QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE: TAKE NOTE OF ANSWERS

Senator LIDDLE (South Australia—Deputy Opposition Whip in the Senate) (15:36): Well, you've really got to ask why. Why is Labor waging war on small business? Family businesses should not live in fear that an historic paperwork error could destroy everything they built.

Jim Chalmers should be fixing these unfair outcomes, not creating new problems with another complex trust tax. Labor's approach is always the same: more tax, more complexity and more red tape. Family businesses are the backbone of the Australian economy.

It is family businesses—and businesses—that employ Australians, that support regional economies, that invest in local economies and that create opportunities for the next generation. The last thing they need is more uncertainty created from Canberra. Small business is battling taxes increasing, interest rates increasing, power bills increasing, insurance bills going up, transport costs and—talking about truckies—freight costs going up too.

Labor has backflipped on so many of its pieces of legislation in its so-called tax reform it's hard to know how to keep up. We've said before they should just take an axe to it. Let's get some insight into this.

For decades, the Prime Minister himself has never had to think about where the money is coming from in his pay packet, nor has he had to think, 'How much am I going to get because my business has performed well?' He has not had to forgo any of that to pay workers. He has not had to rethink how much money he'll take home to buy that new piece of essential equipment.

None of that, in decades, has had to be something that he's had to think about. Not even a change in trading conditions has affected the salary that he knows will come into his bank account. Australians know that the Prime Minister and this government have failed them.

That legislation should go back for proper consultation—not just 'we're talking to' but actually, 'We're listening to, we're engaging with and we're responding to what business is telling us.' The coalition believes in a tax system that is tough on tax cheats, sure, but fair and honest to Australians. We believe family businesses deserve certainty, stability and clear rules, and that's not what Labor is delivering to them right now.

The coalition will restore certainty to trust arrangements and stand up for family businesses, farmers and small businesses right across Australia. Small businesses have been forced to spend money on lawyers, accountants and advisers just to understand what Labor's changes could mean for them. Some businesses have been told restructuring costs alone could reach $50,000.

We've even had questioning in here from experts who work with small business about those costs. That's real, because these people, who have said this is how much it costs, live in the real world. Again, this prime minister has not had to find the money to pay those taxes that Australians never voted for, that they never asked for and that are not welcome, at a time when they are struggling.

They are on their knees. That's not how you run a country. Labor, what you've produced for small business should not even be a thing.