Kate Chaney (Curtin, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Ryan for bringing this motion forward for debate. These are two really important issues facing our country and they deserve the chamber's full attention. Let me start with gas. Australia is one of the world's largest gas exporters. Gas is a resource that belongs to all Australians, and yet for years we've watched multinational corporations extract our gas, sell it at record prices and then send the profits offshore while ordinary Australians pay more for their own energy and receive little in return. The problem is structural. The petroleum resource rent tax was designed for oil projects and it fails to capture value from gas projects. Companies can accumulate decades of deductions, report near-zero taxable profit and pay nothing even while making billions. We need to fix this.

There are two distinct problems. First, Australians deserve a base return for the right to access and sell our resources. That's what royalties are for, and most gas-producing nations collect them. We don't for our offshore gas exports. Second, when war or crisis drives international gas prices through the roof, the windfall profits that flow to gas companies are not the reward for innovation or risk; they're a gift of circumstance. More of that benefit should flow to Australians.

I support a royalty on offshore gas and a genuine superprofits mechanism. Is 25 per cent the right rate? It could be, but my view is that for projects that are already operational, where big investment decisions were made based on an agreed tax regime, the rate should be set at a level that would not have changed the original investment decision. We will need foreign investment in the industries we need to decarbonise our economy, and we have to be careful about sovereign risk. There is room for discussion about the structure and the rate, but one thing is certain—the current PRRT framework is not delivering for Australians.

While the government points to the obligations we have to our Asian trading partners during a period of global fuel insecurity, once the international situation settles, fixing our broken gas taxes must be the first cab off the rank. This issue will not go away like the Prime Minister hopes it will. Australians are onto this and they want a fairer deal. Every time a gas company reports record profits while Australian households struggle with energy bills, it's a reminder that we must do better.

Now let me turn to gambling. After more than a thousand days of silence since the Murphy report, the government has finally moved on gambling reforms. It announced partial restrictions in line with what the gambling industry wants under cover of the budget lock-up so no media would write about it. I can't find a single person other than the Prime Minister who really thinks that this is enough. The evidence is crystal clear: partial ad bans don't work. The government has developed a model where people are required to opt out of gambling ads. Look at the opt-out model on SBS. Less than 0.1 per cent of SBS users have chosen to opt out of gambling advertising. That is not a sign that Australians are comfortable with gambling ads; it's a sign that opt-out systems do not work.

Australia has the highest per capita gambling losses on earth. This is a $32 billion industry that feeds on addiction and the targeting of vulnerable people. Six hundred thousand children are gambling. Coroners are naming gambling advertising in suicide findings. More than three in four Australians want gambling ads banned. The same proportion of AFL supporters want them banned. This is what the Murphy report recommended.

Prime Minister, if you're going to do this, do it properly. There is already growing anger in your party, because everyone knows that your reforms are a cop-out. Australians deserve a full ad ban, a national regulator and a ban on inducements. The political will exists across this chamber if the government is willing to use it. If the Prime Minister doesn't personally support a full ban, he should put this to a conscience vote so every member in the House has permission to articulate where their community and their conscience stands.

The member for Ryan is right that corporate influence shapes policy. The answer is not cynicism but accountability, and that is exactly what we are here to provide, on a gas tax and on gambling reform. I proposed a ban on political donations from social harm industries in my Electoral Legislation Amendment (Fair and Transparent Elections) Bill 2024, but neither major party supported that. We on the crossbench are here to continue to call this out, and that is what we will do.

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