Well, we’re done. We’re out of an agenda, and we’re out of anything to do. It’s only been about 260 days since the election, and the government has got nothing left in the tank. They’re the ‘Jacinda Ardern government’ now—they’ve got nothing left in the tank.
I should explain to people listening, or in the gallery, that we’re now back to what’s called the Address-in-Reply. This is the debate about the address that was provided by the Governor-General back in July last year. So seven-odd months ago the Governor-General came here and outlined the government’s agenda, and there’s been a little bit of a debate afterwards from us about that speech that occurred. Normally we’ll do a little bit of that in the two or three weeks after the new parliament opens, as the government gets—especially a new government—it’s legislative agenda going. It’s pretty rare for us to come back to it seven months later. You’d think there’d be other things going on.
We can only hazard a guess here that the new Labor government doesn’t think there is anything that needs fixing in our country right now, because it has no legislation before us. It has nothing for us to debate or talk about. We’ve got to go back to this time filler. This is like being at school: when the teacher runs out of things to do, she’ll put on a documentary or something to bide time until the bell goes. That’s what’s happening here. We’re filling time.
We’re still getting paid by you guys up there; you’re still paying us, but the government has nothing for us to do. I’ve got more bills than the government seems to have. I’ve got bills I’ve put in this week. I’ve got bills to end vaccine mandates, to give people their jobs back, ridiculous unscientific mandates that still exist. I’ve got a bill to legalise nuclear energy. Let’s debate that. Let’s bring that bill on and debate actually about how we can lower energy prices for Australians and guarantee manufacturing jobs. But, no, the government has no agenda. It must think there’s nothing out there that needs to be fixed.
I don’t know what those in the government have been spending their summers doing. Over the summer I’ve been home. I’ve spent a lot of time in Central Queensland driving around the country to various things I needed to, and I’ve been speaking to people. There are a lot of people hurting right now. It’s very, very tough. With interest rates surging, people’s mortgage repayments have increased. For the average mortgage, we’re looking at $1,000 more a month. Petrol prices are high. Grocery prices are continuing to increase and not slowing down. Today we learnt that box prices are going up, as well as cement, concrete. That’s going to feed into construction costs for everything that’s built in this country.
It’s really tough for people, so why don’t we have some legislation here to debate to help people with the cost of living? Why don’t we have bills here right now on, as I said, nuclear energy, to help power prices come down? Do something! Let’s have a debate about that. Instead, we’re filling time. The government is spinning wheels. It doesn’t know what to do.
I think at the next sitting period this might be rectified. There are some bills before committees at the moment. The government has a bill to weaponise a thing called a safeguard mechanism. They’re going to create a big new tax on the Australian people. So, as I said, I think the biggest issue for people right now is living costs. We need to help people survive day to day, keep them in their home, keep the banks at bay and away from knocking on the door. That’s what we should be debating. Instead the government is going to bring forward, probably in the next sitting week, a bill to impose a huge new tax on Australians and the Australian economy. They want to make 215 businesses in Australia—some of the businesses that create the most jobs and wealth for our country. They want to create a tax, making these 215 businesses have to pay a multibillion-dollar bill to reduce their carbon emissions while the rest of the world builds coalmines, power stages and LNG terminals in Europe. We’re going to make our businesses pay. Jobs will be lost, and, ultimately, Australian consumers will pay for those higher costs.
Of those 215 businesses, two of them are our last two oil refineries. I think we should try to keep our oil refineries in this country. In fact, the former coalition government helped keep them alive in the COVID crisis, which was almost existential for those oil refineries, but we helped them; we provided them support to keep the capacity here in Australia so we could continue to provide an essential product to Australian business and families.
Instead the new government has come in, and it’s going to impose a tax on our last two oil refineries, the one in Lytton, east of Brisbane, and the other in Geelong. They’re going to put a tax on those two refineries. That’s going to flow through to your petrol prices. If you think they’re already high, if you think they’re high enough, the Labor government doesn’t think they’re high enough. The Labor government wants to put petrol prices higher through this big new tax.
This big new tax on the 215 businesses includes Qantas and Virgin. Qantas and Virgin are on the list of the 215 businesses. They’re going to have to pay tax. For anyone who’s had to fly recently, those prices are high. They certainly haven’t come back to their pre-COVID levels. Prices are very high to fly around the country or the world. That’s going to be higher because they’ll have to pay this tax. What are Qantas and Virgin going to do? Of course they’re going to pass that on to you—pass that on to consumers. That’s going to make it even tougher for Australian families in this country.
The public transit authorities in New South Wales and Victoria are also on the list of those 215 businesses. They’re on the list because the bus networks use diesel. There are some electric buses out there, but they still use a lot of diesel. And they’re now in the gun of Labor’s big new carbon tax. They’re going to have to pay the tax. That means higher fares, on public transport as well, for Australian families.
I read today in the paper that New South Wales Labor’s political director has had to give a speech to the Labor caucus this week. His name escapes me at the moment, but he has had to come in to the Labor caucus this week and remind Labor’s members of parliament that what they should be focusing on is the cost of living. Why did they need that reminder? Wouldn’t they be out there talking to people? Instead—
Senator Polley interjecting—
Senator CANAVAN: Well, he’s had to remind you, because all I’ve seen from this government over the last few months are things like the Voice and issues like climate change. They seem obsessed by absolute distractions that don’t go to the realities that Australian families are facing right now. That’s why you’ve had to have your director come in and remind you all: ‘Hey, hey—maybe we should talk a little bit less about the Voice. Most people don’t know what that is. Most people think it’s a reality TV show. Talk a little bit less about that. Maybe we should talk about Australian families. Maybe we should talk a little bit less about our naive ambitions to somehow change the temperature of the globe and focus on how we can make families’ budgets work.’
Obviously, the government is not focused on that right now, given that they have not any piece of legislation here for us to debate. Not a single piece of legislation is live and active right now for these Australian families. As I say, I and other senators on the coalition side have bills ready to go. Let’s bring those on so that we can do something for the Australian people and for our wages right now, rather than spin our wheels as the government is doing in the Senate at the moment.
