Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

Don’t claim the credit for it, because you must share the credit for it with Costello. You must share the blame. From 72 per cent, we dropped down to 14 per cent. Hardly any motor cars are produced in Australia now—no stoves, no fridges, no anything. And you are telling us it is a good thing. You say it is good for the consumers. Do you know what the price of a car was in 1984? Do you know what it is today? I will tell you. It is nearly 70 per cent higher in real terms. There is the outcome for your consumers.

I am very interested in the outcome for the consumers and for small businesses—because that is what our farmers are—after the deregulatory policies that came in. For a litre of milk, the farmer and the factory get 65c and the retailer gets $2. That is a Coles docket. This is after deregulation. Was it good in the field of sugar, something we use every day, or every second day, of our lives? The farmer and the miller get 39c and the retailer gets $1.35. Is this a good outcome for the consumers? With potatoes, the farmer gets 62c and the retailer gets $2.46. Is that a good outcome? These are all small business men, these farmers. With eggs, the farmer gets $1.40 and the retailer gets $4.85. That is a 230 per cent mark-up. The last speaker said this was wonderful for us.

Pre deregulation, three of those were on a fairness tribunal, the same as the arbitration commission. When we had our own arbitration commission, there was only an 80 per cent mark-up. The farmers benefited and the consumers benefited. Under this disastrous free market regime, the big sharks eat the little fishes. That is the outcome. That is the outcome for Holden motor cars and that is the outcome for food in Australia.

I very strongly back the member for Lyne in saying that the small business tax breaks and the investment allowance should stay. They are absolutely, dramatically important for people. In Queensland, Woolworths and Coles have run amok. Two publicans in my hometown of Cloncurry said to me, ‘If you want to close down a town, bring Woolworths and Coles to it.’ What is the state government doing about this? The federal government has done nothing to restrain Woolworths and Coles. The last federal government was in power for 13 years, and its members get up in this place and have the hypocrisy to talk about being for small business. You smashed small business in your 13 years of government. In 1991 Coles and Woolworths had 50.5 per cent of the marketplace—that is all they had. After you had completed your work, Woolworths and Coles had 76.7 per cent in 2002. According to their own figures, they now have 85 per cent of the market—and you congratulate yourselves on that.

I will tell you what happened on the ground in my hometown of Cloncurry. We owned a row of shops in the town. There were four businesses, with our business making that five businesses located in these shops. Where those five businesses used to stand, only one business stands now. That is all that is left. The two publicans said, ‘If you want to close down a town, bring Woolworths and Coles to it.’ We brought in Woolworths and they closed everything in the town. There is not a single business left in the town. I like to walk in the streets of small country towns when I am campaigning, and in Cloncurry there are no doors to businesses for me to knock on. They have all gone—service stations, butchers shops. Everything has gone. That is what happens to a town.

Woolworths and Coles are now applying for 24-hour trading at Mission Beach and Mount Isa and half the other towns in Queensland. It is not enough for them to have 85 per cent of the marketplace. They want everything. There is no limit to their greed. Is there any limitation placed on them by this House? It is a disgrace. In a so-called inquiry by this place, the nearest country in the world had 22 per cent share of the marketplace. In Australia, Woolworths and Coles hold 85 per cent, and they are about to be given 24-hour trading in places like Mount Isa and Mission Beach. My son is on the council in Mount Isa. When he was rung up about this situation, he said, ‘If you want two doors left to walk through in Mount Isa then agree to 24-hour trading because that will be all that is left in a town of 26,000 people. The only businesses that will be left there will be Woolworths and Coles.’ (Time expired)

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