MATTERS OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE
Senator McDONALD (Queensland—Deputy Leader of the Nationals in the Senate) (16:20): The Fuel Tax Credits Scheme is an important one. It allows for Australians and Australian businesses, particularly in fisheries, agricultural businesses and mining businesses where roads are not provided, to get the rebate on the fuel that they use, particularly diesel. We know that the reduction in the fuel excise, which was so welcomed when fuel prices leapt up, and the removal of the fuel tax rebate did provide cash-flow issues for some small businesses, so it's important that it be a clear position from the coalition that we support the use of fuel tax rebates, particularly for businesses that don't get a road provided for them, for fishermen, for agricultural businesses and for mining businesses that really rely on that rebate to remain competitive, to remain able to afford the huge distances that we often transport and that we have to travel across.
The average increased costs for cane harvesters across a 150-day crushing season is $13,800 without a diesel rebate. It's currently sitting at 20.6c a litre, but it's normally 52c a litre. The average increased cost per day for a prawn trawler on a long trip offshore is $412 per day.
For a large mining truck, there are increased costs of $1,700 a day without the 20.6c rebate. Every dollar spent on fuel is a dollar less spent on creating jobs and improving yields. In Innisfail, a cane harvester can burn around 450 litres of diesel in a day's harvesting.
At today's fuel tax credit rate, that's almost $100 every single day. Over a crushing season, it quickly runs into thousands of dollars. In Townsville, commercial fishing vessels heading out to the Coral Sea burn hundreds and often thousands of litres of diesel on a trip.
Even at today's reduced fuel tax credit rate, that's hundreds of dollars in additional costs every time they leave the marina. In Charters Towers, diesel doesn't just go into tractors; it powers pumps, loaders, graders and harvest equipment. If you put a cap on fuel tax credits, you punish the very businesses producing Australia's food and fibre.
In Mount Isa, one large mining truck can burn thousands of litres of diesel in a single day. A cap doesn't change how much fuel the trucks need to move ore. It simply makes producing Australia's minerals more expensive.
Fuel tax credits don't give regional industries a special advantage. They simply ensure that farmers, miners, fishermen and regional businesses aren't paying a road tax for fuel that's never used on public roads, and removing them would simply increase the cost of producing food, resources and essential goods right across the country. North Queensland's economy is built on industries that rely heavily on diesel powered equipment operating away from public roads—things like sugar, bananas, avocados, coffee, citrus, beef, fishing, marine tourism operators, mining, ports, construction for homes, hospitals and schools, remote communities, disaster recovery and essential services.
Oh, and I've left off local government! Fuel tax credits are a longstanding feature of the tax system that prevents fuel excise operating as a tax on business inputs used offroad. It is a critical part of the construct of our system, a place where agricultural businesses in particular don't receive subsidies, don't receive the sort of encouragement and incentives that those in other countries, particularly in the EU and the US, receive for the production of food and fibre.
The system reflects the government's design and a simple fairness principle: that road user charges should fall on users of fuel on public roads. So it is an important construct. We support the use of fuel tax credits and fuel tax rebates.