Shadow Portfolio — 26 June 2026

Ben Small used an adjournment speech to mount a regional defence of fuel tax credits, framing the debate as a contest between east-coast activist pressure and the economic survival of rural and coastal communities in his Forrest electorate [TA-260624-house-08719795bef8:s090]. Small's core argument is structural: fuel tax credits do not subsidise road use, but refund a road-use levy on fuel consumed entirely off public roads — by farmers, freight operators, builders, and fishers.

Removing the credits would therefore function as a new cost impost on businesses that never used the roads the tax was designed to fund. Small cited a new Parliamentary Budget Office report to support his argument that abolition would flow through to higher food, freight, housing and local service prices, squeeze jobs, and deter investment in regional areas. The speech closed with an explicit community mobilisation call — directing constituents to a petition website — signalling that the opposition intends to build public pressure on this issue beyond the chamber.

The broader opposition framing positions fuel tax credits as foundational to regional economies and connects their defence to a wider argument against government expansion and spending.