Rowan Holzberger (Forde, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise in support of the Customs Legislation Amendment (False Trade Marks Infringement Notices) Bill 2026 and, in doing so, congratulate the Assistant Minister for Citizenship, Customs and Multicultural Affairs, who has done a lot of work to make this bill happen—a lot of work that is typical of this government's approach to getting on with the job and fixing up the mess that we were left with after so many years of the former government's neglect. This government is, in many ways, dealing with stuff, and in this case it is dealing with something which industry and stakeholders have been calling on for years. It is only this government that has been able to do it. That's because of two things. We have a philosophy in this government that is about lifting up the living standards of people and making it easy for business to operate, but I think we also have a very sharp managerial edge to our team, where we are just methodical, calm and deliberate in that approach.

Here we are dealing with what is really an insidious problem for small business but also an insidious problem for consumers, who have every right to expect that the product that they buy is genuine, quality, warrantable—they can take it back if the product needs repairing or is faulty in any way—and, most importantly, safe. This is not just about products which you might typically expect to be counterfeited. This is about medical devices. This is about children's toys, where the bits can break off in a baby's mouth. This bill very much deals with a commercial problem for business, but it also deals with a safety problem for consumers, as part of that philosophy that this government brings and part of that skilled management as well.

I'd like to remind people that I came to this place after spending quite a lot of time in small business myself, having a contract mustering business, where I had a pack of dogs and a ute and a motorbike and the will to win. I would go around and help farmers muster their sheep and cattle. But, when we moved to the city 20 years ago, I ran a construction company in Beenleigh. When working in business—and that's why something like this is so important—people really put their heart and soul into creating a product and creating intellectual property. The thing that I really learned about business is that quite often the business person is not doing it for the money. As somebody put it to me once, the money is a way of keeping score. They do it because they've got this idea, they've got this passion for something which generally solves a problem in other people's lives or brings joy to other people. In many ways business is so fulfilling because the most fulfilling thing that you can do is make a contribution to your community. That's what good business people do. That's what good entrepreneurs do.

So it was that that I ran a construction company in Beenleigh. When I say I ran the construction company, I didn't own it, so I regarded myself as chief lackey. There was one family in particular, the McDonalds, whom I would very much like to give a shout out to here today. Ian Macdonald and Grant MacDonald took me under their wing and really showed me the ropes but then let me run the company as if it were my own. When I first met Ian, who was affectionately known as 'Macca', he was in many ways the quintessential Gold Coast entrepreneur—not the one that you might think of in the white shoe brigade, or the flashy type. This guy was really somebody that embodied small business. He was somebody that didn't holiday overseas, didn't eat out, drove the late-model car. When I met him, he was 70 and well and truly a character and a half. He was so passionate about this system that he had developed of sheet-piling—and, Deputy Speaker Boyce, with your engineering background you may have come across what sheet-piling is. Essentially, the idea is that if you need to dig a hole—say, to build a basement in a high-rise building—it's the shoring which is designed to stop the hole from falling in on itself. That's the theory—it doesn't always necessarily work in practice.

Ian's son was Grant MacDonald—who I'd also like to give a shout out to. He was somebody who really understood the business. When you're working underground, the really good people get this sense about when the ground is moving, and Grant had that sense. Grant was so skilled in business and in construction that he took me under his wing and taught me so many things about business. They had actually developed this product which was designed by them, which had been tested at Griffith University and by a local engineering firm, Howl Engineering. They had this Australian designed, Australian-made, Australian installed product, which they had spent hundreds of thousands of dollars patenting and trademarking.

By the time I came along, their business had been running for 20 years or so, and one of my jobs was to sit in the meetings with the patent attorneys and with the lawyers to try to work out how to stop the competition from ripping them off. They had the sheet-piling and, without going into too much engineering, they also had an anchoring system where they had this 20-centimetre-diameter screw head, which would tie into the sheets and pull them back into the ground as an anchor. They had these cowboys ripping them off and copying their exact design, but not only was it poorly counterfeited but it was also poorly installed. I remember the consequences of their competitors doing exactly that. There was a job in Sydney where they were digging a hole next to a post office, and the wall collapsed. The post office started to move and the customers and the workers in the post office were fleeing for their lives as the glass was breaking all around them. That was an example of what happened when their product was poorly counterfeited and poorly installed.

My job was to sit in those meetings with patent attorneys and with the lawyers to work out how to stop the competition. Because the only way to do it was through civil action, it would have cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to take that action, with no guarantee of there being success. That is the sort of example of what companies in Australia that have a trademark have to do under the current system. They have to take the civil action themselves—something which the estimate from the legal stakeholders who took part in this quite extensive consultation process estimated at somewhere between $200,000 and $500,000. And so this government is doing the right thing by relieving that burden, and we'll be able to fine the companies which are caught importing counterfeits, which is, as I say, something that industry and stakeholders have been calling for for years, but it is only this government that has been able to deliver it.

As I say, it is typical of this government's philosophy and its managerial skills that we're able to do this. The one thing that I learned by running a business, which I don't think the member for Goldstein has ever done, is that there are two—in fact, I love the saying that you run a country like you run a company, because there are two ways to run a company. One is to invest in your plant and your people, and the other is to delay the maintenance, to strip out the profits and to run it into the ground. The latter is exactly what the opposition does. That's why, on detail like this, it was just left to go. It's not just on detail like this. It's their opposition to free TAFE. It's their opposition to bulk-billing. It's the fact that they don't want to invest in the people or the infrastructure of this country that has created the problem that we're dealing with now. And so it is that, through this sort of work, the government is really getting on with the job that was left to us to do.

The first point to make about this legislation is that it is not about somebody getting off the plane in Bali with a fake Hermes bag. That's not what this legislation is going to capture. Some of the examples are where organised crime and, effectively, illegal operators have brought in something—for example, Ozempic. There's one case study here where the TGA and Border Force intercepted fake Ozempic pens, believe it or not. They were stopped before they could reach consumers. But there was one case, reportedly, where an individual had used this Ozempic and almost died because it was full of insulin.

There was another example last year where counterfeit Labubu dolls—anybody who has a child would probably know exactly what a Labubu doll is. I'm not sure why anybody would want to counterfeit them, but they're attractive. Attractive may be looking like Labubu dolls perhaps, but when the child imagined—because of the poor stitching and because of the poor construction of these dolls, they broke apart. They would break apart literally in a child's mouth and become a choking hazard. There were examples where these dolls also contained harmful chemicals because of the way that they were constructed.

There's another example where, amazingly, somebody thought about counterfeiting a STIHL chainsaw. You've got to hand it to organised crime to even come up with these things. I've often also said that, if criminals spent as much time being imaginative in a legitimate pursuit, then they would probably make more money than they would be in illegitimate pursuits. They made these counterfeit chainsaws, believe it or not, which were sold online for just a little bit cheaper than what you'd buy the genuine article for, to make it even more convincing. When they found one of these counterfeit chainsaws and unwrapped it, the safety handle actually snapped off as they were unwrapping the chainsaw. Extraordinarily, somebody almost got this into the country, and people would have been able to buy it. As I say, it's not just that gut-wrenching feeling that you would get when you realise that the Hermes bag you bought is not actually Hermes. This is not only something that you can't take back when it breaks; it is something which literally could kill you.

This government is to be commended for doing the work that the previous government didn't do. It is part of an overall strategy to lift the living standards of all Australians and to do it in a methodical and deliberate way, which stands in stark contrast to the utterly chaotic way the government was run under the now opposition. As I say, because of the philosophy that we have of investing in our people and in systems and our philosophy of managing properly—just as I would have learned in a construction company—it is important to get those details right. That sort of approach, through consultation and through listening to what industry and stakeholders want and making it happen and delivering, is a hallmark of this government. The assistant minister is to be congratulated for his work. I commend the bill to the House.

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Deputy Speaker, can I clarify which bill we speaking on. Is it the trademarks one?

Zaneta Mascarenhas (Swan, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Customs Legislation Amendment (False Trade Marks Infringement Notices) Bill 2026.

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak on the Customs Legislation Amendment (False Trade Marks Infringement Notices) Bill 2026. Of course, we all fundamentally believe in making sure that we have the legislative arrangements in place so that Australia's intellectual property framework continues to operate confidently and works to respect the property rights of rights holders.

I was fascinated by the delusional speech by the member for Forde, where he reflected on the state of trademarks and the operational problems around organised crime taking advantage of illicit products imported into this country, in particular when the Labor Party has been central to financing, through government, organised crime for things like illicit tobacco. I believe very strongly in trademark protection, but the solution from the Labor Party in these areas has been to strip products of their trademarks so that they can create a generic product so that they can increase the chances of not just extracting record profits for organised crime but, in addition to that, fuelling and building out the infrastructure necessary for organised crime to thrive.

I've said previously that, legislatively, there has never been a better time for organised crime than under the Albanese government. They're securing record profits. They're securing them in the black market, and there are direct incentives because of government policy to do so. Normally the response from a government would be to snuff out those pathways for people to secure record profits through organised crime. We have a slightly different situation under the Albanese government.

Rowan Holzberger (Forde, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I raise a point of order, Deputy Speaker.

Zaneta Mascarenhas (Swan, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What is your point of order?

Rowan Holzberger (Forde, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On relevance, I think we're witnessing what happens when a member turns up to speak on the wrong legislation.

Zaneta Mascarenhas (Swan, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will ask the member to make sure that he's being relevant to the bill, which is the Customs Legislation Amendment (False Trade Marks Infringement Notices) Bill 2026.

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm sorry, Deputy Speaker, but—

Zaneta Mascarenhas (Swan, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

So I would suggest not talking about tobacco.

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

With the greatest respect, trademarks are branding. Labor governments removed branding from tobacco, creating a pathway for organised crime to thrive. The Labor Party talks about this all the time. It's part of customs legislation. It's entirely reasonable and, if the chair wants to challenge me on that, we can do so. When you have trademarks, it creates differentiation between products. This is about false trademark infringement. When you have trademarks, it creates differentiation between products so that consumers can make decisions based on different ways products are branded. That's the nature of a trademark. As a consequence, when you strip trademarks from products, as previous Labor governments have explicitly done by law and then patted themselves on the back and thrown parties to themselves—the former minister Nicola Roxon said she was the world first—you create a generic product. A consequence of creating that generic product, plus a substantial increase in the excise, is that it has led to the greatest windfall for organised crime, because the government doesn't understand customs regulation, customs legislation, trademark law, the practice of trademarks, trademark infringement, tax law and the intersection that leads to the profiting of organised crime.

As the previous speaker spoke about organised crime, I will speak about organised crime in the context of trademarks, because one of the problems that we have is we have a government that doesn't understand how trademarks practically work. The consequence of failing to understand the importance of intellectual property, the role it plays, what happens when you strip it from products, is it creates an environment where you have a low actual production value good sold at a disproportionate premium. When that happens, as happens with illicit products which have false trademarks, organised crime steps into the breach and profits from it, as the previous Labor speaker referred. What happens? They build the distribution networks to do so. Through the process of building those distribution networks, organised crime has never had a better time than under the Albanese government explicitly because of false trademarks or the government removing trademarks and then increasing excise on certain products.

So when the previous speaker spoke about how I didn't understand how these things practically work, I can assure you I have a very clear understanding about how these things work and about the consequences of poor government legislation and the flow-on effects. We have seen, because of the approach of the Albanese government deliberately stripping trademarks, particularly in the area of things like tobacco, violent bombing of small businesses, dramatic increases in small-business insurance, significant profiteering for organised crime that then goes on to do things like finance terrorism, particularly antisemitic terrorism, including with a country that, last I checked, was currently being bombed by the United States because of its exporting of terrorism and the threat of nuclear weapons. So it highlights how important (1) having a conversation about this legislation is and (2) what happens when bad Labor governments successively get this area of law wrong.

But as I made the point, when bad Labor governments get the law wrong, it enables an environment for organised crime to profiteer. When that happens under the protection of false or legitimate trademarks, as has occurred—according to former minister Bill Shorten—organised crime moves into government funded distribution networks through the NDIS, which is a brand to help people understand what it is trying to achieve but, in practice, has become a honeypot for organised crime.

The key thing we have to do is stop organised crime, and one of the most important ways to do that is to actually respect the private property of trademark holders, and that is what Labor governments have a terrible track record of doing. In fact, they have an explicit history of stripping trademarks from products, and they were explicitly warned by industry at the time that this will lead to a proliferation of organised crime and profiteering that will subvert tax revenue and Australian law—explicitly warned by industry, explicitly warned by trademark experts, explicitly warned by law and order professionals. And, of course, where are those products coming from? They are coming through Australian ports in containers, and we are not seeing tax being paid. Consumers are buying these products unbranded, knowingly or unknowingly.

So the government doesn't understand what it is doing. It doesn't understand our trademark law; it doesn't understand legislatively. And, as sure as hell, the previous speaker has no idea; this was clear from in his interjections and points of relevance. This is a reflection of what happens when a government simply doesn't understand what it's doing.

Sitting suspended from 12:00 to 12:06

Alison Penfold (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Customs Legislation Amendment (False Trade Marks Infringement Notices) Bill 2026. At its core, this bill is about protecting Australians from dangerous counterfeit goods and defending the rights of genuine businesses from fraud and intellectual property theft. That is a goal we support, because counterfeit goods are not a harmless imitation. They are a direct threat to consumer safety, business integrity and the rule of law. As outlined in the minister's second reading speech, we know the scale of the problem. In just one financial year, over 700,000 counterfeit items with an estimated value of more than $35 million, if those goods had been genuine, were seized at the border. That is not a small issue. That is a systemic problem, one that demands a strong and effective response.

Counterfeit goods can include everything from phone chargers to pharmaceuticals, from beauty products to vehicle parts. These are not trivial items. These are products that Australians use every day—products that, if counterfeit, can cause real harm. A faulty charger can start a fire, a counterfeit pharmaceutical can fail to treat illness, and a fake vehicle part can put lives at risk. When people talk about counterfeit items they often think of fake handbags, but we're talking about items that are far more serious and have significant consequences. And when we talk about intellectual property, we're not just talking about legal rights; we're talking about consumer safety.

This bill creates a new strict liability offence for importing goods with false trademarks—that is, counterfeit goods. This brings those offences within the Infringement Notice Scheme under the Customs Act, allowing Australian Border Force to issue penalties without the need for lengthy court proceedings. This is intended to strengthen enforcement, but the use of strict liability offence where fault is not required to be proved is a very serious legal tool. This requires further examination and consideration, and I'm pleased that there has been agreement for this bill to be considered by a Senate committee.

While I understand the problem that this legislation is seeking to address, we must also be honest about the broader environment in which Australian businesses are operating. Right now, businesses are under immense pressure, and that pressure is undermining their ability to compete—not just against counterfeits, but in the economy more broadly. According to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, more than 11,000 companies entered external administration in 2023-24, and insolvencies are now running at over 13,000 annually—the highest level in more than a decade. Entire sectors are struggling. Construction firms are collapsing under rising costs, hospitality businesses are closing their doors, retailers are facing declining demand and there are far too many empty shops on our high streets. At the same time, businesses are facing escalating costs. Energy prices remain high, insurance premiums are rising and borrowing costs have surged. The Reserve Bank of Australia has made it clear that inflation has remained persistent, forcing interest rates to stay higher for longer, and businesses are carrying that burden.

This matters in the context of this bill, because when legitimate businesses are weakened, counterfeiters gain ground; when margins are thin, unfair competition hits harder; when confidence is low, investment in innovation declines; and when businesses fail, the very intellectual property we're seeking to protect disappears with them. While the government says this bill supports a prosperous and reputable retail sector, the reality is that its broader economic policies are doing the opposite. We've seen rising insolvencies, weak business investment, declining confidence and increasing cost pressures. You cannot separate those outcomes from policy choices.

This government has failed to get inflation under control early, presided over spending that has added to demand pressures, introduced workplace changes that increased complexity for employers and delivered energy policies that are driving up costs rather than bringing them down. You cannot claim to protect Australian business from counterfeit goods while making it harder for those businesses to survive. You cannot claim to support intellectual property while presiding over conditions that are forcing businesses to close, and you cannot claim to strengthen the economy while confidence continues to fall. Protecting intellectual property is not just about stopping counterfeit goods at the border; it's about ensuring that Australian businesses are strong enough to innovate, to invest and to grow.

In closing, I'm pleased, as I said, that the bill will go to a committee for further consideration and, hopefully, consultation with the business sector. The intent of the bill is certainly something that I support, because those who create value, who build brands, who invest in quality and who employ Australians deserve to have their work protected. They deserve protection from fraud; they deserve protection from intellectual theft, and they certainly deserve a level playing field. But they also deserve an economic environment that allows them to succeed. Right now, too many businesses are not just fighting counterfeiters; they're fighting to stay afloat.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Ordered that this bill be reported to the House without amendment.