Passenger Movement Charge Amendment Bill 2026

Mr HASTIE (Canning) (09:56): In rising to speak on the Passenger Movement Charge Amendment Bill 2026, I can inform the House that the coalition will oppose this bill. This legislation proposes yet another increase in Australia's passenger movement charge, the nation's departure tax, from $70 to $80 for the vast bulk of passengers departing Australia by air or sea.

The increase is scheduled to take effect from 1 January 2027 and therefore comes only 2½ years after the last increase in the passenger movement charge. If this bill passes, the passenger movement charge will have risen from $60 to $80 between June 2024 and January 2027. In other words, that is an increase of around 33 per cent in little more than 2½ years.

At a time when our tourism industry continues to work extremely hard to maintain its international competitiveness, the Albanese government has simply not made the case for why another increase of this magnitude is necessary. The passenger movement charge has existed in one form or another since 1978, when the original departure tax, as it was then called, was introduced at a level of $10.

It became the passenger movement charge in 1995. Over the decades since, there have been a number of increases and, on one isolated occasion, a decrease. But the question for the parliament today is not whether the passenger movement charge should exist, nor is it whether the rate can or should be adjusted.

The question is whether this government has made the case for this particular increase at this particular time, and the coalition believes it has not. The government expects the measure to raise an additional $745 million over the forward estimates, and that's a significant amount of money. But the additional revenue for the Commonwealth is not by itself a sufficient justification for imposing another tax increase on Australians and on our visitor economy.

And the government has not established a sufficiently clear connection between this additional revenue and improved services for the people who will actually pay the charge. The tourism, aviation, airport and cruise sectors have consistently argued that a greater share of passenger movement charge revenue should be reinvested in the infrastructure and services that support the movement of passengers across our border.

That includes enhancements such as more smart gates, better border technology, improved investment in airport and border infrastructure and more appropriate resourcing for the Australian Border Force. Yet this bill provides no guarantee that the additional revenue will be directed towards any of those ends. Passengers are being asked to pay more, but there is no corresponding commitment from the government that they will see improved border processing or passenger facilitation as a result.

I think that's a very legitimate and very widespread concern. The government's process in bringing forward this increase has also been poor. Key aviation and tourism stakeholders have said they were not meaningfully consulted, and that is particularly concerning given the practical consequences of the commencement date.

Airlines were already selling tickets for travel after 1 January 2027, before this legislation had been passed, and that creates a foreseeable implementation problem. Carriers cannot simply collect a higher statutory charge before that higher charge has become law. The government knew, or certainly should have known, that airlines sell international tickets many months in advance.

This was entirely predictable, yet the industry has been left to deal with the consequences of a compressed implementation timetable that stands in contrast to the substantially greater notice that accompanied the previous increase. This is not a theoretical concern. It affects airlines, travel agents, booking systems and ultimately passengers, who should also reasonably expect to know the full cost of a ticket when they purchase it.

Better consultation and better planning could have avoided this situation. Very understandably and justifiably in these circumstances, industry reaction to this measure has been overwhelmingly critical. The Australian Airports Association, for one, has expressed disappointment about the increase and has warned about the impact on price-sensitive travellers and on Australia's tourism competitiveness.

It has also made the very reasonable point that, if passengers are required to pay more, additional revenue should be invested in tangible improvements at the border. The Board of Airline Representatives of Australia has also criticised both the increase and the lack of consultation. Airlines are already dealing with elevated fuel and operating costs, and this measure adds yet another cost to international travel.

The Tourism and Transport Forum and Cruise Lines International Association Australasia have also raised concerns about the effect on Australia's tourism competitiveness. More specifically, the Tourism and Transport Forum has argued that the industry was blindsided and not properly consulted and that this measure makes Australia more expensive both for international visitors and for Australians travelling overseas.

Those concerns deserve to be taken seriously and, indeed, the coalition has done so in reaching the position that this bill should be opposed. Tourism is an extraordinarily important part of the Australian economy. It supports businesses and jobs across metropolitan, regional and remote Australia.

International aviation connects Australian businesses with global markets and connects Australian families with the world. The government should be looking for ways to make Australia more competitive as a destination, not lazily treating travellers as an easy source of additional revenue. It is true that some stakeholders have expressed a more nuanced view about the direct effect of an additional $10 on overall travel volumes, and it is fair to acknowledge that.

However, even those voices have reinforced the broader argument that Passenger Movement Charge revenue should be reinvested in tourism and border infrastructure. That is a recurring theme across the sector and across the community, and the government has not adequately responded to it. The coalition's position is therefore straightforward.

We do not oppose changes to the Passenger Movement Charge as a matter of principle. We supported the 2024 increase in circumstances where the charge had been unchanged for seven years and the increase broadly reflected accumulated inflation. We went to the 2025 election with a policy for predictable CPI indexation.

But this bill is different. To recap what I said earlier, it imposes another $10 increase after a period of only 2½ years. It lifts the PMC by 14.3 per cent in one step.

It goes well beyond CPI growth over the relevant period. This would all mean, if the bill is passed, that the charge had increased by a third between June 2024 and January 2027. The government also failed to provide a sufficiently compelling policy justification for that increase.

It has failed to meaningfully consult key sectors before putting them in the position of having to manage a rushed implementation and has failed to guarantee that the additional revenue will be reinvested in the border infrastructure, technology and services, for which passengers and industry are asking. Australians are already paying enough. Our tourism and aviation sectors already face significant cost pressures, and simply that it will raise another $745 million for the Commonwealth in the form of a desperate tax grab to try to offset some of the many disastrous budgetary decisions by the Labor Party is certainly not sufficient reason to wave through another substantial increase in a tax on international travel.

For all those reasons and many more, and especially in acknowledgement of the position of the tourism and transport sectors on this legislation, the coalition will oppose the Passenger Movement Charge Amendment Bill 2026, and I commend that position to the parliament. Debate adjourned.