Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

Indeed, I do come back to it. We are talking about the decarbonisation of our economy, which is what this extension of powers is intended to legitimately pursue. We know that. You may have missed my reference to the $17.2 billion being spent in America to create 3,545 jobs. It concerns me that we are heading down the same path, because the Greens tail is wagging this dog of a government. That is not the future I imagine. I imagine a future for my children where there will be industry, productivity, growth and a sense of optimism about the future. Unfortunately, this tax, which we are being asked to endorse ipso facto through this extension of hours, endorsing a broken promise, is really beyond the pale. When we examine why this government is pursuing this ideological bent we see there is no benefit at all for Australia to go down this path and for the Senate to extend sitting hours without applying that time to examining the implications of this broken promise for the Australian economy.

I know the Treasurer released Treasury modelling just a few moments before a committee was due to sit. The credibility of this Treasurer has to be brought into question as well. I know much will be made of the fact—and he posed for a great photo—that he was named Euromoney Finance Minister of the Year. It follows a great tradition, as Senator Joyce referred to, set by Paul Keating, a former world's greatest Treasurer who gave us 'the recession we had to have'.

But I think the tradition of Euromoney awards is more starkly and contemporaneously spelt out by revisiting their 2006 awards. Euromoney said the best investment bank was Lehman Brothers. Of course, Lehman Brothers went broke in 2007. In 2006 Euromoney said that the best equity house was a group called Morgan Stanley. Of course, Morgan Stanley had to be bailed out to the tune of billions of dollars in 2007. In 2006 Euromoney, the same people who awarded Mr Swan Finance Minister of the Year, said the best risk management house was a group called Bear Stearns. Bear Stearns, of course, busted and went broke in 2007. In 2006 the best investor services according to Euromoney were Citigroup, another group that had to have billions of dollars worth of bailouts in 2007. So when they award Treasurer Swan as best finance minister of the year we are right to be dubious about the category he is inserting himself into because he follows in the great tradition of those busted outfits and the man who said Australia had to have a recession with 17 per cent interest rates, and it follows in the tradition that this Labor government has run up billions of dollars of taxpayer debt, mortgaging the future.

Labor want to further compromise the future of the Australian people and hurt successive generations by imposing an all-pervading tax on carbon dioxide. They are doing it under the mantle of presuming that there are going to be green jobs. We have busted that myth, just like Euromoney have given the kiss of death to other firms. We also know there is a very clear indication that this is a tax that will grow and grow and that tens of billions of dollars ultimately will be sent to countries without the scrutiny and accountability that exists under the Australian legislative and corporate framework. We also know that this is an attempt at an election sweetener by reforming some of the tax system and applying some additional benefits to pensioners and others, most of which would be welcome because of the cost-of-living rises that have taken place.

This is the disingenuous nature of it: the government has steadfastly refused to identify and acknowledge that this all-pervading tax will only increase in the future. It will go from $23 at the starting point and it will rise to $29 within a couple of years. Of course, that will put the price of electricity up. It will put the price of everything we use up because ultimately electricity is the thing that is used to light shops, keep refrigeration going, create cement; there are a whole range of applications. This is a tax on electricity, so nothing will escape it. It will continue to rise. Even when it goes to a market based mechanism, of course, which was rejected by the Labor Party; that was their 2007 policy—