Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Fair Work Amendment (Fairer Fuel) Bill 2026. We're now entering the fifth week of the fuel supply crisis the government denied existed and sought to ignore. First, the government told us there was no fuel supply shortage. Apparently, Australia had the best fuel stocks in 15 years. Transport minister Catherine King responded to questions about shortages by suggesting it was actually flooding in Queensland that was causing bowsers to run dry across the country. Then resources minister Madeleine King claimed fuel prices were actually holding steady in the first weeks of this crisis.

Well, it shows this government can't get out of its cushy ministerial wing to the suburbs and the regions of this country and realise, at that point, prices had already jumped 40 cents per litre. Over the past week, the road transport industry has been crying out for immediate assistance to help them get through the current crisis. There are transport businesses parking their trucks and refusing jobs because they cannot afford to pay the skyrocketing diesel prices, which over the weekend were $3.21 and 0.9c in capital cities. That is up from $1.65 just a few weeks ago.

Let's be very clear: this legislation does not provide any immediate relief for the heavy vehicle sector. For the transport businesses listening to this debate and for their representative association, who have asked the parliament to pass this legislation, the bill does not provide you the immediate support you seek. In a briefing provided by the office of the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, we were told that it would take weeks, plural—not days—and that is after an application had been submitted to the Fair Work Commission that would make a road transport contractual chain order. That is weeks before the estimated 50 per cent of truckies who do not have fuel levies in their current contracts can get relief. That is if they can survive that long without laying off workers and without distorting and disrupting supply chains.

By contrast, the opposition announced this week some immediate assistance for our transport industry through an immediate, temporary cut to the fuel excise and a corresponding cut to the road user charge that is paid by our heavy vehicle sector. That is real relief at the bowser with every single litre of petrol for Australian families and, importantly, for our transport sector. The government could announce this assistance today. They don't need legislation to make those changes; they're the government. They could sign a change of regulation, and it would happen like that. You've got to ask why they won't do what the industry has asked and give that immediate relief, rather than have us debating here in this chamber about changes to contractual arrangements that could take weeks for actual impact to be felt.

The industry is also looking for immediate support and has made the following requests to government over the last few weeks, none of which have been picked up by a government that's more interested in calling national cabinet meetings to sit around big tables with premiers to talk about the problem than to actually take responsibility for it. I've had the great privilege of being a minister. It is hard. It is a hard job. And every time it gets hard for this government and these ministers, they look for someone else to blame instead of doing what they swore to do when they took on these ministerial responsibilities under the Crown to act in the national interest.

The industry wants a disaster declared and $25,000 emergency small-business grants to become available to these trucking businesses. They want the 32.4 cent per litre price on diesel abolished. They want that done temporarily, in a targeted way, while this crisis is occurring. That, again, is relief that the government could give today and could have given last week, the week before or the week before that. What we've seen is trucking businesses, who were becoming insolvent at the rate of two businesses a day before the Middle East crisis, being slugged with fuel bills in excess of tens—and, in some cases, hundreds—of thousands of dollars and contractual arrangements that don't assist.

What the industry is also asking for is something that we instigated during COVID, and that is a six-month moratorium on banks or creditors imposing lending repayments. That gives these companies the cash flow relief that they need right now to keep their drivers employed, their trucks on the road and goods turning up across all of our retail sector—picking up primary products, whether it be bananas in northern Queensland, which are currently being left to just rot because no-one can afford the fuel bill, or B-doubles of cattle heading to the abattoir. Indeed, our grain growers, who are trying to get seed in the ground for this harvest, can't afford their diesel bills. That's what's actually happening.

The National Road Transport Association, which represents transport and logistics businesses, has said this legislation is 'too little, too late', with 'dozens of businesses already being forced to close because of high costs and lack of cash flow'. Again I say passing this legislation today will have no material impact on these businesses at all. NatRoad is an organisation that cautiously supports the passage of the amendment, but they are clear that this does not respond to the urgent need being experienced by our transport sector.

Before the start of the fuel crisis, transport companies were going insolvent at a rate of two businesses every day. Following the passage of Labor's closing-the-loophole legislation, insolvencies in the sector have escalated—something the government doesn't want to admit or recognise—and this does nothing to help that. The transport sector insolvencies increased by 42.7 per cent in 2023-24, the year those industrial relations changes were made, and that was followed by a further 48.3 per cent increase in 2024-25. So, if you like the big end of town in the transport sector, you haven't got a problem here. You have not got a problem here, Mr Kaine, have you? But, if you are interested in owner-operators, small businesses, mum-and-dad businesses—particularly out in the regions and the suburbs—being able to employ locals and meet locals' needs, this is not the way to go. And insolvencies have further increased by 21 per cent this financial year to date. In total, to the end of January 2026, 449 transport sector businesses went insolvent, and that isn't good enough. Everyone's fine, because the big end of town picks up the slack. But, in the National Party and on the opposition benches, we back small business—we back small to medium enterprises—as a way of community standing up and solving their own issues.

Because the government denied and refused to acknowledge the fuel supply crisis facing many trucking businesses and farmers, the opposition last week established a self-reporting website: nofuelhere.com.au. The website enables Australians to report petrol stations where there are fuel shortages or where informal rationing is going on, and we are using that data to help the government help our country. Today I was able to write to the fuel tsar and let her know where the shortages were in my home state of Victoria. What is clear from this government is that they're busy telling us we've got more supply than ever before, and yet we've got 600 servos that you can't get a drop from—let alone the price problem.

One job—here's one job, Prime Minister. Please take it out of Chris Bowen's hands; he's absolutely incompetent. Here's one job, PM: ensure that fuel is affordable by cutting the fuel excise and the road user charge, and also ensure that these abundant supplies you are telling the Australian community exist onshore—we'll take you at your word—get to where the shortages are. It's no good for the four big fuel companies to be hoarding and hedging, clipping the ticket on the way through, because, right now, people are going broke, workers are being laid off, and our communities are suffering. The level of anxiety out there not just in the business sector but across communities is significant.

The coalition will be moving amendments to this bill. This bill is tarted up to say it's an emergency measure for a crisis, yet the measures of this bill will extend far beyond the crisis. In fact, it will embed these measures and the ability to reach into contractual arrangements beyond it just being an issue of whether you're one of the 50 per cent of the trucking industry who aren't able to have their contract reflect increased fuel prices, so we will be moving a sunset clause. I really encourage the government to put a timeframe limitation on this particular measure. This measure hasn't gone through the usual process of a Senate inquiry, where we're able to go out and examine it in detail. We are taking the government at its word that it wants to assist trucking companies who can't have those increased fuel prices that aren't reflected in their current contractual arrangements ameliorated, but this shouldn't be a measure that is beyond the current crisis, so we will be moving a 12-month sunset clause.

We'll also be seeking an independent review after this has operated for six months, because this hasn't been through the usual process of parliament, where we go out to communities, experts and legal eagles to understand the flow-on impacts of this. We're going to move amendments to require the Fair Work Commission to consult on proposed orders. One of the critical concessions that the transport industry negotiated during the closing loopholes legislation debate was a lengthy and encompassing consultation process. We know that Labor doesn't like consultation, because they don't like to hear that they might have a bit wrong. They shut this chamber down from debating serious, nation-changing legislation at a whim—with their partners, the Greens—instead of just allowing this chamber to do what it does.

You've got the numbers; don't be afraid of the debate. You're going to win, but the Australian public has sent us all here to put our views on the table in this democracy, which all deserve to be heard. Consultation going forward will be one of the amendments that we seek, because this legislation seeks to truncate that safeguard. We want to make sure that the Fair Work Commission must consult on any emergency application. We want to restrict the emergency orders solely to the issue of fuel charges, because this was the original request of the Australian Trucking Association. However, no limitation on this power exists in the legislation. You've got to ask: why? Why do we have a much broader application than what the industry wants?

The government is seeking to expand the range of matters that could be determined by the Fair Work Commission under the emergency powers, and I don't believe that's appropriate. We want to move an amendment that ensures the minister can only make a determination if a declaration of the national emergency has been made under the Liquid Fuel Emergency Act 1984. That's important. We're all being inundated, around this chamber, with the real-life impact of the current issues. I've been contacted by a bulk haulage transporter from Inverleigh, west of Geelong, who wrote to me over the weekend, talking about the reality of parking trucks because they can no longer afford to keep them on the road. It's core business—Roe Transport in Barnawartha also. Thank you. We've all been inundated in other debates. I'll be able to outline that.

Transport is an essential service. Every Australian depends on it for food, water, housing, energy and medical supplies. Without a transport industry, those sectors fail. Everything we know fails. We won't be frustrating this legislation, but we will be moving sensible amendments to ensure that this legislation works for industry in the long term.