Malcolm’s Official Speeches in Parliament
Yesterday I spoke on an amendment to the Native Title legislation. While I support anything that removes complexities, the government still hasn’t promised to give farmers restoration or compensation of their property rights.
Make no mistake, farmers property rights have been stolen by governments to comply with international agreements like the Kyoto Protocol and Paris Agreement. They must have restoration or compensation.
I spoke on my ongoing investigation into the case of mine worker Simon Turner. A huge abuse has happened here and government agencies have done nothing.
As a servant of the people of Queensland and Australia, I have a duty to raise and fix issues that are both hurting and concerning everyday Australians. As a Senator I work for the people.
Today, I raise a matter of great concern for everyday Australians – particularly our hardworking coal miners.
Australian workers are feeling afraid for their jobs, for their livelihoods, for their future. Workers need fairness, integrity, trust and accountability. I’m concerned for the many workers and businesses small and large that have suffered from state and federal govt COVID restrictions. Business leaders and workers are all looking for direction from this government, yet at the same time a government authority is doing the wrong thing and abusing workers.
What I’ve witnessed since coal miner, Stuart Bonds and I took up the cause of the exploited, abused and discarded Hunter Valley casual coal miners, is a mass of evidence pointing to potential systemic failures and possibly corruption inside a government agency. An agency that Hunter Valley CFMEU bosses and Minerals Council of NSW executives jointly govern and direct. We Australians cannot afford our own government to continue shonky behaviour at a time when we should be spending our money wisely.
Thanks to Stuart Bonds’ voluntary help for abandoned workers like Simon Turner and others the Coal LSL scam was uncovered. Simon Turner and many workers wrote for help from their local MPs including Joel Fitzgibbon six times and to this day Joel Fitzgibbons has ignored their letters. Six times.
Joel Fitzgibbon has been the member for Hunter since 1996 so it’s surprising that he does not know that coal miners are the key to this area’s future.
The agency involved is the Coal Mining Industry (Long Service Leave Funding) Corporation – better known as ‘Coal LSL’. An Australian Government corporation established to regulate and manage long service leave entitlements on behalf of eligible employees in the black coal mining industry.
What I hear is that governance isn’t just lacking, it’s absent. I’m yet to hear why causals get a different LSL rate to permanents on the same rosters, same work.
As an example, Coal LSL’s system seems incapable of checking whether an employee actually receives their correct long service leave entitlement. Coal LSL just accepts an employer letter and pays the employer. No validation or checking of payments to entitlements to actual payment to employees.
A recent analysis of information that Coal LSL themselves provided reveals evidence of duplication, even triplication, of transactions paid to employers. The reporting recently provided to me is unclear[1]. Levy reimbursements during 2018 include a category for details “Not readily available”. For example, the $264,000 of refunds, not reimbursements, paid out from July 2017 to November 2018. What are these refunds, where’s the transparency? Coal LSL makes lump sum payments that, again, make reconciliation complex. For example, one of BHP’s OS entities in the Hunter Valley received $187,881.77 in a single transaction in May 2020. For who?
It seems that Coal LSL may not be able to confirm employees are even real people as they do not collect ABN or tax file numbers. They simply get a name and a date of birth. They’re operating in the dark ages and need a modern system to prevent fraud?
In some cases we have heard of companies in Singleton being reimbursed for long service leave even though they do not work in coal mining. In one case, Coal LSL paid reimbursements totalling approx. $57,000 to the wife of the owner of a Queensland company with no state office. Why?
We have learned of an employee not receiving on-boarding information about the Coal LSL scheme, particularly in regard to the employee option to opt out of the scheme and save money. In one case recently a coal miner reported that Coal LSL debited his entitlement for 250 hours of long service, when he actually had not taken leave from his employer. Where’s the governance?
Concerns have been expressed to me that Coal LSL’s current processes might enable a bogus company to register and then to possibly launder money through Coal LSL and then reclaim the funds ‘cleaned’ and available to be transferred to criminals. Where are the checks in the system? The CEO whose annual remuneration is a staggering $430,187 and her Governance Officer have clearly been asleep at the wheel.
I have personally challenged Coal LSL many times in Senate Estimates and even they do not understand how entitlements are accrued, invested, reconciled and paid to individual coal miners. The CEO could not provide a satisfactory response to a simple question in regard to how Coal LSL accounts for monies paid in and monies paid to employees.
The question is that if bogus companies have been paid in the last seven years, then how could this not be picked up? I’m informed that Coal LSL takes registered companies at their word. That has already led to Coal LSL admitting serious errors in miners’ accounts and entitlements.
As Coal LSL has revealed in senate estimates, it has not listened to the complaints of many coal miners who’ve found discrepancies in their entitlements. Once raised, Coal LSL is slow or unresponsive.
I encourage all coal miners to check that Coal LSL has correctly stated their entitlements so they’re not ripped off. Simon Turner, an exploited Hunter Valley coal miner is a case in point where, after years of requests and complaints, Coal LSL took the word of his rogue employer, Chandler Macleod. Over solid evidence and over Simon’s legitimate requests for a fair go.
Coal LSL is lax at informing employees of their options with many casual miners not told that they’re entitled to choose to not contribute to the scheme and to instead take their employers’ contributions as cash in hand. Let’s face it, at the moment Coal LSL receives the employer contributions for many casual coal miners who it never has to pay out if employees do not stay for the eight year qualifying period. Where does this mountain of cash go and how is it accounted for? What I do know is that many casuals would be better avoiding Coal LSL.
There are many, many examples of Coal LSL failing in its obligations and failing to have appropriate checks and balances to verify that employees are getting their entitlements.
For all we know there may be systemic corruption on this governments’ watch. Have unaccountable union bosses and Minerals Council of NSW executives on this Morrison government authority lined their pockets using bogus companies at the expense of coal miners throughout Australia? We just do not know? Clearly, it’s time for change.
We’re talking about an authority that thousands of workers rely on to protect long service leave entitlements. An authority with a culture biased towards pleasing the employer not on protecting and being accountable for employee’s entitlements. This is not the Coal LSL clerical staff’s fault. It’s the Board and management who must stand up and be held to account. Governance does not exist and the culture of Coal LSL is not solutions or customer focussed. Clearly, it’s time for change.
For too long, Coal LSL has operated as a rogue government authority. Until I brought them before Senate Estimates they were never called upon to explain their actions. It was the suffering of exploited and abandoned workers like Simon Turner that put a spotlight on Coal LSL and its culture that ignores abandoned workers. Clearly, it’s time for change. And it must be now.
Today, Stuart Bonds and I are strongly advocating for change in Coal LSL and a reconciliation of all accounts and entitlements to ensure that workers and employers are not being ripped off.
Stuart Bonds and I pledge to work for justice for workers hurting from the actions of unthinking, uncaring, unaccountable government authorities like Coal LSL. Authorities under the joint control of shadowy union bosses and a Minerals Council acting for uncaring mining conglomerates. The same mining companies and union bosses that enabled the exploitation of casual coal miners in the Hunter Valley.
Clearly, it’s time for a change. Coal LSL needs to be taken out of the hands of self-interested parties. Coal LSL management needs a broom put through it. A change to build an open, honest transparent, accountable culture to protect the entitlements of everyday Australian workers.
I implore all workers and everyday Australians – rural and city – to vote with your feet. Please go and tell your local union branch, member of parliament and senator that you expect that workers’ rights and entitlements to be protected. Tell Joel Fitzgibbon that the time for talk is over and it’s time for action. Tell Joel Fitzgibbon, the NSW Minerals Council and the CFMEU Hunter Valley union bosses that Coal LSL like all government bodies must demonstrate the highest standards of integrity, to protect workers’ interests, to behave with common sense and transparency. Workers deserve integrity and support.
The Cashless Debit Card is controversial. Last week One Nation voted to extend the trial of the system. Controversial because activists, Labor and the Greens are ignoring the facts and confusing the public with mistruths.
Firstly, it’s not a cashless program. Recipients still have between 20% and 50% in cash. Secondly, this is a program that was requested from communities to help protect children and families. This system stops people from using their entire taxpayer funded welfare payments on alcohol, gambling, drugs and cigarettes.
Reports from those on the system and their communities are already claiming that there are less hungry children and less violence and crime. This program protects children and families and taxpayer welfare payments. There are no plans to extend this program to the pension. This is a scare campaign by the left. And we wouldn’t support it anyway.
Hi, I’m Senator Malcolm Roberts, and I’m in Parliament House, Canberra. And I want to discuss the cashless debit card or it’s actually the less-cash debit card because it still comes with cash. Why are we doing it? And why do we support the government’s trial? Because it’s all about kids and families, protecting kids and families.
Making sure that kids get a belly full of food and it’s not just consumed, the money is not just wasted on alcohol and booze from their parents. So it’s about the future of our country because kids learn better at school. They develop better physically when they’ve got full bellies and not starving. It’s about kids and families.
Making sure that the money from taxpayers goes to people who deserve the welfare. So that leads me to my second point. And that, that as a Senator, I have responsibility not just to the people who need welfare and support, but to the people who pay for the welfare and the support, the taxpayer. So we have to make sure that the taxpayer’s money provides value for the taxpayer.
‘Cause it’s a lot of money for taxpayers, who have worked hard to get that money and to see it wasted on booze and drugs and gambling and cigarettes, is just not on. The third thing is that, I hinted to it earlier. It’s a less-cash card, it’s not a cash-less card. There’s cash still involved, the proportion of cash varies from 20% through to 50%, depending upon the community.
This is a trial and they’re trialling many different parameters. And that means that as people learn from the trial, and the trial has now been going for a few years. As people learn, they tweak the trial because they learn from their mistakes and let’s remove the mistakes, and they see other opportunities. And so they wanna make sure that people benefit from that.
And remember, the less-cash card came out of requests from communities where there was massive abuse of kids and families. Waste of money, tearing up the communities. Those communities approached government and wanted help. Liberal National Party Government, and the Labour Party Government under Gillard.
So this is about protecting our future, and protecting taxpayers, and above all, protecting kids. So it is a difficult issue, an emotional issue. It’s been distorted by various people using lots of lies and slang, but it is about protecting kids, protecting families, and protecting taxpayers, and making sure that Australia gets value for its money.
Last week in Canberra I was unable to give this speech in the Senate so I recorded so you could hear. The government is proposing changes to the the Industrial Relations system and I wanted to put my views on the record and say to the government that the IR system is broken and needs fixing. And simplifying.
I serve the people of Queensland & Australia and want to discuss our shared need for:
And I will shine a light on the Industrial Relations Club, known as the IR Club. The root cause of most IR conflict.
We have listened to workers – casual and permanent – across Queensland and Australia. From Thursday Island to the Hunter to Tasmania, from Brisbane to Perth. We have listened to union bosses and union bodies. We have listened to small and medium sized businesses. We have listened to employer and industry groups.
We have listened to the government and to the opposition. I’ve worked underground at the coalface in five regions across our country, managed mines and negotiated and introduced IR changes improving safety, productivity and security. As a mining executive I introduced the Australian coal industry’s first radically new enterprise award, one proudly based on matching employees needs and employers’ needs.
Our people set records that stood for decades with extremely high worker retention and Australia’s best safety performance for large underground coal mines. Listening reveals that across our country, people are hurting, feeling vulnerable. Afraid for their jobs, afraid of the future.
Add to that Australians are hurting from the economic fallout from COVID with restrictions and lock-downs keeping us away from our jobs, businesses and loved ones. People feel confused, often despairing, even hopeless. Many feel powerless to improve their situation or their business, frustrated that this government didn’t listen and just listens to the IR Club.
And people like HV miner Simon Turner crippled, exploited and discarded due to abuses proving the complete failure of current Industrial Relations laws. People are angry. The “Industrial Relations Club, the IR Club” is alive and well. It keeps its members fat, well paid and secure – lawyers, courts, employer peak bodies like the BCA, major UB’s.
Driven to perpetuate conflict so they have something to “fix,” a reason for staying in existence. Using complexity to conjure issues that need lawyers and UB’s to sort. The primary workplace relationship between employee and employer has been shoved aside. The IR system is broken. And that’s destroying Australian industry and exporting jobs to China.
The IR Club perpetuates artificial restrictions that needlessly destroy productivity and job security and suppress wages. Restrictions hurting workers and employers. The Building & Construction General On-Site Award is almost 150 pages long with 80 separate allowances on top of the prescribed wage schedule.
Australia’s cabotage is another IR Club casualty – and guts national security, sovereignty and tax revenue. The IR Club’s other victims are small and medium sized business. Our economy’s engine room. The IR Club insists on a one size fits all from large multinationals with huge teams of lawyers through to small businesses. Queensland’s 445,000 small businesses are now under even greater pressure as a result of the govt’s COVID response.
And, as a result of the IR Club, small businesses are left with complex, unworkable IR rules that are not fit for purpose. The IR Club is one reason why small businesses and honest big businesses are angry. We need honest, competent leadership making decisions based on solid data and facts with strength of character and a willingness to serve our country’s people, Australians. A Prime Minister who tries to do good, not just look good.
One Nation protects workers’ rights and knows that only employers, entrepreneurs, small businesses and workers create jobs. The govt’s COVID restrictions have done enormous damage. Yet the govt-induced collapse is not an excuse to cut pay or job security. Instead, let’s reform IR together properly.
Thank you madam acting deputy president. I was told in meetings with defence last year that the PFAS task force was working on the problem with PFAS contamination by applying a whole of government response. So I asked for the minutes of their meetings to see what a whole whole of government response looked like. I was refused. I did a document discovery. Still no minutes arrived.
This third attempt has succeeded. It should not have been this hard to get hold of a simple set of minutes. Having read them, I do understand why they had to be prized away from the task force. The Morrison government’s PFAS response is all talk. It is a process that has no destination and as a result is achieving nothing. It seems to be aiming to stall and to avert. The last concrete action by this government was in 2018 to award $55 million for a drinking water programme for affected areas and $73 million for research into PFAS.
There are now over 900 PFAS sites around Australia. The government is remediating four defence sites. Bases at Williamtown, Oakey, Edinburgh and Katherine. Four down, 896 to go. While the PFAS task force is sitting around holding meetings and reissuing old guidances, the residents of the red zones continue to live with the nightmare every day.
Residents are trapped in homes that are unsaleable. One resident that I’ve spoke with many times and visited his house on a number of occasions, David Jefferis and his wife Diane Priddle from Oakey in Queensland purchased their property in 2004 for a combined $2.4 million investment. At that time, the defence department knew his land was affected by PFAS and yet they kept quiet.
Once the contamination was made public the property became unsaleable. Dave and Diane’s successful cattle breeding and grazing business had to close because nobody wants to buy contaminated cattle or genetics. They have a stud property. A very clean, tidy operation. David and Diane’s property and business was recently valued by a registered valuer at just $400,000.
A $2 million loss through no fault of their own. It’s an outrage that the Morrison government is allowing these residents to remain trapped in red zones while the PFAS taskforce drifts around from meeting room to meeting room in search of direction. While a recent class action lawsuit was settled, Dave and Diane received just $120,000 compensation and he hasn’t got the money yet.
The government’s own PFAS subcommittee has made the same recommendation in the last two update reports which called for remediation, compensation and like for like relocation. That’s fair. I hope the third head of that subcommittee in just two years, Senator McCarthy, has more success in getting their recommendations implemented.
The way forward now must be to remove residents out of the contaminated red zones, install remediation units and treat the groundwater before these toxic plumes spread further and ruin yet more lives.
Now last year, I asked the then Minister for Agriculture Senator McKenzie if it was safe for producers like David and Diane to send their cattle to auction and Senator McKenzie replied, quote,
“There is no reason why farmers cannot send their produce to market.”
End of quote. Well, let’s examine that statement. Food standards Australia specify a safe level for PFAS exposure of 20 nanograms for PFAS and 160 nanograms for PFOA. These can be present together for a total PFAS level of 190 nanograms per kilo of body weight. On the 19th of September 2020, The European Food Safety Authority set a new safety threshold for PFAS contamination.
The limit which now applies across the EU, is just 4.4 nanograms per kilogram of body weight per week. A fraction of what Australia allows. The European body considered the decreased response of the immune system to vaccination to be the most critical human health effect of PFAS exposure.
So I ask. Has the PFAS task force considered that the Morrison government is about to introduce a vaccine for COVID that might be put at risk through our tolerating PFAS levels that are 40 times higher than the new European Safety Standard. Cattle in the red zone from RAAF Base Richmond have been tested at over 1000 nanograms per kilo.
Newborn calves are testing at over 300 nanograms. This is the product that former Minister McKenzie says is safe to sell and consume. It is not safe to sell. By sending contaminated products to the EU, we’re risking food and livestock exports of $2 billion a year. This is not just affecting Oakey, this is affecting the whole beef industry.
The Morrison government can find billions to give to its big business mates for corporate welfare in the name of COVID but can’t find a lesser amount a much much lesser amount to find a like for like relocation and compensation scheme for everyday Australians caught up in the nightmare of the government’s making despite the committee recommending it do so. It’s time for the prime minister to fix this problem. And I seek leave to continue my remarks.
Transcript
[Malcolm Roberts]
Hi, I’m Senator Malcolm Roberts and I’m in Parliament House in Canberra. I’d like you to watch a few clips coming up from a debate last night in the Senate. They’re clips of Senator Hanson and I addressing the word Racism and the word Racist. We’ve noticed that, over the last few years, people use those terms when they don’t have facts, don’t have data, and don’t have a logical argument to counter us.
So what some of the Greens were doing, some of the weaker greens and some of the weaker people in the Labor Party, they were diverting attention from the merits of the Cashless Debit Card and calling its supporters racists or invoking racism so Pauline and I decided to launch into that. Have a look at these clips and see what you think.
[Malcolm Roberts]
To the minister. It’s very sad to see and disappointing to see the term racist and racism used as an excuse because whenever I’ve seen it, it’s been an excuse covering the lack of facts and solid logical argument. And it seems to be meant to intimidate and silence and divert. It won’t silence people who have the facts. Has there ever been any targeting of groups, either under Labour or the Liberal National Party governments, or is this initiative broadly based upon people’s needs and protecting children?
[Deputy President]
Minister.
[Minster]
Thank you, thank you very much Senator Roberts. The measure is targeted at the people that are on income working age, income support within geographical areas.
[Deputy President]
Senator Roberts.
[Malcolm Roberts]
Thank you. Minister, just seems to be continuing on this racist theme. My understanding of racist and racism is where one group, a particular race, is classified or thought of as inferior or superior. Is there any discussion at all, or labelling of any group within the department as inferior or superior or is this based on needs?
[Deputy President]
Order, order. Order. Minister.
[Minster]
Thank you very much, Madam Deputy President. As I have stated on a number of occasions, the cashless debit card is in places where the community have sought for the support and help of the government through the implementation of this card and other associated measures. And there were quite a number of them including, many of the wraparound services and support services that exist as well. But the card is in places on the basis of the request of the leaders within a geographical community area.
[Pauline Hanson]
Thank you very much. Well, I’ve listened to the debate and I’ve listened to some of the questions that have been asked to you tonight and really disturbs me. The question being asked is this about racism? Is it racist and the policies of where you pick theories, this- I asked the minister directly, how did it come about and the areas that were picked.
The areas were picked just because of community whether it be the mayors, the councillors, the community themselves, the business leaders, or even community leaders have asked for this trial. Whether – and the whole fact is yes, the same because the population and Senator Wong asked the question about the percentages and we got and high 40% of one area are indigenous and yet another area got 80% indigenous so where you have the majority are non-indigenous.
We as a parliament need to look at and leaders of this nation we need to actually look at what is the best interest of the people. This was a trial that was put out. These are communities that asked for this trial, it’s a card that is actually going to restrict the spending of the money to 80% has to be spent on central services, meaning paying the rent, buying food, clothes for the kids, and it’s actually ensures there’s food on the table.
Isn’t the basis of what we’re all should be concerned about is the wellbeing of the children. Adults can take care of themselves, children can’t, children rely on the parents. If we have a problem in our society where the parents are tied up in alcohol or drug abuse or gambling, that the money doesn’t get to where it should get, isn’t that the basis of why we are looking at this card. And it doesn’t matter what race or colour of your skin is we have problems right across our whole society we have this problem and especially in regional and rural areas there’s a huge drug problem. I hear it constantly all the time.
The thing is that you talk about is it racist? I can go into many areas that I can say we have racist policies in Australia.
[Deputy President]
Order.
[Pauline Hanson]
That is purely based on the fact that because if you’re indigenous you get extra funding, you get care taken for you. So I’m not gonna head down that path as many Australians know that. I don’t think that’s the basis of what we should be looking out here. I’ve travelled these indigenous communities I’ve been there and I’ve seen the problems that we have there, but it’s not only in the indigenous communities we got in other areas in Australia that needs to be addressed. But we as the leaders of this nation we must look at what are we trying to achieve here? It’s the benefit of the future generations. Kids in these communities are not getting schooled, they are not getting the care that they need, they’re not getting fed. So the fact is that that’s what we need to address. We actually have to also look at the fact that the communities have asked for this, I’ve listened to the indigenous leaders that have begged for the card.
[Deputy President]
Order.
[Pauline Hanson]
That they wanted this card. We have people opting in for this card. We have people in communities are saying we can’t control our money because our family and friends come to us and they force us to hand over the money to them. Now they have control of their money. What are you actually worried about? They’ve got 20% of their money they can still spend as they wish, 80% is going to the needs that they need for their household, for the children to look after children. If you look at the stats and reports and I haven’t got the figures in front of me.
[Deputy President]
Order.
[Pauline Hanson]
But a lot of the figures were 40% plus were actually saying there’s less drug use, there is less gambling, there is less domestic violence. The replace report that came in said there’s less domestic violence and promise to having more kids are going to school, they’re actually being fed before they go to school. These are the actual facts just sit here and argue over the fact is it racist policy is not what this is about. And I’m sick of people, some people in this chamber calling themselves as if they’re the victims. Our job is to make sure good policy for all people, all Australians, that they actually have the benefit of our wise decisions.
[Deputy President]
Order.
[Pauline Hanson]
Because they are relying on us to make the right decisions in this parliament,
[Deputy President]
Senator Wong, oh, sorry I thought you finished.
[Pauline Hanson]
I hadn’t.
[Deputy President]
Continue, Senator Hanson
[Pauline Hanson]
Thank you very much. Also, the fact is that on websites we are seeing and the scaremongering that is going on on the opposition side parliament telling it is the elderly who are going to be affected by this people ringing up my office and saying, “Well, it is the age pensioners “that are going to be losing this due to the card.” There is no talk about that whatsoever, that question has been asked by the government it is not going to include the aged.
So I’m sick of the scaremongering that’s going on with people because I’m getting that and it is up on the website but you clearly say it is the elderly. And so people think and the veterans that you’re gonna tie them up in this and it’s got nothing to do with them. This has been completely blown out of proportion by people telling lies and not telling the truth to the Australian public to know the benefits of this card, minister then I asked you the question clarify here in this chamber to the people of Australia are aged pensions going to be involved on this card?
Are the people who are on disability pension going to be included on this card? Who is it actually going to affect? Do you intend, and I think the Australian people need to know have a direct answer, is this going to be rolled out in this term of parliament till the next election to all Australians? Because that is what is been said to all the Australians in lies to the putting out by the opposition and lies have been put out by the Greens Party.
I want the people have to have an honest answer that is recorded here in the parliament is this going to include the elderly, is this going to include those in disability pensions, is it going to be rolled out to all Australians before the next election? And what do you intend to do with your policies after next election minister?
[Deputy President]
Minister.
[Minister]
Thank you very much.
[Deputy President]
Order
[Minister]
Madam deputy present, I’ll try and answer all the components of the Senator Hanson’s questions and contribution. And I apologise if I miss some of them but I’m more than happy to come back to them.
Firstly, I acknowledge the second reading amendment of Senator Patrick which did give us the opportunity to put on the record that the government has provided a commitment through that second reading, supporting of that second reading amendment that no recipient of the age pension or a veteran or services pension will be placed on the cashless debit card. There are however, a couple of exceptions to that and I wanna put that on the record very, very clearly, very, very clearly.
[Deputy President]
Order.
[Minister]
With the exception, and there are two main categories of exemption, people on the age pension are able to voluntarily seek to go on to the card whether it be the Basics Card or the CDC. And we know in the Northern Territory around two and a half thousand people that are on the Basics Card in the Northern Territory are actually, have gone on so voluntarily. And of those two and a half thousand people that are on voluntarily are over 800 of them are actually aged pensioners.
The second category of people who could be on income management who are of pension age or also on a pension, are those that have been either referred by the Family Responsibilities Commission and for those who are listening and don’t know what the Family Responsibilities Commission is, it is the group of commissioners in the Cape York that make the decisions in relation to the people of that community, and it’s also contained in this bill.
Where child protection workers, social workers, or Alcohol Mandatory Treatment Tribunal in the Northern Territory has requested on the basis of safety, either safety of the individual or safety of those in their care that they go on to the card. There are only a very few people who are on the card for that reason. However, I just wanna be very, very clear they are the only two categories of people on the age pension that are on a subject to income management.
In relation to your comments around, the information and the data around what we’re seeing is improvements as a result of the cashless debit card and income management. As I said, in and of itself they are not the single silver bullet. You sort of remedy all for some of the problems that they are, the cashless debit card and the Basics Card we’re seeking to reduce.
They are but one component of a suite of measures that needs to be put together to bring about the kind of change that the communities who have sought access to the cashless debit card have requested. And in reading the letter of support that I received from the community leaders in Ceduna there were many things that these communities that observed over the time that the cashless debit card has been in place in that community and I’ll just read just a little bit of the letter that I received, Senator Hanson.
And I quote, this is actually a quote, “Since the introduction of the cashless debit card, “we have observed positive changes in our communities. “Fewer vulnerable people have been harassed or humbled” These are their words, “To hand over cash to others. “More children are attending school, “families have money to spend on groceries “and alcohol fueled violence has decreased. “Our communities are safer, “people are saying they have the money they need “to provide for the basics of life “such as buying clothes and food and paying rent and bills.”
And this does not flow there’s more in between it, but the final statement that these community leaders across the whole of Australia and we have community leaders that have signed this letter to me today Senator Hanson from all of the 12 sites around Australia, the final sentence.
And I think is, “In order to create stronger, safer, “and healthy communities now and for generations to come “we call upon a parliamentary representatives “to pass the Social Security “Amendment Bill 2020.” So they are in the words of the people who are at the coalface, these are the people whose communities this card serves.
Scott Morrison is due to attend another climate jamboree where he will no doubt promise to implement more of the United Nations agenda destroying more of our economy.
Well I have an idea. I can go in his place.
One Nation opposes this motion. I for one, would be happy for our Prime Minister not to speak at the Climate Ambition Summit. Our prime minister has demonstrated that he will not put the interest of Australia first.
On the international stage under pressure, the prime minister turns to jelly and adopts the agenda of the United Nations without regard for the damage it does to our Australian economy or the lives of Australians.
If Australians want someone to represent and fight for Australia, may I suggest Senator Hanson or I would be happy to take the prime minister’s place. The greens won’t debate me, so maybe some of their globalist masters will.
One Nation supports this motion. Cheap reliable hydrocarbon fuels have led to the greatest improvement in human progress in the past 150 years.
One Nation supports Senator Rennick’s proposal to extend the Kogan Creek coal power plant.
Climate policies and renewable subsidies have led to Australia having one of the most expensive power prices in the world and becoming more unstable. Senator Rennick’s proposal is good for Queensland and good for Australia.
Who could possibly vote against it?
I move:
That the Senate notes that the current dispute between China and Australia is more deep-seated than a trade spat involving wine, coal and timber.
The motion I moved is the opening paragraph in Robert Gottliebsen’s newspaper article in The Australian yesterday, and I’ll quote it again:
When China declared that Australia had been “evil” it suddenly became clear that the dispute between the two nations is more deep-seated than a trade spat involving wine coal, timber etc.
As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia who is involved in the governance of Australia, I want to focus on Gottliebsen’s meaty fourth paragraph:
From President Xi down, there has been little respect for Australia for a long time and many in China believe we are a foolish country that makes mistakes at almost every turn, led by defence.
He then details serious flaws in the governance of three Defence projects, the submarine ‘shemozzle’, as he calls it, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighters and the Hunter frigates. We obviously are ‘a foolish country’ based on this, and the obvious point of his article is our shoddy governments over many decades, both Liberal-National and Labor.
People in this country are feeling concerned about the seriously deteriorating state of our country. We have lost our economic sovereignty. We’re losing our national sovereignty. We’re plunging towards catastrophe economically, and dependence with a complete loss of security. People are fed up and, across many communities and industries—and I mean right around the country—people are feeling dispirited, hopeless, confused, aimless, wary, concerned and even fearful, because most can sense our country’s destruction. Yet, 100 years ago Australia was No. 1 in the world in income per person and had the highest GDP—gross domestic product—per person.
There’s a worse aspect beyond economic demise though. Bullies like China prey on those perceived as being weak. Gottliebsen rightly says that, due to poor, and even stupid, decisions, we’re rightly perceived as being weak in defence. Yet he barely scratches the full extent of the deterioration of our security, because our productive capacity has been dismantled, and our economic security has been smashed, destroyed. We are vulnerable. Now, as a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, that is what I will discuss, because, like bullies in a schoolyard or in a workplace, China preys on those it perceives as weak or foolish. By the way, when I raise China, I refer to the Chinese Communist Party and not the millions of Australians of Chinese descent now in our country, descendants of those who came during the gold rushes almost two centuries ago, and those who immigrated more recently.
Not only does the Chinese Communist Party assess other nations against China’s values and standards; the Chinese Communist Party assesses our country against our own values, and from that it finds out: Does our government have courage? Does our government have integrity? Do the politicians in this country and this parliament have the strength of character needed to lead a country? I’ve been thinking about this for some years now and I’ve made a list of Australian values: mateship; a fair go; support; loyalty; being fair dinkum; telling the truth; honesty; fairness; freedom to live; freedom of speech; freedom of thought; freedom of belief; freedom of religion; freedom of faith; freedom of interaction; freedom of exchange; democracy; our flag; our nation; family; care; respect for people; respect for community; respect for the law; respect for the environment; making sure government fulfils its three primary roles, which are protecting life, protecting property and protecting freedom, and stays out of everything else; and our Constitution. We value our Constitution, especially competitive federalism, and we value human progress. Australia has led that improvement in progress in the past 150 years. It has been amazing progress, right across the world.
So let’s assess governments against these values and their impact on our productive capacity. Productive capacity depends on many things, but particularly energy costs—the primacy of energy. An ever-decreasing cost of energy has led to 150 years of human progress. Australia has gone from having the world’s lowest electricity prices to having the world’s highest, yet we’re now the world’s largest exporter of energy—gas and coal. China imports a lot of our coal, but the production of coal in their own country is eight times our total production—not just our exports but our total production. They make us look like small producers of coal. They have the largest coal reserves in the world, along with the United States. They use our coal. They’re building steel power plants out of our coal, and they’re building hundreds of coal-fired power stations.
We legislate to use their wind turbines and their solar panels. We subsidise them. It drives up the cost of our electricity, and we pay them for unreliables—their solar and wind generators. We pay them for components of electric vehicles, which we also subsidise. And then we have Chinese companies, affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party, owning electricity networks in our major cities. Then we have the Queensland Labor government stealing $1½ billion a year through the generators. All of this destroys jobs and destroys competitiveness.
Then taxpayers pay people, quite often foreigners, to come in and squat on the land, just to get carbon dioxide credits. It’s called carbon dioxide farming. It takes good farmland and destroys it with noxious weeds and feral animals—pests—and then that has to be reclaimed at some later date; who knows when. Then we have Angus Taylor, the Minister for Energy and Emissions, a farmer. He knows that the EPBC Act is hurting him—I’ve had conversations with him—but he just smiles, rolls his eyes and puts up with it. He is a sceptic on climate change—sceptical that we are affecting the climate. He’s been slammed, and he’s now coming back into parliament and driving up electricity prices. Matt Canavan, Barnaby Joyce: strong sceptics in their beliefs. Barnaby Joyce was the Deputy Prime Minister. The Chinese know that. They watch him. They saw him come into cabinet and they saw him run for election in New England, when he moved out of the Senate and into the lower house. And Malcolm Turnbull, to get Mr Joyce elected, showered $400 million of taxpayer funds on unreliable wind power. Then Matt Canavan and Barnaby Joyce were both in the cabinet, and they suddenly became alarmists, spouting alarm about carbon dioxide.
So I asked Matt Canavan in the Senate one day where his evidence was, and he just slid away from me. Now that he’s out of cabinet and Mr Joyce is out of cabinet, all of a sudden they’re becoming a little bit sceptical again in their words. But the Chinese Communist Party see this and that tells them a lot about the lack of leadership in this country.
The Chinese have their own agreement within the Paris Agreement. It says, ‘We will continue doing whatever we want, continue growing our economy, continue constructing our country, developing our country and putting in place infrastructure, and then in 2030 we may consider something.’ Meanwhile, this parliament in this building has legislated to destroy our economy to comply with Kyoto. That’s not an agreement; that is stupidity and economic suicide. The Chinese Communist Party watches us pay academics to tell lies about climate and to misrepresent the climate science. We even put some of them in charge of or in senior places in the CSIRO and pay them $800,000 a year to destroy our country. Dr Andrew Johnson went from head of the climate research agency department in the CSIRO to become head of the Bureau of Meteorology. Under him and his predecessors, the Bureau of Meteorology has been shown to be concocting the data and misrepresenting temperatures.
We pay people like Ove Hoegh-Gulberg and Ian Chubb, former chief scientists, to destroy the science, to misrepresent the science. In 1975, Whitlam signed an agreement saying we’ll comply with the Lima Declaration to shut down our manufacturing and export it. The following year, Liberal Prime Minister Fraser ratified the deal. In 1992, Paul Keating’s Labor government signed the Rio Declaration, which is about 21st century global governance. Then we had the Kyoto protocol destroying our country, stealing our farmers’ property rights. And now we have the Paris Agreement exporting jobs and shutting manufacturing.
Then the current Prime Minister has the temerity to say, ‘We will fiddle with the industrial relations system to bring back manufacturing.’ How the hell can you bring back manufacturing when you have the highest electricity costs in the world and a big component of manufacturing—the largest component, usually—is the cost of electricity? How the hell can you do it with a tax system that favours multinational companies and lets them off scot-free? How the hell can you do it with overregulation? How the hell can you do it with a lack of water? How the hell can you do it with a lack of infrastructure? The Chinese are watching this and they’re helping us destroy our electricity sector and export even more jobs, because our prices for electricity are going up, businesses are shutting and then the jobs start up in China.
We are now reversing the last 170 years of human progress, because the key to human progress is decreasing the price of energy, which raises productivity, raises wealth, raises the standard of living. That ended in this country 24 years ago. We have ceded governance to the UN: Lima, Kyoto, Rio, Paris and many other agreements. How does this comply with Aussie values? How does it comply with being fair dinkum? Worse, the granddaddy who concocted this climate change rubbish was Maurice Strong. He concocted it when he created and then took over as head of the United Nations Environment Program. He pushed that program, starting from the 1970s, and in the 1980s he ramped it up. In 1988 he formed the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a fraudulent organisation. And the Liberals, Labor, the Nationals and the Greens have fallen for it all. Maurice Strong was a crook. He was wanted by the police in America and died in exile in China. Who’s the beneficiary of all this destruction of Western civilisation? The Chinese government.
That’s what the people in this chamber and the chamber across the hall there have done to this country by blindly following the UN diktats. How does that comply with our values? It doesn’t. It breaks our values. What about water ownership? Destroyed by separating water ownership from property ownership. What about the Murray-Darling Basin and the corruption that is rife? What about the family farms shutting down? What about water projects? What water projects? That’s it; there aren’t any. And yet look at what amazing water projects the Chinese Communist Party has put together to develop its country.
What about infrastructure? Hardly anything built and no plan. The north is exposed without the Bradfield scheme and we see floods destroying Townsville. There is destruction and a waste of water flowing out to sea. We see the state governments joining in. The Labor Party in Queensland has reef regulations which are shutting down agriculture. Vegetation protection legislation is destroying agriculture. Firebreaks aren’t allowed and are being destroyed when farms are under fire. We put animals and fungus ahead of humans.
The Queensland Labor government put a Chinese company in charge of the electoral roll and then there is Queensland local council corruption linked to the Labor state government. This extends well beyond Ipswich and Paul Pisasale; it is systemic and it is widespread. We have foreign banks that were deregulated under John Howard and we saw the result of that through the Hayne royal commission. We see Adani frustrated by both the Liberal-National and Labor governments in Queensland and by the federal government, which was weak. That’s one man from India, which has a booming, growing economy, who wanted to spend $17 billion in our country. He was thwarted for eight years. That’s a blight on us that not even the Chinese can miss—that no-one in the world can miss. We go on and on and on.
I give Senator Rex Patrick credit for moving a motion to get an inquiry into the relationship between China and Australia six times—and I supported him every time. Both the Labor Party and the Liberal-Nationals squashed it. This is what the Chinese are seeing, yet Australians are wanting far more. Australians want leadership. Australians want security, reassurance, confidence, leadership, trust, pride and freedom—a restoration so that we can be No. 1 in the world again. What does Australia need? It needs principled leadership based on values. It needs disciplined leadership based on data and facts instead of ideology paying off donors. It needs honest leadership and strength of character. It’s the simple ability to say: ‘I’m wrong, I’m sorry—can you help me? Please explain.’ We need visionary policies, and that is what will take us back to being No. 1.
Thank you Mr. Acting Deputy President. And there we have it, a motion and hyperbole, not one bit of science. In serving the people of Queensland and Australia, I wanna firstly point out that The Greens last week wanted to declare a climate emergency because New Zealand did.
Not because of the science, but because New Zealand did. The Greens wanted to declare its climate emergency because Japan did. Yet Japan is building coal-fired power stations hand over fist. Now The Greens want to pledge to increase 2030 targets in line with the science.
Yet listen to what the CSIRO has divulged. I asked them where’s the danger? They said, they’ve never said there’s any danger due to human production of carbon dioxide, never. And they said they never would. So why the policy? Why The Greens rants? Secondly, the CSIRO admitted that today’s temperatures are not unprecedented.
That means we didn’t cause the mild warming that cyclical natural warming that ended in 1995 And it’s been flat since. Then ultimately the CSIRO relied not on empirical scientific data, It relied on climate models. Models unvalidated and already proven wrong. What’s more, the reliance on models means that they have no critical scientific evidence.
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