House debates

Tuesday, 24 March 2026

Matters of Public Importance

Fuel

4:13 pm

Photo of Tim WilsonTim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I'll tell you who won, outside of the Albanese government and their behaviour. Coming in in third place was Russia with the troika laundromat, where a full-scale bank laundered money, to the tune of $26 billion. That's third place. This list hasn't been updated. That was once silver, but now it is bronze. Then of course you have the CFMEU-Labor cartel, where $15 billion to $30 billion of Australian taxpayers' money has been handed to organised crime.

Who is it that managed to beat the CFMEU-Labor cartel? It was the missing millions scandal of Ukraine—up to $40 billion. In this case, a Ukrainian court found a particular individual guilty of high treason and sentenced them to 13 years in prison. As they fled, they left behind documents that showed how they'd financed a life of luxury at the expense of citizens, using nominees as frontmen in a complex web of shell companies, from Vienna to London to Liechtenstein—I could almost add 'and potentially to some super funds', but we won't go there. Swedish broadcasters eventually reported that the shell company with a Swedish bank account received $3.7 million in one bribe alone.

What happens when you have this industrial-scale corruption? The family fled to Russia in February 2014, after civil unrest sparked deadly conflict that claimed over 100 lives, including by sniper bullets. What about a regime that is alleged to have laundered between $15 billion and $30 billion of public money to organised crime through the CFMEU-Labor cartel? Well, they sit in government, and this is the problem. In Victoria you've got the Allan government and in Canberra you've got the Albanese government.

There are consequences for that, because that is Australian taxpayers' money. When Australians are going to the petrol station to get the fuel they need, they're finding they're not getting it at a price they can afford—if there's even anything in the bowser. There's plenty of fuel for inflation, but there isn't for farmers and families. What are Australians experiencing when they go to the supermarket? Increasingly, they're having to put items back because they can't afford the cost of inflation that this Albanese government is imposing on them.

This government keeps borrowing from the future to pay for today, creating an intergenerational problem. The next generation of Australians aren't just going to live with the consequences of inflation; they're going to live with the consequences of the taxes to pay for it, because it's also fuelled by debt. At every point this Albanese government has no understanding of the consequences of what it's doing. But I can assure you of one thing: when they run out of money, they're coming after Australians.

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