Barnaby Joyce (New England, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was Slim Dusty who said, '… there's-a nothing so lonesome, morbid or drear than to stand in the bar of a pub with no beer.' But there is. It's to stand at the bar of a pub with no patrons. If we don't start doing something about the cost of the fundamental core reason why people go to a hotel, there won't be patrons there because the obvious place to be will be to stand at the bottle shop with the slab with no fear, rather than the pub with no beer. Where the local hotel resides is embellished in the Australian psyche. We talk about it in everything from Crocodile Dundee to 'Priscilla of the desert'—what's that one?

Anne Aly (Cowan, Australian Labor Party, Minister for International Development) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was 'queen of the desert'.

Barnaby Joyce (New England, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, 'queen of the desert'. Yet we are doing our very best to try and put them out of business, and we will successfully put them out of business, even in my area such as Urbenville or Drake. In Drake there's a hotel called the Lunatic Hotel. They're always trying to get me to have my photo taken underneath it, but I'm not game. But these places just won't exist as that centre of a community, where you organise everything from your camp drafts to your bushfire rosters. But, most importantly, what are you going to do on the weekend? You've got to do something. You can go have a beer, have a 'countery', get away from the property for a bit and just relax.

If we lose our hotels in Australia, if we lose our little regional pubs, then we will be diminished as a nation. We are not going to maintain these hotels unless we remove the excise completely. Now, I believe the cost of removing the excise from hospitality venues is around about $2 billion. I can understand when people say, 'Well, where are you going to get the money from?' We are spending hundreds of billions of dollars on intermittent power, the so-called renewables, the euphemism for basically butchering our power grid, so you can find the money. The money is there. They say that intermittent power renewables are going to look after regional Australia. Well, they're doing a fine job of it. They're wrecking our roads. They're destroying our communities. They're putting pensioners out of their houses. Even for construction in a lot of areas, we can't find the water for the mixing of the concrete. They're a disaster. We believe that it's not that you should slow them down. We believe the construction of them should stop. That's enough. We've got enough. If you want them on your roofs, in your cities, knock yourself out. We have no problems with that. It's none of our business. But, if you want them in our areas, it is. This goes to show you the juxtaposition of things that are relevant to us in regional areas and what actually happens now.

My office had a bit of a discussion with a few of the publicans around this area, and they say a slight reduction in the excise is not going to help them. If you freeze it—it's already too high. We've got to go beyond freezing it. We've got to get rid of the excise completely. Whether it's Donny and Tina from the top pub at Stanthorpe or the Bernhards at Walcha Road Hotel—but Stephen Ferguson, the CEO of the Australian Hotels Association, quite properly says that every drink poured into a glass in the pub creates a job. The most sociable and safest place to have a drink is in a licensed premises. We need to make sure that excise does not force people to stay at home, away from their communities. And isn't that correct? How many people in country areas have had a period of their life where they worked at a hotel? I know I worked there for a couple of years. That's part of growing up. It's part of the socialisation. It also gets you a job. It's a job that's in a local community. It's a job that's proximate. You're paid at the award rates. But that opportunity also goes.

We have to do something substantial, if we are going to stand behind the iconography of the local Australian hotel. We have to do something substantial, if we truly believe that, in a country and remote regional areas, they have a right to the most minimal form of social infrastructure. In cities, you have so much taxpayer sponsored social infrastructure. It's immense. The classic ones you can see, like the opera house or parks—sponsored by the state or basically subsidised by the state. We don't have that. What we do have—one focal point—is our local hotel, and we are not going to have those. They are closing down. I can go to places such as Warialda Rail. There used to be a pub there. It's no longer there. As you drive along, you can go through areas where there were pubs and now there's just a ramshackle building that's falling over. Why would that happen? If they were commercially viable, of course, they wouldn't close. But they're not commercially viable. People are making the best attempts to try and turn the hotels into restaurants and stuff like that. It works on a form, but, of course, if you turn it into a restaurant, you're going to have to employ chefs. You've got to find chefs. You've got to pay them all rates that are probably beyond the scope of the hotel to manage. And, obviously, you're finding a much higher price per patron, and a lot of families can't afford that.

I'm going to move an amendment that we get rid of the excise on beer completely. The amendment as proposed has been circulated, so I move:

That all words after "House" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:

"calls on the Government to support hospitality venues struggling under the growing burden of government regulation and growth in overheads by eliminating alcohol excise duty on any alcoholic product sold for consumption on-premises in a hospitality venue".

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Katter's Australian Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I could tell a thousand stories, but I have just a quick one. I was in the pub at a little place called Garradunga in North Queensland, and I was going to a Lions Club meeting. I had my Lions badge on. Someone said, 'I didn't know you were a Lion.' The bloke across the bar said, 'Mate, he's been a lion all of his life,' and everyone roared laughing at my expense. It's fun, but it's also ironic that the ALP is moving this, because the ALP was founded in the pubs in North Queensland—you know, Barcaldine, Cloncurry and also western New South Wales. But I would say 'Red Ted' Theodore was the real founder of the labour movement in Australia. The story is told about him and 'Big Bill' McCormack—about 'Red Ted' Theodore and 'Big Bill' McCormack. He goes into the pub and says to one of the blokes drinking there, 'Tommy, you haven't taken out a ticket'. It's a union ticket. He just starts writing him out the ticket, and Tommy says, 'Stick it up'—well, we know the rest of 'stick it up'. 'Big Bill' McCormack comes up and says, 'Did you say to Ted that he should so-and-so and so-and-so?' and he says, 'Yes, I'll say it to you too.' So McCormack grabs him by the hair and punches him in the mouth. He goes down. He kicks him all around the floor, then lifts him up by the belt and says, 'Now take the bloody ticket out,' so he takes the ticket out. He says, 'Well, why didn't you take it out in the first place, Tommy? It would have saved you a lot of trouble,' and Tommy says, 'Oh, well, you didn't go to the trouble of explaining it to me properly, like Bill did.' He was bashing the hell out of him.

I tell that story to indicate that the labour movement—and both sides of the house would agree—has made a magnificent contribution to the people of Australia. One in 30 of us that went into cane fields never came back out alive. One in 30 of us that went down into the mines never came back up alive, until the Labor movement came along. I'm very proud to say that my family were very well off and threw their full weight behind the labour movement in its early years. But the point of the story is that the labour movement was founded in the hotels just the same as the democracy movement was founded in the coffee houses in France. I always thought this was very funny, but it was probably not so funny when the revolution took over. The revolution had been made in the coffee houses in France, and the minute the revolutionaries took over, the first thing they did was close down the coffee houses, because nobody else was going to make a revolution there. The minute the Labor Party gets in, they start banning pubs. The same story really is being repeated again.

Now, I don't want to get too dramatic here, but the good lord Jesus turned water into wine. There can't be anything much wrong with alcohol if the good lord turned water into wine. Deputy Speaker Freelander, if you're looking for money, you are importing, now, $62,000 million a year of petrol. In 1990 you imported no petrol at all, virtually. There's no reason why we can't move back to that immediately. In Brazil they're on about 60 per cent ethanol and other things, and they supply the other 30 per cent from indigenous crude. We have 30 per cent indigenous crude. Just one thing alone: if you buy the petrol here in Australia instead of importing it, the same as we did in 1990, then you give a gift to the Australian people of $62,000 million a year—a gift to the Australian people.

What if you built the Bradfield Scheme? He wasn't exactly an idiot, Bradfield. He built the Sydney Harbour Bridge, built the underground railway system, won the world prize for engineering and built the University of Queensland. But, if you build that great water transfer scheme, that's 40,000—it was a hundred thousand million in two hits. That's $25 billion in tax revenue for the government. Deputy Speaker Freelander, I'm sorry. Let me just repeat that. If you buy the government motor vehicles in Australia instead of importing them from overseas, there's a $40 billion or $50 billion benefit there for Australia. The Bradfield was $42,000 million. If you stop the importation of petrol and go back to the way the country was run in 1990, then it's $62,000 million. There's you go. There's all the money you could ever want to replace the little pittance that you're getting.

The honourable member for New England is dead right. Australia's identity very much comes out of the bush pub, and you are eroding the identity of Australians if you take that away. You are also eroding our ability to talk to each other. As a member of parliament, I like to find out what people are thinking—what their attitude is towards the government's policies—and the best way to do that is to go down to the local hotel. But I'm well aware of the foundations of the Labor movement, in which my own family was a very important little cog in the machine, and I can tell you that it is ironic that people are coming in here to abolish hotels when their very movement was founded in the hotels—including the bush hotels—of Australia.

There's a little town called Maxwelton, and I love pulling up there because of all the cockies in the area and all the contractors and various other people that are employed in the cattle and sheep industry. You find out what's going on. You could have a good time at the Maxwelton pub. Well, it doesn't exist anymore, because of the impositions that you placed upon it. In a pub in Queensland, you are watched by Big Brother. There's a camera there. When I went to university, on the reading list in the schools and in the university was 'Big Brother is watching'—Nineteen eighty-four, a very scary book. That Big Brother is now watching us all the time in hotels.

What sort of people would demand that you have the government watching you in a hotel when you're trying to have a bit of fun, a bit of good time, to let down your hair and get away from the stresses of the world? It's interesting to watch the graph of suicides amongst males in Australia. It parallels the graph of the decline of the hotels and people going into the pubs. I know that, if I myself am really down, I just go down to the pub, have a lot of good fun with my mates and go home a lot happier and more relaxed than before. But, for people who are more traumatised by reality than, probably, I am, it really is a matter of life and death in many cases, and that's not an exaggeration.

So I want to say: 'Hey, you people. Your party was born in the pubs, and the first thing you do is close them down.' The first thing that leaps to my mind is the Puritans, a very ugly group of people in Britain. The first thing they did, of course, was to ban people from celebrating Christmas, having a few beers and any other type of fun that they might have. Well, the people dug up the body of Pym and the other leader and they tore their bodies to pieces in the streets, such was their hatred of those two men, those two Puritans. There are very few examples in human history where the people just went out, dug skeletal remains out of the ground and tore them to pieces in the street. But their hatred of those people that stopped them from having fun, stopping them having a good time, stopping them talking to each other and maybe coming up with an improvement in society—that was the reaction of the English people, our forebears that came from England.

There's terrible and very sad irony here that the party that was founded in the pubs is the party that now is closing down the pubs. Shame upon them. Shame.

Andrew Willcox (Dawson, Liberal National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Manufacturing and Sovereign Capability) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Well, mates, anyone in North Queensland will tell you our one day of winter normally falls on a Wednesday! For the rest of the year, it's prime beer drinking weather. There's nothing quite like the sound of just cracking a coldie open after a long hot day. Whether you're pulling up crab pots out in the creeks of the Burdekin, knocking off after a shift in Paget or wrapping up a week of training in Lavarack Barracks in Townsville, that first sip of frosty beer is one of life's simple pleasures. It's not just about the drink; it's about the moment, the mateship, the laughter, the stories told over the bar, the sense that, no matter what's going on in the world, you're among good people. And that's what this debate is really about. It's about protecting our way of life, protecting the local pubs, the clubs and the breweries that keep our communities connected. We are talking about the Excise Tariff Amendment (Draught Beer) Bill 2025, and, look, any relief for our pubs, sporting clubs and brewers is a good thing. The Nationals support this freeze on draught beer excise because we'll never stand between a cold pint and the Aussie public.

But let's be honest—this move from Labor is but a drop in the schooner. When you crunch the numbers, this so-called beer tax cut works out to be less than 1c per pint. That's not cost-of-living relief; that's a headline dressed up as a happy hour. The real pressure on Aussie families doesn't come from the bar tap. It comes from the bills on the kitchen table. Inflation has smashed through the RBA's target band. Mortgages are up, groceries are up, electricity is up, and it's all being driven by this government spending that is going faster than the economy can grow. Government spending is running at more than four times the rate of the economy, and Australians are paying the price. Since Labor took office, mortgage holders are, on average, paying $1,800 more per month. Families are paying 16 per cent more for food, 22 per cent more in rent, 39 per cent more for insurance and 38 per cent more for electricity. So, yes, 1c off your beer is a tiny step in the right direction, but it's cold comfort when your grocery bill is going up by 50 bucks and your mortgage is eating your pay packet.

In my electorate of Dawson, we don't just drink beer; we celebrate it. In Mackay, we've got two great breweries that come to mind. Red Dog Brewery was named one of the best breweries in Queensland, as a finalist in the Queensland Day best-pub awards last year. Congratulations to Jason and his team. And Goanna Brewing is a place where you can actually brew your own beer—pick your own ingredients, roll up your sleeves and make a beer that's as unique as you are. I'll give a shout-out to the team in Victoria Street. It's a fantastic microbrewery with great live entertainment on the weekend. That's the Australian spirit: hands on, proud and community driven.

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Katter's Australian Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Could I just interrupt for a moment and point out these great beers from North Queensland that have my picture on them?

Mike Freelander (Macarthur, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Member for Kennedy, props are not allowed. I'm sure it's a very fine beer, but props are not allowed.

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Katter's Australian Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Sorry!

Andrew Willcox (Dawson, Liberal National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Manufacturing and Sovereign Capability) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Deputy Speaker. I'd like to thank the member for Kennedy for his assistance with this speech!

These places aren't just businesses. They're where our people come together—locals after work, tourists chasing a real taste of local life and mates catching up for a yarn. In the Whitsundays, hospitality is the lifeblood of our economy. People travel from all around the world to sip our fine Australian beer on a beach in paradise. And up in Townsville, our garrison city, there's no-one more deserving of a cold one than our fine men and women from our Australian Defence Force. They train, they serve, they protect our country, and they've earned a frothy at the end of the day.

That's why protecting the affordability of beer isn't just symbolic; it's cultural. It's the Aussie way. Behind every bar in North Queensland—from the Burdekin to Airlie Beach, Mackay to Townsville—there's a hardworking local doing their bit to keep the economy turning. Across Australia, around 176,000 people work in the alcohol and hospitality industries. They are students, parents, part-timers and full-timers, pouring beers, cleaning glasses and greeting guests. They're the heartbeat of our pubs and clubs. When we're talking about freezing the beer excise, we're not just talking about tax policy; we're talking about real people, real jobs and real communities. When a pub shuts down in a small town, it's not just a business that's lost. It's a meeting place, a fundraising venue and a social hub. It's where raffles raise money for the footy club and where stories are told. Pubs define who we are. But here's the rub: if Labor were serious about fixing the problem, they'd call for a comprehensive review of the alcohol excise system. The Nationals also believe this excise relief should be extended to include spirits on tap. It's hard to believe, I know, but not every Australian drinks beer.

We get patchwork fixes from this government that sound good on the news but barely make a dint in reality. This freeze is worth $90 million over the forward estimates—less than two per cent of what the government collects in alcohol taxes each year. Meanwhile, Labor's reckless spending has added $100 billion to our national debt in just three years. Debt is heading for $1.2 trillion by the next election. Every minute, Australians are paying $50,000 interest in debt. That money could be going into regional roads, hospitals and schools.

I don't want to sound like I'm frothing at the mouth here, but Labor's economic policy has gone flat. What we need isn't a quick pour from a tap; it's a full tap reset. We need leadership that's focused on growing the economic pie, not slicing it thinner, because a rising tide lifts all boats, and, in North Queensland, a lot of the ones that are moored are moored outside the pub. The Nationals' plan is simple: stop the spending spree and start growing the economic pie. That's how we will deliver lasting cost-of-living relief.

We believe in backing the people who are making things, growing things and employing Australians, not punishing them with higher taxes and endless red tape. When local businesses thrive, local communities grow. Whether it's a sugar mill, a farm or a small brewery, they all deserve a fair go. When I visit pubs and sporting clubs across Dawson, I see the hardworking people doing it tough, but they still show up with a smile. I see publicans who kept their doors open through COVID, cyclones, staff shortages and rising costs. I see bartenders who know every regular by name. I see families gathering for birthdays and mates catching up after a long week. That's who this bill should be helping, not in a token way but in a tangible, meaningful way, because, in places like Mackay and the Whitsundays, hospitality isn't just an industry. It's part of who we are.

I'll give this government some credit—at least they finally recognised that beer matters. But, when your idea of cost of living is shaving one cent off a pint while inflation eats your pay cheque, that's like offering a stubby cooler for a warm beer. Australians don't need a photo op at a pub by a politician. They need a plan—a plan to tackle inflation, a plan to grow the economy and a plan to back the industries that make this country tick. So, tonight, when we raise our glasses, whether it's Red Dog, Goanna or Great Northern, let's remember what we're really toasting. Let's toast our hospitality workers, the quiet heroes on the weekends. Let's raise a glass to our local brewers, who pour pride into every pint. Let's toast the soldiers, the farmers, the tradies, the nurses and the teachers—the Australians who have earned that knock-off beer the hard way. And let's toast to a better government, one that understands that cost-of-living relief can't be brewed overnight. In North Queensland, we don't just drink beer, we defend it. We know that, when the heat's up, mateship matters. When times are tough, communities rally, and, when there's work to be done, Australians roll up their sleeves and get it done, no excuses. So let's keep our pubs open, our breweries busy and our communities strong. Here's to common sense, and here's to a cold one that we can actually afford. Cheers!

Tom Venning (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Let me start by saying quite clearly that the Liberal Party supports the freeze on the beer excise indexation. Personally, I support reducing excises, especially in our pubs and clubs, and so we welcome this relief for every Australian who enjoys a cold one. I know I certainly do. The small country towns that I represent—I represent the most in this place—rely on three things: the primary school, the footy club and of course the pub. And the pubs are hurting. We're seeing closures every other week. Eventually, the community shrivels up, and that town becomes a ghost town. That story is all too familiar in regional South Australia.

In 2022, when this Labor government was elected, the Treasurer delivered his first budget. At that point in time, we already had the most expensive cigarettes in the world, and he hiked up the excise on tobacco yet again. And I can quote what I and my friends said. We said at the time that all he's going to do is create a black market. Well, indeed, that's exactly what happened. We're losing billions of dollars a year in excise, smoking rates are up, and illegal tobacco crime is up as well. I'm concerned that we're going to see the same with alcohol, particularly in my community in regional Australia.

Beer is a regional industry. I'm a farmer. We grow a lot of barley, particularly malting barley, which goes into the beer that we drink. We export barley. We export malt all over the world. South Australia's biggest export commodities are wheat, barley and lentils. They go to India, Indonesia and China. As I said before, it is our biggest export market. And, of course, South Australia has the famous Coopers. Beer is a regional industry, and it must be supported. But, while we are happy to take the discount, let's be honest about the service we are getting from this government and at Jim and Albo's pub. Just on that pub, I wonder what it should be called—maybe the 'Slug and Lettuce' or perhaps the 'Chook and Parrot'.

Anyway, I can't help but look at the Treasurer and see a man who has missed his calling. He's running the economy like a confused bartender. Bartender Jim is behind the tap. He waves at you with a big smile. He says: 'Mate, good news! This round is on me. I'm freezing the tax on that schooner.' And you think: 'Beauty! Finally a win.' But then you look at the change he hands you. It's less than 1c per pint. They don't even make a coin for that anymore. That is the extent of this so-called relief. It's enough to buy the Labor Party a headline, but it is not enough to buy a single peanut at the front bar. If this government were serious about alcohol excise reform, they would not be throwing us a 1c coin and asking for a round of applause. They would have the Treasury conducting a comprehensive review of the entire alcohol excise system. Instead, we get a patchwork fix. It doesn't help those buying a bottle of wine. It doesn't help those winemakers either. In fact, it doesn't help the wine industry at all.

From the Lower Eyre Peninsula to the Clare Valley, Grey, beautiful Grey, is home to some of Australia's finest wine-growing regions. And, while Bartender Jim is focused on beers, the wine industry needs help. Last year, I wrote to the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry about the crisis facing our wine industry. Small family owned operators are drowning under commercial pressure, regulatory failure and rising costs. Where is their support?

Take Flinders Run, for example, in my electorate. They paid $14,000 to Wine Australia for their US market entry program. It was a disaster. It was poorly communicated and offered zero value, raising serious questions around how grower levies are spent. Additionally, while I welcome the government's response to the Emerson review and the decision to progress a mandatory code of conduct for wine grape purchasers, growers have been clear with me that regulatory reform alone will not address the market conditions facing this industry. Indeed, the impending container deposit scheme will also add massive costs. They're trying to solve a problem that does not exist. Industry estimates suggest that this will impose an additional cost of up to $100 million on the sector. This measure risks becoming a cost grab that further undermines the viability of wine businesses, particularly in regional South Australia. Wine producers have been forgotten by this government. They need targeted assistance packages and genuine accountability. While Labor is making a song and dance about saving a fraction of a cent on a schooner, business is hurting.

But it isn't just business; let's look at the rest of the menu prices at this Labor pub, the Chook and Parrot. Inflation just recently hit 3.8 per cent. Insurance is up 38 per cent. Energy bills are up 38 per cent. Rent is up 22 per cent. Health costs are up 18 per cent. Education is up 17 per cent, and food is up 16 per cent. These aren't luxuries. These are the essentials. But bartender Jim says, 'Don't worry about the mortgage; just grab another pint.' The reality is that this treasurer is watering down the drinks while charging top-shelf prices. Spending is at its highest level, outside of a recession, in nearly 40 years. Government spending has blown out from 24 per cent to 27 per cent of GDP under Labor. That is an addiction. Bartender Jim is drinking on the job, and it's on the taxpayers' tab.

We support this bill because any relief is better than no relief. But let's not pretend that this is a solution. This is a mid-strength distraction. The Treasurer is shouting a round with one hand and pickpocketing the nation with the other.

Colin Boyce (Flynn, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to make a few brief comments on the Excise Tariff Amendment (Draught Beer) Bill 2025 and the amendment moved by Mr Joyce, the member for New England. I listened to the member for New England's contribution, and he's absolutely right to refer to the iconic song by Slim Dusty:

…there's-a nothing so lonesome, morbid or drear

Than to stand in the bar of a pub with no beer.

Well, there is; when you go to any of the outback towns where I come from and you walk into the bar, you're the only person there—that's the worst thing. This is what is happening across rural and regional Australia in the small communities where the only focal place in those communities is the local pub. The reality is there's a reason for that; people don't go to the pub anymore, because it costs too much money to have a beer. Whilst I support the intent of the government to address the beer excise and freeze it—I agree with that—it simply does not go far enough. One cent a pint, as many of my colleagues have pointed out, is not cost-of-living relief at all. That is a headline, as one of my colleagues has pointed out. The reality is that we need to get rid of the excise altogether—as suggested in the amendment moved by the member for New England, which I do support. In many of these small communities, people going to the pub and having a couple of beers and saving 2c is nonsense.

So, as I say, we must support our publicans. We must support the brewery industry, the beer industry, our local hotels and clubs and societies, the bowls club, the golf club, everywhere these licensed premises are that sell beer. The reality is the government needs to wake up to itself and go back to its own report, the Henry tax review, which was written more than a decade ago. But the alcohol tax system is broken and needs reform, it certainly does, and that's what I encourage the government to do.

The removal of the excise on beer and alcohol is reported to cost somewhere around $8 billion. Again, as the member for New England has pointed out in his contribution, we're quite happy to subsidise the renewable energy sector to the tune of billions yet we won't remove the beer excise and alcohol tax and help out our small communities, our clubs, our pubs and so forth. The renewable energy sector is driving up the cost of electricity. How can the small pubs and clubs and so forth keep the beer cold? This is another issue that needs to be addressed.

Furthermore, this goes all the way to the tobacco tax excise, and we've seen what's happened there—the loss of some $10 billion on revenue because the old ciggies, the durries, are just too expensive, so that's been taken over by the illegal tobacco trade, by the criminals and so forth. Are we now sending the alcohol industry down the same road?

We need to make significant reforms. I do support the government's intent, but it just simply does not go far enough. Let's support our small communities. Let's support the beer drinkers. That is about all I have to say today.

Debate adjourned.