Malcolm’s Official Speeches in Parliament

COVID: What happened to our country

I dare to ask questions. I have a duty as an elected representative to share the facts. I have a duty to the people of Australia to promote debate and understanding for informed debate.

What we are seeing in these COVID times is the squashing of debate. I call on you to decide for yourself. What happened to basic freedoms? What happened to Australia? Are you willing to help us bring back Australia?

Transcript

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I ask: what’s happening to our country? On COVID, due to the overseas deaths early last year, I was cooperative and supportive from the start. On 23 March 2020 and 8 April 2020, on single-day sittings in this Senate, we gave the government a blank cheque. But I added, on behalf of constituents, that we would hold the government accountable and we expected data and a plan. I mentioned the most successful nation was successful without crippling its economy because it did not cripple its economy. I mentioned ivermectin. Yet we never heard back—no data and no plan. Like people across Australia, I now have important questions.

People are feeling scared. Some are terrified, lost, hopeless, daunted and confused. People are feeling unsafe because of the vaccine side effects. People are feeling insecure because crucial, universal human needs are not being met—needs like security, health, reassurance, trust, confidence, support, leadership, honesty, competence, care, freedom, ease, calm and direction.

Where’s the plan for managing the virus and our economy? There’s clearly inconsistent behaviour across our states, and the national government has revealed no plan. Queensland, Victoria and WA have deepened fear and insecurity to win elections and to control people. Governments have abandoned the people and removed accountability. I asked the Chief Medical Officer, the Therapeutic Goods Administration and the head of the federal health department to confirm my list of strategies that should be part of a plan for managing the virus. Isolation is one. Testing, tracing and quarantining is another. Then there’s restrictions, cures and prophylactics, vaccines, personal behaviour, and health and fitness. That’s seven I’ve raised with them. They’ve agreed with all seven. But we only see three in use, and then only partially, with crude and limited impact on the virus and a huge economic and social cost.

In response to my question in Senate estimates in March, I received data on the severity and transmissibility of this virus. The mortality is known by the health authorities to be low to severe. In fact, Senator Rex Patrick didn’t even know he had the virus. Others with co-morbidity, though, can die. Just like with the flu, there’s a huge range of symptoms. So why do the Chief Medical Officer and the health department not publicly separate out each of the group’s mortality rates? Is it because people need to be kept in fear?

Now our taxes are being given to big pharma for unproven and risky vaccines. Let’s consider some of those risks and facts. There have been deaths from the vaccine. Thousands of people overseas have died from it. There have been a wide variety of side effects from the vaccine, such as blood clots. The health minister, Mr Hunt, had cellulitis, reportedly a known vaccine side effect, and was hospitalised. The Chief Medical Officer, the Therapeutic Goods Administration and the head of the federal health department refuse to declare the vaccine as 100 per cent safe.

So my first question is: how did the vaccines get provisional approval? They said there were no alternative vaccines available. But wait—once the first was approved provisionally, the others faced an approved alternative. So how did the others get provisional approval? The vaccines fail to prevent transmission of the virus. The vaccines fail to stop someone getting the virus and getting sick. Intergenerational effects are not known at all. The vaccine’s effect against mutations is still unknown. The dosage is unknown. Vaccine frequency, number and time between jabs are still all unknown. Are people going to be jabbed forever? The vaccine fails to remove restrictions on our lifestyle. The vaccine fails to open up international borders.

The vaccine makers all lack integrity. They have been fined billions of dollars—not hundreds of millions but billions of dollars—for misrepresenting their products. The health minister himself said, ‘The world is engaged in the largest clinical vaccination trial.’ I am not a lab rat. Australians should not be treated as lab rats. This is the first time in history that healthy people have been injected with something that could kill them—and yet, on ivermectin, this is the first time that sick people have been denied medicine that is safe and successful for COVID, as multiple overseas jurisdictions prove.

Let’s move on to ivermectin. I took it successfully in 2014 for something else. Some 3.7 billion doses have been given over six decades. It is prescribed for many ailments. There’s no risk. It’s safe. It’s cheap because it’s off patent. It’s affordable. It is being used successfully overseas to treat COVID en masse, regionally and nationally. There are 250 medical papers in support of ivermectin—proven successful with COVID. In times of emergency, when four vaccines are provisionally approved, and adults are vaccinated—and now kids, despite the early warnings, and now pregnant mothers, apparently—why isn’t a proven, safe and affordable treatment like ivermectin provisionally approved? If no-one has made application, why didn’t the government get off its hands and do it? The government has blood on its hands. My second question is: why have four unproven, untested and risky vaccines been given provisional approval, yet one known, safe treatment has not been given provisional approval, despite extensive medical papers and successful widespread use overseas? What happened to basic freedoms? What is happening to Australia?

I received a letter from the Therapeutic Goods Administration last week threatening me because I shared some facts publicly. I dared to ask questions. I have a duty as an elected representative to share the facts. The Therapeutic Goods Administration calls that ‘advertising’—in an effort, apparently, to control me. I have a duty to the people of Australia to promote debate and understanding for informed debate. Without that, there can be no informed consent, and, without informed consent, there can be no vaccination or treatment. People are free in our country to make what they want of the facts. The Therapeutic Goods Administration seems to think that discussing facts and data is advertising. Whose side is the TGA on—the people or Big Pharma? My third question is: what are the connections between Big Pharma, Monash University, the Therapeutic Goods Administration, the Gates Foundation, Google and Facebook? Think about this. Google’s parent company is Alphabet. It owns YouTube, which took down one of my videos on the topic. Google owns 12 per cent of Vaccitech, which created the AstraZeneca vaccine. Aren’t these conflicts of interest? Another possible conflict of interest is surely Sequoia Capital, a venture fund known for making millions from early funding of Google, YouTube and Apple. Sequoia owns 10 per cent of Vaccitech. I have no financial or other ties with vaccine makers, ivermectin or drug companies. My interest is ensuring that we protect people’s health and safety—our nation’s health and safety. So what happened to basic freedoms? What is happening to our country?

Coercion seems widespread and primed for stronger, wider, more extensive coercion. Let’s have a look at some of the types of coercion: letters from so-called authorities intimidating people; threats to doctors; threats to employees of withholding employment or livelihood—a basic means of survival; media intimidation from the legacy media; journalists labelling and misrepresenting people. It’s no wonder that mainstream media is rapidly becoming the legacy media. There is also government funding of media companies on vaccine propaganda. But I do want to single out one journalist. Adam Creighton, in the Australian, has done a fabulous job of exposing and sharing the facts. We move on now to what the government is calling a ‘digital certificate’. Is that going to become a digital passport? Will there be the withdrawal of people’s basic access to amenities, transport, travel and jobs unless they get the jab? Will there be the withdrawal of livelihood—the ability to live? This is not a digital passport; it’s a digital prison. Social media threats: Facebook and YouTube take down posts and threaten shutdown. Always, beneath control, there is fear. So my fourth question is: of what are authorities afraid? Clearly, it’s not the virus, because they have no plan. They’re afraid of people, the truth and freedom. Freedom is so easily squashed. The key question is: why is there no government action to approve ivermectin? I call on the government not to wait for an application for approval and to get on with the job of inquiring about, and investigating, ivermectin and approving it. Australians, I call on you to decide for yourself. Compare ivermectin and the vaccine. Consider the actions of federal and state governments. What happened to basic freedoms? What happened to Australia? Are you willing to help us bring back Australia?

/46 Comments/by

Profiting CEOs should pay back JobSeeker

I spoke in support of a motion that big companies who had a profitable COVID year and paid millions in executive bonuses should be made to pay back JobKeeper. JobKeeper was meant for companies that were struggling to keep their doors open, not to pump up executive bonuses.

Transcript

One Nation supports this motion. Many broad-stroke policies were voted through in the early days of COVID due to the uncertainty at the time. And yet mistakes were made, and these must be admitted and addressed. In some cases, JobKeeper payments went to companies with no need for the money and who used the money for purposes having nothing to do with the intent of JobKeeper, which was to protect jobs and to help workers and families get through tough times. Mega car dealership, Eagers Automotive, claimed JobKeeper and then paid out dividends for almost the exact same amount—$67 million. Star Casino received $64 million and then gave CEO, Matt Bekier, an equity bonus of $800,000.

Without basic governance, greed has come out to play. Company executives purloining JobKeeper for their own financial benefit does not pass the pub test. It’s time this government stopped running the country for the benefit of its big-business mates and started caring about the people paying for all of this—Australian taxpayers, current and future.

/by

Gendering Violence does not fix the core issue

,

The Greens moved a motion in the Senate today about domestic violence. While we know from statistics that women suffer greatly from DV, it is not the whole story and trying to pitch this issue as one gender versus the other will not fix it.

Motion: https://parlwork.aph.gov.au/motions/5e92f027-69ca-eb11-b864-005056b55720

Transcript

Thank you, Madame acting Deputy President. One nation opposes this motion. The national crisis is the very existence of violence in our homes and communities. That is violence against men, violence against women, violence against children, the elderly and those living with disabilities. It is fact that males are less likely to be victims of assault from an intimate partner compared to women. But that’s not the whole story. When it comes to violence and assaults from other family members, these statistics show that men and women are almost equally likely to suffer. Australia loses six men per day to suicide. And more men died from suicide in 2019, than the entire Australian road toll of 2019, 2020 combined. Men are 75% more likely to commit suicide than women. These figures are a national tragedy. This motion separates out a portion of the problem without regard for the whole. To solve a problem, first requires understanding the problem and its causes, and understanding what drives the perpetrator and the victim. To separate out only a part of the problem will perpetuate the violence.

/by

Debate me on climate – Challenge ignored for 602 days

,

The one thing we have never had in the Senate is empirical scientific evidence showing that carbon dioxide from human activity needs to be cut.

I have repeatedly challenged the greens to debate me on climate change. They refuse to because they don’t have the facts.

Transcript

So far we’ve had a global warming emergency, then a climate change emergency, then a climate catastrophe emergency. Now we’ve got a climate collapse emergency. One thing we’ve never had is any empirical scientific evidence showing that carbon dioxide from human activity needs to be cut. I first challenged Senator Waters to debate me and to provide the scientific evidence 10½ years ago. She immediately declined. She declined again in 2016 and again 602 days ago in the Senate. There has been nothing since, because there is no such evidence justifying the collapse of our electricity sector. What is threatened with extinction here is not our planet; it is our civilisation and it is science.

/by

How Northern Australia is left behind by the government

, ,

The Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility has been slammed as too hard to access and failing in its job to support growth in the North.

While this bill will hopefully begin to fix that, the real problems are far bigger. Access to cheap, reliable electricity, water and an efficient tax system are the biggest blockages to development. Fix those and the entire country will boom.

Transcript

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, Senator Hanson and I are passionate about developing the northern part of our country. The 2015 government white paper clearly articulated the unique challenges facing our north. It’s a no-brainer. Consider these things: long distances; highly variable weather, with more extreme weather in cyclones; services; shortage of services; and reliable and accessible infrastructure—which we simply take for granted here in the south. There are no economies of scale in the north, and they have smaller populations and plenty of communications blackouts.

In spite of the best intentions, a big pot of money and all the knowledge required to develop a robust fit-for-purpose infrastructure fund to meet the needs of the north, the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility has not been fit for purpose. As a member of the Select Committee on the effectiveness of the Australian Government’s Northern Australia agenda, I repeatedly felt disappointed to hear witnesses across northern Australia stating that getting money from NAIF was impossible.

Northern Australia is operating from a lower base than in the south. The foundational pieces that we take for granted here in the south—all-weather road access, reliable internet and access to a skilled workforce and highly qualified professionals, be they in the trades, engineering or medicine—are not readily available across northern Australia.

NAIF needed to be adding value to northern development at a grassroots level, yet missed that target altogether. It’s significant that, for a 20-year development horizon, the first five years have been far from optimal. We welcome the changes included in this legislation, but the ground lost during the last five years was an unnecessary opportunity cost and loss of momentum. The government had all the information it needed to have made better decisions from the start.

A more accessible NAIF is not the only element, though, that needs to be addressed. It’s ironic that the issues that need addressing to facilitate development in the north are systematically being dismantled in the south due to atrocious federal and state governments. For example, energy, land tenure and water access and price are severe problems and hurdles in the north. How the hell can these be addressed and solved with policies currently destroying energy, destroying water access and raising water prices, and destroying land tenure in the south? The problems in the north cannot be solved with these destructive policies.

It’s wonderful to have NAIF improved, but we need to get the governance in this country fixed. The core issue suppressing development in the north is atrocious state and federal governance. People, their talents and resources are being suffocated under the stifling morass of bureaucracy inherent in the interference, overlap and duplication of government agencies, state and federal. Until this poor governance is addressed, the good work that NAIF can bring will be diluted and development in the north will remain painfully slow, to the whole country’s detriment.

I look forward to the next review to see how quickly and effectively this last $2.5 billion brings northern Australia along with the rest of the country. We will be support being this bill, especially given the deadline of 30 June for the changes, and we will be closely scrutinising all amendments. We will not be supporting racially based amendments. We will improve assistance to the people in the north, and I point out some of the comments in my dissenting report to the Northern Australia agenda inquiry. We will be balanced and measured, but we will always ensure responsibility is with the right people.

/by

There is no “Climate Collapse”

,

First it was the hole in the ozone layer, then global warming, then it was climate change, now it’s climate collapse.

Alarmists keep moving the goalposts because their claims are simply not true. I spoke to this in the Senate last week.

Transcript

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I’ll discuss collapses already underway, and none of them involves a climate collapse—firstly, the economic collapse. In the name of unsubstantiated climate alarm, the Howard-Anderson Liberal-Nationals government, starting in 1996, colluded with the states to deceitfully bypass the Constitution to steal farmers’ property rights to comply with the UN’s Kyoto protocol. It concocted Australia’s first major party emissions trading scheme, a carbon dioxide tax to comply with UN dictates. It introduced the Renewable Energy Target, which has grown to now cost Australians an additional $13 billion each year, every year in their electricity costs, again to comply with UN dictates. In the name of climate, our electricity prices have risen artificially from the world’s lowest to now be the world’s highest. Manufacturing has collapsed. We no longer make cars; we make fewer household appliances; and we make no manufacturing tools, which are crucial for our security. Agriculture is being hammered. The Liberal-National energy minister, Angus Taylor, openly states he has fears for electricity prices, reliability and grid stability. Under this budget’s dreamy forecast, bets on hydrogen and continued subsidisation of expensive unreliables like wind and solar, we’re enduring a manufacturing collapse and we face economic collapse.

The second collapse is the collapse of science. Here are some facts. Firstly, on Monday 26 September 2016 the CSIRO confirmed that it has never stated that carbon dioxide from human activity is a danger and said it never will. So why do the Greens push policies for economic collapse? Why have Liberal-National and Labor governments enacted policies over 2½ decades for economic collapse? Secondly, on Wednesday 10 May 2017, in this building, the CSIRO admitted that today’s temperatures are not unprecedented. That means we didn’t cause the current mild cyclical warming that ended around 1995. So why did the Greens push policies for economic collapse? Why have Liberal-National and Labor governments for 2½ decades driven economic collapse? According to NASA satellites, global atmospheric temperatures have been essentially flat with no warming for more than a quarter of a century. Despite China, despite India, despite America, despite Europe and despite Russia producing record quantities of carbon dioxide, higher human production of carbon dioxide has not increased temperatures. So why do the Greens push policies for economic collapse? Why have Liberal-National and Labor governments driven for the last 2½ decades economic collapse?

Following the global financial crisis, most nations were in recession during 2009. In 2020, as a result of government COVID restrictions around the world, nations were again in recession. In both recession years, the use of hydrocarbon fuels fell and human carbon dioxide production fell, yet in both recession years atmospheric carbon dioxide levels continued increasing. Nature alone controls the carbon dioxide levels, so why do the Greens push policies for economic collapse? Why have Liberal, Nationals and Labor governments driven economic collapse for the last 2½ decades? The Bureau of Meteorology data on cyclones in Australia show no trend in cyclone frequency, severity or duration. There’s no climate catastrophe. The most severe drought in the last 120 years was the 1920s to 1940s drought. The next worst was the Federation drought in 1901. There is no climate catastrophe. Floods, bushfires, snowfall and every other climate factor show no change, just natural cyclical variation. There is no climate catastrophe. It’s been 601 days since my latest challenge to the Greens to present the data on which they base this nonsense and to debate me on the climate science and the corruption of climate science.

Finally, there’s no unprecedented global warming. There’s no climate change. There’s no climate catastrophe. There’s no climate collapse; instead, we have a collapse of science. The collapse of science led to an energy collapse that caused an economic collapse. Welcome to the Greens nightmare that is now the Liberals, Nationals and Labor nightmare. This is what happens when data is ignored and, instead, governance is based on unfounded opinions, personal and party political agendas, cronies, headlines, fear, emotions, UN policies, party donations and serving vested interests. And who pays for this atrocious governance and for these climate lies? We the people pay.

/1 Comment/by

Will there be a sorry day for transgender kids?

,

Where do you think our transgender kids will end up? Children who present with a felt sense of being born into the wrong body are given licence to make irreversible decisions that will affect their brain development and scar and mutilate their bodies.

When we start to accept that boys at 10½ can take puberty blockers, girls at 14 can have double mastectomies, and parents can be criticised and shamed when they attempt to counsel their children against these life-altering decisions, then lunacy, neglect and savagery are prevailing.

Transcript

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I raise a deeply troubling issue for all Australians. We know that feelings arise and pass, especially through adolescence. No feeling is final. Yet children who present with a felt sense of being born into the wrong body are given licence to make irreversible decisions that will affect their brain development and scar and mutilate their bodies. This is the life ahead for too many young people on the transgender highway.

There’s been an undeniable explosion of young females presenting with gender dysphoria. A hundred years of diagnostic history indicates this predominantly impacted males, yet in just 10 years we have witnessed a social contagion running rampant through our teenage girls—girls with no childhood history of gender dysphoria. In the United States, females requesting gender surgery in 2016-17 quadrupled. In the UK, females presenting with gender dysphoria over the last decade has risen over 4,000 per cent. In Australia, the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne has seen referrals rise from one in every two years to 104 in 2014.

In spite of the horrendous outcomes for many of these children—and I’ve met some—solid statistics are hard to come by. It seems this area of medical practice would prefer to keep their bad news under wraps. Gender dysphoria, as many eminent medical professionals will agree, overwhelming presents with pre-existing mental health conditions. In today’s highly politicised environment, when a child shares their distress around comfort with their gender, parents are challenged and even shamed if they attempt to take a comprehensive therapeutic approach to help their child. Instead, parents are labelled abusive and accused of harming their child when they refuse to consent to their child’s self-declared transgender identity.

Many of us may not remember our own teenage years, but those of us who have raised children through to adulthood will recall our own children going through adolescence. Parents walk a very fine line between nurturing their child’s emerging independence and supporting their child’s fragility. What we do know is that teens become super sensitive during this time. They hate people looking at them, they often loathe their newly emerging adult bodies or even feel revolted by them.

Everything is magnified, and they’re easily embarrassed. Being part of a tribe is powerful during this time, and that’s a perfect concoction for a social contagion. To make matters worse, the process of neural pruning during this time means their executive function is compromised, which is where we make our most effective decisions.

It’s irresponsible that we’re surrendering these life- and body-altering decisions to our children, putting them on a medical pathway of puberty blockers, sex hormones and irreversible surgery. An adult brain is required to balance the consequences of these life-changing decisions. We’re charging our children and, equally abhorrent, our courts with these enormous decisions. It’s our children, as young adults, that will left to face the horrendous consequences.

The medical pathway for children presenting with gender dysphoria is widely accepted as experimental. There’s no evidence that it’s safe. This is a call to all parents: your children are being used in an experiment where there’s no evidence it’s safe and plenty of evidence it’s not. Overnight, Sweden’s leading gender clinic stopped routine treatment of minors with hormone drugs due to safety concerns, citing cancer and infertility risks. There are concerns around bone density, memory, development of grey matter and cognitive impairment. These treatment are not proven safe, and yet our children can quite easily be prescribed puberty blockers and sex hormone treatment to then land on the operating table for irreversible surgery with grossly inadequate counselling. The counselling instead is left for the parents, for them to come to the terms with the loss of a child of one gender and welcome the emergence of another.

There’s another Sorry Day coming. That Sorry Day will be for all those vulnerable children that struggle through adolescence, as so many do, and we did nothing to protect them. When we start to accept that boys at 10½ can take puberty blockers, girls at 14 can have double mastectomies, and parents can be criticised and shamed when they attempt to counsel their children against these life-altering decisions, then lunacy, neglect and savagery are prevailing. These children will have every right as adults to turn to their parents, medical professionals, hospitals and the judicial system and demand compensation for our negligence because we lacked the courage, we lacked the will, to protect these children when they needed it the most.

/by

Budget: Government has abandoned the next generation

, , , ,

The Liberal/National government has handed down a budget that the Labor party would be proud of. The Government is increasing borrowing to respond to a phoney climate emergency. Our ports and much of our power grid are in the hands of malicious foreign owners, and yet there is nothing in the budget to buy back these vital strategic assets.

Defence funding is being spent on wasteful white elephant programs like the attack class submarines instead of caring for our diggers and making sure they have the equipment they need. There is no vision or care for the future in this budget. Only One Nation has the vision to fix the country.

Transcript

As servant to the people of Queensland & Australia I remind the senate and all Australians that 24 years ago Pauline Hanson warned that Australia was heading to a place that we would not recognise as Australia.

The Media devoted much attention to the immigration aspects of her comments, and completely missed the substance.

Today we have arrived at the place Pauline warned us about.

Australians are living with restrictions on association, on speech, on movement, on protest and we even have mandatory face coverings.

Our federation has broken apart, we have seen border checkpoints between States.

The phrase ‘papers please’ which has defined tyrants throughout history, is now life for everyday Australians.

Our police are arresting law-abiding citizens in their own homes for the crime of organising a peaceful protest.

Our police are forcefully arresting a journalist for the crime of reporting that protest.

Dictators have been overthrown for less than this!

In the famous words traced to French, English and American philosophers Montaigne, Bacon and Thoreau, our leaders had “nothing to fear but fear itself”, and they chose fear!

The Premiers and the Prime Minster have surrendered power to ‘unelected bureaucrats with medical degrees’ who have shown themselves incapable of seeing the big picture.

While social media are calling the COVID restrictions on businesses a war on Capitalism, it’s much more sinister.

Corporate Australia have record sales, record profits and have paid themselves higher dividends and bonuses.

The Liberal National Government sent JobKeeper to these same companies who used the money to pay themselves yet more dividends and bonuses.

Now with this budget the Company Tax clawback has been extended to 2023/24. Companies making a loss in 23/24 can claim that loss against tax paid in 2018/18 and the Government will give a refund.

Let me explain the concept of taxation to the Treasurer. The Government is not supposed to take the tax paid by corporate Australia… and give it back to them.

This money was supposed to pay for the things that define Australia as a caring society – Medicare, Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, childhood education and social security.

The Treasurer cannot give corporate tax back and then borrow the money to pay for recurring expenditure.

Yet that is exactly what this budget does.

Debt, debt and more debt to pay for profligate spending seemingly with no thought to the next generation that will be left to pay for it.

This is a budget of which Labor would be proud.

When I talk about the Lib Lab duopoly, even their budgets are looking the same.

As a result of coronavirus measures the world’s 400 richest people have increased their wealth by over 1 trillion dollars. We do not need to add to their wealth accumulation.

Much of this wealth is money that was once spent in local communities, in local hardware stores, community supermarkets, gift stores and greengrocers. Now many of those have been forced to close.

Online growth has gone to Amazon whose owner is the world’s richest man.

The real outcome from coronavirus measures has been the largest transference of wealth, from small business to the elites in Australian history.

We expect this sort of thing from the Liberal Party and their sell-out sidekicks the Nationals.

But Labor has embraced the politics of fear and cronyism in Queensland, Western Australia and Victoria.

Shame on you.

Only One Nation is committed to restoring a fair go for working Australians.

As our motion today on the National Curriculum and last sitting on de-gendered language shows, One Nation will continue to defend Australia as a faith-based nation committed to family and community.

One Nation continues to champion the natural environment. We continue to fight for clean air, for clean water, for clean food and for clean medicines.

We leave worshipping of the sky god of warming to Labor, the Greens and sadly now, in their final act of surrender, the Liberal-National Party with their policies contradicting science, common sense and nature.

With this budget the Government is borrowing money to increase funding for a fake climate emergency. There’s no climate emergency and a gutless pandering to the bed wetters on the left is not in the best interests of Australians.

This budget has a black armband view of Australia’s future. The projections for the contribution to GDP from agriculture are based on the assumption that lower rainfall will return and agricultural output and exports will decline.

According to the Government’s own research a drought like this last one has happened 10 times in the last 1000 years. It was not climate change 1000 years ago and it is not climate change now.

Cold weather has overtaken the northern hemisphere with widespread crop failures, reduced harvests and higher prices. This will not change over forward estimates.

Natural climate cycles have given our farmers a wonderful opportunity to grow our agricultural sector and exports.

Foreign influence and ownership in Australia has reached crisis levels and this budget has not done anything about it.

Our ports in Darwin, Melbourne and Newcastle and much of our power grid are now in the hands of a hostile foreign power. Those owners have publicly professed their loyalty not to Australia but to the Chinese Communist party.

This budget makes no provision for the cost of buying these contracts back so one can assume the Government does not intend to act to restore Australian sovereignty over our strategic assets.

Our armed forces are incapable of waging war against any serious challengers. Our subs are in pieces, only 1 sub is combat ready at this moment.

One.

The budget continues the new subs project despite the cost rising to an estimated $200 billion and delivery pushing out past 2030.

On the bright side Mr President, Australia is advancing our space capability.

Later this year an Australian designed and manufactured satellite will be launched into orbit from an Australian designed and manufactured rocket, using an Australian launch facility.

How amazing is that?

This is proof that it is time to get the government out of people’s lives and let free enterprise and Aussie ingenuity fix this mess.

Starting with withdrawing from the United Nations and their sovereignty-sapping, wealth-sucking, industry-killing conventions that make Australia less not more.

One Nation’s alternative budget will recover the freedoms, opportunities and living standards that Australians once enjoyed.

One Nation will cancel the submarine contract and purchase nuclear powered submarines off the shelf to expedite delivery and recover our defensive capability.

One Nation will terminate the clean energy fund and the Department of Climate change while honouring agreements already in place.

Every year Liberal-Labor-Nationals climate and energy policies cost Australians an ADDITIONAL $B13. The Liberal Energy Minister admits he is afraid for future electricity prices and terrified of losing reliability and stability.

Rightly so thanks to Liberal-Labor-Nationals policies starting with John Howard in 1996.

One Nation will abolish all energy subsidies for fossil fuel (except the diesel fuel rebate) and renewables so that free enterprise can build reliable, baseload power of whichever type they consider the most efficient.

This will restore our productive capacity by breathing life into our devastated industries.

One Nation will allow doctors to prescribe Australian medical cannabis to anyone with a medical need.

One Nation calls for a national taxation summit to reach agreement on how our taxation system is failing everyday Australians and destroying our country and to arrive at solutions based on proven principles.

This budget increases the number of public servants by 5000 over the next 12 months.

One Nation will freeze employment numbers in the Federal public service and re-allocate staff away from virtue signalling and pork barrelling projects into productive pursuits.

One Nation will reduce immigration such that our net population growth becomes zero. This will allow infrastructure like roads, hospitals, schools and housing to catch up with the avalanche of migrants that Labor/Greens and Liberal/Nationals have let in over the last 20 years.

A net zero population policy will actually allow around 80,000 migrants to still come in each year to replace the 80,000 who leave each year. We would expect 10,000 of those will be refugees.

This contrasts with a peak arrival rate of 275,000 new migrants annually pre COVID – 3 & ½ times our stable number.

The reduction in demand will take the heat out of the housing market and allow everyday Australians some relief from the extreme inflation we are seeing in housing, education, aged care, child care and medical expenses.

One Nation is preparing a plan that will turn Northern Australia into a growth engine for the whole country, offering a new future for Australia based on agriculture, mining, value adding.

More importantly, based on community.

/3 Comments/by

Northern Australia left behind by terrible government

, , ,

In North Queensland I met local visionaries with commitment, competence and dedication to a better North. But that was matched, sadly, on the other side of the scale by the incompetence of state and federal governments.

The North is simply waiting for good governance, I hope they get it before it is too late.

Transcript

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I want to relate my travels through the Flinders catchment area, which is the fourth biggest river flow in Queensland. There is rich soil, vast grassy plains with no trees and water: abundant water, regular water yet untapped. The potential is being wasted. I felt excited, supported, encouraged and inspired by the people I met in North Queensland, but I also felt worried and disappointed because of the atrocious state and federal governments that are cruelling that area. My needs in the people were met entirely: commitment, competence, dedication. But that was matched, sadly, on the other side of the scale by the inability of the state and federal governments to meet their needs for support and good governance.

We went to look firstly at the Bradfield Scheme, to do our due diligence. We’ve done it at the Murray-Darling Basin; now we’ve done it in the Flinders. The Bradfield Scheme is a visionary scheme to turn the waters that are flowing to the east and being wasted to the west and into the Thomson. We wanted to look at the Murray-Darling Basin catchment, which we have, and also at the Flinders, and this was a chance to see the Bradfield Scheme source and then to go across the Flinders. What we saw flying up the coast was naturally wet area in the tropics, the coast, Ingham and Tully. We then swung west over the Tully midstream and all the way down the Burdekin River to the Burdekin Falls Dam. We then turned west and went back across the Flinders catchment area, through Charters Towers, Hughenden, Richmond, Julia Creek, Cloncurry. We touched down in Cloncurry to fuel and then went north to Normanton, where there are huge vast plains, and then back south-west to Townsville where we started.

We then spent a week driving on the ground, listening to people, getting the lay of the land and the lay of the people. What impressed us were the locals with vision, real vision, complemented by their energy, their knowledge, their competence and their practicality. It was very inspiring, as I’ve already said. And there was plenty of water. They all said: ‘We don’t need the Bradfield Scheme water here. Let it go to the Thomson, as the original visionary plan from Bradfield suggested.’

In particular, I was impressed with the Richmond council; John Wharton, who is I think Queensland’s longest serving mayor—25 years if my memory is correct; and his very young but very competent CEO, Peter Bennett. They have a plan and a project that the locals are onboard with, called the Richmond agricultural project. It’s very simple: no dams, just divert water to 8,000 hectares of irrigable and rich, fertile soil. With agricultural production comes people and with people come services. Instead of Richmond bobbing around at 900 people, we can get it back up to 3,000, maybe even 8,000, people. It could be a really vibrant area in the north.

We also visited Hughenden, where the same recipe is being followed: water captured not in a dam but in weirs and diverted into storage areas or underground water. We saw Jane McNamara leading her team there; and Daryl Buckingham, who’s had experience in the Murray-Darling Basin and who’s transferring it to the north. We also visited HIPCo, Hughenden Irrigation Project Corporation, with Shane McCarthy. The council sponsored projects there, as I said, follow the same recipe.

We then went to Julia Creek on the ground, and we went to Etta Plains where we saw a very dynamic young Lucas Findley from Findley farms escaping the Murray-Darling Basin and the devastation of the regulations, the bureaucracy and the poor governance in the south. And we saw something fresh.

I could go on, but time will catch me here. What they’re all waiting for is good governance, which the state government and the federal government are not providing. The state government won’t allocate water allocations. They can’t do anything without that.

Ironically, the state government talks about capturing carbon dioxide, which the evidence shows is not necessary, but crops absorb carbon dioxide, and dams create crops that will absorb carbon dioxide. If they were fair dinkum, they’d do it. Ironically, the challenges up north are land tenure, water and energy. While they’re looking for it up north and have it in abundance, they can’t use it, because the same policies are destroying governance in the south.

/by

Industrial Relations Omnibus Explainer

,

The Government’s IR omnibus was gutted last week before it passed the Senate. I was disappointed to see that the wage theft and enforcement measures were not passed. The insertion of a detailed definition of casual worker is good for certainty.

The inclusion of a right to get conversion from a casual position to a permanent position was also a welcome addition. Industrial Relations must return to the fundamental relationship between the employer and employee. The complexity of the Fair Work Act is the cause of many of our problems in IR. It must be simplified if we are going to have a productive country.

Transcript

Last Thursday’s industrial relations changes are a win for employees and for employers. I was disappointed though to not see more, especially the wage theft and enforcement measures in Schedule 5. I’ve been very vocal and active working for casual miners and workers, and want to share what last Thursday’s changes mean.

Firstly though, the government agreed to my demand for a comprehensive review into the employment of casuals in the Hunter Valley. The government committed to the Fair Work Ombudsman doing a thorough review. Secondly, after almost two years supporting injured casual coal miners, it’s time to look for a broad and complete solution.

I invite the key stakeholders to join me at a round-table to discuss solutions for the problems that I have identified facing many workers in the Hunter and throughout Australia. I will be inviting key stakeholders including unions, employer groups, and government to come together to work cooperatively and then report back on the results.

It’s time the facts came out and are addressed. Thirdly, the IR Club, class-action lawyers, and political parties with vested interests have driven a dishonest misinformation campaign protecting their easy profits and their power over workers.

So now, here are the industrial relations changes and what they mean:

Casual workers now have a pathway for conversion to secure permanent work. There are 2.5 million casuals in Australia. In some industries casuals want to stay as casuals for the loading or for the lifestyle. 830,000 casuals are employed in small business, our country’s largest employer and largest provider of jobs.

Most awards already include casuals. The Black Coal Mining Industry Award though, did not have provision for casuals on production, and only in staff jobs and the unions refused to fix that. Despite that prohibition on casuals, the Hunter Valley CFMEU negotiated and signed enterprise agreements that allowed abuse of casuals.

It did that without casual conversion and that had locked many miners into being casuals forever. Some enterprise agreements that the CFMEU had agreed to were for substantially lower pay rates than mine owner enterprise agreements. I tried many ways to overcome this, yet once I realised that union bosses had signed these enterprise agreements with lower pay, I knew that the workers were then legally bound by that deal.

It’s important to know that some workers value casual employment as a way of getting into the coal industry or as a way of getting more money quickly and then leaving the industry. Workers and employers have a definition of casual employment now that provides clarity to protect all businesses, small and large, and gives workers a fair go.

The definition is complex yet detailed and comprehensive. We negotiated a 12-month review of the new law to identify and rectify any unintended consequences, it’s one of our amendments to protect workers. Employers will be protected from paying twice for casual workers’ entitlements as that could have driven businesses, especially small businesses, insolvent.

And workers can still get their entitlements, and will get their entitlements. Permanent workers will get their entitlements while casuals will continue to be paid a casual loading in lieu of the entitlement, it just means people won’t be paid twice.

This protects small business from double-dipping where workers are paid a casual loading in lieu of entitlements, and then paid for those same entitlements in addition. Now following my commitments and my comments opposing double-dipping, I should have been no surprise that I voted for this Offset clause.

The class-action lawyers and some union bosses who profit from signing the abusive enterprise agreements and then taking employers to court are worried about the changes. Employees in small businesses will have the option to ask for conversion to permanent instead of adding to busy small business employers’ paperwork having to track people.

This will ease small business red tape, and that’s an amendment we added. Preserving all workers’ entitlements and rights means that workers will still be able to file claims for wage theft or to vary enterprise agreements made incorrectly, we made sure of that. Now some enterprise agreements were for substantially lower pay rates than mine owner enterprise agreements on the same site.

Again, it’s the union bosses that signed those agreements and made them law, we can’t do anything about them. Workers have greater flexibility now in seeking to convert to permanent work when it suits them, while the many who want to stay casual can now have that option too.

Having worked at the underground coalface for three years, I proudly admit to having a soft spot for miners. Yet while taking care of miners, I have a responsibility as a national Senator to our whole country, including small business, Australia’s largest employer. Out of the hundreds of awards in place across Australia, only 12 don’t have clauses for casuals.

This law now covers all awards, including coal mining and small business, and miners now have a casual conversion option at last. Though we are also asking the Fair Work Commission to ensure that the awards align with the legislation. When this legislation was first introduced into parliament last year, we immediately wrote to more than 80 stakeholder groups, and invited feedback.

The CFMEU construction division said it was the only invitation they received from a politician. In total, we listened to around 100 groups, some more than once, including the ACTU who had three meetings with me. The big problem for casual coal miners were the cracks they fell through because union bosses were happy to sign agreements knowing there was no definition for a casual coal production worker, and this disadvantaged casual coal miners.

The union didn’t care about that for years. The lack of a definition of casual coal mine worker that the union bosses, the Fair Work Commission, and the Fair Work Ombudsman, and the Government ignored for years until now has caused huge problems for workers. Now we have a definition, and this should only be better for workers.

Groups representing small business as well as individual business owners have been very positive about the changes that One Nation advocated for economic recovery.

These include: the Council of Small Business Organisations of Australia, COSBOA,

the Small Business Association of Australia,

the Australian Retailers Association,

the Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman,

the Australian Hotels Association, taking care of pubs,

the Australian Industry Group,

the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry,

and the Queensland Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Opponents of these reforms have been treated harshly by employers and employees alike. For example, the ACTU reportedly copped it from small business employees. Simply saying it’s bad for workers, it’s not enough to describe this legislation, that’s nonsense.

Some workers are taking time to understand the changes, yet small business employees and employers have been quick to see the benefits. The main negatives we faced have been from class-action lawyers and the Industrial Relations Club, so we must be doing something right for workers.

The negotiation process has confirmed some core truths: Firstly, the Fair Work Act is the real culprit. It’s six bloody inches thick. How can any worker or small business know their entitlements, rights, and protections? They can’t. And that’s why workers have lost entitlements and unions have lost members.

The Fair Work Act is the root cause of the complexity and problems, and we must do something about that. And we had success during negotiations with unions and employer groups agreeing to my invitation to them to discuss what employers and employees need in order to restore Australia’s productive capacity, and to give workers a fair go.

The Rudd-Gillard-Shorten Fair Work Act has led to a drop in union membership and a deterioration of management and executives right across our country. People are going around the laws. Workers and employers are both losing and hurting. Employers could not afford the complex system or the cost, and nor can the workers.

We need to restore the primary workplace relationship between employees and employers to make work safer and more satisfying for our workers and employers, and make it more productive for our country’s future.

/by