Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Productivity Commission Amendment bill 2017 amends the Productivity Commission Act 1998 to expand the general policy guidelines for the exercise of the Productivity Commission's functions to include consideration of inequality, and establishes a framework for the Productivity Commission to regularly report on economic inequality.

The purpose of this bill is to improve the quality of information and analysis available about economic inequality in Australia and to ensure that proper consideration is given to inequality in the public debate about economic policy. We firstly compliment Senator McAllister and the ALP for putting forward this bill, even if we have some reservations, as expressed quite well by Senator Leyonhjelm.

I will firstly discuss inequality. Inequality of wealth is an important economic phenomenon that should be properly and independently measured and analysed; however, it is a result, not a cause. A significant level of inequality is not in itself an economic issue. It is whether someone has sufficient and growing wealth to pay the bills, not whether someone else has even more sufficient and growing wealth. So, provided this is used correctly, and not politically for pushing a philosophy, it will be a valuable addition to the debate in this country.

Inequality only makes economic sense as one possible indicator that something may be askew with the levels and trend of real net wealth. Real net wealth is driven not by inequality but by factors such as real income and wages versus the real cost of living. The latter, cost of living, is partially and imperfectly measured by the CPI, which nevertheless clearly shows why poor and middle-class Aussies continue to struggle. The poor in fact get hammered by regulations, which seem to be the solution to many of the problems or challenges that the ALP see. The ALP, along with their Greens allies, quite often put forward an increase in regulation. Regulations bring with them an increase in cost, a decrease in quality and a decrease in production, which hurt the poor most of all. Regulations are an indiscriminate and regressive impost on the poor.

The Productivity Commission has been a bastion of sound economics and common sense for decades. The Productivity Commission will be aware of the primary role that too many government interventions, such as in the form of regulation, tax and money supply, have in reducing real net wealth as possibly indicated by significant levels of inequality. Thus, no government agency is in a better position to be tasked with assessing inequality than is the Productivity Commission.

Inequality can be very difficult to define. Senator Ketter has already attempted to discuss some of those aspects. Is it gender inequality? Is it geographical inequality? Is it inequality of tax? Is it inequality of wealth? As I said, regardless, when it comes to economic considerations, inequality is a result, not a cause.

Senator Ketter raises the question of declining union membership. That is no secret. A lot of people are aware of this. And then he raises the point about penalty rates. It is all too clear that the people who have pushed the decrease in weekend penalty rates, for example, are the very union bosses that have complained no about the Fair Work case result. Some in the media are referring to the Leader of the Opposition as Electricity Bill. That is not something I would do in this chamber, but that highlights two things. That is what people are seeing, and that gets to the heart of Senator Ketter's comments: these are open, everyday things. The penalty rates decision was preceded by the union bosses doing deals with the big end of town to strip penalty rates out of enterprise agreements. The decrease in penalty rates has been led by union bosses.

We then see energy policies—electricity especially. As the famous saying goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Some work by our staff indicated that single pensioners pay 11 per cent of their income, which is not discretionary, on energy. It is now a highly regressive tax to increase energy prices, which is at the core of Labor Party policy with its 50 per cent renewable energy target and its now support for the disgraceful Finkel report, which has no sound economic merit at its base. (Time expired)