Dean Smith (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade) Share this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy President, I congratulate you on your election to the office. I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by the Minister for Foreign Affairs (Senator Wong) to questions without notice asked by Opposition senators today.

With Labor having a commanding majority in the House of Representatives, a very cosy relationship with the Australian Greens and plans to legislate for additional senators from the territories, Western Australians are on a 'GST watch'. Senator Wong, in question time today, said that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese came to Western Australia and said that WA's GST is safe under Labor. Well, Western Australians want Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to go to Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Hobart and Adelaide and tell the rest of Australia that he's sorry but WA's GST deal is safe. The key element of that GST deal, delivered by a coalition government in 2018, is the preservation of the 75c floor, which guarantees Western Australia no less than 75c in every dollar.

Western Australians are on a GST watch because, in last year's budget, the Infrastructure Investment Program delivered to Western Australia a drop in revenue. The GST watch that Western Australians are on is not just to watch over the preservation of the 75c floor; it's to watch over Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and make sure that he does not work to undermine Western Australia's federal revenues by stealth. Last year's budget showed that the Infrastructure Investment Program's contribution in Western Australian will fall from $1.4 billion to just $370 million by 2028. So, when Prime Minister Anthony Albanese comes to Perth, goes to Kings Park, with its majestic views over our city skyline, and says that he wants his federal WA Labor MPs to be bold and stand up for the WA GST deal, he is saying to Western Australians, 'Look over here, because I've got a plan for something different for federal revenues that come to Western Australia.'

Let us be reminded that federal Labor MPs were slow to join the very loud chorus of noise coming from Western Australian voters who were arguing for a better GST deal many, many years ago—so much so that it was the Labor deputy premier and now premier of Western Australia, Roger Cook, who had to call out federal Labor MPs in Western Australia, asking them—demanding—at the time to take the GST issue seriously. In 2017, the West Australian newspaper reported:

To date, WA Labor members in Canberra have done nothing about the GST other than grumble the system is a rip-off.

At the time, the Sunday Times reported that federal Labor representatives had let WA down on the WA GST issue.

This government, elected 11 weeks ago, has a commanding majority in the House of Representatives. In the Senate, it will govern with the support of the Australian Greens. It has a well-known, public plan to increase the representation of the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory. Increasing the representation of territories in the Senate diminishes the representation of every other state. Those three things together will give Prime Minister Anthony Albanese permission to change the GST arrangements and to continue the reduction in federal funding of Western Australian roads, health and education services.

Western Australian federal Labor MPs that have come to this place this week are on notice. Western Australians will hold them accountable to stand up and to be vocal in their defence of the GST arrangements that were put in place by previous coalition governments.