Andrew Southcott (Boothby, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

In the consideration in detail stage of this bill we are considering one of the worst examples of public policy we have seen in recent times. In the future, no-one will go back to the mining tax and its various iterations and hold it up as a proud example of a functional federal government. Let us just go back and remember. In its first iteration, with Kevin Rudd mark 1, this was a mining tax, the resource super profits tax—because profits are bad—and it was expected to raise $49.5 billion. Then it was revised to the MRRT, and it was forecast to raise $26½ billion over five years. And now we see that, since it began, the MRRT has raised only $400 million. The former government had all these compensation measures to compensate people for the impact of the mining tax, but the mining tax raised no money. They locked in more than $16.7 billion in spending over the forward estimates, or $18.4 billion of expenditure on a fiscal basis over the current forward estimates.

It is disingenuous of the opposition to come in here and talk about this measure or that measure which is going as a consequence of the abolition of the mining tax. This was one of the central policies in the federal election, and the Labor Party fought it out as well. They had their internet stuff about the schoolkids bonus. We all saw that. People were very aware. But the problem with Labor's approach to spending is that it was simply unsustainable.

We have heard the argument that, no, the schoolkids bonus was not part of the mining tax. The former government were very clear on this. Former Minister Penny Wong, Senator Wong, from South Australia, linked the payment of the schoolkids bonus to the proceeds of the MRRT. She said:

I think it's about making sure we use the benefits of the boom wisely. And I think the Government's approach with the mining tax and making sure the benefits of that flow through to families, particularly low and middle income families through the School Kids Bonus, where people get assistance for kids' education costs—

does that. That was Senator Wong on 891 ABC Adelaide Drive with Michael Smyth on 6 June 2012.

Now, there are arguments for a resource tax. This was done in Bass Strait, and the Hawke government was actually a very good example of how to achieve this. But the Rudd and Gillard governments just completely mismanaged this. They came up with a mining tax which raises no money and linked it to $12 billion to $15 billion of spending, of compensation for a tax which raises no money. It is simply unsustainable.

I want to say something about the impact of this in South Australia. Everyone in South Australia has been anticipating the benefits of the mining boom for a long time. The state government were always spruiking it: with Olympic Dam, we were going to see 20,000 jobs. But having a mining tax does not make investment in mining go ahead. Having a carbon tax does not lead to the conditions that are going to make someone invest and see it go ahead.

The Liberal Party have said that we need to do everything possible to see that Olympic Dam goes ahead. We cannot promise that it will go ahead, but I can tell you—as sure as this—that having a mining tax in place makes sure that it does not go ahead. The Prime Minister has said:

I want to do everything I humanly can to help this expansion to go ahead by not having a carbon tax, not having a mining tax, and trying to ensure that we don't have bloated construction costs because of union militancy through the restoration of the Australian Building and Construction Commission.

It is very simple. We need to remove the government of— (Time expired)

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