Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Hansard source

I would be embarrassed if I were know a member of the Australian Labor Party and I was exempted from paying this tax. I and Senator McLucas know a lot of people who really did not want the $1,000. Do you know why they took it? Senator McLucas knows. Because they would not have to pay the tax then. That is true. Senator McLucas does know people. We both know the same people who took the $1,000—they donated it to charity—but they will not be subject to the tax any more. What sort of legislation is this? Minister can you tell me please the policy rationale—I was hoping Senator Bob Brown would be here to assist you in an answer—behind the fact that individuals will pay for the rebuilding of Queensland but not all of those mining companies which, according to Senator Brown and some in the Labor Left, are ripping billions of dollars out of the ground in Queensland. If I read Senator Brown correctly, he is accusing those coal-mining companies of being a cause of the floods and the cyclones. Are they going to contribute any of their income to the recovery of Queensland? Why are they exempt? Why is it that these multinational companies, which are ripping billions of dollars out of the ground in Queensland and, according to Senator Brown, causing the floods and the cyclones—going to be let off scot-free, but in my home town my butcher and my baker will be paying this levy? BHP and Rio will not be. Woolworths and Coles will not be. Why should my butcher and baker have to pay this levy but Coles and Woolworths do not? Why do Rio and BHP escape scot-free from rebuilding Queensland when my motor mechanic will have to contribute to the levy? I would be very interested, Minister, if you could set me right on the policy reason. Please tell me I have misread the bill.