Just when you thought the government could not come up with another bad idea, here comes another one, wham! It is unbelievable—bad idea, after bad idea. It is just extraordinary to watch how many stupid ideas this government can actually come up with. This one is an absolute ripper. What have we got here? They say, ‘Higher taxes are going to lead to investment.’ Ooh! That is something a rocket scientist must have thought up—higher taxes are going to lead to investment. Isn’t that extraordinary? Everywhere else around the world, they seem to be saying, ‘It’s actually lower taxes that lead to investment.’ Maybe the Prime Minister read the advice a little wrong and he put ‘higher’ in when he should have put ‘lower’. This is one of the most stupid ideas that a government has ever come up with. Guess why? If you threaten the viability of the mining industry, you threaten jobs. It is as simple as that. It does not matter how many complicated arguments you want to put around this, if you threaten the viability of the mining industry, you threaten jobs. We hear a lot of talk about Western Australia and Queensland in this debate, but so many of those jobs are in New South Wales and people in New South Wales are very worried about losing their jobs.
I went travelling right through the central west and western New South Wales—17 towns—a couple of weeks ago.
Senator Kerry O'Brien: In your green car?
Yes, in my green car. Thank you, Senator O’Brien. I will take that interjection. I could not find one person who supported this mining tax. And I am not talking about big miners from all those mines the other side say are making billions of dollars. I am talking about real people on the street and on the ground who know that their jobs rely on those mines. Out around where I am, small regional communities such as Cowal, Cadia and Northparkes rely on those mines to be profitable and sustainable. What is this government going to do? It is going to rip the heart out of the future viability of the mining industry. We talk a lot about coal. I am talking about the metals out there. We can see that this government is going to take away the viability of that industry.
Interestingly, Ken Henry apparently wants to just tax everybody. He said, ‘Let’s just whack this big tax on all sorts of businesses.’ What did the government say in response? It said:
The bottom line is the Government’s position in relation to the resource super profits tax is that it applies to non-renewable resources in Australia.
Who would believe the Prime Minister? He changes his mind so often and does so many backflips, who on earth would now believe anything he says? They do not. People out there across Australia no longer believe this Prime Minister. So what is next, Prime Minister? Is this tax going to apply to agriculture? Are we going to start seeing farmers being hit with a tax? Whatever the Prime Minister says, you can no longer believe him because he simply backflips on just about everything.
Talking about bad ideas, this mining supertax is at the top of the pile. But it is at the end of a long list of bad ideas. What have we seen so far, colleagues? The emissions trading scheme was a bad idea. That was a cracker of a bad idea. The list of bad ideas just keeps going. How about getting rid of the single desk? The single desk went two years ago today. That was a bad idea if ever there was one, because the wheat industry is in absolute turmoil. What else have got? We have the government getting rid of the $2 billion telecommunications fund. What have we seen there? They do not care at all about regional telecommunications. Let us look at another bad idea. How about the insulation scheme? That was a cracker. How about another bad idea, such as wasting money on school buildings? The list is endless—bad idea after bad idea.
Now we have the mining tax. Interestingly, how could anybody in this country ever think that the government could do it properly? They cannot do anything else properly. The country is going to the pack because this government have absolutely no idea how to run the country. It is like letting a bunch of kindy kids be in charge of a high school. Mind you, the kindy kids would probably run the country a bit better at the moment. It is appalling what this government are doing. They have no idea.
Speaking of bad ideas, we have another cracker coming up from this government with the sustainable diversion limits under the Murray-Darling Basin Plan. This one is going to be an absolute cracker, because they are going to completely ignore the needs of regional communities and the social and economic impact. They are going to weight it to the environment and it is going to be yet another bad idea, just like the mining tax.
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