Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Our transport industry is a very, very important part of Australia’s internal trade and of what makes us such a great nation. The fact that we can have trucks and carrying vehicles moving freely throughout the country helps our economic position and helps many of the small business men who are involved in the trucking industry. These bills before the parliament today are of fairly great significance to Australia’s economy. The Interstate Road Transport Charge Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2008 and the associated bill, the Road Charges Legislation Repeal and Amendment Bill 2008, are the matters in discussion today.

The first bill, the Interstate Road Transport Charge Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2008, permits the making of regulations to apply new registration charges to the five per cent of heavy vehicles registered under the Australian government’s Federal Interstate Registration Scheme, which I will refer to hereafter as FIRS. These new charges were agreed by the Commonwealth, state and territory ministers at the Australian Transport Council in February this year. The states and territories have already implemented the charge schedule on heavy vehicles under their registration systems. That means that 95 per cent of Australia’s heavy-vehicle fleet is already operating under the revised registration schedule. The first bill, the Interstate Road Transport Charge Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2008, updates some of the definitions contained in the original act, establishes a disallowable charge-setting mechanism based on regulation and stipulates a table of charges or an annual adjustment process.

The FIRS provides an alternative to state based registration for heavy vehicles weighing more than 4.5 tonnes and is designed to provide uniform charges and operating conditions for heavy vehicles that carry interstate goods exclusively. Currently, slightly more than 21,000 heavy vehicles in Australia are registered under the FIRS. In the case of the ACT, locally registered trucks are subject to the Road Transport Charges (ACT) Act. That act applies charges that are calculated on the same basis as the trucks registered under the FIRS. In the ACT, there are some 2,550-odd trucks that are locally registered, of which 91 per cent are rigid. This means that the majority of the ACT-registered truck owners would see their registration fees go down if the ACT were able to apply the new charges agreed by the Transport Council. Moreover, in spite of limited application to the FIRS for Australia’s heavy-vehicle fleet, the coalition does recognise that the scheme not only promotes regulatory consistency solely involved in interstate operations but also provides some competition and discipline in the heavy-vehicle industry. In the other chamber, the shadow minister for trade, transport, regional development and local government, Mr Truss, spoke at some length about this bill and indicated as I now do that the coalition will not be opposing the first of these two bills.

The second bill, the Road Charges Legislation Repeal and Amendment Bill, does two things. It appeals the Road Transport Charges (ACT) Act so that the ACT may set its own heavy-vehicle charges. We believe that the ACT should be free to make such decisions, and we support that element of the legislation. The second part of the bill, though, relates to a different issue, and amends the Fuel Tax Act 2006 to implement a road user charge at the rate of 21c a litre from 1 January 2009. The road user charge is levied on the basis that the costs arising from the industry’s use of the road system should be recovered. Both the trucking industry and the coalition accept this in principle, but what is important is that the amount being levied is seen to be fair and that it is spent on roads.

Motorists and the trucking industry currently pay 38.14c in tax for every litre of fuel they purchase; however, the trucking industry may claim a partial rebate under the Fuel Tax Act. This act sets for the heavy vehicle sector a road user charge which is intended to cover the costs attributable to the industry’s use of the road system. Trucking operators receive through the tax system a rebate of the difference between the fuel tax they pay at the pump and the road user charge. The road user charge is currently 19.633c per litre; the rebate is, therefore, 18.510c per litre. Should the road user charge be set at 21c a litre, the rebate will only be 17.143c per litre. This increase is the result of a decision by the Australian transport ministers earlier this year to support the National Transport Commission’s fourth heavy vehicle charges determination, a set of charges levied upon the heavy vehicle industry based on the principle of cost recovery for the roads.

The government has also attempted to implement this tax increase before. Senators may recall that in March this year, when introducing the Interstate Road Transport Charge Amendment Bill 2008, the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government flagged the intention of the government to implement a new heavy vehicle determination and increase the road use charge from 1 January 2009. He also stated the road user charge was to be indexed annually to the same road construction formula that was to apply to registration charges. The coalition is concerned that this was an attempt by the Rudd government to reintroduce indexation of the fuel excise. You will recall that, after years of Labor government indexation of fuel prices—it was introduced by Mr Keating—the indexation was abolished by the coalition in 2001. Our opposition on this matter has not changed; we remain opposed to fuel excise indexation on fuel. That is why, with regard to that road user charge, the opposition here disallowed the regulation made under the Fuel Tax Act in May of this year.

In this bill, the government has removed the link to indexation. The Road Charges Legislation Repeal and Amendment Bill 2008 would repeal the relevant section of the Fuel Tax Act and add a new subsection which would set the road user charge at 21c per litre and enable the government to make regulations at other times that may be prescribed. This would be a disallowable instrument. We acknowledge that the government has made this change and we think it is quite a constructive improvement. Industry, however, remains concerned about the manner in which the National Transport Commission develops the road user charge. Its consultation process appears flawed and it refused to disclose to the trucking industry much of the data and the model it used to develop the charge. The coalition is concerned that the government has also linked these bills to the implementation of its announcement of a $70 million, four-year, heavy vehicle safety and productivity package.

We call upon the government to stop this tactic of blackmail, which seems to be much in vogue by the government these days. In the education bill we just dealt with, the government used what were effectively bully-boy blackmail tactics. It seems to be the case for this heavy vehicle safety and productivity package as well. To threaten to block the $70 million package, inadequate though we think that is, should these bills not be passed, is pretty grubby politics and harms the safety of those who work on our roads. It suggests that the government is more interested in collecting taxes than in industry productivity and safety. Governments collect huge revenues from taxes on motorists and the transport industry. More of that money should be allocated for roads. New tax increases are not in themselves required.

There are no performance benchmarks in the package. There is nothing, for example, that stipulates how many roadside facilities will be built. How can truck operators be sure that they will get the benefits being traded for these increases in the road user charges? Likewise, the government does not link the new charges to the obligations of the states to deliver their promises to harmonise transport regulation. It is unknown what the government is doing about the appalling failure of the states to implement cross-border changes to the rules which so impede the development of an efficient, cost-effective national road system. Labor said when it was elected to office that, because there would then be wall-to-wall Labor governments around Australia, they would fix these interstate inconsistencies and state differences. In transport reform, the Rudd government has failed dismally, and it is not allowing another opportunity to deliver these reforms at this time. These are key weaknesses of the bill before us in that they do not address the fundamental problems of regulation reform.

Because of that, the coalition will be moving a number of amendments relating to confirming that under no circumstances can the government consider an indexation element to the increases in the road charge in the future. We are agreeing with the increase from, effectively, 19-odd cents to 21-odd cents, because we believe that that additional money can be put to very good effect. Unfortunately, the bill does not carry through and say that, so we are going to be moving amendments to address those issues. At this stage I do not want to take too much time of the Senate in this debate on the second reading speech. Suffice it to say that, as I mentioned earlier, we want to ensure that indexation is never a possibility. We then want to ensure that the additional money recovered goes to at least an average of 50 additional heavy vehicle rest areas per year for the next four years. We want to make sure that the rest areas are appropriately constructed.

We want to link these increases as well to substantial harmonisation in state and territory transport regulations. I know some of my colleagues will be mentioning some of the huge inconsistencies there are between the different states at the present time which cause a lot of difficulty for the transport industry. We also want to ensure that, when the government does consider increasing the excise in the years ahead—and it will not be able to do that by indexation; we are determined to put a stop to that—there is proper and appropriate public consultation. Our amendments will deal with how that consultation should proceed, and we want to make sure that the transport minister has regard to those submissions when considering the issue. I will, of course, speak in more detail about that during the committee stage of the bill.

Before I conclude I want to mention briefly another issue which will play havoc with the Australian road transport industry, as well as with all of those ordinary Australians who travel interstate in the course of either their business or, perhaps more importantly, their holidays. That is the stupid proposal being put forward by the Bligh Labor government in Queensland to ensure that a new system is put in place so that New South Welshmen and other Australians cannot temporarily receive the benefit of Queensland’s lower fuel prices—because Queensland, you might recall, has never had a fuel tax. That is something for which we can give thanks to the Bjelke-Petersen and Chalk governments and other Liberal-National Party governments in past years in Queensland. It has been followed by the Labor government. There is no fuel tax in Queensland, so our fuel should be eight cents a litre cheaper than that of others. And that has been the case for some time.

As you can imagine, as you get closer to the border, New South Welshmen slip over the border to fill up in Queensland because they can get cheaper fuel there. To address that, the New South Wales government had sort of a series of incremental fuel taxes as you went to closer to the Queensland border, so that New South Welshmen and businesses up in the north of New South Wales would not be unfairly disadvantaged—so that they would not have a competitive disadvantage when competing with Queenslanders in that South-East Queensland, north-east New South Wales section of our country.

The current Labor government in New South Wales is just appalling. Everyone knows just how hopelessly incompetent that Labor government has been with its financial management—even more so than the Rudd Labor government is demonstrating that it is at the current time. That is accepted by all sides of this chamber at the present time. But without thinking of what it would do to businesses and people in the north of the state, they have just cut out all of those incremental increases. That means that businesses and people in northern New South Wales will be competitively disadvantaged compared to those of us who live in Queensland and have a cheaper rate of petrol. That clearly was not thought through by the New South Wales Labor government and is just another example of their complete mismanagement of their economy—typical of all Labor governments.

What is the Queensland government going to do to stop those horrible New South Welshmen slipping across the border and getting our cheaper petrol? We are all going to get a bar code on our licences so that, when we Queenslanders go in to fill up with fuel, we will swipe our cards and, if we have the right bar code—providing we have remembered to bring our licence with us, and a lot of us do not travel with our licences—we get our petrol at the cheaper price. But, if we are New South Welshmen, if we are truck drivers coming through delivering goods to Queensland, if we happen to have forgotten our licence or if we work for someone who has company vehicles and we do not leave our licence there, then we will have to pay the dearer price of petrol. And I understand, from the Queensland position, you will not be able to get a refund at all.

But the real problem is this new system being introduced by yet another Labor government—this time the Queensland Labor government—which will mean an enormous impost on independent fuel sellers. We have heard all the fine speeches during that debacle of a Fuelwatch program put up by the federal Labor government about how we want to promote competition. This proposal by the Queensland Labor government will stifle competition. Sure, the majors, the big fellows, the chains will be able to afford the $40,000 that I understand it is going to cost every service station to put in this card-swipe thing, but the independents, the little people, will simply not be able to afford the $40,000. They will therefore go out of business, and that will mean less competition in the fuel business in Queensland.

There is going to be more about that. There is an election coming up in Queensland. The Labor government cannot work out whether they want to bring it in before the budget—they have got to do something because their budget is also in diabolical trouble—or whether they will leave it until after the election and hope that they scrape back in. So there will be a lot more about that. But I warn the Senate now that this is going to have an enormous impact on interstate trade. There will be privacy conditions that will be of federal relevance. There will be many issues that will need to be addressed by parliament, and I just want to alert the Senate to that impending bungle and stupidity from the Queensland Labor government at this early stage.

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would just like to have a brief talk on this whole road user charge. To support what my friend Senator Macdonald has just said, New South Wales really is becoming a farce. We have seen the extra cost of fuel in New South Wales; that is just one of the reasons why up to 500 people a week move from New South Wales to Queensland. Yet what did we see at the last federal election? Where New South Wales used to have 50 federal seats, we got reduced to 49 seats. We had the seat of Gwydir, the seat of the former Deputy Prime Minister John Anderson, taken from us, and another seat formed in Queensland—the new seat of Flynn—so that Queensland went up from 27 federal seats to 28. This is typical of what is happening in New South Wales with the state Labor government, which, as Senator Macdonald said—and as everyone around here must agree—is in complete disarray, in complete meltdown mode and is driving people out of the state.

I take your attention back to Labor’s history on fuel excise. Back in 1983, when the Hawke-Keating government was elected, the federal excise was around 6.3c a litre. Of course, they were quick to introduce indexation on fuel. Putting fuel tax up is one of the Labor Party’s traditional policies and they are sticking with it. When they left in 1996, thanks be to that, it was 34c a litre. The Hawke-Keating government took fuel excise from 6.3c a litre to 34c a litre. Mr Keating would say there were no new taxes or increases in taxes but, after the election, he would say, ‘Throw another 5c on fuel while we are at it.’ Now we have Mr Rudd increasing the road user charge on our transport industry—from 19.5c to around 21c. I must say that I am a little disappointed in the representatives from the transport industry. Although I have not been in this chamber for long, the word I have had from my friends is that during the coalition’s era any suggestion of increasing the road user charge would have been a terrible idea and would face huge objection. The industry now seems to say, ‘All right, we are going to pay our way; we will accept the increase to 21c.’ I am disappointed in that.

I go back to the election promise of Mr Rudd: ‘We will put downward pressure on grocery prices.’ Where I live in country New South Wales, there are no rail lines, no rail network. Everything comes in by road. Increasing the tax on our transport industry to lead to lower grocery prices? I have yet to work that one out. It is another cost so that country communities will have to pay more for their freight. The businesses will pass the cost on to the consumer, and the ordinary Joe Blow on the street will pay for it. That is what we are facing here. Of course, indexation is the thing that the Labor Party are good at. They are trying to do it now with our transport industry—not with the CPI but some sort of cost increase each year that spits out of a computer according to how much it cost to maintain our road system. This is more cost on the very people, the truckies, who shift our exports, who keep our nation alive and who actually drive the nation.

That is what this is about today. I can assure you that the coalition will be flatly refusing any suggestion of any indexation. That is why our amendments will be there: to see that that will not be introduced. I sincerely hope that Senator Xenophon, Senator Fielding and the Greens have a good close look at this and see what we are doing to our nation, especially those who live outside the cities, those who do not have public transport and those who require fuel to transport their wheat, wool, cattle, sheep and exports. These are vital products and export dollars this nation needs. To tax them more is simply disgraceful.

We make no bones about it. Having spent a lot of time in trucks over the years myself, I know that more rest areas are required. We have these stringent regulations now where if a truckie goes past their allocated hours in their work diaries—as there are now, instead of logbooks—they face severe fines, but what a situation it is when the time is expiring in their work diary but they cannot find a rest stop or anywhere to park the truck. This is a problem especially if it is raining and you cannot just pull up on the side of the road for fear of bogging the truck and being stranded there. We will certainly be pushing for that in our amendments. We will also be pushing for some consistent driver rules throughout the states. We saw back on 29 September, from memory, new driver regulations brought in in several states around Australia. It was a crazy situation. In Queensland, if you were working within 200 kilometres of your home base, you did not have to fill in a work diary. But in Victoria if you were within 100 kilometres you did not have to fill in a work diary. If it was 101 kilometres you did, but in Queensland it was 201 kilometres. In New South Wales, the state of red tape—well known for it under the changing premiers of Carr, Iemma and now Rees—as soon as you left home, nought kilometres from home, you had to fill in a work diary. The little delivery trucks around Sydney, delivering the milk, had to spend half a day filling in paperwork. They have put it on ice for 12 months, but these are the crazy differential regulations that drivers have to face around the nation.

There are a lot of other laws. There is the 84-hour rule instead of the previous 144-hour rule. After driving for 84 hours in a week—and of course going by the logbook rules—the driver has to stop for 24 hours. I know of situations where friends of mine in the livestock-carrying industry might have to go off to Charters Towers or somewhere to cart cattle to the abattoirs, and they will get up there and then they have got to turn the truck off for 24 hours. The truck driver just sits around in the sleeper cab or wherever. Wouldn’t it be better if there were more consistency in relation to a little bit of flexibility? Perhaps they could stop for 12 hours, have a good night’s sleep in the truck, load up the next day and still get on with their work. Then after 144 hours they could take their 24 hours off. The situation is crazy. It is restricting our productivity and it is costing the nation a lot of money. We will be moving these amendments today so that the government cannot have this indexation be automatic.

As I said, I have been through the history of the Labor Party’s indexation on fuel and fuel costs. We know full well the National Party’s stand. I remember former Deputy Prime Minister John Anderson demanding the fuel rebate to the transport industry several years ago to relieve the cost to that industry and to help this nation be competitive against many of our overseas competitors, such as America, who have a lot less fuel tax. That is our history; we know it. We will be here to keep them honest today, and I urge the crossbenchers to have a good close look at this. This is vital legislation. As I said, the industry has conceded the 21c. So be it; they are prepared to pay their way. We will remember that later on when we are in government, and hopefully that will not be far away. That is where we stand and that is about all I have to say.

Julian McGauran (Victoria, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I join my colleagues Senator Macdonald and Senator Williams. I am inspired to jump up by Senator Williams. A former truck driver himself, he knows only too well the costs and the pressures upon truck drivers—made up not just of the big transport companies but of owner-drivers, median operators who own up to six trucks. This is an industry that really reflects some of the best entrepreneurial elements of the economy of Australia, of Australians. This is a fine industry. There are so many people who can make their way and build and feed their family unit via this industry, particularly the single owner-drivers. These single owner-drivers are also vulnerable to the brunt of the changes in the economy—more so now than ever—to interest rates and to costs and charges put onto them by the government. Senator Williams finely represents them in this chamber.

The Interstate Road Transport Charge Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2008 and the Road Charges Legislation Repeal and Amendment Bill 2008 are in fact, in short, an increase of the costs and charges of these drivers and the industry. It ought to be made clear from the start: this is not just legislation that increases costs and charges on big operators, the big end of town—and some of those do make up the industry; they always have—this is really legislation that increases costs and charges on the owner-operators, who make up, I dare say, the majority of the industry.

That is why I would like to reflect on the history of these bills. In another form, not much different, they came into the parliament in February. That date is very significant because the Rudd government was elected only some three months earlier, so you would assume the cabinet met in January to approve these bills. So, just two months into the Rudd government’s term, they make a decision to increase costs and charges—classic Labor. One of their first decisions is to increase the costs and charges upon the owner-operators, the truckies. What a classic Labor decision that is. What is more, they sought to bring back the old Hawke-Keating indexation of fuel. This is in January of the brand-new government’s term. They did not hesitate. They returned to their instinctive nature.

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Upped the taxes.

Julian McGauran (Victoria, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They upped the taxes, upped the charges and indexed it while they were at it. That is what they decided to do to those working families within months of coming into government, before they had even handed down their first budget.

We should have seen the signs, Senator Williams. When they handed down their first budget in May an array of new taxes were introduced: alcopop taxes, condensate taxes, luxury car taxes and passenger movement taxes—taxes that they certainly did not announce before the election. I did not hear them announce that they were going to introduce taxes to the tune of $19 billion before the election, Senator Conroy—I never heard that announced. But they all came gushing in from left field, literally—

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Disabilities, Carers and the Voluntary Sector) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Left wing.

Julian McGauran (Victoria, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

‘left wing’ says my colleague—in the first budget. It caught everyone by surprise, journalists and the parliament, let alone the people that would be paying those taxes. But we should have seen the signs very early on, because early on in the term of this government they sought to increase the costs and charges upon truck drivers of this country. It was one of the first decisions they made. That is the history of this legislation, and they have not let go.

It is now 12 months into the government’s term and they are still insistent on increasing those charges. What has changed from February to now? A lot has changed. We all know the economy has changed. The Reserve Bank rushing cannot reduce interest rates quickly enough, and there is good reason for it. Consumer confidence, business confidence and investment are at an all-time low and we are feeling the brunt of the international crisis. But the government still insists on increasing costs and charges upon owner-operators. They still insist that this is necessary—because the state governments have dictated it to them, hungry for the dollar to prop up their own budgets.

This is very much state-driven legislation, and the government, who promised to eliminate the blame game, have decided to acquiesce to the states. We misunderstood the meaning of ‘eliminating the blame game between the states and the federal government’. What they meant was, ‘We won’t blame each other for increasing taxes.’ That is what they meant, and this is the perfect example, because this is state and federal cooperation in increasing costs and charges. Let that be known. This is a COAG decision, a state and federal decision by the transport ministers to increase costs and charges, and they are not letting go. It first came in February and now we are in December, in the last few days of the session, and they are still insistent upon it, even though so much has changed.

When we were in government we had similar recommendations come before us to increase the costs and charges upon the transport industry. We never even contemplated indexation of fuel, I should add.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We got rid of it.

Julian McGauran (Victoria, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We abolished it. And Labor could not introduce it quickly enough in the first months of their government, Senator Macdonald. The last time that the recommendation came before the government was in 2006. And that is all it was, just a recommendation from the Transport Commission. They are just doing their job. They work off their formula to determine what ought to be the links between registrations, the road user charge and what the heavy transport vehicles are affecting. The point is: it is just a recommendation. In 2006 that recommendation came to the coalition government and we rejected it. The industry made pleas to the government not to introduce it at that time, and we did not.

So governments have to take responsibility. I can imagine the minister standing up defending this and saying it is not a tax, it is not an increase and it is directly linked to the effect that the vehicles will have on the roads. But the point is if you are in government, you have a responsibility. You have seen the economic circumstances change dramatically since the first time you introduced this and you ought to make the decision that you are assigned to do—one that arises in so many other portfolios: if it does not fit you do not accept it. You do not accept every recommendation that comes up to you from the Public Service. Senator Conroy, you know that! Every minister knows that, but they seem captive to recommendations. That is certainly so in this particular case. So I think it is interesting to note that particular point.

This is a government that came in with huge expectations in regard to fixing fuel costs. What did we get? The now abandoned Fuelwatch scheme, which was defeated, mercifully, in the Senate. But we are still getting an increase in fuel, through this legislation, for owner-drivers. What did we get before? The grocery watch scheme. They promised so much that they would fix grocery prices. What are we getting here? With the increases in costs and charges, there will be—and there is no way around it—a cascading effect right up to grocery store shelves. That always happens; costs are passed on. It all has to be passed on. A lot of these drivers cannot absorb the costs. They will pass them on. So there is an inflationary effect; it may be small or it may be large, but there is an effect. As far as truck drivers are concerned, those two commitments, those two promises, before the election have not been met, and the blame game commitment has not been met as to this particular industry.

This is a disgraceful piece of legislation when one considers one particular aspect. One aspect of this legislation has the worst effect. It is to do with indexation. As my colleague said before, the former coalition government abolished indexation. The government are going to be dragged kicking and screaming to the table, to abolish the indexation that they embedded in this legislation, because they have not got the numbers in the chamber—and that is a good thing. I believe they may even move their own amendment to abolish it. The point is they would not do it before. They have put it in there and they have stuck by it, even after the Senate committee inquiry found out the effect that it would have. The effect is that effectively every year the rate would be around seven per cent. They were attempting to index fuel costs on owner-drivers by seven per cent. That is an enormous amount. That is the formula they were working off. But I believe, in the face of support by the Independents for our amendment, the government have—and I will not say they ‘have seen reason’—been bludgeoned into taking the indexation factor out of this legislation.

But the problems with and flaws in the bill do not stop there, and we will be moving amendments to fix them. Hopefully, they will be accepted. Take for example the rest stop situation that Senator Macdonald, who has carriage of this bill for the opposition, mentioned. Back in February 2006, the states and the territories agreed that they would build rest areas across Australia to a national standard by the end of 2008. That was a very ambitious commitment by them, ambitious in that it was calculated that some 900 rest stops would have to be built to that national standard in that time. The fact is they have not even made a healthy start on them. It is a commitment that they have abandoned. What’s more, this government is not holding them to that commitment. That is the problem and that is the gripe of the industry and of, in particular, the Australian Trucking Association. It was concerned about the lack of progress by the state and federal governments in meeting the heavy-vehicle rest areas commitment. According to the Senate committee report, its officer, Mr Bill McKinley, the National Manager, Government Relations and Communications, for the Australian Trucking Association, said this:

… there are only a few weeks left—

I dare say that was said tongue in cheek—

… and unless there is an enormous flurry of rest area construction in the next six weeks, we estimate they will be 900 rest areas short. … This is a critical issue for the trucking industry. When we held our safety summit earlier this year it was the principal issue raised by ordinary trucking operators at the summit.

The federal government ought to go back to the states and territories and hold them to some degree—in fact, to any degree—to that commitment. To that end we will be moving an amendment, and we will be sticking by this amendment, as to any future increases in the road user charges. The net figure must be linked to the building of rest stops. The amendment says ‘an average of at least 50 additional heavy-vehicle rest areas’ must ‘have been constructed each year on the National Land Transport Network, as defined by’ AusLink legislation. It says ‘the type of rest areas constructed, their spacing and amenities’ must be ‘consistent with the goal that rest areas in the National Land Transport Network will comply by 2019’. The point is we are linking any future increases in the road user charges to the establishment of a base number of rest stops. This is critical for the safety of the owner-drivers and for the safety of the public generally.

The other issue of concern to the opposition is the harmonisation of state and territory transport regulations. Again commitments made by the state governments have never been met, nor are the state governments being held to account by the new federal government. These are serious issues that go to the heart of safety on our roads for the drivers and for the public. But there seems to be no interest, no care, no commitment by the federal government to enforce a national regulation scheme. The state governments have committed to this but, as usual for the state governments, there is no progress at all. So the opposition will be making amendments to the legislation to enforce these commitments.

This bill—probably as much as any, if not exclusively—really highlights the Australian public’s disappointment in the Rudd government. They trusted them on the commitments that they made prior to the election. But the high expectations the Australian public had of the Rudd government were pretty much dashed in the first month, when the government rushed into a decision to increase the cost of charges on owner-drivers. These are family people who would be severely affected by the increase and, now that the economy has changed for the worse, it will probably be worse for them than it was back in February. With inflation, they will be affected more by the increases in these costs and charges.

The federal government has failed to enforce the commitments of the states with regard to rest stops and the harmonisation of regulations. Of course, the telling part of this legislation is the federal government’s attempt to reintroduce indexation on fuel. That has become a sacred cow for them. The Hawke-Keating government introduced indexation. The Liberal Party, in government, abolished it. The Rudd Labor government, in its first months, reintroduced it. If they can get away with it here, where else will they want to reintroduce it? I would say that they would not mind reintroducing it on the current fuel excise tax. If they could get away with it, they would. It is obvious. They believe they can get away with it here. They have stuck to their guns for close on 12 months with this indexation clause. They will lose it on the floor of the Senate, but the point is that this has become an icon for the Labor Party. This has probably become an icon within Treasury, for all we know. The indexation of fuel, whether it is wrapped up in road user charges, fuel excise or any other form, will be objected to vigorously and voted against by this side of the chamber—as we will do on this doomed attempt. The amendments are very critical for the opposition and we will be sticking by them and holding the government to account on them.

Steve Fielding (Victoria, Family First Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The debate on the Interstate Road Transport Charge Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2008 and the Road Charges Legislation Repeal and Amendment Bill 2008 centres around road charges for trucks and how the cost of trucks using the road system can be recovered in the future. The Interstate Road Transport Charge Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2008 is now relatively uncontroversial. It is intended to establish a more uniform system of truck registration charges across Australia. But the road charges bill is more contentious. It sets a charge that is collected from truck drivers through the cost of every litre of petrol. Family First approaches the road charges bill with a number of concerns. Firstly, as a general principle trucks should pay their own way and the charges imposed on them should be fair in relation to the costs of the road network. Secondly, we need a fair and transparent system for truckies so that they can pay their own way. But the way the charges are determined should be clear and truckies should have a chance to provide feedback to the government. Thirdly, there is a need for money for truck rest stops to improve the safety of trucks on the road. That should include a review of the government’s heavy-vehicle safety productivity package.

Family First has been in negotiations with the government over the last couple of weeks to find a way to achieve these aims. Most would agree it is fair that truckies should pay a road user charge that covers the general cost of the use of the roads. But the government tells me that the road user charge for trucks has fallen behind and trucks have not been covering that cost for a number of years. The bill is important because it increases the road user charge for trucks from 19.6c per litre of fuel to 21c a litre, moving the road user charge back towards full cost recovery.

The next question is: how best do we make sure that the road user charge continues to keep pace with the cost of trucks using the roads? The government proposed a system of automatic indexation, by regulation, which would see the charge being automatically increased each year according to a formula and a system of consultation. Family First was concerned that a system set up through regulation takes the annual decision away from parliament and that parliament would not have an opportunity to stop increases in the charge if they were unreasonable. Family First has argued with the government for a system whereby parliament has the chance to prevent a change in the road user charge if it is an unreasonable change. The road user charge is, in effect, a charge on trucks for using the roads. It is a ‘rear-mirror tax’, with trucks now paying a charge for the previous year’s use of the roads. Changes in taxes generally come before parliament for consideration, so it is reasonable for changes to the road user charge to come before parliament as a determination which can be considered and disallowed if deemed to be unfair.

Family First has also been in negotiation with the government to improve the transparency and fairness of road user charges. Family First wants a 60-day consultation period so that truckies and other members of the public can make their views known on any proposed increase in the road user charge before the minister makes a final decision. Family First has also urged the government to spend more money on truck rest stops to improve the safety of our roads. The National Transport Commission estimated that, in one year alone, truck driver fatigue was a possible cause of 33 fatal accidents and more than 3,000 other crashes.

The National Transport Commission has issued a set of national guidelines for the provision of rest areas stating that there should be six to 12 rest areas for every 100 kilometres of road, depending upon whether the road is a single or dual carriageway. An audit of major highways found that none of the highways met the guidelines and the majority had major deficiencies. In Victoria, for example, the Sturt Highway, which runs through north-west Victoria and is a major connection between Sydney and Adelaide, has a lack of major and minor rest areas. There is also a need for a number of projects, including construction of rest areas on the Western Highway between Nhill and the South Australian border, and upgrades to existing rest stops on the Hume Highway between Wodonga and Melbourne. Additional rest stops on the Princess Highway/Freeway and the Calder Highway/Freeway are also necessary. All this of course costs money. The government’s heavy vehicle safety productivity package has allocated $70 million for additional truck stops. Family First has urged the government to increase that funding to improve the safety of all drivers on our roads.

The Australian Trucking Association estimates that 900 more rest areas are needed across the Auslink national highway network to meet the National Transport Commission’s minimum guidelines. Truck drivers have a hard slog working long hours and driving long distances. They need adequate rest stops to ensure they get the breaks they need and to ensure improved safety for all road users. This is about keeping families safe on the road. We have all had trucks thunder along near us on the roads and we have all been concerned about our safety in case of an accident.

Extra truck stops give drivers an opportunity to stop and rest and make our roads safer for everyone. Family First believes in the general principle that trucks should pay their fair share generally and that trucks should generally pay for the wear and tear they cause on the roads, but this should not be a blank cheque for the government. There needs to be a transparent and fair process for determining the road user charge. Family First believes that this bill needs to be amended to achieve the right balance between allowing the government to increase road charges and allowing truck users to comment on and test the fairness of those charges.

Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank members for participating in the debate on the Interstate Road Transport Charge Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2008 and the Road Charges Legislation Repeal and Amendment Bill 2008. The purpose of the Interstate Road Transport Charge Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2008 is to amend the Interstate Road Transport Charge Act 1985, which imposes registration charges for heavy vehicles registered under the Australian government’s voluntary Federal Interstate Registration Scheme, FIRS. The bill also allows regulations to be made to specify heavy vehicle charges for application to FIRS vehicles.

FIRS is a registration scheme that covers only about three per cent of Australia’s trucks. The rest are covered by state and territory schemes. All of the states have imposed the new charges since 1 July this year. It will enable the implementation of the registration charge elements of the 2007 Heavy Vehicles Charges Determination, which revises national charges for heavy vehicles and trailers for application to heavy vehicles registered under FIRS. The determination was agreed by the Australian Transport Council in February 2008 and was implemented by the states on 1 July 2008. It is self-evident that it is in Australia’s economic interest that registration charges for heavy vehicles, which regularly trade across state borders, be consistent. I commend the bill to the chamber.

The other bill we are dealing with cognately is the Road Charges Legislation Repeal and Amendment Bill 2008. I thank senators for participating in the debate. The bill repeals the Road Transport Charges (Australian Capital Territory) Act 1993 as well as making consequential amendments to the Road Transport Reform (Heavy Vehicles Registration) Act 1997 to allow the ACT government to set its own registration charges consistent with the registration charges adopted in the other jurisdictions.

The main impact of the bill is to amend the Fuel Tax Act 2006 to set the road user charge rate at 21c per litre in line with the 2007 Heavy Vehicles Charges Determination. Like all motorists, truck operators pay 38.14c per litre at the bowser for fuel; however, unlike the rest of us they receive a fuel tax rebate of 18.51c per litre. The balance, 19.66c per litre, is known as the road user charge. That rate was specifically set by the previous government in 2000 to recover the trucking industry’s share of road infrastructure costs incurred by governments. It was proposed by the National Transport Commission after an extensive consultation process undertaken during 2007. This is an issue that was inherited from the previous government—

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Williams interjecting—

Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will not hold you responsible for it, Senator Williams; you were not part of it. In April 2007 COAG asked the Australian Transport Commission to devise a new charges determination for implementation in 2008 that fully recovers infrastructure costs from the heavy vehicle industry, ends cross-subsidisation between heavy vehicle classes and indexes charges to ensure costs continue to be recovered. Cost recovery of infrastructure costs from trucking is only fair. The rail industry has to pay for its infrastructure, safety and regulation costs, as does shipping. No-one, not even the trucking industry, is arguing that 21c per litre is unfair.

The bill allows for the minister to issue regulations to index the charges. That regulation would be subject to review by this parliament in the normal manner. The government was always committed to ensuring a fair and transparent process for that regulation so that industry had sufficient confidence in the process. However, I note the concerns from some senators about the indexation provisions. I foreshadow government amendments to remove the capacity of the government to pass regulations that may index the charge beyond 21c per litre. The amendments will ensure that the government can only adjust the charges by disallowable instrument and cannot establish any mechanism that indexes. In short, every adjustment will be disallowable. The amendment will also propose that, prior to its making, the government must ensure that the proposed adjustment undergoes a 60-day consultation process and that the minister considers the comments received in that process.

This is a bill we inherited from the previous government. In a speech given in June 2007 entitled ‘The coalition government’s transport reform agenda’, the then federal Minister for Transport and Regional Services and Leader of the Nationals said:

The National Transport Commission will develop a new heavy vehicle charges determination to be implemented from 1 July 2008. The new determination will aim to recover the heavy vehicles’ allocated infrastructure costs in total and will also aim to remove cross-subsidisation across heavy vehicle classes.

The new charges will be fairer to both those in the industry and to the wider community. Importantly, the new charges deliver the requirements of the Council of Australian Governments for full and ongoing cost recovery. This in turn will make better use of the nation’s infrastructure—a key element of the Rudd Labor government’s plan to raise productivity, fight inflation and maintain economic growth. I note a couple of comments from I think Senator Williams and Senator McGauran. This is not a bill about the indexation of fuel excise.

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was originally.

Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is not. Fuel excise will stay at 38.14c per litre. Truckies only pay 19.7c per litre—their charge for the use of roads. As roads funding increases, so too does the charge. I commend the bills to the chamber.

Question agreed to.

Bills read a second time.