Kirsten Livermore (Capricornia, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Judging from phone calls to my office and from local talkback radio this morning, there are two topics in town: the state election in Queensland, and the Prime Minister’s announcement the other day of the rebates for LPG conversion. It seems that his announcement of those rebates has really raised more questions than it has answered. We saw an example of that in question time yesterday, when the member for Throsby brought to the attention of the House a letter that she had received from the Special Minister of State. She had made inquiries about the fitting of LPG tanks to the government fleet and the minister’s letter back to her really scotched the idea. In the letter he said that LPG was not necessarily available right across the country and that consideration needed to be given to factors such as the fact that you need to be driving over 50,000 kilometres a year to make the conversion worthwhile and to get the full benefit of the efficiencies from that conversion.

These sorts of problems are consistent with information that I have received from the installer of LPG tanks in Rockhampton. I had a quick talk to him yesterday, in between his trying to call the supplier down in Brisbane to get hold of some tanks. He said he had been on the phone all morning trying to get through because things had gone crazy. He is worried that he will not be able to meet the demand resulting from the government’s announcement.

He was very concerned that consumers could be ripped off in this new scheme—that people would be coming forward to get their cars converted to LPG without really knowing the pros and cons. Of course, Pat Sullivan is a very scrupulous businessman. He has been in business for many years in Rockhampton, and his concern was really for consumers. He was worried that people would be coming forward with older cars and making the investment in LPG conversion without fully understanding the pros and cons of the decision they were making, and that unscrupulous operators could very easily take the money and leave people with what is going to be a pretty bad investment for them.

The government needs to be very careful and match its promise the other day with very substantial consumer information so that people can make a properly informed decision about converting their cars. They should not just see the $2,000 rebate as an opportunity to rush off and get this done when it may not actually be in their best interests if they have an older vehicle.

We have also seen other examples. In the Australian today there is criticism of the policy. It really is policy on the run, whereas the Labor Party’s blueprint on fuels sets out a comprehensive plan for an Australian fuels industry. (Time expired)