MOTIONS

Senator McKENZIE (Victoria—Leader of the Nationals in the Senate) (10:12): It gives me great pleasure, as the shadow transport minister and also as the Leader of the Nationals in the Senate, to support Senator Cash's call that this chamber be suspended and that the government give fuel relief to Australians right now. We do not need to have legislation. The minister, with the stroke of a pen, could cut the fuel excise right now and make changes to the road user charge so that our trucking industry could get the relief they are desperately seeking.

Whilst the government stands up and talks a big empathetic game—the language: so empathetic; you'd think butter wouldn't melt in their mouth—we are heading into the fifth week of this crisis. And only now are we seeing a plan for a meeting today to come up with a plan on how to actually help our nation get through this crisis. We are at the end of the global supply chain, so at the start of crises you do not feel the impact.

But, as the war drags on, it is our communities that are impacted. We are the most heavily reliant country in the world when it comes to diesel. It's not just our agricultural industry, as Senator McDonald knows; it is our miners—the industries that pay the bills, that pay for Medicare, that pay for politicians, that pay for our roads.

Mining and agriculture rely on diesel supplies. And this government is wringing its hands. In the first week of the crisis, what did they do?

They blamed Australians: 'Stop getting concerned. We've got it under control'—we've got no plan but we've got it under control. In the second week of the crisis: 'It's the states.

What are the states doing?' Every single day, this government has the powers available to it to make sure the limited supply of fuel that we have gets to where it's needed. Yet Minister Bowen is afraid to use the powers this parliament has given him. We see them, time and time again, coming in here, wringing hands, attacking everyone else and refusing to take responsibility for the great privilege of being the government of this great country, which also comes with great responsibility—and you'd better use it when the crisis comes.

You're not always going to get it right, but the very worst thing you can do is do nothing. You have to admit that your own policies have meant we're weaker going into this crisis. Businesses have been going offshore.

Meanwhile, you've nailed them on industrial relations and you've nailed them on environmental approvals, so— Senator Cash: Energy. Senator McKENZIE: Energy policy—you've kept clinging to net zero like a life raft for your EU trade agreement. Well, how is that going to help us when we have no sovereignty over our own fuel?

We need to be looking at the business going offshore and why we haven't been getting new oil and gas projects up and running and ensuring that our country is better prepared. You heard the minister then talk about the ACCC powers: 'They can hand out higher bills.' The government did not change the ACCC's powers to actually make sure they can examine and investigate price gouging by big international oil companies, who are holding regional Australia and our agricultural industry, particularly, to ransom during this crisis.

And, yes, we need families to have relief at the bowser right now, and that's something that should have already happened. And our trucking industry is desperate. This is what they've actually asked for.

What are you giving them? You're allowing the TWU into the contractual arrangements for the trucking industry, but that's okay. My inbox, like everyone's here, has been absolutely flooded with local businesses seeking relief.

We've got a transport operator, a third-generation transport business—the viability of their business is threatened with the rapid increase of fuel prices and an immediate cash flow crisis. That's why the transport industry has also been asking the government about GST relief and about actually giving them what we gave them during COVID: six months of relief from lending arrangements with banking and other creditors.

It's a cash flow crisis. Truckies are parking their trucks and not filling them up, because they can't afford to. Declaring this the emergency that it is, instigating disaster-relief packages for our industries—that's exactly what the industry has been calling for.

And, once again, this government has done nothing.