Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer and Revenue) Share this | Hansard source

I thought the minister might take the opportunity to respond, but it is apparent that he is not going to. So I think it is incumbent upon me to do so. The opposition facilitated the opportunity for the member for Kennedy to move his amendments notwithstanding the fact that we will not be supporting them in this place.

The member for Kennedy has raised some legitimate concerns. It was the same concern—or one of the concerns—on the part of the opposition that caused us to send this piece of legislation to a Senate committee. He is entirely right to raise those concerns in this place. Indeed, the opposition maintains its right to further pursue these same concerns in the Senate when this bill reaches that place. Why have we chosen to defer any further consideration to the other place? It is simply because we have only very recently been given some of the information we sought throughout the process of the Senate committee.

I think you could say that the Minister for Revenue and Assistant Treasurer in his summary tried to embarrass me by suggesting that all of the questions which were raised at the Senate committee hearings were answered. Indeed, he indicated that the Senate committee gave additional time to the department to provide those answers. But here is the point: why are we bringing legislation into this place upon which the department cannot provide answers weeks after its introduction? Why haven’t we got a situation where, when tax amendments come into this place, the questions can already be answered?

I would have thought that the Australian people would be somewhat concerned that a government is introducing amendments to tax law without knowing the answers to the questions that are likely to be asked in this place, in the other place and, indeed, during the Senate estimates process. The government and the framers of its legislation should know the answers to these questions in advance. They should not require additional time to answer those questions when they are asked in this place, in the Senate or, indeed, in the process of Senate committees.

The minister said that the government are now much better at consulting industry, so that is an acknowledgement that the government have not been particularly good in the past at consulting industry or other stakeholders, including consumers or the poor old taxpaying Aussie battler. But we want them to consult industry and other stakeholders before they introduce amendments to tax laws in this country. The current modus operandi is this: they throw the legislation at us on a Thursday; they typically have the second reading debate on the next Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday; and by Thursday of the next week they are moving their own government amendments because they have not consulted industry properly, they have made an error in law or they have miscalculated the financial impact of the bill on the budget bottom line.

So why are we in this situation? There is only one reason: we are in this situation because of the incompetence of the government—not the incompetence of the opposition. We only respond to what they put forward. When they put a tax amendment forward, we expect that they will know all the answers to the questions and they can disaggregate the costings and not lump them together. There are a number of measures contained within this tax bill which have the costings aggregated. We want them disaggregated, but of course they cannot provide the answers.

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