Angus Taylor (Hume, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

The dragon, exactly—they'd beaten the dragon! Well, what do you know? It didn't take long before inflation started to surge again. As they pour out money, with record levels of government spending from those opposite, we know that that has been quite literally pouring fuel on the fire.

Inflation continues to surge. It would be hard to find an economist right now that doesn't think that inflation will continue to surge in the coming months, not just because of what Labor was already doing but because now we have an additional disruption. Of course, many smart economists across the world were saying, 'The reason why you have to get inflation and interest rates sustainably under control without a resurgence is that a disruption might come along.' Many across the world were saying this. John Cochrane, one of the world's leading experts on inflation, has been saying this for years. You've got to beat it. It can't start to resurge. The moment it does, if a disruption arrives, then you're in trouble. That is exactly what's happened. They got the warnings.

The result of this is that we have the highest inflation of any developed country in the world. We have the highest inflation and rising interest rates. Australians are now paying $28,000 on a typical mortgage, after tax. With having to find $28,000 that they didn't have to find before, it is no wonder they are angry and frustrated. They are confused by this government. They've been told so many things by the gaslighting prime minister, the gaslighting Treasurer, the gaslighting energy minister—that's for sure. This has gone on and on from those opposite, yet what they're experiencing is entirely different.

The economy isn't working for them, and that extends beyond just inflation and interest rates. It's not growing in any meaningful way for households. There has been 7½ per cent aggregate growth in the economy since Labor came to power, but population—mostly immigration—has grown by exactly the same number, 7½ per cent. That means that, from a household perspective, there has been no growth for four years. I think this is how they were going to try to beat carbon emissions. The problem was that carbon emissions haven't come down. They have completely failed in their no-growth economy mission. Well, sorry, they've succeeded in achieving no growth for households; they just haven't seen out the green dream they were trying to achieve. This is the context in which we look at this fuel crisis right now.

With National Cabinet happening today, there are four imperatives for the government. I went out to petrol stations on Friday and on the weekend to make the point that Australians are suffering. We paid $3.16—$3.159 to be exact—for diesel, two days in a row. That was the leader of the National Party and me. He makes the point that the National Party paid for the fuel both times. For once, the National Party's paid for something! It's wonderful! We are a happy coalition though, aren't we!

Opposition members: Hear, hear!

We are a happy coalition. But, the truth is, to pay $3.16 a litre for diesel is absolutely extraordinary. That's why we said last Friday that it was time to slash the tax. I've just received a note to say that the Prime Minister has, under pressure from us, followed our lead.

Opposition members: Hear, hear!

He didn't want to go into question time and get asked questions about why he wasn't prepared to take 26c a litre off the price of fuel for Australians.

An opposition member: Who's running this agenda?

Who is driving the show here? The first objective—this is the right outcome for Australia. Let's be clear: this is the right outcome for Australians. We have led the way. We have set the agenda. We are showing leadership, and those opposite are following.

Look at $16 million a day—the delay. It's $16 million, every day that he's delayed, for Australians in the hip pocket. But we are pleased to see this outcome. We'll work in a bipartisan way to make sure this is put in place as quickly as possible. That's No. 1: slash the tax. No. 2: move the fuel. Now, it's pretty simple. The energy minister stood up in this place each day last week and told us that there are more stocks than there ever were—more stocks than before the crisis began. Well, if there are more stocks than there were before the crisis, and yet there are 600 or more service stations without fuel, it doesn't seem to me to be too complicated. The common sense of Australians would say: move the fuel to the service stations. It's there; move it. Move the fuel.

There's a second part of moving the fuel, which is to make sure fuel from offshore gets to our country. This bill is playing a role in supporting that. We do support that part of what this bill is doing. I think this is an important initiative, and we will absolutely support that, but it has taken too long. They were moving the fuel. They were moving all of the petrol, from one of our two remaining refineries, offshore. They were exporting it. They needed to move that fuel not off to Asia or wherever it was going but to regional communities and those 600 servos that didn't have fuel.

The third thing this government needs to do is make the situation transparent. Why is it that we have to walk into this place each day and ask the energy minister how many servos are without fuel before he actually answers the question? He should be putting this out every day. He should be telling us where the stocks are, where there are shortages and what he is doing to fill those shortages. That will give Australians the confidence they need to know that this situation is under control. This energy minister has spent most of this crisis telling Australians that it's their fault, that it's a jerry-can-driven demand surge. Frankly, this bloke will look for anyone he possibly can to blame. But, the truth is, it's been his fault for not moving the fuel to where it needed to go and not being transparent about what the situation is. We need real-time data coming in and him explaining to us where the gaps are and how he is moving with the oil companies, the energy companies and the fuel companies to get that fuel to where it needs to go.

The fourth thing this government needs to do is tell us where this is going to go from here. We've seen reports of all sorts of secret plans to ration—do we go back to the odds and evens? I'm old enough to remember that—Christmas 1973—and it was a pretty tough Christmas. Are we going back to that? Is there going to be a limit of $40 when you go to the bowser? What is this government planning to do? They keep telling us there's enough fuel, so I don't know why they would be going down that path, but what we need is an energy minister and a Prime Minister who are prepared to be upfront, and they need to do that straightaway.

We've got one out of four so far. They've slashed the tax. I'm delighted to get a note to say that they've come on board on that. They have three to go: move the fuel, make the situation transparent and explain to Australians—front up to Australians—where you're going from here. I should be clear about that final point. We do not support heavy handed mandates. We don't want a situation where Australians are feeling like they're back in a COVID-like situation and the government is telling them what to do. It's got to be supply driven. We want to see it supply driven. Labor loves demand management. They've been trying to push this through in the electricity sector, saying to people, 'Just use less.' Well, if that's what's necessary, explain it to us; be transparent. But, in the absence of that, they keep telling us that the fuel is there and is coming onshore, so we don't need those heavy handed mandates.

This is part of a longer term issue with this government: their complete and utter failure to get oil and gas and other resources, for that matter, out of the ground. We need a government that is absolutely focused on that, but in bill after bill that has come through this place—existing bills and past bills—we have seen, time and time again, exclusions for oil and gas and other sources of energy in this country. We've seen it with the EPBC, the environmental planning act. We have seen this government exclude oil and gas reserves from the accelerated process that applies to other parts of our economy.

An opposition member: The national interest test.

The national interest test—exactly right. The government has done it with EFIC as well. They've excluded oil and gas until now. This bill is actually going part of the way to addressing that, but it's only through the national account, not through the commercial account. The government will have to explain why it is they're not extending it to the commercial account. What that means is every single one of the transactions that EFIC engages in has to be approved by the minister. I guess this minister wants to do as little with fossil fuels as he can possibly do. That seems to me to be his sentiment, and it has been all the way along.

But it is also true that, across large swathes of programs that this government has in place, it has excluded oil and gas. We need our oil and gas in this country to be not sitting in the ground but coming out of the ground to serve Australians—to make sure we have the crude oil we need to keep the wheels of industry moving, to make sure that farmers can plant their crops and harvest their crops, to make sure that truckies in this country can keep moving food to our supermarkets and doing all the other things that they do and to make sure families across this great country are able to get to where they want to go on their Easter holidays and can take the kids to sport and to school.

We need we need a government that recognises that we're not all driving EVs. If people want to buy an EV, knock yourself out—great. But that is just not a feasible proposition for Australians in many cases, and so it is so important we continue to see oil and gas coming out from under the ground.

We need to dig and drill in this country. That's how we will make sure Australians are able to get what they need. It is also how we will make sure we have a strong economy. You dig, you drill and you can pay down the bills that way, and that is exactly what we need to see as soon as possible. We do commend the changes being made in this bill, but we do think they should go further. We do think the government should, having made progress on one of the four focuses that I've laid out, get on with the other three.

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