Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Families and Social Services) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Hanson for her question. At the outset, can I acknowledge her longstanding and passionate commitment to ensuring that Australians are the beneficiaries of our nation's endowment of natural resources. The government has worked very hard to strengthen the integrity of the petroleum resource rent tax by addressing the design issues that were contained within the Callaghan independent review. In fact, the government brought down its response to the Callaghan review on 2 November 2018. In that, we then worked to make sure that we implemented many of the recommendations that were contained in that review—things like reducing the uplift rates that apply to carried forward expenditure. We've also set up a process to address the remaining recommendations relating to the gas transfer pricing for LNG projects. Indeed, legislation giving effect to the key changes came into force on 1 July 2019 and will raise an additional $6 billion over the next decade. We are absolutely committed to supporting the resource sector, which has invested over $600 billion in Australian projects over the last decade. But, in doing so, we need to make sure that we strike the balance between ensuring that investors around the world know that Australia's doors are open for investment and ensuring that the national interest is being realised by making sure Australians are the beneficiaries of our resources.

Foreign direct investment has been an enduring feature of our national story, and the oil and gas industries have absolutely been at the forefront of making sure that we are able to prosper as a nation by realising the value of the resources that we have in the ground, whether they be under our terrestrial soils or under the sea. We will always make sure the national interest is served.