Pat Conaghan
Cowper · National Party · Australia
“Yesterday, we heard Labor spruiking their changes that came into effect with the new financial year, and there was a lot of chest beating and oversimplified statements around the standards of living that would make anyone not living in the real world think that things have never been better.”
“Small businesses, we haven't forgotten you. We know that your input costs are already through the roof and your profit margins are even slimmer. We know that the number of annual insolvencies has tripled this financial year when compared with 2022.”
“Insurance is up 42 per cent. Household electricity bills are up 38 per cent. Gas is up 37 per cent. Rents are up, and your weekly food shop is up 17 per cent.”
“Australians deserve honesty. They don't deserve to be treated like mugs by their own government. But yesterday we saw the Prime Minister call those on this side of the floor 'the axis of grievance' while evading giving an actual answer to any question posed by the opposition on behalf of those we represent.”
“As representatives, we are here to make sure that the collective grievances of our constituencies are heard by those opposite—that their legitimate and real pressure points are being expressed and considered in the policies we create and not swept aside by spin and gaslighting.”
“My question is to the Prime Minister: I refer to another mean-spirited act by the Prime Minister—cutting the private health insurance rebate for Australians aged over 65.”
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“My question is to the Assistant Treasurer. Recent collapses like Shield and First Guardian have put over $1 billion of Australians' hard-earned retirement savings at risk. How many times has the government ignored warnings from Treasury and ASIC to effectively regulate these schemes?”
“The coalition believes in accountability, we believe in protecting taxpayers, and we believe that when government makes mistakes the Australian people deserve explanations of those mistakes and deserve that these mistakes receive proper scrutiny. So let's have a Senate inquiry do that work, hear from stakeholders that have been paying these fees and understand how they've been impacted. And if there's more that the government needs to consider before parliament passes these retrospective changes, so be it, because if small businesses are expected to comply with every rule and regulation to the letter of the law then surely ASIC and the government should do the same. Debate adjourned.”
“That is why we will move to refer this bill to the Senate Economics Committee for full and proper scrutiny, because this parliament should not be rushed into rubberstamping a retrospective law that excuses 14 years of misapplied fees without knowing exactly how it happened and who was responsible. The Senate committee process will allow businesses, accountants, company directors and legal experts to have their say. It will shine a light on how such a serious error went undetected for so long and whether affected companies deserve a refund or an offset. We will not oppose the bill today, but we also can't support it until it receives proper scrutiny.”
“Before this parliament agrees to validate these fees, there are serious questions that must be answered. How did this happen? Why wasn't it detected by ASIC, Treasury or Finance much earlier? And should any of the businesses that have been harassed about these fees get some leniency about this blunder? Australians have a right to expect that regulators are held to the same standards they impose on everybody else. ASIC's heavy-handed approach to enforcement has been a longstanding concern across the business community. We've heard it from farmers, tradies and family trusts that have been hit with late fees and penalties when they were doing their best to comply. Yet ASIC, which lectures others about compliance in corporate conduct, has itself been collecting unlawful fees.”
“That is not something the parliament should ever take lightly. The coalition generally oppose retrospective legislation, particularly retrospective taxation. It undermines confidence in the rule of law and sets a dangerous precedent. However, we are conscious that, without a fix, we could see a $150 million budget black hole that could be patched only by higher taxes. We don't want to see taxpayers forced to pay for Labor's mistakes, but it is something that needs to be properly scrutinised. That's exactly why this bill needs to go to the Senate Economics Legislation Committee. We are talking about more than a decade of unlawful fees charged by the corporate regulator itself, an agency that too often demands absolute precision from others.”
“Due to a technical error, ASIC itself has technically incorrectly applied the law for 14 years, charging unlawful fees, and is now asking the parliament to fix the mess. Small businesses that are a week late on a $310 annual review fee can get deregistered, but ASIC has gotten the law wrong for 14 years, overcharging a minimum of $150 million. We appreciate that ASIC found this error themselves, but we should have a higher expectation of our own regulator. The government introduced new regulations in March this year to correct the problem going forward, and that's fair enough. It's a good step. But this bill goes further. It retrospectively validates every fee charge since 1 July 2011. In other words, it rewrites history. It makes what were technically illegal charges legal after the fact.”
“Another 800,000 deregistered entities were charged. And nearly half a million more were invoiced but hadn't yet paid. All told, somewhere between $150 million and $200 million has been over-collected due to the indexation that wasn't legally valid. This is an extraordinary fix to ask the parliament to agree to, and it deserves proper scrutiny. ASIC collects around $1.8 billion in fees and levies every year, including over a billion dollars in registry fees from Australian businesses, from small family companies to farmers and not-for-profits. It is a regulator that is notoriously tough on small business. It routinely cancels companies' registrations for late payments, it imposes penalties too often on low-hanging fruit and self reported mistakes, and it holds businesses to the absolute letter of the law. Yet, here we are.”
“That mistake meant that, since 2011, legally, indexation was improperly applied to a variety of ASIC review fees, including late payment fees, the 10-year prepayment fee and the special-purpose company fee for charities and not-for-profits. That means that, each year, ASIC published the index amount, charged them and collected the revenue from millions of Australian companies without a proper legal basis to do so. It wasn't until late 2024, during an internal ASIC legal audit, that the error was finally discovered. Fourteen years after Labor's regulation took effect, ASIC realised it had been charging the wrong amounts all along. While this was a drafting mistake, and we accept mistakes can happen, the scale of this mistake is breathtaking. More than 1.5 million registered companies have paid the affected fees.”
“I rise to speak on the Corporations (Review Fees) Amendment (Technical Amendments) Bill 2025. This is a remarkable piece of legislation and not for the good reasons. What we have before us today is a bill that seeks to retroactively validate more than a decade's worth of unlawful fees collected by ASIC because of a mistake made under Labor back in 2011. This is no small administrative oversight; it is a drafting error of at least $150 million that sat hidden in law for 14 years. And now Labor is seeking parliamentary approval to make it all go away by passing the biggest retrospective tax validation in Australia's history. Let's step through how we got here. In 2011, under the Gillard Labor government, the parliament introduced legislation that impacted indexation of ASIC company review fees. But it turns out the legislation was botched.”
“With the ever-increasing pressures on the cost of living, the urgent need for both parents to actively earn income has never been greater. We, as government representatives, must highlight successful organisations like Kempsey Children's Services, actively support their growth however we can and learn from their success. We must create policies that foster the growth of not only individual centres but the sector as a whole. I'm proud to have a gold-class centre like KCS in my electorate, and I look forward to another 60 successful years in our community.”
“Today I take the opportunity to shine a spotlight on a much-loved Kempsey institution, Kempsey Children's Services. The fantastic, community led early education service recently celebrated their 60th anniversary, and it's not hard to understand why they have been so successful for so long. I went there some 50 years ago, and, while some things have changed, the core of their model has remained the same. They truly put the community first. They treat their children, the parents and their wonderful staff with an exemplary level of care and respect. While centres across the country are struggling to find and retain staff, leading to available childcare places becoming limited despite a centre's true potential capacity, KCS has bucked that trend. We need more childcare providers like KCS in the regions.”
“And I thought, hold it, there are another hundred years of people that have built up this valley, cleaned up the land and started it all, and unless somebody puts it together, they're going to be lost.' That was the kind of man he was: generous, reflective and diligent to a fault. Vale, John Lean.”
“A passionate historian, John understood the values in recognising and appreciating the driving forces that made our townships what they are today, including the contributions of his own family and through the generations, starting with his great-grandfather. From Aboriginal tribes to pioneers, convicts and politicians, John diligently chronicled the land settlement in the Bellinger Valley from the 1860s to the 1960s. He not only wrote one book; he wrote five. When asked by a local paper why he started the impressive chronology, he said: 'I started these books when I became aware that a lot of people thought the history of Bellinger started about 1970, when the land use changed from the large farmers to smaller lifestyle blocks and the refugees from the cities arrived.”
“Ethan was one of only 15 to be selected. Congratulations, Ethan. We can't wait to see you continue to thrive in the pool for many years to come. Your entire community is behind you. A small shout-out to the Nambucca Valley Rotary Club, who will be holding a fundraiser for Ethan on 23 September at the Bowra Sports Hub. I encourage everyone to go along and support this rising star. My second recognition today is made in tribute to a much-loved and much-admired member of the Dorrigo and Bellinger Valley community, John Lean. John, a national stalwart, passed away on 9 August as a result of complications following a fall while travelling in Norway. Born in Sydney in 1937, John attended Hawkesbury Agricultural College and found a love for the land early in life and took the reins of the family's generational property at Thora.”
“I would like to take the opportunity today to recognise two inspirational members of my community for two very different reasons. The first is a young man at the start of an extremely promising Paralympic swimming career, Ethan Blockey from Macksville. At the age of 18, Ethan has racked up medal after medal at state and national competitions over the past few years. For those who know him, this comes as no surprise. Under the supportive watch of coach Daniel Bannerman, Ethan diligently trains six sessions a week and grabs every opportunity to compete and represent the Coffs Coast with both hands. His achievements have not only gained him local notoriety but also recently caught the eye of the Australian Institute of Sport, which selected him to participate in the prestigious Paris swimming nationals future program.”
“Could they have protected hard-working Australians who have done the right thing and now have lost everything? We simply don't know because this government has bizarrely buried its own report. Where is the government? Where are the Prime Minister and the Treasurer? Where is the help for everyday Australians who have lost everything? They deserve transparency and they deserve answers. I'm calling on the Treasurer to release the review, put the facts on the table and address this issue directly for the Australians caught up in this scheme. The government should be providing answers to everyday Australians, but, once again, Labor are asleep at the wheel.”
“Billions of dollars of everyday Australians' retirement savings are now at risk, lost in the collapse of dodgy schemes like First Guardian and Shield, all of them so-called managed investment schemes. Thousands of Australians are facing devastating losses and in too many cases they've lost their entire retirement nest egg. And what's the government's response? Nothing but silence. Back in the 2022-23 budget, the government promised a review into how these schemes are regulated. They gave themselves a deadline and missed it. That's right. They missed their own self-imposed generous deadline by 18 months. Since then, there has been no report and no explanation. What were the recommendations? Could implementing those recommendations have protected these investors?”
“That is why we will keep pressing for a payment system that is not just modern but also accountable to the parliament and to the people.”
“It wouldn't stop the government from acting swiftly when needed, but it would give parliament the ability to step in when it must. That's why we've moved our amendment to put these concerns clearly on the record, and in the Senate we will move further amendments to make the decisions of both the RBA and the Treasurer subject to allowance. The coalition have a proud record on payments reform. We initiated this work in government and we welcome Labor finally picking it up, even if the pace has been slow. We will always support a payment system that is modern and fair and focused—one that keeps the cost down for small business, fosters innovation and protects consumers. Without this most basic form of parliamentary oversight, there is a serious gap.”
“That's the kind of concern some of our most innovative businesses have raised—not opposition to regulation itself, which they support, but to the potential for unfair rules that stifle innovation and create structural advantages for incumbents. Under this bill, even the Treasurer's new powers would not be subject to parliamentary disallowance. To be clear, we support giving the Treasurer these powers. National security, cyber threats and consumer data protection are too important to leave gaps. However, when giving the Treasurer such broad powers, it is entirely reasonable for parliament to have the power to review them. Disallowance is not a radical idea; it is a commonsense safeguard. It would reassure industry that decisions would be made proportionately, transparently and with democratic oversight.”
“Its mandate doesn't make it well-suited to consider broader economic impacts like whether a new rule might hinder competition for consumer credit or stifle innovation from a fintech start-up. Less competition means higher prices for consumers. Fintechs are increasingly offering alternatives to legacy payment systems, but if regulation tilts the playing field in favour of incumbents, the risk is that promising innovations never get off the ground. For example, a local fintech could develop a low-cost payment app that starts gaining market share, but if an RBA unintentionally favours the big banks, that start-up could be locked out before it even has the opportunity to compete.”
“The bigger the net, the more important it is that parliament has the ability to review how those powers are being used. Under the act the RBA's regulatory net will now extend into fast-evolving areas like digital wallets and blockchain based systems. The Reserve Bank's decision will have a wider and more complex commercial, competitive and technological impact. Imagine if the Reserve Bank introduced a standard that unintentionally drove up costs for small business. Parliament would be powerless to act. Let me be clear—we are not questioning the Reserve Bank's competence; it is a respected and capable regulator. However, its mandate is narrow. It looks at efficiency, stability and competition within the payment system.”
“We had one very simple ask, the most basic form of parliamentary oversight, but, unfortunately, Labor could not agree. Under the PSRA none of the Reserve Bank's decisions are subject to parliamentary oversight or are disallowable. That means when the Reserve Bank designates a payment system or sets rules for it, parliament has no power to review or disallow those decisions even when they affect consumer choice, innovation or small-business cost. This bill does not change that, even though it expands the PSRA to cover a far broader range of technologies, providers and payment models than ever before. That's the key issue here. The RBA isn't getting brand-new powers, but its powers are being applied to many more businesses, from global tech giants to small fintech start-ups.”
“Our plan called for a licensing framework for payment providers, giving fintechs and new entrants the regulatory certainty that they need to grow, and clearer rules around digital assets so that Australians remain globally competitive in attracting investment and maintaining innovative fintech businesses. Progress on these reforms has been too slow, and that delay carries a real cost. When Australian start-ups can't get clear rules at home, they take their ideas, their capital and their jobs offshore. That means fewer career opportunities for graduates from Southern Cross University in Coffs Harbour or Charles Sturt in Port Macquarie, who instead moved to Singapore or London. Australians deserve better, and we need to get on with the job. These reforms take important steps forward. We want to be bipartisan and constructive on the issue.”
“It updates the PSRA to include modern payment systems like Apple Pay and Afterpay; it introduces a new national-interest power for the Treasurer, allowing intervention in cases involving security, consumer protection or data sovereignty; and it modernises enforcement with new civil penalties, enforceable undertakings and stronger criminal actions. These reforms are sensible and overdue. In fact, in response to the 2021 payments system review, the coalition led the charge, laying the foundation for these changes with our detailed plan to modernise Australia's payments framework. This bill is just one piece of that larger vision, but, unfortunately, much of the coalition's broader plan remains untouched.”
“To put that in perspective, in 1998 Amazon was just an online bookstore being run out of Jeff Bezos's garage, and most of us were carrying Nokias, not smartphones. The PSRA was designed for a world of cheques, EFTPOS, Visa and Mastercard. It doesn't cover many of the payment systems Australians rely on today: Apple Pay, Google Pay, Afterpay and newer technologies, such as blockchain based payment systems. That is why we support the objective of this bill. We must ensure the law reflects how Australians actually live, shop and do business in 2025. The bill does three key things.”
“Every tap of a card and every online transaction flows through it. This system is governed by the Payment Systems (Regulation) Act 1998, or the PSRA. In simple terms, the PSRA lets the Reserve Bank step in and set up the rules for payment systems, like making sure that fees aren't too high, that smaller players can get fair access and that the technology works safely and reliably. For example, in 2004 the PSRA was used by the Reserve Bank to force Visa and Mastercard to open their systems to smaller banks and new entrants, a change that increased competition and enhanced consumer choice. This shows that, when done right, regulation can help level the playing field and deliver choice and lower cost for Australians. It is an important law but it was written more than 25 years ago.”
“I rise to speak on the Treasury Laws Amendment (Payments System Modernisation) Bill 2025. This bill matters because it takes the Reserve Bank's powers and applies them to far more businesses than before, not just to Apple Pay and Google Pay but to smaller, local fintechs competing with big banks and big finance. We think this expansion justifies allowing the parliament to review or disallow the RBA's regulation. That is a basic parliamentary safeguard and that's all we're asking for. The payments system is the critical infrastructure underpinning our economy. The payments system includes both the behind-the-scenes infrastructure that moves money, like bank transfers, BPAY and tap-and-go systems, and the services built on top of it, like Visa, Mastercard, Apple Pay and Afterpay.”
“I move the second reading amendment circulated in my name: That all words after "That" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words: "whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House: (1) notes: (a) that the Bill implements recommendations of the 2021 Payments System Review, first initiated by the Coalition, to modernise the Payment Systems (Regulation) Act 1998 ; (b) that under the Bill, key decisions of the Reserve Bank of Australia and the Treasurer—including designating payment systems, imposing access regimes, and setting standards—will not be subject to parliamentary disallowance; and (c) concerns that the Reserve Bank's narrow mandate does not allow for appropriate consideration of impacts on competition and innovation, and may not be suited to regulating fast-changing industries like fintech and digital payments; and (2) calls on the Government to ensure that major regulatory decisions made by the Reserve Bank and the Treasurer under the Payment Systems (Regulation) Act 1998 are subject to disallowance to provide an appropriate parliamentary oversight mechanism".”
“Every day you head out on the job, it's your families and loved ones who pray for your safe return ,who worry if texts go unanswered, who witness the impact of a bad day on you. They carry the burden and knowledge that you are serving others. While you willingly signed up to serve, your families are conscripted, and they deserve our collective acknowledgement. Finally, I'd like to acknowledge the work of police legacy and their important role in family and community support. Your compassion and care is invaluable, and we are lucky to have you. To all the members, thank you for your service.”
“I'd like to acknowledge their families, their friends. I know that your communities will embrace you with the compassion and support you need. I've been through the exact same thing, with two of my colleagues killed in Crescent Head, now 30 years ago. With that, I thank all sworn and unsworn members of our police forces around the nation for your service. What is seen cannot be unseen. What is heard cannot be unheard. Thank you for getting up every single day and bearing witness to sometimes horrific events so that others do not have to. Thank you for your personal sacrifices. I can promise you that they do not go unnoticed. Thanks must also go to your families and loved ones for their own sacrifices.”
“On 13 September current and former police officers from every state will commence the Wall to Wall Ride for Remembrance, an inaugural journey that begins in each capital city and concludes here in Canberra at the National Police Memorial. The event is open to serving and retired police officers. They will travel in convoy by motorcycle to Canberra and arrive at the National Police Memorial, a journey made in honour of our fallen colleagues right across the country. I'd like to acknowledge the event organisers, entering into their 16th year. I know the member for Wide Bay has been doing it for a number of years now. Recently, the sad results in Porepunkah, Victoria, mean two new names will be added to that memorial: Detective Leading Senior Constable Neal Thompson and Senior Constable Vadim De Waart, tragically killed in the line of duty.”
“The camaraderie of my friends, my fellow men and women in blue, and the satisfaction when you know you've locked up a crook who has committed an offence, the fact that you've protected a victim and prevented further suffering in the community, is something only police officers can understand. Having said that, equally the job provided some of my worst memories, our worst memories. We were faced with unimaginable scenes and personal accounts that ripped away any rose-coloured glasses. There is stress in knowing that any failure on your part, whether it's putting together a brief of evidence or a prosecution, has the potential to negatively impact lives and livelihoods. We suffer the loss of brave colleagues whose lives were taken by the job or because of the job after they left the service.”
“I am very pleased to rise and speak on this motion filed by the member for Wide Bay on Police Week. I'm very proud to stand here because in the room we have the member for Wide Bay, the member for Hinkler, the member for Richmond, myself and the member for Tangney; the member for Latrobe is not here. We all served. I'm proud that this government can have people with experience in the police to bring that experience and make those decisions. I thank you all for your service. All members of the police force take an oath to protect and serve. As a former police officer myself, I know we proudly wear the uniform in order to keep our communities safe. We know the risks. We know how difficult the job can be. But I can honestly say that my 12 years in the police force provided me with some of my best memories.”
“We want to burn you down with your flag and replace it with our values—with values that we have brought from other places that don't sit well with Australian people.' How did we get here? We got here because we have been far too tolerant for far too long. Well, tolerance no more. This government needs to legislate now to criminalise the burning of the flag, to put in place fines and imprisonment for Australian citizens and to revoke the visas of noncitizens, because we have had enough. Us Australians love our flag and we will protect it by all means.”
“I'm sorry, but 'disappointing' is missing a bus when you're already running late. Burning the Australian flag is treacherous and treasonous, and it should bring with it the penalties that go along with being treacherous and treasonous. We should see jail sentences for burning the Australian flag, and, if you are not an Australian citizen, then you don't respect our Australian views and you should go back to your country. Your visa should be revoked on the spot. You might say that it's not a violent act to burn the Australian flag, but it's violent in its intent. What it is saying to us Australians and to the 77 per cent who love our Australian flag is: 'We want to burn you down.”
“Across the years, the Australian flag has draped their shoulders in Olympic Games and other sporting events across the world. Cathy Freeman, Betty Cuthbert—so many athletes held the Australian flag aloft and celebrated their wins and, quite often, celebrated their losses. The Flags Act is now 70 years old. That's seven decades, and it is time that we upgraded it. We have seen, in recent weeks and months, people out there burning the Australian flag. I never thought that I'd stand in this place talking about the need to legislate and to prevent those people intent on doing harm to Australia by burning the Australian flag. I never thought I'd see that day. So what we would like to see is this government legislate to outlaw burning the Australian flag. Some politicians have called it 'disappointing'.”
“I thank the member for Herbert for bringing on this motion to make it a criminal offence to deface or burn the Australian flag. The Australian flag is more than just a bit of fabric; it is our fabric. It is our values, our traditions, our history—everything that makes us Australian. This week we celebrate 124 years of our national flag—the same flag that our men and women, including the member for Herbert, served under; the same flag that men and women died under; and the same flag that draped their coffins. The Australian flag symbolises the freedoms that they wanted for us then, now and into the future, and it symbolises everything good about Australia and everything good that Australian people do and give. You can also look at our sportspeople.”
“And I'm already being told by the service providers: 'Pat, we have to leave the scheme. We can no longer afford to run our practice when the government is cutting our travel time by half and reducing what we get paid.' And the data which the government used to cut these payments was flawed. What I'm asking the government to do is reconsider your decision. Suspend it for three or six months and actually consult with the industry, which is something you didn't do before you made this decision to cut the payments to service providers. Go out, have the consultation and actually see the impact of what your decision is doing right now. Look at how many people have left the scheme. Look at how many service providers are no longer there. This decision is hurting the most vulnerable in our community, and it needs to be stopped now.”
“They're saying: 'Look, it's not always about the money. We care about our clients, but we just can't continue with our businesses.' On top of that, those opposite cut their travel payment by 50 per cent. That might be okay in the city, for somebody who drives five kilometres to go and see their client. But what about somebody in Port Macquarie who has to travel to Willawarrin, an hour and a half away, to see their client? To have their travel costs cut by 50 per cent—they're simply not going to do it. There are those who say, 'Why can't the participant get in their car and drive to Port Macquarie to get those services?' The person who says that doesn't understand how hard it is out there for these people. Not only are they struggling with disability; they're struggling with the everyday cost of living, just like most people out there.”
“All of us in this place would have heard stories about rorts or cruisers or abuse of the system, where somebody is charging to care for a participant at three different locations on the one night. That is where we need to find the savings. That is where we need to root out the people who abuse the system—not do what this government did on 1 July and cut payments to service providers in allied health. We are already stretched thin on the ground trying to get allied health professionals to be able to service the clients—particularly in regional and rural Australia, where I live and where my colleagues in the National Party live—because it's hard enough to find those allied health services without cutting what they pay. I've met with those professionals in physiotherapy, occupational therapy.”
“I'm pleased to rise to speak on this motion. Whenever I start a conversation about the NDIS, I say, 'The right person with the right package and the right service provider is life changing.' I have seen that over and over again for people with disabilities who are now on the NDIS. The shame of it is that this vital program or scheme is now costing the economy, the taxpayer, around $40 billion a year. The current trajectory is that, by 2035, it will cost $120 billion a year, which is simply not sustainable. We cannot put that on the Australian taxpayer, but we must look after people with disabilities. There is a definite need to be able to find cost savings in the NDIS.”
“The coalition will back those who take risks, reward effort and investment and clear the path for the private sector to thrive. This is the only way to truly lift wages, ease cost-of-living pressures and build lasting prosperity.”
“It's just old-school Labor, where politicians and bureaucrats pick the winners and taxpayers pick up the bill. What if, instead of another scheme, the government just stopped making things harder? Wouldn't that be nice? What if it paused the relentless red tape, got out of the way of business and let the private sector lead on jobs and innovation, which they do so well? We on this side of the floor know this: you don't raise living standards by raising taxes, you don't raise living standards by raising the cost of doing business and you don't raise living standards by increasing the burden on future generations. Australia's prosperity has always come from the hard work of entrepreneurs, innovators, small business and individual workers who get up every day and get on with the job, not from the hand of government.”
“In simple terms, taxpayers are paying for wage growth. If you work in the private sector, that means that you are paying for bureaucrats' wage increases while your own wage remains flat. How often do you hear that? And then we see that productivity has gone backwards, under this government, by 5.7 per cent—the lowest in 60 years. Small business, the engine room of the economy, is on the brink, with insolvencies up 57 per cent in 12 months. The productivity roundtable talkfest was just another expense on the taxpayer, with predetermined outcomes. It is shameful. We've already seen Labor's idea of the productivity plan. It's called Future Made in Australia—a multibillion-dollar ad campaign dressed up as a policy. There's nothing productive or visionary about it.”
“They're closing their doors at record rates. You get accustomed to seeing 'vacant' signs popping up in increasingly high numbers. People and businesses out there are hurting. They know that, under the Labor government, food has gone up 15 per cent; health care, up 15 per cent; education, up 17 per cent; housing, up 19 per cent; rents, up 20 per cent; insurance and financial obligations, up 20 per cent; and—we all know this one because we all feel it—electricity, up 39 per cent, with gas on par at 39 per cent. It's no wonder people are closing their businesses and aren't able to put food on the table after going out and working all week. We now have working poor because of the policies of this government. In the year to June 2025, real wages grew by just 0.3 per cent, with most of that coming from the public sector pay rises.”
“Labor's big-government dream is coming to fruition, with nearly half of the country now relying on public sector jobs, welfare, pensions and government contracts. We know that this trend is only going to get worse, with 82 per cent of new jobs created in the past two years being taxpayer funded. That is a dramatic reversal from over 75 per cent of new jobs being private sector jobs under the last term of the coalition. Having low unemployment is a good thing, but it doesn't take a PhD in economics to understand that taxpayer funded jobs are not the answer. The Treasurer might like to point to statistics to claim that the economy is strong, but Australians living in the real world know better. Around my electorate—and I'm sure it's the same in your electorates, and I do mean across the floor—businesses are doing it tough.”
“Now, I am the first to say I hate smoking, I hate vaping and I would love to see them go. But the fact is the policies that we have right now are not working. We're seeing firebombings in Sydney and Melbourne, and police do not have the resources to tackle this, nor do the state health authorities. And I'm very happy that the Assistant Treasurer is in the Federation Chamber today, because we've done the costings on legalising vaping, which would bring in about $7 billion to $9 billion a year. Regulate it, control it, and take it out of the hands of the crooks. I again say I hate smoking and vaping, but this policy is not working.”
“We've heard the saying, 'Just because you say something doesn't make it true.' Simply saying that Australia has banned illicit tobacco and vaping products doesn't make them miraculously disappear. In fact, it's not just propagated the whole industry but sent it to the black market. How can we possibly go from a retail landscape with a rapidly diminishing tobacco store footprint leading into 2020 to seeing a new shop popping up on every street, in every town? It just says to us the policy isn't working. Conversely, with all these new stores, how can we see tax revenue from tobacco decreasing? Logically, if more shops were legally selling regulated products, the government coffers would be growing alongside them. Yet, tobacco excise collections have collapsed to their lowest level in 14 years.”
“Congratulations on your appointment, Deputy Speaker Lawrence. Last week, I went and visited a small corner-store business in one of my small towns in the electorate of Cowper. The business owner reminded me how bad government policy can kill small business. I won't name the business, because he is genuinely fearful of reprisals for what I'm about to talk about—and that is the increasing infestation of illicit tobacco and vape stores across Australia. This business isn't the first one to reach out to me; I get calls every week, particularly from small corner-store businesses that are being hammered. Their cash flow is being cut because of these illicit traders. Surely, Deputy Speaker Lawrence, you're hearing about this and your Labor colleagues and the crossbench are all hearing about this.”