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One Nation vs Labor: Putting Money Back in Your Pocket

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The Labor government introduced legislation to increase the petrol and diesel excise by 16 cents a litre. When combined with GST (a tax on a tax) and retailer margins, everyday Australians will face an extra 32 cents per litre at the pump. This is money going straight into Treasury to fund Labor’s wasteful spending.

This tax hike hits those who can least afford it. While large corporations can pass these costs on to consumers, small and medium businesses lack market power and must absorb the hit directly from their profits. For everyday families, commuting, running errands and simple drives will all become more expensive.

Contrary to claims, reducing the fuel excise is not inflationary. It directly lowers fuel prices, which immediately reduces CPI inflation.

Furthermore, because fuel is a core input across the whole economy (farmers, tradespeople and freight operators), lowering fuel costs relieves inflationary pressure across all goods and services.

When One Nation proposed cutting the fuel excise by 50% and freezing indexation, it was dismissed. Yet, when the government temporarily adopted our measure, it proved to be a resounding success for living costs and inflation. That is why One Nation is calling on the government to freeze the fuel excise and cancel all indexation increases until June 2028.

While Labor is raising taxes to fund its reckless spending, a One Nation government would put a line through these wasteful projects.

We would:

➡️ Terminate all Net Zero spending, including associated departments, grants, and subsidies.

➡️ End funding to the “Aboriginal industry”, replacing it with direct grants to local councils for housing, infrastructure, and community support.

➡️ Scrap Snowy Hydro 2.0, saving taxpayers from a financial sinkhole that could reach $100 billion.

➡️ Cancel the $3.8 billion federal allocation for Victoria’s Suburban Rail Loop, an insane project projected to cost $216 billion that serves to line the pockets of union bosses.

The Albanese government must stop overtaxing Australians to funnel money to renewables, union mates, and left-wing causes.

One Nation will put money back in your pocket, starting with a freeze on the fuel excise until 2028.

Transcript

Senator Roberts: This week the government is introducing legislation to make a 16c a litre increase to the excise levied on petrol and diesel. When including the GST, which is levied on top of the fuel tax—it’s a tax on a tax—and then adding retailer margins, this will cause petrol to go up around 20c a litre before the weekend. Every litre, 20c—kerching into the Treasury for Labor to waste. This is occurring just when small business and everyday Australians are recovering from the high petrol prices caused as a direct result of the war in the Strait of Hormuz. 

Make no mistake, this is a tax on those who cannot afford it. Large corporations can simply pass this rise on to their customers—meaning you’ll be paying more. Small and medium businesses can’t do that. They have no market power. They are price takers. This tax rise will come straight out of what is left of their profit. Everyday Australians will find their drive to work will be more expensive, as will running around after the children. Even a simple day out, just getting in the car and going out for a drive, will be more expensive. 

I know when One Nation promised a 50 per cent reduction in the fuel excise at the last election, the commentariat called that ‘inflationary’. Then the government copied our policy and suddenly it’s no longer inflationary! Which is correct? It’s not inflationary. Reducing the fuel excise reduces the petrol price, which is directly trapped in the CPI—the consumer price index—calculation. Lower fuel prices means lower inflation. 

There is a second-round effect as well. Fuel is an input cost right through the economy, from the farmer running a cool room or ploughing a field, to the local tradesman, to the truckie who delivers everything we buy. When fuel goes up, everything goes up. When fuel goes down, inflationary pressure is taken out of the economy. Reducing the fuel excise will reduce inflation. It’s that simple. It’s proven. This is why One Nation promised, at the last election, to reduce the fuel excise by 50 per cent and suspend indexation for 12 months, with a review after that. 

Well, the government borrowing our policy for a few months has provided the review we needed to know that the policy is a winner. Everyday Australians have enjoyed the lower cost of living. Inflationary pressures were taken out of the economy for a short time. This is why One Nation are calling on the government to not increase the fuel excise until June 2028, including cancelling all indexation increases, and then review it after the next election, which any incoming government would do anyway. Give hardworking Australians and small businesses two more years of respite from the Albanese government’s high—stubbornly high—inflation. 

Why do the government need to put this tax up? Because they’re wasting our money again, that’s why! This budget included measures that One Nation would have put the red line through. I’ve already spoken about our policy promising to remove all net zero spending, including the department itself, loans, grants and associated boondoggles. We’ve already announced all spending on the Aboriginal industry will be terminated. Instead, One Nation will give grants directly to local government to build the homes and roads and provide maintenance and support to Aboriginal communities. 

We’ve already announced that Snowy Hydro 2.0 will be terminated and taxpayers saved from a financial disaster which may reach $1 trillion for capital costs, interest, maintenance and subsidies for the tiny amount of electricity the project will generate in the period the construction loans are being paid back. The budget set aside $3.8 billion for Victoria’s Suburban Rail Loop. The Victorian Parliamentary Budget Office has put the cost of this project at $216 billion over a 50-year finance cycle. This is an insane project. Even Victorians don’t want it. It’s there to put money into the pockets of corrupt union bosses and assorted underworld figures, as 60 Minutes clearly showed last night. One Nation would terminate that project. 

We will have more policy announcements in the months ahead. For today’s debate, let me say this: the Albanese government needs to stop overtaxing everyday Australians so it can funnel money to its mates in the unions, to the renewable solar and wind industry, academia and other costly lefty nonsense causes—spending that does not benefit everyday Australians and certainly benefits the Labor Party’s election campaign funds. Labor is making life harder during a severe cost-of-living crisis. One Nation will put more money back in people’s pockets, starting with a freeze on fuel excises until 2028. 

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Senate Estimates – How much GST are we losing at the border on imports?

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Millions upon millions of parcels flow into Australia every month. Some dodgy operators avoid paying GST on imports by understating the value of the goods being posted. This is a huge disadvantage to our Aussie shops and we need to be doing more to enforce the rules on GST for foreign imports.

Transcript

[Malcolm Roberts] I have some brief questions on border force. How many parcels come through Australian border force each financial year?

So Senator just give me one second. I’ll just get, I might just ask deputy commissioner Saunders to join me at the, the front table as well. In terms of parcels, probably I might describe it slightly differently if I could. So air cargo consignments, if I could start there cause Senator the goods coming into Australia, primarily from a border screening point of view is either sea cargo, stuff that comes in containers, air cargo, stuff that comes in crates in the belly of aeroplanes and international mail. So in terms of air cargo consignments between the 1st of July, 2020 and the 31st of March, 2021 there were 54,340,909 consignments in relation to sea cargo, there’s been a significant uptake. So I’ll give you the numbers for 19 and 20 first of all. So between the 1st of July, 2019, 31st of March, 2020 there were 2,472,286 consignments. Between the 1st of July, 2020 31st of March, 2021, 7,449,539 consignments. The reason for that is because of COVID-19 because of changes in logistics, supply chains, etc, a lot of people shopping from home, smaller consignments and the the freight forwarders need to get it here somehow. And there just isn’t a number of aeroplanes coming to Australia to support all of that coming through air cargo. So a lot of, a lot of the smaller consignments are now coming in containers and that’s led to a significant increase. In terms of international mail you see that data is actually commercially confidential because obviously Australia posts are in competition with you know, freight forwarders and other sort of international supply chain sort of companies. And, we don’t put those numbers out there Senator in terms of Australian international mail.

[Malcolm Roberts] Okay. But the total number of consignments for the nine months, July 20 to March 21 was 54 million, including air, mail and sea.

Well not including mail, I can’t give you that number because that’s commercially sensitive because Australian posts are sort of a, you know there’s a single commercial entity and they’re in competition with other people in the market. We don’t put that number out there. So what I’ve given you is in terms, sorry, air cargo consignments 54,340,909

[Malcolm Roberts] That’s just for air.

That’s for air, cargo. And for sea cargo an additional almost seven and a half million, 7.449 million.

[Malcolm Roberts] Okay. Thank you very much for that. How many of these parcels are checked for value and whether or not GST is applied?

I might just call

[Malcolm Roberts] Sorry commissioner, just on that number, the sea cargo is that, how are you quantifying that number?

Consignment, so a consignment is obviously

[Malcolm Roberts] Do you define that as per container or how

No consignment is if you import a good into Australia, that’s a consignment, so that could be an entire container load that you have or if you’ve got lots of lines of goods in a container, so let’s say a freight forwarding company wants to get a lot of consignments to Australia, previously they might put them in a crate in the belly of an aeroplane, whereas now they’re putting them in containers. So we’re getting containers with lots and lots of consignments in them.

[Malcolm Roberts] I see, thanks for clarifying.

Does that make sense?

So it’s an individual entry for an importer of a good and that can be a private person or a commercial entity.

[Malcolm Roberts] Thank you. Thanks.

Thanks Senator Roberts. I might just ask Vanessa Holben here in terms of the, the GST question. If I could, it goes to matters of customs policy.

Vanessa Holburn group manager, customs group, Australian Border force. So your question is related to GST?

[Malcolm Roberts] Yeah. How many of the parcels that come in, consignments, are checked for value and have GST applied?

So I’ll need to take on notice the number of consignments that are checked. What I can give you though, is the dollar value of the undetected, undecided GST detected?

[Malcolm Roberts] The under?

The undecided GST detected. So that’s, that’s where they haven’t obviously claimed GST. So the dollar value, would you like it in the financial years?

[Malcolm Roberts] Yes, please.

So 2019-20, 25,827,753. I can go previous years if you’d like to as well.

[Malcolm Roberts] No it’s fine.

Year to date, so 31st of March, 2021, 411,719.

[Malcolm Roberts] So that’s the, could you say that again? What is that 25 million?

So we determine it, we determine it as understated, GST detected.

[Malcolm Roberts] Understated, GST detected.

Correct.

[Malcolm Roberts] So what does that mean? Understated? So that means only the only the parcels that have been where the GST has been understated and where it’s detected.

Correct.

[Malcolm Roberts] So what proportion of parcels are waved through without checking to see if GST should be paid.

That’s what I need to check on notice for you.

[Malcolm Roberts] Okay. Thank you. Is there any estimation of how much GST has not been paid per year? It’s a massive task as, as Mr. Adam just told us.

Again, I’ll need to check that on notice.

[Malcolm Roberts] Thank you. How many notices are sent out to call in GST prior to the parcel being released?

I’ll need to check that on notice Senator.

[Malcolm Roberts] What is the estimated loss to Australia per year for the lost or forgone GST?

I’ll need to take that on notice

And senator, we’ll take that on notice, but also we do obviously with GST, recognise other departments have a stake in the GST question, the ATO and treasury. So we will take it on notice, but we’ll, we’ll also link in with our other departments who have an interest in the GST policy.

[Malcolm Roberts] Thank you. What has been done to assist the cost of this forfeit and to implement a remedy. We’ve got to define the problem before we can solve it. With 54 million consignments, I’m sorry, 61 million consignment, it’s a pretty massive opportunity.

Can you repeat the question again Senator?

[Malcolm Roberts] What’s been done to assess the, the loss of revenue the forgone revenue, and to implement a remedy.

We can talk about our audit inspection control programme.

So, so the compliance, we have a compliance programme obviously to detect non-compliance through those avenues.

[Malcolm Roberts] That’s sampling is it?

Correct, yes so there’s targets and there’s profiling. Also we do business engagements, that’s around educating those that are importing to ensure that they are quickly classifying the goods and obviously paying those duties attached to those goods.

[Malcolm Roberts] So there’d be hidden costs, is the government, I don’t know who to ask this question of, perhaps a minister, perhaps Mr. Adam, is the government aware of the hidden cost to Australian manufacturers and retailers who must add GST to their goods, whereas imports bypassing customs do not?

Probably a matter of policy I suggest, and maybe a different department would be best placed to answer that.

I’ll say, we are aware in the general sense of the matters you raise, but I’d need to take on notice the quantum of that.

[Malcolm Roberts] Yeah, so depends on the size of the problem, I understand that. So is it possible to consider another solution being tax reform? Another way of levying the tax?

Those options are always available to be considered by policymakers.

[Malcolm Roberts] Okay, Thank you very much.

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Tax Reform in Australia

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Tax is one of the biggest costs to this country and governments are not spending it wisely. Tax reform is in the ‘too hard’ basket for both parties but the country is dying without it. Take for example the GST. When it was introduced, the State Governments promised to abolish 6 different taxes to make up for it. Every single one of them is still being slugged on Australians.

Transcript

[Malcolm Roberts] G’day Marcus, how are you?

[Marcus Paul] All right. Did you have a steak in the last couple of days up there in Rocky for beef week?

[Malcolm Roberts] I had one of the best steaks I’ve ever had, mate.

[Marcus Paul] Really?

[Malcolm Roberts] I had beef in the Rocky Sports Club two nights ago. Absolutely delicious. Just melted in my mouth.

[Marcus Paul] Oh, nice. Now, that’s a really big event up there, of course.

[Malcolm Roberts] It’s huge. I don’t know how much it costs to support this and organise it, but it must be millions. It’s really well done. Very professionally done. It’s a really, really big credit to Rocky.

[Marcus Paul] Well, it attracted everybody including the prime minister of the country. He was there as well the other day.

[Malcolm Roberts] That’s right. They’re all taking credit for it. Whereas it’s really the beef graziers and the beef associations that need to take credit for it. And Rockhampton.

[Marcus Paul] Yeah. Well look, so long as we support the industry, that’s I think what’s vitally important now. Malcolm, as you know, there’s a couple of things certain in this life. One is death, the other is bloody taxes.

[Malcolm Roberts] Yeah. The tax levied on families in Australia is completely unreasonable. I mean, Joe Hockey himself, the former treasurer, said in 2015, a typical Australian works from January to June just to pay taxes. You lose half your money in taxes, that’s what he said. In 2000, I think it was the Australian Bureau of Statistics, you can no longer get these figures but I’ve got to confirm them. A person, the ABS, I think it was, said a person earning the average income pays 68% to government in the form of rates, taxes, levies, fees, special charges. That means that a person on the average income, which today is $80000, works from Monday to mid-morning Thursday paying for government. So, we’ve been fed a line that’s a complete lie. We’ve been told that the biggest purchase of our life is a house. It’s not. The biggest purchase by far of our life is government. Who sees value for money in that purchase in Australia?

[Marcus Paul] So you work Monday to Thursday mid-morning paying government, not only obviously in income tax, but all the other levies, charges, etc.

[Malcolm Roberts] Rates, fees, that’s it. That’s it, Marcus. That’s far too high. People don’t mind paying tax, because they see that’s the cost of government. We’ve got to have defence, we’ve got to have police. Okay, we all get that. But tax also represents, when it’s wasted, when that money is wasted, Tax represents the cost of government waste. And that’s what people are paying for in this country. The abuse of their taxes by a government that is not accountable. That’s the problem.

[Marcus Paul] Why is it unfair, this tax levy? Why is it unfair? I mean, we’ve got multinationals that avoid paying probably their fair share. And I’ve discussed this at length with politicians from both sides of politics, but nobody can seem to come up with the right answer. I don’t understand why the burden falls on those most, I don’t want to say vulnerable. I mean, we all need to pay our own way and nobody can expect to get a handout for their entire life. Sure, from time to time, you might need a hand up. And that’s what the social service network is for. That’s why we have social security. But I mean for goodness sake, if we’re paying, as you say, you’re telling me we’re working Monday to Thursday mid-morning paying government in fees. Why is it then that big multinationals, why do we allow our administrators, our governments allow these big companies to avoid paying their fair share?

[Malcolm Roberts] You’ve nailed it. Let me give you some figures here. The deputy commissioner of taxation in 1996 and 2010, and his name was Jim Killaly, and I’ve met the man, I met him in early 2015, he said publicly in the media, that 90% of Australia’s large companies are foreign owned and since 1953, have paid little or no company tax. Jim Killaly, 1996, 2010. Now why is that? Well, it goes back to 1953 and the so-called double taxation legislation that was introduced by liberal prime minister Menzies. He made sure that legislation, that foreign companies don’t have to pay company tax. Bob Hawke, the labour prime minister in 1987, passed the PRRT tax, Petroleum Rent Resources Tax. The largest companies in the world and the worst tax avoider in the world, Chevron, other multinationals, are not paying tax and the Australian government gets virtually nothing for the gas that they tap into in the Northwest shelf and send overseas. We’re the largest exporters of gas and we get the least for it in the world.

[Marcus Paul] There was some figure that I think we talked about recently, where in, I can’t remember, it might’ve been WA, there was a gas exploration venture that was being undertaken whereby 5.3 billion dollars, I think that was the figure, worth of gas was shipped off overseas. Our gas prices haven’t come down as a result of it but the company involved, I won’t name them, but the company involved, paid a paltry, 300 odd million dollars in tax compared to taking away five point odd billion dollars worth of our natural resources. How on earth, Malcolm, do we allow this to happen?

[Malcolm Roberts] Exactly Marcus. The Japanese government levies an import duty on Australian gas coming into Japan. The Japanese government makes three billion a year on taxing Australian gas. So, they get that income. We get bugger all. And that’s the fact, because both the liberal party and the labour party over many years, it’s not just a few, it’s decades, over many decades, have allowed this to occur. And they do that despite 90% of Australia’s large companies being foreign owned and paying little or no tax. And what that also means is that Australian companies that are working in this country have to pay 30%, their company tax. That means they’re immediately behind the eight ball when it comes to competing with these multinationals. So, it’s just completely unfair.

[Marcus Paul] All right, well, maybe that is a short term fix to tax foreign multinationals more appropriately. I mean, tax reform is difficult. We know that the liberal Howard government introduced GST in return for states dropping six taxes, yet all are still being levied, including in my opinion, the most ridiculous crippling tax of all, payroll tax. I mean, that hits employment and it penalises those taking the risk by setting up business and in fact, people, these businesses employ people. Why on earth are we penalising businesses for employing Australians?

[Malcolm Roberts] Exactly, Marcus. We all know, everybody knows, you don’t need to be well educated to understand that when you tax something, you get less of it. So, why are we taxing payroll? Because that’s a tax on employment. When you tax employment, you get less of it, but let’s have a look at some of the so-called tax reform in this country. As you said, in 1999, liberal prime minister Howard introduced the GST, in return for the states promising to drop six state taxes. Every one of those taxes is still levied. In 1985, Paul Keating first called for a GST, the labour treasurer at the time. He almost got it up and Bob Hawke went wobbly at the last minute and they dropped the GST. Later, despite being the first person to talk about a GST in this country, Paul Keating reversed his position to belt John Houston on the GST. And he won the unwinnable election.

[Marcus Paul] Yeah, of course.

[Malcolm Roberts] In 1998, there was a transaction tax proposed by somebody. Quite, quite good thinking going behind it. Peter Costello, the treasurer. He did a pretty good job in my opinion. Peter Costello, even he, when it looked like they could smash this politician over the transaction tax, he turned around, and even though he said earlier, that it was… Well it had quite a bit of merit and it looked good, he then used it to belt that politician. So, he trashed that opportunity. So, what the point is here is that both the parties attack someone else whenever they raise a system of proposed change for taxation. We all agree, right around the country, that the taxation system, it needs to be reformed completely around. It is the most damaging system in this country. Australians pay far too much tax, multinationals pay bugger all, but the point is this, every time someone puts forward a tax reform system, the party politics is played and it’s smashed. What we’re seeing is the liberal and labour and national parties too busy protecting themselves and they’re sacrificing the country to the worst and most destructive system in the country. What we need to do is to approach this in a far more effective sense, because we can’t continue as we are. So, what I would suggest is what we need to do is make sure we have agreement that the tax system has failed and must be changed. And then, instead of getting into the details, agree on the basic principles, things like fairness, equity, transparency, efficiency of taxation. Our taxation system is so inefficient. And then once the principles are established, out pops the solution in the form of a system. We’ve got to front up and be honest that this system is so bad at the moment and we’ve got to come up with a new way of addressing this politically.

[Marcus Paul] All right, Malcolm, good to have you on the programme as always. We’ll chat again next week.

[Malcolm Roberts] Look forward to it, Marcus. Thanks, mate.

[Marcus Paul] All right, One Nation’s Malcolm Roberts.

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