Australia’s international reputation as a place where you can come and invest your money in an environment of certainty, not subject to the arbitrary whims of government like some South American dictatorship. In the limited time I have got available, I would like to turn specifically to my own electorate of Stirling. I can tell the House that if the coalition were to get elected in the upcoming election—and we hope that that will be sooner rather than later—I will be fighting for the electorate of Stirling to get its fair share of government funding. Sadly, through this budget, local projects in Stirling have gone wanting, with no new funding announced for the projects that matter most to the people I represent. At the last election, Kevin Rudd announced in front of the camera for advertisements in Western Australia, standing in Kings Park overlooking the city, that he would ensure that Western Australia got its fair share. By his own measure, Stirling’s fair share appears to be nothing. Despite the contribution that the people of Stirling have made to help steer Australia through the global financial downturn, this government has overlooked every area of need in my electorate. The obvious and most notable snub by Labor has been their repeated failure, despite consistent promises, to provide any funding for road infrastructure in Stirling. In other Labor states across the country, this budget has managed to find billions of dollars in funding for major road and infrastructure projects. The budget has brought forward money for a number of projects that I am sure are welcomed by other members’ electorates, but there has been no funding, absolutely no funding, for road projects in Stirling. The most galling omission is something that Kevin Rudd promised prior to the last election, that every state Labor government has promised and that every federal Labor candidate in Stirling has promised, and that is that they would build the Mirrabooka Avenue-Reid Highway overpass. This intersection has at various times been the worst black spot in Western Australia and has been responsible for countless deaths, maimings and injuries. It has been a serial trouble spot for many, many years, something that all sides of politics have acknowledged needs to be addressed. Sadly, the promises made by state and federal Labor candidates have gone unfulfilled again in this budget. As the member for Stirling it has long been one of my priorities to see this intersection improve with the construction of this overpass. I have been the member since 2004, and literally, in every state and federal election since then, the Labor candidates running have promised that this overpass would be built. But the state Labor government has squibbed it and the federal Labor government has squibbed it also. Here we are, after one term of this government, three budgets and a record spending spree, the likes of which Australia has never seen outside of wartime. We have record government debt, yet no money has been found to build this vital piece of infrastructure in my electorate of Stirling. As is so often the case with Kevin Rudd and his Labor government, they are all talk and no action. Later this year, when the election is announced, I am sure that the Labor Party will again commit to building this overpass, but I would encourage everyone in Stirling to peruse their previous empty promises on this matter and make a judgment about how serious they are this time. The Rudd Labor government have given nothing back to the Western Australian community and they have been particularly harsh to Stirling. What this government should have done was deliver funding to the local projects that matter most, such as funding to help fight crime—and crime remains one of most serious issues facing people in my community. My community knows all too well the effects of crime, particularly vandalism, theft and assault, and sadly this is an ongoing problem. On the front page of this week’s Stirling Times, the local paper in my electorate, there is a report on the increase in the number of reported burglaries of local businesses. During the term of the Howard government I was very proud to secure funding for the City of Stirling’s Safer Suburbs Plan, which delivered more security patrols through local neighbourhoods, CCTV cameras at Scarborough Beach and throughout the electorate, and crime prevention measures such as electronic message boards and ATV security vehicles. Unfortunately, the Labor government have not shown the same sense of urgency when it comes to addressing the alarmingly high crime rate in parts of Stirling and have failed to deliver any more funding for crime prevention measures in this budget. Nor has this government allocated funding for local environmental projects such as the one down at the Henderson Environmental Centre. The Henderson centre has the potential to deliver environmental education across my electorate and beyond, and I have been very keen to work closely with the new state Liberal government to see how the centre can be improved and look at the possibility of developing it into a facility which is one of the premier environmental centres in Western Australia. The centre can be used not only to educate schoolchildren about the local environment but also to assist university students with research projects. The Henderson centre is a fantastic resource and already enjoys the support of many local environmental groups. Educating our youth about the benefits of protecting the environment is important, and the Henderson centre would be an ideal avenue to deliver this message. Sadly, it is projects such as this which the Labor government has chosen to ignore. There has been no allocation for valuable and worthwhile local projects in a budget that instead focuses on slugging the mining industry to pay off the government’s massive debt, accrued through waste and mismanagement. Sporting facilities, schools, community groups and other local organisations in Stirling have all fallen by the wayside as this government desperately tries to bail itself out of the fiscal problem that it has created. The Labor government will probably claim in the coming weeks that this budget has allocated funding to one local project in Stirling: the Mirrabooka Community Centre. But this is a typically false claim—typical smoke and mirrors. The government is actually just repackaging funding that was already announced in previous budgets, and it was a commitment that they made prior to the 2007 election. That the government has included old funding in a new budget is an admission of their own guilt as they try to divert attention from the reality that Stirling has been completely dudded by what has gone down as one of the worst budgets in Australian history. I believe that my constituents deserve better, and as a member of a future coalition government I will be fighting for local projects in Stirling such as improving local roads, including the Reid Highway and Scarborough Beach Road. I will support environmental projects such as the Watermans Bay and North Beach coastline, and help the Henderson centre reach its potential as a premier environmental education centre in WA. I will also do whatever I can to get a future coalition government involved in crime prevention measures in local communities and, of course, particularly in my local community, assisting the good work done by the City of Stirling. I want to say a few quick words about the tragic inaction in my own portfolio of justice, customs and border protection. We all know about Labor’s dismal record on border security. Since changes were made to our robust system of border protection in August 2008, we have had a tsunami of boat arrivals: 129 illegal boats have arrived since then, illegally bringing to Australia almost 6,000 people. This problem, of course, is accelerating. In 2010 we have already witnessed an influx of 61 illegal boats carrying over 3,000 people. The surge of boats continues because the government does not have the resolve to do anything about it. Labor’s failed border protection policies have already cost taxpayers in excess of $1 billion over the four years of the estimates contained within this budget. The government, of course, is doing nothing to stop these costs from increasing. Their answer to this problem is to keep shovelling money to pay for the cost blow-outs and not to actually address the issue, which is the broken policy here in Canberra. The $1 billion of blow-outs is just the beginning of this; it will go higher and higher as long as the government refuses to address its failure to protect Australia’s borders. Despite the rhetoric from the Rudd Labor government about being tough on border protection and crime, the budget papers indicate that they will slash 250 jobs at the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service, 10 jobs from the Australian Institute of Criminology and one job from the Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity. As a result of Labor’s reckless spending, the Prime Minister has cut $146.3 million from the Customs service, despite this agency already being stretched beyond capacity in dealing with his failure to address the crisis on our borders. The $1 billion blow-out that I referred to comprises $770 million to increase offshore asylum seeker management expenses and $236 million to be spent on capital items, including additional accommodation on Christmas Island, reopening the Curtin detention facility and upgrades to other centres around the country. This government’s inaction has been plain for everybody to see. It is a problem that continues to accelerate, and the government has no answer to it apart from further spin and throwing further money at the problem. This will not fix it. It is a problem that has been completely made by Kevin Rudd’s weakening of the system in August 2008 when he dismantled the Pacific solution and the system of temporary protection visas that had stopped these boats from flowing in the first place. Only a coalition government will address this problem and, therefore, I reject the cuts that have been made to the Customs and Border Protection Service. The government should do much better in this vital area. (Time expired) 5083 11:39:00 Clare, Jason, MP HWL Blaxland ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Employment 1 0 Mr CLARE —I rise to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 and cognate bills. A budget needs to meet the challenges of today but it also has to build a bridge to the future. There are big challenges ahead. As a nation we are getting older. By the time I am 65 the number of Australians that age or older will have doubled and the number aged over 85 will have quadrupled. That means health care will cost the budget more, the cost of funding the age pension will increase and there will be fewer taxpayers to pay the bills. It is the job of government to meet these challenges. That is why health reform is important, that is why we need to increase superannuation savings and that is why we need to increase the productivity of the workforce and keep more people in the workforce for longer. The budget is focused on all three of these long-term challenges and takes steps to meet them. Because I am the Parliamentary Secretary for Employment I am going to focus on the third of these challenges: building the skills that the workforce needs for the future. Australia’s unemployment rate is the envy of almost every other country in the world. Unemployment in the UK is now at eight per cent, in France it is 10.1 per cent and in Spain it is 19.1 per cent. Around the world last year 27 million people lost their job. At the same time more than 230,000 jobs were created here in Australia. Just over two years ago unemployment in Australia and in the United States was under five per cent. It is now 5.4 per cent in Australia but in America it is almost double that—9.9 per cent. This did not happen by accident. It is testament to the decisive action we took last year, which was opposed by the opposition. Treasury data shows that the Australian economy grew by 1.4 per cent last year. Modelling by the Treasury shows that, without the economic stimulus, the economy would have shrunk last year by 0.7 per cent. In other words, the Australian economy would have gone into recession with the rest of the world—and all that that means, including higher unemployment and more businesses destroyed. In my electorate, where unemployment is already the highest in the country at over 11 per cent, unemployment today would be more like it is in Detroit. Experience tells us that industries like manufacturing never really recover from a recession and many older workers never get a full-time job again. That is why what the government did last year was so important. Stopping a recession is the most responsible thing a government can do. And it reaps other dividends. The budget will be back in surplus in three years time—three years early—and debt is less than half of what was predicted last year. But success brings other challenges. Because we got through the global recession better than most we will face the challenges of recovery sooner than most. One of those challenges is skills shortages. We will see that first in the mining sector and in the construction industry. Changing demographics will also drive a surge in demand for workers in areas like health care and aged care. At the same time, in other parts of the economy there will be job losses and, in some places, higher levels unemployment that will be difficult to budge. I spent the last 12 months on the road, with Bill Kelty and Lindsay Fox, working in the 20 areas across the country that have been hardest hit by the global recession. From Cairns to Burnie, from south-west Sydney to the south-western suburbs of Perth, they all have one thing in common: the proportion of people who have completed high school in these areas is lower than the national average. That is the common thread. Unemployment in places like these will only get worse if we do not do something about it. There is a reason for that: the workforce is changing. In the future there will be many more high-skilled jobs and many fewer low-skilled and unskilled jobs. I was in Washington in January and I spoke to some think tanks and employer groups there. They told me that three out of four jobs created in the United States in the next decade will require postsecondary skills—in other words, 75 per cent of the new jobs created in the United States in the next 10 year will require completion of high school plus an extra qualification. Monash University has done the same research in Australia and they have reached the same conclusion. We know what the workforce is going to look like. The key to building this workforce and cutting unemployment in places like my electorate is the same: education. It is also the driver that will boost productivity and workforce participation. That is why the investment made in skills in this budget is so important. We are already driving big reforms in our schools and our universities. If most of the jobs of the future are going to require postsecondary qualifications then we have to boost retention rates. That is why we have set a target of 90 per cent of students completing high school by 2015. We have also uncapped university places. As a result of our reforms, there are now 44,000 more students at university today than this time last year. As this budget shows, vocational education is the next stage of our education reform agenda. The budget includes over half a billion dollars to help build the skills that we need for the future. It is broken into the following parts: a guaranteed entitlement to a training place for every Australian under the age of 25; a $200 million critical skills investment fund that will fund 39,000 training places in key skills shortage areas like mining, infrastructure, construction and renewable energy—access to the fund will require industry contribution; a major increase in funding for adult literacy and numeracy programs—one of the key drivers of productivity and workforce participation; additional funding to boost the quality and performance or our top 100 vocational training providers; and the extension of Apprentice Kickstart to help recruit 22,500 more apprentices in the next six months. Apprentice Kickstart has been enormously successful. It came out of meetings that were held last year with business when I was on the road with Bill Kelty and Lindsay Fox. Businesses I met with said that they needed more help to put apprentices on, and the facts bore it out. Between April and June last year, the number of people starting trade apprenticeships dropped by 27 per cent compared to the same time the year before. So we tripled the bonus that employers get for putting on a teenage apprentice over summer; we increased that bonus from $1,500 up to almost $5,000—a simple idea, and it worked. We exceeded our target of 21,000 apprentices and put on more than 24,000 apprentices. The number of apprentices starting a traditional trade now is higher than before the global recession. We have done that in one year. To put that in perspective: when Australia went into recession in the early 1990s, apprentice recruitment dropped by about the same amount, but it took 13 years before we recruited the same number of apprentices again—and we have done it in one. I have met a lot of apprentices over the last few weeks and a lot of bosses. Three stick in my mind. In Bayswater North in Melbourne I met a bloke called Paul. He builds state-of-the-art fibreglass fishing boats. He told me he was planning to put on an apprentice over summer. Apprentice Kickstart meant he put on two—two young blokes called Ryan and Mitchell. In Penrith in Western Sydney I met a young bloke named Jack. He has been doing a pre-apprenticeship in carpentry at the local TAFE there for two years before finally picking up an apprenticeship. He is an outstanding young man. His boss David told me that Apprentice Kickstart made all the difference. It helped him to put Jack on. In Coffs Harbour, on the mid-North Coast, the team at Bushmans Bakery make great meat pies. They also make great apprentices. Dally has run the company for over 20 years. He told me Apprentice Kickstart helped him put on more apprentices as well. More importantly, he told me the story of a young bloke who works for him. Dally tries to put on apprentices who need a bit of help. This young bloke had dropped out of school and had been in trouble with the law. He is not a Kickstart apprentice. He has been an apprentice there now for over two years. Dally told me that this young bloke told him, ‘If I didn’t have this apprenticeship, I would probably be a no-hoper.’ This budget extends the Apprentice Kickstart program because it works and because of the difference that an apprenticeship can make. Recruitment of apprentices is only part of the challenge; completion is the other part. Too many apprentices do not finish their apprenticeship. Fifteen years ago, about 65 per cent of apprentices completed their apprenticeship; today it is about 50 per cent. There is an enormous lost opportunity here. It costs businesses money, it costs apprentices time and it costs us the skills that we desperately need. Apprentices drop out for a number of reasons: expectations, employment conditions and the quality of training are all big factors. Pre-apprenticeships and school based apprenticeships are an important part of the solution, and so is mentoring. We recently announced $10 million for mentoring services to help apprentices complete their training and secure jobs. The budget also provides funding to move from a system with fixed time frames to a competency based training system. It is another important reform that will help to tackle skills shortages without undermining training quality. The potential impact of the reforms that we are undertaking in education and skills is enormous. The more skills we have, the more we are likely to earn and the longer we are likely to stay in the workforce. The more skills an economy has, the stronger and more competitive it will be. Last week the Deputy Prime Minister released some economic modelling from KPMG Econtech. It shows that, if our reforms in education and training are fully implemented, it will boost employment by more than 500,000 each year and boost economic growth by about $4,000 per person per year every year for the next three decades. I thought the Liberal Party understood this. In the opposition’s last few years in government, skills shortages drove up inflation and interest rates and strangled growth. In December last year, when the new Leader of the Opposition was appointed, when he was putting together his shadow cabinet, he gave two of his shadow ministers responsibility for apprenticeships and training. So I was genuinely shocked a few weeks ago when they announced that they were going to cut investment in both. The opposition have now said that they will cancel the Productivity Places Program, which is providing 711,000 training places across Australia to help those out of work to find jobs and those with jobs to improve their skills. They have said they will cancel the Trade Training Centres in Schools Program, which is delivering new trade training centres to every secondary school that wants one. They said they will cancel the computer in schools program, which will provide a computer to every school child in years 9 to 12 by the end of 2011. They said they will cancel the Smarter Schools teacher quality program, which includes paying our best teachers more to work in schools that need them most—schools like the ones in my electorate. If this policy was ever implemented, the impact on the economy would be enormous. It would mean that almost 400,000 fewer apprenticeships and training places would exist. It would mean that 1,800 trade trading centres around the country would not be built. It would mean that 120,000 students would miss out on the most important tool in the workforce today—a computer. It would mean kids in places like Blaxland would continue to miss out. At a time when skills shortages are already re-emerging and when the jobs of the future are going to require more skills and not less, this would make things worse. Already 45,000 Australians miss out on a training place each year, 60,000 leave school and do not go onto a job or further education, and 360,000 young Australians do not have a higher school certificate or a certificate II qualification. The Leader of the Opposition’s solution, apparently, is to cut off the dole to people under 30 and send them off to the mines. In April, the Sydney Morning Herald reported that the Leader of the Opposition was developing a plan to relocate unemployed people to Perth. There is only one problem with this idea: the Liberal Party has tried it before and it failed. In 2006-07 and 2007-08, the department of workplace relations ran two separate pilots aiming to relocate job seekers from areas of high unemployment to Perth. It did not work. Mining is a highly skilled industry. The shortage is not workers; it is skills. The proof of this is Kwinana in south-west Perth. A couple of kilometres away is the Australian Marine Complex, where work is ramping up on the Gorgon liquid natural gas project. Very few of those jobs are being picked up by young people who live in Kwinana, where teenage unemployment is through the roof. These are young people who live in Perth, who live in WA, and cannot find work in this industry. It is proof that you cannot just put someone on a plane and expect them to find a job. The problem is much deeper. It requires real investment in skills and real investment in education, which is what this budget does. The challenges ahead are not hard to see, but they do require hard decisions. That is why this is an economically responsible budget. It will help to build a bridge to the future we want, not one dictated for us—one where health care is affordable and of a high standard, where people can retire with enough superannuation for a comfortable and secure retirement, and where we have the workforce we need to drive a strong economy. This budget and the response to it reveals that there is only one party in this place capable of meeting those challenges. I commend the budget to the House. 5087 11:57:00 Scott, Bruce, MP YT4 Maranoa NATS 0 0 Mr BRUCE SCOTT —I rise to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011, Appropriation Bill (No. 2) 2010-2011 and Appropriation (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 Despite the rhetoric that has been uttered by the Treasurer since the bringing down of the budget—and in fact in the lead-up to the budget when he said that this was going to be a boring, low-spending budget—the reality is quite the opposite. When you start to go into the details you find it is a big-spending, big-taxing budget. But that is what we find from a Labor government: big spending and big taxing. And, of course, there are new taxes. In fact, this budget is built on the new mining tax, the resource super profits tax, in which anything above a six per cent return on capital is considered a superprofit. Look out any company in Australia listed publicly. If you are making more than a six per cent return on capital, the Labor Party considers that as a superprofit. It is also built on a new tax on cigarettes. In some ways I do not mind the fact that there will be a tax in that area, but we have got to also match that approach to addressing the issue of getting people to stop smoking because of the risk to their health. The Prime Minister and the Treasurer have had a billion-dollar blow-out in their budget due to the failed Home Insulation Program. Not only have they spent something like $2.5 billion giving out free batts to insulate roofs, we now find in the budget that they are going to spend a billion dollars to take them out. A billion dollars after having spent $2.3 billion in a flawed approach to put them in ceilings. We have had a $1.7 billion blow-out in the Deputy Prime Minister’s program to put her name tag on halls—in building ‘memorial halls’, as we have come to know them, in schools across Australia. Many of those are going very well in the private schools, the Catholic schools, the independent schools and the Christian schools. The cost of building them under their supervision is about 25 per cent of the cost of those in the public sector, because the state governments are involved in it and they are running it in their departments. That program initially was part of a stimulus package designed to stimulate the economy in 2009-10. Yet they will still be spending this money, stimulating the economy, in 2012-13. The so-called stimulus package was meant to be targeted in that period in history under the global financial crisis tag. We have seen a billion-dollar blow-out in the Computers in Schools program. We also saw this government commit something like $4 billion for the National Broadband Network prior to the election. But what we see now is a $38 billion National Broadband Network, and we are starting to see some of it rolled out in parts of the country without even legislation passing either house—without that yet appropriating funds through other methods to put some optic fibre cables in marginal seats. I can see the vision already: Prime Minister ‘hard hat’ with high-vis jacket during the election campaign rolling out blue cable into an underground trench somewhere when the fact of the matter is that more than 50 per cent of it is going to be along power lines. I can see the vision already of this Prime Minister during the next election campaign. Regional Australia hardly rated a mention in the budget. Agriculture and the farmers did not rate and yet they are a significant part of our national economy. So often we hear from this Prime Minister that mining saved us from the recession. I put it to you, Deputy Speaker Slipper, and to this chamber, that the farming community of Australia and farm exports, which were up in value during this period and continue to grow because we have the most efficient farmers in the world, contributed significantly to helping Australia avoid dipping into a recession. So it is not just the mining sector. Yet in the Treasurer’s speech in the House I think he mentioned regional Australia once and farmers not at all. There is no new funding for quarantine. Some 250 Customs staff look like they are going to be sacked and yet we want to keep our borders safer, we want to keep our clean and green image and we want to keep ourselves free of disease in this country. Yet what we see is a cut in this area of the budget. In Dalby in my electorate of Maranoa we have the first grain ethanol plant in Australia. All they use is grain to produce ethanol. It is a brand-new, high-tech plant. Under the coalition we put incentives through the tax system for ethanol to ensure that ethanol was taken up as part of the mix in petrol for consumers. There was no tax on it. But we find in this budget a tax on ethanol that will progressively ramp up between now and 2015. This is going to possibly impact on the production of ethanol, because it may mean that fewer people will use the E10 mix in our motor vehicles. It is going to cost jobs, potentially, over time. What was this government about? Another new tax. The deficit this year will be some $57 billion. That is the biggest deficit that Australia has seen in its peacetime history. In 2½ years we have gone from surplus budgets, money in the bank, to this year $57 billion in deficit. We are also going to end up with a $93 billion debt. It took the previous Labor government some 13 years to rack up $96 billion, but this Labor government gets the gold medal three times over—gold, gold, gold!—because they will achieve that inside their first term. They started with no net debt and $20 billion in the bank. The government, because of its reckless spending and its inability to manage the economy and the finances of this nation, will now borrow $100 million a day. This week they will borrow $700 million just to pay the bills. That means that every man, woman and child in Australia will have a debt of $4,075. On the birth certificate of a child born today will be, ‘$4,075 of debt compliments of the Labor Party.’ Somehow they will have to pay back those $4,075. That is their inheritance from the Labor government. When I look at this budget deficit, the interest that we are paying is $4.7 billion this year, $6.5 billion next year and then it rises up to $8 billion. That $8 billion, which has to be paid before any other bill is paid, as anyone with a mortgage would know, would build the inland rail twice every year. It would upgrade the Warrego Highway from beginning to end, from just west of Brisbane to Charleville, 16 times every year. We are desperate for money for those major highways. The Landsborough Highway is 1,000 kilometres long and is the major arterial route from southern Australia right through Mount Isa and on to Darwin. How often would it rebuild or at least upgrade that highway? This government has not even got any money in the forward estimates for this 1,000 kilometres of strategic road. It is important not only for tourism but also for the development of the Galilee Basin resources sector and for the defence links between Darwin, northern Australia and right down to southern Australia. What about some strategic roads for the outback? How much would that $8 billion a year do for strategic roads in the outback? What about some money for optic fibre cable into those communities that rely on radio signals to gain access to the main telecommunications networks in Australia? Under this government we have also seen power prices rise 18 to 22 per cent across the nation in the last 12 months. The Prime Minister went to the election talking about working families. He was going to do something about groceries, the cost of living and petrol, yet petrol in the last 12 months has gone up over six per cent. There have been three interest rate rises and we are still counting. Where are the Prime Minister’s working families now? The Prime Minister committed prior to the last election that he would axe the Public Service. He would get into it and make it an efficient public service, yet we have seen 20,000 new positions created in the last 2½ years. What about Minister Wong’s department of climate change? They awarded some 220 new contracts worth $32 million. The ETS is in the bottom draw somewhere but, if they win government, it will come out for sure. That will be $14 billion a year in new taxes on all Australians. What are they doing? Are they just sitting in limbo? Have they been moved to other departments? The Prime Minister was also going to take over health and fix our hospitals without any new bureaucracy. But what we find in the budget is $500 million for additional bureaucracy in the health department because he wants to get control of this, notwithstanding the states saying, ‘Sorry, Prime Minister, under our model the public hospital systems will share the responsibility but you are not going to take it over down in Canberra.’ Yet there is $500 million for new bureaucracy in that sector. Let us go to the big one—that is, the superprofits tax. It will eventually mean that the resources sector will pay a 58 per cent tax on their profit. The only country in the Western world that has got a tax that is even close to that is the United States of America, which has a 40 per cent tax rate. Resource companies already pay 30 per cent on their profits. They pay 10 per cent of their gross in terms of royalties and they pay payroll tax to state governments as well. Canada, which is our most direct competitor, taxes its mining sector at the rate of 25 per cent. We have already heard the Lieutenant Governor of Saskatchewan saying that they would love to attract some of this investment which would create jobs in their minerals and mines area. Why? Because they are a competitor to us in the global market, yet the tax they impose on the mining sector there is some 25 per cent. An interesting comment was made by the head of Rio Tinto, Tom Albanese. He was quoted in the Australian on Monday this week saying: Over the past month I’ve been to Japan, Canada, Europe, the US, China and they are all asking me ‘what the heck has happened in Australia?’ Tom Albanese, head of Rio Tinto, well, Kevin Rudd and Wayne Swan is what happened in Australia. It is all about their great big new tax because of their failure to manage the economy. All they have done to the economy is put it into debt after debt that only a coalition government will address in order to start to repay it and so manage the economy, as we demonstrated during the Howard and Costello years when it paid off the previous Labor government’s debt. We left a legacy of a budget surplus and money in the bank—the Future Fund. I want to touch on where some of this money could have gone. This government will spend some $38 million on advertising, without going through the approval process that they promised prior to the last federal election. This is $38 million being spent on advertising how their mining tax will help our economy. It is $38 million that could have gone into, in my case and I think across Australia, disability services. Just some of that money would help the Granite Belt Support Services to purchase a new building 19 times over. A problem that we have to address is support for these support services that are doing a magnificent job looking after people with disabilities. In the town of Dalby is a wonderful organisation called Waminda which provides support for children with autism. It is a shocking statistic there that one in every 52 children enrolled in schools across southern Queensland between Jondaryan and Charleville has been diagnosed with autism. Couldn’t some of the $38 million have gone into supporting those services with infrastructure rather than being spent on advertising for this great big new tax that was not proposed prior to the last federal election? I want to touch on one other issue—and I will be saying a lot more about it in the time ahead—Northern Australia. We have not seen any money in this budget go towards significantly addressing the needs of Northern Australia. Northern Australia’s population is 4.7 per cent of the total population of Australia. Northern Australia is described as ‘north of the Tropic of Capricorn’. That covers some 45 per cent of the land mass of Australia. It is also where the great mineral resources are in Australia. It is where the future prosperity of our nation will be generated from, but we have to do more for this area. I support a proposition that is being put by an organisation called ‘Australians for northern development and economic vision’. The purpose of the Australian northern development economic vision—and I support this in concept—is to influence federal and state governments and other interested parties to secure the lowest possible tax rates for the remote north of Australia and to create a range of practical incentives to achieve investment and attract and retain a sufficient workforce. We have a zone tax rebate system in place in Australia today but it is not addressing the fundamental and core issue that needs to be addressed: in order for mining and the resources sector to develop projects they have to operate staff on a fly in fly out basis. We need to have personal income tax concessions to encourage the people who work in these sectors not only to live there but to work there in that zone for at least one year. We have to do something about the population of Northern Australia. This is where the economic zones and the prosperity of Australia will be generated from in the future, yet this government has not seen fit to do anything about addressing the serious issue of the lack of an available local workforce in this part of Australia. We could also extend that zone beyond the Tropic of Capricorn into the Cooper Basin. In my electorate, for instance, I have the Galilee Basin, the Surat Basin and the Cooper Basin. If today Mount Isa was built on a fly-in fly-out basis, we would not have Mount Isa as it is today. It would be a donga resource centre that would not have the infrastructure that it has today. Previous generations did it; we have to return to that area and do it again. My electorate will see, if a coalition government is elected and we repeal this mining superprofits tax, the development of the Surat coal basin, where there is some $80 billion of investment sitting on hold—and the jobs that go with it. Of course there is also the Galilee Basin in the east of the Barcaldine-Alpha-Jericho area in Maranoa. We need to make sure that these developments can proceed. Under the government they will not proceed, they will be put on hold and that capital will go to other countries. We will lose as a nation an opportunity to grow our economy while the Labor government is in power, proposing yet more taxes on the sector that is going to help us grow our economy and our future prosperity. ANDEV, Australians for Northern Development and Economic Vision, have my support. I certainly look forward to talking with them. We are short of workers in this country. So many of the skills that we need are being provided through 457 visas. In fact, in my own hometown such is the shortage of skills that you cannot make a McDonald’s hamburger or service a vehicle without a 457 visa worker. We have to develop Northern Australia, and I support the ANDEV concepts. (Time expired) 5091 12:17:00 Bevis, Arch, MP ET4 Brisbane ALP 1 0 Mr BEVIS —This budget, as with last year’s budget, is set against a backdrop of international difficulty in global financial markets. Against that background of the worst financial crisis this planet has seen in more than 70 years, Australia stands alone as the only advanced economy to have weathered that storm and to have avoided a recession. Today we look at an unemployment rate of around about 5.3 per cent, anticipated to fall to 4.75 by mid-2012. It is worth noting that the IMF, the International Monetary Fund, have credited this government’s stimulus packages with having saved at least two per cent of the workforce from unemployment queues. That is a quarter of a million Australians in work today directly as a result of the Rudd Labor government’s fast and effective action to protect the Australian economy. That has been recognised by every credible commentator and just about everybody in the Australian community, except for the Liberal Party, especially its current leadership. I want to refer to some of the observations that others have made. The Australian Financial Review in November last year said: The federal government’s financial position is one of the strongest among the world’s leading developed countries, many of which face a huge task in reducing public debt to safe levels … Australia is at the top of the economic report card when it comes to that performance, and I want to say something about government debt shortly to put that into perspective. Reserve Bank Governor Glenn Stevens said this in March this year, as reported in the Australian: We can come out of this episode— that is, the global financial crisis— as the country that didn’t have to buy their banks, where government finances are in terrific shape, where the government debt ratio will peak at 10 per cent of GDP, with a strong regulatory framework and where unconventional fiscal and monetary measures worked a treat … Reserve Bank Governor Glenn Stevens’s view is that the approach this government took in insulating and protecting Australian jobs and businesses from the global financial crisis ‘worked a treat’. Michael Rennie, managing partner of McKinsey, in March this year said: Many countries would envy Australia’s debt position— and they do. We need to put an end to the foolish and childish argument that so often goes on in this parliament, with those opposite claiming credit for the government’s low debt and saying—as we just heard then from the member for Maranoa, a person I had more respect for, frankly, than his speech gives credit to—that conservative governments, Liberal governments, pay off the debts and look after the economy after periods of Labor government. The inescapable truth of it is that, if you go back over generations—and I recently went back over a period of 30 years looking at the Australian government debt—Australian government debt is at the very bottom of the OECD every year. It has made no difference whether there was a Labor government or Liberal government. The truth of the matter is—and it is about time this debate had a little bit more truth and a little bit less spin—that the Australian government, irrespective of its politics, has had extraordinarily low debt levels. That goes back not just years, not just decades, but generations. If you have a look over the last 30 years, you find that our debt has been a tiny fraction of that of our trading partners and the OECD average. At the moment it stands in stark contrast. Australian debt is now expected to peak at 10 per cent of GDP. Contrast that with the United States. The United States now has government debt in the order of 100 per cent of its GDP. The United Kingdom is in the same category—100 per cent. Japan has debt in excess of 200 per cent of its GDP. The average for all countries in the OECD is now above 50 per cent and Australia sits at the bottom of that at 10 per cent. So let us put to rest this nonsense argument that those opposite like to trot out: that they come and rescue the economy and pay off the debt. The truth is that Australian government debt is, and has been for as long as anybody in this place can remember, extremely low and it has not mattered whether there was a Labor government or a Liberal government. It is time we had a little bit of honesty in the debate. Every serious commentator knows that is the truth. It is a pity some of the people in the gallery do not print a bit more of what they know rather than just repeating some of the nonsense from those opposite. With the stimulus package, the Australian government has helped steer Australia, alone amongst all of the advanced economies, through this period of economic difficulty without going into recession. In doing so, we have also embarked upon a program of building services and infrastructure. I have spoken in this parliament before about the wonderful work being done in Building the Education Revolution. In Queensland, where I know the situation quite intimately, the additional resources that have gone into schools were much needed and are being very effectively and efficiently applied. But I want to turn for a moment to another area of importance, and that is health. Throughout our history, it has fallen to Labor governments to create the foundations for our decent health system. We often talk here about the Australian health system being the best in the world. That did not occur by accident and it was not easy, because every milestone that we point to today was fiercely opposed, usually by the conservative politicians in this country and very often by some in the medical profession. I want to cite the key milestones. The Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, something that everyone in this parliament would now embrace and which the Australian people rely on to ensure that every Australian has access to quality pharmaceuticals, was a system introduced by the Chifley Labor government. It was opposed fiercely by the medical profession at the time and, in the face of that fierce opposition, Labor pressed ahead. It was the Whitlam Labor government that introduced Medicare, as we know it today—Medibank as it was then—to ensure that every Australian, irrespective of their means and no matter how poor they may be, could, if they were sick, go to their local GP and get medical attention. That was fiercely opposed by the Liberal and National parties and fiercely opposed by the AMA. Today it is regarded as a bedrock of our health system. Of course the election of the Fraser government saw Medibank largely dismantled and dismembered, and it took the next Labor government of Bob Hawke to restore it and it became the Medicare system that we largely know today. I do have to say that the Howard government took the knife to that when it had the opportunity. It all but destroyed bulk-billing for the first half of its tenure in office, only to realise that the Australian public would not tolerate that, so it spent the next few years trying to restore what it had destroyed. It is now the Rudd government that is taking the next significant step, with the historic agreement reached with the states and territories—all but the Liberal government of Western Australia. We are now going to see significant increases in funding for hospitals so that they will be properly resourced into the future and run locally. We are also seeing the introduction under Labor of e-health, allowing each individual to personally control their own medical records but to have them accessible electronically so that wherever they may be in the country they can go to a doctor and be assured that that doctor has access to their full history. This is an interesting example of the double standards the Liberal Party have applied to this issue. The leader of the Liberal Party, Tony Abbott, has said that he will abolish the e-health commitments that this government has made. That is in direct contrast to what his own health shadow minister had to say, and it is even in contrast to what he himself has said in the past. When he was health minister, Mr Abbott said— 10000 Slipper, Peter (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. Peter Slipper)—The member should refer to the Leader of the Opposition by his title. ET4 Bevis, Arch, MP Mr BEVIS —I said when he was the health minister. 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —I think you then said ‘Mr Abbott’. ET4 Bevis, Arch, MP Mr BEVIS —I did, yes. The then health minister—I will not use his name if that offends the Deputy Speaker— 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —No, it is just that the standing orders should be observed. ET4 Bevis, Arch, MP Mr BEVIS —Like I said, I will not use his name if that offends the Deputy Speaker. 10000 DEPUTY SPEAKER, The The DEPUTY SPEAKER —It is not a question of offending me; it is a question of what the standing orders provide. ET4 Bevis, Arch, MP Mr BEVIS —He said: Without an integrated health record system, effective and efficient team care will be almost impossible. Queues will be longer and costs will be higher as health professionals under pressure keep asking the same questions and ordering the same tests. That was the view of the Leader of the Opposition when he was health minister in 2005. He thought it was a good idea then; today, of course, he has a different tune and he has committed the Liberal Party to oppose this. This is in contrast to what his shadow minister has had to say. His shadow minister in 2009 is on the record as saying: When I first sat down with Nicola— the health minister, Nicola Roxon— coming into this portfolio only six months ago I gave her an undertaking that we would—on the issue of e-health—provide bipartisan support. It is a bit like the bipartisan support they provided for the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme—it did not last very long. You cannot take the Liberal Party at their word. They have demonstrated that they are untrustworthy. I want to turn to the debate that is engulfing a lot of newspaper columns at the moment—the debate on the resource super profits tax. It has been discussed in this debate by other speakers. Opposition members continue, through either ignorance or malice, to perpetuate falsehoods. Rather than just have me argue the point, I want to refer to the comments of the former head of the Minerals Council of Australia, Mr David Buckingham, who was also the head of the Business Council of Australia. He described some of the reactions to the tax in the media as ‘hysterical’. So let me look at what the facts are. The resource super profits tax of 40 per cent replaces the crude oil excise, and it effectively replaces state and territory royalties by giving a refundable credit for all royalties that have been paid. That is going to ensure that there will be no double taxation of resource profits. The new lower company tax rate of 28 per cent will apply to all companies, including mining companies. This new super profits tax only applies to the super profits. In fact, mining companies in less profitable ventures are actually going to have their tax rate reduced. For example, most mining companies with a 10 per cent profit return on investments will actually pay less tax, not more tax. Companies are also going to be encouraged to undertake exploration with an upfront rebate at the prevailing company tax rate, including, I am pleased to see, for the exploration of geothermal energy. David Buckingham, who given his experience is a person who understands the industry very well, made this comment in a recently published article: … I think the balance over time is likely to see an escalation in investment, a growth in jobs, a growth in exploration activity not, as a number of the more hysterical commentators are suggesting, withdrawal. David Buckingham not only understands the industry very well but is able to bring to this a broader perspective than the short-term self-interested mining executives, who seem to be able to channel their thoughts through the Leader of the Opposition very well. In fact, David Buckingham, in his article, cited a similar scare campaign that was run by mining companies. He said: A similar pattern occurred before I arrived at the Minerals Council in the 1990s with the long and scarifying debate around native title. Australians were told native title would cause an investment strike, lost projects, lost jobs, exports and national income. As we all remember, the debate had some ugly features throughout. Of course, we all know what happened next—native title legislation was passed, the sky did not fall in, and the mining industry went on to grow and prosper in the years that followed. In the context of the current debate and indeed the ads that the mining companies are running today—and I think Rio Tinto had one that was mentioned in media bulletins earlier today—David Buckingham made this rather prophetic observation: … miners will always quote the 30 per cent company tax rate. They won’t talk so much about the other elements of the company tax system that are equally important, but far less obvious to the casual observer. For example, not many miners will talk about the concessions they enjoy under the company tax. But we all know that concessions like accelerated depreciation mean that the effective tax rate is well below the headline rate. He went on to say that the Henry review found that in Australia the biggest beneficiaries of these concessions are the information and mining sectors. He said: Once you allow for concessions, the mining sector faces an effective company tax rate of 17 per cent, far shy of the 30 per cent headline rate. Rio Tinto are spending their shareholders’ money trying to tell people they are paying too much tax—something like 35 per cent. But David Buckingham, the former head of the Minerals Council, has belled the cat. He says that, when you take account of all the concessions, the true figure is closer to 17 per cent. There are plenty of wage earners in my electorate who, as pay-as-you-go taxpayers, would be delighted to have a 17 per cent tax rate. In fact, those of my constituents who earn more than $80,000 are currently paying more than 40 per cent marginal tax anyway, so I do not think they are shedding too many tears at the thought that Rio Tinto might have to pay the same rate that they pay as individuals. But there is an important comparison to make in terms of what has occurred in the past decade or so with the mining boom and where the revenue has gone. From 1999-2000 through to 2008-09, mining profits grew by $80 billion—a very substantial increase in profits for the companies. Over the same time the amount of additional tax collected from the mining companies by all governments—that is, state and federal governments—grew by just $9 billion. So in the last decade we have seen an enormous shift towards the companies. The taxpayers of Australia have received a diminishing return on those mining profits. There has been an $80 billion increase in profits for the mining companies but over the same time there has been a $9 billion increase in revenue to all governments. The mineral wealth of our nation is not the property of a handful of very rich Australians, nor is it the property of overseas corporations and investors. The mineral wealth of this nation belongs to all of us and it is time that all Australians got a fair share of it. The Leader of the Opposition seems to think that mining companies pay too much tax but at the same time he wants to block Labor’s cuts in the tax rate for small business. The Liberals want to block Labor’s plan to increase the minimum superannuation from nine per cent to 12 per cent. I should add that this increase would have occurred if the Howard government in its first budget had not abolished the program for increases in superannuation that had been put in place by the previous Labor government. It seems that the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Abbott, and the Liberal Party are keen to protect the biggest mining companies in the world but not too keen on protecting the retirement benefits of millions of ordinary working Australians. There was a very worthwhile editorial in the London Financial Times on 30 May. It states: Australia has for years levied a petroleum rent tax of 40 per cent on oil and gas profits before applying the normal corporate tax rate of 30 per cent to the remainder. Canberra now wants to do the same in mining. Good. It will be a long overdue update of the mediaeval practice of levying royalties on gross production. Being regressive, royalties squeeze marginal producers while letting those with the most abundant mines keep the largest share of their loot. Quite insightfully, the London Financial Times says: Miners predictably warned it will hurt jobs. The charge that it turns Australia into the ‘number one sovereign risk issue’, made by Tom Albanese, chief executive Rio Tinto, is absurd. That is the judgment of probably the pre-eminent financial newspaper in the world, the London Financial Times. The London Financial Times labels Tom Albanese’s and Rio Tinto’s claim as ‘absurd’. Put that together with the comments of David Buckingham, the man who headed up the Minerals Council for years in this country and was an executive at the Business Council of Australia, who says that the response of the mining companies, echoed by those opposite in the Liberal Party, is ‘hysterical’, and you start to understand the picture that confronts the government. The editorial in the London Financial Times went on and noted, interestingly: The industry’s greatest fear is that other countries follow Canberra’s lead. As the benefits of the tax reform become visible, there is no reason why they should not. The London Financial Times has identified where this campaign is at. The reason this government is confronting such a heavy-handed, high-cost media campaign from the mining companies is not just that they have a concern about what will occur here in Australia. They know, like the London Financial Times, that there are plenty of other countries in the world that actually want to move down this path too. And that worries the mining companies more than anything that is happening here. Their mouthpieces in this parliament are the Leader of the Opposition and the Liberal Party, who seem to be more concerned about the top end of town in the mining companies being able to rip off $80 billion in the last decade—I withdraw that. They did not rip it off, they received $80 billion in profits, and that is a fair return for them. It is $80 billion in profits but only $9 billion to the taxpayer. This budget is a good budget. The tax laws are good laws and I support them. (Time expired) 5096 12:37:00 Hunt, Gregory, MP 00AMV Flinders LP 0 0 Mr HUNT —I want to begin with some simple numbers as we look at theAppropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 and associated bills. The simple numbers relate to one of the government’s programs which was emphasised in last year’s budget—that is, the Home Insulation Program. This program was set out as a $2.45 billion program which would achieve 2.7 million homes as being subject to insulation. Instead, what we have seen is a program which delivered 1.1 million homes with insulation, of which it appears that almost 300,000 are dodgy, defective or have to be pulled out. So at best case it will achieve 30 per cent of what it set out to achieve. But it is the costs of achieving the program which have been highlighted in this budget and it is the costs in human terms which outweigh any other possible conceivable benefit. Let me begin with very simple numbers. Firstly, overnight we have heard that what was 144 house fires only as recently as 14 May had increased to 156 house fires by 26 May. With at least two more over the weekend in Melbourne in the suburbs of Ormond and Lalor, we now have 158 house fires from this program which are known and confirmed. That does not include what else may have occurred. That is house fires alone. Yet we know that not every house will be checked. Over 800,000 houses under this government program will never be checked despite the warnings of Commander Ian Hunter of Melbourne’s Metropolitan Fire Brigade, who said on April 6 that every house must be checked, and despite the warning this week of the Metropolitan Fire Brigade Commander Frank Stockton, who noted that there had been a marked increase in insulation fires and warned that with winter now arriving ‘these fires won’t stop’, because more lights were being left on for longer, which would lead to more roof insulation fires. Against that background, it is inconceivable that in this first area of fires alone, with 158 house fires across Australia, this is not being seen as a national emergency. The advice of the Metropolitan Fire Brigade that every home must be inspected is being ignored. How can this be? The numbers continue to grow. There are 1,500 potentially deadly electrified roofs. That is an extraordinary thing and we know that the advice was such that now foil will either be ripped out of every home or a safety switch will be installed. At the same time, the Master Electricians have said that even ripping the foil out will not reduce the risk where staples have been placed in the vicinity of live wires. They believe that the only thing that will guarantee safety for the 50,000 foil roofs is a full set of safety switches, because these are ticking time bombs which can last for years and years. A decade from now, a homeowner, an electrician, an insulation installer or a pest controller could face a further fatal complication. Beyond those 1,500 potentially deadly electrified roofs, which have necessitated the complete refit of 50,000 roofs with foil in them, mostly in Queensland, we have the fact that up to 240,000 dangerous and dodgy roofs have been identified under the non-foil component of the Home Insulation Program. That is almost a quarter of a million homes that previously did not have an issue but now have a dangerous or substandard insulation job in their roofs. The magnitude and scope of that is extraordinary to behold. It is inconceivable that any Australian government could oversee such a level of mismanagement. These are 240,000 homes out of over one million non-foil homes; we just do not know which ones are the dangerous ones. Against that background, it beggars belief that the Prime Minister continues to ignore the warnings, as he ignored the warnings through August, September, October and November of last year that there were looming tragedies in the installation process. Now he continues to ignore the warnings that every home must be inspected. Be it upon his head if there are further tragedies, as the Metropolitan Fire Brigade warned of just this week. They could not rule out and were fearful of the potential for further fatalities, let alone further fires. We will know that the Prime Minister has continued, for whatever reason, perhaps stubborn and wilful blindness, to ignore further looming tragedies. Beyond that, let us look at the human dimension. Four young lives have been lost in the course of this program, which the government was warned about in advance. There were warnings about the risk of fire, the risk of injury and the risk of death in the risk register reports and updates that were within the government. We know that on July 31 a risk register update was issued that made reference to fire, injury and death. We know that, on September 17 last year, a risk register update was issued with a reference to fire, injury and death. We know that on October 1 a risk register update was issued with a reference to fire, injury and death. These are at the heart of the government’s system within the project control group, a group which specifically included some of the most senior officers within the government and within the Prime Minister’s own department, a group which reported to Senator Arbib and provided reports to Minister Garrett. These warnings were at the highest levels. Sadly, the warnings were never adequately respected. The warnings were never treated with the gravity they deserved. We also know that Mr Garrett wrote letters to the Prime Minister on at least four occasions. Three of those letters have been disclosed, revealing 12 separate warnings within them. These letters, dated 27 August, 28 October and 30 October, include 12 warnings to the Prime Minister about safety and about unacceptably high risks to homeowners and others in the installation process and in the ongoing maintenance of people’s own homes—their sanctuaries. We do not know what was in the 14 August letter from Mr Garrett to the Prime Minister. Given the degree of shock about what was included in the other three letters, what was in the 14 August letter must be extraordinarily powerful as it has been buried and remains within the Prime Minister’s office, locked away in his desk. That letter must be revealed, because this is about the circumstances in which young lives have been lost. This is about the warnings that the highest office in Australia received from a cabinet minister. These issues are profound and real. First and foremost, we have the tragic consequences of fires, 240,000 potentially dangerous and deadly electrified roofs and, most importantly, the loss of young lives. In addition to that, we have the profound waste of public money. Up to $1 billion will be spent, as the budget papers reveal, in order to rectify the problems created by spending $1½ billion. Thinking of it as $10,000 in tax paid for an average worker on $55,000, 100,000 workers will have to work for a year of their lives just to fix the problems created by the Home Insulation Program. These 100,000 workers will toil—whether they are in a supermarket, in a shop, on a factory floor, in a trade or a profession or in a small manufacturing firm—for a year in order to simply pay off the cost to fix the nation’s roofs. The budget papers reveal these costs. I turn now to the items within the budget papers. The Home Insulation Program, which has been discontinued, has $507,662,000 in its estimates for the remainder of 2009-10, 2010-11 and 2011-12. The industry program has $15 million in it. The foil inspection safety program has $84½ million. The home inspection safety program has $339,750,000. It is unclear whether or not the insulation installers training program is contained within those figures or is an additional $41 million. If the insulation installers program is contained within those existing figures, there is a total provision of $946,907,000 for fixing up the nation’s roofs. If the insulation installers training program is in fact a separate line item, it is $987,907,000 which has been provisioned. Either way, this is an extraordinary and unparalleled waste of public money, coupled with a catastrophic impact. It is an impact which continues at this time because the Home Insulation Program is out of control. It is out of control when we have statements from Melbourne’s Metropolitan Fire Brigade that these fires will not stop and when we have statements from the MFB’s chief of the fire investigation unit that ‘every home must be inspected’. These statements by the independent heads of state authorities are not lightly made. These are considered, profound statements of grave warning about grave risk—yet they are being ignored as we stand here. The revelation overnight that we have now had 14 fires in 15 days is an extraordinary indictment, firstly of the design and inaction during the early stages of the program but now of the inaction in implementing these inspections at a time when Australians are at risk. The fire in Ormond—where a senior pensioner, Edith Preston, fought back flames of up to five metres high with her own bare hands—must surely be a warning that no minister, no officer of the Crown, no Prime Minister of Australia could ever ignore. How can it be that pensioners are standing with buckets of water fighting back flames up to five metres high which are the consequence of a government program? And the Prime Minister still refuses to ensure that every home is inspected. That is a derogation of duty. That is a failure of the most basic responsibilities to protect Australian homes, homeowners and lives and it is a statement of wilful contempt towards the consequences of what has already been a catastrophic program. I make those points about the Home Insulation Program, and three things must occur now. Firstly, there must be a commitment to inspect every home. The money is there in the budget. The one thing that has happened is that the money has been allocated to fix the nation’s roofs. It is simply not being directed to the purpose, which is a national emergency. Make no doubt about it. We have a phoney national emergency for which $38 million has been expended by the government for advertising, but we have a genuine national emergency of 158 house fires, and that number is growing. Secondly, beyond the inspection of every home, there must also be a package for the small businesses who have suffered. Almost every day I have approaches made to me from small business people who have been longstanding members of an industry without any issue for 10, 15, sometimes 20 years. People such as Helen Curkpatrick of Horsham, who runs Wimmera Home Insulation, have found that their businesses have collapsed. They had no problem before. They ran successful small businesses which did not return a king’s ransom but they were proud, independent, self-employed people who now, through no fault of their own, face the fact that there is simply no demand for their product. The bubble created has burst and, through a combination of the fact that there are simply no takers and there is a stain on the reputation of the entire industry, work has dried up. But that story is repeated not just in Horsham but in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast. People I have spoken to and met up and down Australia’s east coast and right through Australia have suffered and lost their businesses. They are losing their businesses in the absence of any meaningful program. The program which was put in place provides a 15 per cent cost rebate for surplus insulation which is held, but that does not deal with the fact that the good business people, the sensible business people, often managed their inventory so they had no overhang. But they had long-term, ongoing fixed business costs for buildings, for telecommunications and for staff. They are having to put off staff. As we see, 3,500 staff have been sacked or retrenched—all against the desires of their employers—because insulation has simply collapsed as a successful industry. The third thing, beyond the package for inspections and beyond the package for legitimate longstanding small businesses in good order, is a royal commission. This program must never be allowed to occur again. It is clear that the lessons have not been absorbed by the government. It is clear that the government has no deep concern for what has happened, because how else could the Prime Minister sit in a room with the parents of Matthew Fuller, inject himself into the room, inject himself into the conversation and, when asked to apologise, remain mute? That is not the act of somebody who understands the gravity and the consequence of that which has occurred on his watch, under his program, under his guidance. So there has been no lesson learnt by the government. It has simply been about avoidance of responsibility for moneys allocated with catastrophic consequences. So the royal commission serves two purposes: firstly, and most importantly, to make sure that we never again see a catastrophe of this magnitude repeated under any government program over the next 100 years in Australia. Let the Home Insulation Program be a leitmotif for what governments must never do again. Secondly, it is about bringing to account those who have ignored the warnings and who have evaded responsibility. It is about bringing to account those at the highest levels of government for errors which are unforgivable. The reason they are unforgivable is that the environment minister had at least 26 warnings from industry, from unions, from the government’s own legal advisers and from state and territory authorities; the Prime Minister had at least 12 warnings from his minister alone. For those reasons it is unacceptable that no royal commission is being held. My focus today in examining the budget appropriations has been to address one particular element: a catastrophic failure of management on the government’s part which must never be allowed to occur again, which is yet to be rectified and which is still to be received with the warnings which are implicit within the way the program has been carried. Right now the Prime Minister has three tasks: first, to listen to Australia’s fire authorities and ensure that every home is inspected; second, to listen to the voices of small business men and women who are desperate and who still have no package that has any meaning for them—this needs to be addressed; and, third, to stand up and take responsibility for ensuring there is a royal commission so that the lessons learned can never be ignored again and so that those responsible are brought to account. Debate interrupted. Sitting suspended from 12.57 pm to 4.03 pm 5100 16:03:00 Cheeseman, Darren, MP HW7 Corangamite ALP 1 0 Mr CHEESEMAN —I take this opportunity to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 and cognate bills. I will start my speech today by talking about the efforts undertaken by the Rudd government to avoid the global financial crisis. The stimulus packages that we have put in place as a government have helped create some 225,000 jobs right around Australia. Australia is now recognised as one of the best-performing economies in the Western world and this will give the government the opportunity to build a modern tax and retirement income system, invest in renewable energy at a historic level and deliver health and hospital reforms. This budget is responsible, with every dollar of new spending being offset over the forward estimates. This will allow the budget to return to surplus within three years. That is a tremendous achievement. This government’s stimulus allowed the Australian economy to continue to grow by 1.4 per cent while the other advanced economies were contracting by some three per cent. Australia’s unemployment was, as you might recall, forecast last year to peak at 8½ per cent but, because of the decisive action taken by this government, it peaked at 5.8 per cent. This cannot just stop now. The events that have taken place over the last month or two in Greece are a great example of the risks that still affect many economies around the world. That is why the Rudd government have delivered this budget that will bring the Australian economy back to surplus quicker than we expected. Through the Rudd government’s budget announcements and the opposition’s reply we now have a very clear choice in 2010. On the one hand we have people with vision who will support people in regional Australia and, of course, support the people in my area of Greater Geelong and, of course, the people with that vision are the Rudd government. On the other hand we have the opposition who in this regard I believe are clueless particularly in the way they have responded to the economic crisis and to Wayne Swan’s third budget. The Rudd government have built a budget that will secure a great future, which is a clear commitment to the people within my seat in the Greater Geelong area and to people in regional Australia right throughout the nation. We have clear social commitments and we have clear industry development and job commitments. If Tony Abbott were elected with his current policies we would see region after region devastated by inaction. For many years Geelong was referred to as a ‘Sleepy Hollow’. Under Tony Abbott’s current budget policies and if he were elected our region would be hit extremely hard. I have been involved in politics, like many other people in this place, for many years and I have never ever seen an opposition leader respond to a budget the way he has responded. His reply budget is the worst budget you could possibly imagine for regional Victoria and, of course, it is the worst opposition reply budget for country Victoria, for country Australia and for all regions. As the local representative of Corangamite I have always tried to be positive in this place. The 2010 budget continues Labor’s strong commitment to modernise the region’s health, road and rail infrastructure and provides real help to small business and working families. Workers are getting their third tax cut in a row. The Rudd Labor government have, of course, delivered three budgets and each one has delivered tax cuts. The tax cuts in this year’s budget will see a worker who is earning, say, $50,000 a year pay some $1,750 less in income tax in the coming financial year. Under the changes in this budget all workers will receive, with our tax reform processes, an increase to their superannuation from nine per cent to 12 per cent, which I think is really where we need to be as a society. That initiative continues Labor’s strong commitment to superannuation for working families. As you would recall, it is Labor that has continued to build superannuation for Australians. The coalition continue to do everything they can to get in the way of average Australian families securing a decent income for their retirement. On top of that we have continued to build on Labor’s very substantial reforms in the pension system. And that, I know, is something very dear to many people across this nation. As well there are some 14,658 small businesses across Corangamite—including sole traders, partnerships and incorporated small businesses—that will be able to receive substantial tax cuts when they purchase assets up to $5,000 because of the reform agenda that this government has. Small business will also be able to get a company tax cut with the measures, actions and policies of this government. The Rudd government’s budget bills are terrific for local families and will help my region of Greater Geelong keep its economy strong. The federal budget has also maintained the momentum of investment in the region’s infrastructure, including the allocation of some $37 million for rail upgrades to the port of Geelong and on the Melbourne to Adelaide rail line, helping important parts of our economy throughout south-west Victoria, particularly our farming communities. Further to that, an $11 million federal contribution has been made to continue the work required to duplicate the Princes Highway. This has been added to the $110 million Victorian contribution. That was a very significant election announcement that we made in 2010. We are also investing some $4.4 million in the G21 region with the Roads to Recovery program. There is a $2.2 million contribution this financial year to Geelong Ring Road stage 4B, which is the seamless connection between the Geelong Ring Road and Princes Highway West. We are continuing the investments to modernise our schools across the region. The federal government’s investments are modernising our road and rail infrastructure. Projects, such as the Geelong Ring Road, the Princes Highway duplication and the port of Geelong have all continued to benefit from the Rudd government. Greater Geelong is also perfectly positioned to take advantage of our major new national health initiatives. The $523 million national investment in training and support for Australian nurses is perfect for Deakin University’s nurse training program and for our reputation for the highest quality nurse training facilities anywhere across this nation. Our medical school will benefit from increased GP training funds to train the nation’s future doctors. Similarly, I believe our region can do very well out of the $467 million allocated to modernise electronic health and hospital records, with Geelong Hospital and Barwon Health seen as a model for the rest of the nation. Our region will be able to pitch for funds to further develop our systems, which I believe will lead the rest of Australia. In short, this budget continues the transformation of our region that has been happening under the Rudd government. We are now miles away from the days of the Howard government when our region always got nothing and languished for many years. We are now one of the best performing regional economies, thanks to the efforts of the Rudd government to support these changes. Our unemployment levels have been consistently below the state and national averages—averaging some five per cent. Under this budget and the previous Rudd government budget we have gone from a regional economy that had often been the victim to a regional economy that is an exemplar. I am very proud of the Rudd government’s budget and our record investment in this region. I have worked very hard with our communities to deliver this. I would now like to turn to the opposition’s budget reply. This was one of the most extraordinary events that I have witnessed anywhere. If it were ever implemented, it would be a calamity for my region and many regions like mine. We see a list of things that would not happen in my region if that went ahead. Based on the opposition’s budget reply and the shadow spokesman on finance’s hit list, our region would be hit very hard. My region has worked very hard to secure funds for the Geelong Ring Road, but that project would be terminated. The Princes Highway duplication would stop. Both of these projects are central to our economic development across broader Geelong. The building of trades training schools around the region would be abandoned, with $12 million worth of investment being lost to our region. There would be no future new GP superclinics built across our region, damaging the opportunity for our people to be able to access health care. Ford, of course, is a mainstay of our regional economy and has been so for many years. It has been announced that Ford will receive up to $43 million under the Green Car Innovation Fund to build more fuel efficient cars. That would be axed. Non-investment into broadband infrastructure would deny our region perhaps up to $32 million to help strengthen broadband. Over $8 million of industry facilitation funding for renewable energy would also be lost to an industry that has enormous potential across western Victoria. We could also reasonably expect investments in e-health which would help support our region to be cut or abandoned. Industry has been very important for our region and will continue to be so. That is why the Rudd government is taking decisive action to help support industry in our region. There is a whole raft of other things that would not go ahead if there were a future coalition government. Tax for small business would not go down; in fact, it would go up. Some $5 million in school upgrades would be lost. This would not be good for my region. The immediate impact would be, perhaps, somewhere in the vicinity of $250 million if an Abbott government were elected. The impact would see the loss of hundreds of jobs almost immediately; but even more importantly, the long-term impacts would be far greater to our region. Private sector investment lost to the renewable energy sector, Ford and many other programs would be an absolute catastrophe for our region. The long-term impact would be the loss of millions of dollars of future investment across our region—perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars. The combined axing of the Renewable Energy Fund and other programs would be devastating to our region. As we speak, there is some $4 billion of private sector investment pending in the renewable energy sector across our region. With the announcement made by the Victorian Liberals, many of these investments would not go ahead. It is clear that the Abbott razor gang which looked at these issues did not have an eye for regional Australian or the Greater Geelong area. The Rudd government continues to build on the very substantial investments that we have made to our region. Our economy is strong, but continues to need support from the Rudd government to ensure that we can continue to modernise. One of the very substantial announcements that has recently been made within my region is on the need to create and build an additional hospital in southern Geelong. Under our healthcare reform, if it is a state priority of course, the federal government’s health and hospital reform will play a substantial role in supporting our community’s need for an additional hospital. Under the Rudd government, we will continue to build our health and hospital services and our education services across our region. What we do know is that under an Abbott government our region will be gutted. I commend the bills to the House. 5103 16:20:00 Andrews, Kevin, MP HK5 Menzies LP 0 0 Mr ANDREWS —I say in response to the honourable member for Corangamite’s remarks on Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011, Appropriation Bill (No. 2) 2010-2011 and Appropriation (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 that the greatest threat to the people of Corangamite, that part of Victoria south-west of Geelong, would be the re-election of the Rudd government. Two proposals which the Rudd government has would be devastating to the region of Corangamite and to the employment prospects of many people in that region—namely, the emissions trading scheme, which would hit industries in Corangamite, and on top of that the great big new mining tax that is now being proposed by this government. If one or both of those taxes are introduced then the one electorate in Victoria and in Australia that is sure to suffer is in fact Corangamite. This is another big-taxing, big-spending Labor government with high levels of government debt into the future, no hard decisions and no serious reform. Here we have a situation where in less than three years the Rudd Labor government have taken a $20-plus billion surplus and turned it into a massive $57.1 billion deficit, the biggest deficit since World War II. We have got this amazing turnaround from a substantial surplus, which Mr Rudd and Mr Swan had as Prime Minister and Treasurer when they came to government, into the largest deficit in a budget since the end of the Second World War. It is no wonder that the Treasurer in his budget speech on the night of the delivery of the appropriation bills wanted to talk about three and four years hence, wanted to suggest to the Australian people that we will be back into a billion-dollar surplus some years down the track, as if magically we are going to get from this year’s budget to that period in the future. Why have we got this major turnaround in the finances of the Commonwealth of Australia? Because we have a government which is unable to deter itself from continuing on a spending spree. Worse than just a spending spree, what we see is a government that has wasted a lot of the money. The coalition did not say that there should be no stimulus funding; we said the stimulus funding should be appropriate to any threat which Australia faced. Australia was in a much better position than almost every other country in the world because the previous Howard-Costello government not only left no debt to Australia but also left a surplus so far as the budget was concerned. The Rudd Labor government has been unable to restrain its own expenditure and it has gone out and wasted money. Take just one totemic program—namely, the Home Insulation Program—where it not only wasted a lot of money but it is now having to pay more money in order to rectify the problems it put there in the first place. This budget presents no real plan for the economy or for the future of Australia. Instead it is a grab bag of unrelated announcements with few real benefits for most Australians. Significantly, it delivers little for families at a time of increasing cost pressures. One of the pressures that Australians are facing at the present time is in relation to housing affordability. I recall prior to the 2007 election the then opposition spokeswoman, Ms Plibersek, saying that housing prices in Australia had risen to seven times the average wage of Australians. Today they are nine to 10 times the average wage of Australians. There is nothing in this budget that is aimed at improving housing affordability for Australians. The budget lacks any tough decisions because Labor is hoping to put them off until after the next election. There is no doubt that, if this government is returned, there will be many nasty surprises in store. It seems to be the pattern of the way in which the government is operating. The Prime Minister and the Treasurer should be more upfront with the Australian people before the election about the hard decisions that are needed to protect and secure Australia’s economic future. The budget does not factor in the risks of another serious economic downturn, for example in Europe, or the risks of America not being able to get out of the very significant adverse situation it is in at the present time—or, for that matter, the risks if the building bubble in China were to burst and not be able to be controlled economically by the government of that country. The lack of a strategic longer term approach in the budget demonstrates that the Rudd government’s core values have evaporated and that it is now making knee-jerk decisions based on day-to-day political survival. Australians have a right to question whether this government believes in anything anymore. A government that believes in nothing will in fact deliver that: just nothing. All we are getting from Labor is knee-jerk policies, just at a time when Australians need certainty. Mr Rudd and Labor’s reckless economic mismanagement is hurting Australian families, and this budget reveals the high price all Australians will pay for the great big spending spree over the last 18 months. The budget’s suggestion, which some might think fanciful, that we are going to have a return to surplus in a short period of time relies upon as its central core a great big new tax on Australia’s resources sector and not upon tough decisions. The government is taking a massive punt on the mining super tax being fully realised and on it not damaging other parts of the economy. This great big new mining tax is a dagger in the heart of the Australian economy, putting major projects at risk and sending jobs offshore. The Prime Minister and the Treasurer think that they can impose a great big new tax on the mining sector to raise the revenue they need to return the budget to surplus, but they fail to understand that the tax will do enormous damage to the economy in the medium to long term. Imposing a great big new tax on mining will also have significant flow-on effects right across the economy. Whether it is regional small businesses that rely on mining projects, the subcontractors employed at the mines, the suppliers or those industries that use resources like coal and gas, everyone will end up paying. The illusion that the government wants to create is that this is just about the big miners, that this is only about Rio, BHP and Fortescue Metals, but we know that this tax applies to the local quarry. The Leader of the Opposition was at a local quarry in Queanbeyan—and I see that the member for Eden-Monaro is in the chamber at the present time. What does he say to the quarry owners, to the people whose livelihood is dependent upon being able to provide materials which this new tax is going to apply to in the future? It is not just the Rio Tintos and the BHPs of this world that are affected by this tax; this is a tax that applies right down to the local quarry, which is mining for material which goes into the building of houses and commercial buildings and construction in Australia. The budget also confirms that the Prime Minister’s original great big new tax on everything, the ETS, as I said earlier, will be coming back after the election. What is the government doing about the day-to-day management of the economy? What is it doing about trying to bring its expenditure under control? We know that this government is having to borrow $700 million a week—not just this week but week in, week out: $700 million. That is $100 million a day, day after day after day, which is being borrowed by this government to fund reckless and wasteful spending which in turn puts upward pressures on interest rates and the cost of living for Australian families. Government debt will be a massive $94 billion in 2012-13, requiring $6.5 billion a year in debt interest payments. Recall that in 1996, when the Howard government came to office, there was a $96 billion Commonwealth debt and that took a decade to pay off. And here we are again, in a period of less than three years, where we now will have a $94 billion Commonwealth debt in 2012-13. That will require $6.5 billion a year simply to meet the debt interest repayments—$6.5 billion a year that could be going to hospitals or schools or other services within the community in Australia. As I said, it took a decade to pay off $96 billion. The Prime Minister, Mr Rudd, and the Treasurer, Mr Swan, have managed to achieve a similar debt in a record short period of time. The budget also exposes the costs of the Rudd government’s waste, mismanagement and policy failures. The budget includes a $1 billion blow-out as a result of the Prime Minister’s weakening of Australian borders and $1 billion that is being spent to fix Labor’s tragic home insulation mess. That is $2 billion that is being spent simply because of poor, bad policy decisions on the part of this government. The government will also be wasting $126 million on taxpayer funded political print, radio and television advertising, something which the Prime Minister said was a ‘cancer on democracy’; something which, his hand on his heart, he said was ‘not what we will do when we are in government’. But here we are, turning around and spending $126 million on political print, radio and television advertising. And, despite having no climate change policy for the time being, the Rudd government will spend $30 million for another climate change advertising campaign. If that is not a waste of money, I ask: what is? They will also spend $38.5 million over two years to advertise the outcomes of the Henry tax review, even though they have only adopted a handful—I think two, maybe three—of the 138 recommendations in the Henry report. And despite having not at this stage passed their legislation for paid parental leave through the parliament, they have committed $12 million to fund advertising of it. The Prime Minister is also proposing a new $29.5 million advertising campaign to sell his health changes, even though Western Australia has not signed on and the new beds will not even be delivered until 2013-14. Let me turn to some specific matters in the Families portfolio. At estimates recently Professor Alan Hayes, the Director of the Australian Institute of Family Studies, confirmed that 10 per cent would be cut from the institute’s annual appropriation. This is the only body in Australia that carries out, in an in-depth way and on an ongoing basis, research into the state of families in Australia and the problems and issues that are being faced, whether they relate to family law, child support, poverty or dysfunction within families. This is the institute that was established to do this and that has been supported in the past by governments of both political persuasions. But here we see 10 per cent being cut from their budget. Then when we look at family relationship services and marriage counselling, we see announced in the budget papers a slash of $4.5 million from marriage counselling services. AK6 Gash, Joanna, MP Mrs Gash interjecting— HK5 Andrews, Kevin, MP Mr ANDREWS —Yes, it is a shame, as the member for Gilmore says. These are services for families that are having marital, financial and other difficulties. They are services to help them wherever possible to reconcile their differences, but if it is not possible to reconcile those differences, to come to some conciliation about the way in which the family will go ahead. In the absence of these services, what will happen is that more people will end up in Family Court proceedings in Australia, which is regrettable. Having fewer people involved in Family Court proceedings, whatever the rights and wrongs of a particular case, is obviously desirable. And yet $4.5 million has been slashed from the marriage counselling program in Australia. So Relationships Australia, Centacare, Anglicare and all the other agencies in the voluntary charitable sector that run those services in almost every electorate within this country are going to find they are not able to deliver services in the way they have been able to do. They are saying: ‘We’ve already got waiting lists. We’re already having difficulty being able to meet the demand from people who have difficulties in these matters.’ So one would expect that these waiting lists will grow longer as a result of these changes. But what was worse about this budget was that hidden away, not announced, not in the papers, not anywhere that you could look at and, indeed, not disclosed for a couple of days was the fact that a further $43.9 million was being slashed from the Family Relationship Centres. As you would realise, Mr Deputy Speaker, and other colleagues, Family Relationship Centres were established by the previous government as a result of widespread concern in the community—concern which was raised in inquiries in this parliament—in relation to the way in which families could seek help and support when difficulties arose in those relationships. Part of the reason for establishing the Family Relationship Centres was to have one place where people could go and obtain services and to avoid, as far as possible, people ending up in the costly litigation process of the Family Court. And yet, without announcement, 24 or 48 hours later when inquiries were made by people in the sector, the government then conceded that yes, indeed, $43.9 million had been slashed from the Family Relationship Centres in this budget. When you add that to the cuts to marriage counselling then you can see some indication of the way in which this government, despite its rhetoric in the past of talking about working families, is actually treating families. In addition to that, there was a decision not to replace four judges in the Family Court and the Federal Magistrates Court, which again places unnecessary pressure on the judiciary and means that family law matters will now take even longer to get to court, let alone be resolved. This is a government which basically, in terms of these decisions, seems to have given up on providing the type of support that families who are in difficulty require in the community. In addition, under questioning in a Senate estimates hearing, it has emerged that Centrelink’s rural service officers are also under threat. These officers play an important role to rural Australia but it seems that the bush is again being ignored by the Prime Minister and the Treasurer. I said at the outset of these remarks this is a budget which demonstrates a government which is not able to take hard decisions. This is the worst turn around so far as the budgetary situation of the Commonwealth is concerned since at least the Second World War. A $20 billion plus surplus turned into an almost $50 billion deficit within the space of three years. That is a shame, it is an indictment on the failure of economic management of the Treasurer and the Prime Minister, it is an indication of the reckless spending which has been undertaken by this government and it is an indication of the waste and incompetence of this government in terms of the last 2½ years. If Australians want to change that then the opportunity to change this government will come at the next election. When Malcolm Fraser was asked about the Prime Minister in a television interview some time ago, and said that he was even worse than Gough Whitlam, that was some indication of the way in which Australians are increasingly coming to see the man who occupies the position of Prime Minister of this nation. All rhetoric, overblown rhetoric, great promises made with enormous hyperbole at the time but when it comes to actually delivering programs, when it comes to putting policies in place that are going to do good and make a benefit for the people of Australia then he absolutely fails on every occasion. One could go through the litany of programs and the litany of policies where there has been failure from GroceryWatch to Fuelwatch and right through to the scandal of the Building the Education Revolution, not because there is not a need in some areas for buildings in schools but because of the enormous waste of the program. Once again, today as each other day, we have the Deputy Prime Minister standing up there with more front than Myer saying, ‘It has got nothing to do with me. I put a task force in place to make sure that these concerns are met.’ Well, hang on a moment, who was actually responsible for putting this program in place? It was the Deputy Prime Minister. This is an incompetent government. This is a government which has been indicated by waste and reckless spending. Nothing in this budget turns this around. Indeed, what we have is a proposal for a great big new tax which will threaten the economic future of this country. This budget and these appropriation bills ought to be condemned. 5108 16:39:00 Kelly, Mike, MP HRI Eden-Monaro ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Support and Parliamentary Secretary for Water 1 0 Dr KELLY —I very much appreciate this opportunity to support the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011, the Appropriation Bill (No. 2) 2010-2011 and the Appropriation (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011. In debating the passage of the 2010 budget, we are faced with a very clear choice between the government’s decisive plan for prudent, responsible financial management and a set of erratic, serious threats from the opposition to slash jobs, cut services and simply oppose for opposition’s sake. This budget represents the government’s commitment to sound economic management and exemplifies the government’s determination to continue investing in the future of this country. The beneficial effect that this budget will have on our economy and the specific benefits that are expected to be felt in my seat of Eden-Monaro will be profound. First and foremost, we should reflect on how remarkable in all the circumstances is the government’s success in producing a budget that will deliver a surplus within three years—three years earlier than previously forecast—and halve net peak debt within three years. That in and of itself is an extraordinary achievement, recognised by all credible commentators. I noted, for example, that on 31 May the Australian reported comments from the French economist Christine Altuzarra, who works for a French agency that rates at-risk countries. She stated: Australia has without doubt the prize for excellence in all categories, as much in terms of its debt or deficit. The French newspaper Le Monde is also quoted as having reported that: Australia is in a situation that any country in Europe would envy … noting that our stimulus package enabled us to avoid a recession. The only risk that Le Monde cited to cloud our horizon was the threat of overdependence on Chinese demand in the mining industry, and this is precisely the situation that we now seek to address with the RSPT—a situation that the coalition remains blind to and betrays the national interest on by seeking to prevent us from acting upon this challenge. This time last year we heard the opposition in this place positively crowing about the fact that the budget was headed for a deficit. Faced with the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, the government made some hard but responsible choices to keep our economy on track. Those choices meant accepting a temporary deficit and, while we on this side of the chamber were prepared to do the hard yards, all those opposite could think about was scoring political points. Instead of seeking to work with the government, the opposition did the only thing it really knows how to do: it opposed and resorted to its scaremongering routine. When this government rolled out a stimulus package to keep our economy from sinking into recession, it opposed it. This government delivered improvements to schools, invested in rail, ports and roads, delivered direct funding to councils for local projects and gave families a one-off payment to keep them safe and help them weather the worst effects of the economic crisis. When we did all that, and invested heavily in schools and infrastructure to keep local tradies in business, the opposition did everything it could to stop us. So it was throughout the past year that this government got on with the job of managing the economy, steering our country through the global financial crisis, while the opposition threw rocks from the sidelines. Here we are, 12 months on, and what has happened? Thanks to the responsible actions of this government, Australia has avoided slipping into recession. Two hundred thousand jobs have been saved—that is, 200,000 incomes that are currently being spent in our economy. The alternative would have been a drain on our welfare coffers and the creation of massive social dislocation—200,000 reasons for the government to be proud. The simple fact is that this government has made good on its promise to the Australian people to deliver prudent, responsible financial management. When this government was elected in 2007, the Australian economy was the ninth strongest among the 30 OECD nations. Now, it is estimated that this budget will make our economy the fifth strongest among those nations. I am particularly proud of our health measures. In addition to making our economy stronger, this budget will fund reforms and deliver investments where they are most needed in that respect. This year the budget will deliver a fully funded and historic reform to our health and hospital system, the likes of which we have never seen before. New health announcements include investments that will improve access to general practitioners and primary health care delivering better after-hours services, upgrades to around 425 GP and primary health-care clinics across the nation and new GP superclinics, one of which I am proud to say is based in Queanbeyan and is well underway. Our nurses, including aged-care nurses, will be provided with $523 million of additional support and training, strengthening the backbone of our health system. A new $467 million e-health initiative will modernise our health and hospital system, help reduce the duplication and cost resulting from poor patient record handling and help reduce the mistakes in treatment, estimated to be around 80 per cent, that are also caused by this deficiency. An additional $2.2 billion will be invested in the health system, which will take the government’s new investment in health reform to $7.3 billion over five years and $23 billion over the rest of the decade. This government is taking responsibility for the majority share of hospital costs as well as full policy and funding responsibility for GP and primary-care services and aged-care services. I can confirm that my electorate of Eden-Monaro overwhelmingly welcomes this proposed reform. In relation to apprentices, the government is planning for the future skill needs of our economy—one of the great neglects of the 12 Howard years in relation to dealing with the capacity constraints on this economy, which included infrastructure. We have invested in a record number of apprenticeship places through the Apprentice Kickstart program. In fact, the government is investing almost $80 million to support around 22,500 new apprenticeship places in traditional trades that are experiencing shortages. This funding will be targeted at helping small and medium businesses with fewer than 200 employees put on more apprentices. The economic downturn particularly hurt apprenticeships but, with the support of employers and young people, Apprentice Kickstart has been a great success. Thanks to Apprentice Kickstart we are training more electricians, carpenters, plumbers and bakers. During the 1990s recession the number of new apprentices starting in key traditional trades fell 34 per cent and it took 13 years before we recruited the same number of apprentices again. Thanks to the Rudd government, we have done that in one year—not 13 years. I am proud to say that, as a result of this program, an additional 214 apprentices were signed on in Eden-Monaro over this year’s summer period alone. I was recently joined in Queanbeyan by the Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, and the Minister for Employment Participation, Senator Mark Arbib, to speak with local apprentices about the Apprentice Kickstart program. The overwhelming feedback we received was that this program is helping young kids, both male and female, to take up trades in industries where we need them. The Australian government remains committed to the challenge of climate change. The government will be providing $652.5 million to establish the Renewable Energy Future Fund to support Australia’s transition to a low-carbon pollution economy. The renewable energy fund represents an economically responsible approach to tackling climate change and will form part of the government’s expanded $5.1 billion Clean Energy Initiative. The fund will provide additional support for development and deployment of large- and small-scale renewable energy projects in solar, wave and geothermal energy, and the take-up of industrial, commercial and residential energy efficiency, which will assist local businesses to reduce their energy consumption. Action on climate change continues to be a high priority for me personally, and I look forward to the possibilities that this fund will create for us in Eden-Monaro. Our potential in this area is virtually unlimited. The budget will bring welcome relief for families, low-income workers and seniors, who will receive their third round of tax cuts in three years. For three years in a row this government has helped working families to balance their own budgets by delivering tax cuts. We on this side of the chamber have been unwavering in our commitment to deliver these cuts. As a direct result of these cuts, this year a worker earning $20,000 will pay $750 less, a worker earning $50,000 will pay $1,750 less and a worker earning $80,000 will pay $1,550 less. Thanks to the tax cuts delivered by this government, from 1 July 2010 low-income workers across Eden-Monaro will be able to earn up to $16,000 and not have to pay income tax. That is a $5,000 increase from the previous minimum of $11,000 in the 2007-08 budget. This budget will also increase the amount of income a senior Australian eligible for the senior Australian tax offset can earn before they pay income tax or the Medicare levy. The budget changes will increase the income threshold eligible senior Australians can earn tax free from $29,867 to $30,685 for singles and from $25,680 to $26,680 for each member of a couple. The government will make it easier to fill out tax returns in the new reforms announced in this budget. From 1 July 2012 the government will give people the option of choosing a standard deduction of $500 rather than tallying up all their work related expenses. The standard deduction will be increased to $1,000 from 1 July 2013. As a result taxpayers across Eden-Monaro will soon be able to forget about the hassle of shoeboxes full of receipts and the cost of getting their tax done at the end of each year. These changes will make life that little bit easier for families in Eden-Monaro at tax time each year and provide a bit of extra cash to help make ends meet. It is worth noting though that, if people want to continue claiming expenses under the existing system, they are welcome to. When I travel around and talk to people in Eden-Monaro about tax they want to see a less complicated system, one where everybody pays their fair share including the mining industry. In addition to individual tax cuts, which I have mentioned earlier, small businesses in Eden-Monaro will get tax relief as well and an easier tax return process with the ability to instantly write off assets worth up to $5,000. Businesses that pay tax at the company rate will receive additional tax cuts. As a result Eden-Monaro businesses, which are the lifeblood of our region, particularly small and medium enterprises, will be able to spend more time growing their business and less time managing their bookkeeping. In addition to tax breaks to benefit individuals and businesses, this government will increase the superannuation guarantee from nine to 12 per cent, a measure that will increase our national savings and deliver benefits to all Australians. I am also proud of the Landcare funding, something that is close to the hearts of many residents in Eden-Monaro. Landcare was officially formed by the Hawke government through an alliance between the National Farmers Federation and the Australian Conservation Foundation. Through this budget the Rudd Labor government will continue that tradition with increases in funding from $35 million in 2009-10, to $36 million in 2010-11, and $39 million in 2011-12, 2012-13 and 2013-14. The government has invested $81.6 million in 630 Landcare projects with many such projects achieving great results in my own electorate. The government highly values Landcare and the thousands of volunteers who dedicate their time and energy to improving our environment. The Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Tony Burke, recently addressed the National Landcare Forum in Adelaide and argued passionately that Landcare will be the answer to challenges we face into the future such as climate change, food production and environmental protection. Similarly, overall Caring for our Country funding will increase next financial year by $15 million to $423 million. The Australian government’s $2 billion Caring for our Country program is aimed at protecting the environment and supporting the uptake of sustainable farming. We on this side of the chamber are justifiably proud of our achievements and committed to delivering the responsible, prudent financial management that our economy needs along with investments for the future where they are needed. The coalition, on the other hand, have opposed us at every step of the way providing no credible policy of their own, just opposition for opposition’s sake and a devastating attack on the programs we need to secure the economic future of this country. In particular I am focused on the Public Service job cuts that threaten our region. These people provide an invaluable service to Australians in my region through outputs from Defence, Medicare, Centrelink, education and others, and they also provide a major source of other employment and services through their demands for the rest of the economy in the region. In the seat of Eden-Monaro thousands of Queanbeyan, Jerrabomberra and Bungendore residents work in the Commonwealth Public Service. Current figures estimate that in excess of 20,000 people make the daily commute to the Australian Capital Territory for work either in, or dependent on, the public sector. That is up to 20,000 families that rely on the public sector component of our regional economy and 20,000 incomes that are spent on tourism in Batemans Bay, Moruya, Narooma, Merimbula, Bega, Cooma, Jindabyne and all through our the region. So it was with great alarm that I observed the federal Leader of the Opposition stand up in this place recently and promise to cut 12,000 jobs from the federal Public Service in 24 months. Not only is this an affront to the hard-working public servants that live in Eden-Monaro, it has dire implications for the Eden-Monaro economy. This threat includes the Commonwealth services shopfront and call centre currently under construction in Batemans Bay. To make matters worse these job cuts are not based on any kind of analysis or examination of whether they are necessary or achievable and specifically where the axe would fall. No reference has been made to functional reviews, to maintaining outputs or increasing productivity. I demand that Mr Abbott clarify before the election which jobs he intends to cut in the Canberra-Queanbeyan area and whether the Batemans Bay centre is under threat. Mr Abbott’s approach would be likely to trigger a massive exodus from the region and cause a decimation of the delivery of government services the likes of which we have not seen since the coalition’s last assault on the Public Service in the Howard government’s 1996-97 federal budget. We know that the Howard government cut 30,000 Public Service jobs, following the 1996-97 budget, after saying that it would only cut 5,000. This is yet another example of why the coalition cannot be trusted on this issue. We know that the gospel truth in this case is that those opposite are supporting a plan that will adversely affect the livelihood of a great many people. It is a plan that is about as constructive as Work Choices, with far fewer details. This would be compounded by Mr Abbott’s threat to can our school building, computers, and trade and training centres programs, the renewable energy fund and the CPRS, the company tax reduction and superannuation guarantee, the infrastructure funds and skills program, the health reform plan and the National Broadband Network. These would all be gone, and they are all so vital for my region. In return, we would get a return to Work Choices. What kind of trade-off is that? In conclusion, let me emphasise that in debating this appropriation bill we are effectively debating the government’s plan for our nation’s economic future. We weathered the worst of the economic crisis due to the decisive action of this government and despite the carping and negativity from those opposite. Now we have a plan to take our nation forward, a plan that will return our budget to surplus, reform our health system, simplify our tax system and increase our national superannuation savings. For their part, those opposite have responded with the usual predictions of gloom and doom, ignoring the successes of the past 12 months and hoping that the Australian people will confuse a vague list of slash and burn threats, particularly against our regional economy, for a genuinely comprehensive, visionary and decisive plan to secure our economic future. The choice could not be clearer. I look forward to working with my colleagues in the government to deliver a health system that is funded nationally and run locally. I look forward to delivering the high-speed National Broadband Network our region is crying out for, employing more apprentices to service our future skills needs, providing effective action on climate change, creating a simplified personal and business tax system, increasing superannuation savings for working families and increasing funding for local Landcare projects. I look forward to opposing at every opportunity Tony Abbott’s plan to cut 12,000 jobs from the Public Service, which would affect the incomes of 12,000 families from Eden-Monaro and which would be the biggest kick in the guts our region has ever experienced. 5113 16:57:00 Schultz, Alby, MP 83Q Hume LP 0 0 Mr SCHULTZ —I rise to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 and the related bills, or what is commonly referred to as the budget. From the outset, I emphasise that this document is nothing more than a shameless con and more of the Rudd Labor government’s smoke and mirrors approach to running the country. It does nothing to rein in the government’s reckless and wasteful spending. It is big taxing, big spending and threatens Australia’s future economic prosperity by relying on a new tax on Australia’s resources sector, not tough decisions to return the budget bottom line to surplus and to assist the government in servicing its growing overseas debt. Despite the Rudd government’s own budget showing a historic record deficit of $57 billion for the 2009-10 budget year, flowing from its unprecedented incompetent mismanagement of taxpayers’ money, it still congratulates itself for its fiscal ineptitude by announcing that the 20010-11 deficit will be $41 billion. Spending in this budget will increase by $26 billion over the next three years relative to last year’s record spending forecast. The government will have to borrow over $700 million a week—that is, $100 million a day—just to fund its reckless and wasteful spending, putting upward pressure on interest rates and the cost of living for Australian families. Interest on net government debt alone will be an astonishing $4.6 billion in 2010-11. By 2012-13 the government’s spending on interest payments will increase by $1.9 billion to $6.5 billion a year. The projected peak debt bill of $93.7 billion will be the amount owed by the Australian people to pay for Kevin Rudd’s spending spree, but this ignores the $26 billion to $43 billion to be borrowed for the National Broadband Network over the next six to seven years. I might add that $18 billion of this amount is expected to be borrowed over the forward estimates. The improvement in the budget fiscal position is a direct result of a growing economy and stronger terms of trade combined with tax hikes on the mining industry, cigarettes and an attack on the private health insurance area. The budget also exposes the costs of the government’s waste, mismanagement and policy failures, including a $1 billion blow-out as a result of Kevin Rudd weakening Australian borders and $1 billion being spent to fix Labor’s tragic home insulation mess. The government’s $9 billion a year mining superprofits tax will damage the sector of the Australian economy which did the most to see us through the global financial crisis. Already this reckless decision has resulted in BHP casting doubt on the $20 billion expansion of Olympic Dam, Santos deferring a decision on a $15 billion LNG export terminal in Gladstone, Xstrata suspending a $30 million regional exploration program and Origin Energy predicting increases in domestic energy and fuel prices. That is already happening. There is no doubt at all the resource super profits tax will force multinationals such as Rio Tinto to look to developing iron ore projects in Africa and coal projects in both India and Indonesia and jettison Australian jobs in the industry. This supertax also affects smaller mining companies, not just the large multinationals, and in that respect I have renamed the tax a disincentive tax rather than a supertax. Recently I visited a small family owned quarry in the Hume electorate. There are, by the way, a number of small privately owned extractive quarries within the electorate of Hume that quarry for hard rock, sand, clay and other such minerals for their own use as well as for commercial sale. This tax will impose a crippling financial burden on quarry businesses as retained earnings will be significantly reduced. These earnings are vital for operation and expansion. Privately owned quarries already, in addition to company tax, pay local infrastructure levies through local government contributions and rely heavily on local business and industry. It should be noted they do not receive royalties, so the 40 per cent resource tax will be a significant burden on their businesses. It also needs to be remembered that privately owned quarries own the resource—it is not owned by the Crown—so the income derived by local quarries stays locally and employs local labour and supports local business and industry. Small businesses across Australia will be deeply concerned by the additional $445 million that Mr Rudd and Mr Swan will be giving to the Australian Taxation Office for increased compliance and the two per cent decrease in company tax will be immediately swallowed up by the increase in the superannuation guarantee. Locally, a decrease in company tax, although being welcome, will be of little or no benefit to businesses in the Hume electorate because the majority of those small businesses are either family based companies or partnerships. It should be remembered that companies must first be paying tax to take advantage of this concession. Given that many companies in Hume are still recording losses because of the longest drought in living memory, two per cent of nothing still equates to nothing. Labor’s budget reveals the economic cost of Kevin Rudd’s losing control of Australia’s borders. Offshore asylum seeker management has blown out by a massive $777 million since last year’s budget. This blow-out in offshore management costs has occurred at the same time as Kevin Rudd has walked away from his commitment to universal offshore processing. Labor will spend an additional $202 million on accommodation for illegal arrivals both on Christmas Island and on the Australian mainland in Darwin, Sydney and Port Augusta, not to mention the $5.6 million it is costing in private jet flights for asylum seekers flying between Australian detention centres. A recent article in the Australian states that each chartered flight typically costs more than $100,000 and the Department of Immigration and Citizenship had spent $5.6 million by 15 March this year on 45 flights. Furthermore, reports of the immigration department canvassing churches on the availability of vacant monasteries, convents and boarding houses to accommodate the increasing number of asylum seekers arriving on our shores is compelling evidence that this government has failed in keeping our borders secure. We will undoubtedly see further unwarranted expenditure that will add to the real budget deficit. Sources advise me that immigration officials have recently visited the vacant former Kenmore Psychiatric Hospital in Goulburn in my electorate. There are local concerns that this facility will be used to accommodate illegal arrivals. The budget also confirms that Kevin Rudd’s home insulation disaster will cost at least $1 billion to fix, with thousands of homes across Australia still not inspected in the aftermath of the scheme’s cancellation. The Home Insulation Program, which has been tragically linked to four deaths and has resulted in 240,000 dangerous and dodgy insulation jobs, 1,000 electrified roofs and with today’s figures in the vicinity of 146 house fires, will cost the budget a further $1 billion. This program is the most monumental failure of government policy in living memory. The cowardly way in which Prime Minister Rudd abandoned small businesses entrapped financially because of his minister’s incompetent inability to manage the scheme is testament to the contempt Labor has for small business. This failed policy has directly affected the Hume electorate. Earlier this year, I questioned the Prime Minister in this place as to why his inspection program, to check those houses suspected of being fitted with faulty or incomplete insulation, would include only 15 per cent of the suspected one million affected houses. His answer to me was: … in terms of dealing with the practical problems on the ground for his constituents and the constituents of other members here: we will deal with each of these practical problems as they arise, both for workers, for installers who run good companies, as well as for householders and the concerns they have. I look forward to any representations from the member for Hume or any members opposite in terms of particular concerns in their electorates. As recently as two weeks ago, I have been dealing with complaints from constituents whose houses have been fitted with dodgy foil insulation and from legitimate installers who are still owed tens of thousands of dollars in unpaid installation invoices. In the community of Hill Top, a very small community in the Southern Tablelands, a constituent whose house was fitted with foil insulation under the failed Home Insulation Program has been unduly dumped on the government’s bureaucratic merry-go-round. After trying to arrange an inspection of the premises, it has taken a week for the constituent to be told that the current inspection scheme has been shut down pending the setting-up of a new inspection scheme. In the meantime, my constituent and her family are still living in their home—uncertain of whether or not their home is safe. I have also made representations to Minister Combet regarding unpaid invoices to legitimate installers. In one case, an installer is owed some $30,000. This installer is a small, family-owned business of only five employees. A $30,000 hole in their cash flow is threatening the survival of their business. These two isolated cases make a true mockery of the Prime Minister’s commitment to me that he ‘looked forward to representations from the member’. By setting a target for full employment and an employment rate of 4.75 per cent in 2012, the government is effectively giving up on the employment prospects of 75,000 Australians. The government’s promise of $661 million for skills investment rebadges $601 million of existing spending, including a $456 million cut in the Productivity Places Program. Further delays in the Julia Gillard school hall program will mean that $500 million of stimulus funding will not be spent until 2011-12, at least three years after the global financial crisis. The budget also confirms that Kevin Rudd’s health policies will be about more bureaucrats and not better services. 10000 Burke, Anna (The DEPUTY SPEAKER) The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Ms AE Burke)—Members are asked to refer to members by their appropriate titles. 83Q Schultz, Alby, MP Mr SCHULTZ —The government will spend around $500 million to establish new layers of Commonwealth bureaucracy, and in less than a month the Prime Minister has broken his promise of no net increase in health bureaucrats. Having broken his election promise about superclinics, building just two of the 36 GP superclinics, the Prime Minister is now asking the Australian people to trust him to build 23 more. On this conversion rate, Australians can expect this latest promise from the Prime Minister to deliver just 1.4 extra superclinics. Furthermore, what the government is not telling people is that only nine of the additional 23 superclinics will be at full operational capacity. Having shelved its responses to what the Prime Minister described as ‘the greatest moral and economic challenge of our time’, the budget demonstrates that the government does not have a credible policy on climate change. The coalition remains the only major party with a policy that will reduce carbon emissions by five per cent by 2020 while at the same time delivering good environmental outcomes. This backflip emphasises that what was once the ‘greatest moral and economic challenge of our time’ has become this year’s greatest inconvenience. How can you believe this bloke—the Prime Minister—and trust the incompetent, business-bereft union officials who dominate his government at all levels? The budget also confirms that the Prime Minister’s ETS will come back after the election. In an undisguised election campaign strategy, the government will spend $126 million on print, radio and television advertising—and my contribution today does not take into account the $38 million that is being spent to try to justify the dreadful decision the government  has made on the mining super tax. Despite having no climate change policy, the government will spend $30 million on another climate change advertising campaign and keep employed at the department of climate change all of the non-productive bureaucrats who have been associated with that ‘great moral challenge’. The government will also spend $38.5 million over two years to advertise the outcomes of the Henry tax review, even though they only adopted a handful of the review’s 138 recommendations—I think the number is three. The Paid Parental Leave scheme legislation has been introduced into the parliament and, for the second budget year running, the government has committed funding for PPL advertising to a new total of $12 million. The Prime Minister’s daily PR spin on hospitals will continue with the new $29.5 million advertising campaign to sell the government’s health package, even though Western Australia has not signed on and all new beds will not even be delivered until 2014. With broadband services under the NBN still years away, the Rudd government has committed $16 million over two years, including $7.6 million in the current financial year on an NBN advertising campaign. At the same time it is cutting $16.4 million from the previous, coalition government’s Australian broadband guarantee program, which ensured fast and affordable broadband. The converse would have been like the functioning high-speed broadband network that was launched in the electorate of Hume by the former Prime Minister, the Hon. John Howard in 2006. It would have been well and truly functioning by now. It would appear that politically motivated government advertising is more important to the Prime Minister than the $21.2 million program to combat illicit drugs, from which he has cut $4 million. Treasurer Wayne Swan’s budget delivers the Prime Minister’s priorities to Defence: more bureaucrats and less ADF personnel to the front line, increasing civilian numbers by 1,500 and cutting the number of uniformed personnel by 500. It is nice to know that the Prime Minister and his ministers of the Crown believe it is more important to put civilians behind desks than it is to be ready by having additional ADF personnel in uniform. The budget will also place greater pressure on recruitment and retention in the ADF, with further cuts to the successful Defence gap year program. The budget does not invest a single additional dollar in Australia’s major road networks. As an example, there is no additional funding for the duplication of the Pacific Highway, making a farce of the Prime Minister’s commitment to finish the duplication by 2016. It is another broken promise. Nor indeed has there been any commitment to funding the duplication of the Barton Highway between the Hume Highway and the Australian Capital Territory. The only thing in this budget that will be introduced any time soon are the income tax cuts as announced by the Treasurer on budget night. But it must be remembered that these are the tax cuts that were announced by the Howard government and were due to be introduced as a matter of course from previous budgets. This budget, as I said at the outset, is nothing more than smoke and mirrors. It goes nowhere near adequately addressing the hard decisions that need to be made to reduce the increasing government debt or to return the budget to surplus. The government says it will return the budget to surplus within three years, but I, like most Australians, have serious doubts, given the record of previous Labor governments. Only a coalition government will have the fortitude and business acumen to make the necessary decisions needed to bring this country back to surplus and at the same time offer some hope for future generations of Australians. I say this to the Australian public: if you currently have some concerns about your children and grandchildren being able to cope with the continuing burgeoning debt this incompetent government is creating, these concerns will pale into significance if you elect them again. They will say and do anything to deceive you, the Australian people. I remind you they are so bereft of management skills they could not successfully run a chook raffle in the local pub let alone manage the economy of this great country of ours. 5117 17:07:00 Ramsey, Rowan, MP HWS Grey LP 0 0 Mr RAMSEY —I rise to address the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 and associated bills. Much has been made by the government about its financial rectitude in this budget. The team of ministers sent out in the last few weeks with the task of selling it to the Australian public flagged their intention to limit government outlays to two per cent real growth. It is highly unlikely a Labor government will ever be able to impose this kind of discipline on itself, and it is worth looking at previous budget outlays for an indicator of that possibility. During the course of the last three budgets, all delivered by Treasurer Swan, government outlays have grown by 21 per cent. In 2008-09 planned expenditure was $292.5 billion. Following a significant budget blow-out, in the end it was in fact $324.4 billion. In 2010-11, the government’s third budget, projected expenditure is $354.6 billion. In three years the budget has grown by 21 per cent, or $66 billion give or take a lazy $100 million. There is a difference between millions and billions. I am reminded of a story that was around a few months ago. Apparently a million seconds added together is 11½ days. A billion seconds, by comparison, is 32 years. I suspect that there are many in the Australian public that are often confused by the difference between millions and billions, but it is a thousand-fold. It is the difference between 11 days or 32 years. After presiding over budget growth figures of seven per cent, the government is now telling us they will constrain themselves to two per cent growth. It is worth recalling the language of the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd prior to the last election. ‘I am a fiscal conservative,’ he said. ‘I will deliver surplus budgets,’ he said. He called for an end to reckless spending. I find it difficult to believe this is even the same person we have seen at the controls of the nation in the last three years. The Prime Minister’s actions simply do not match the rhetoric. The Prime Minister and his Treasurer have proven to be anything but fiscally conservative. They have never delivered a surplus budget and probably never will. They are the most reckless spenders Australia has ever seen, not only spending billions but, tragically, wasting billions. The government repeatedly claims we are the standout economy in the world, but it is totally dishonest with the electorate about why that is the case. The government claims Australia was saved by stimulus spending when in fact most evidence suggests the absence of government debt and the strong surplus budgets of the Costello years were indeed much bigger factors. After all, if the saviour of our economy was the government borrowing money and then squirting it all around the electorate with no emphasis on quality of investment, just quantity and speed, why then didn’t the same formula work for so many other places in the world? If borrowing money and pumping it with very few constraints back into the economy works, why are Greece, Spain and Britain in so much trouble? Why does the US have an unemployment rate of 10 per cent? If borrowing and spending saved Australia from the recession, it certainly did not deliver the same results in other economies. I have always had difficulty with the concept that, if overborrowing and indebtedness caused the world recession, the antidote is to borrow more money and go further into debt. In fact, government intervention around the world has shifted the unstable liabilities of the private sector to the government sector and the taxpayer. The second-wave effects of the global financial crisis are yet to be fully played out, but I suspect those central bankers who drove policy and government reactions throughout the crisis may yet wonder whether their early claims of success are premature. While I know some economists, indeed some retailers, will disagree with me, I could never see how borrowing $900 to give to people to spend, when in the end as taxpayers they will be responsible for the repayment of that debt, ever looked anything like a good idea. Following the biggest spendathon in history, the Labor government claims they have rediscovered that fiscal conservatism and will limit spending growth to two per cent. We shall see. The Deputy Prime Minister is very fond of saying that we on this side of the House voted against the stimulus package, that we were against a particular school project and that we rejected funding for school computers. Absolutely we did. We voted against the government borrowing $900 to give to people only to demand it back some time in the future. We voted against those cheques going to dogs, dead people and people living overseas. We voted against the pink batt insulation scheme and its 1,500 electrified roofs, 140 house fires and four deaths. We voted against the phantom installations. We voted against a scheme that was eventually to drive reputable long-term insulation businesses to the wall as their operations have been dragged into the mire of this policy disaster and then abandoned by a Prime Minister who said he gets it and he understands, businesses like Insulation Matters in Wallaroo in my electorate, which is owed more than $200,000 by the government. It has retrenched most of its workforce and has a shed full of insulation material with no markets. I was recently speaking to a young builder I know well who decided to register for the Home Insulation Program. He told me he was amazed to find that all he had to do to become a licensed installer was fill out a form and tick some boxes. He had never installed insulation. While I am fully confident he could have insulated a house without electrifying it, he did not think that ticking a few boxes was much of a procedure to assess his ability to do so. As it turned out, he never installed any insulation, but many others did with no more scrutiny and we all know the results. Apart from the immediate tragedy of this project, the Australian taxpayer will probably continue to pay for this disaster for years to come. Unfortunately, this is not the extent of the this government’s mismanagement; it is just an example. To return to my theme: we on this side of the House were pleased to have voted against the 40 or 50 per cent of the school halls project that has been wasted. Every day we pick up the Australian and read of another million-dollar rip-off. Today I attended an event out the front of Parliament House where the Tottenham school came to Canberra. The parents of the Tottenham schoolchildren are incredibly upset. I could not believe their anger. For $610,000 under the BER funding scheme, they were provided with a 24-square-metre tuckshop. By the time you put the fire exits in and the door and a window, this tuckshop has room for a sink, a fridge and a serving bench but no room for a preparation area. You can imagine how upset they are. They feel as though they have been totally short-changed. These things are occurring not just in New South Wales but in South Australia as well. In my electorate, the Ceduna Area School language centre is to be one of the many projects investigated by the minister’s inquiry, too late to get better value, but at least one day we may know what went wrong. Minister Gillard has claimed that 85 per cent of schools are happy to be getting buildings under the BER scheme. What would we expect? Of course they are happy to be getting something—unless, of course, you happen to have a deal like Tottenham’s, where in reality they are getting almost nothing. At Ceduna the school is happy to have a new language centre, but that does not mean to say it is happy with the $5,000 per square metre construction cost. Five thousand dollars a square metre! It is barely believable. No wonder communities around Australia are outraged. Madam Deputy Speaker, you may have read in the press lately about a previously obscure building guide, Rawlinsons Australian Construction Handbook. The book, a guide to building costs, is for the industry to use to assist builders to accurately quote for building contracts. It is an ill wind that blows no good: as a result of the chronic mismanagement of the BER, there is a chance that the Rawlinsons building guide may enter the bestseller list, because every journalist worth their salt in Australia has been consulting the chapter on schools. I managed to borrow a copy. I duly turned to the pages on school buildings and yes, it is true: recommended building rates for this type of construction in Adelaide are $1,345 to $1,450 per square metre. Even if we allow for demolition, up-country costs, contingency fees et cetera, surely $2,000 a square metre or even $2½ thousand a square metre should be achievable. Five thousand dollars a square metre is appalling. Reports from New South Wales tell us that the state department has authorised school tuckshops for $25,000 per square metre—and I refer again to Tottenham—but surely this is a sick joke. In fact, the BER program has been so badly run that Rawlinsons will not include the BER projects in their new edition because they are so clearly a distortion of the pricing structure. Unfortunately, the situation is not confined. Another school in my electorate, at Cummins, is still trying to negotiate its new library. The price? In excess of $5,000 per square metre. Yet another school, at Snowtown, is being asked to reduce its building program to pay for $94,000 worth of fire water tanks, clearly not part of the BER program but a cost-shifting exercise by the state government—and, at $94,000 for 85,000 litres, somewhere around 10 times the price of off-the-shelf tanks. Minister Gillard has belatedly announced a $14 million task force to look at the problem, but it is too late. The horse has bolted. The mistakes are made, and now the taxpayer is being asked once again to fund the beginnings of the investigation. I suspect that this inquiry—and probably a number more to come—into this appallingly managed program will eventually politically hang the Deputy Prime Minister. It certainly should. She has presided over the biggest waste of public funds on an individual program in Australia’s history. The BER was always set to be a building blow-out. The projects should have been given to schools for them to control the money. In some places, they were. The Catholic and independent sectors have managed their own projects, and the difference could not be more stark. For instance, Maitland Lutheran School was given $850,000 to build a multipurpose hall. They took control of the project themselves, and the result is a measuring stick of what should be achieved elsewhere. With the addition of another $120,000 of school funds, delivering a total project of a little less than $1 million, the school has a multipurpose hall of 42 metres by 24 metres, 8.38 metres high, a building of over 1,000 square metres at less than $1,000 a square metre. Additionally, the school has seven-metre verandas on two sides capable of being enclosed as classrooms at some future date. That is another 270 square metres. The building is fully landscaped with substantial areas of paving, has a $115,000 rubberised Gerflor surface with sports markings, an office and a kitchenette area with a fridge et cetera and is fully plumbed with a 20,000-litre rainwater tank, all with the per metre cost of less than $700. Compare that with the $5,000 a square metre I have already referred to in the delivery of projects by the state government. My local football club is building new club rooms—go the Kimba Tigers!—even bigger than the Maitland Lutheran School building, including extensive wet areas, lots of windows, a kitchen and a bar for around $700,000. Admittedly, there has been considerable in-kind support from the community, but no more than could have been achieved in similar communities for a school building project. In any case, even allowing for in-kind support, the cost will be less than $1,000 a square metre. The third round of BER money is about to be rolled out—$5.5 billion. That is one-third of the program. Even at this late stage, the minister has a chance to take control and plug the waste, hand management of the program to the schools, bypass the state departments who have shown themselves to be completely inadequate at management and let the locals have a go, as they have done in the private sector. This budget is predicated on the establishment of a mining super profits tax. Without it, the government’s much vaunted surplus in 2013 cannot possibly be reached. In fact, it will miss by billions. Unfortunately, the mining super profits tax is beginning to look like another prime ministerial thought bubble. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but it had not been road tested. It is beginning to look as if the Prime Minister is about to engage in another unedifying backflip. When it comes to the mining industry, because of difficult geology, South Australia has been something of a Cinderella state. Our big sisters have gone to the mining dance and we have been left at home. New technologies have begun to reveal great wealth, even though typically there are great physical barriers to the development as a reflection of the difficult geology, and things have begun to change. But this means the big sisters, the other states, have already had a very good stream of mining royalties and South Australia has barely started. The mining super profits tax lies at the heart of this budget and threatens to leaves South Australia—particularly my electorate, which covers the most part of the state—at home waiting in vain for a taxi to the dance. Relative to the rest of the state in population terms, my seat of Grey has been declining all my life. Efficiencies in our traditional agricultural base have fuelled a drift to the city. The loss of major regional industries, such as shipbuilding and railways, have all contributed. In short, if we do not have jobs we do not have people. Many of our regional centres have suffered greatly as youth have left their local communities. However, in the last 10 years we have seen a reversal of fortunes as the mining industry has breathed new life into these communities, creating thousands of new jobs and, in the case of Roxby Downs, actually creating a new town. This is the moment South Australia has been waiting for, but it has been put at risk by a desperate Prime Minister and an increasingly desperate government looking to fill an enormous budget black hole caused by chronic mismanagement and overspending. It will come as no surprise that I have been speaking to miners and prospective miners about their opinion of the tax grab. When I ask about the reaction of the overseas investors that we must have to get these projects off the ground, they say the general reaction is bemused and confused. They simply cannot understand why the national government is intent on disadvantaging our own industries. Mining can be a boom or bust experience. In some ways it can be a little like farming in that you need to make hay while the sun shines and batten down the hatches when times are not so good. When times are bad, miners pull in their belts and seek to make ends meet out of existing investments. When commodity cycles are good, miners make profits and in many cases take the opportunity to reinvest in the industry. The good times are what entice them into the industry in the first place. Anyone who thinks you can take 57 per cent off the top in the good times has no understanding as to why investors take the very big risk in the first place. That is exactly what the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, plans to do—introduce an effective tax rate of 57 per cent. The government proposes to take 40 per cent of company profits. They have already paid payroll taxes, wages, super, WorkCover et cetera. The company will then have the opportunity to meet the interest on the borrowings and what is left will be subject to a 28 per cent company tax, resulting in a combined tax rate of 57 per cent. It is worth having a roll call of just what is on offer in my electorate of Grey. Centrex are looking to develop a new iron ore province on Eyre Peninsula. OneSteel are expanding exports. Western Plains Resources and IMX plan to develop a new iron ore province in the Woomera-Coober Pedy area. They will be needing a new port. Heathgate are planning uranium expansion at the Four Mile mine. Other uranium prospectors have significant investments at, among others, Mullaquana and Waddikee. Petratherm and Geodynamics are developing hot rocks ventures. There is coal to liquids and gasification being done by Altona in the far north and Linc Energy near Orroroo. Syngas has a project at Port Clinton, Iluka will expand their mineral sands project west of Ceduna and Oz Minerals were planning to expand their mines but have put a hold on all further work at the moment south of Coober Pedy. There are strong exploration programs by Adelaide Resources and Rex Minerals on Yorke Peninsula. It is a big list but it is not exhaustive. The problem of course is opportunities abound but they all take money and an appetite for risk. It seems just like yesterday that the Prime Minister stood side by side with his best friend Twiggy Forrest and promised the Australian government would work hand in hand with big Australia to provide 50,000 new jobs for Aboriginals. I wonder how the Prime Minister will advance that relationship as he implements an enormous tax on the industry. We were all looking at the mining industry to provide the bulk of those jobs. The growth, which was to provide most of those jobs, may now never eventuate. The IMX Resources project near Coober Pedy is planning for Indigenous jobs, as would any expansion of the Prominent Hill mine and the Iluka mineral sands mine. The Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara have encouraged prospectors onto their lands with the promise of Indigenous employment. What will they think of the government’s real commitment to them? Money is not the answer to the problems of Indigenous Australia, jobs are. Employment offers paths for a truly productive life for these people but it cannot happen without the jobs. This tax threatens all that, the encouraging prospects on the APY Lands are in the most remote part of Australia and the government is saying to the miners, ‘Have a go, see what you can do, see what you can find and if you get lucky we’ll take 57 per cent, thank you very much.’ These projects simply will not happen. This budget has as its foundation this ill-conceived tax grab for easy money, to plug an enormous budget black hole caused by a government which has no self-control, cannot manage projects and denies the truth of its incompetence. Without the new tax, there is no surplus in three years; without it the smoke and mirrors fall in a heap. Now the Prime Minister sheds his last vestiges of credibility by embarking on a blatantly political advertising campaign that he once described as a sick cancer within our system—a cancer on democracy. Another $38 million of taxpayers’ hard earned, flung out the window. You can almost hear the government thinking: ‘What difference is that little bit going to make? It is only another $38 million.’ This budget claims to be responsible; it does, in fact, threaten to stall Australia. 5122 17:37:00 Marles, Richard, MP HWQ Corio ALP Parliamentary Secretary for Innovation and Industry 1 0 Mr MARLES —I might pick up where the member for Grey finished off. It is right that the resource super profits tax forms an important part of the budget that we have put in place, but if you listen to the member for Grey you would think that the conservative parties of this country are speaking for everyone in Australia where in fact what is going on is that the Liberals and the Nationals stand absolutely isolated on this issue. We are talking about putting in a resource super profits tax which will shift the payment for resources from a system of royalties to a profit based tax—something that the mining industry itself is saying today needs to happen. We are talking about trying to have a fairer share of the resources of this country put into the tax base of this country in circumstances where Mitch Hooke from the Minerals Council today said that he believed there was a case for mining to pay more. It is not unreasonable when one is considering tax reform that we look to this area where there is an utterly outdated taxation arrangement and a system of state royalties around the country, where what you have is every single economist in the country saying that this is a system of taxation which needs to be replaced and there is an academic unanimity around the proposition that what we ought to have in place is a profits based tax. What that really means, when you listen to what the member for Grey has said, is that the Liberal Party and the National Party have essentially contracted out their articulating of public policy to the Minerals Council of Australia and have even actually gone beyond that and been won out in this country in relation to what we ought to do about tax reform. That was and is an important part of the budget that was put before this parliament and forms the subject of the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 and related bills. It is a really important budget for this country, coming as it does in the immediate aftermath of the global economic crisis and during a period of global economic history which remains uncertain and in which the road to recovery for the globe would appear to be rocky when you look at what is happening in Europe, particularly in Greece. Despite that, we are putting the budget back into surplus in three years—three years ahead of time. Last year’s budget dealt with the biggest global economic shock that we have seen since the Great Depression. Through the decisive action of the Rudd government, we steered a path through those troubled waters which was unparalleled by any other country on the planet. We are the envy of the rest of the world in terms of our financial situation. It is not just a matter of putting a stimulus out there. We were always alive to the fact that the stimulus needed to have bounds around it, and it has. It has resulted—which I will come to in a moment—in just about the lowest net debt or percentage debt of any country in the OECD. But, having accumulated that debt in circumstances where it needed to occur, we have put the budget on a path to surplus far earlier than expected, which was exactly what we needed to do. This is a much greater and more rapid fiscal consolidation than we saw after the previous two global recessions that Australia went through but avoided on this occasion. We have done that by ensuring that all new spending is offset within the budget. We have made sure that real spending growth has been held to a two per cent cap. As a result, the forecast deficit for this budget is $40.8 billion. That is $16.3 billion less than was expected for this financial year last year. Net debt is now projected to peak at 6.1 per cent of GDP, half the rate that was projected a year ago and less than a tenth of the average net debt across the major advanced economies. As I said earlier, it places Australia in an enviable position relative to the rest of the world. We have seen, almost uniquely amongst OECD countries, Australia grow during this period of time. During 2009 Australia’s GDP grew by 1.4 per cent. That stands in contrast to the average of the advanced economies’ decline during that period of 3.2 per cent. What comes out of this budget is a forecast for the next financial year of an increase in GDP of 3¼ per cent and, of course, that is backed up by the very positive news in relation to GDP growth that we have heard today. We have the second lowest rate of unemployment amongst the advanced economies. During this period of time we added another 225,000 jobs to the economy. Our peak unemployment was less than six per cent, yet you see that the United States is right now up around 10 per cent, the UK is up around eight per cent and the average for the G7 is in a similar place. So, on the measure of unemployment, we are doing better than almost any other country in the developed world. As I said, net debt is projected to peak at about 6.1 per cent. This compares with the US, where net debt is around 80 per cent; France, where there is a similar number; and Japan, where net debt is projected to peak at around the 155 per cent mark in 2015. By any measure, this is an impressive achievement in terms of economic management. You can hear the froth and bubble of the opposition when it comes to all of these particular things. They nitpick but they cannot escape the hard bottom line of these figures which makes it clear that because of the decisive action of this government 200,000 jobs were saved during the global economic crisis. Had we walked down the path that they asked us to walk down by opposing the economic stimulus, those 200,000 people would on this day not be working. That is an enormous contribution to the Australian economy and it is an enormous contribution to the social fabric of the Australian economy, and that is very much the case in Geelong as well. What we are now trying to do is harness the potential of the resources boom for the whole economy. In this budget we are seeking to invest in skills and infrastructure. We are continuing to ease the burden for working families and we are modernising the tax system. There will be tax breaks for 2.4 million small businesses in the form of a one-off claim in relation to assets of up to $5,000. As a result of this bill, the company tax rate will be reduced from 30 per cent to 29 per cent in the income year 2013-14 and to 28 per cent the following year. Small businesses will be given the full two per cent reduction two years early, from the financial year 2012-13. There are 720,000 small businesses which can take advantage of that, 5,499 of them, according to the latest stats, in my electorate of Corio. There will be an enormous reduction in their costs and an enormous improvement in their bottom line as a result of this budget. It is interesting to note that the so-called party of small business created by Sir Robert Menzies back in the late forties are now blocking that provision. They now stand for the proposition that small businesses ought not to get that reduction in the company tax rate. In fact, their proposition is that there should be a great big tax paid in relation to their proposed paid parental leave scheme, which would undoubtedly flow through to small business. They stand for an increase in taxation for small business; we stand for the opposite. We are also looking at simplifying tax arrangements by putting in place an optional standard deduction of $500 for individual taxpayers. Again, this is a very important initiative. Most importantly, for the third year in a row there will be income tax cuts for ordinary Australians, which will see the average Australian taxpayer save $450 a year. In this bill there is a provision for the superannuation guarantee to be increased from nine per cent to 12 per cent, a long-held ideal for working people in this country. It is going to make an enormous difference to the working people of Australia. As part of that, there will be a tax break for superannuation contributors on lower incomes, which will see a $500 credit paid to their accounts. This in effect means that those at the lower end of the spectrum will have an increased threshold for paying tax. We are looking at putting $650 million towards investments in renewable energy. We have watched the opposition—and this is a matter of real interest in my electorate of Geelong—consistently block every attempt to deal with the incredibly difficult issue of climate change. This budget will put in place significant investments in the renewable energy space through the establishment of the Renewable Energy Future Fund. We are seeing historic reforms to the health system: $7.3 billion over five years, increasing the capacity of emergency departments and setting in place a four-hour target for attending to patients in an emergency department. There will be $417 million to improve after-hours access to GPs; $355 million to upgrade GP healthcare clinics, which will include the establishment of 23 new GP superclinics—and to that end we are very excited that shortly we will be seeing the completion of the GP superclinic in Belmont, which will service the southern suburbs of Geelong and which has been welcomed by my community—and another $523 million to go towards nurse training. There will be $660-odd million for skills and training, with 39,000 new training places and the extension of the Kickstart initiative, which will see 22,500 new apprentices—already 300 of them in Geelong—along with a $5.6 billion boost for infrastructure over 10 years. Included in that will be the $110 million upgrade of the rail line between Albury and Geelong. This is going to cut transit times and allow heavier trains to go down that track. It will be a 13-month project that will support 275 jobs. The National Broadband Network of course is at the heart of this budget. And a smaller thing but one which I want to particularly mention on this occasion is $55,000 to the Barwon Community Legal Centre to continue its pilot program to support separating families. Whilst it is a small amount of money in the context of the entire budget, it is a very welcome allocation to the Barwon Community Legal Centre for the great work they do in that area. By contrast, what we have seen on the part of the opposition is to take a slash and burn approach to the development that this government is putting forward within Australia and particularly in my region in Geelong, be it the e-health initiative, be it new GP superclinics, the Green Car Innovation Fund, which has been so important for Geelong but which the opposition is seeking to cut back on, the Carbon Capture and Storage Program, the Renewable Energy Fund, the climate change adaptation fund, the National Broadband Network, removing the reduction in company tax, as I said earlier, particularly in relation to small business, removing the small-business instant asset write-off, the super tax rebate for low-income earners, the BER schools upgrade, and I could go on. All of these will have an enormous impact on my community in Geelong. A particularly important program that would be scrapped in Geelong as a result of what has been proposed by the opposition is the trade training centre at the Corio Bay Secondary College, which is an $11 million investment by the Rudd government which involves nine schools in the northern Geelong area. It is going to benefit 300 students a week from years 9 through 12. This is sorely needed in the northern suburbs of Geelong to provide the skills training for the industries that these students will have the ability to get work in. To remove that really does demonstrate that the opposition has no interest whatsoever in the skills development of the people of the north of Geelong. While the opposition is focused, if you like, on cutting the base for the development of manufacturing in a place like Geelong, we stand at the other end of that spectrum. On 21 May this year the Prime Minister visited Geelong and announced the $37 million federal contribution to the Australian Future Fibres Research and Innovation Centre at Deakin University. This will see the relocation of the CSIRO materials and fibre research group. It will see an expansion of the Centre for Material and Fibre Innovation within the Institute for Technology Research and Innovation that will see the construction of a carbon fibre research pilot plant in partnership with the Victorian Centre for Advanced Materials Manufacturing. All up, it is about a hundred million dollar spend, of which the federal government is contributing $37 million. AFFRIC will develop innovative and functional materials which will include nano materials, smart fibrous materials, green natural fibres and carbon fibre. That will have enormous applications in areas of aerospace, alternative energy, automotive and textiles and biomedical industries. There will be 300 staff and students working within this centre, which will include 85 CSIRO staff. There will be 400 people working in the construction of the centre. Carbon fibre is five times stronger than steel yet only one-fifth of its weight. As a result it has huge applications in aerospace and in automotive, especially when we are talking about electric cars and in the context of the aviation industry. With the Boeing 787 Dreamliner we have the first aeroplane which has been specifically designed with a view to its fuselage being made out of carbon fibre. Brad Dunstan from VCAMM has said that if Australia does not get on the carbon bandwagon then we will miss out. In the 1900s to be an advanced economy we used to talk about the fact that an economy needed to have the capacity to make steel. In the 1950s they said that to be an advanced economy you needed to have the capacity to make aluminium. Well, in the 21st century it will be the capacity to make carbon fibre which defines whether or not an economy is an advanced economy. It is expected that over the next five to 10 years we will see the demand for carbon fibre increase by 20 to 30 times. With its research furnace, the university will have the capacity to make 20 to 30 tonnes of carbon fibre annually. It is not a commercial amount, but this will be a unique research capacity on a global scale. Nowhere else is there a furnace that will be able to make commercial-grade carbon fibre which will be available for research. It will be really important for developing graduates. It will bring world manufacturing to our door. It will build on Geelong’s strong automotive capacity to make it a burgeoning city in the aerospace industry. It will make Geelong— 848 Secker, Patrick, MP Mr Secker —The centre of the universe! HWQ Marles, Richard, MP Mr MARLES —It is that. But, in addition to that, it will make Geelong the Australian centre for carbon fibre. This is a really important capacity that the country needs and it will position Geelong really well for the future. This must be considered within the context of the other achievements of the Rudd Labor government over the last 2½ years. There are facilities being built at more than 100 schools in the Corio electorate and more than $100 million is being spent. We have seen greater investment in community education and trade training. I have mentioned the $11 million investment in the Corio Bay Senior College trade training centre. We have also seen increased investment in Gordon TAFE’s East Geelong campus and indeed the Diversitat employment program. In the last budget there was $3.2 billion for the Tarneit rail bypass, which will cut travel times to Melbourne for Geelong commuters, increasing the lifestyle aspect of living in Geelong. We have seen $14 million spent on the new stand at Kardinia Park, which is a very important and welcome initiative in Geelong. This stand was opened by the Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, the most senior ranking ‘Fed Cat’ in the government. We have also seen the green car fund and the Geelong Investment and Innovation Fund. This demonstrates that the Rudd government is committed to the future of Geelong. This stands in stark contrast to what the Liberals are putting forward. It is clear that, at the next election, the people of Geelong—(Time expired) 5126 17:57:00 Bird, Sharon, MP DZP Cunningham ALP 1 0 Ms BIRD —I very much enjoyed the parliamentary secretary’s speech on these bills. I look forward to him joining me for the launch of the Energy Pipeline CRC at the University of Wollongong, which I am sure he believes is the second best university in the country—and I am sure I am not verballing him there! I rise to speak in support of the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 and associated bills, otherwise known as the budget bills. I want to make some comments on the context within which this budget is presented and then go to some of the specific details of the budget which I think are worth endorsement. I was elected to this place in 2004. It has been an interesting process over a short period of six years. I remember my participation in debates in this place around the time of the 2005 and 2006 budgets. An issue that was raised in 2006 and debated in the 2007 election period was the concern that we had been through a period of a significant minerals based boom in this country and there were some real issues around the impacts of that boom for the growth and prosperity of both the manufacturing and services sectors. Indeed, the former Treasurer, Mr Costello, gave a reference to the Standing Committee on Economics, of which I was a member at the time, asking us to look at the impacts that the minerals boom was having on those two sectors and potentially what we needed to do to support them to innovate and grow into the future so that we retained a diverse base in our economy and did not see a narrowing in the base of the economy. I thought that was an issue that was well worth looking at. The economics committee was at the time chaired by Bruce Baird, who, of course, is no longer in the parliament. I found him to be a very good chair to work with on that committee. We heard a lot of evidence about the wonderful flow-on effects of the minerals boom on many sectors of the manufacturing and service industries whilst at the same time hearing from other sections of those industries that it had created some real challenges for them. The exchange rate of the dollar was clearly one that we all understood: if you were trying to export, it was not a particularly encouraging position. In particular, when we visited Western Australia, where my colleague who is here with me now is from, we heard a lot of evidence from the tourism industry about labour supply issues. One of their great concerns was short order cooks and so forth being lured away for much higher wages in the mining areas. That was putting real constraints on them and they told us about restaurants in Perth that were closing down and so forth. Clearly it was a real issue. We all valued the mining boom and we wanted to maximise the outcomes of it to make sure that all of the sectors of our economy that could profit from it did so and did so effectively. That was one issue that was going on during my first few years in this parliament. The other one was the effects on public sector demand that a mining boom can have. By that I mean—and it will come as no surprise to anybody, like me, who comes from a mining area—a boom carries with it a whole lot of issues around infrastructure, skills and training. In my area I have had conversations for many years now with the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy. The University of Wollongong is a major trainer and supplier of mining engineers and the national organisation has a very active and well-led local branch of mining engineers in Wollongong. My own father was an electrical engineer in the mining industry, so I have known many of these people for a long, long time. They were constantly at my door talking to me about the need to address the severe skills shortages that were developing as the mining boom continued not only in engineering but also in a broad range of skills needs that the sector has. At the same time you could pick up a newspaper and see stories about ships queued off Newcastle and, in Queensland, a real problem with getting mineral exports out of the country at the rate at which they were being demanded. One of the real problems for the long-term sustainability of the minerals industry was that a lot of that boom was built on the back of high prices, partly determined by constraints on supply because of infrastructure issues. So there was great pressure on government—at that time we were in opposition—to address the infrastructure bottlenecks and the skills shortages. Indeed, the RBA itself issued consistent warnings that these two problems in particular and their effects on demand were becoming a significant inflationary force; hence, a fairly significant and sustained rise in interest rates occurred as the RBA sought to address that rising inflation. We were elected to government on the back of a promise to get serious about addressing infrastructure bottlenecks and skills and training deficits in this country. That was exactly what our initial budget was about. It was about establishing, for example, Infrastructure Australia—to have an independent national audit of infrastructure that was needed for the growth and productivity of our nation. We see now, 2½ years later, significant investments, as outlined by the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government in the House today, providing new roads, new rail and new port facilities to ensure the productivity and sustainability of the minerals industry more broadly and also at the local community level. In my own area, I have been a great champion for a new rail link. We have a port, the port of Kembla, and we feed into the southern coalfields. We do have a bit of a physical challenge to overcome in our area, in terms of the escarpment. It is a beautiful thing and a wonderful asset in the tourism base of our economy in the Illawarra, but it is a bit of a challenge in terms of the infrastructure base. The Maldon-Dombarton rail line was being built to link the port of Kembla to the southern coalfields and on to the Lithgow coalfields at the time. Sadly, when my good friend from this place, former member Bruce Baird, was the transport minister for New South Wales he cancelled that project, in a very short-sighted manner, halfway through its construction. That was at a time when we saw the downturn occur in the mining industry. When those downswings happen as a result of the international situation in mining, I think that it is wrong to assume that it would not be followed by an upswing. Consequently we have a rail line that is quite an amazing thing to see. There are gorges where you have a rail bridge built halfway across and it literally just stops. You could be forgiven for thinking that someone had cut the photo in half, it is such a dramatic image. We have been supporting the government having a look at the viability of completing that rail line with a view to linking it in to the Southern Sydney Freight Line and having the port of Kembla be part of the solution for the issues of the port of Botany. At the end of the day, these things have to be done properly, and we as a community understand that governments have to do feasibility studies, they have to make sure that these sorts of projects stack up, and that is what we were agitating to get. The chair of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Transport and Regional Services—which I was also a member of—at the time, Mr Paul Neville, the member for Hinkler, visited the port with the committee and in his report, The Great Freight Task, he endorsed the need to look at that rail line. On being elected, the Rudd Labor government has committed to the process and at the moment we are undertaking a $3 million full feasibility study into the capacity of that line. Why is this important in a community like mine? We have a real issue around export and, in particular, the movement of minerals around this country, in that they have to come to the seaboards for export through a port, and you have got growing populations and urbanisation around the coast. So you have got competing interests occurring when people in urban areas are increasingly saying, ‘We don’t want trucks rolling through our town, we don’t want them rolling through 24 hours a day.’ All those sorts of limitations then affect the productivity and efficiency of that freight connection. So it is very important, as The Great Freight Task report said, to get as much of that growing freight movement off our roads and onto rail as possible. Those were the challenges that we were facing, and I was very pleased when we came to government and, in that first budget, we started to tackle not only infrastructure but also, importantly, investing in education, training and skills development. I thought that was a well-overdue response to the issues that have been raised by people like the Reserve Bank of Australia for a very long time. We then had the intervention of the global financial crisis and the dynamic changed significantly. I agree with the many, many commentators on both the national and the international stage, including international ratings agencies and economic forums, that this government handled that crisis outstandingly well. The Prime Minister, the Treasurer and senior members of the government intervened quickly and decisively, understanding that when private sector money pulls out of not only a nation but also communities, people lose confidence. As a result, you see businesses closing down and shops being boarded up, and that leads to ‘for sale’ signs in yards and to houses staying on the market for long periods of time. As people drive around their communities and see those boarded-up shops and houses for sale, they lose confidence. That loss of confidence feeds on itself and people stop spending. Next you see the little restaurants, takeaways and retail shops shutting down. It is a pattern that has happened in societies whenever confidence is knocked out of an economy. The really quick, significant intervention that this government took to bolster employment and to bolster local economies was critically important to the success we had with confidence and the fact that we did not end up going into technical recession. The budgets during that period were about the importance of that stimulus. It was always made clear that we had a view that you inject government spending at a time when the private sector is pulling out and you do it in a sustained way and then, as the private sector investment picks up, you start withdrawing and you get your budgets back into balance. This budget sits in that part of the cycle. This budget is sound and responsible. It is about paying off the debt that was necessary in the context that I have just outlined—necessary in keeping Australia from falling into a recession and, indeed, necessary at a very human level to sustaining communities, families and jobs. This budget will be in surplus by one per cent of GDP three years ahead of the schedule that was identified in the budgets in which we took intervention in the economy. This budget is responsible in that it invests in productivity. It is about human capital and it is about building the future. It is about identifying what we did wrong with the first mining boom and making sure that we do not repeat that with the second one. There is investment in health and hospitals in particular, which I think is very important, and there is investment in education and skills—a great passion of mine. It also builds on the nation’s savings by increasing the superannuation guarantee to 12 per cent. I do not think people should ever underestimate the fact that we had a trillion dollars in super as a national savings bank in this country. It was a very important part of the financial stability of this nation during the global financial crisis. I sometimes hear people talking about the option of putting this sort of money into some sort of sustained future fund type arrangement. The superannuation of this nation is the future fund. It is not only a future fund for the individuals who draw on that super; it is a national savings bank that underpins a lot of our financial performance. The budget delivers on the tax cuts that we had promised. Of particular importance in terms of that concept I was mentioning about making sure that all sectors of our economy share in the wellbeing that we experience from selling the minerals that we own, the budget also introduces cuts to company tax and, in particular, an early introduction of the cut to the company tax for small businesses. Additionally, it also allows an immediate write-off for small business assets worth up to $5,000—which I think will be very, very welcome. Certainly small businesses in my area welcomed the interim small business offset we had in place. The budget also invests $700 million in the first year of a new infrastructure fund, which will go towards addressing some of the issues that I outlined were pressing problems at the 2006-07 debate that we were having in this country about infrastructure. After we finish sitting in this parliament at the end of this sitting session, I will be going to talk to my local division of GPs about some of the opportunities under the superclinics program. In particular, I am very, very pleased to see that part of that program provides an opportunity for existing GP clinics to get up to half a million dollars to upgrade themselves to be able to provide those additional services that a superclinic provides. I will be keen to encourage many of my locals to become involved in that. I should also indicate that I participated the other week in an aged-care forum in my electorate to talk to providers and workers from that industry. Some members of the Combined Pensioners came along as well. I am very pleased that this government will invest $533 million over the next four years to improve access to high-quality aged care. It is important to indicate the government’s commitment in this budget to reducing Australia’s energy consumption and improving energy efficiency. The budget provides $652 million over four years to the Renewable Energy Future Fund. That is a particularly important fund to support and develop both large- and small-scale renewable energy projects. I think there will be many businesses in areas like mine looking to those opportunities. I have had people in my area talk to me about the problems with getting the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme through the parliament and their disappointment that because both the opposition and the Greens opposed it in the Senate it was not able to be put into place. But it is important to remember that that was one prong of a multipronged approach to tackling climate change issues and it is important to be committed to renewable energy. I am very pleased that the Apprentice Kickstart bonus program has been extended. It has been a fantastically successful initiative in my own area. Along with the Illawarra Mercury and the Illawarra Business Chamber, we set a target of 500 apprentices and we exceeded that by about 50 to 60 apprentices. I am thrilled and I am sure the local community will come together to make sure more young people get a start. The last time we had a downturn, in the 1980s, it took 13 years to get the number of apprentices being employed back to the level it was at the time before the downturn started. A significant part of that contributed to the skills shortages that I described earlier. This program made sure that we got back to those levels in one year. For young people—and more broadly for our economy to avoid a future skills gap—this is a really important and successful budget initiative that I commend. I have talked broadly about the economic situation. You may tell from my comments that I am a great supporter of the resource super profits tax. I have lived with five generations of a mining family and I have at least 10 family members currently working in the mining industry. We have heard the scare campaign every time before. We heard it on land rights. We heard it on Mabo. We heard it on occupational health and safety. We heard it on rolling back Work Choices. They like to lobby hard, I respect that, and they will respect the fact that I will lobby back just as hard and say ‘You are not going to frighten me off what is in the nation’s best interest by a scare campaign’. I have seen it before. I recognise it and understand it. Go out and do your best but at the end of the day we will make a decision that is in the best interests of the nation as a whole. The mining sector will continue to prosper and I am sure they will be back knocking at my door wanting to talk about their approvals for future development and growth. (Time expired) 5131 18:17:00 Irons, Steve, MP HYM Swan LP 0 0 Mr IRONS —I rise to talk on the Appropriation Bill (No. 2) 2010-2011 and the Appropriation (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No. 1) 2010-2011 or, as the member for Cunningham referred to them, the budget bills. I appreciate her view on the rent resource tax. I do not agree with it but I appreciate that she has the right to have a different view. Coming from a state that is built on resources and survives purely on resources, I am sure that the member for Cunningham will understand that I will have a different view from hers. I will try to put some of those reasons out here tonight. Three years ago when I gave my first speech to the House of Representatives I reminded the government of the many commitments it made to the people of Swan and Western Australia before the last election. Members will remember some of these promises the Prime Minister made to Australia. The first was to bring down petrol and grocery prices and all we saw was the failure of the boy wonder, the member for Prospect, in overseeing the disastrous Fuelwatch and the equally disastrous GroceryWatch. The cost blowout and failure of these two programs cost taxpayers a mere estimated $8 million—and that was just for the Fuelwatch program. Why do I say ‘mere’? Because it is mere compared to the total cost to the taxpayers of this government’s waste and expenditure, which is budgeted at a loss of $57 billion this year. Next we had the Prime Minister promise to take over hospitals by mid-2009 and all we got was a Prime Minister with spin and headlines about an historic agreement being reached. Luckily, no agreement has been reached because Colin Barnett, the Premier of Western Australia, did not get sucked in to supporting just another layer of bureaucrats—but this will not stop the government wasting more of taxpayers’ money on propaganda promoting the Labor Party’s historic agreement which has not been reached. What about building 36 new GP superclinics around Australia? Members of the public should be asking: how many are actually completed and operating? That is another failure for this government. We were going to get the building of 260 childcare centres to avoid the double drop-off, but that program has now been scrapped—another failure and backflip by this government. The Prime Minister promised faithfully, as he does with most things he announces, that the government would not touch the private healthcare rebate, that he would keep the budget in surplus and that he would be an economic conservative—fail, fail, fail. This government promised a laptop for every secondary school student. As at 21 April this year, there have only been 609 computers delivered to the electorate of Swan, which in 2½ years is pretty poor. It is actually the second lowest nationally. The only electorate with less is Lyons and I am sure that the member for Lyons would be disappointed that his electorate is ranked lowest on the rollout of school computers in the whole of Australia. The rollout of computers by this government is well below what they promised. This is poor, particularly with my electorate being the second lowest. Today in the House we saw the member for Melbourne get up and talk about expenditure in my seat of Swan. We also heard him pick out particular areas of Swan. As you would understand from being a member from South Australia, Deputy Speaker Georganas, Western Australia is a very parochial state. One of the things we do not like in Western Australia is—hearing the bells! A division having been called in the House of Representatives— Sitting suspended from 6.21 pm to 6.53 pm HYM Irons, Steve, MP Mr IRONS —Before the division I was saying how parochial we are in WA. I know that in South Australia similar sentiments particularly relating to football evoke the same parochial spirit we have in Western Australia. It was good to see the member for Hindmarsh, who is sitting in the chair, tossing the coin at the football the other week. I was very impressed to see that he tossed a tail and did a great job there. The people in Western Australia are parochial as well and they would be annoyed that the member for Melbourne, who was having a crack at me in question time today, included a part of Western Australia which is not even in my electorate. That just proves to the people in Western Australia, and particularly the people in Swan, that the Labor Party people based in the eastern states know nothing about our state and have no respect for it. This is proven by the fact that they have introduced a resource rent tax which will decimate any further and future projects that are envisaged for Western Australia, particularly the financing of them. I think that this government just does not get how important the resources and mining industry is to Western Australia. As well, the Prime Minister made commitments on government advertising prior to the last election. He called it a ‘cancer in our democracy’. It looks as though we must be at war, if a state of emergency has been declared, where we have more taxpayers’ money being used to fight our very own mining industry that pays millions of dollars through taxes into our economy. They pay in many ways, including royalties and through GST on the purchase of multimillion-dollar equipment, and I know that for a fact. My company supplied air-conditioning equipment for years into the north-west to mining companies. The company I worked for, which was based in Melbourne, had a manufacturing plant and survived also because of the West Australian mining industry. So it is not only going to affect companies in Western Australia; it will affect manufacturing companies in the eastern states. I know from talking to some of the mining companies that they still buy large equipment from companies in the eastern states, particularly Victoria. They pay PAYG tax on behalf of all the people they employ. They also pay payroll tax and they all pay income tax. So they do pay their fair share. In Western Australia we are parochial. Premier Colin Barnett recently stood up for the state on health. He gave a speech to the CCI of WA on 21 May. It was a good speech about the resource super profits tax. It was so good that I am actually going to quote parts of speech. He said: Western Australia is the world’s leading mining economy. We produce $70 billion worth of mining and petroleum projects. Five weeks ago, I was in the United States. Rupert Murdoch, who I don’t pretend to know, but he very graciously hosted a lunch had about 20 or 30 of the leading financial people of New York, Wall Street. And I was able to proudly outline the size, the scale and the sophistication of our mining and petroleum industry, and I passed around a list of about $170 billion of projects that I, from my own judgment I guess, expect to proceed. So I didn’t put everything in there, these are the ones that I thought had a very strong probability of going ahead. And it was an awareness of Western Australia and its mining industry but many of the major sort of investors there, particularly the private equity groups, you know, sort of said well we traditionally haven’t been investing in resources, we stay away from commodity areas, but we might have another look at that. And there was great enthusiasm, great interest in the oil and gas industry, which I … I’d just spoken at the gathering in Houston, some of that, obviously the world’s major companies made the comment to me … there’s only two places in the world we’re interested in. The Gulf of Mexico and the west coast of Australia, they’re the only two places we really want to invest, in big projects. So we are on the radar screen, well and truly. Since that five weeks, we’ve had this proposal from this resources super profits tax, we’ve seen share prices collapse, projects stalled and abandoned, companies saying they’re going to now explore offshore. We’ve seen the dollar fall, other factors, but a fair bit to do with that … is this proposal. My guess is that we’ll probably lose 25 percent of those $170 billion of projects. I’m not suggesting the mining of petroleum industry is going to collapse or even decline. It will continue to grow but it won’t grow at the pace at which it could have. I have been concerned for some time that the rhetoric coming from the Federal Government is that the global financial crisis is all behind us and we’re heading into another resources boom. But I’ve been saying to the Prime Minister and to the Federal Treasurer, in my judgement that is not the case. The economy is still fragile, including the mining industry. Yes, we can be optimistic that we’ve got through the hardest part, and yes, the stimulus package did work, but it’s not boom time; it’s a long way from that, that’s why I banned the word ‘boom’ from the vocabulary in Western Australia. I would also make the point that … as I said before, Australia and Western Australia … but Australia as a whole is a commodity trading economy—mining, petroleum and agriculture, that’s what we’re known for, that’s what we’re seen as, and the Australian dollar is a commodity currency. It’s a highly traded currency, and it will bounce around and according to people’s perceptions of Australia as a place to invest for Australia’s future, as a generator of export income. All those factors seem to be being glossed over. Now the arguments that have been put forward to try and justify this, by Ken Henry and now by the Federal Government, are many and varied, but they just deserve some critical examination. The first point is, they argue the mining companies don’t pay enough. Okay, maybe you know that arguments, but at the same time, they argue, that many projects don’t go ahead because state royalties are too high. In my 20 years around its industry, probably longer, I have never come across a mining project that couldn’t get up because it had to pay state royalties, and I’ve never seen a project that failed because of royalties. They simply are not that high, they are not deal makers or breakers. It is said Australians, all Australians, own the resources. Well, no, they don’t. The resources are owned individually by the people in each individual state, so the Tasmanians don’t own the Pilbara iron ore resources—we do. Important difference, and there may be some constitutional issues about that. It’s then been said that the companies are foreign owned. Yes, the mining industry has grown on the back of foreign investment. We would not have had the Pilbara without the investment and the take or pay contracts entered into by the Japanese involved in the European and American businesses. It would never have happened. And now we’re seeing the flow of investment from China, from India, from other emerging and developing economies that’s the reality. We need foreign investment. We need foreign investment for that capital inflow to help cover our current account deficit and in the long term, we need that foreign investment to stimulate the exports to support living standards of Australians into the future. It’s said that we need this new tax to pay for company tax break … cuts and superannuation. Well yes, you can fund company tax cuts out of it, small as they might be. They won’t pay superannuation. I think everyone in this room knows, employers will pay superannuation as it goes from nine to 12 percent. Income from the mining industry will not be used to pay your superannuation bill, you’ll be paying that. It’s also been said that state royalties are based on the tons of iron, not the value of the product. Well I would have thought Federal Treasury could have done better research than that. The royalty is an ad valorem value royalty, it’s priced on its quantity; it’s value-based, not tonnage-based. And it’s said that the petroleum industry has a petroleum resource rent tax then it’s just fine. Yes, it was introduced in 1987, it was the only taxation measure in the Commonwealth offshore resources. At the time the North West Shelf Project was under construction and therefore was exempted, and it has only applied prospectively. What is proposed under this new tax is it … applies retrospectively across all existing projects, not just future projects. Then the argument goes on, well it won’t really have much impact. In fact it’s been argued that it will help the mining industry grow and prosper. Not a lot of evidence of that so far. We’ve seen a whole lot of companies just sort of basically say we’re not going to proceed. I had a meeting with about a dozen of the mid-level mining companies, not the [inaudible] ones, but nevertheless significant companies that are looking at spending hundreds of millions of dollars, in some cases billions. The general consensus was that the value, the net present value of those companies and of their resources have been discounted by about 15 to 20 per cent, some say more; so it’s just basically driven say 20 per cent of the value of that … those mining companies. And ironically they are the Australian companies. They are the new emerging companies. They’re the ones that have been hit. The very large internationally based companies if they want to go ahead with a project, well they can fund it out of their own cash flow, they have secure financing, but ones that are vulnerable are the mid-level Australian-based companies. It has a multiplier effect. It won’t just be the mining companies— it will be the— service, supply, transport, catering, fabricators—that’s where it’ll be hit. And while major mining companies might be able to say, well, we go and explore in central Asia or Africa or Southern America, the service and supply companies and West Australian businesses don’t have that option in reality. Balance of payments, I’ve mentioned that. But if you then look at the structure, as people are starting now to do, obviously it actually gets worse. A six per cent threshold, it’s assumed or declared that any return above six per cent is a super profit. I don’t know anyone who would go into a mining investment to make seven per cent. I mean you would stay home, put your feet up, open a tinny and watch television all day. You would not do it. You probably want at least 15 per cent, maybe more depending on the risk. It is a risk investment. The projects are difficult. Capital cost risk, construction risk, risk of commodity prices, all of those things demand a return way, way above six per cent. And even the resource rent tax has got a six per cent plus a five per cent buffer, so they basically cut in at about 11 per cent. So that just shows a complete naivety and lack of understanding of investment decisions in the mining industry. I’m astounded by that. I’m astounded that so much work could go into producing such a bad policy. It makes us far less competitive internationally. Major companies, and I think BHP has estimated that it brings the effective rate of taxation here from 43 to 57 per cent on a mining project. That compares with 23 per cent in Canada and about 35 per cent in Brazil. They are the countries we compete with. We’re not competing with the United States and the United Kingdom, we are competing with similar resource-based economies like Canada, and emergence economies like Brazil, African nations, Central Asian nations, many of which of course have far lower labour costs than we would have here. The tax rate: 40 per cent just way too high. I was stunned when that came out at 40 per cent, which is way, way over the top. No need to say more. Then there’s another argument, that don’t worry because when you pay this tax the Commonwealth will refund what you’ve paid in state royalties. Okay, I guess if you’re a mining company you’d think well that’s … one good positive part. But just think about where is the logic in that. It is the state that owns the minerals, constitutionally the iron ore, the alumina belongs to the people, therefore the Government of Western Australia. The state royalty is not a tax, it is a sale price, it is a price at which this state agrees to sell its minerals to private companies. That’s what it is, it’s a sale price. So if under this so-called Federal mining tax royalties are to be refunded, the great irony is we will be giving away our natural resources for nothing. We will be the only country in the world that actually gives … Three years on and not one of these promises has been kept. What a disappointment. Yet the numbers in this budget make this lack of delivery quite difficult to understand. By 2012-13 government debt will be a massive $94 billion, requiring $6.5 billion a year of debt interest payments. Mr Rudd will have to borrow over $700 million a week to fund his reckless and wasteful spending, putting upward pressure on interest rates and the cost of living for Australian families. Remember this number. All this after the Rudd government inherited a $20 billion surplus from the previous coalition government. How can the federal government have spent all this money, including plenty it does not have, yet not delivered on the comparatively modest spending commitments that it made before the last election? Perhaps the answer lies in the waste that is backed up on an almost daily basis by stories in the national newspapers. Today we have parents protesting outside federal parliament about the Julia Gillard school halls program that has blown out by unprecedented figures. The disastrous Home Insulation Program has seen an additional $1 billion blow-out in this budget, yet the government still will not undertake to provide a safety inspection to every single house as it should. On top of this is a $29.5 million advertising campaign to sell health changes, even though Western Australia has not signed on and new beds will not be delivered until 2013-14. Confronted with such a bad balance sheet and out of control spending, this government had a choice in this budget. They could have chosen, as most responsible governments would have done, to rein in their reckless spending and to start paying back the deficit in a responsible way. That is what the Howard government did in the 1990s, when confronted with the huge bill left by Paul Keating. However, this government chose the easy way out. They chose to tax more so they could continue to spend. They chose to make our mining industry the most heavily taxed in the world and, in doing so, they chose to put at risk the jobs, the superannuation and the standard of living of the people of my electorate of Swan. This resource rent tax, which appears to be holding together the Rudd government’s entire budget, is a $9 billion tax on mining that will put a handbrake on the resources industry in Western Australia. Up to 500,000 Australian families and individuals depend on mining for their jobs and these are at risk. The $6 billion plunge in Australia’s superannuation retirement savings on the announcement of the tax shows how important the strength of the resources sector is to all Australians, particularly to Western Australians. Make no mistake, local people are not happy about this tax. The sign outside the working-class Redcliffe tavern declaring, ‘Miners in, Rudd out,’ tells its own story. The fact that the government has made these tax changes without any community consultation is not surprising. The residents of my electorate of Swan have been living with the consequences of the federal government’s failure to consult on the flight path changes it introduced in November 2008. This is a government that does not listen but dictates. This is a Prime Minister that increasingly stands for nothing. Australians have a right to question whether the government believes in anything any more. A government that believes in nothing will deliver nothing. This budget does little to address the very real problems in my electorate of Swan, as I mentioned earlier in my speech. There is nothing to address the major environmental issues in my electorate—the withdrawal of the NRM and the lack of river wall infrastructure. There is nothing to address the aircraft noise issue in my electorate. I assure my constituents that I will continue to fight for an airport noise insulation scheme for Perth. Road infrastructure requirements have been sidelined and there was a shameless re-announcement of funding promised before the last election in the House on Monday. You may remember how in 2007, following a commitment from the Howard government, Kevin Rudd promised to fix the Great Eastern Highway. It was a ‘me too’. However, three years on the government has failed to deliver any improvement to this important arterial road in Perth and we have now been informed the work will not start until mid-2011. As a small businessman, I am disappointed that only old-news initiatives have been announced in this budget. The Australian Retailers Association were right to proclaim the federal budget had disregarded the engine room of this economy. (Time expired) 5136 19:09:00 Burke, Anna, MP 83S Chisholm ALP 1 0 Ms BURKE —I want to speak in support of the 2010-11 appropriation bills. This will be the 12th time I have spoken on appropriation bills in this place. One of the startling things is that, regardless of what is in the budget, the rhetoric from both sides very rarely changes. The member for Swan has probably trotted out lines that some of us in our opposition days trotted out as well. It does come as passing strange that the member for Swan has accused the Rudd Labor government of standing for nothing when he comes from an opposition that actually has no policy to speak of. The only policies they had they are no longer going to honour because they can no longer afford them, because they are not prepared to take the hard measures that are needed to ensure our ongoing financial success. I am proud to be part of a government that has successfully steered the Australian economy through the global financial crisis. It is fascinating to read the comments of various people in the press and academia. The one astounding fact that continues to come through is that it was the government’s decision to implement a stimulus package that has steered us through these rocky times and not the mining industry. While most advanced economies have entered into recession and record massive unemployment, Australia has maintained economic growth and kept unemployment at low levels. Last year I had the opportunity to attend a fascinating conference in London, which the Herald Sun reported as a junket—but never mind, I enjoyed it. The fascinating part of being in London and Ireland this time last year was seeing the depths of unemployment already impinging upon those economies and the stark difference to what we were experiencing back here. This budget builds on the success we have had during the global recession and consolidates our economic position. It is a responsible budget that will halve our peak debt and see the budget back into surplus in three years—three years earlier and ahead of every major advanced economy. Indeed, the world is not out of trouble and many of the economies around us are beginning to falter and fail now. Central to our future economic prosperity is the implementation of the resource super profits tax. This is a tax that will benefit Australia and restore the share of mining profits going to the Australian people to where it was in the early 2000s. It is a comprehensive reform that will encourage efficiency and see a 40 per cent tax on returns that are classified as superprofits. It will apply to our non-renewable resources and ensure that the proceeds of the mining boom flow to all Australians. It is unfortunate that some of the mining companies are pushing deceptive information on the Australian public through a multimillion dollar corporate advertising blitz. I daresay those who are downstairs this evening will be hearing a different account of the RSPT. The RSPT has been lauded by many commentators as the most sensible way of taxing a non-renewable resource that belongs to all Australians. The mining companies are fighting so hard against this tax because, if we introduce sensible tax reform here, many other countries will follow. It is the multinational mining giants that are worried that sensible tax reform in Australia will be replicated in many other countries. We have seen the same scare campaign run in the past, and it is disappointing to see the opposition act as a mouthpiece for the mining industry. We only have to reflect on the last election to see what ads the mining industry ran against the Labor opposition then and the fear and loathing. This is nothing new. Recently a group of 20 leading academics and economists came out in favour of the proposed tax, saying that the sector should hand over more of its profits. In their statement they made it quite clear that replacing a royalty regime with a profit based tax is squarely in the national interest. Indeed, the mining industry agrees. To quote from the statement: … the current public criticism of the proposed tax has been dominated by misinformation. Mining is different to other industries in that it uses and depletes natural resources. Some return on those resources should flow to the Australian public. There is no reason to expect a net contraction in mining over the longer term as a result of replacing royalties with the proposed resource rent tax. This is because a tax on economic rent of non-renewable resources is a more efficient way of raising revenue than taxing mining production (royalties). The revenue raised from the RSPT will be used to deliver long-term economic reform and will result in higher wages and more secure retirements for Australian workers. Gradually lifting the super guarantee from nine to 12 per cent is a vital reform that builds on Labor’s long history of leading the way in the provision of retirement incomes. It was the Labor government of Andrew Fisher that introduced the first Commonwealth age pension in 1908 for males at age 65, the Chifley Labor government that introduced the national compulsory contributory pension fund, the Whitlam Labor government that undertook to lift pensions to 25 per cent of male total average weekly earnings and the Hawke-Keating Labor government that introduced a compulsory superannuation system. The gradual increase of the superannuation guarantee to 12 per cent will benefit around 8.4 million Australians. That is 90 per cent of all full-time workers. For an 18-year-old entering the workforce on average earnings, this reform will add $200,000 to his or her retirement income. This will help to ease the burden of an ageing population by adding $85 million to Australia’s pool of superannuation over 10 years. Meanwhile, around 3.5 million low-paid Australians will receive a concession on their superannuation guarantee contributions for the first time. Additionally, people aged over 50 with low super balances will be given more generous contribution caps to allow them to make catch-up contributions. Older Australians will also be encouraged to stay in work if they choose to, with people aged between 70 and 75 now part of the compulsory superannuation guarantee. That is something many in my electorate have been looking for for a long time. These are important reforms for the Australian superannuation system that build on Labor’s past commitments to improving the retirement incomes of working Australians. Small business in my electorate of Chisholm will benefit from the budget announcement. A phased cut in the company tax rate to 28 per cent will assist the competitiveness of all Australian industries. We will also seek to cut the company tax rate further as revenue allows. Small business will get a head start on the company tax rate, with the 28 per cent rate applying from 2012-13 and a new instant write-off for assets worth up to $5,000. Depreciation of other assets will be simplified, reducing complexity, cutting red tape and providing upfront tax relief. My electorate is home to many fantastic small businesses. Small business always plays a prominent role in the suburbs, and Chisholm is the quintessential suburban electorate. Box Hill in the north of Chisholm has been identified by the Victorian government as a central activity district, where over 9,000 people work. Indeed, Box Hill has the second-most rental office space outside of the Melbourne CBD. It is a thriving suburb in which small businesses operate and add to its overall vitality. And, whilst we do not have a beach, we have many, many fantastic restaurants. Moving through the middle of my electorate to Mount Waverley and south to Oakleigh, small businesses are pivotal to Chisholm. I know the small business owners in my electorate will welcome these reforms, particularly the cut in the tax company rate and the cut to red tape. Small businesses have been crying out for the cut to red tape since the introduction of the GST and the dreaded BAS. Many imposts were placed on small business under the last government. People in my electorate are very passionate about climate change. Like the government, my constituents understand the issue is not going away and we must take action. I am continually reminded of the need for the government to act in the national interest on this issue. It is a topic guaranteed to be raised at my weekend mobile offices. I am sure when I am out in Mount Waverley this weekend it will be raised again. The government remains committed to the introduction of a CPRS and will implement an ETS as a matter of course. The opposition have made it quite clear that they are controlled by climate change sceptics. It is astonishing that they are prepared to go against the consensus of scientific opinion on this issue and assert that climate change is not happening. The government, on the other hand, acknowledges the threat climate change poses to our future. We are introducing policies to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and to make the transition to a green economy. The budget announces interim measures which will boost Australia’s renewable energy sector prior to the future commencement of the CPRS. The government will provide over $652 million to establish the Renewable Energy Future Fund to support Australia’s transition to a low-pollution economy. This fund forms part of the government’s expanded $5.1 billion Clean Energy Initiative. I certainly know that many people in my electorate have actually taken on the issue wholeheartedly themselves and have adopted many renewable energies within their home. I have had a huge take-up rate of solar panels, solar hot water, water tanks and the like. Many people within my electorate are now feeding back into the grid. The fund will provide additional support to develop and deploy large- and small-scale renewable energy projects like geothermal, solar and wave energy. It will also enhance the take-up of industrial, commercial and residential energy efficiency, helping Australian businesses and households to reduce their energy consumption. We all need to take responsibility for lowering our greenhouse gas emissions. Together, Australia and the world must transition our economies and environmental policies onto a more sustainable path to ensure future generations can continue to prosper. The Renewable Energy Future Fund is an important start, and I look forward to announcements of specific commitments under the fund. The work that is being done at the Sustainability Centre at Monash University will be a great feed into many of these projects. Labor are long-term champions of Australian health system reform. Through the national health and hospitals reforms we are introducing the biggest changes to our health system since the Whitlam Labor government brought in Medicare. While the Liberals ripped money out of the health system when Mr Abbott was health minister, the Rudd government are putting more into the system to ensure better outcomes for all Australians. We are investing $7.3 billion over five years to create the National Health and Hospitals Network. These health reforms will lead to genuine improvements and better prepare the system to cope with the increased demands of our ageing population.  The budget delivers a further $2.2 billion package of investments over four years. Improved after-hours access, new GP and primary healthcare clinics, training and support for Australian nurses and the introduction of electronic health records are important initiatives delivered in this budget. My electorate is already benefiting from the government’s increased focus on health care. My electorate is home to two very large public hospitals and one large private hospital. Indeed, it would be one of the largest employers within my seat, within the medical sector. Monash Medical Centre, one of the biggest hospitals in Victoria—I would probably say across Australia—is receiving over $3 million in support from the government for a 23-hour care unit as part of the Elective Surgery Waiting List Reduction Plan. This will help to reduce waiting lists at the centre and help deliver elective surgery on time for 95 per cent of Australians, a key objective of the national health and hospitals reforms. The government has also committed $71 million towards a $141 million project for the construction of the Monash Health Research Precinct transitional facility. This facility will accommodate laboratories and offices for staff engaged in transitional research covering vital themes which address major priority areas—chronic debilitating disease, bone and joint disease, asthma, diabetes, heart attack and stroke. Just as important as the increased funding to health and hospitals are the government’s reforms to the way the system is structured. We are developing a more accountable and efficient system that incorporates all aspects of our health system: hospitals, GP and primary health care, the workforce, aged care, mental health, e-health, research and prevention. The historic agreement reached between the Commonwealth and the states and territories amounts to serious foundation reforms and improvements to health care in the community. While my electorate is actually very well serviced by the health profession, it is an ageing profession and we need to look at ways of ensuring that we are attracting younger GPs into the area. I welcome the $154 million in funding for legal assistance services announced in the budget. This is a welcome addition for our terrific legal centres, who support some of the most vulnerable in our community. The Monash-Oakleigh Legal Service and the Eastern Community Legal Centre are two phenomenal community organisations within my electorate that will benefit from this announcement. I have had many constituents write to me outlining the pressures faced by legal centres to meet the increased demand for legal assistance. This funding recognises the valuable contribution these centres make to the community. Both Monash-Oakleigh Legal Service and the Eastern Community Legal Centre will receive considerable funding to continue their family relationship partnership programs. There has been a very successful pilot, and the continuation and support of these programs is a good thing. Providing additional support to these organisations will ensure they have greater resources to help families within Monash and Whitehorse achieve better outcomes. This is the largest and most significant injection of new funding into the sector for well over a decade and it will improve access to legal assistance within my electorate. Many of my constituents are extremely passionate about the Millennium Development Goals and the Make Poverty History initiative, which focuses on the fight against extreme poverty and global disease. I recently held a Make Poverty History forum in my electorate and I was delighted to host the Parliamentary Secretary for International Development Assistance. It was fantastic to have the parliamentary secretary directly engage with my constituents about these issues and answer their questions. Again, given the nature of my electorate, some of these questions were fairly tricky. Also, because office space is cheaper in Box Hill than it is in the city, it is home to some very interesting NGOs, one being the CBM, the Christian Blind Mission. Most people will not know that something called the Christian Blind Mission exists, but their fundamental goal is to ensure that sight is returned to people in developing countries. They do a phenomenal job and, over time, we have been able to increase our funding to this terrific organisation. Someone’s sight being returned actually gives them back their livelihood, their life and their existence. Many times it is a matter of fairly simple and non-costly and minor procedures—for example, cataract surgery—that are just beyond reach within the countries that CBM operates in. So it was delightful to have people from CBM, from World Vision, from the Oaktree Foundation, from Syndal Baptist Church and from many other great organisations come along to the forum and quiz the parliamentary secretary about where we are going with this initiative. The government is committed to increasing Australia’s official development assistance to 0.5 per cent of gross national income by 2015-16. This budget increases Australia’s overseas aid to $4.3 billion, all of which will go to poor and developing countries for education and health investment, humanitarian assistance, stabilisation and peace building. Through our foreign aid program, Australia has contributed to a 20 per cent increase in school enrolment rates in PNG, a 13 per cent fall in maternal mortality rates in Bangladesh and an 81 per cent decrease in the incidence of malaria in Vanuatu. All these things bring many great benefits to these communities. While the opposition is committed to cutting $300 million from the aid budget, I am proud to be part of a government that is acting in the global humanitarian interest and Australia’s national interest by increasing our foreign aid budget. During the last British election, I was fascinated to see both sides of parliament come out and say that, regardless of who won the election and regardless of the financial crisis the UK is in, neither party would reduce foreign aid. I thought that was a terrific statement and I am quite saddened that the opposition has seen fit to suggest that we should be cutting our foreign aid. The 2010-11 budget is economically responsible and will further strengthen the Australian economy. The budget will be returned to surplus in three years, ahead of every major advanced economy, and will keep our finances strong. Importantly, this budget delivers in key areas such as health, superannuation, climate change and small business and it puts in place long-term reforms that are squarely in Australia’s national interest. I commend the bill to the House. Debate (on motion by Mr Raguse) adjourned. 5141 19:26:00 Main Committee adjourned at 7.27 pm 5142 Questions in Writing 5142 5142 1300 5142 Marino, Nola, MP HWP Forrest LP 0 Ms Marino asked the Minister for Tourism, in writing, on 11 March 2010: What Government programs or initiatives exist to directly promote and support the tourism industry in the South West of WA. 5142 Ferguson, Martin, MP LS4 Batman ALP Minister for Resources and Energy and Minister for Tourism 1 Mr Martin Ferguson —The answer to the honourable member’s question is as follows: The Government has a range of initiatives to support the tourism industry covering marketing, policy, programs and industry development. The Tourism Australia’s “There’s Nothing Like Australia” global marketing campaign will promote and support the tourism industry in all regions in Australia. This campaign will supplement existing domestic tourism marketing such as the “No leave, No life” initiative. Australia’s South West featured in one of the seven episodes of the No Leave, No Life television series over summer 2009/10 on Channel 7. The production of this episode was in partnership between Tourism Australia, Tourism WA and Australia’s South West. The episode was watched by 1.1m Australians nationally and the region also received exposure online through the No Leave, No Life and Yahoo!7 websites. In addition to the television series, Australia’s South West sponsored the March/April 2010 issue of the No Leave, No Life tactical offers magazine which gave them logo placement on the front cover and premium advertising space. There is a range of Australian Government programs which stimulate key elements of the tourism industry– examples include the small business programs such as Business Enterprise Centres and Enterprise Connect; indigenous employment initiatives such as the Indigenous Employment Program; climate change, environment and heritage programs such as the Climate Change Action Plan, Caring for our Country. TQUAL grants program which provides specific funding to boost the quality and diversity of Australia’s tourism industry. In December 2009, 70 TQUAL grants were announced totalling almost $8.3 million. Of these grants eight were in Western Australia and these projects are receiving just under $690,000 in funding. This includes funding to contribute to the Fontys Pool 4 Star Tourist Accommodation Upgrade at Manjimup and funding for Augusta Margaret River Tourism Association Inc to assist with the holding of the CowParade Margaret River-developing inter-regional art/event program. 5142 5142 1315 5142 Morrison, Scott, MP E3L Cook LP 0 Mr Morrison asked the Minister representing the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, in writing, on 18 March 2010: As at 17 March 2010: Had the Minister or any of the Minister’s staff met with members of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Australia during 2009 and 2010; if so, what are the names of those who attended the meeting(s). Did the Minister refuse any requests to meet with members of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Australia during the same period; if so, why. 5142 McClelland, Robert, MP JK6 Barton ALP Attorney-General 1 Mr McClelland —The Minister for Immigration and Citizenship has provided the following answer to the honourable member’s question: I did not meet with any members of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Australia during 2009 or 2010. Members of my staff have not met with any members of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Australia during 2009 and 2010. I have not refused to meet with members of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Australia. I have received two representations from the Coptic Orthodox Church of Australia during 2010 which included meeting requests. I referred one meeting request to the Australian Embassy in Cairo who would have been able to provide a comprehensive response to the issues raised. I have sought further information from the Coptic Orthodox Church of Australia in relation to the second meeting request and referred the matter to the appropriate program area within my Department to facilitate detailed information dissemination on the issues they raise.