Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I was going to leave the speech of the member for Brand alone but how could I not with that enticing invitation at its end, the idea that a Shorten Labor government would somehow be interested in the consumers of Australia? What a beautiful piece of sophistry, of eloquence, from the member for Brand, the wannabe minister who has created a falsehood right at the heart of everything that they stand for. Because there's one thing you know when you get a Labor government: it's that the consumer and the Australian taxpayer come not first, not second, not third, not fourth—in fact, I'm trying to think which is the pecking order of the many unions, the trade union interests, the various vested interests, where they like to bring together a corporatist, unionist, big government agenda—but the people of Australia fit somewhere down kind of the bottom of the pile. The bottom.

Just take the agenda of those opposite on energy, where they, frankly, couldn't give two hoots about the price of electricity bills that actually hit Australian households. In fact, they dismiss the idea that this is even an important part of the discussion and the agenda. The shadow consumer affairs minister not being worried about the prices of household bills is one of the most incredible statements you will ever hear in this place. But these are the difficult realities that we must confront, that the Australian people must confront in the coming months and weeks and, scarily, if they get their chance, years.

What we know always with Labor governments is their interest is to talk to the top end of town and sort out cushy deals and sign the deals away. The same is true with the trade union movement. We see this no clearer than in the great state of Victoria, where nothing is impossible, so long as you take the tax dollars of average Victorians and chuck them on the table to the benefit of unions and their members. You could achieve anything, just don't ask who's going to pay. And, of course, who's going to pay? It's going to be the Australian people. We know this from the NBN, where they're just going to build things without any costings whatsoever and lumber future generations. By the time the technology is completed under their plan, people will be paying thousands of dollars for their bill to get basic access to internet services—thousands for what will probably, by then, be outdated and redundant technology. It doesn't seem to matter what the Labor Party touches. They have an anti-Midas touch, which you've almost got to admire for its capacity to kill and destroy the aspirations and hopes of Australian consumers and households.

What we've got today, in front of this parliament, is a very simple bill, the Treasury Laws Amendment (Gift Cards) Bill 2018. It's a bill that understands the aspiration of many Australian consumers, which is that gift cards will be able to be redeemed when they seek to use them. I'm not going to try and pretend I don't have some philosophical conflicts about whether government should be involving itself in the gift card market. But the intention of this bill is that, when somebody goes off and buys their loved one a gift card as a Christmas present—as a reflection of sentiment without determination of the gift, because they don't know what their loved one wants—and the loved one goes, in 12 months time, to the Christmas sales, which might have just fallen past the 12 months, the gift card can still be redeemed.

We've all been there. We've all been given gift cards for Bunnings. We've all gone on to redeem them, and sometimes—

Ms Madeleine King interjecting—

You're mocking me, member for Brand! I go to Bunnings and I do gardening too. It's the satisfaction of watching plants grow and seeing the beauty of our natural organic environment. It's about going to Bunnings, putting the gift card on the table and having confidence that it's going to be redeemed when you seek to do so.

Many Australians have had the experience of going to JB Hi-Fi, having got their gift card and waited for the latest technology, only to realise that the gift card expired months ago. What this bill does is create a standardised system across the whole of the nation so that, if you buy a gift card, it will be honoured for a minimum of three years. Gift cards already stipulate the contract terms, but what we're doing is making sure that even those who have purchased them before will be able to go and have them redeemed in the future.

Yes, there's an issue around competitive federalism, which I have some issues with as well. I'm a great believer in federalism. I'm a great believer that the source of power of this country isn't in this room, or, as Menzies said, with the 'chattering classes', but around the kitchen tables of the nation—individuals who come together to form families as a foundation for community and statehood and country. That's how we should govern our nation. We need competition and different laws, because there is nothing more offensive in this country than the monopoly of big government centralised in Canberra. But all we are seeking to do is reflect the sentiment of what has already been enacted in state law so that consumers can have confidence that, in the future, they will be able to redeem the gift cards of so many national businesses today that cross state boundaries.

Having this consistency and time frame are two of the most important issues confronting the consumers of the nation. I hear this from people and consumers who are frustrated. I hear it from the opposition. That's why this government is making passing this legislation today a priority.

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