Elizabeth Watson-Brown (Ryan, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Mackellar for raising this very important matter of public importance. An overwhelming number of Australians support a gas export tax to fund essential services in Australia. In a national poll conducted by YouGov, 61 per cent of voters agreed that gas export companies should pay a 25 per cent gas export tax. Only five per cent disagreed. It's not a secret anymore; Australians have cottoned on to the fact that we're being taken for a ride by massive gas corporations, and they're demanding that the government do something about it. They're demanding a 25 per cent tax on gas exports. Not only would this raise much-needed revenue for essential services; it would also incentivise gas companies to divert gas to Australians. One of the easiest ways to avoid an export tax would be to sell it domestically, increasing supply and lowering the price for everyday Australians.

Your cheeky Friday beer generates more tax than Australia's gas industry, and that's a credit to how good we are at enjoying a few cold ones! Despite Australia being one of the largest exporters of gas in the world, we make more from taxing beer than taxing gas. Why? Because the government represents the interests of massive gas companies over those of everyday Australians. Did you know that, despite producing absolutely zero gas themselves, Japan has become one of the largest traders in the global gas industry, entirely off the back of Australian gas exports? When overseas buyers can onsell Australian gas for a massive profit—and they're paying almost no tax—something is fundamentally and seriously wrong. We extract the gas and we export the vast majority of it overseas without any guarantee of domestic supply, and gas companies make record profits while paying almost nothing in tax. Since gas exports began in 2015, they've led to the tripling of wholesale gas prices on the east coast and a doubling of electricity prices. We are paying to ship our gas overseas. Who benefits from Australian gas? Certainly not everyday Australians. It's the massive gas companies who pay no tax, the politicians who receive huge donations from the gas industry and the ultra-wealthy shareholders.

Did you pay more tax last year than a massive gas corporation? Let's find out. Are you a nurse or a teacher? If yes, then you paid more in income tax than Santos, Chevron, Australia Pacific LNG, PETRONAS, TotalEnergies and Shell combined. Are you an electrician or a plumber? Then you paid more in tax. Are you a barista, grad student, hospitality worker, doctor, chippie, public servant or small-business owner? Then you paid more in tax than gas corporations in Australia. Beer drinkers pay more in beer excise than gas exporters pay in Petroleum Resource Rent Tax. Students pay more in HECS repayments than gas exporters pay in tax. We are being ripped off.

In just four years, multinational corporations have made $149 billion exporting gas from Australia totally royalty free. Labor and the LNP often tell the public that we can't afford to do this or that in the budget. A 25 per cent tax on gas exports would raise $17 billion every year, and it would raise it from the companies making billions in profit. So why don't they tax them? Because Labor and the LNP are on the take. They accept millions of dollars in corporate donations from these same gas companies, and they don't want to stop the gravy train.

See this speech in context