Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister Assisting the Leader for Science) Share this | Hansard source

You have—a $100 million cap instead of the $20 billion arrangement. It is a new measure of which no notice has been given, none whatsoever. Minister, is it not a fact that companies get prior approval before they lodge their claims and often before they actually undertake the investment? Is it not a fact, Minister, that the proposition you have just put to this chamber is completely erroneous because some companies such as CSL—an Australian manufacturer that makes vaccines and biopharmaceutical products—undertake strategic investment decisions on the basis of that advice, and that your proposal will in fact change the ground rules retrospectively on the basis of the investment they make? Whether or not they lodge their claim at any point in the future for activity undertaken in the period covered by this new amendment—this new proposition—the $100 million cap will, in fact, come into play irrespective of any other statements you have made. That is the nature of the retrospectivity. Is that the case?