MATTERS OF URGENCY

Senator DAVID POCOCK (Australian Capital Territory—Independent ACT Whip) (16:17): Australians know that, once our resources are gone, they're gone. There's no getting them back. There's no having regret after the fact.

We had this incredible amount of gas that was exported from this country and yet we look at our national deficit and it's hurtling towards $1 trillion of national debt. It's cold comfort to them to hear a government that is regurgitating lines from the gas industry, despite a proposal from the ACTU. The Australian Council of Trade Unions put forward the proposal that a 25 per cent gas export tax was a way for Australians to get a fair return from the gas that we export and a way to reduce the price of gas in Australia for manufacturers, households and businesses.

And yet we've got the Labor Party not just voting against but arguing against a proposal like this which the vast majority of Australians support. We're not making decisions in this place like we want to be here for a long time. We're not saying: 'We have this resource.

It's finite. It needs to be part of the transition. Let's actually get a fair return for it.' We're happy to flog it off, take the crumbs and then repeat what the gas industry says.

For many years they were in denial about this. They were. They said: 'Absolutely not.

It can't happen.' Now they're in delay mode. They realise that the vast majority of Australians want a better deal, and so the gas industry is trying to delay it and now the Labor Party is trying to delay it. They're saying, 'The petroleum resource rent tax, down the track, will give us a return.' When you look at the Treasury numbers, we get almost as much from passport fees in this country as we do from the petroleum resource rent tax.

Aussies aren't buying this. No wonder they're looking at the major parties and going, 'Well, who are you guys serving? Are you in there to make good decisions for us or are you shilling for the gas industry and shilling for the gambling industry?' What are we here to do?

This is a finite resource that belongs to all Australians. While we delay, while we dither and while the government doesn't have the guts to put in a windfall profits tax, companies like Woodside are laughing all the way to the bank. We'll see LNG revenue climb from $59 billion last financial year to $65 billion in 2027.

You've got Woodside saying that they've had a 28 per cent jump in revenue—$6 billion in the past three months—and they've exported less gas. And the government says, 'All good mate; all good.' (Time expired)