Senate
12 September 1979

31st Parliament · 1st Session



The PRESIDENT (Senator the Hon. Sir Condor Laucke) took the chair at 2.15 p.m., and read prayers.

page 575

PETITIONS

Metric System

Senator ARCHER:
TASMANIA

– I present the following petition from 23 citizens of Australia:

To the Honourable the President and Members of the Senate in Parliament assembled:

The petition of the undersigned citizens of Australia respectfully showeth objection to the Metric system and request the Government to restore the Imperial system.

And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray.

Petition received and read.

Uranium Mining and Enrichment

Senator KEEFFE:
QUEENSLAND

– I present the following petition from 7 1 citizens of Australia:

To the Honourable the President and Members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The petition of the undersigned respectfully showeth that the construction of a uranium enrichment plant in North Queensland and the mining of uranium on the Herveys Range area should not be proceeded with on the following grounds:

1 ) No safe method has yet been devised for the disposal of nuclear waste.

The mining of uranium ore exposes workers to considerable danger from radon gases.

The danger of poisoning chemicals seeping into surface and underground water supplies as a result of uranium ore mining and refining of uranium ore could pose serious health hazards for persons living in the Townsville region.

Your petitioners most humbly pray that the Senate in Parliament assembled should take all possible steps to abandon or postpone indefinitely the mining of uranium in the Herveys Range area, and the construction of an enrichment plant in the Townsville region.

And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray.

Petition received and read.

Citizen Forces: Long Service and Good Conduct Medals

Senator MISSEN:
VICTORIA

-I present the following petition from 10 citizens of Australia:

To the Honourable the President and Members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The humble petition of the undersigned members and ex-members of the Citizens Forces of Australia respectfully sheweth:

On 14 February 1975, the then Australian Government deprived the Officers and men of the Australian Citizen Naval Military and Air Forces of the distinctive and historic Decorations and Medals for long service and good conduct, namely the Reserve Decoration, the Efficiency Decoration, the Air Efficiency Award, the Efficiency Medal and Long Service and Good Conduct Medals, awarded for long and meritorious voluntary service in the citizen forces:

The proposed substitution of the National Medal for these Decorations and Medals varies the principle of selective recognition of efficient voluntary service in the citizen forces in that it recognises the period of service only and embraces also full time service as well in the defence forces as in the police, fire brigade and ambulance services:

This deprivation caused and is continuing to cause serious discontent amongst personnel of the Citizens Forces who willingly and cheerfully give of their spare time outside their normal full time civilian careers, to serve Her Majesty and Australia:

The Reserve Forces of Australia have been recognised by the present Government as a valuable- and costeffective component of the Defence Forces. Anomalously, whilst the Government is actually supporting recruiting for these Forces it has imposed and continued this deprivation which as foresaid has depressed the morale of the Citizen Forces:

Her Majesty has not cancelled the said Decorations and Medals.

Your petitioners therefore humbly pray:

Your Honourable House take appropriate action to resume the award of the several distinctive and historic Reserve Forces Decorations and Medals to members of the Royal Australian Naval Reserve, Citizens Military Force (Army Reserve) and Citizens Air Force.

Petition received.

The Clerk:

– Petitions have been lodged for presentation as follows:

Citizen Forces: Long Service and Good Conduct Medals

To the Honourable the President and Members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The humble petition of the undersigned members and ex-members of the Citizens Forces of Australia respectfully sheweth:

  1. On 14 February 1975, the then Australian Government deprived the Officers and men of the Australian Citizen Naval Military and Air Forces of the distinctive and historic Decorations and Medals for long service and good conduct, namely the Reserve Decoration, the Efficiency Decoration, the Air Efficiency Award, the Efficiency Medal and Long Service and Good Conduct Medals, awarded for long and meritorious voluntary service in the citizen forces:
  2. The proposed substitution of the National Medal for these Decorations and Medals varies the principle of selective recognition of efficient voluntary service in the citizen forces in that it recognises the period of service only and cmbraces also full time service as well in the defence forces as in the police, fire brigade and ambulance services:
  3. This deprivation caused and is continuing to cause serious discontent amongst personnel of the Citizens Forces who willingly and cheerfully give of their spare time outside their normal full time civilian careers, to serve Her Majesty and Australia:
  4. The Reserve Forces of Australia have been recognised by the present Government as a valuable- and costeffective component of the Defence Forces. Anomalously, whilst the Government is actually supporting recruiting for these Forces it has imposed and continued this deprivation which as foresaid has depressed the morale of the Citizen Forces:
  5. Her Majesty has not cancelled the said Decorations and Medals.

Your petitioners therefore humbly pray:

Your Honourable House take appropriate action to resume the award of the several distinctive Reserve Forces Decorations and Medalsfor Long Service and Good Conduct to members of the Royal Australian Naval Reserve, Army Reserve (CMF) and the RAAF Citizens Air force. by Senator Lewis.

Petition received.

Education Funding

To the Honourable President and Members of the Senate in Parliament assembled. The petition of the undersigned citizens of Australia respectfully showeth:

That further cutbacks in Commonwealth funding to State Schools and transferral of funds to wealthy independent schools as required under the guidelines to the Schools Commission announced by the Minister for Education in early June are of vital concern in that they mitigate against the interests of the great majority of Australian Children in State Schools.

That Queensland State Schools have not reached the Resource Usage Targets set by the Schools Commission, and even at those financial levels will fall well short of actual provision standards envisaged by the Commission.

That Queensland’s effort in respect of Capital works is particularly of concern being less than half the per capita effort of other States.

Your petitioners therefore call on their legislators to ensure:

  1. That Federal funding to State Schools is restored to at least 1974-75 levels;
  2. the independence of the Schools Commission to recommend the allocation of funds to schools on the basis of need, unhindered by Government directive; and
  3. that sufficient funds are provided to Queensland, appropriately tied, to ensure achievement of National standards in this State.

And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray. by Senator MacGibbon.

Petition received.

page 576

COMPENSATION (COMMONWEALTH GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES) AMENDMENT BILL 1979

Notice of Motion

Senator GUILFOYLE:
Minister for Social Security · Victoria · LP

– I give notice that on the next day of sitting I shall move:

That leave be given to introduce a Bill for an Act to amend the Compensation (Commonwealth Government Employees) Act 1971.

page 576

SEAMEN’S COMPENSATION AMENDMENT BILL (No. 2) 1979

Notice of Motion

Senator GUILFOYLE:
Minister for Social Security · Victoria · LP

– I give notice that on the next day of sitting I shall move:

That leave be given to introduce a Bill for an Act to amend the Seamen’s Compensation Act 191 1.

page 576

QUESTION

QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE

page 576

QUESTION

TAXATION INCREASES

Senator WRIEDT:
TASMANIA

-I remind the Minister representing the Treasurer that on 23 August he gave an undertaking that he would refer to the Treasurer the taxation table prepared by Mr Eric Risstrom of the Australian Taxpayers Association which showed quite clearly that personal income tax this year will increase. Can the Minister now give the Senate the Treasurer’s comments on Mr Risstrom ‘s calculations?

Senator CARRICK:
Vice-President of the Executive Council · NEW SOUTH WALES · LP

– The Treasurer has made public quite clearly his comments on Mr Risstrom ‘s calculations. The public of Australia has clearly accepted the Treasurer’s comments. They are that on 1 December every taxpayer in Australia will get a reduction in taxation. That is quite clear. The Treasurer has made it perfectly clear that there is nothing new in the stated fact that if in the course of a year a taxpayer gets increased wages he will pay increased tax. Nevertheless, the salary or wage of a taxpayer on 30 November will be increased on 1 December by a reduction in taxation. That is perfectly clear.

Senator WRIEDT:

– I ask a supplementary question. I remind the Minister that on 28 August I referred again to the undertaking that he gave to refer this matter to the Treasurer and that he said in his reply:

I have not as yet received a reply from the Treasurer, but I will seek one.

Is it not incumbent upon the Minister to table in this chamber an answer to a question which he has to refer to his colleague? I asked for that. Are we on this side of the House not entitled to believe that for some reason or another- a reason which does not escape our attention- the Minister is reluctant to table in this chamber the Treasurer’s calculations as to his justification for saying that Mr Risstrom ‘s figures are wrong?

Senator CARRICK:

– I answered the substantial part of Senator Wriedt’s former question to me and I answered it effectively. If a response from the Treasurer to Senator Wriedt is outstanding I will invite the Treasurer to make that response.

page 576

QUESTION

AUSTRALIA DAY COUNCIL

Senator TOWNLEY:
TASMANIA

– I ask the Minister representing the Minister for Home Affairs whether the Minister for Home Affairs today announced the composition of the Australia Day

Council for 1 980. Is it a fact that the Council includes representatives of every State and Territory except Tasmania? Does the Minister believe that Tasmanians regard Australia Day as a foreign holiday and therefore do not celebrate it? If the Minister is not suffering from such delusions, will he ask the Minister for Home Affairs to take immediate action to rectify this serious omission?

Senator WEBSTER:
Minister for Science and the Environment · VICTORIA · NCP/NP

– I have not seen the statement that the Minister for Home Affairs made about the Australia Day Council, but I am aware that a decision on it was to be taken and was to be announced shortly. The honourable senator raised a question about the composition of the Council. I too am particularly surprised that no member of the Tasmanian community is to be on that Council, I will certainly draw that to the attention of the Minister.

page 577

QUESTION

EDUCATION: PRIVATE STUDENTS

Senator BUTTON:
VICTORIA

– I refer the Minister for Education to the Budget Papers estimate that the introduction of a charge on private students from overseas countries who enrol for the first time or who change their courses of study at Australian universities or colleges of advanced education will yield $6m in 1979-80. 1 ask: How are the expressions ‘private students’ and ‘change of course’ to be defined for the purpose of the levying of this charge? For example, will ‘private students’ include persons sponsored by community aid programs, such as Rotary and the Freedom from Hunger campaign? Will the expression include persons awarded university post-graduate awards and external students from Papua New Guinea? What is in fact meant by the expression ‘change of course ‘?

Senator CARRICK:
LP

– I hope in the early future to be able to introduce into this Parliament substantial details which will cover all the matters raised by Senator Button.

page 577

QUESTION

TAXATION DEDUCTIONS: MOTOR VEHICLES

Senator MESSNER:
SOUTH AUSTRALIA

– My question is addressed to the Minister representing the Treasurer and refers to the recent Budget statement concerning the limitation to $ 1 8,000 of depreciation deductible for motor vehicles. Can the Minister confirm that the proposed law will allow a deduction against taxable income of the whole of lease payments in respect of a lease agreement for motor vehicles valued in excess of $ 1 8,000? Further, in respect of hire purchase or chattel mortgages for such vehicles, will the whole of the interest payable on such loans also be deductible?

Senator CARRICK:
LP

-Whilst I have some knowledge on this matter, I think it would be better if I were to refer the matter to the Treasurer to get his precise response. I will do so.

page 577

TELEVISION NEWS BROADCASTS:

page 577

QUESTION

DEAF PEOPLE

Senator HARRADINE:
TASMANIA

– My question is addressed to the Minister representing the Minister for Post and Telecommunications and concerns the very large number of Australians who, because of being profoundly deaf or having severely impaired hearing, find it most difficult to understand television news broadcasts. Some years ago the Australian Deafness Council raised this matter with the Australian Broadcasting Commission and with commercial television stations and suggested that captions be used during the broadcast of television news, as is the case in the United States of America and the United Kingdom. Is the Minister prepared to take up this matter with the Australian Broadcasting Commission and, indeed, with the Australian Broadcasting Tribunal so that the Tribunal can consider the matter when granting licences? Will the Minister be in a position to make an announcement on this matter during Australian Deafness Awareness Week, which will be the first week in October?

Senator CHANEY:
Minister for Aboriginal Affairs · WESTERN AUSTRALIA · LP

– 1 understand that the Minister for Post and Telecommunications has kept himself informed of developments in this area overseas. The Postal and Telecommunications Department has been actively monitoring the various overseas experiments which have been undertaken in both hand signing and subtitling. The Minister has been regularly briefed on those developments, particularly those in the United States of America, and an officer in his Department has recently held discussions with British officials of ITV and the British Broadcasting Corporation concerning their experiments with closed captioning using the teletext system. Currently the Australian Broadcasting Commission and 18 commerical television stations are conducting teletext trials and current thinking suggests that the system will be the best suited to serve Australia’s needs. But there are some technical problems to be overcome and a final decision on the introduction of teletext has been delayed pending a resolution of those problems.

Matters relating to station programming and presentation are the prerogative of the national and commercial operators but the Minister for

Post and Telecommunications has already approached the Australian Broadcasting Commission and the Federation of Australian Commercial Television Stations to seek their views on captioning possibilities for programs such as news headlines, special services annnouncements and possibly certain documentary programs. As to whether the Minister will be in a position to meet the last request of the honourable senator, namely, that the Minister make some announcement in the particular week mentioned, I will refer that to Mr Staley and ask him to reply to the honourable senator.

page 578

QUESTION

TASMANIAN AIRPORTS

Senator ARCHER:

– I ask the Minister representing the Minister for Transport: What was the degree of excess to pavement overload at Wynyard Airport subsequent to the issue of Pavement Concession No. 6826 which authorised Lockheed Hercules C130H-type aircraft to operate at 49,900 kilograms at a tyre pressure of 517 kilopascals? Has either of the two major domestic airlines ever applied for, or made inquiries to operate, DC9 aircraft to and from the Devonport or Wynyard airports, either for additional scheduled operations or for use as an alternative?

Senator CHANEY:
LP

– I had a funny feeling this morning that someone would ask me a question along those lines, and I have a little information with which I can assist the honourable senator. I am advised by the Department of Transport that the current pavement rating at Wynard would normally preclude the operation of Lockheed Hercules C 1 30H aircraft. Pavement concessions are issued to allow aircraft to operate at low frequency with weights exceeding that allowed by the pavement rating. In the case of a Hercules C130H we can allow considerable overload in relation to the rating because the undercarriage has a wide load distribution effect. It is the same as saying that if a very heavy person is sitting on one it is better that he be also very wide. The same principle applies apparently to aircraft landing on airstrips. With an aircraft like the DC9 however, there is not that spread effect. Therefore there is greater stress on the pavement, and this is a pavement which has failed previously under less severe loadings. The domestic airlines, I am advised, have not applied to operate DC9 aircraft into Devonport and Wynyard as additional scheduled operations or on an alternate basis. They have made inquiries about using DC9 aircraft for charter operations but have been refused because of pavement limitations and environmental problems.

page 578

QUESTION

UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFIT

Senator GRIMES:
NEW SOUTH WALES

– My question is directed to the Minister for Social Security. In the absence of any explanation in the Budget Papers or the Budget Speech, can she give us the justification for the Government’s failure again this year to increase the unemployment benefit to the unemployed without dependants? Is there any particular percentage of the standard rate that the Government intends to allow this benefit to fall to?

Senator GUILFOYLE:
LP

– At the time of the Budget last year it was said that there would not be automatic increases in the unemployment benefit to those without dependants but that the matter would be reviewed in this current Budget. It was reviewed in this Budget and it was not thought possible to increase it or to index it. It is a matter that will be reviewed constantly when decisions are being taken with regard to the level of social security benefits. There is no percentage in the mind of the Government to which this benefit would be allowed to erode before any increase were made. However, I point out that a very large percentage of the people who receive unemployment benefit are those who do not have dependants. The different levels of unemployment benefit take into account family responsibilities, the age or other responsibilities which may apply.

page 578

QUESTION

ALLEGATION OF RACISM

Senator MISSEN:

– I draw the attention of the Minister representing the Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs to an Age article of 5 September 1979 in which Professor Jerzy Zubrzycki, Chairman of the Australian Ethnic Affairs Council, alleges that Nazi-type racism is flourishing in Western Australia and that prejudice against non-European migrants is promoted there by a number of organisations. Will the Minister comment on Professor Zubrzycki ‘s further claim that there is in Western Australia a well-organised group of people spreading a gospel of hatred and falsehoods similar to the ideology of Nazis he had fought in 1939 when Hitler’s armies invaded Poland?

Senator Walsh:

– The Kimberley Division of the Liberal Party.

Senator MISSEN:

-No doubt the honourable senator knows all about it. Is the Government aware of this serious situation? Has the matter been referred to the Commissioner for Community Relations for further investigation? If not, what action will the Government take to overcome this problem so that justice and tolerance may be enjoyed by all sections of the Australian community?

Senator GUILFOYLE:
LP

– I have some information on this matter from the Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs. I understand that Professor Zubrzycki, who is Chairman of the Australian Ethnic Affairs Council, made his comments in the context of a public meeting organised by that Council’s Committee on Community Consultation and Media held in Perth on Sunday, 2 September. He made it clear in a letter to the West Australian published on 7 September that some of the comments on his statement were without foundation. This applied particularly to some newspaper reports that he had said that Western Australia was the most racist State. Professor Zubrzycki made it clear that he did not make any such comment. He also made it clear that the hostile reaction to Asian migration on the part of a few speakers at the meeting was in sharp contrast to the reaction at comparable meetings held in other parts of Australia.

He mentioned also that he was very much comforted by the thought that the great majority of those present at the public meeting were concerned mostly with genuine discussion on the needs and problems of Australia as a multicultural society. I understand that the meeting in Perth was attended by some members of the League of Rights and of the Immigration Control Association who identified themselves as such and were vocal in expressing their views against Asian migrants and refugees. Australia has a bipartisan non-discriminatory approach to immigration. Manifestations of racial prejudices are inconsistent with that non-discriminatory approach, especially since, as a nation, we have accepted obligations to resettle refugees here. Australia is a country of immigrants and both major political groupings in their policy statements have expressed the view that it is through mutual understanding and tolerance that we can best achieve a socially cohesive society where there is scope for cultural diversity. Bigotry and prejudices are a waste of energy and emotion.

The Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs would urge all Australians to channel their resources and energies towards achieving the goal with which all members of parliament will agree, of promoting a tolerant and understanding cohesive society. On this basis we can build an even stronger and more tolerant nation with a greater capacity to assist in the solution of some of the major world problems, not the least of which is the need to exhibit humanitarian concern for people who have become refugees as a result of events in Indo-China and elsewhere.

page 579

QUESTION

USE AND EFFECTS OF X-RAYS

Senator MELZER:
VICTORIA

– My question is addressed to the Minister for Science and the Environment. It appears that the State Government in Victoria has ignored whatever powers it has to control X-ray equipment. The Australian Radiation Laboratory has had great influence in this area and has been responsible for research into the effects of X-rays. As the Minister’s Department is responsible for the Radiation Laboratory, can he advise the Senate of steps being taken by his Department to safeguard the community from overuse of X-rays?

Senator WEBSTER:
NCP/NP

-The honourable senator is correct in saying that there is some disquiet in the community about the over-use of X-rays in various practices. The organisations associated with this matter have taken it up as a question on which they are to report to the Minister for Health. Perhaps I could bring back to the honourable senator a paper which will describe the current situation.

page 579

QUESTION

SOVIET UNION: TRAVEL VISAS

Senator ROCHER:
WESTERN AUSTRALIA

– Is the Minister representing the Minister for Foreign Affairs aware of a recent refusal by Soviet authorities to grant travel visas to a party of Australians of Latvian origin who wished to visit Riga, the Latvian capital, during a planned visit to the Soviet Union for the Olympic Games? Have Union of Soviet Socialist Republics authorities advised the Commonwealth Government on that country’s policy regarding group travel by former nationals to Latvia and other acquired Soviet territory?

Senator CARRICK:
LP

-I am aware that a letter published in the Australian, I think, at the end of June of this year raises the matter of a recent Soviet refusal to issue visitors’ visas to a group of Australians of Latvian origin for the group to visit Riga, the Latvian capital. My understanding is that this particular visit had no relation to the Olympic Games to be held in Moscow in 1980. 1 must say that each country, including Australia, has the right to decide who may or may not enter it. Nevertheless, if the refusal of visas to Australians were an act of discrimination, the Government would deplore it. The Government has received no official information indicating a change in Soviet policy concerning group travel. On the general question of facilities for Australian visitors to the Moscow Olympic Games, I am aware of reports in this morning’s Press, I think, that the Australian authorities have been successful in securing a satisfactory allocation of Games tickets. I understand the reports to be substantially correct. The agreement reached between the relevant Australian and Soviet organisations seems to represent a reasonably happy outcome of the discussions between Australian and Soviet authorities on these matters and a satisfactory resolution of the difficulties suggested in the Press, I think last weekend.

page 580

QUESTION

CARCINOGENIC EFFECTS OF CHEMICALS

Senator ELSTOB:
SOUTH AUSTRALIA

-I ask the Minister for Science and the Environment: What research is being done in Australia by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation or other government agencies into the carcinogenic effects on workers of chemicals used in industry? Does the Minister receive regular reports from overseas agencies carrying out similar work? Is this information given to industries which use the particular chemicals under research? Is this information released for public scrutiny?

Senator WEBSTER:
NCP/NP

– I think that I can say with some authority that the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation is not conducting any research related to the carcinogenic effect of chemicals upon the workers in any particular industry. My understanding is that that would be a matter primarily for the Department of Health. Certainly, from time to time manuals on chemicals, the use of which may be considered hazardous, come across my desk. These go not only to my Department but to the CSIRO. I repeat, this general area is, in the Federal sphere, the responsibility of the Department of Health. I will refer the honourable senator’s question to the Minister for Health and endeavour to obtain further information for him.

page 580

QUESTION

RANGER URANIUM PROJECT

Senator KILGARIFF:
NORTHERN TERRITORY

– My question is directed to the Minister representing the Minister for Trade and Resources. As a territorian, I have more than a passing interest in the present stage of development, and sale, of Northern Territory uranium, and I ask the Minister: Is it the intention of the Government and the Ranger partners, Peko-EZ, to continue to market their share of uranium production separately? If so, has a firm price been established? Having in mind also that the Government’s Ranger shares may be on the market, is the criticism made by would-be buyers that, although firm proposals for the purchase of the shares must be in the hands of the Government by the end of this month, the Government has given insufficient information as a foundation upon which a firm proposal may be made?

Senator DURACK:
Attorney-General · WESTERN AUSTRALIA · LP

– The Ranger agreement, which was signed on 9 January 1979 between the Government, the Australian Atomic Energy Commission and Peko and EZ companies, is strictly a production joint venture agreement and does not extend to marketing or sale arrangements. In consequence of that agreement, each joint venture partner is, and remains, responsible for marketing its share of production. The Government has not yet made any decision about how it would market its share. In accordance with the Government’s export marketing policy for uranium, announced on 1 June 1978, the Minister for Trade and Resources must determine, in advance of companies ‘ making firm offers or entering into legal commitments, the terms and conditions relating to uranium sales contracts, including those in respect of pricing. The details of these commercial terms and conditions are confidential to the Minister and to the individual companies concerned.

In answer to the third aspect of the honourable senator’s question, I am advised that information on the Ranger uranium project has been provided to all companies and organisations which have expressed in writing an interest in acquiring the Government’s interests in the project. The information provided to date includes data on the Ranger project capital costs and other cost-related information. It is important that the Government should observe the confidentiality requirements of the Ranger agreement relating to such material. It is also necessary to bear in mind the extent to which it is appropriate to provide detailed commercial information to parties who may be potential competitors of Australian producers or potential purchasers of Ranger uranium.

page 580

QUESTION

VALIUM

Senator MASON:
NEW SOUTH WALES

– My question, which is directed to the Minister representing the Minister for Health, relates to reports in today’s Press concerning the United States Senate subcommittee’s inquiry into the use of the drug Valium, in the course of which 8 witnesses are said to have testified that they had become addicted to the drug. Is the Minister aware of the reported comment of the Chairman of that Committee, Senator Kennedy, that: ‘If you require a daily dose of Valium to get through the day, you are hooked and need help.’? Also, is the Minister aware that at that inquiry the Chairman of the company which manufactures Valium in the US,

Hoffman la Roche Inc., admitted that the company was now embarking on a program to warn users of possible withdrawal symptoms? I ask the Government to institute inquiries into these reports and, if they are confirmed, to proceed to establish a new status for Valium in Australia, as a drug of habituation, and attempt to limit the rate of its prescription in this country which is reported to be as high as 10 million prescriptions a year.

Senator GUILFOYLE:
LP

-I saw the Press report to which the honourable senator has referred but have received no advice from the Minister for Health on this matter. I will refer to the Minister the matter raised and seek information from him concerning it, together with any information that the government may have with regard to either the hearings of the United State Senate subcommittee, or any other attitudes that it may have with regard to the classification of Valium as an addictive drug.

page 581

QUESTION

ALLOCATION OF FUNDS TO SCHOOLS

Senator PUPLICK:
NEW SOUTH WALES

– My question is addressed to the Minister for Education. In the Government’s guidelines to the Schools Commission the recurrent grants to government schools, in real money terms, have remained static for 1980 whilst the recurrent grants to non-government schools have been increased. Is there justification for the criticism that this means that the nongovernment sector has benefited at the expense of government schools?

Senator CARRICK:
LP

– In short, there is no justification at all for the criticism that is being widely and quite wrongly made. To understand the situation, five-sixths of all the revenue of government schools comes through State revenues, largely from income tax reimbursement from the Commonwealth, and one-sixth comes from the Schools Commission. One has to look at the total amount of the funds going to government schools and non-government schools to see whether, in fact, there has been equity. When one looks at that one will find that the government schools have been so funded that they have moved much faster towards their Schools Commission resource levels than the non-government schools. The illusion is created and perpetuated by propagandists taking one segment- that is, as Senator Puplick says, a static figure for government schools for recurrent grants and a slight increase in non-government recurrents grantsand then saying: ‘Here we have evidence of an increase’. Let me make it perfectly clear that the great bulk of the increase in the Schools Commission’s funding of non-government schools relates to the fact that there is a percentage linking of the per capita grants of non-government schools to government schools. If I may demonstrate this: If a non-government school is to get a per capita grant which is 20 per cent of the per capita grant of a government school, then it will get an increase in that grant only if the government school’s grant goes up. So in no way at all can the non-government schools benefit by percentage linking unless prior to that the government school grants have gone up.

To demonstrate that, let me take the position over a period of four years. In 1974-75 - I use December 1978 levels- the average standard cost of a Victorian primary school pupil was $791. It rose the next year to $958, the next year to $ 1 ,0 1 1 and the next year to $ 1 ,069, making an increase per pupil of $278 in standard terms over those four years. That is for a State government pupil. A 20 per cent per capita grant would have risen from $158 to $192, to $202 and to $214, making an overall increase of $56. If the nongovernment school moneys have gone up, it follows that the government schools in that factor must have gone up by five times the amount. It is a complete misrepresentation of the figures to suggest that one sector is favoured compared with the other. Overall it is very simple. Seventynine per cent of students go to government schools. They in fact absorb something like 89 per cent of all public funds spent. Twenty-one per cent of pupils go to non-government schools. They absorb a little over 1 1 per cent of the funds spent. So the preponderance of money being allocated goes to the government schools and the resources gap is growing for government schools by camparison with the non-government schools.

page 581

QUESTION

ALLOCATION OF FUNDS TO SCHOOLS

Senator WRIEDT:

-Is the Minister for Education aware that page 75 of the Budget Papers shows that the total allocation this year by the Federal Government to government schools in the States and the Northern Territory has been reduced by $77.3m? Is that a result of a recommendation by the Schools Commission or is it as a result of the Government informing the Schools Commission that it was determined to reduce its allocation by that amount?

Senator CARRICK:
LP

-It is neither. If Senator Wriedt had directed himself to my guidelines that were brought down here, he would know that the guidelines directed the Schools Commission with regard to a sum of, I think, $41m, involving capital payments to Government schools, and not $73m. Whatever figure he refers to must be an accumulation over a range of States. The guidelines show that in real money terms after adjustment for inflation the Government has maintained the current grants to government schools at the same level in 1 980 as for 1979, although there is a minor reduction in the number of students. The Government has reduced the capital flow to the States but, at the same time, the States in this coming year will have less expenditure to the tune of some $40m in terms of student scholarships, the large bulk of which will be financed by the Tertiary Education Assistance Scheme. The States will not have less money on balance; it will be for them to adjust themselves to this situation.

In fact, what has happened is that in the last three financial years, even though the population of schools has gone up less than 3 per cent, in real money terms after adjustment for inflation the recurrent funds to State schools have gone up 9 per cent which is a huge amount. No amount of figures waved at us can overcome this one point: The Schools Commission set targets for government and non-government schools. The target for primary schools was to be reached in 1980, and for secondary schools it was to be reached by 1982. The targets for government schools were reached and surpassed in the last year and are now moving well ahead of those targets; in other words, this Government has so arranged the finances in the Federal and State sphere that schools have done far better than the Schools Commission resource targets indicated.

Senator WRIEDT:

- Mr President, I wish to ask a supplementary question. I am not concerned about the Government and nongovernment aspect of the matter. I am concerned about the actual figures stated in the Budget Papers. The Minister does not appear to be able to explain it. The $41m to which he refers does not appear on those Papers. I put my question to the Minister again. The Budget Papers show that the allocation for government schools in the States and the Northern Territory last financial year was $45 1.2m. This year, it is $373. 8m, which is a reduction of $77.3m. Can the Minister explain how that reduction has come about?

Senator CARRICK:

– Of course, that was not the question that Senator Wriedt asked. Hansard will show that he asked whether this was a reduction of $73m in Schools Commission funding. I responded and said that was not true. I have not looked at page 75 of the Budget Papers, nor can I hope to have them before me now. I will look it up and give the honourable senator a comment.

page 582

QUESTION

CONSERVATION OF LIQUID FUELS

Senator KNIGHT:
ACT

– I refer the Minister representing the Prime Minister to the Prime Minister’s statement on 27 June on energy policy. He stated:

The Government has initiated a study of the scope for saving liquid fuels within government departments and agencies.

Can the Minister say what stage this study has reached and what the findings thus far have been? Can he say when the study is expected to be completed and whether it will be made public?

Senator CARRICK:
LP

-As Senator Knight indicates, earlier this year the Minister for National Development wrote to all Commonwealth Ministers seeking their advice on current fuel consumption and the scope for liquid fuel savings within their portfolios. Initial results of this survey are that major uses of fuel are for civil and military aircraft, diesel and petrol vehicles, military craft and heating and cooling of government buildings. Departments and agencies have already introduced a number of important conservation measures in their transport operations and in buildings and factories. Departments are canvassing a wide range of additional conservation measures. This information has been presented through the Australian Minerals and Energy Council to State governments which have been examining ways of reducing liquid fuel consumption in their operations. I understand that the Minister for National Development proposes to follow up the initial responses to establish a program for action and monitoring results. He will report to Parliament when this stage of the study is completed.

page 582

QUESTION

DISARMAMENT

Senator KEEFFE:

– Is the Minister representing the Prime Minister aware that in the final document adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on disarmament held in New York in 1978, many countries expressed their concern about the continuing threat to mankind of the proliferation of nuclear weapons and the spiralling costs of the arms race and the effect of the latter on the economic and social development of the peoples of the world? Can the Minister inform the Parliament whether the Australian Government intends to take any action in favour of disarmament during the week commencing 24 October 1 979 as this week has been set aside as the United Nations Disarmament Week? Can the Minister further inform the Parliament whether the Government intends to send Australian parliamentarians or other delegates to the second special session of the General Assembly of the United Nations which will be held in 1 980 for the purpose of discussing disarmament again?

Senator CARRICK:
LP

-Senator Wriedt and, indeed, the Senate will know that the Commonwealth Government has had a continuing policy of opposition to the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Australia is a signatory to the treaty on non-proliferation. Therefore the Government takes a 365-days-a-year attitude to express and to carry out policies in that regard. Of course, it also deplores the fact that there is an arms race and that there are spiralling costs of armament throughout the world. In response to Senator Keeffe ‘s question, I state that the policies of the Federal Government are continually expressed. They are well known. I think I was asked yesterday what steps the Commonwealth Government was taking with regard to the particular disarmament function to be held over a week. I said that I would seek that information. I am not aware whether any members of Parliament will be present in connection with the two occasions mentioned by the honourable senator. However, I will invite the Prime Minister to comment.

page 583

QUESTION

UNEMPLOYMENT

Senator YOUNG:
SOUTH AUSTRALIA

-I refer the Minister representing the Minister for Employment and Youth Affairs to the recent figures published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics showing a reduction in unemployment in Australia. What effect will the situation in South Australia have on the figures published recently by the Australian Bureau of Statistics which clearly show that there has been an increase of some 6,000 people on the unemployment list in South Australia and that the State unemployment figure rose by approximately 3 per cent in the last 12 months? I ask the Minister again: What effect will these unfortunate figures in South Australia have on the total assessment of unemployment in Australia?

Senator DURACK:
LP

– As Senator Young has indicated, the economic problems in South Australia are pretty depressing. Not having detailed figures at hand, I am not able to give a clear answer to Senator Young’s question. I will refer it to the Minister for Employment and Youth Affairs to see whether he can supply an answer at an early date.

page 583

QUESTION

EDUCATION: POST-GRADUATE AWARDS

Senator EVANS:
VICTORIA

– I give Senator Carrick another opportunity to lift his game in his capacity as Minister for Education. How can the Government possibly justify its Budget cutback in Commonwealth post-graduate awards from $9m to $8. 8m this year, representing a cutback in real terms of some 10 per cent, given the steadily increasing drain of Australia ‘s most qualified researchers overseas, the fact that Australia has already made a massive investment in their education and the fact that stepped up research in many fields in particular, energy and alternative fuels, could not be more vital at this time?

Senator CARRICK:
LP

-It is true that the investment in post-graduate awards by the Commonwealth Government has been reduced. It is true that I would like to see an increase. To look at the overall picture, though, one has to look at the massive amount of research that is going on, coordinated now by the Australian Science and Technology Council and through the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation and the universities.

Senator Button:

– None of the expert committees agree with you.

Senator CARRICK:

– ASTEC is the expert body and it has expressed itself in this regard. It is true that the Williams Committee of Inquiry into Education and Training has indicated the desirability of increasing research in universities, and especially in some special research centres. I think that these awards are desirable, and as soon as the Government has the additional resources so to do I have no doubt that they will be expanded.

page 583

QUESTION

LUCERNE

Senator MacGIBBON:
QUEENSLAND

– My question is addressed to the Minister for Science. With reference to his public announcement today on the release by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation of a new strain of lucerne which is resistant to two different parasites or diseases, I ask: Is this new variety suitable for growing in all parts of Australia where lucerne is subject to attack?

Senator WEBSTER:
NCP/NP

– Today’s announcement by CSIRO that it has produced two new varieties of lucerne which are resistant to aphid attack is of great importance. The honourable senator who asked the question would be well aware that only in the last two years has Australia been beset by this problem. He will understand that there is great joy that our major research organisation has had the capacity, within such a short time, to be able to deliver two plant varieties capable of resisting the two types of lucerne aphid which presently are the main sources of attack in Australia. The effect on the rural population of the lucerne aphid in its first year in Australia was lost lucerne production valued at some $50m and that has been a matter of great concern.

The two varieties produced are the result of combining existing and introduced varieties which have some resistant capacity. The first of the two varieties is called Siriver an adaptation of the Hunter River variety of which the honourable senator would know. The other one, which is called Sirotasman is a combination of a plant from New Zealand and, as I understand it, a strain from Tasmania. I am not certain which is the one that can be grown in low temperature areas; I think it is the Sirotasman variety. However, the important point is that CSIRO believes that both are resistant to the two types of aphid in Australia, the spotted alfalfa aphid and the blue-green aphid. It is a major achievement for CSIRO. Not only are the scientists who developed the plant to be congratulated but also the technicians who attempted by various means to produce in hothouses three crops of the plant in one year. This achievement is of enormous importance to Australia.

page 584

QUESTION

AUSTRALIAN MERCENARIES

Senator O’BYRNE:
TASMANIA

– My question is directed to the Leader of the Government in the Senate in his capacity as Minister representing the Minister for Defence. Has the Minister any information to give the Senate relating to the raid by Zimbabwe-Rhodesian airmen and soldiers into Mozambique, reported in the Age of 10 September 1979, which included two Australians? They were killed in the raid. Can the Minister inform the Senate whether those soldiers were recruited in Australia, whether they were Australian citizens and, if so, whether they were there with the knowledge of the Australian Government? In times of delicate negotiations concerning the United Kingdom, Australia and representatives of Mozambique, what instructions, if any, have been issued indicating that the Australian Government dissociates itself from Australians who choose to accept mercenary assignments?

Senator CARRICK:
LP

– I do not have before me at this moment the precise information that Senator O ‘Byrne seeks. I will ask the responsible Minister whether he will comment upon it.

page 584

QUESTION

PIPALYATJARA AND PITJANTJATJARA ABORIGINAL COMMUNITIES

Senator TEAGUE:
SOUTH AUSTRALIA

– My question is directed to the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and concerns allegations of interference with Aboriginal community decisions. Is it true that the Aboriginal community at Pipalyatjara is in the process of developing specific mining contracts for the extraction of chrysoprase from Mount Davies? Is it also true that the Pipalyatiara mining company is considering the merits of alternative contractsone proposed by a Hong Kong based buyer group and the other proposed by a South Australian mining group? Allegations have been made in South Australia that non-Aboriginal community advisers employed by the Pitjantjatjara Council and the Pipalyatjara Council have interfered with Aboriginal community decisions in these negotiations, overturning Aboriginal majority decisions which had opted for a contract with the South Australian based group. Is the process of determining such contracts in any way under the Minister’s jurisdiction? To what extent does the Commonwealth Government fund the salaries of the employees of the councils mentioned? If the allegations of interference are sustained, what is the remedy for the Aboriginal people whose interests are directly affected?

Senator CHANEY:
LP

– The honourable senator has taken a considerable interest in the Aboriginal people of northern South Australia. He has now addressed a series of questions to me. The answer to the first part of the question is yes. The Aboriginal community to which he refers is developing mining contracts and extracting chrysoprase from Mount Davies. It is true that the mining company is looking at alternative contracts. I do not know, on the other hand, whether there is any substance to the allegations which the honourable senator has put to me in his questions about manipulation by various advisers. As far as the further questions asked by the honourable senator are concerned, I do not have any jurisdiction in determining contracts of this kind. The mining company is partly funded by my Department. Its latest allocation was $5;000. The company receives other funds from the sale of chrysoprase. The Commonwealth is concerned only with accounting for trie use of Commonwealth funds. Otherwise we have no power of direction or control over the company.

The next question concerned the extent to which we fund the salaries of employees. We fund the salary of the community adviser of the Pipalyatjara Community Council and of the project officer of the Pitjantjatjara Council. Both persons are non-Aboriginals. The Commonwealth also funds the salary of the solicitor for the Pitjantjatjara Council, who is also a nonAboriginal. We do not fund the salary of the non- Aboriginal manager of the Pipalyatjara mining company, although it is possible that the company pays part of that salary out of the $5,000 which I referred to earlier. I turn now to what can be done by the Aboriginal people if the allegations repeated by the honourable senator are true. Those Aboriginal bodies have the same remedies as would be available to any person in that circumstance. Of course, they do have legal advice available to them. They can seek legal advice from the other legal service if they need it. They are also in a position to dismiss their advisers who are directly employed by them. If the Aboriginal people feel that the advisers are not doing their job they can simply get rid of them. My understanding is that the people concerned have not entered into any contract to date. I do not think there is any other information I can usefully add. If the honourable senator is concerned- I think he probably has contact with the community- it may also be desirable to draw the matter to the attention of the South Australian Government. The area is situated on South Australian land and comes under the South Australian Mining Act. It may be that that Government also has an interest in the matter.

page 585

QUESTION

FEDERAL GRANTS TO SOUTH AUSTRALIA

Senator WRIEDT:

-Is the Minister representing the Treasurer aware that under the last Budget of the previous Government capital payments to South Australia totalled $375m? Does he agree that if that amount had been maintained in its real value then this year South Australia would have received $548m in capital payments? I am speaking of both general capital payments and specific purpose payments. Is it not a fact that under this Budget South Australia is receiving $302m in capital payments? Does the Minister agree that the South Australian Government is receiving $246m less this year than it would have received had the same level of payments to that State continued to be made as were made in 1 975? I ask the Minister: Does he not agree that this has a very dampening effect on the South Australian economy? What is the Government’s justification for this throttling of South Australia?

Senator CARRICK:
LP

– Neither I nor the exLabor Premier of South Australia, Mr Donald

Dunstan, would agree with Senator Wriedt because Mr Donald Dunstan said that under the Whitlam Government the funds provided were so insufficient that the South Australian Government could not maintain existing services and had to make the highest increase in taxes that had been made in South Australia ‘s history.

Senator Wriedt:

– He said no such thing. Give us the facts. Quote your authority.

Senator CARRICK:

- Mr President, I have been invited to give the facts. The facts are that I am quoting what Mr Dunstan said in his speech to the annual conference of the Australian Labor Party in Adelaide in 1 974.

Senator Wriedt:

– Produce it.

Senator CARRICK:

-I have been asked to produce it. If I can find a copy of the statement amongst my papers I will have it incorporated in Hansard at the end of Question Time. I believe that I have it amongst my papers. Also, the Senate will know that I used extensive quotations from that speech during a recent debate. Since then the South Australian Government has been able, year by year, not only to balance its Budget but also to cut taxes and to have surplus funds.

Senator Wriedt:

– Provide the proof of that. You cannot provide the proof of that, can you?

Senator CARRICK:

– I am asked to provide the proof. I will be happy tomorrow to provide the Treasury figures, year by year, for the South Australian Government along with other governments in Australia which had deficits and higher taxes under Whitlam and which now have been able to reduce their deficits and to cut taxes. The only way to decide whether the South Australian Government has more money under the Fraser Government is to make the measurement of whether the South Australian Government had to increase taxes under Whitlam, which it did, and whether it was able to reduce taxes under the Fraser Government, which it was. So, taken overall, the South Australian Government has done far better under the Fraser Government. The only difference is, as has now been clearly recognised, that the gross mismanagement of the Australian Labor Party has been such that it has failed to attract commerce and industry to South Australia and South Australia is lagging pathetically behind the rest of Australia to the loss of enormous job opportunities.

Senator WRIEDT:

-Mr President, I wish to ask a supplementary question.

Senator WRIEDT:

-I know that honourable senators on the Government side of the chamber hate to hear the facts from the Treasury Papers. When I quote these figures I quote from the Treasury documents; I do not make up the figures on the floor of the chamber out of sheer convenience. I again ask the Minister representing the Treasurer: Is it not true that the Treasury documents show that this year South Australia will receive in capital payments $302m; that it received $375m four years ago under the Labor Government; and that this year the payments are down in real terms by $246m under Fraser federalism? I ask the Minister to deny those figures.

Senator CARRICK:

-As I said, whilst I do not have those figures in front of me, one has to look at the total amount of revenue that was available to the State under the Whitlam Government and the total amount of revenue that is available under the Fraser Government. As I was challenged to produce the facts, I now read from the speech made by Mr Dunstan, the ex-Premier of South Australia, in 1974. What did he say? He said:

In 1973-74 under Labor in Canberra we were forced to bring in the heaviest program of tax increases in the history of the State. It comprised payroll tax, harbour charges, water rates, the levy on electricity sales and hospital fees. Difficult though it may be to apply still further increases in the field of State taxes we will be forced again this year to levy additional revenues to finance services of an adequate standard.

He went on to say, referring to 1 974:

This year the Prime Minister informed us we would get no more money than was prescribed in the formula -

That is a reference to Whitlam- although that would be plainly insufficient to meet the needs of the State which has no means of reducing its expenditure markedly from revenue sources except to reduce the very programs of importance in schools, hospitals and welfare upon which in accordance with Labor Party policy we have concentrated.

He went on to say that the solution to this is to get a fixed share of personal income tax which the State now has and which enabled it to reduce the taxes under the Fraser Government and to expand its services compared with the disaster under Whitlam. If the Labor Party wishes the whole of the text of Mr Dunstan ‘s speech to be incorporated in Hansard, I would be delighted to do so.

page 586

QUESTION

ADVERTISING OF TOBACCO

Senator PETER BAUME:
NEW SOUTH WALES

– My question is directed to the Minister representing the Minister for Post and Telecommunications. I ask him whether the code of practice agreed upon between broadcasters, the Tobacco Advisory Committee and the Department of Health and Social Security in Britain includes the following note:

In the case of signs displayed at sporting or other events the manufacturers have agreed that if the event or part of the event is to be televised, signs which might otherwise be exposed to television may be completely obscured for the duration of the period of television coverage. The television authorities, who are responsible for taking the necessary action, have been informed by the DHSS that such signs should be covered.

Since this would ensure a more effective compliance with the Government’s ban on advertising of cigarettes and tobacco on electronic media, will the Minister undertake to examine the British provisions with a view to their being applied in Australia on the same basis of agreement between industry and government as has occurred in Great Britain?

Senator CHANEY:
LP

– I understand from the Minister for Post and Telecommunications that the code of practice referred to by the honourable senator includes the note to which he has referred. I am advised also that the arrangements surrounding the use of static advertising signs at televised events also cover a number of other aspects including the positioning of such signs, what the sign should include and the number and size of signs where, of course, the sign has not been covered in terms of the note referred to by Senator Baume. I would be happy to arrange for that further information to be made available to the honourable senator if he does not have it.

The matter has also received a good deal of attention in Australia in the context of the Government’s decision in 1976 to proceed with the decision to prohibit the advertising of cigarettes and tobacco products on the electronic media. Representations have been made to the Minister for Post and Telecommunications and to the Minister for Health and the matter has already been the subject of discussions between the two Ministers. I shall certainly ensure that Senator Baume ‘s further points are brought to the attention of the Minister for Post and Telecommunications. I am sure that he, in consultation with the Minister for Health, will examine the applicability of the British arrangements to Australian circumstances.

page 586

QUESTION

UNEMPLOYMENT

Senator BISHOP:
SOUTH AUSTRALIA

-Has the Minister representing the Minister for Employment and Youth Affairs seen a document which was put out by the Catholic Commission for Justice and

Peace and which, based on the statistics prepared in January by the Commonwealth Employment Service, shows the unemployment rate per job vacancy in various regions of Australia? Is he aware that the figures in the document, which I understand has been shown to the Government, demonstrate that in Hornsby in Sydney, for example, the unemployment rate per job vacancy is 1.69 percent, and in Mount Druitt the figure is 1 3.46 per cent; in Melbourne in the suburb of Waverley the figure is 2.45 per cent and in Sunshine is 9.37 per cent; in two Brisbane suburbs the figures are 12.63 per cent and 4.64 per cent; in Adelaide suburbs the figure for Elizabeth is 13.7 per cent and 5.3 per cent for Unley; and in Perth suburbs at Girrawheen the figure is 13.3 per cent and in Claremont the figure is 6.6 per cent? From those figures does the Minister agree that unemployment is distributed in various ways throughout the whole of Australia? Have these figures been considered along with the representation by the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace that some increase in the unemployment benefit should be given?

Senator DURACK:
LP

-That is a very detailed question. I will refer it to the Minister for Employment and Youth Affairs.

page 587

QUESTION

ZIMBABWE-RHODESIA

Senator CARRICK:
LP

-Senator O ‘Byrne asked me a question about Zimbabwe-Rhodesia. I do have a brief that says that the Government is aware of Press reports that two Australians, Stephen Eric King and David Rex Prosser, were killed during raids by Rhodesian forces into Mozambique on 6 September. The Government has no information as to the basis on which the two men were serving with the Rhodesian armed forces. As I have stated, the Government deplores the on-going conflict in Rhodesia with its resultant loss of life on all sides. The Government has made it clear that it can give no approval to Australian citizens serving in the armed forces of other countries except where such service is in accordance with agreed arrangements. Parliament has passed legislation which, amongst other things, makes it an offence to recruit a person to serve, except with the specific approval of the Australian Government, in any capacity in or with an armed force in a foreign country. The Government is, however, not able to prevent Australians from being recruited or enlisting while overseas. The Australian Embassy, Pretoria, advised the Department of Foreign Affairs that the parents of Mr King and Mr Prosser had received telegrams from the

Rhodesian authorities confirming the deaths of their sons, and will make normal consular assistance available if required.

page 587

QUESTION

ALLOCATION OF FUNDS TO SCHOOLS

Senator CARRICK:
LP

-Senator Wriedt asked me a question regarding page 75 of the Budget Papers. I am advised that he is referring to figures for financial years. As in all guidelines and Schools Commission matters, I have been referring to figures for calendar years. I have been using in guidelines figures adjusted in constant dollar terms, whereas the Budget Papers are not in those terms. So, my reply is thoroughly consistent in that regard.

Senator WRIEDT:
Leader of the Opposition · Tasmania

– by leave- I wish to make a statement on that reply. I and, I am sure, other members of the Senate are not satisfied with the answer which was given by the Minister for Education (Senator Carrick). This fall-back position that is constantly used as a ploy by the Minister in respect of education expenditure through the States simply is not satisfactory. The Budget Papers surely must be taken as the true indicator of what the Commonwealth is spending on education through the various States. I again draw the attention of the Senate to the fact that the figures shown in the Budget Papers are actual figures. They are headed in each column as the actual figures for the preceding years. Of course, for this year we have an estimate. Even though some of these figures are a bit rubbery at times, according to a former Treasurer, they are still the only figures we can go by as the authoritative statement of the Government. These figures show quite conclusively that the payments to government schools in the States and the Northern Territory are down in money terms by $77.3m a year, and no means of trying to camouflage that by talking in terms of constant prices is going to convince this Senate or the Australian people.

page 587

PERSONAL EXPLANATION

Senator WALSH:
Western Australia

-by leave- I claim to have been misrepresented in the House of Representatives yesterday by the Minister for National Development, Mr Newman, when he quoted me as saying:

At present oil prices, an ethanol extender -

I interpolate here that I was referring to particular parts of Australia: is close to breaking even . . .

He claimed that in that statement I was endorsing the Government’s crude oil pricing policy. I have a copy of the speech which I delivered in

Tasmania and to which he referred. I should like to read just two paragraphs from it. With respect to the Government’s crude oil pricing policy, 1 said:

In the long term consumption will bc more responsive to price, especially for industrial use. The Government’s 1977 policy to phase in import parity, accompanied by a resources tax, was an acceptable compromise. It carried the message to transport, building and industry that energy frugal design was essential, without sending the inflationary shock through the economy that 1 978 and subsequent policy has.

The Government’s interest rate and inflation objectives have been ruined by its fuel taxing policy. Attempts to correct that self inflicted damage will drive the economy deeper into depression. More people, especially the young, will suffer the economic deprivation of unemployment and the social stigma which the politicians who caused it have attached to it.

page 588

QUESTION

AVGAS

Senator DURACK:
LP

– Yesterday at Question Time Senators Sibraa and Wriedt asked questions concerning the outlook for further supplies of avgas from Abadan. The Minister for National Development has provided the following answers:

  1. 1 ) There has been no formal advice from the National Iranian Oil Company along the lines suggested by Senator Wriedt.
  2. In the course of a conversation between officials of the Department of Foreign Affairs and NIOC on 26 August it was indicated that there would be no exports of avgas from Iran during the remaining part of 1979. However, at that time Mobil, which had negotiated a cargo, was awaiting advice from NIOC of the date of loading. Subsequently Mobil received from NIOC that the cargo had been deferred. Mobil remains in communication with NIOC but has been unable as yet to obtain a firm date for shipment.
  3. As to 1980, the latest information we have is that NIOC may be in a position to determine export availability around October/November this year.
  4. All three marketers- Mobil, Shell and BP- are actively pursuing further cargoes, and Shell secured a part cargo from Venezuela on the spot market which delivered 4500 tonnes to Queensland early this month. The remainder of that cargo is destined for Singapore, from where some deliveries will be made to Darwin and the north of Western Australia.
  5. In the Minister for National Development’s Press statement of 30 August he said that he had commenced discussions with the oil companies with a view to increasing Australia’s refinery capacity for this very important product and is actively pursuing this matter.

page 588

QUESTION

HOUSING: COMMONWEALTH-STATE ARRANGEMENTS

Senator WEBSTER:
NCP/NP

-Yesterday Senator Archer asked a question of the Minister for Housing and Construction relating to Tasmanian Housing Division returns. I confirm the figures that Senator Archer used in relation thereto and state that the Tasmanian Housing Division returns for the period 1 July 1976 to 31 December 1978 show that 44 public rental dwellings were sold.

page 588

QUESTION

INTERSCAN SYSTEM

Senator WEBSTER:
NCP/NP

-On 30 August 1979, Senator Primmer asked me a question about the InterScan system and I now give the following response. Senator Primmer asked whether I was aware that the InterScan system was now being jointly developed in West Germany and the United States of America and being published as an American development. I said that I was not but later received from Senator Primmer a portion of an unidentified German document on the subject. The document reports an arrangement by which German-developed distance measuring equipment might be used with the new-generation time-reference-scanning-beam microwave landing systems in the USA.

The InterScan microwave landing system developed in Australia by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation and the Department of Transport established the feasibility of TRSB systems for the new international standard and is still a most promising system, but it is not the only one; competitive TRSB systems are under development in the USA and elsewhere. DME is not a landing system at all but is an auxiliary navigational aid normally carried on aircraft. Senator Primmer may rest assured that the commercialisation of Interscan is firmly in the hands of InterScan Pty Ltd under the guidance of my colleague, the Minister for Productivity.

page 588

QUESTION

X-RAYS

Senator WEBSTER:
NCP/NP

– Earlier today Senator Melzer asked me a question relating to the usage of X-ray equipment in Australia. I now refer her to an answer given by Senator Guilfoyle to a question on the same subject on 1 March, as reported in the Senate Hansard at page 403. Also, the honourable senator may be assured that the Australian Ionising Radiation Advisory Council has had this matter under consideration for some time. She is quite correct in saying that there is concern as to the excessive use of* ionising radiation in medical and dental practice. The Radiation Health Committee has reported to me. I have sent the advice that it has given to the Minister for Health. My understanding is that he has the recommendations of that Committee under scrutiny by the National Health and Medical Research Council.

page 589

QUESTION

TELEVISION

Senator CHANEY:
LP

-Yesterday Senator O ‘Byrne asked me a question about an Australian made television series on China which he said was ignored by television companies in Australia. I referred the question to Mr Staley for reply direct to the honourable senator, but Mr Staley has provided a reply to me. I am advised by Mr Staley that the Australian Broadcasting Commission has auditioned the series ‘The Human Face of China’ and is currently negotiating with Film Australia, the program maker, for its purchase. Any decision by commercial operators to purchase it is presumably based on the usual commercial criteria but in any case is the prerogrative of such operators.

page 589

INCOMES

Discussion of Matter of Public Importance

The PRESIDENT:

– I have received a letter from Senator Button proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the Senate for discussion, namely:

The growing discrepancy in incomes in Australia under the Fraser Government.

I call upon those senators who approve of the proposed d iscussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of senators required by the Standing Orders having risen in their places-

Senator BUTTON:
Victoria

-In the course of the 1 975 election campaign, the then Leader of the Opposition, Mr Malcolm Fraser, promised that if his party was elected to power in this country it would provide what he called government for all the people. I want to examine that promise amidst the array of other promises which were made by that gentleman in an extraordinary smorgasbord of undertakings which he has been unable to deliver. I want to examine that promise in the context of incomes and what that promise means, after five years of Fraser Government, to the incomes of the people of Australia. More particularly, I want to look at the question of what it means, after five years of Fraser Government, not only for unemployed people and the ordinary Australian wage earner but more particularly for the average Australian family. I remind the Senate that in dealing with this problem one does so in the context of a government which has consistently opposed wage indexation, consistently sought to lower the value of real wages and consistently sought to use the Australian Conciliation and Arbitration Commission as a scapegoat for the failure of the Government’s economic policies. I remind the

Senate that the Fraser Government is a government which promised to govern for all Australians and which has presided in the intervening years over a declining standard of living for most Australians, a fall in the value of disposable income for most families, increased health costs, higher interest rates and increased petrol prices. I would make that reminder in the context of singularly confused and discriminatory attitudes by Ministers of the Government towards the issue of incomes in Australia. For example, only three weeks ago the Prime Minister, after four years of maintenance of the view that wages were responsible for most of the problems of this country, went on record in the Australian newspaper as saying that wages are a neutral factor in inflation. Four weeks ago he said that after four years of saying exactly the opposite. He also said four weeks ago that there had been no significant wage drift outside the Conciliation and Arbitration Commission. For four years he has been saying exactly the opposite. How can the people of Australia be anything but confused as a result of the policies of a government led by this man?

Let me look at another aspect of the change in income patterns in Australia, that is, the singularly discriminatory nature of the Government’s attitude towards these questions. I point out that the changes in the lowering of the value of the average family income in this country have been accompanied by, in the last year or so, greatly increased profits in the corporate sector amongst larger companies and a relative erosion of earnings of skilled manpower. The Government is constantly saying that Australia needs more skilled manpower, while some Ministers say that more skilled manpower can be brought here as migrants, or that there should be more training in Australia for skilled manpower. The answer to the problem is to be found in taxis and trucks in Melbourne, Sydney and places like that where skilled tradesmen are doing that sort of work because they are given inadequate rewards by the system which has developed in the last few years. In addition to that, as a discriminatory factor there have been significant rises in unregulated incomes, particularly the incomes of the professional classes in Australia, such as lawyers and doctors, which are totally discriminatory and vitally relevant to the whole question of the incomes policy. For example, I notice that members of the Victorian Bar recently received a 13 per cent or 14 per cent increase in their remuneration.

Senator Messner:

– When was the last one?

Senator BUTTON:

– It was some three years ago. The increase to the Victorian Bar was justified by my good friend, the Chairman of the Victorian Bar Council, Mr Frank Costigan, Q.C., on the basis of changes in the consumer price index. What are people on salaries of $80,000 to $ 1 50,000 a year- that is the upper range at the Victorian Bar- doing justifying those increases by changes in the CPI? How is that a measure of the significant changes which ought to be made in those sorts of incomes? Are the prices of vegetables, meat, bread and petrol relevant to those sorts of incomes in any real sense? There are plenty of examples to hand from which one can see this growing discrepancy between incomes in this country.

Of course, these things are all connected. One cannot ask the majority of Australian wage and salary earners to forego their living standards at the same time as a blind eye is turned to the rapacity of the Australian medical profession. The Government cannot govern for all Australians if it does that; it cannot arrive at any social consensus about where this country is or ought to be going. It cannot do that in a context where there is growing unemployment and no increase in unemployment rates on the one hand and, on the other hand, a Prime Minister who flits about all over the world in exclusive and expensive Boeing aircraft. That cannot be justified in a society like this because these things are relative and of concern to people. One cannot waffle away about a $4.50 tax cut for average weekly earners and a $38 tax cut for a man like the Prime Minister on $80,000 a year. Of course, the problem is exacerbated by the recent Budget. Mr Acting President, I seek leave to have incorporated in Hansard two tables, one showing real after tax income based on the 1978-79 and 1979-80 taxation rates, and a document showing percentage increases in prices and wages, average weekly earning increases and increases under the metal trades Award in the period December 1974 to June 1979 which is the period of this Government.

Senator Carrick:

– May I see the documents?

Senator BUTTON:

-Yes, certainly. I should indicate that those documents have been incorporated already in Hansard in the House of Representatives. These problems of growing discrepancies between the incomes of certain professions and the incomes of ordinary wage and salary earners are a source of great social tension in the community. Today I want to illustrate the point by reference to the salaries and earnings of members of the medical profession in

Australia, compared with the salaries and earnings of average income earners and below average income earners. At the same time, I point out that, as the ordinary family is being burdened with additional health charges, there have been steadily and rapidly rising incomes for members of the medical profession. The recent Ludeke inquiry into medical fees resulted in a 13 per cent average increase to doctors’ incomes. The Senate will recall that in the course of that inquiry the medical profession- the Australian Medical Association- refused to disclose the level of doctors ‘incomes.

If a wage earner seeks a wage increase through the Conciliation and Arbitration Commission he has to disclose everything. The company from which he is seeking a wage increase need not disclose anything. But in the case of the medical profession, when Mr Justice Ludeke requested information from the AMA about doctors’ salaries and earnings, he was told that it could not be provided. Who do these people think they are- doctors or witch doctors? What is their right- as a group in the community- to refuse that sort of information to a responsible tribunal? What is the attitude of the Fraser Government in the face of that refusal? The Fraser Government supinely backed down. It is the Government which all the time is talking about the necessity for reducing real wages. That Government backed down in the face of the Australian Medical Association and refused to insist on the disclosure of those figures. Very little information is available as the basis for assessment of rising medical incomes.

Let us examine the question of the medical profession in more detail in terms of social responsibilities to Australian society. The average cost, estimated by the Department of Health, of training a doctor in Australia- a member of the medical profession- is $7,500 a year. This represents the highest cost to the taxpayer of any group of students at Australian universities. One might expect some degree of social responsibility in return for that high investment made by the taxpayers. There is no information available to the Australian Government even on the simple question of the number of doctors in Australia. The Commonwealth Department of Health gets its estimates of the numbers of doctors in Australia from, of all places, a journal put out by the drug trade and its mailing list. That is where the Department of Health gets its information about the number of doctors in Australia.

On the question of doctors ‘ incomes, of course, considerable information is available but there is a dearth of serious information about this problem. From information available, it can be seen, first of all, that doctors’ incomes are expected after July to rise to an average of well over $80,000 a year.

Senator Peter Baume:

– Gross or net?

Senator BUTTON:

-That is gross, Senator. A medical source told the Age newspaper recently that after the rise, most general practitioners would earn a taxable income of between $30,000 and $50,000 a year. That is earnings as distinct from the other practices which go on and to which I will refer in a minute. Between 1956 and 1976, according to the survey by the Melbourne University, the average medical income increased by 384.4 per cent. The period of highest relative increase occurred between 1976 and the present day. Senator Peter Baume has made himself something of an authority on this matter not only here but also in New Zealand. He estimates that in New South Wales those figures up to 1 976 got close to $70,000 in terms of gross income. He is reported in the AMA Gazette as saying: lt raises some very real questions about our capacity as a community to sustain such levels of expenditure on medical services. Certainly we cannot sustain that rate of increase in insurance payments.

There are numerous other figures available. Senator Baume had this to say to the Congress of the Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science:

The high levels pose serious questions about the equitable sharing of resources available for health care.

They also pose serious problems about the equitable sharing of resources amongst the Australian community under the Fraser Government. Senator Baume continued:

The problem of medical costs was compounded by Australia’s system which rewarded action rather than results or value. Our medical men are paid more if they do more.

According to Senator Baume, New South Wales had a tonsillectomy rate nine times that of Sweden or the United Kingdom. These figures are available. Dr Margarey, the former President of the AMA, warned doctors in the AMA Gazette of July 1979 about abuses in services which were leading to this sort of situation. The difficulty is that the facts show that doctors constitute 40 per cent of the highest income earners in this country. They are costly to the community in terms of their education; they set no example in terms of social responsibility in return for those high incomes.

Let me deal with a number of other matters of concern regarding the medical profession, and 1 wish to refer particularly to what can be described only as rackets- rackets which are perpetrated by very highly paid professional men in teaching hospitals in my own State of Victoria. Let me give some examples. At each of two teaching hospitals in Victoria with which I am personally familiar there is a slush fund contributed to by doctors out of which they draw benefits such as cars, overseas trips, and so on. That slush fund is compiled at taxpayers’ expense. It is compiled in those teaching hospitals by doctors who are full time consultants employed on salaries of $40,000 plus perks and who have the right to private practice in those hospitals. That right of private practice encourages them to spend a lot of time in over-use of hospital facilities which are paid for by the State, by the Government. They use those facilities for services for which they charge fees. The fees they charge in respect of those uses of public services and the fees for over-consultations of patients referred to specialists and consultants by resident medical officers are paid into slush funds which are used to buy cars and overseas trips for already wealthy doctors. That happens at a number of teaching hospitals in Victoria. The slush fund at one hospital with which I am familiar stands at more than $500,000, and no tax is paid on that money. Doctors on high incomes are not only indulging themselves with very high incomes as against the rest of the community but are also using that extra tax-haven money, which is obtained at public expense and by abuse of the public health system of this country, to indulge in greater perks and rip-offs than one could imagine in circumstances where such high salaries are paid.

This whole question of the over-use of services, which was referred to by Dr Margarey, in fact is an abuse of the health insurance system, an abuse of the public health system of this country, and is being carried out by highly paid professional men who are the most costly people to educate in terms of taxpayers’ input into their education. In the limited time at my disposal I cannot deal with these things in very great detail, but they are matters of great concern. In talking about an incomes policy in a country such as this, as I said before, the Government cannot on the one hand charge ordinary people more for health insurance, attempt to reduce real wages constantly, and reduce family income standards, and at the same time have insufficient guts as a government to stand up to a system which allows these sorts of incomes to be made without any firm hand or direction. The Government cannot allow these sorts of abuses to go on. It is a corruption of the social fabric of this society, a corruption which is being instigated by highly paid professionals who ought to know better in terms of any sense of ethics which a profession such as the medical profession might be expected to have.

In five years this Government has produced no real incomes policy. It runs in a cowardly fashion from the hand of the medical profession but stands up to the poor and impoverished of this country on the question of incomes. It has produced no industrial relations policy after five years. It has no coherent view of any of these things. The Government is presided over by that dreary presbyter from Nareen, with the intellectual vitality of a used Wettex, who goes on about his penny-pinching housekeeping but allows these sorts of rackets to develop in what is becoming increasingly a rotten society because these things are not being attended to by Government policies. On the question of doctors, Bernard Shaw, who knew all this, had this to say in 1 890 in the preface to The Doctor’s Dilemma:

The test to which all methods of treatment are finally brought is whether they are lucrative to doctors or not.

He went on:

Just as the object of a trade union under existing conditions must finally be nol to improve the technical quality of the work done by its members but to secure a living wage for them, so the object of the medical profession . . . is to secure an income for the private doctor: . . .

In Australia doctors are doing pretty well. As I have said, it is an abdication of public responsibility by a particular group in this community which draws into very clear perspective the priorities of this Government- a soft hand with the medicos, a stern hand with the poor and impoverished. That is the philosophy of Nareen and it is the philosophy which engenders all the policies of this Government in relation to incomes and industrial relations. Five years of barren, thoughtless government on these issues leads to the moral decay of a society such as ours, with an increasing lack of social cohesion and diversion within our society. It is a very real problem. A crisis of leadership is being presided over by this Government. It is for that reason that the Opposition has raised today the relationship between incomes of one group in the community and those of another, and the growing discrepancies between those two groups. In that respect I have used the medical profession as an illustration. There are other illustrations which will be referred to by my colleagues in the course of this debate.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Scott)- Senator Button sought leave to incorporate two documents in Hansard. Is leave granted?

Senator Carrick:

– What is the source of the documents?

Senator BUTTON:

-The first document, which relates to after-Budget incomes, was tabled by the Leader of the Opposition (Mr Hayden).

Senator Carrick:

– What is the source of it? Who made it up?

Senator BUTTON:

– It was compiled in Mr Hayden ‘s office.

Senator Carrick:

– On that basis, we will accept it for incorporation.

Senator BUTTON:

– It is consistent also with Mr Risstrom ‘s figures. The second document was compiled by the Parliamentary Library.

Leave granted.

The documents reads as follows-

Senator CARRICK:
New South WalesMinister for Education · LP

– The Opposition indicated today that it wanted to debate as a matter of public urgency the subject of the growing discrepancy of incomes in Australia under the Fraser Government. In fact what Senator Button did for 20 minutes was to make a vituperative attack on two classes of people, lawyers and doctors. Let Senator Button, who made that attack, a lawyer, speak for himself and his own conscience, and that of his colleagues, in pursuing the practice of law. No doubt Senator Gareth Evans was nothing loth himself in the course of his practice to do so. Let those doctors who are in the Labor Party speak for themselves. But the subject ought to be taken seriously and, at the outset, without attempting to defend any one profession, let me say this: First of all, Senator Button should know that the facts are that throughout Australia average medical incomes, which are still high, nevertheless are falling significantly. That should be indicated. This is happening primarily because the scarcity of doctors is being overcome. As more supply and demand rules occur, this is happening, in fact there is a glut in some areas. Equally, Senator Button was inaccurate when he said that there was no requirement before Mr Justice Ludeke for disclosure of information on doctors’ earnings. As I understand it, the disclosure was done confidentially, but it was done and the judge had that information.

All sorts of loose allegations have been made; allegations that living standards have fallen, which are utterly wrong, and that health costs are higher. The fact is that if the Hayden health scheme were functioning today health costs would be considerably higher than they are. I want to get to the nub of the situation, that is, the subject of the growing discrepancy in incomes in Australia under the Fraser Government. Is there a growing discrepancy under the Fraser Government compared with the three years of the Whitlam Government? It is a matter of history that under the three years of the Whitlam Government inflation rose to a record and destroyed the purchasing power of people on fixed incomes and destroyed savings and investments.

Senator Gietzelt:

– Record inflation was under Menzies in 1 95 1 . Tell the truth.

Senator CARRICK:

– I encourage interjections because they indicate that what I am saying hurts. Interjecting is a device of the Labor Party. I want to put facts instead of the vituperation put forward by the Labor Party. In the period of the Whitlam Government inflation forced up the earnings of all wage and salary earners- doctors, lawyers and others. There was a record upsurge which put us out of world markets. The Whitlam Government forced up inflation to the extent that it destroyed savings. It lowered the purchasing power of those on fixed incomes and pensions. It lowered the value of investments. That record is being compared today with the record of the Fraser Government. We are comparing an inflation rate which started at 4 per cent when the Whitlam Government took office which was on its way through 1 8 to 20 per cent at the tail end and which is now running at 8.8 per cent. On the first test, the destruction of savings and fixed incomes has not only been arrested but also reversed. So much for the growing discrepancy.

The whole thrust of the actions of the Labor Party, which has among its members a lawyer in Senator Button, a doctor in Senator Grimes and another lawyer in Senator Evans, putting aside the fact that the professions of the rest of them are scruffy, is based on the claim that it has a particular virtue, that is, that it is concerned about the little people. Let me tell the Senate about the Labor Party’s concern for little people. When we came to power we removed the obligation of half a million people on lower incomes to pay any tax at all, quite apart from giving those people extra purchasing power. Is that a growing discrepancy? It was in favour only of the little people. One would have thought that these facts would have rolled out, but they did not. Senator Button’s speech was all about the professions that he, Senator Grimes and Senator Evans practise; it was nothing to do with the policies of the Government or the Opposition.

Let us look at the position of the little people, the pensioners. It was the Fraser Government that removed the property test on age pensions. It was the Fraser Government that enlarged the benefits beyond 70 years of age for pensioners and so gave so many more people, little people, a right to pensions. It was not the Whitlam Government that did these things; it was the Fraser Government. It was the Fraser Government that so increased the value of pensions that for the first time they went to a record level of almost 25 per cent of the average weekly wage. It was the Fraser Government who indexed pensions, not the Whitlam Government. We are talking of the position of the little people. It was the Fraser Government that dealt with the little people and helped the little people.

I turn to the quaint old matter of income tax; the little matter of the rates imposed by Treasurer Hayden. What happened to taxpayers? There were three main rates for taxpayers- 45c in the dollar, 55c in the dollar and 65c in the dollar. The bulk of the people were in the 45c in the dollar and 55c in the dollar bracket under the Labor Party- the party that is supposed to help the poor. The wicked Fraser Government that is supposed to be helping the wealthy reduced the three standard rates of taxation to 32c, 46c and 60c in the dollar. Some 90 per cent of the people are on the lower rate. So we have, in fact, helped the little people enormously.

We went even further than that. Having restored the purchasing power that the Labor Government had eroded by inflation, having increased the number of people eligible for pensions by 180,000-odd, having increased the value of pensions- all these things helped the little people- the Government then did something that is quite historic. It changed the whole structure of child endowment and introduced a family allowance concept that brought about the greatest transfer of real wealth from the affluent to the poor. Did I hear Senator Button acknowledge this fact? Was there any acknowledgement of this at all? Not at all. The fact is that the discussion was meant to have been about whether there had been a transfer of wealth, but all we heard was what the wicked doctors and lawyers were doing. Nobody would know better than Senator Button, Senator Grimes and Senator Evans what the wicked doctors and lawyers are doing. Let them speak for themselves. Let them go back to the ethics of their professions. If they are to be listened to, let them be listened to in those halls to be looking after their own. I remind the Senate of the expression ‘physician heal thyself.

It is not a bad record for the Fraser Government, which is supposed to be helping the wealthy, for it to have wiped out taxation altogether for half a million people, increased the number of people who can get pensions at both ends of the scale, indexed pensions as such and reduced the tax scales so that the little people pay infinitely less. The Labor Party now sees virtue in tax indexation but does not promise to bring it about. Of course, we have brought down inflation and are continuing to bring down inflation and interest rates. It is fair to say that the Whitlam Government took a country that had the lowest inflation rate in the world- it was averaging 2]A per cent over a decade- and the highest sustained full employment rate in the world as well as the highest home ownership in the world and, in the space of three years, took our inflation rate to the top one-quarter of all Western countries, costed us out of world markets, destroyed 1 10,000 jobs in manufacturing, literally made this country a country in which the standard of living of people was being destroyed and forced up taxation at all levels. The Labor Party is asking us to say that there is a growing discrepancy. There is a growing discrepancy in favour of the smaller incomes. lt was a proud achievement for us that after two decades of Liberal government- the 1 950s and 1 960s- the Henderson Commission of Inquiry into Poverty was able to produce a report concerning Melbourne that said that Australia was one of the most egalitarian countries in the world. It was stated that there were far less extremes between wealth and poverty. Indeed, that was repeated not so long ago by Dr Podder from the University of New South Wales in a research report to the Henderson Commission. He said:

There is sufficient reason to believe that Australia is one of the most egalitarian countries in the world as far as the distribution of wealth is concerned.

The Labor Party hates profit. It has an insensate hatred of profit. One of the reasons why South Australia is on its knees today and has no industries and no commerce and why South Australia is going broke and has the worst record of all Australian states, is the insensate hatred of the Labor Party of free enterprise. The Labor Party never understands that a dollar of profit is a dollar to be put to work, to invest and create factories, machines and jobs. Every time some company makes a dollar of profit some 46 or 47 per cent of it is taken in company tax for payment out for social services, health or education. A considerable amount goes to corporate bodies such as superannuation funds. The superannuation funds of the little people comprise one of the largest shareholdings of the Broken Hill Proprietary Co. Ltd. The profits of companies are distributed to millions of Australians, firstly in child endowment, pensions and education services and, secondly, in superannuation. What we should be doing is encouraging the making of more profits. If a doctor makes another dollar we will take 60c of that dollar for sure in direct personal income tax and, unlike the Australian Labor Party, we will pursue tax avoidance. Incidentally, the other 40c in the dollar is subject to all sorts of indirect taxes and sales tax. So we will take more and will translate the efforts and energies of that doctor, and even of lawyers like Senator Button, into child endowment, pensions and those kinds of things.

What kind of nonsense was talked by Senator Button. I will tell you what he is doing, Mr President. He is seeking to overthrow his leader in this Senate, just as the honourable member for Kingsford-Smith, Mr Lionel Bowen, is trying to outdo the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Hayden, in the House of Representatives. What Senator Button has to keep in mind is that he has to keep on side with Mr Bowen, the Deputy Leader of the Labor Party. The whole basis for the raising of this matter of public importance today is outlined in Mr Bowen ‘s speech of 28 March this year to the Amalgamated Metal Workers and Shipwrights Union in Sydney. This is what Mr Bowen said:

The paucity of statistical information makes it impossible to estimate accurately just how much could be raised by a realistic wealth tax.

He went on to say:

But there is strong evidence to suggest that such a tax. with a suitably high exemption limit, would probably affect no more than one per cent of Australians, and could raise over $1,500 million.

I take it that Senator Button supports the raising of an extra $ 1,500m from the higher income earners of Australia. Is he or is he not supporting his Deputy Leader, Mr Bowen? His silence in this is eloquent. He knows that anybody who attempts to take $ 1,500m from the higher income groups of people would virtually destroy the whole of the capacity in Australia for any production of investment funds, which would destroy all incentive in Australia. That is the giveaway; that is the whole basic reason for this matter being raised today. The debate has turned from what was really a debate on whether there has been a proper distribution of income- who has helped the little people- because demonstrably Labor has no argument on that, to a disclosure by the Labor Party of its real hatred of profit, its real hatred of enterprise and its real desire to socialise and to destroy. That is what has come through in this debate.

Let me get back to what has been said. The suggestion is that there is a growing discrepancy in incomes in Australia under the Fraser Government. There is conclusive proof that that discrepancy has been in favour of the lower income groups of people, which is clearly contrary to what was the case under the Whitlam Government. Yes, there has been a growing discrepancy in terms of real need. We have turned the whole thrust to real need. I repeat: When we came to office inflation was destroying the savings of all people, particularly people on fixed incomes, pensioners and superannuants. We have cut the inflation rate by half and therefore created a growing discrepancy, but in favour of and not against the lower income groups. We have brought in family allowances, an heroic change in concept, in order to transfer wealth to the mothers of the lowest income families and the largest families. We have taken away property tests. We have altered the means test at the 70- years-old level. The whole basis of this has been to increase the number of people who can get pensions. That number has increased enormously. That has been done by the people who are supposed to favour the wealthy.

At the lower level, we have altered the tax scales so that half a million people are excluded from paying tax. We have altered the tax rates from those of 45c, 55c, and 65c in the dollar under the Labor Government to 32c, 46c and 60c in the dollar, so an enormous benefit is now accruing to the lower income groups. We have cut taxes. For example, last year we forwent some $3,000m worth of taxes, which the Whitlam Government would have harvested from ordinary people. To talk as Senator Button talked is to talk nonsense because the real test is this: The Labor Party, at both a Federal and a State level, stands condemned- the Whitlam Government for bringing Australia to its knees and the Dunstan-Corcoran Government for bringing South Australia to its knees. If there were ever an example of discrepancy against the little people it lies in South Australia, where people are being destroyed today through a lack of job opportunities because of the socialist nonsense of the Labor Party, which will not create industry, which will not create commerce and which will not discriminate in favour of the little people. Unlike the Labor Party, the Fraser Government’s record in terms of the ordinary Australian family is unchallenged.

Senator GIETZELT:
New South Wales

– One myth which we constantly hear repeated by this Government- by the Prime Minister (Mr Malcolm Fraser) and by Government Ministers in this place- is that Australian society is egalitarian. In fact, that myth appears in the preamble of the policy statement of the Liberal Party of Australia and it is part of their theory. But if we examine the practice, we find that that claim is another part of the rhetoric which is so symptomatic in this Government’s policies. This Government states that if there is any small difference in the distribution of income or wealth it is due to the individual’s lack of talent or enterprise. As we will see, the reality is somewhat different. Australia has a shocking distribution of income and wealth and under this Government it can be shown to be getting worse. Back in 1971, the London Times, referring to Australia, stated:

The distribution of wealth is among the most inequitable in the civilised world. The rich are very rich and the poor are very poor, and while there is really no excuse for poverty in such a potentially rich country, nevertheless it exists to an alarming degree.

It is not surprising that the Times said that, for in 1974- these are the most recent figures I have been able to get- the top one per cent of income earners received 8.4 per cent of total pre-tax incomes; the top 10 per cent obtained about 30 per cent of total incomes; and, at the other end of the scale, the bottom 20 per cent of persons received less than 2 per cent of total incomes. Because we were aware of that inequity and of the disparity between incomes and taxation, the three Labor Budgets set about to redress that inequity. What did we do? We raised pensions to 25 per cent of average weekly earnings. We gave more money to the States, which promptly reduced State taxation. Wages were increased and we have been criticised by this Government and by the media ever since. Contrary to what the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Carrick, has just said, in point of fact, the last Budget of the Australian Labor Party, the Hayden Budget, set about to relieve 500,000 people from any payasyouearn tax liability. Quite obviously, the Minister is prepared to continue to mislead or to lie to this House, Mr President.

The PRESIDENT:

– Order! Senator Gietzelt, you must not imply that any honourable senator is lying.

Senator GIETZELT:

– The Minister is prepared continually to mislead the Parliament and the Australian people. The document which I presented to the Parliament last evening in my speech on the Budget shows very clearly comparative statistics on PA YE taxation. It shows that in the last Labor Budget PAYE taxation represented 41.7 per cent of total Commonwealth taxation revenue, that in the 1977-78 Budget it went up to 45.2 per cent of total Commonwealth taxation revenue and that in the Budget now before the Parliament it represents 44.1 per cent of total Commonwealth taxation revenue. Yet he has the gall in Question Time and in his contributions in this place constantly to suggest the contrary of what the figures and the Budget documents actually show. What is shown by that survey conducted by the poverty inquiry and published in the London Times’! It showed that in Australia men were better off than women, that 10 per cent of males got almost 20 per cent of all income received by males and that the corresponding 10 per cent of females received almost 32 per cent of such female income.

Let us look at what figures can be shown to do. As a side note, an analysis of the 1973-74 taxation statistics compiled from tax returns indicates that the top one per cent of persons received only 1 8 per cent of income from gross rent, premiums, dividends, interest etcetera, that the top 5 per cent got 38 per cent and that the top 10 per cent got 47 per cent. That is a discrepancy that points not only to the dangers of using taxation statistics for determining income inequality but also suggests that certain income recipients are very skilled at either evading or avoiding tax. As we well know- and the Treasurer (Mr Howard) has attested to this- one of the growth industries in this country is the tax avoidance industry. Lawyers and accountants, after having had their education paid for through the public sector, the university system, are not now spending all their time on improving the life styles of the Australian people or on making a contribution to the wealth of this country, but are seeking to distort the incomes of those in the top brackets in Australia. As those figures I have just cited show, they are succeeding in doing just that. Tax avoidance has very much concerned even the current Treasurer.

Wealth in Australia is distributed just as unequally as it is distributed anywhere else, and the effects of this are clear and are ignored by this Government. Recent research has shown that one per cent of the adult population owns 22 per cent of personal wealth, that the top 5 per cent owns 46 per cent and that the top 10 per cent owns almost 60 per cent of the wealth of Australia. That is what we are talking about in this matter of public importance. Half of all Australians own less than 8 per cent of Australia’s wealth. In other words, the top 6 per cent own more than the bottom 90 per cent put together. The results disclose that far from there being an egalitarian society the top 2,000 people own as much wealth as is owned by the bottom twoandahalf million people. The wealthiest 10 percent have 220 times the wealth of the poorest 10 per cent. Any Government that claims in its philosophy, in its practice and in its Budget that it is seeking to redress that, must admit, on the basis of surveys which have been carried out by reputable economists and by people who have based themselves on the statistics of the Australian Taxation Office, that there is a maldistribution of wealth of this country.

What has this Government done? In accordance with this Government’s fantasies of an egalitarian Australia it has dismantled progressively any measures that stand in the way of private greed or, in its own words, incentives. The few redistributive taxes on property- death duties and land taxes- have been either abolished or reduced. In 1966-67 such taxes comprised 9:7 per cent of total tax collected, but 10 years later this figure had fallen to 6.7 per cent. In 1938-39 gift and estate duty comprised 2.6 per cent of total net Federal tax revenue. By 1967-68 this figure had fallen to 1.3 per cent and in the 1 976-77 Budget to 0.4 per cent. Programs to abolish or reform probate and succession duty are being implemented in every State bar South Australia. It is one of the few taxes which redistribute wealth. This Government has decried attempts by the Australian Labor Party to come up with a formula based on capital gains on wealth which would be one way in which those who have the capacity to pay tax shall pay their contribution.

What about income tax? After all the fanfare about indexation and new scales, surely we can have an equitable income tax system. Not so, however. In reality the proportional tax system, thanks to this Government, is highly regressive, as even Paddy McGuinness stated in the National Times of last week when referring to research by Neil Warren of the University of New South Wales. I quote what he said:

Clearly, the incidence of the tax structure is moving in the direction of greater regressivity, and, given the fact that unemployment benefits have not been increased in the interim, it is brutally clear that the tax structure, as it is at present, operates tailor-made to increase the incidence of genuine poverty.

It is the lower income groups that are paying most tax. Warren concludes that in 1975-76 the income range of $4, 160 to $20,000 accounted for 74 per cent of all households, receiving 7 1 per cent of all money income and paying 70 per cent of all taxes, making the incidence there near proportional between the range of 31.85 per cent and 35.35 per cent or a difference of only threeandahalf percentage points. Below that range households were more heavily taxed overall. It is only above the 1 975-76 income of $20,800- roughly $28,000 in current earning terms- that the tax burden begins to rise substantially above one-third of total income.

The result makes nonsense of most of the proposals for proportionate income tax put forward by various naive tax reformers who feel that they pay too high a marginal rate of tax. What the proponents of portional income tax without any other changes in the tax structure are in fact proposing is a declining burden of income tax as incomes rise- the poorer you were, the more tax you would pay. This is a proposition which appeals to many higher income earners. An example is the Prime Minister’s support for increasing the share of indirect taxation which hits low income earners hardest while reducing marginal rates on high income earners. But it is impossible to justify this on any principle of equity or fairness. Yet that is precisely what this

Government was about in its last Budget, when it justified the increase in the excise on petrol, and in its previous Budget, when it justified a massive increase in the excise on beer and cigarettes. This Budget has been compounded by the oil levy which in effect is another sales tax and is thus regressive.

Then there is the tax on social service benefits which this Government has introduced. Surely it does not justify that. It is a shameful exercise if ever there was one. Estate and gift duties were finally buried on 1 July this year. The last remaining tax on wealth was a minor source of revenue, but clearly even this pinprick was intolerable to the masters of the Liberal Party and to those whose assets are in that top 10 per cent to which I referred. The continual decline in the real value of family allowances is another product of the Government’s policies. The payments are totally inadequate. The bottom 10 per cent of families receive only 2.2 per cent of aggregate income while the top 10 per cent gain 23 per cent of all income. These actions are typical of the con job that this Government has done on the Australian people. Thank God they are beginning to wake up, as every poll indicates.

By pretending that income tax is the key, the Government has allowed indirect taxes to hit the poor harder in every Budget. If we are to examine the impact of the tax system we must examine the total tax system and not merely direct income tax. Indirect taxes- sales tax and customs and excise duties, which have increased by seven times in the case of the petrol tax and by 70 per cent in the last four Budgets in the case of excise duties- are paid proportionately to the sale of a product. Since the amount paid is the same irrespective of the income of the purchaser such taxes are regressive. In Australia these indirect taxes on goods and services comprise approximately one-third of government revenue obtained from taxation. Moreover, since company, income and payroll taxes are incorporated in the price of goods and services- and that is not denied by this Government- these too can be considered on one interpretation to be regressive. In addition, one can question the progressivity of the personal income tax structure itself. The definition of income used in assessing tax is likely to favour higher income groups by exemption of most capital gains, subsidised fringe benefits, which we all know exist, and allowing income splitting and spreading. At the same time as the Government claims to be cracking down on tax avoidance, in this very Budget the retention allowance- a classic tax dodge- is raised from 60 per cent to 70 per cent. This is after a lift from 50 per cent to 60 per cent in the previous Budget. So, that is an increase of 40 per cent in the last two Budgets. The refusal to implement tax indexation and instead the reduction of taxation for the few earning higher incomes is typical of this Government’s disregard for any humanitarian or egalitarian principles.

The Mathews Committee on taxation and inflation in 1975 remarked that the effect of inflation was to reduce the progressive structure of personal taxation, since average tax rates rose faster for those on lower incomes. The basic profile of wealth redistribution has remained largely unchanged in the last 55 or 60 years. The relative inequalities still exist and are extensive. Certainly, materially people are better off individually, as the wealth cake has grown overall; but the increase is not as great as myths would indicate. The 1915 mean average male wealth was $665, which converts to about $6,000 in 1970, using the continuous series of retail price indices. But, whilst the cake may have expanded, the shares going to the classes have not really changed. It is still a case of crumbs to the masses, and this Government begrudges them even those crumbs.

Senator MESSNER:
South Australia

– I must admit to being extremely confused about this motion. Indeed, I am afraid that when Senator Button started speaking I was unable to get the drift of what he was really talking about; but finally it became established that it was nothing but a witch hunt of the medical profession and, to some extent, of the legal profession. He instanced no particular case. He put forward no evidence whatsoever to support certain statements which he made in general terms and which I will now seek to answer as quickly as possible. Senator Button made the point that he knew that inflation rates in this country had risen since the Fraser Government came to power. That, of course, patently is not true. The inflation rate has fallen from something of the order of 14 per cent in 1975 to approximately 8.8 per cent today. Similarly, Senator Button said that interest rates had risen since the Fraser Government came to power and that this was somehow reducing the real incomes of families. But in fact the bank overdraft rate was 11 1/2 per cent in December 1975 and today stands at WV2 per cent. In no way can such a reduction as that be interpreted as an increase.

Senator Button talked of unemployment. In these sorts of statistics the Australian Labor Party consistently forgets to include items such as the Regional Employment Development scheme- a totally over-paid unemployment benefit scheme which existed in 1975 and covered approximately 35,000 people. That is excluded from the figures quoted. Total unemployment in December 1975, when the Fraser Government came to power, was of the order of 340,000. By today’s Australian Bureau of Statistics figures, that number has fallen to about 314,000. That is the sort of nonsense that comes from the Opposition, and it is the sort of nonsense which I must say has been spread around in South Australia in the last three weeks by the Premier of South Australia, because he has simply no basis for argument on State issues. He refuses to argue with the Opposition on State issues and finds that he has only one argument, and that is to knock the Federal Government as hard as he can.

Every Press advertisement that has been put out by the Labor Party during the current State election campaign is an attack on the Fraser Government. In no way has any campaign advertisement by Corporal Corcoran addressed itself to the real issues of the campaign. That, of course, is the reason why the Labor Party is looking so bad in the polls at the moment. The people of South Australia are not being tricked. The simple fact is that if one studies the results of the poll taken yesterday in the State seat of Torrens one will notice that there is a swing of upwards of 13 per cent to the Liberal candidate and a reduction in the Australian Labor Party vote of something like 16 percent.

Senator Elstob:

-Who took that?

Senator MESSNER:

– That is according to the South Australian Institute of Technology poll, for which Senator Elstob does not seem to have much respect now but for which I notice he had a lot of respect in 1977. Nevertheless, that quite clearly proved the state of play in our State. That poll went on to analyse particular issues. ( Quorum formed). Before the quorum was called, I was saying that a poll conducted by the South Australian Institute of Technology yesterday showed that there had been a 16 per cent fall in the Labor vote in the seat of Torrens. I was going on to indicate the issues which are of specific concern to the people in that area. Clearly, these were the points that were made: Of the intending anti-Labor voters, 83 per cent were concerned about the state of the local economy; 86 per cent were concerned -

Senator Bishop:

– I raise a point of order, Mr Acting Deputy President. I draw your attention to the fact that the speaker is offending against Standing Orders 419 and 421. The matters that he is talking about are not relevant to the matters under discussion. I ask you to draw his attention to that fact. He will have an opportunity later this afternoon to talk about the Budget or South Australia, if he wants to.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Collard)- There is no point of order. I have been listening with great attention to the honourable senator’s speech and he is using it to prove a point.

Senator MESSNER:

– I intend to draw the strings of the argument together a little later, in order to ensure that even Senator Bishop can understand the point. I was about to say that 86 per cent of the people polled in that particular group indicated that they were concerned about the direction of the Labor Government in South Australia and they felt that they were insecure as a result of Labor’s continuing term in office. The more significant point was that over the last three weeks the Corcoran Government has been continuing a campaign of denigration of the Fraser Federal Government. I ask honourable senators to guess how many people in that State poll were showing an intention to change their vote as a result of that publicity. Only 1 3 per cent were concerned about Federal issues in this State campaign. The people of South Australia are concerned about the real issues of the State -

Senator Bishop:

-Mr President, I raise a point of order. I draw your attention to Standing Order 419 which says:

No Senator shall digress from the subject-matter of any Question under discussion . . .

The subject under discussion, in the terms of the notice given, is:

The growing discrepancy in incomes in Australia under the Fraser Government.

I put it to you, Mr President, that the honourable senator is talking entirely about the South Australian election, which has no relevance to the subject matter of the notice, and in that respect he is abusing the parliamentary Standing Orders.

The PRESIDENT:

– The point of order is not sustained.

Senator MESSNER:

-For Senator Bishop’s benefit, I will indicate that what I have been saying about the disastrous state of the Labor Party in South Australia and the Corcoran Government is directly related to what I believe Senator Button was talking about. When he began discussing this matter today I was under the impression that we were about to have a rather intellectual debate concerning wage and income policies in this country as a whole. What developed was merely a witch hunt directed against certain professional groups in Australia, and the medical profession in particular. That is wholly and solely what this argument got down to.

We know that this week in Melbourne the Congress of the Australian Council of Trade Unions is debating the adoption of a new wages policy. I had expected that that would get an airing, but it did not. The ACTU Congress, in its wisdom, has decided in the last couple of days to go outside the wage indexation guidelines. It is to conduct an industrial campaign- which to the Australian people means turmoil- irresponsibly and against the interests of the community generally. It intends to do that just when the economy is beginning to recover. Admittedly, inflation levels represent a problem which will need to be carefully controlled, but an irresponsible action is now proposed by the ACTUapparently as a matter of policy- one that will create difficulties for the rest of the community.

It is significant that only one week ago the Government of South Australia indicated publicly that it would support a wage claim of $40 a week, outside of wage indexation, by the metal industries of that State. This claim, as many people will understand, and as the people of South Australia will know, has resulted from political pressure by the left wing unions of the State fo: a settlement of the strike which the metal trades planned to call in the early part of this month. What the State Government, in all of its desperation, did was to say: ‘Call off your strike. We have an election on. We promise to go to the Arbitration Commission and support your $40 a week claim’. That action on the part of the South Australian Government has been an absolutely -

Senator Keeffe:

– You are lost for words.

Senator MESSNER:

-Yes, and so would be the honourable senator if he had to consider such horrors. The national Press has taken up this issue with great vigour and has realised that if that were to occur in South Australia the effect would flow over to the rest of Australia. Thus, that action of the South Australian Labor Government, controlled by Corporal Corcoran, would have been designed to bring about a wage change in this country. I believe that that announcement had a considerable influence upon the deliberations of the ACTU and that the body has now shown itself to be just as irresponsible as Mr Corcoran has been because it has now pursued a similar wages tack. As a result, it is clear that the present Labor Government of South Australia does not deserve to continue to exist as such. In terms of its national responsibility it has shown itself to be irresponsible. Clearly, it has given away its political responsibility- if one likes to use that term- in regard to controlling wage levels in this country. It does not give a damn for the rest of Australia. On that issue alone, quite apart from local South Australian issues, the Corcoran Government stands condemned.

One can only hope, as I said two weeks ago in the course of the Budget debate, that next Sunday morning Mr Corcoran will wake up and find himself leader of the Opposition. But that will not be for long. We all know who is waiting in the wings. We know that Mr Duncan is waiting there to step in and take over, in his left wing glory, the control of the South Australian Labor Party. It is pretty clear that this is the matter in that State which will urge people to vote for the Liberal Party on Saturday. All of the indications are that people are aware that Labor is destroying the State and in fact, as I have just demonstrated, the rest of the Commonwealth with it. I do not believe that that is too long a bow to draw. Honourable senators will recall that a certain pacesetting wage increase in the Public Service of the Commonwealth in 1974 subsequently flowed throughout the community and brought with it the tragic rates of inflation, and consequent unemployment, that occurred in the 1 974 and 1975 periods. I guess that if Corcoran is returned to power on Saturday taxes will go up in South Australia.

The PRESIDENT:

– Order! The honourable senator’s time has expired.

Senator WALSH:
Western Australia

– We have just heard a fairly incoherent tirade from Senator Messner, one that had nothing to do with the subject of this debate but had a great deal to do with the impending election in South Australia. The honourable senator would have the gullible belief that the state of the economy in South Australia is the product of the actions of a Labor Government in that State.

Senator Young:

– Hear, hear!

Seantor WALSH- Perhaps the gullible South Australian senators who are cackling ‘hear, hear’ can explain the state of the economy of Western Australia. I remind them that Western Australia, according to the Commonwealth Employment Service figures, has the highest unemployment of any State. One could argue endlessly about this subject but there is not much point in doing so. I would just make one or two more remarks in case there are a few gullible people, other than the hyenas who cackle from across the chamber.

The PRESIDENT:

– Order!

Senator WALSH:

- Mr President, I apologise; I have been provoked. In case there are a few other gullible people who have been persuaded by Senator Messner’s incoherent argument- that State governments exert a substantial influence on the levels of employment and economic activity- I emphasise the fact that in 1 974 when a Liberal government was last elected to office in Western Australia, that State had the lowest rates of unemployment and of inflation in the Commonwealth, but that after four years of Sir Charles Court’s Government it had the highest figures of any State in both categories. It still has the highest unemployment. Also, when the present Labor Government of New South Wales was elected it encountered the highest rate of unemployment in Australia. That State now has the second lowest rate of unemployment.

Senator Young:

– We beat you hands down on the figures per capita of the work force. Look at those figures.

Senator WALSH:

-At what figures?

Senator Young:

– The per capita figures.

Senator WALSH:

– I can tell the honourable senator one thing. The ratio in Western Australia of job applicants to jobs available is very much worse than it is in South Australia. The honourable senator should look at those figures. However, this is all rather pointless because, as anyone who knows anything will realise- that obviously excludes a number of people across the chamber- State governments have very little influence on the level of economic activity in their States. Unemployment is high in Australia, and rising, because we have an incompetent Federal Government.

As to the reference to the Australian Council of Trade Unions, it is important to note for the record that within the last few days the President of the ACTU made an offer to the Government to sit down with its representatives and those of employers to discuss a comprehensive policy with respect to employment, wages and general economic regulators. The Government has refused the offer of the President of the ACTU because it does not want an economic recovery. In its desperation it wants only confrontation. If it can get it it wants violence. It believes that in violence there are votes for it.

Having dealt with the remarks of Senator Missen I return to the subject matter of the debate. Australia was once an egalitarian society. Senator Carrick quoted from the Henderson report which, in 1972 and 1973, observed that Australia was one of the most egalitarian countries in the world. However, that situation is changing. As it changes, social cohesion disintegrates. That is happening under a Prime Minister who says that we must have wage restraint, who tells moderate and even low wage earners that they must accept a fall in their real standard of living while he swans around the world in his tandem 707s, which cost the taxpayers 20 million bucks. That demonstrates the level of moral leadership that we are getting from the Prime Minister (Mr Malcolm Fraser). Given that type of moral leadership, the present disintegration of social cohesion is totally predictable.

Just before he was elected, Mr Fraser said: We will support wage indexation’. Within a month the Government which he led was presenting a submission to the Conciliation and Arbitration Commission arguing trenchantly against wage indexation and for a cut in real wages. So much for that promise. It reminds one of the sort of deal which was explained in the National Times last weekend, again concerning the Prime Minister. It gives us some insight into the ethics of the man who is currently, and temporarily, the Prime Minister of this country. On a Sunday night the Prime Minister rang the local motor bike dealer and said that he wanted a new motor bike and asked what trade-in was offered on his existing machine. The dealer offered $ 140. The Prime Minister said: ‘Agreed. Can you bring the machine out tonight?’ The dealer said: ‘Yes’. When the dealer arrived at Nareen, the lord of the manor had changed his mind. He said that he wanted $180 for the motor bike, not $140, as he had agreed over the telephone.

Senator Keeffe:

– Who was this?

Senator WALSH:

-The lord of Nareen, John Malcolm Fraser. He said: ‘The deal that I made on the telephone half an hour ago is inoperative’. Ronald Ziegler used to say: ‘That is inoperative’. The Prime Minister then said: ‘I want $180 for the trade-in now’. Of course, the dealer then had the option of being blackmailed in that way and paying the extra $40 or taking the motor bike back to town.

The PRESIDENT:

– Order! The honourable senator cannot accuse any member of this place or the other place of blackmail or that sort of thing. I ask the honourable senator to withdraw it.

Senator WALSH:

– I withdraw the reference to blackmail and say that that sort of shonky, shoddy business ethics is a sample of the way in which he conducts his private business and the way he governs the country. So no wonder social cohesion is disintegrating.

The subject matter of the discussion is the distribution of income. There are two highly relevant ways of measuring income distribution. There is a primary distribution, which is what people get from wages, dividends and so on, and there is a secondary distribution, which is what they get after taxation and after transfer payments. Looking firstly at the primary distribution of income we see that between December 1 974 and March 1979 the consumer price index increased by 56.2 per cent whereas, for example, the metal trades award in New South Wales, increased by 53.88 per cent. In other words, in the primary distribution of income there was a fall in real terms of just over two per cent during that period. On the secondary distribution of income- that is, net after taxation and after accounting for transfer payments including family allowances and so on- we find that there has been a very substantial and regressive alteration in the secondary distribution of income. The primary distribution of income has already gone against wage earners.

If we look at the position of people earning $10,000 a year in 1978-79 we find that after all the transfers have taken place they have a disposable income of 79 per cent of their gross. That is marginally lower than it was in 1975-76. On the other hand, the disposable incomes of people on current incomes of $30,000 a year is 64.4 per cent as against 60.6 per cent in 1975-76. That is for a single taxpayer. After these transfers have been taken into account that represents a massive redistribution of income in favour of the higher income groups. If we look at the position of a single income earner with a dependant spouse and two children, we find that the $10,000 a year income earner retains 89.1 per cent of the primary income at present against 90.74 per cent in 1975-76. The high income earners on $30,000 a year- we are talking about less than one per cent of the population- have 67.7 per cent of their primary income left whereas they had 64.3 per cent in 1975-76. I know that the use of figures is confusing to many people and is probably particularly confusing to people on the other side of the chamber, but those figures leave absolutely no doubt that there has been a very substantial and regressive change in the distribution of income since 1975-76. Of course, it is actually worse than that because the table from which I have just quoted is for 1978-79. Since the last Budget the situation has become even worse.

Taxes in general have gone up to the highest level ever levied in peace-time in Australia. Wage earners’ taxes in the aggregate have risen by 15 per cent. The Government expects wages to rise by 9 to 9]/i per cent and the consumer price index to rise by 10 per cent. So the Government itself is predicting not only that there will be a further decline in primary income, wages, salaries and so on but also that there will be an even greater decline in after tax income because taxes have gone up 15 per cent and wages are to go up only nine per cent. For all but the higher income groups, if one looks at the effect of those tax changes throughout the full income spectrum, it is even worse than that. The people on the middle and lower incomes have had their taxes increased more than proportionately relative to those on the higher incomes.

If we look at some specific examples of the effect of the Government ‘s 1 979 Budget taxation policy as against that for the previous year we find that over the year a family with an income of $160 a week pays 28 per cent more tax and a family with an income of $240 per week pays 16 per cent more tax but someone on the Prime Minister’s salary of $1,600 a week pays only 10 per cent more tax. The regressive change in the distribution of income which had already occurred before this year has been exacerbated by the changes made in the Budget. The Prime Minister’s so-called tax reduction which is to take effect on 1 December, which is only part compensation for previous tax increases, is worth $38 a week to him. All this is completely consistent with the Fraser social value judgments and with the style of the lord of Nareen, who tells the ordinary wage earners, people and families on middle incomes that they have to accept a drop in their real standard of living while he swans around the world in tandem Boeing 707s at a cost to the taxpayer of $20m.

So far I have been talking only about income tax and its effect on the distribution of income. If we look at indirect taxes we find that the position is even worse again. The major change in indirect taxes has been the notorious petrol tax. It is even more regressive. I intend to quote figures for country people that I derived from the 1975-76 survey by the Australian Bureau of Statistics of household expenditure. I see that the National Country Party is barely represented in this place at this moment, but perhaps some of its supporters are listening to the broadcast of this debate. ( Quorum formed). It is probably beyond the capacity of National Country Party senators, and probably half the Liberal Party senators, to understand these ABS statistics. I will summarise them for the benefit of the innumerate. The figures show the effect of rising petrol prices on people who live in the country, particularly on the low income people. They show that 6 per cent of the low income family’s income is spent on petrol, oils and lubricants; for the middle income family the figure is 3 per cent; and for the high income family, only 1 Vi per cent is spent on those commodities. So, the effect of increasing petrol and associated charges hits the medium income people twice as hard as it hits the rich and it hits the low income people four times as hard as it hits the rich. That is what this Government is deliberately doing to people who live in the country and that is what the Opposition is complaining about in this motion.

The PRESIDENT:

– Order! The honourable senator’s time has expired.

Senator SHEIL:
Queensland

– It was a most unusual occurrence to have the knocker of the north call a quorum on the whinger from the west. At least it saved honourable senators from some of that tirade of hate, greed, envy and jealousy that has been emanating from the other side of the chamber today. I understand that these are the tools of socialism, and socialism as a generator of wealth has been discredited all round the world. Yet, here Opposition senators are promulgating their policies on us. Even that Valhalla of socialism, Sweden- about which we have not heard so much lately, since the Swedes turned against socialism- is on the downhill run. The Australian Labor Party would make all of us in this egalitarian society equal and it would have us all on equal incomes. I venture to say that if we divided up all the wealth in Australia and dished it out equally to everyone at midnight tonight, by five minutes past midnight it would all be unequal again.

I hope people are aware of the promises that the socialists make concerning Australia’s wealth. This afternoon honourable senators have heard that the Labor Party would bring back gift taxes, and introduce wealth taxes, capital gains taxes, asset taxes and every other sort of tax one can think of to make us all equal. With an asset tax a person ‘s assets are added up every year and he is taxed on them, whether he is making a profit or not. They would certainly make us all equal; we would all be sharing misery equally. Opposition senators promise us the politics of benevolence. They want to buy votes by promising benevolence. They want high sickness and unemployment benefits, high pensions and single parent benefits and every other sort of benefit, but from Australia’s experience and experience around the world it is the politics of benevolence that always backfires. If a government introduces high sickness benefits it is subsidising sickness, not health; if it has high unemployment benefits it is subsidising unemployment, not employment; and high pension benefits subsidise not wealth but poverty. So the situation goes on. When the single parent is subsidised, families are undermined. The evidence is there for us to see. It has happened in the past. But this is what the Labor Party would promise.

I know there has been a slogan that we should do an honest day’s work for an honest dollar. I am sure many people did an honest day’s work but they found, particularly under the Labor Government, that the dollar was not honest; it was worth less and less every day. One could not blame people for wanting more and more of those dollars because they were worth less and less. That happened under Labor because it gave us an inflation enema that kicked inflation along. I shall say a few words about the high minimum wages that have been the result of trade union activity over the years. High minimum wages have put a lot of people out of work. There are many people who would work for less and there are people who can afford to pay less. But, people are unemployable because they cannot be paid the high minimum wages. Worse than that, they are put out of competition with the unions who are attracting the high minimum wages. I see that as a most important cause of unemployment. It is also making the gap between the rich and the poor bigger all the time.

I see the latest assault on technology, coming both from the trade unions and the Australian Labor Party, as devastating for Australia’s progress. Technology creates jobs and wealth. For example, it is said that Australia has nonrenewable resources in, coal, oil and other things. But, they are not non-renewable. Technology finds more reserves. Not only that, it teaches people how to get out reserves more efficiently and then how to use them more efficiently. It creates jobs, wealth and more reserves. While on that subject I point out that the three big inventions in the history of mankind have been fire, then the wheel and now plutonium. They are all about as dangerous as each other. I think they are wonderful servants but fearful masters. Plutonium is as big an invention as either of the other two.

I again refer to welfare. When the Labor Party was in government it tried to make a monopoly out of welfare services. The private welfare services tended to atrophy. So, there was a whole bureaucracy of social welfare workers who needed to go out and find more clients, to tell people what their rights were as opposed to getting people off welfare, which should have been the policy. They were generating more welfare, making people become more conscious of welfare and telling them that they were entitled to these things by right. People were not allowed to accept charity because that was demeaning; it had to be their right. The word right is bandied about too freely at the moment. These things may be an entitlement; they are certainly not a right. The whole thrust of the Henderson Commission of Inquiry into poverty, which has been mentioned in this chamber today, was to give poor people more money and hope that that would solve the problem. That would not solve the problem of poverty at all. I am reminded of the old saying of Confucius: ‘Give a poor man a fish and he will eat for a day; teach him to fish and he will eat forever’. The new social consciousness says that that is not good enough because that means he will eat fish forever. He is not allowed to do that. He must be given money to buy whatever he wants. Surely we could teach him to trade a few fish. That would solve his problem.

In regard to the solutions to the problems, I return to the question of unemployment. Since government has taken over unemployment, it has been a problem. But, I think unemployment could be a very profitable business. For example, if it were handled under an insurance scheme and people could insure against unemployment, receiving good bonuses for longevity of employment, it could be an eminently profitable business. Similarly, people who suffer from chronic, catastrophic, debilitating illnesses- illnesses that are uninsurable- could be handled by lotteries. People would be happy to buy tickets in them. It would be rather like the Sydney Opera House lottery. Other things, like international sporting competitions, could be taken away from the Government and put into the hands of a lottery organisation so people could pick and choose into what they put their money.

The cost of bureaucracy and the inquiries we have had lately to try to make bureaucracies more efficient, and the worry we have had about the growth of bureaucracy, is a difficult matter to handle. Every government seems to make a bigger and bigger bureaucracy. In the circumstances, the only theory I can think of is my own, which is that we take the head of each department, sub-department and section and offer him double his salary every time he halves the number of staff in his department. In that way, I think that we would avoid the problem of imposing staff ceilings and we would retain the best of the public servants in the Public Service.

Senator Coleman:

– It would not provide service to the public.

Senator SHEIL:

– We could return the money to the members of the public and they could provide their own services. This is one of the problems with the Australian Labor Party. It does not think that people can think for themselves. It wants to do everything for them. The Labor Party wants government to do it all for them. The evidence stands before the Labor Party that government cannot do it all for them. In fact, government is a consumer of wealth, not a creator of wealth. The people know a lot better than the Government how to spend their money.

Senator Gietzelt:

– But your Government is complaining to us because they are saving it.

Senator SHEIL:

– No, we are not. The honourable senator has not read the Budget Speech. We want to get the money back to the people and to have less government, less tax and less government interference. I see nothing wrong with policies that make the rich richer and the poor rich.

Senator WRIEDT:
Leader of the Opposition · Tasmania

– In the recently published document entitled ‘Beyond Unemployment’ which was prepared by the Catholic Commission on Peace and Justice, the following appears on page 13:

The essential long-term problem concerns the distribution of wealth. We have already seen that Australia is a very wealthy nation and that this wealth is concentrated in the hands of a minority of its members. We have also seen that another minority, the unemployed and others who are disadvantaged, miss out on a fair share of our national wealth. Finally, we have seen that true service to the community frequently goes unrewarded.

The report goes on to state:

A change in the attitudes and goals of society must involve a new means of distributing wealth. If we redefine work in terms of service, we will be able to recognise the contributions each person makes. We must then, as a society, guarantee that those contributions are rewarded.

That is a quote from a document prepared by the Catholic Commission on Peace and Justice which was published recently. I think it is fair to say that this document was not prepared by a group of college pinkos or militant lefties but, in fact, was prepared by people who are genuinely concerned about the inequalities of wealth in this country. I suppose that Senator Carrick and many other honourable senators on the Government side would dismiss the document as socialist propaganda. I do not think that it can be given a label, except to say that it reflects the concern of a thinking group of people in the community who recognise the inequalities that exist within our community, who are prepared to speak out against them and to come out in a positive sense and implore not only the Government but also all political parties and politicians to do something about them.

That is the purpose of this motion today. We want to alert the Parliament and the Australian people to the fact that we live in a society in which the distribution of wealth and income is grossly inequitable. I quote again figures which have been used during the course of this debate in order to highlight the nature of that lack of equitable distribution. If we look at the distribution of family income in Australia, we find that the bottom 10 per cent of income earning families receive only 2.2 per cent of income. The top 10 per cent of income earning families earns 23 per cent of income- almost exactly 10 times as much per family as those families in the low income group. The bottom 20 per cent of income earners receive 6.7 per cent of income in Australia, whereas the top 20 per cent earn 38 per cent of the income. If we look at wealth, as distinct from income, we find an infinitely more inequitable position from the figures.

Senator Rae:

– What is the source of the figures?

Senator WRIEDT:

– I am quoting from Dr Podder’s figures on the distribution of household income in Australia. They were published in the Economic Record in 1974.

Senator Rae:

-In 1974?

Senator WRIEDT:

-I refer to his table showing the distribution of wealth. As honourable senators know, these surveys require exhaustive analysis by the people who prepare them. They are always a short space behind. Dr Podder has also shown that the distribution of income alters very marginally over the years. If we look at the distribution of wealth, we find the bottom 10 per cent have 0.32 per cent of the national wealth whereas the top one per cent own 2 1 per cent of the nation ‘s wealth. The bottom 20 per cent of income earners in Australia own 1.28 per cent of the nation’s wealth. The top 10 per cent own 56 per cent of the nation ‘s wealth. It is no good any honourable senator’s saying, just on the basis of those figures, that it is the fault of the Fraser Government, the fault of the Whitlam Government or the fault of some other government. In fact, no Federal government has really ever grappled with this problem. Firstly, the powers over income distribution in this country do not rest with the Federal Parliament. They rest with the State parliaments.

The disturbing thing about this debate today has been that those honourable senators on the Government side who have spoken are quite happy with the position. That is the point that comes through in this debate. They say that this state of distribution of wealth and income in Australia is the proper thing- that that is as it should be. We are told that the people on the very low levels of income and who have very low ownership of wealth in this country have to stay in that position. That is the difference between the attitudes adopted by the Opposition and the Government in this debate.

Honourable senators will recall that in 1973, during the period of the Labor Government, we recognised this problem and endeavoured, by referendum, to obtain those powers for the Federal Parliament. Of course, the Australian people unfortunately refused the transfer of those powers from the States to the Commonwealth. If a policy is adopted which gives an equitable distribution of income, it must be done on a national basis. The States themselves cannot be expected to implement income policies because of the obvious disparities that would immediately develop between the States. Yet, as I have indicated, during the course of the debate we have heard statements, particularly by Senator Carrick, to the effect: ‘There is nothing wrong with this policy. It is all right. What are these people complaining about? Why should the people who are already getting these very low incomes be given any assistance?’ He went on to make claims about taxation reductions, et cetera, during the period of this Government.

Senator Carrick:

– Of course, I said nothing of the sort.

Senator WRIEDT:

-Senator Carrick is now interjecting. It was OK while he was saying these things but now when the reply comes he does not want me to be heard. Let me say it loud and clear: Since this Government came to office it has increased taxation by $23,000m in its first three Budgets; $23,000m of additional tax has been collected by the Fraser Government despite the fact that it came into power saying that it was a tax reducing government. These are the facts from the Treasury papers. It is no good Senator Carrick or anybody else denying them. I say to Senator Carrick: ‘Physician heal thyself.

In the more damning instance of increasing taxation- the area of indirect tax- this Government has increased tax receipts by no less than $5,000m. The petrol tax rip-off- the famous

Fraser tax rip-off- has affected the low income earner just as much as it has affected the high income earner. It has been stated and it should be re-stated that indirect tax is the most inequitable form of taxation. People earning only $ 1 1 5 a week must pay that additional indirect tax in the same way as a person earning $500 a week. This is the deliberate policy that has been pursued by the present Government. Of course, to add insult to injury, as members of Parliament, honourable senators on the Government side earn $36,000 and $37,000 a year. The Prime Minister receives a salary of $80,000 a year -

Senator Gietzelt:

– Plus the superphosphate bounty.

Senator WRIEDT:

– Plus the superphosphate bounty. He is a millionaire five times over, yet he is telling the trade unions that they have no right even to expect the incomes of their members to keep up with inflation. That is the Government ‘s message to Mr Hawke, who said, as Senator Walsh mentioned: ‘We are prepared to sit down and talk to you about this.’ What did Mr Fraser do? He said: ‘No, we are not even going to talk to you about it’. Only last week Mr Keating, the Opposition spokesman on minerals and energy, said: ‘We are prepared to sit down and talk to you about a national policy on what is probably the most crucial issue facing this nation, namely energy.’ He made an offer to the Government. We do not want to score off the Government in terms of party politics. We should not be doing that because the issue is too big. But what was the response? The Government said: ‘We are not going to do that. We will go our way with our policies. ‘ What hope is there for this nation if on these basic issues of politics we are simply going to argue it out all the time? The offers have been made on the industrial front. We are prepared, in conjunction with the Australian Council of Trade Unions, to talk to the Government about a rational sensible policy. On the question of energy we are prepared to do the same. Yet the Government has said no, it is going to go its own way. That is exactly where Mr Fraser is taking us, and I suggest that it is the last thing the Australian people want to see.

Returning to the question of redistribution, we have seen the figures on the last Budget published by Mr Risstrom. Three weeks ago we asked the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Carrick, to produce figures to disprove those set out by Mr Risstrom, the Secretary of the Australian Taxpayers Association. We have not seen any figures from the Government and we will not see any because Mr Risstrom ‘s figures cannot be disproved. The figures in Mr Risstrom ‘s table show that under the last Budget the lower a person’s income the higher will be his taxation this financial year. Starting at the lowest rate for a taxpayer with dependants, a person earning $6,000 a year will have an effective tax increase under this Budget of $134.63 this financial year. Coming to a person on $8,000, his tax will increase by $ 1 7. The point is that the higher a person’s income the less he will pay in increased taxation. Mr Risstrom ‘s figures do not go as high as Mr Fraser’s income, of course, but on an income of $40,000 a year- we would have to double that to get to Mr Fraser’s level- the effective tax increase is $3.67. In other words, on that sort of income the increase in taxation is almost irrelevant and anyone could afford to pay it, but people on the lower incomes are paying more tax.

It is this regressive redistribution of income that concerns the Opposition. In the Labor Government’s last Budget we also had a redistribution of the tax scales, and we did it in a way that assisted people on lower incomes, exactly as the Catholic Commission report advocated that it should be done. Of course, this Government is doing the direct opposite. Looking again at the taxation statistics for males in the Budget- I will not include females because that might distort the figures- there are no less than 1.25 million males earning less than $ 155 a week. How can a Government, led by a man who is a millionaire five times over and runs around all over the world in a couple of $20m jets, say to the ordinary wage earner: ‘We are not going to allow you even to keep up with inflation this financial year. We are going to increase your personal income tax by 18 per cent. We are going to allow your wages to increase by only half that amount, but we are also telling you that inflation will increase by 10 per cent and maybe 11 per cent’. That is the philosophy that the Opposition opposes and for which we see absolutely no justification.

In closing, may I point out the reason why this Government gets so upset about the decisions that were taken at the national conference of the Labor Party in Adelaide only a month or so ago, a conference which was described by International Public Relations Pty Ltd, the firm that covered the conference, as an outstanding success. It described the conference as a triumph for political common sense, and indeed it was. Very intelligent decisions were taken, but very humane decisions. As our platform on taxation states, we recognise that taxation is a source of revenue, and it is also a means of redistributing income and wealth. That is what the Labor

Party’s policy is all about. It is quite obvious that it is the intention of Mr Fraser and all his colleagues, as was displayed here today, to maintain in this country the most inequitable income distribution possible because that is the nature of Liberal philosophy.

Senator RAE:
Tasmania

– What an extraordinary afternoon we have been treated to. The matter of public importance that we are debating is the growing discrepancy in incomes in Australia under the Fraser Government. I repeat: The growing discrepancy in incomes in Australia under the Fraser Government. What did Senator Button, who raised this matter, talk about? He talked about doctors and lawyers. It was almost like a hate session of some sort, or perhaps it is just that he was upset that he had left his former profession and come into politics and decided that he would have a go at those who are left behind. I really could not understand what his speech had to do with the subject matter, nor could I understand what Senator Gietzelt was talking about. However, Senator Walsh was quite clear. He was true to form. He spent most of his time on a rather vicious attack on the Prime Minister (Mr Malcolm Fraser), retelling unsubstantiated stories as reported in the Press. What on earth that had to do with the question we are supposed to be debating I am damned if I know.

Senator Wriedt got a little closer to the mark, and I congratulate him for that. He talked about the subject to some extent; he was the first speaker from the Opposition side who even approached the subject. However, it is five years since the publication of the figures on which he based most of his speech and it would have been several years before that that they were gathered and processed. Certainly they show what we all know, that is, that there is and always has been in Australia a discrepancy in incomes between the lowest income-earning members of the community and the highest income-earning members. But I do not think the figures show anything more than we already know and they certainly do not prove that in the past four years under the present Government there has been a growing discrepancy in incomes. When Senator Wriedt went on to state that we as a Government had increased taxation by $23,000m he made a rather serious error. I think he meant to say that we had increased taxation to $23,000m. The fact is that during the three years of the preceding Government, if we are going to make these comparisons- I think they are somewhat odious, but let me get the record straight -

Senator Wriedt:

– From what are you quoting?

Senator RAE:

– I am about to quote from Table 6 of the Budget Papers. In the three years from 1973-74, when taxation revenue was $10,873m, to 1975-76, when it was $16,843m, there was an increase of 54.9 per cent. That is a fact, as will be seen from a table which in a moment I will seek leave to incorporate in Hansard. In the first three years of the present Government the total taxation revenue rose from $ 1 9,642m in 1976-77 to $23,288m in 1978-79, which was an increase of 1 8.6 per cent. So we are comparing an increase of 54.9 per cent in the first three Budgets with an increase of 1 8.6 per cent in the following three Budgets. That increase is shown in table 6 on page 262 of Budget Paper No. 1 . 1 seek leave to incorporate the table in Hansard.

The PRESIDENT:

-Is leave granted?

Senator Wriedt:

– I do not wish to deny Senator Rae the right to incorporate tables, but let us be clear about what is being incorporated.

Senator RAE:

– I am seeking leave to incorporate table 6 on page 262 of Budget Paper No. 1 .

Senator Gietzelt:

– There is nothing wrong with page 262.

Senator Wriedt:

– I am sure that there is not, but whether it is in the context of the debate is another matter.

Senator RAE:

– Rather than have my time taken up I withdraw my request to have the document incorporated. Anyone who doubts the accuracy of the figures I have given can seek them out at page 262 of Budget Paper No. 1 for the current year.

I believe that what we have witnessed this afternoon, with the exception of the positive part of the contribution by Senator Wriedt, is an example of the thinking which gives rise to the description of the dead hand of socialism. The speeches were divisive, reactionary, outdated and in no way contributed to overcoming such problems as may exist within Australia. The idea which seemed to be behind the thinking of the majority of the Labor Party’s speakers was that if they attacked some tall poppies they would shake out a little pollen and everybody would be happy. I cannot imagine why that should be so, any more than I can imagine that the theory that government interference inevitably improves an economy has any basic validity which can be demonstrated. In fact, the socialist parties of Europe are far ahead of the socialist party in Australia- the Australian Labor Party- because they have virtually abandoned the idea that by continually interfering with an economy and manipulating everything governments can do better for the people than the people would otherwise do in a free enterprise economy.

In any event, the people of Australia have relatively recently expressed their view in relation to government control of incomes. It was put to them by way of referendum and they rejected it overwhelmingly. In the context of this debate it is relevant to remind honourable senators that the people of Australia have expressed a view about giving governments control over the structure of incomes and have rejected that idea. What we need to overcome our problems in Australia is a further expression of the private enterprise principle of incentive so long as we do not overlook the role which I believe all of us accept falls on government, that is, to ensure that the weaker or less fortunate members of the community are protected. Unless a government has the means to be able to protect them what protection can it give? Productivity leads to the creation of enough bread to distribute in the community, but if the bread has not been produced it cannot be distributed. The idea that seemed to be inherent in some of the earlier speeches from the Opposition this afternoon was that if they divisively and offensively attacked some of the people who are receiving some of the higher incomes then somehow they would cure some of the problems of Australia. That is obviously garbage.

The tax strike which we are suffering at the moment is an indication that the discouragement of the strong will not strengthen the weak. I think it is accepted in most parts of the modern world that we do not produce more by attacking the producers; we do not produce more in an economy such as ours by saying: ‘We will take away the incentive from those who are willing to produce extra efforts, work harder and have greater capacities’ and then equalise everybody. That simply equalises everybody down.

Senator Wriedt:

– That is not the argument.

Senator RAE:

– That is the sort of approach that was being put. Senator Wriedt can say that that is not the argument. I am glad to hear him say that. The impression that was being given was that somehow, by attacking the higher income people, one succeeds in covering the problems of the economy.

Let me conclude by showing what nonsense is the claim that there has been growing discrepancy in incomes in Australia under the Fraser Government. The 1974-75 report of the Commissioner of Taxation stated that 2.8 million individual taxpayers in Australia- approximately half of the taxpayers- were in the taxable income bracket of $3,200 to $6,400 per annum. They were the middle block in the total tax paying public of Australia. The 1977-78 report of the Taxation Commissioner showed that the same percentage- 2.8 million individual taxpayerswas in a taxable income bracket of $7,000 to $16,000 per annum. In other words, the income of the average taxpayer in Australia- I take the median between the two- has gone from $4,500 to nearly $12,000 per annum at a time when inflation has not nearly doubled. The fact that in 1974-75 there were 35,000 taxpayers on incomes over $20,000 whereas in 1977-78 there were only 38,000 taxpayers on incomes over $30,000- in other words, if we increase the figure by 50 per cent for the high income bracket we have about the same number of taxpayers in that bracket- shows the nonsense of this claim. It does not show that there is no case for doing something more about the lower income people in the community, but it does show that the Labor Party’s motion is nonsense.

The PRESIDENT:

– Order! The discussion having reached the limit of two hours allowed by Sessional Order, I now call on the Business of the Day.

page 608

JOINT SELECT COMMITTEE ON THE FAMILY LAW ACT

Proposed Extension of Time for Report

Consideration resumed from 1 1 September.

Motion (by Senator Carrick) proposed:

  1. 1 ) That the Senate concurs in the resolution of the House of Representatives contained in message No. 325 of the House of Representatives, and
  2. That the foregoing resolution be communicated to the House of Representatives by message.
Senator COLEMAN:
Western Australia

– The motion appointing this Committee was first moved by the Attorney-General (Senator Durack) in the Senate on 17 August 1978. The motion in paragraph 12 contained provision that the Committee report to Parliament by 3 1 December 1979. It was reasonable at that stage for the Attorney-General to expect that the Committee should be able to report by the end of 1979, although honourable senators were no doubt aware that it was extremely unlikely that Parliament would be sitting on New Year’s eve. However, the passage of the motion through Parliament was not as rapid as might be expected by the Attorney-General when he moved it. Amendments were made to the motion in the House requiring the concurrence of the Senate. Because of the interest in the inquiry, the matter of nominations to sit on the Committee was not finalised until 12 October 1978. The first meeting of the Committee took place on 18 October 1978; submissions were called for by 3 1 December 1 978. So, the inquiry did not really get under way until February of this year when public hearings commenced. Nor could the Parliament or the Committee be expected to anticipate the tremendous public interest in the inquiry, which has resulted in the Committee’s receiving 485 written submissions.

The Committee has worked extremely hard and has pursued the inquiry relentlessly since its first public hearing on 8 February. It has conducted public hearings in all State capitals, except Brisbane, where it is meeting for a public hearing on 24 September. The transcript it has taken now comprises some five and a half thousand pages of evidence. The Committee since its appointment has accumulated a substantial body of information, both local and international, bearing on the inquiry. The Chairman recently returned from a study tour of Europe and North America, during which he gathered substantial data on family law systems in other countries with comparable jurisdictions. The Committee has accumulated a wealth of facts and knowledge and will require time to assess and process that information. A series of private meetings with selected experts is being undertaken to examine particular issues. Consultation on this basis is a comparatively new technique in parliamentary committee work. These meetings will cover topics where difficulties have been identified, such as the position of children under the Act, custody, maintenance, property and the organisation of the Family Court.

As all honourable senators are aware, the issues for inquiry by the Committee are complex and diverse in their implications and it is considered that more time to finish the inquiry is needed. In those circumstances, the Committee has agreed that it would not be able to do justice to the inquiry if it attempted to rush through a report simply to meet the deadline contained in the resolution of appointment. The Committee believes that a more considered and substantial report on the many issues that this reference has raised will be possible only if an extension of time to report is obtained. The Committee believes that it could report to Parliament by the middle of the Autumn sittings in 1 980 and will direct its efforts to presenting its report to both Houses shortly after Easter next year and certainly by the end of the Autumn sittings.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

page 609

QUESTION

BUDGET PAPERS 1979-80

Debate resumed from 1 1 September, on motion by Senator Carrick:

That the Senate take note of the papers.

Senator GIETZELT:
New South Wales

– It might be recalled by honourable senators that last evening when I was speaking on the Budget I was endeavouring to make the point that the Budget has to be seen as only one of the instruments which determine the level of economic activity in this country, but in fact it has a limited influence on the course which the economy takes. Our criticism is directed at what we believe are the inadequacies of the Budget in that respect. I made the point that in the operation of the economy of a modern industrial society the real basic decisions about growth, development, the course the economy should follow and the creation of jobs depend largely on decisions which are made privately and not publicly- decisions which are made by major corporations on whether they shall invest here or there, whether their capital will leave this country and go off-shore to Asia, or whether the building of steel mills, oil exploration or other major projects will be undertaken by those owners of capital. I referred to what we have seen happening in recent times as a result of past Liberal-Country Party Budgets. I mentioned that capital has taken advantage of investment decisions, investment incentives, investment allowances and so on to introduce technology. I referred also to the fact that, in addition to those influences, international influences were considerably affecting the course being followed in the Australian economy.

I mentioned that changes in the economy are taking place against the background of a series of Budgets which have placed emphasis on capital and not labour. As a consequence, the Budgets which have been characteristic of the Fraser Administration, including the current Budget which is a Howard-Fraser Budget, can be described only as class Budgets insofar as they seek to take in taxation from the common pool of income in Australia a greater proportion from the pockets of the wage earners and to redistribute that money in the form of incentives for big business or the big corporate sector of our economy. One only has to look at the balance sheets of numerous major organisations in that sector of our economy to see that their profit ratios have been boosted as a result of the incentives provided in past Budgets. Obviously those organisations will take advantage of incentives contained in this Budget also.

Notwithstanding those incentives, the fact is that the growth factor is not significant enough to overcome the difficulties present in the Australian economy. Despite the rhetoric of the last four Treasurers, there is a lack of business confidence. There has been a lack of confidence in the Australian community. An examination of any evidence which is available can only lead one to the conclusion that the lack of response by the business sector and by consumers indicates a massive vote of no confidence in the policies being pursued by this Government. This Government is aware of that fact and has been pleading with the business sector to take steps to regenerate the private sector. The Government has been pleading with consumers to spend more. But of course the evidence shows that investment decisions which will create new jobs are not being made and that consumer spending is not taking place. That is because this Government has lost the confidence of the people.

Not only do the people not trust this Government, not only are they able to see through the Government’s mis-statements and misleading pronouncements from time to time, but also the great mass of the people, at least those on the average wage- I am not talking of average weekly earnings but of the average wage, which is about $170 to $180 a week-have found that their living standards have fallen by some $14 a week. It is in that sort of political climate that savings bank deposits are increasing. We cannot blame people for taking steps to put money away for a rainy day because that rainy day is arriving much faster than many people thought it would. Such is the concern in the community now that many economists, organisations such as the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace, many people in universities and even many people who generally can be described as conservative in their thinking are beginning to show some signs of concern about what is happening in the economy.

Yet what does this Government do? It takes more money out of the hands of the average person through higher taxation. It does that both directly in the form of pay-as-you-earn taxation and indirectly in the form of increases in the excise duty on petrol which have been applied seven times and in four Budgets. Those increases have meant that under Fraser the price of petrol has more than doubled in the past 18 months. The cases of people who have come to me show that ordinary working people living in the far western suburbs of Sydney are spending an extra $10 a week getting to and from their places of work because of a lack of planning in housing and the distribution of jobs in far-flung areas away from the place of residence of the workers. That extra $10 a week, coupled with increased taxation, both direct and indirect, and a reduction in living standards resulting from a drop of approximately $14 a week in income all contribute towards the lack of confidence of the average person.

On the other hand, in taking advantage of the world parity price for oil, this Government has handed out to the oil companies massive sums of money. I was referring to that when I concluded my remarks last evening. One company, the Esso-BHP company, has gained $400m. If we look at other corporations we find that in the last two Budgets $920m in actual handouts has gone to the big corporations to buy machinery for the purpose not only of increasing productivity but also of reducing the labour content. As a result of this increase in technology hundreds of thousands of jobs have disappeared from the labour market never to come back. We heard honourable senators in a previous debate referring to the fact that technology is something of a progressive nature. Of course it is, provided that it leads to the eradication of menial tasks and does not lead to an increase in unemployment.

What does this Budget do? The retention allowance has been raised once again, this time to 70 per cent, which opens even further loopholes for the big business sector. As can be seen, the Government’s policy has been to fight inflation in an effective way except to the extent that inflation is now being used as an excuse to reduce the workers’ living standards. All that the Government has done in its four Budgets and its two mini-Budgets is to make inflation worse. We all recognise that by the end of the last quarter of this year we are likely to have an inflation rate of something like 14 per cent a year. As demand falls the large corporations simply raise prices to protect profits. That has been shown clearly by a study made by the United States Congress to be the process that operates. Honourable senators opposite may laugh, but there is abundant evidence that in a period of declining sales profits rise because prices have no control mechanism. This is particularly so in an economy which is as concentrated as that of Australia. Australia has one of the largest concentrations of corporate power in the Western world. This Government sees the allowing of prices to rise as part of its integral strategy because it has taken steps to reduce the incidence of supervision through the Trade Practices Commission and the Prices Justification Tribunal. It is not surprising, therefore, that people are not spending because with a predicted growth rate of 2’A per cent- half of that of last year- they fear for their jobs.

Let us lok at the external debts. This idiotic policy is compounded by massive borrowings on overseas capital markets to plug holes in our balance of payments. After criticising the Labor Party for trying to borrow money for productive investments- for controlling our natural resources and for buying back the farm- this Government turns around and puts Australia in hock to the tune of $4,700m. To bring it down to a per capita basis, $390 for every many, woman and child in Australia is the extent to which this Government has borrowed over the last four years. Even the Bank of New South Wales, which I do not think would lose any sleep if I were to say that it is a supporter of the philosophy and policies of this Government, has seen fit to note the following in a recent document:

The period of heaviest burden of capital repayment when debts mature starts in 1981-82 and does not ease until 1987-88 . . . If in three or four years hence Australia were still in the position of being a net borrower overseas, over and above its requirement to roll over borrowings, it could in deed be building up intractable problems on the external account.

When this is combined with tariff policies that are progressively destroying an independent Australian economy it is clearly true that this Government’s policy is the most disastrous in Australia ‘s history.

In the few moments that I have left I want to refer to the often repeated criticism that is made about the attempts of the Labor Government to redress the imbalance of income distribution in Australia when we took specific steps to catch up on public works and to increase the ratio of wages to incomes and profits. We are supposed to be concerned about public requirements and facilities in our own country, and I think it is interesting to look at page 253 of Budget Paper No. 1 to see what happened in the years when Labor was in office. We certainly increased the expenditure needed to catch up for the long years of post-war Liberal rule. We make no apologies for the fact that in our first Budget we increased education expenditure by four times; that in our second Budget our allocation for social security went up by 50 per cent; that in our first Budget we increased by 339 per cent the amount of money going to the States for public housing; that we increased by 1 93 per cent the allocation for urban affairs in the previous Liberal Budget; that we increased the money going to culture and recreation by 85.6 per cent; and that in our third Budget we increased the money allocations for health and welfare by 130 percent. These are not matters which we believe we should have to defend as though we made some indefensible decision to increase the money for water and sewerage supplies and to try to give money to the States so that the price of land and accommodation could be brought down within the reach of the ordinary citizen. We make no apologies for increasing pensions to 25 per cent of average weekly earnings and for making money available so that cities’ and decentralisation planning schemes could be brought into effect.

It is true that taxation increased in those periods. But who were the beneficiaries of those increases to which I have just referred? Substantially it was the States. In 1 970 the Premiers of the six States of Australia, Liberal and Labor, made a very strong submission to the national Parliament about the inadequacies of the Liberal Party as far as State funding was concerned. We took steps, as is shown on page 260 of Budget Paper No. 1, because in our three Budgets we increased payments to the States and to local government from $2, 623m to $4,436m, an increase of 70 per cent. We see that even in this Budget the States and local government get 36 cents in every dollar that is collected by the national Government. So they should, because if the Commonwealth does not have equitable arrangements with the States, the States will increase State taxation; and that would be detrimental to the overall interest of the Australian people.

This Budget continues the inept, inadequate and incorrect policies of the first Fraser Budget which was brought in in 1976 and in which the Government expressed confidence that the business sector would take up the slack, that consumers would begin to spend and that the economy would get on an even keel. Four years later in its fourth Budget the Government knows that unemployment is up, that inflation is beginning to rise again, that there is a lack of business confidence in this country- except in the big corporate sector- that the small business sector is reeling as a result of the downturn in the economy and that the average Australian has no confidence in the Budget’s strategy or in its objectives of trying to get some health back into the Australian economy. In the light of those circumstances the Labor Party makes a very trenchant criticism of the most contractionary Budget that has been brought before the national Parliament during the period of the Fraser Administration.

Senator KILGARIFF:
Northern Territory

– One would have to go a long way before one struck such a dismal and pessimistic viewpoint as the one that has just been expressed. I think we can thank God that the viewpoints and the supposed facts that have been expressed in this debate today and particularly yesterday cannot be supported. The fact is that Australia has been through a difficult time. Everyone in the nation realises that. When the coalition Government went out of power in 1972, unemployment and inflation were stabilised. But from that year onwards there was a rapid increase in inflation, with the result that by 1974- in some three years- inflation had increased to something like 14 per cent. It has been stated before, and it is a fact, that when Labor went out of power in 1975 the inflation rate was nearly 18 per cent. Unemployment had gone hand in hand with inflation, and by then, of course, the unemployment rate had risen to about 5 per cent.

Honourable senators opposite do not like to have to face up to the sins they committed when they were in government. They complain about the situation now, but they should remember that they were the creators of that situation and that in the last three years it has been necessary to take steps to bring about a responsible, stable economic situation, which I suggest is with us today. The inflation rate has gone down to about 8 per cent. It is recognised that our inflation rate is one of the lowest in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries. It is some 2 per cent below the average for those countries. It is no mean feat to get into this situation. As I said earlier, it has been achieved by very hard work.

This is a responsible and reasonable Budget, despite what the knockers have to say. It is interesting to note that the opposition to this Budget was more than spontaneous. The opposition to it came before it could be read or appreciated. Rent-a-crowds were arranged to voice opposition to the Budget. The arrangements were made before the Budget was actually tabled. I suppose that rent-a-crowds have some use; but surely it means little to the people of Australia that people have to be paid to be pressured to come along like fools and be told what to do. But this is what happened. The renta.crowds and the hangers-on are the tools of the militant left wing unions.

Senator Cavanagh:

- Senator Button does not believe in it. There was no one at his meeting.

Senator KILGARIFF:

– I do not know what Senator Button has to say about the matter. Let me get on with the matter under discussion and review the Budget theme. It was stated very clearly in the following terms:

The clear benefits of firmly pursuing an anti-inflationary policy over more than three years are reason enough to re-affirm that policy . . .

I believe that the silent majority of Australians believes in that policy and supports it. There are very many indications that the policy objective is being achieved. The supposed facts that Senator Gietzelt gave a little while ago, when he said that unemployment was increasing, that consumer spending was down -

Senator Young:

– He was referring to South Australia.

Senator KILGARIFF:

– Yes, possibly he was referring to South Australia. I will refer a little later to a situation that has come about there. Over the last months there has been a clear indication that unemployment is levelling out- I will give official figures later- and employment is improving, despite what the knockers say, namely that we are drifting into a depressed and recessed state. At times I wonder whether it is the wish of these people that the Australian economy be eroded and destroyed, and that the country go into a depression. It appears to me that this is the aim of some people. I will refer to this later in my remarks when I refer to the actions of the militant left wing unions and what they are endeavouring to do to erode or white ant the economic state of the country as it is today.

Sitting suspended from 6 to 8 p.m.

Senator KILGARIFF:

– Before the sitting was suspended I had been discussing the very worthwhile themes of the Budget and had noted that the clear benefits that had resulted from firmly pursuing an anti-inflationary policy for more than three years were reason enough to reaffirm that policy. Moreover, the difficulties that over the next year are to be faced by the entire industrialised world, including Australia, in responding to fresh inflationary pressures, make it all the more essential that fighting inflation should be the hallmark of this Budget. Although I am sure all Government supporters will agree with me on that I suggest that it would be the belief of the silent majority of Australians also.

This is a Budget which seeks to reduce inflation and promote sound, broadly-based growth. It provides incentive for both individuals and business within a responsible overall framework that is conducive to our longer-term economic goals. The Budget significantly reduces the call of Government upon this nation’s financial markets and equips Australia to succeed in a world environment of rising inflation and intensifying competition.

It is interesting to look back at the debate that has taken place and to recall the rather depressed tone in which Senator Colston and Senator Gietzelt have discussed the Budget. That reflects their way of thinking, but Senator Colston struck a very depressed note indeed. I see no reason for it. In his thinking the honourable senator got almost to the track, as it were, and then turned back. All he could say was that the depressed economic situation that he sawwhich I repeat really does not exist- had resulted from the actions of this Government. Senator Gietzelt ‘s remarks were even more interesting. His approach to the Budget was a knocking approach, but that is the nature of politics. He got to the point of saying that the Budget had a responsible part to play, but was not the end-all and be-all. He got to the middle of the track and then he too turned back. If those honourable senators had crossed the track and had taken a balanced view of the Budget and its responsibilities- it is after all a framework, a body of economic guidelines for the future- I am sure that they would have had to say that the community and unions also had a part to play.

Today we see much abuse of the union system. Most government supporters in the Parliament would agree with me that the principle of unionism is extremely desirable, that it is warranted and necessary, and that its introduction over the years has been good for employees. I suggest that it has also been good for employers. But something has happened. The union system, as it operates today, is under test. One could say that it has developed a cancerous growth. I say that because the union system has been abused, though not by the individual, who is in a very difficult situation. It appears to me and to many, if not most, Australians that the left wing of the union system represents a very irresponsible approach, as has been demonstrated by its forays, its attacks, against the economic base of Australia. Therefore, if we are to get Australia back onto the proper financial footing, with inflation levels under control, militant unionism surely must be considered its No. 1 enemy.

We heard Senator Gietzelt relate sad stories of what had happened to people who were in poor circumstances. I would not joke about that, or disagree with him. We know that in Australia there are people who live under such circumstances. But if the honourable senator had been fair and had taken a balanced look at the situation he would have gone across the line and examined the militant unionism system, which today is making irresponsible raids upon our economy. Let us look at what is happening to the small people, to the family which is part of the union system. I have seen what happens. An irresponsible strike may last for weeks. The official who guides the strike can be seen to be living on the cream of the economy. He is fully paid.

Senator Mcintosh:

– Come on. Where are your facts and figures?

Senator KILGARIFF:

– He is fully paid, Senator, and I suggest that while the strike continues he receives extra privileges too. But what about the small man who gets no pay whatsoever and week by week has few rations coming into his home? What must he do? He has no money and must obtain finance from some source. These families have very little to live on. Recently I have seen unionists, in an attempt to keep money flowing to their families, obliged to draw on their holiday pay- to bring into the house a few scant dollars so that food can be bought for the children. Then, the strike having continued, the time arrives when no further money will come in unless he finds a part-time job. But what happens then? The strike eventually comes to a shaky conclusion and everyone returns to work. The union member, having lost four or six weeks work, is probably a thousand dollars down the drain. But all that this battle, this foray, this raid upon the economic situation has brought him is $2, $3, $4 or $5 a week extra. He has suffered a loss from which he will never recover. All must agree surely that this is irresponsible unionism.

Yet there is, naturally, a part for unionism to play. The unionist is a part of the country. I repeat that I agree with unionism. There is a part for it in the development of the country. Naturally, without our unions there can be no development. The Arbitration Commission system was developed so that the employer and employee could come together, but now one learns that that system is to be tossed into the gutter because the militant unions want more than the Commission is prepared to recommend as representing the preservation of a fine balance in the development of a fine country such as Australia is today. Australia is a fine country. If one travels round the world one will see that, despite the problems we have today, we are the envy of most countries of the world. We have the resources and the standard of living. We have everything that should make Australia a fine producing country. But, of course, we are having troubles. Senator Gietzelt also had, one could only say, a peculiar bee in the bonnet about big business, as he calls it, and corporations. He reads the daily newspapers and sees with horror the profits that are being announced annually by private enterprise within Australia. He does not look at those areas where business is in the red.

Senator Hamer:

– He confuses profits and profitability.

Senator KILGARIFF:

– That is quite true. Perhaps he would not want to look at the position in South Australia as the metal industry is really the only industry keeping South Australia going. Yet we have the preposterous situation of left wing unions wishing to destroy that industry.

Senator Mcintosh:

– You don’t know what you are talking about. You just yack on.

Senator KILGARIFF:

– The honourable senator has let this get under his skin. We had the situation only this week of the militant unions seeking an extra $40 a week. I presume that if they receive this $40 a week this would bring the car industry of South Australia to a standstill. It would founder and disappear. One can believe this. (Quorum formed). As I was about to say, when one looks at the balance sheets of the car industry in South Australia, one can see that it is teetering on the precipice and it will not take too much to push it over. That will be the end of industry in South Australia and so there will be mass unemployment. As I have said before, I wonder why this action has been taken. All I can assume is that militant unionism in Australia wishes to destroy the economy of Australia. The point to take into consideration is why the South Australian Government has said that it will agree to go along with the rises that are being sought. It means, of course, that that Government also will have to shoulder the blame when this industry goes under.

I have spoken before about Senator Gietzelt saying that there is growing unemployment, that consumerism is down and that it is a bit like Hanrahan in that, regardless of what happened, the world was lost. I do not know if he has ever read it, but that reminds me of a passage from The Boree Log, namely, ‘We will all be lost’, said Hanrahan, ‘before the year is out’. No matter what happened, it was the end. I will briefly refer to the speech of the Prime Minister (Mr Malcolm Fraser). In doing so, I think that Australia is fortunate in having such a leader and such a deputy leader. They have courage and they are the guiding force that is putting Australia back on the tracks, yet it seems to be fashionable for mudslinging to occur. I suppose that is because their opponents fear them and fear the success that they are making of bringing Australia out of the morass, the bog and the mud in which the Labor Government delivered it a few years ago. In his speech, the Prime Minister said:

The strategy that we followed has already been vindicated. In the year to June 1979, compared with the figure a year ago, civilian employment is up by more than 64,000, and it is worth noting that the number of full time unemployed is 18,000 fewer than it was a year ago. How many people out in the countryside are aware of that?

One would wonder because so much mud is thrown around to disguise the true situation. The Prime Minister went on to say:

So often, people have reported that unemployment is rising and continues to rise; but, on the figures issued by the Bureau of Statistics, unemployment is 18,000 fewer than it was a year ago. Unemployment has been reduced from 6.2 percent to 5.8 percent.

The Prime Minister went on to say that profitability is up, but it can be improved even more. He continued:

Inflation is down substantially from the 17 per cent of Labor’s years to around 9 per cent. This figure is higher than we would like and higher than we believed at this time last year it would be; but we all know what has happened since … On an annualised basis, inflation in the United States is now running at around 14 per cent. On the latest figures, inflation in the United Kingdom is around 22 per cent.

When one looks at the position in those two nations, which unfortunately are running at such a high inflation rate, one notices that their trade is sluggish and the whole state of output is on the decline. Of course, the situation in Australia is now changing. Markets are picking up. It has been clearly indicated in the last few weeks that consumer buying is picking up, which I think is very good. One would expect it but, at the same time, one would also expect that the people of Australia would be fearful of the militant unions and the strikes that surround them day by day. Obviously they can see that there is a future and that militant unionism can be defeated not only by the framework of government but also by the employees and the employers in the Australian community playing their part. Comment has been made on two matters which arose from the Budget, namely, taxation and the surcharge that has been lifted. Once again I must refer to Senator Gietzelt, who keeps on talking about higher taxes. Of course, the inference is that the rate of taxation is going up. There is no such thing as an increase in the taxation rate. When one looks at what has been done in the Budget, one can see that the taxation rate has come down. The only way a person can pay more tax is by earning more.

Senator Primmer:

– By buying petrol.

Senator KILGARIFF:

– This is a natural sequence for a country that is developing and which has an increasing standard of living, because of higher wages. Naturally he will pay a little more.

Senator Young:

– The honourable senator who interjected may have to sell his Mercedes-Benz and buy a smaller car.

Senator KILGARIFF:

– Shame on you, Senator, having a Mercedes-Benz and coming from the Labor side of the chamber.

Senator Primmer:

– You wish you had a Mercedes. You are only jealous.

Senator KILGARIFF:

– I drive a Honda, and I am proud to say it. We had the situation where Mr Risstrom hit the headlines. He reminded me of a ballet dancer who wanted to get all the acclaim of the country, but I am afraid that the proposition he has put forward has not been thought through. I think he shot from the hip because when one examines the situation it is quite obvious that the total additional cost of Mr Risstrom ‘s proposals is in the order of $900m. Let us not belittle the situation as far as unemployment is concerned. I believe that the development that will take place because of the 1979-80 Budget- the action and moves that are being taken within the Budget to encourage young people, apprentices and new work projects- will bring about a situation where unemployment will decrease. I say once again that the Government has produced a framework for the Budget that can put Australia back on the rails but it is up to the unions, employers and employees to play their part. They would be fools not to because what has been offered to them by the Fraser Government is something that will bring prosperity to Australia in the future.

Senator EVANS:
Victoria

-While speaking to the Budget Papers I want to treat with the ignore they deserve the numerous banal provocations of Senator Kilgariff and rather make what I hope will be a constructive contribution on the subject of tax avoidance- the scale of which is revealed in the Budget Papers- and measures which should be taken to overcome it. In doing so I will tread on both familiar ground and also on what has been hitherto more or less hallowed ground. The familiar ground is that the tax avoidance industry, despite the various steps which have been taken in recent months to curb it, is still operating on a monstrous and intolerable scale. Further steps must be taken to outlaw it in the interests of the nation as a whole. The hallowed ground on which I will tread is to suggest that one of the most important remedies which should be taken in respect of tax avoidance is to outlaw the most blatant avoidance schemes by retrospective legislation. That should be done not just by limited retrospective legislation back to the date of the discovery and an announcement of particular schemes, as the Government is now employing, but rather retrospectivity all the way back to the date of the first known commencement of the schemes in question.

In arguing for this remedy I acknowledge that I am taking the argument not only further than it has been taken by the Government and Government members- although I note an honourable exception in this respect in the notable speech of Senator Hamer in this chamber on 22 November last year- but also I am taking it further than hitherto it has been taken by my own Party. On several occasions- most notably in the debate on the Income Tax Assessment Amendment Act in May last year- the Opposition has argued for the extension of retrospective legislation back to the commencement of the fiscal year in which the particular scheme was discovered and remedial legislation announced. It is also the case that the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Hayden, in his speech on 28 August last said that he gave fair warning on behalf of the Labor Party that the next Labor Government would wipe out the tax avoidance industry ‘in all cases retrospectively’. But, whilst he employed language wide enough to encompass full retrospectivity of the kind to which I am referring, it is certainly the case that he was not completely explicit on that point. I want to be explicit; I want to take back the argument that further distance and to put the case that at least in certain areas of tax avoidance, which I will seek to define with some precision, fully retrospective legislation is both necessary in practice and justified in principle.

An understanding of the problem involves an appreciation of the scope of tax avoidance in this country. By any estimate, the scope or scale of tax avoidance is now huge. Just how huge it is depends rather on how one defines the problem. If one collapses together the already fairly tenuous distinction between avoidance and evasion and regard as being satisfied by the description of avoidance all those kinds of schemes of a paper variety involving offsetting losses against other sources of income, if one takes into account income splitting devices of various kinds and if one takes into account not only those things but straightforward dishonest evasion schemes involving the non-disclosure of income thentaking into account the whole box and dice- the estimate that has been made, I think credibly, of the scale of evasion and avoidance in this country is something over $3.000m per annum. If one takes a narrower definition of avoidanceone which excludes straight out obvious evasion in the form of non-disclosure or other manifestly and obviously unlawful activities but includes all the rest, not only the paper schemes but also the various income splitting arrangements- it is more difficult to get anyone to give a remotely plausible figure. Certainly there has been no assistance from the Treasury in discerning a figure, but the kind of suggestion that I think credible is that avoidance of this kind is of the order of $ 1 ,000m plus per annum.

However, the narrowest definition of avoidance and the one on which I propose to concentrate specifically tonight, is one which omits reference altogether to those kinds of avoidance arrangements which involve income splitting schemes or other ways of ordering one’s affairs which might conceivably have some commercial justification, and concentrates rather on the socalled paper schemes, the essential characteristics of which I will describe. They are highly artificial arrangements which are unambiguously inspired by avoidance motives which have no legitimate commercial functions in whatever context they might be employed other than tax avoidance. Very often they involve arrangements which have no connection at all- or only the vaguest connection- with the form of business or profession normally carried on by the taxpayer. They are usually hawked in secrecy by promoters operating on a commission basis, collecting a commission of the order of 15c for every tax dollar saved. They are the kinds of schemes that the present Treasurer (Mr Howard) has been claiming to be cracking down on in his highly publicised series of announcements, enactments and proposed enactments over the last 1 8 months.

The kind of schemes that I am referring to in this narrowest definition of avoidance is best typified by the notorious Curran scheme which, in its original form as upheld by the High Court of Australia, involved the conversion by a stockbroker of a $2,000 money profit into a $ 1 80,000 paper loss. It is not my present purpose to discuss any of these particular schemes in detail or even to try to list those which have already been identified. Their general characteristics are well known and about a dozen of them so far have been subjected to remedial legislation which either has been enacted or introduced over the last 18 months. I refer to the Income Tax Assessment Amendment Acts (No. 1), (No. 2) and (No. 5) 1978 and the Income Tax Assessment Amendment Bill (No. 4) 1979 which is presently before this Parliament.

Despite this remedial legislation, the loss to revenue from these paper schemes has been and continues to be huge. I suggest to the chamber that one of the main reasons for the huge size of that loss, which I will endeavour to quantify in a moment, is the half-hearted way in which the Government has been going about its remedial legislation. In particular, I refer to the way in which in all cases legislation has been made retrospective no further back than the date of the Treasurer’s first announcement of the existence of the scheme and his intention to legislate against it. As a result of that half-heartedness, the cost to the revenue and to this nation has been very great indeed.

How can we estimate just what that cost has been? In relation to these paper schemes, unlike tax avoidance generally on which there have been no figures coming forth from the Treasury or the Taxation Office, we have now been given in the recent Budget Papers at least some figures from which we can begin to put together an estimate of the revenue losses involved. The presentation of these figures in Budget Statement No. 4 is, to say the least, confusing. Indeed sometimes it seems almost wilfully so. But it does appear that one can pull out the relevant figures and appreciate that the loss to the revenue in recent financial years, in the Government’s own estimate, is of the order of $3 88m in the period up to the beginning of the present financial year, with a further $250m being the estimated loss for the current financial year. The precise figures on tax avoidance are $158m for the period up to 30 June 1978, $230m for the 1978-79 financial year- that represents an upgrading of the original Budget estimate of $50m by another $ 1 80m to reach that total figure- together with a projection for the current financial year of $250m.

Senator McAuliffe:

– That is the first time the Government has done this in the Budget.

Senator EVANS:

-That is right. Although the Budget Papers do not put it in so many words, it seems clear that these figures represent in reality not just tax which is in dispute, not just ‘outstanding tax’ which might conceivably be recovered for which a separate figure of some $433m is stated in the present Budget Papers; but rather it represents permanent, irrecoverable losses. There is some overlap between the figure of $433m and the global figure of $638m which I have mentioned as being the amount of those losses. But it is acknowledged by the Treasurer that the tax which is presently being sought under the legislation as it stood before this Government’s remedial amendments to it is unlikely, in fact, ever to be recovered.

Thus the situation is that the overwhelming bulk of that $638m the Government specifically refers to has been lost, and lost permanently, to the revenue and the nation. Those permanent losses are squarely attributable to the failure of the present Government to legislate fully retrospectively to cover those schemes during the period of their operation, prior to the application of the specific remedial legislation which the Government has now enacted. The reality, of course, as we all know in relation to the operation of these schemes, is that secrecy of a kind operates which means that the schemes just do not get discovered until at least well into the second year of their operation. Thus, one has a situation in which, unless legislation is fully retrospective, going right back to the date of commencement of the scheme, the tax promoters and, in particular the taxpayers get off scot-free. At present the stable door is being locked but it is only after the horse has been bolting for at least a year in each case.

The result is that on the Government’s own estimate sums of the order of magnitude of $638m over the whole of the period prior to this year, and $480m over the last two years are being lost by specific paper schemes.

However, the position is worse than that. There is reason to believe that the figures that I have mentioned are almost certainly understated and that the amount of irrecoverable loss to the Treasury is, in fact, substantially higher. One just cannot assume, in relation to the period prior to the current financial year, that all the avoidance schemes then in operation have been detected. There has already been a substantial upward revision of the estimated loss for the 1978-79 period from $50m to $230m. It may well be that that loss will be further increased after further facts and information come to light. However, there is no basis for the estimated loss of $250m for the current financial year, other than the guesstimate of the Treasurer. So much is overtly acknowledged in the Budget Papers. Presumably it is an educated guess based on past experience but it is no better than a guess. But there is a reason to assume that this estimate of $250m for the current financial year is, in fact, quite substantially understated. The particular considerations that I draw to the attention of the Senate in justification for that assertion are these: In the first place, this Government was anxious in the run-up to the Budget to create a picture of a very low Budget deficit. The reality is that such a deficit will be achieved only if there is a minimisation of any loss to the revenue which could increase the size of that deficit. The higher the acknowledged avoidance figure for the present financial year, the bigger the deficit figure which would have clearly emerged from the Budget arithmetic. That is a reason for supposing that a very conservative view has been taken of the likely loss through tax avoidance schemes this year. It is also the case, I think one can assume, that the Treasurer is anxious to claim that his anti-avoidance measures over the last 18 months have been attended with a degree of success, that his measures are biting and that the Government is succeeding in its supposed crackdown on tax avoiders.

It would be an awful confession of defeat were the Treasurer to come up with a massive figure of the order of $500m plus for the estimated loss to revenue through these schemes this year. I suggest that they are both excellent reasons why the true figure, in fact, is likely to be much higher this financial year than the $250m which has been stated. Indeed, I go so far as to suggest that the true figure is likely to be of the order of $500m a year. And taking into account the accumulated loss over the last run of years in which these tax avoidance schemes have been a problem, the true figure is not likely to be of the order of $638m, as has been stated in the Budget Papers, but rather closer to $ 1 ,000m.

I think one should appreciate just what that means in real terms. Let us assume that there is a loss in tax revenue, whether accumulated over previous years or in this financial year alone, of the order of $500m. This means that if action is not taken effectively to recover it, the Government would be unable to spend that money. For example, $500m would buy tax cuts for everyone on average weekly earnings of four per cent or $2 a week. That $500m would buy an increase of eight per cent to all pensioners- $4.60 a week for single pensioners and $7.70 for married couples. I am suggesting that the $500m lost through, the present acceptance of the operation in their first year of these tax avoidance schemes could generate in the building and construction industry and in support industries something like 40,000 new jobs.

But this Government seems not anxious to take action to recover the losses- the fantastically large losses- which are attributable to this kind of avoidance. The reason cannot be the practical difficulty. It cannot be the technical legal difficulties standing in the Government’s way. A number of remedies are open to the Government of the technically easily accessible kind. One of them is to rewrite section 260 of the tax Act- the notorious section 260- in such a way as to overcome the emasculation of that section which has been accomplished by the High Court and to make it a genuine annihilating provision of the kind it was originally intended to be. However, I do acknowledge that getting section 260 right is likely to be a fairly time-consuming business, given the present incumbents of the High Court and the tentativeness the Government is showing in this area. It may be that, practically speaking, it is not as readily efficient a recovery mechanism as another obviously available one. That obviously available one is the very mechanism I am suggesting tonight, that is, full retrospectivity. There is nothing easier than to accomplish full retrospectivity from a technical, drafting and legislative point of view. All we have to do when drafting and enacting the kind of legislation that Mr Howard has been putting up over the last 18 months is to write into the date of operation clause an earlier date than the figures presently appearing there.

The reason cannot be practical; it must have something to do with principle. That, of course, is the basis on which the Government has been refusing to extend the legislation in the way I am suggesting. The nub of the argument against full retrospectivity is the objections in principle. What are those objections? What is their force? I believe that the force of the arguments against retrospectivity has been much overstated and that there are good answers to all of them. Moreover, there are answers which have been accepted in other countries within our own legal tradition, most notably the United Kingdom where there are ample precedents, including very recent precedents, for this kind of legislation. The objections can be and are stated in a number of different ways, but really they boil down to objections of two distinct types. First of all, there is the argument that it is unjust, it is immoral, to make unlawful what, at the time the person did it, was quite lawful, albeit only technically. The second argument is based not so much on considerations of immorality or injustice but rather on inconvenience, the uncertainty argument; the argument that it would create intolerable uncertainty and confusion in the business community if people were unable to order their commercial and financial affairs in a way that would be the case if the ground rules could be changed after the event.

What is the force of those arguments? Let me begin with the question of injustice or immorality. The proponents of this principle, this argument, point to the presumption against retrospectivity which has been long embedded in Anglo- Australian law and has been the subject of innumerable judicial and other statements explaining and justifying it, the essence of which is to the effect that the legislature does not intend that which is unjust. Perhaps the best known statement of it is that of Chief Justice Sir Owen Dixon in the case of Maxwell v. Murphy in the High Court in 1957. There are a number of points which can be made about this so-called presumption, this so-called principle, and let me state as succinctly as I can the four main points. The first is that the presumption as a matter of law is not absolute. The courts do acknowledge that it is always open to the legislature to make retrospective any law it wants to, provided it does so in clear terms and, moreover, that the legislature may be perfectly justified in principle in so doing. That point was made clearly by Mr Justice Isaacs, as he then was, in the case of George Hudson Ltd v. The Australian Timber Workers Union in the High Court in 1923, when he said this:

But its application -

That is the application of the presumption against retrospectivity- is not sure unless the whole circumstances are considered, that is to say, the whole of the circumstances which the Legislature may be assumed to have had before it. What may seem unjust when regarded from the standpoint of one person affected may be absolutely just when a broad view is taken of all who are affected. There is no remedial Act which does not affect some vested right, but, when contemplated in its total effect, justice may be overwhelmingly on the other side.

That was not a tax case, but the point has been powerfully made in a leading tax case, and I refer in particular to the English Court of Appeal decision in 1 942 in the case of Lord Howard de Walden v. Inland Revenue Commissioners, when the Master of the Rolls, Lord Greene, said on behalf of the court in relation to a particular and fully retrospective provision in the English Finance Act:

The fact that the section has to some extent a retroactive effect appears to us of no importance when it is realised that the legislation is a move in a long and fiercely contested battle with individuals who well understand the rigour of the contest.

The second point I want to make is that the principle against retrospectivity, in the terms in which it is usually stated, is not strictly applicable to the general taxation area anyway. A revenue law stating what income is and is not assessable does not, after all, make certain activity unlawful or illegal. All it does is attach certain financial consequences to the pursuit of that activity. Revenue laws have a quite different operation and purpose from criminal or penal laws. Their aim is to raise revenue rather than to punish anti-social conduct. I am not talking, might I add, about penalty provisions in anything I say about fully retrospective law. I do not argue for the appropriateness of criminal or penalty provisions in relation to fully retrospective remedial legislation. I do not think it is appropriate that people should be subject to criminal sanctions. However, I do think it is appropriate for them to pay the tax they would otherwise have paid had they not been able to take advantage of the avoidance scheme. In making this point, may I note in passing that this distinction between taxation and criminal laws generally is one that has appealed very much to the United States Supreme Court, where retroactive taxation laws in fact have been upheld on a number of occasions as not unconstitutional or not otherwise bad in principle.

It must be acknowledged, however, that there is some manifest disadvantage attached to the operation of retrospective taxation remedial legislation, a disadvantage which perhaps is felt even more acutely by the taxpayer since he lacks any opportunity, as a result of the retrospective application of the law, to re-order his affairs in some way that may be more to his own firm’s advantage, albeit this time more legally. So one has to go on to produce further justifications, persuasive justifications, for the operation of retrospective legislation.

The third point I make then is that there is a set of obviously persuasive reasons for justifying the disadvantage so caused in the case of the particular kinds of schemes to which I have been referring. The arguments flow from the very nature of the schemes the subject of this discussion, and I simply reincorporate here the list of characteristics of the paper schemes that I referred to earlier in this speech. I referred to the schemes in question as being highly artificial arrangements, unambiguously inspired by avoidance motives, having no other conceivably legitimate commercial function than tax avoidance, and so on.

The other point that needs to be made in this context is that we should appreciate just how grossly inequitable these schemes are to other members of the community, other wage and salary earners who have to pay their taxes, who cannot afford, even if they are motivated to do so, the kinds of fees charged by promoters, who do not have the kind of income or asset base which enables them to take advantage of these schemes. There are figures I could read into the record had I time which indicate just how there has been a steady erosion of the position of payasyouearn taxpayers as against non-PAYE taxpayers over the last few years, as a result, one can only assume, of the increasing burden they have had to bear because of the shirking of that burden by the non-PAYE taxpayers, the kinds of people who are taking advantage of the schemes.

The essential injustice of allowing these schemes to stay on foot even for a limited time has been squarely acknowledged in the United Kingdom. I refer in this respect to the Budget Speech made by the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr Healey, on 1 1 April 1 978 in which he announced the implementation of fully retrospective avoidance legislation- it covered a two-year period- specifically aimed at particular unattractive schemes which he there described. That legislation was the subject of some small controversy in the United Kingdom but has been passed. It is only the latest in a long line of similar fully retrospective avoidance remedial legislation which has been passed in that country over the years.

The fourth point I make in respect of the socalled injustice of these schemes is that Parliament, under the proposal I am making, has full opportunity to debate the pros and cons of particular proposed retrospective remedial laws. It is not a matter of giving the Commissioner of Taxation or anybody else an open mandate to wander at large striking down anything that strikes his fancy; it is a matter of the Parliament itself carefully scrutinising particular schemes and the legislation proposed for their remedying to satisfy itself that they are as iniquitous as I have been suggesting, that in a particular case all the characteristics that I have referred to- the absence of any other legitimate or potentially legitimate function, the unambiguously avoidance motivated character of them and so on- are in fact satisfied. That is essentially the answer, I think, to those who worry about the notion of tax avoidance legislation of this kind being the thin edge of the wedge and an open ended stimulus for the implementation of all sorts of other intolerable retrospective legislation in other contexts, however justifiable it may be in this context. That argument does not wash when one considers the way in which the Parliament would have an opportunity fully to debate each such measure.

On the subject of uncertainty I can be, as indeed I have to be, much briefer. The argument speaks for itself but it is an argument which is mis-stated in this context. Of course it will create uncertainty to have the possibility of these schemes being struck down after the event. That, after all, is the very objective- to operate as a deterrent to the future marketing of these schemes and not just a way of collecting lost revenue in the past. The question has to be whether in all the circumstances of the particular case the creation of that kind of certainty is in fact justified. The argument as to whether it is justified is essentially then the same kind of argument as I have just been putting based upon the essential nature of these schemes. The starting point in this kind of argument is the proposition that uncertainty in law is not itself an unmitigated evil. It can on occasions serve a noble purpose. Its role in the front line in the war against tax avoidance schemes is such an eminently noble purpose and one which justifies the operation of fully retrospective tax avoidance laws.

Senator TEAGUE:
South Australia

-The Senate is debating the Budget. I want to concentrate my remarks tonight on the way in which the people of South Australia have perceived the Federal Budget and also, to some extent, on the way in which in the current State election campaign the Labor Government has abused its responsibilities by trying to pass the buck to the Federal Budget for its deficiencies in government. That has been very much to its discredit and is dishonest.

In speaking this year to the Budget, which is a good and responsible Budget, I am reminded of my comments in the Senate a year ago when I also spoke about my State of South Australia. Exactly 12 months ago- I believe these words are still very accurate for today- I said:

South Australia is on edge at the moment. The future is uncertain. I find that, despite my natural sense of optimism, I have become increasingly angy that the foundations of our State’s prosperity are in danger.

The remedy I put forward then is the remedy that I put forward now. I continued:

First and foremost, the State Labor Government in South Australia needs to be thrown out of office. Industry is turned off by the high-cost strategy of the socialist program.

Some statistics published recently by the Australian Bureau of Statistics illustrate the point that I make. First of all, the retail industry- this is a current issue in South Australia- has become so alarmed at the declining retail sales that it has gone to great lengths to urge its own employees, indeed the whole State, to back the Liberal Opposition to become the government on Saturday. Retail sales in South Australia have dropped to an annual growth of 6.5 per cent, whereas in other mainland States they are at an average of about double that. South Australia’s share of the new motor vehicle registrations has dropped to only 8. 1 1 per cent of the total Australian registrations. This can be compared with New South Wales, which has 36 per cent, and Queensland, which has 1 5 per cent.

Another statistic is the fall in employment in South Australia. Since the 1977 State election employment in the private sector in South Australia has fallen by 5,800 people; it is the only mainland State to have had such a fall. In other States there has been an increase. In New South Wales there has been an increase of 27,000-odd. Another statistic that points to the distress and dilemma of South Australia is employment directly in manufacturing industry. In South Australia it has dropped by 17 per cent over the last five years, compared with drops in other States of a much smaller magnitude. In building industry over the last four years South Australia’s share of new dwelling commencements has dropped to a shocking 6.2 per cent, whereas new dwelling commencements have been as high as 33 per cent in New South Wales, 1 1.9 per cent in Western Australia, 2 1.6 per cent in Queensland and 22 per cent in Victoria. What is happening to South Australia? Why is South Australia coming last in all the interstate comparisons?

Perhaps the most distressing statistics are those related to industrial investment in Australia. For the coming two years only 1.5 per cent of all the investments that are being clearly foreseen throughout Australia will go ahead in South Australia yet South Australia is the State abundantly rich in natural gas, uranium, copper, iron and of every other kind of natural resource. What is going wrong with South Australia? My concern and anger, as was the case last year when I was first elected to the Senate, are about the marvellous potential of my home State being wasted and underdeveloped and the State becoming the poor State of Australia.

When the Federal Budget was brought down one would have thought that it would have been entirely a matter for debate and discussion by the people of Australia through their representatives in the lower House and in the Senate. But in South Australia we found the Labor Premier, to build a smokescreen for him to try to pass the buck for these disasters in South Australia, calling an immediate election the very day after the Federal Budget was brought down. For months he had been banking upon an unpopular Budget, a Budget which he thought he could capitalise on, being brought down to enable him to win by using a smokescreen, by default, by passing the buck, sufficient election victory to give the Labor Government another three years in office.

This ploy, this tactic by Labor in South Australia has fallen entirely flat because, as the people of South Australia have recognisedindeed, I believe as all the people of Australia have come to recognise- the Budget is good and responsible. The people of Australia have welcomed the announcement of the ending of the income tax surcharge from 1 December. They have welcomed the return of twice-yearly indexation of pensions and benefits, the wider eligibility for pensioner health benefit cards and, for small businesses, a very considerable expansion of the retention allowance- a rise from 60 per cent to 70 per cent. Additional help has been provided for the tourist industry. The Budget contains direct measures to encourage energy conservation. It has provided increased funds for defence, $2 15m in export incentives and $32m for industrial research.

Whilst the Budget contains those positive initiatives to stimulate Australia, to bring equity to the social security area and to lower taxation in Australia from 1 December, the dimensions of the Budget are entirely responsible. The deficit has been brought down to only a little over $2 billion, a reduction of $ 1,285m on last year’s figure. In other terms, it is a reduction from 3.4 per cent of gross domestic product to only 1.9 per cent of gross domestic product. So the Government’s strategy to decrease the rate of inflation is still a paramount thrust in its overall economic strategy. It is a good Budget, a responsible Budget, and its main features, which I have summarised, have led the South Australian people to support it. As a consequence, the very illconceived tactics of the Labor machine in South Australia to force a State election on the issue of the Budget is falling flat.

I mention also, in terms of the Budget being responsible, that Budget outlays for government expenditure in the period of the Fraser Government have been increased, on average, by one per cent per year, whereas in the Whitlam years Budget outlays for government expenditure increased by 10 10 1/2 per cent, which represents an enormous growth in big government and government expenditure. In the three years leading up to the period of the Whitlam Government, Budget outlays for government expenditure increased at a normal rate of 4% per cent. Our outlays in the past three years increased by an average of only one per cent per annum because of the degree of responsibility which the Fraser Government has taken on to win back the wild seeds of disorder which were sown during the period of the Commonwealth Labor Government. Madam Acting Deputy President, recently I asked the Leader of the Government in the Senate (Senator Carrick) a question concerning the overall management by the Fraser Government of inflation, interest rates and fuel prices.

Senator Carrick replied to my question in the Senate on 29 August. I seek leave to have a copy of my question and Senator Carrick ‘s answer incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The document read as follows-

INFLATION

Senator TEAGUE:

– My question, which is directed to the Leader of the Government in the Senate, concerns the references made in the Senate during Question Time yesterday to the present Gorvernmen’s achievements in the areas of keeping down inflation, keeping down interest rates and, despite world oil costs, keeping down fuel prices in Australia. How does Australia ‘s inflation rate compare with the inflation rates in other countries? How do Australia’s interest rates compare with interest rates overseas? How do Australia’s petrol prices compare with petrol prices overseas?

Senator CARRICK:
LP

– Yesterday I was able to indicate to the Senate the extraordinarily good record of the Fraser Government in terms of inflation rates.

Senator Gietzelt:

– You are the only one who believes that.

Senator CARRICK:

– The fact is that the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development believes it even if Senator Gietzelt does not want to believe the OECD. The OECD figures for the six months to June 1979 give an average inflation rate for all the member countries of 11.8 per cent. In the United States of America, the inflation rate was 14 per cent, for France it was 1 1.3 per cent, for the United Kingdom it was 1S.7 per cent, for Canada it was I0.S per cent, for Italy it was 1 5.8 per cent, for New Zealand it was 1 4.3 per cent and for Australia it was 9 per cent. Australia ‘s efforts were exceeded only by two countries, namely, Germany and Japan.

Internationally, at the end of July interest rates in various countries were as follows: The United States 10 per cent, Japan S.2S per cent, Germany 5 per cent, the United Kingdom 14 percent, Canada 1 1.75 percent and Australia 9 per cent. Again, with the exceptions of Japan and Germany, Australia has the best performance of the Western countries. The third part of Senator Teague ‘s question dealt with fuel rates. It would be fair to say that most Australians pay for motor spirit about half the price which prevails in European countries and Japan. For example, in Australian cents per litre, the price in Japan is 48.9, in the United Kingdom it is 46.9, in West Germany it is 41.7, in France it is 49.8 and in Italy it is 5 1 .6. It can be seen that we pay about half that. The price would be very much lower still if the Whitlam-Hayden government had done its job in the past.

Senator TEAGUE:

– I thank the Senate. To draw out a couple of points made by the Leader of the Government, I point out that he indicated that for the six months to June 1 979 the average inflation rate for the member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development was 1 1.8 per cent. In Australia it was only 9 per cent. Interest rates in the OECD countries were, in some instances, 10 per cent, 1 1.75 per cent, 14 per cent and so on. In Australia interest rates for that period were 9 per cent. Throughout Europe and in Japan the price of a litre of petrol was well above 40c. In Australia the price is only half that amount. With those kinds of achievements, I believe that we have a good management team in the Fraser Government.

With that responsible record of the Federal Government and with the very attractive response by the people of South Australia to the Federal Budget, the tactic of the Labor machine to call an election in South Australia has fallen flat. It has fallen flat doubly because the South Australian Liberal Party, right from the beginning of the election campaign, has concentrated all its thrust entirely on State issues. In my experience of politics in South Australia, I have not seen a clearer contrast between the program and policies put forward by one party and those put forward by the other party. The initiative has been entirely with the Liberal team in South Australia. Its policies properly have been to cut away from the smoke screen which Labor created concerning the Federal Budget and to concentrate entirely on State issues. As Mr Tonkin has outlined, the Liberal Party in government will cut State taxes. It will abolish succession and gift duties, abolish land tax on the principal place of residence, exempt from stamp duty the first $30,000 involved in the purchase of a first home and it will make major cuts to payroll tax to boost business and to create new jobs for our young people. Those policies have not been matched- rather, they have been repudiated- by the present State Labor Government. The Liberal Party in government will cut down bureaucracy, cut down on government, stimulate business by lowering taxes, stimulate activities by home builders by lowering taxes and stimulate activities of all property owners by lowering succession duties and death duties. 1 believe that the people of South Australia are seeing the strength of the Liberal policies. Similarly, the Liberals have stressed their policy of eliminating waste in South Australia. Wastage on Monarto, that white elephant beyond the hills in South Australia, will be terminated. The South Australian Land Commission, which is losing money at the rate of $9,000 a day -

Senator Messner:
Senator TEAGUE:

– Yes, it is losing $9,000 a day. The taxpayers’ money is being lost. Monarto is losing $5,000 a day in interest payments.

Senator Messner:
Senator TEAGUE:

-Yes, it is losing $5,000 a day. Those commitments have led to the creation of a long term debt in capital and interest of $200 m in South Australia.

Senator Messner:
Senator TEAGUE:

– Yes, it has a long term debt of $200m. When we consider those wasteful schemes of the State Labor Government, whose period in office will end on Saturday, the runaway growth of the Public Service, the $14m-odd which it has been acknowledged has been wasted in hospital administration, and other Labor schemes, we realise that it is high time that the Liberal policies of eliminating waste and of cutting back on government spending and government programs were put into operation.

Senator Messner:

- Senator, how many statutory authorities has the State Government?

Senator TEAGUE:

– There are hundreds of statutory authorities and all of them consume taxpayers’ money. All of them consume funds which should not be taken from taxpayers but which should be left in their pockets and so lead to higher consumer spending and the creation of more jobs. There is another area of enormous contrast between the Liberal program and the totally indolent, ideologically blinding approach adopted by the Labor Government, that is, the area of the activities of the processing industries and the mining industries in exploiting our natural resources in South Australia. Roxby Downs has been described as potentially the biggest mine in the world, not just in Australia. The Liberal Party in office will encourage the full-scale development of the copper and uranium deposits at Roxby Downs. The Labor Party has not mentioned Roxby Downs. It is not going to develop Roxby Downs in the immediate future. The jobs that would be generated by this development are an important part of the boost needed to overcome our massive unemployment problem in South Australia. A South Australian Liberal government would approve the processing of uranium and continue to promote the establishment of an enrichment plant to process uranium oxide from mines not only in South Australia but also in all States. I come to the petrochemical plant at Redcliff to use the Cooper Basin liquids. I am reminded that at the height of the election campaigns in 1973, 1975 and 1977 Labor promised that Redcliff would be built. Enormous popular interest was generated and, I believe, votes won on the basis of this dream. Nothing has happened. Redcliff was promised in 1 973 but it did not eventuate. It was promised in 1 975 and it did not eventuate.

Senator Messner:

– Will the people believe them?

Senator TEAGUE:

– I do not believe that the people will believe Labor. Its credibility is shot through. The Liberal program is to give a fullsteamahead approach to the Cooper Basin. Where does the credibility of the Liberal promise lie? It lies in the period in which the Cooper Basin was first developed, when enormous amounts of money were spent in the 1950s and l’960s before any cents were gained by any product being sold. That is 25 years ago and it was in that period, under a Liberal environment in South Australia, that the Cooper Basin foundations were laid. This is the kind of atmosphere for free enterprise, for getting ahead with the development of the Cooper Basin, that a Liberal government will restore. Our policies on taxation, on the elimination of waste and on the development of the State are only a few of the comparisons, but I believe that they are crucial ones which distinguish the indolent and ideologically bound Labor non-policy from the progressive developmental Liberal alternative.

What has been the response to this from the Labor Government? It has not responded with any positive debate. It has not said that it will be doing the same. It has tried to cover up the statistics I mentioned earlier with this great Federal scare, this great Federal non-event, whereby it has tried to pass the buck to the Federal Budget. I instance the main media campaign by Mr Corcoran. I quote from a newspaper advertisement which states:

The Fraser Government is the biggest tax collector in South Australia- not the State Government. The Fraser Liberal Government collects $7 out of every $8 you pay in tax.

Senator Messner:

– A dishonest statement.

Senator TEAGUE:

-I believe it is a lie. Nevertheless the advertisement was published throughout the media. Corcoran went on:

I need your support to tell Fraser to ease off.

What does he mean by that? Does he mean that Fraser should lower taxes and hence lower the amount of money that goes to South Australia? Does he mean that Fraser should raise taxes and so give more money to South Australia? Either way he is lost in inconsistencies and throughout the whole process he has persisted again in passing the buck to the Federal figures.

Senator Messner:

– Logically if he is asking Fraser to back off he is really saying, ‘Let me put taxes up’, to keep his programs up.

Senator TEAGUE:

-I believe that is the logical outcome of the Corcoran campaign, that he is proposing to raise State taxes. He has already done this. He has raised water rates. He has raised land tax. He has proposed to get a greater franchise from electricity. (Quorum formed). When the quorum was called there were only five Labor senators in the chamber and I am glad that it has swelled the number of honourable senators who will show an interest in the points. I believe that whenever the truth about the State election and the Liberal advantages strikes home to Labor senators opposite they want to stop the speech. We shall persist because on Saturday the Liberals have every opportunity to win government in South Australia. I was speaking about the continuing Labor tactic of building a smokescreen and of trying to pass the buck to win the election on the basis of the public response to the Federal Budget.

When the Treasurer, John Howard, visited South Australia he fully answered this point. He has shown that Mr Corcoran ‘s figures are inaccurate. He has shown that Mr Corcoran neglected to say that approximately 40 per cent of all Commonwealth personal income tax raised in Australia is returned to the States and that South Australia gets a greater per capita share than the bigger eastern States. Whilst this media campaign has been conducted in each electorate, in a number of electorates household newsletters have been published, one of which I have before me. It was delivered to my home in Norwood by the aspirant Labor member for Norwood who, I believe, will be defeated on Saturday by Frank Webster, the Liberal candidate. I seek leave for this letter to be incorporated in Hansard. I have the consent of Senator Button that the words of this letter may be incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The letter read as follows-

A MESSAGE FROM GREG CRAFTER

Dear Fellow Citizen,

The election on 15th September will give you a real chance to decide the future direction of the Government of this State.

I believe the present Government has shown its genuine concern for the future of young people, as well as for the elderly and all the more vulnerable members of our society, while demonstrating its ability to manage difficult economic and energy questions.

Present national economic policies have made it vital that South Australia retains a Government that has the desire and the ability to act in a fair way, and one that will act to offset the adverse effects of policies of the Fraser Government on South Australia.

The Fraser Liberal Government’s Budget inflicted on South Australians the following reductions

Pre-School and Child Care- Down 26.5 percent

Housing (including pensioner housing)- Down 45 per cent

Schools- Down 15.2 percent

Community Health Programmes- Down 68 per cent

School Dental Scheme- Down 62.4 percent

Universities- Down 47.2 percent

The Premier, Des Corcoran in the Labor policy speech delivered last Wednesday made a major commitment to create more jobs.

The State Liberals have indicated they will abolish the State Unemployment Relief scheme! This will add further to our list of the unemployed.

At the same time their Federal colleagues have cut funds for youth employment training programmes by $54.6 million- and as these funds diminish so too will the jobs open for the young.

A vote for the Corcoran Government on 15th September will add to this State’s bargaining power in vital forthcoming Federal/State talks about finance and taxes.

I look forward to your support, so that I may continue to serve you to the best of my abilities.

Yours sincerely, 242 The Parade, GREG CRAFTER, Norwood 5067 Member for Norwood. Telephone 3324949 (office) 3328558(home)

Authorised by C. Schacht, 242 The Parade, Norwood

Printed by Delmont Pty Ltd, 8 1 Stephen Tce., St. Peters

Senator TEAGUE:

– In this letter, copies of which were distributed in thousands by the Labor machine, the Labor team has stooped to a new low in its gross distortion of the recent Federal Budget. This letter dishonestly misrepresents the Federal Budget funding in South Australia for education, housing and health programs. It lists various headings such as pre-school and child care; housing, including pensioner housing; schools; community health programs; school dental schemes; and universities- the sorts of things that we in South Australia are concerned about. It lists a series of lies. It says that in these areas there have been cuts of such amounts as 68 per cent, 62 per cent and 47 per cent, incredible amounts which even a person with the smallest grasp of the Federal Budget would see right from the start as fraudulent. Yet copies of this letter have been distributed to thousands of South Australian homes. What is the accurate picture? I have looked carefully at the Budget Papers and the picture is nothing like that which has been described by this dishonest candidate in Norwood. I believe that he and those who distributed such figures should be tossed out of Parliament and the Liberals be -

Senator Messner:

– His leader is telling him to do it.

Senator TEAGUE:

– I know it is the leader, the Labor machine, but I believe that if these candidates put their signatures to such lies they should not be successful in the State election. One example is funds for pre-school and child care which this year are up by 9.2 per cent.

Senator Wriedt:

– I raise a point of order, Madam Acting Deputy President, and I ask for your ruling. Is it appropriate that reference should be made to somebody in another parliament lying? I ask for a withdrawal of that remark.

Senator Peter Baume:

– As I heard Senator Teague, Madam Acting Deputy President, he was saying that the document contained lies. The question is whether he was referring to the document or whether he was referring to a member of another parliament.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Coleman)- I understood that the honourable senator was referring to the document as containing lies; but I understood also that he referred to the candidate, who happens to be a member of parliament, which could raise some question. I think the honourable senator should contain himself a little.

Senator TEAGUE:

– I believe that they are dishonestly misleading and inaccurate statements. One example is in the area of pre-schools and child care. In the Budget, the figure in this area is up 9.2 per cent, but it was put out as being down 26.5 per cent. How did that discrepancy occur? It occurred because of the choice of only one minor line of the Budget- the figure in that one little area happened to be down 26.5 per cent- in order to put a gloss on the whole area. This has been repeated seven times in the letter. The letter claimed that in the area of schools there was a fall of 1 5.2 per cent. In fact funding is up 1 . 0 1 per cent. In the area of the school dental scheme, it is claimed that funding is down 62.4 per cent, but in fact it is up. For universities it is claimed that the figure is down 47.2 per cent. That is a totally misleading and inaccurate statement. In fact, it is down by only a few thousand dollars. The figure for the community health program in South Australia is not down 68 per cent; it is down 0.5 per cent.

Senator Wriedt:

– You cannot read. Why don’t you read page 1 84?

Senator TEAGUE:

-Senator Wriedt is interjecting, and I can only say that that is because the truth hurts the Labor Opposition. These inaccurate and deliberately dishonest statements about the Federal Budget have been spread around by Labor candidates in South Australia in an attempt to pass the buck and to draw attention away from State issues and on to the Federal arena. But this is not sticking. The people of South Australia have seen through this and have seen the initiative that the Liberal Party has taken in coming back squarely and fairly to State issues. I believe, as the polls published today and yesterday in the Advertiser have shown in respect of Morphett, Torrens, and indeed other seats, that the people of South Australia are getting behind the Liberal Government. I believe that in Norwood, in Morphett, in Mawson, in Newland and in Todd we will see a sweeping swing that will bring victory to the Liberal Party in South Australia. The Federal smear campaign of the Labor Party will totally backfire, as so many journalists are reporting this week. In speaking to the Federal Budget, I can say only that it is a sound Budget, and because it is sound it has caused the Labor tactic to totally misfire and led to a gigantic Liberal swing in the current campaign in South Australia.

Senator CAVANAGH:
South Australia

– The last thing that I enjoy doing is entering into the gutter of filth over the current State election. I am forced into this position by the lies and perfidy that we have heard over a period. The incorporation in Hansard today of a question which was asked on Wednesday of the week before the Parliament rose and which is the same as the question that the honourable senator from South Australia asked this week- this is done for the purpose of emphasising a comparison with other countries- shows how low statesmen will go for the purposes of political achievement, under the guise of considering the welfare of the State. From the honourable senator who spoke before me, Senator Teague, came accusations and lies about members of the South Australian Parliament. But what he said about the member for Norwood was not as bad as what was said by Senator Messner when he interjected and said that that member’s leader had instructed him to tell lies. We are getting from the South Australian senators a complete distortion of figures.

There are no lies in Greg Crafter’s letter; there is merely a use of different figures. There has been an increase in some education payments. On the basis of a comparison of costs, the accusation may be correct; but what Greg Crafter says in relation to universities and schools is that capital payments have been depleted. I do not ask the Senate to take my word for it. If we look at Budget Paper No. 7, which deals with payments to or for the States and the Northern Territory, at page 1 84 we will see, in the words of the Federal Treasurer (Mr Howard), a reference to housing for servicemen and we will see that the figure for the colleges of advanced education is reduced from $5,177,000 to $4,300,000. In the payment for the school dental scheme there is a reduction. The payments for senior citizens centres and pre-schools and child care centres are all reduced according to those figures. If

Greg Crafter is lying, then the Treasurer must be lying.

Senator Webster:

– Are you telling the truth?

Senator CAVANAGH:

-Here are the figures. I do not hold myself out as the one who is saying this. I am asking: On the available figures from the authorities, who is proved the liar? That is all I am asking. There are the figures, and they are the Treasurer’s figures.

Throughout Senator Teague ‘s address we heard the words ‘in my opinion this is not so ‘ and CI do not believe this is so’. What he said is that the South Australian Liberal Party is winning because it is dealing with State issues. The South Australian Liberal Party thinks it is winning because it is keeping its incompetent leader out of the limelight and away from the public in South Australia. The South Australian Liberal Leader gave a policy speech in a television studio, without an audience. That policy speech lasted for a quarter of an hour. In the advertisements we see today he is shown in a car driving by, saying: Yes, pull South Australia out of the rot. Stop the rot’. But he cannot be interviewed. The advertising for the Liberal Party is being carried out by the Master Builders Association, under its name- it does not even trust the Liberal Party enough to give it funds now- the Chamber of Manufactures and the Retail Traders Association, with advertisements in the newspapers every day asking people to defeat the Labor Government.

Senator Messner:

– They didn’t blast him. They blasted the Labor Government.

Senator CAVANAGH:

-Time will not permit me to answer stupidity in a desperate attempt to save a defeated party. The petrochemical industry, which has been promised for two elections, and I think promised again, was held up because of the failure of the Fraser Government to give the authorisation for the borrowing of funds overseas for the purpose of establishing the infrastructure which was necessary for that project. I think it was last year or two years ago that permission was given for the application to be made.

The reason for this election relates to the raising of taxation by the States. It is to prevent the Government from being forced into a position of raising its own taxes. It is an attempt to show that the people in South Australia are opposed to Fraser’s restrictions and the federalism which will force the State governments to levy State income tax. They have been robbed insofar as the Federal Government imposes surcharges so that it will not have to distribute a proportion of the revenue to the States. The fact that this is an attempt to force the States to raise their own taxes is contrary to what the Leader of the Government in the Senate (Senator Carrick) has said over a period. I put it that more than an election is involved. Something tragic is happening in Australia, something about which we should all be concerned. In 1975, when Labor was defeated in the election, I referred in this House to the fact that Rupert Murdoch was the person who decided who was to govern in Australia. Rupert Murdoch decides who governs. Senator Webster asked whether that was the same fellow who in 1 972 had given the Labor Party $74,000. Rupert Murdoch put Labor into power in 1972 because he wanted Labor in power. When he could not get himself a place of power, as Ambassador to Great Britain, he put Labor out of power, in 1975. He did not interfere greatly in State politics until he applied for the television licence for Channel 10 in New South Wales, was granted it by the licensing board, and was attacked by David Combe, Senator Evans, who appeared in opposition to him in the case, and Senator Ryan, who was critical of the granting of the licence to him.

I believe that Des Corcoran was confident of victory because everyone who had opposed Fraser had been victorious, until out came the South Australian News. The Rupert Murdoch press in South Australia mounted such a daily attack upon Labor that Mr Hudson, the Deputy Premier, was obliged to refer to it as playing the traditional role of the prostitute. In last week’s National Times we read how one Mr Harry Gordon, as editor-in-chief of the Sydney Murdoch Press, was sent to Queensland, for the purpose of conducting an attack on BjelkePetersen. He has made three such attacks. He has reduced the National Party’s popularity in Queensland by 12 per cent. He is a genius. He is successful. He then spent two days last week organising the campaign in Adelaide. He was sent from Brisbane to Adelaide to organise it for Rupert Murdoch. It is not a question of politics but rather one of power. Rupert Murdoch claims that Labor has not learnt that what he wants he gets. Regrettably, we find men who are not concerned about the loss of democracy.

As an illustration of the distortion that has gone on, I refer to the report in today’s Advertiser, inspired by the publicity efforts of the Liberal Party, concerning a fall in the registration of new businesses in South Australia. Certain figures have been quoted. Mr Hugh Hudson, the Deputy Premier, has noted the actual increase in new business in the State this year. He said that there has been an increase in the number of new businesses; that the decrease referred to had resulted from the fact that previously it had been necessary to register all businesses but from this year it was no longer necessary to do so unless the business employed a given number of persons.

Senator Teague:

– What about the employment statistics?

Senator CAVANAGH:

– Let us examine the employment statistics. I am indebted to the honourable senator. I do not want to give an opinion. I do not want to say anything that is not based on fact. I shall quote Mr R. G. Jackson, a prominent construction authority, who states that his major company has operations in all Australian States, as well as in New Zealand and Indonesia. That gentleman spoke at a seminar in Adelaide on 16 February.

Senator Teague:

– How many months ago was that?

Senator CAVANAGH:

– I am referring to February 1979. Mr Jackson pointed out that Australia has great prospects. In regard to employment he pointed out that 80 per cent of South Australia ‘s industrial production is sent interstate and that therefore the prosperity of that State relies on the prosperity of other States. The Federal Government is entirely responsible for the employment situation in South Australia. He stated:

So because of its industrial significance in its own right, particularly as a manufacturer, and its dependence on markets outside the State, the South Australian economy cannot be considered in isolation from what is happening in the rest of Australia, and in turn in the world economy. Indeed, it would be unreasonable for any potential investor to conclude that the present economic problems of South Australia are due only to factors peculiar to this State.

There we have his opinion, in elaboration of the facts. He also said:

  1. . while the number of manufacturing establishments in South Australia in 1976-77 declined by 5.8 per cent or twice the national average, new capital expenditure on manufacturing increased by 8.5 per cent, which was more than four times the Australian figures.

The position is remarkably different when one considers the facts. We see what the Government has done. In his address he also said:

Indeed, the Australian Bureau of Statistics figures show that between June 1977 and June 1978 civilian employment here fell by nearly 10,000. This fall was associated with heavy retrenchment in the car industry, the closing of the Whyalla shipyards-

Who was responsible for that closure? -the effect of the drought on the rural industry, and the decline in housing and industries dependent on it in the wake of previously excessive activity. This resulted in manufacturing’s share of South Australian civilian employment falling from 23 per cent to 23.6 per cent, and South Australia’s share of Australian manufacturing employment from 9.6 per cent to 9. 1 percent.

Later on he said:

While South Australian unemployment had risen by 7.6 per cent from October, for December the figure was 7.7 per cent.

That was December last.

However, over the country as a whole, the present trend is worse than in South Australia, with between those two months unemployment increasing from 5.8 per cent to 6.8 percent.

Senator Teague:

– But you can’t argue with the Australian Bureau of Statistics, which shows that there is a fall in employment in South Australia.

Senator CAVANAGH:

– I am trying to use the figures of the South Australian Bureau of Statistics and point out, as Mr Jackson does, that the South Australian figures for employment were higher in the 1974 to 1977 period and have decreased since. As South Australia’s manufacturing industry relies on the other States, unemployment did not affect South Australia until it increased in the other States, which could not buy the white goods that are the mainstay of its economy. Therefore, unemployment is now increasing at a greater rate in South Australia than it is in other States and it will possibly remain at a greater rate until the other States get back into a position of consumer spending and start buying again. If the Labor Government is returned to office it will extend its relief to the unemployed. It proposes to give $20m this year. There is no such proposal from the Opposition. Mr Jackson points out that if there is anything that we need to do in South Australia it is not to rubbish this State. Some confidence has to be given to the State. He said:

The major incentive in South Australia to the potential investor is the labour cost advantage.

There has been talk about variations to the metal trades award. South Australia has the lowest cost structure of labour in Australia. Mr Jackson also stated:

Published information suggests that labour costs here are still some 4.6 per cent below those of Victoria and 7.8 per cent below those of New South Wales. The differential is probably still comparable with that evident in the mid to late 1950s.

That detracts from the suggestion that Des Corcoran or the Labor Government will ruin the State by supporting a metal trades award application before a Federal court.

Senator Messner:

– Yes, he is backing a $40 claim.

Senator CAVANAGH:

– Let us set the record straight. The Labor Government never went ahead and supported a $40 claim. The claim was for $40 and the Labor Government, through its counsel before the court, said that it did not oppose an increase in the metal trades award because the earnings of tradesmen employed under it were dollars behind those of other tradesmen and the important metal trades industry was losing tradesmen to other industries, lt was essential to the development of South Australia’s manufacturing industry for the skills of those tradesmen to be retained in the metal trades.

If one looks in the year book which was distributed today one will find that the salaries paid to metal tradesmen are below those paid to distributors, far below those paid to building workers and below those paid to transport workers- in fact, below those paid to most workers. How can a government be criticised for wanting to keep these men in the industry for the development of the State? Confrontation is the Fraser Government’s policy. That is to the detriment of the State of South Australia. The average weekly earnings of employees in South Australia in 1 978 were 9 1 .9 per cent of those of employees in New South Wales and 93.6 per cent of those of employees in Victoria. Between 1950 and 1956 they were 92.5 per cent of those for New South Wales and 92.9 per cent of those for Victoria. Those figures were prepared by the Bureau of Statistics. Over that period of years South Australia has been a low cost State and South Australian support for any activity in an industrial court is not something threatening or to be ashamed of. Outside Queensland, South Australia has the lowest payroll tax in Australia. After the employment of 15 employees, South Australia becomes the lowest.

Workmen’s compensation insurance is one of the things for which South Australia is criticised. It is criticised because it provides for the highest weekly payment in Australia. Men are compensated on a full weekly wage basis. This matter has been the subject of criticism by the South Australian Liberal Party. The figures for 1976-77- the latest figures available- show that the premium payable for workmen’s compensation in South Australia was $ 1 82, as against $252 in Victoria and $191 in New South Wales. So where is the basis for the condemnation which is now being peddled throughout South Australia. The industrial record of South Australia, which is another incentive to attract industry, shows that the figure for the working days lost per 1,000 employees is basically half the national figure taken on an average. In 1 977 the figure was 20 per cent of the national average. Why is that? Because South Australia believes in co-operation rather than confrontation. It is being said that we will drive everyone out because we are changing the industrial laws in South Australia. It is because we have been ahead of other States with our industrial legislation that we have a record of industrial peace in South Australia. That is the reason. The State does not want to cut out payments to sub-contractors, as alleged; it wants simply to give the arbitration machinery, the industrial court, the power to supervise the payment to sub-contractors. Much work is done on a slave labour system in South Australia at present. Industrial land is cheaper in South Australia than it is in either New South Wales or Victoria. Power is cheaper in South Australia, despite the fact that the rates have gone up. The average revenue per kilowatt per hour in South Australia is 9 1 per cent of the New South Wales rate and 87 per cent of the Victorian rate.

Senator Teague:

– Why are we losing industry in South Australia? Why are we not generating jobs?

Senator CAVANAGH:

– It is the old story that if one repeats something often enough someone will believe it. I have just pointed out that the figure for the registration of new business in South Australia has increased. Why are we losing business? I told honourable senators why we are losing business. I will give the actual figures for business at the time Mr Jackson reviewed them. Mr Jackson stated:

On exploration, I was encouraged to hear recently that 40 reputable mining companies representing Australian, North American, British, European, Japanese and South African interests, are now actively exploring in South Australia. Apparently they hold about 1 SO exploration licences for areas under application, covering some 160,000 square kilometres of the State, and involving expenditure of around $6 million annually. For your interest, the CSR group is spending more than $700,000 of this amount, or about 12%. Indeed, there now appears to be renewed confidence.

What does it matter what they are exploring for? They are interested because they think it is profitable to explore. We have stooped to the stage of using anything to discredit the Government that has advanced its State more than any other State in the Commonwealth. Some overseas resident, who had to establish himself as an Australian, said that the Government had to go. Despite Senator Teague ‘s optimism, if there is a drop in the percentage of votes cast for Labor- I do not think there will be- it has to be to the extent of seven per cent for the Liberals to get into government, and it has to occur in the metropolitan seats now held by Labor. That has not happened since 1947. It is possible that in excess of a one per cent swing could alter the representation for the seat of Morphett if it were not in an area where the swing will not be as pronounced as perhaps it might be in another place.

Senator Teague:

– This morning’s paper showed it was there.

Senator CAVANAGH:

-The Labor Party has an outstanding candidate who has held the seat for two years. He has looked after his electorate and he is confident that he will be returned with the public support he has. The morning paper carries an evaluation poll, where 480 electors in the district were examined, and that is determining the swing. They cannot tell whether there has been a swing of 8 per cent or from 4 per cent up to 9 per cent. That is the accuracy of the polls. The honourable senator’s confidence is based on this poll, while Tonkin stops at home or in the back seat of the car with a rug over his head so that no one can see him. He is hoping. My time has nearly expired but I will refer the Senate to an advertisement for the Labor Party in today’s newspaper. This replies to suggestions which have been made that the State is bankrupt and that companies will not invest. The advertisement states that for Simpson Pope Ltd, profits have risen by 35 per cent; John Shearer (Holdings) Ltd had a profit of $1.3m; Television Broadcasters Ltd (Channel 7) had a rise in profits of 3 1 per cent; the profits of John Martin and Co. Ltd rose by 37.4 per cent; the profits of Kelvinator Australia Ltd rose by 69 per cent and F. H. Faulding and Co. Ltd had a profit rise of 97.3 per cent. This is trade in the bankrupt state! With all this trade, wealth and success, and with all the achievements, men come here and want to overthrow the Government of South Australia at the behest of some overseas giant who has allegiance with a minority group in South Australia.

Senator YOUNG:
South Australia

– There have been many speakers on the Budget Papers. While there has been criticism from the Opposition in some areas of the Budget, generally speaking there has been wide acceptance of this year’s Budget in the general community. I can only say that I endorse the remarks that have been made by so many of the leaders in industry and other people throughout the community that this Budget shows clearly that the Government has been on the right fiscal path to bring Australia back on the road to recovery. One only has to look at the market place to see the confidence that exists. One looks at the stock exchange these days, which is always a good indicator, and one finds that share values are up again. That is a strong indicator that there is confidence again in the market place. So, one can go on down the line. One can refer to export development that has taken place and the initiative of the Government that brought in export incentives which have done so much to encourage the development of new export markets throughout the world. A further great amount of money is provided in the Budget this year to give further encouragement, help and incentive to industry generally.

Whilst I could spend the whole of my allotted time dealing with various aspects of the Budget, at this stage I feel that I must deal with a couple of criticisms that had been made by the Opposition. I wish to refer to crude oil pricing, which has been criticised both in the Senate chamber and in other places. The wisest thing the Federal Government did was to bring in import parity for crude oil pricing because that has had many benefits for Australia. Honourable senators should realise that, initially, Australia had 70 per cent of its own oil requirements, which came from Bass Strait, Moonie and from Barrow Island- the bulk coming from Bass Strait- but this was rapidly depleting. By 1985 Australia could have been down to something like 40 per cent indigenous supply. Because of import parity the Government has increased the reserves of crude oil in Australia. By increasing the price of crude oil the Government has made it economically possible for so much more oil to be produced that otherwise would have laid unused in the sea-bed. Figures are given that reserves have increased by something like 600 million to 700 million barrels or, to put it another way, an increase of something like three years’ supply of crude oil for Australia. At a time when there is a critical shortage in the world it shows just how wise this policy was.

The Government has also done something else. The last Budget brought in tax incentives for off-shore exploration. This is a very expensive exercise. It can cost up to $10m to drill one wellhole. The record has been a success rate of something like one in 43 holes off-shore. Exploration has developed again off-shore and this year the Federal Government also brought in incentives for on-shore exploration. We have seen the great upturn there. This is not entirely due just to the incentives that the Government has given by way of taxation. It is also due to the pricing policy of the Government. Let me say here and now that, irrespective of incentives for exploration, no company would have ventured out to the north west plateau, which is regarded as one of the most prospective off-shore areas in the world, to try to find oil when it was at the ridiculous price which the producers in Australia were getting before import parity, of something like $3.60 a barrel.

Senator Walsh:

– You didn’t bring that in. That dates from 1975.

Senator YOUNG:

-Now the Labor Party is trying to claim some credit for it.

The PRESIDENT:

– Order! Senator Walsh, Senator Young has the call from the Chair.

Senator Walsh:

– Let him stick to the facts.

The PRESIDENT:

– Order! Senator Walsh, if you insist on your interjections I will deal with you.

Senator YOUNG:

– I wish to give some indication of the history of oil exploration in Australia. I will start with the base year of 1 972, which is when the Labor Party came to power. There had been a great increase in exploration both on and off-shore in Australia, and in that particular year 101 wells were drilled. In 1973 there were changes in policy and we then see a decrease in the number of wells, from 69 wells in 1973 to 54 wells in 1974, to 23 in 1975 and 21 in 1976 and 1977. That clearly shows the drift away from Australia because of the lack of incentives for companies to get out and expend multimillions of dollars to look for such a valuable asset, which is also a very scarce asset today. I can only say that I wish that the Whitlam Government had shown wisdom and foresight, because then perhaps Australia would not be in the position it is in today, where it is still dependent on quite a bit of its oil from overseas.

Having said that, I wish to mention two matters in regard to pricing. Firstly, the pricing policy has increased reserves and, secondly, it has greatly encouraged exploration. In fact, already in 1 978 exploration had risen to 52 wells and indications are that that number will be greater in 1979. A third point involves the alternatives to crude oil. Of course, honourable senators would have read a fortnight ago that ethanol may be produced in Sydney. We know that shale oil is coming into the limelight considerably. This is only because the stage is being reached where those products are commercially viable. When crude oil reaches a certain price then research is carried out, development will take place and we will get these alternative sources of energy in Australia for our transport needs. I refute the arguments put by the Opposition with regard to export pricing and import parity. I consider that the South Australian Government should also do the same.

Road tax was abolished throughout the States some months ago. The South Australian Labor Government legislated for the introduction on 1 October of a Ica litre tax to compensate for the loss of the road tax. But let me make this point clear: The lc a litre tax will return far more in revenue that the loss of revenue caused by the abolition of road tax. However, the South Australian Government did not stop there. It did not equate that tax with the import parity price or with overseas oil prices. It wanted the tax to be a growth tax and to be indexed. This is an entirely different kettle of fish. It was only through the Liberal Party Opposition that this action was stopped in South Australia. Again, I think that this clearly shows the stand of the Opposition which is virtually playing two different roles when it comes to the Federal side and the State side of politics. As I said, the State Government is using this tax as a revenue raiser and is receiving more income than it was getting before. Also, the South Australian Government was not going to tie the tax to overseas crude oil prices, which the Federal Government has done, but rather to index it to other factors.

I also mention the petrochemical industry at Redcliff. Tonight Senator Cavanagh said that it is the Fraser Government’s fault that the Redcliff project is not a goer at the present time. This year the Fraser Government did something unique in Australia. It was something which had not been done before. It agreed that the States could resolve the situation in respect of overseas loans within the Loan Council to finance projects such as the Redcliff project. The green light was given to the States, including South Australia, by the Federal Government to go ahead with projects such as that at Redcliff. The State could get its finance overseas. Let us go back a little earlier into the history of Redcliff. The project was proposed early in the 1970s by the Dunstan Government. I supported the Dunstan Government’s proposal for the establishment of this petrochemical industry. Everything was going well until all of a sudden interference came from Canberra. Directives came from the Whitlam Government. It was the Whitlam Government that totally stopped the Redcliff project at that stage. On that occasion I did not hear Senator Cavanagh or any other Federal Australian Labor Party member from South Australia criticise Mr Whitlam for stopping an industry that could have meant so much to the iron triangle of South Australia. Yet tonight honourable senators have tried to lay the blame on the Fraser Government when it is doing all it can to assist the development of Redcliff in South Australia.

The blame lies squarely at the feet of the Labor Party including the South Australian members of the Labor Party in Canberra.

This year the Labor Party hoped that, politically, we would have a very bad Budget. It hoped for such things as a tax on gas and a sales tax on wine. These taxes did not eventuate. Nevertheless, the left wing of the Labor Party had committed Mr Corcoran to an election. There was no turning back. The timing was set and it acted. As I have said before in this place, Mr Corcoran has been made the front image for the left wing because it knew jolly well that it could not win an election with anybody else. It appears now that it will not win with Mr Corcoran because the electorate has woken up to the fact that Mr Corcoran will not be in his position very long. The people know that they would be appointing only a temporary Premier ready for the left wing to take over. Who would the Premier be? Would he be Mr Peter Duncan? Mr Corcoran has stated that he would nominate Mr Duncan as a potential leader of the Labor Party in South Australia.

Mr Corcoran has tried to blame the Federal Government for the sick economy in South Australia. I think that the Treasurer, Mr Howard, made this clear a few days ago when he was in Adelaide. Speaking of Mr Corcoran he said:

He neglects to say that approximately 40 per cent of all Commonwealth personal income tax revenue is returned to the States for general purpsoes. In 1979-80, South Australia will receive an estimated increase of 12.8 per cent in these general purpose funds.

Senator Teague:

– That is more than inflation.

Senator YOUNG:

– That is more than inflation. It is a 50 per cent increase on the inflation rate. The Treasurer also goes on to say that Mr Corcoran: also neglects to say that South Australia receives about $160 per capita more than both Victoria and New South Wales, under the general revenue tax sharing arrangements between the Commonwealth and the States.

It is interesting to see that Mr Corcoran goes on criticising the Federal Government when clearly the Treasurer has shown that, in relation to the other States, the Federal Government has been extremely generous. Perhaps it is the habit of Premiers of South Australia to criticise the Federal Government. I cast the minds of honourable senators back to the Australian Labor Party Conference held in Adelaide in 1974 and quote from a statement made by the then Premier of South Australia, the Honourable Don Dunstan, who said:

In 1973-74 under Labor in Canberra we were forced to bring in the heaviest program of tax increases in the history of this State. lt comprised payroll tax, harbour charges, water rates, the levy on electricity sales and hospital fees. Difficult though it may bc to apply still further increases in the fields of State taxes, we will be forced again this year to levy additional revenues to finance services of an adequate standard.

This was the criticism that Mr Dunstan levelled against the Whitlam Government in 1974. Mr Dunstan went on to say:

This year, the Prime Minister a week ago informed us, we would get no more money than was prescribed in the formula, although that would be plainly insufficient to meet the needs ofthe State, which has no means of reducing its expenditure markedly from revenue sources except to reduce the very programs of importance in schools, hospitals and welfare, upon which, in accordance with Labor Party policy, we have concentrated.

I think it is interesting to see how the Premier in those days was so critical of Mr Whitlam. Of course we recall that in 1974 other things were happening. There have been three elections in South Australia in the last few years and the people are getting sick of them. They realise that the Corcoran Government went to the people 1 8 months ahead of time. What is the real picture in South Australia? Without a doubt it is the poorest State in Australia today. Industry is leaving and investment is down. It does not matter what honourable senators turn to; they will find this pattern all the way through. Industry has been leaving and will continue to leave South Australia if things continue as they are and the Labor Party continues in office. This is borne out by the fact that so many advertisements have been placed in the newspapers by industry generally criticising the Labor Party. In addition private advertisements have been placed by individuals in South Australia. I refer to an article in the Australian of Wednesday, 12 September 1979. It states:

South Australia had attracted a modest l.S per cent of all mining investment in Australia in the two years to April.

Western Australia won 53.1 per cent of the total investment for the two years, followed by Queensland 21.5 per cent, Victoria 8 per cent and New South Wales 7.7 per cent.

Mining investment in Victoria will soon go up dramatically through the great coal projects that will start as a result of the encouragement given to industry in that State. The article gives another reason why South Australian businesses have spent over $ 100,000 on an anti-Labor campaign. It states:

South Australia had fallen to just 6.2 per cent of the total of new dwelling starts over the past four years.

What a dismal performance- 6.2 per cent of new dwelling starts over the past four years. Comparable figures for other States were New South Wales 33 per cent, Victoria 22 per cent, Queensland 2 1 per cent, and Western Australia 1 1 .9 per cent. I repeat: South Australia sat with a dismal 6.2 per cent. Yet we heard the Opposition tonight say how things really were booming in South Australia, and trying to quote fact and figure. I am quoting reports from yesterday. I am quoting reports of what industry in South Australia is saying currently, which indicate why it is spending so much money on advertising. Even though there is hope of survival in the rest of Australia because of the upturn in the economy through good budgeting and the fiscal policies of the Fraser Government, South Australia is the only State in Australia that presently is going backwards. It is a tragedy that this has been allowed to happen. The figures I have quoted show it, and I could go on. Since the last South Australian election employment in the private sector of industry has fallen by 5,800 people, according to the statistics, compared with a rise of 27,000 in New South Wales, 3,000 in Victoria, 2,800 in Western Australia, and nearly 2,000 in Queensland.

I wish now to make a quick reference to Roxby Downs. As I have said many times in this place, the Roxby Downs mine has been proven to be as large as the city of Melbourne. It is regarded as being the biggest and richest mine in Australia and one of the biggest mines in the world. It has a potential of many millions of dollars, and I am talking of thousands of millions of dollars. I am talking of an investment of something like $2,000m, of a construction work force of up to 3,000 people and of a permanent work force that could be up to 5,000 people. The great volumes of copper there have been estimated at between 10 million and 15 million tonnes- I am not talking of ore, I am talking of copper. The development of Roxby Downs could mean the construction of a smelter and a refinery, which no doubt would be in the region of South Australia ‘s iron triangle, and I refer to Whyalla, Port Augusta and Port Pirie. These in turn would create great opportunities for employment and bring in a great amount of revenue. The railways would have to be connected to the mine. Huge tonnages of concentrates would come down that rail, which would bring in revenue for the railways and create more employment. The service industries would also be involved, and one could go on to detail just how much the mine would be worth to South Australia.

Senator Messner:

– A bonanza.

Senator YOUNG:

– It would be an absolute bonanza, as Senator Messner says. But the Government is saying no. The executive of the Australian Council of Trade Unions is saying yes because it can see that, for many reasons, there is a need for Roxby Downs to be developed. Might

I say that if the mine is not developed it will be the only one of its kind in the world that is not being developed or likely to be developed. All I can say is that that will be an absolute disgrace. It is now a disgrace upon the Labor Party that nothing has been done about it.

Reference was made tonight to certain areas of industry advertising in the South Australian Press and expressing concern at the situation in South Australia. I am pleased that industry in South Australia has been prepared to stand up for its rights. It is the first time in the history of that State that that has happened and I hope it will be the last time. I hope that it is the last time there will be any need for industry to take such a stand. It is a tragedy that a crisis situation has developed, and in that regard I refer to the retail industry, which states in its advertisement:

  1. . you should know that annual growth in retail sales in South Australia has dropped to 6.5 per cent.

That’s equivalent to a loss of $66m in retail sales in one year.

One can see what that means in the way of jobs. Turning to motor vehicles, we have two major motor vehicle manufacturers in South Australia, Chrysler Australia Ltd and General MotorsHolden ‘s Ltd. In the industry advertisement it is stated:

If you work in motor sales and servicing, you should know that South Australia’s share of total new motor vehicle registrations has dropped to 8.11 per cent.

That’s equivalent to 4,340 motor vehicles which have not been sold, and goodness knows how many jobs have been lost.

If we look at the other States we can see that there have been large increases in sales of cars. Turning to unemployment, again we see that in South Australia unemployment increased by 3 per cent in the last 12 months compared with unemployment in the other States. I quote again from theAustralianof10 September- very recently- which states:

Bureau of Statistics figures released last week showed unemployment on a national basis dropped -

I emphasise the word ‘dropped ‘- by 4,600 in August, but in South Australia it rose by 5, 100.

In fact, unemployment rose in South Australia by more than the fall-off in the other States, and we finished up with an increase in unemployment of 3 per cent over the12 months. In addition, the statistics also show that at least 2,000 people left South Australia. No doubt the great bulk of those people were looking for employment and moved to other States because the job opportunities were there. It is a tragedy to see the youth of our State having to leave South Australia and go elsewhere to look for work.

The Fraser Government has been blamed tonight for the state of the South Australian economy. What about the wastage that has occurred in South Australia? Let us look at Monarto. In the region of $25m has been spent so far in acquiring the land at Monarto and developing it, and I am talking in dollar values of a few years ago. With inflation, in real terms today that would be something like $35m. Senator Messner is an accountant and he would know. It would be around that mark. The original estimate was about $10m, and so there has been some wastage somewhere, although one does not know where. The interesting thing is that while the State Government is still sitting with that land, which is lying idle, the interest alone is accumulating at the rate of some $5,000 a day.

Senator Messner:

– Say that again.

Senator YOUNG:

-I repeat: $5,000 a day in interest is accumulating for the dead horse Monarto. In the end even the Whitlam Government refused to support Monarto because it could see that it was a white elephant. Mr Dunstan and the Labor Party would not give in. They continued with Monarto, and the South Australian Government is still sitting with those broad acres lying idle and costing South Australian taxpayers $5,000 a day. Turning to the Land Commission, the situation is even worse. The State Government continued to overdevelop. In June 1 978 it spent $31 m on developing allotments and the interest alone on the unsold developed blocks is costing the South Australian taxpayers more than $9,000 a day. I come now to the great debacle of the frozen foods. The Public Accounts Committee report stated that the construction cost of the establishment was $9. 14m, yet it was originally estimated to cost only $4m. Coupled with that, however, alterations had to be made to the kitchens and so on at the Adelaide Hospital. For example, $500,000 was spent to modify the kitchen at that hospital to enable it to work in with the frozen food factory. It was claimed that this would save $500,000 a year in operating costs. However, not only did it cost $500,000 to change the kitchen, but $1m was lost on the operation in the first year. At the Flinders Medical Centre $2m was wasted in installing the wrong computer. This gives the Senate some idea of the wastage that is taking place in South Australia.

I can go on. The Auditor-General’s report for South Australia should be coming out at any time. There is no doubt, again, that this election was forced on earlier than usual because the Labor Party in South Australia was running scared of the release of the Auditor-General ‘s report. There is no doubt about that. I have quoted a few things tonight. I have quoted from a report of the Public Accounts Committee of the Parliament of South Australia which exposed problems about frozen foods and hospitals. There is no doubt that the Auditor-General’s report will bring to light far more scandalous examples of the waste that has taken place in South Australia not just in the last 12 months but over a longer period. I repeat that there is no doubt that the Labor Party is running scared, probably because of the release of the Auditor-General’s report. The left wing is making sure that it gets firmly entrenched in South Australia so that it will not matter a dam what sort of report comes out in the future as the Labor Party will have consolidated its position.

Honourable senators may ask why I say that. I return to the summary of the Labor Party Conference that was held as recently as 16 to 20 July this year in my fair city of Adelaide. I can think of no better city for a conference. The part of the summary headed ‘State Upper Houses ‘ reads:

The ALP has retained its commitment to the abolition of State Upper Houses -

I repeat:

The ALP has retained its commitment to the abolition of State Upper Houses- the Legislative Councils in New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania would all disappear under Labor.

Senator Evans:

– And so they should.

Senator YOUNG:

– Even senators from Victoria are saying the same thing. If the Labor Party got control of the Legislative Council in South Australia it would destroy it. Irrespective of whether it abolished the Council, if it got control of both Houses it would gerrymander electorates and set itself up in total control for the future. Mr Corcoran has made it clear that the Legislative Council will toe the party line if the Labor Party gets control of it. As a South Australian I am disturbed at the situation, but in the few weeks since the election campaign started I have been gaining confidence that, with the change of government which will take place on Saturday, South Australia will recover as it can recover. We have the potential. We have the initiative. All we need is the right government in office to make sure that we can carry out the necessary things.

Senator BISHOP:
South Australia

– It is unusual to hear Senator Young talking about his concern for South Australia because in most recent times he has refused to support in the Senate logical South Australian claims which, in the early stages, were supported by him. I refer, of course, to the need again to start up the Whyalla shipyard, based upon a proposition which was put to the Government by the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence. It was recommended that consultation should take place with the Australian Council of Trade Unions and the trade unions concerned. All the Liberal and Labor senators in South Australia put their names to a request to the Prime Minister (Mr Malcolm Fraser) to carry out a recommendation from the Committee, whose chairman, a Liberal senator, is presently in the chamber. One of the people who voted against the proposition when it was brought into the Senate but who had signed the earlier document was Senator Young. He turned down the request.

The request was a logical one which could have been carried out. Only in the last few days the Minister for Defence, Mr Killen, has reached an agreement with the ACTU and the trade unions concerned in respect of a request to build the new Royal Australian Navy ship in Australia. After discussions regarding the promotion of the most co-operative attitude from the unions concerned in the industry a target price was put forward which was less than that proposed by overseas companies. So a realistic proposition was put forward by concerned South Australians about an important district. Senator Young turned it down and would not vote for it. Senator Jessop and Senator Kilgariff walked out of the Senate.

In addition, fairly recently a deputation saw the Minister for Transport (Mr Nixon) concerning the Stuart Highway. I remind Senator Young, who is in the chamber, that he accompanied that deputation. We all agreed- the Mayor of Alice Springs, representatives of the Country Party and other honourable senators- to request Federal funding for the Stuart Highway. We did not make much progress, but we brought the proposition to the Senate. We proposed that the Senate should affirm that principle so that it might be reinforced. What happened? Again Senator Young did not vote for what was logically a genuine State request which in the old days -

Senator Young:

– I asked you to alter that motion and then I would have supported it.

Senator BISHOP:

– The honourable senator makes reservations. When it came to a vote some of the Liberal senators walked out of the Senate. The fact is that in the old days when Premier Playford was in control in South Australia the Labor senators in this place always supported the State. They never griped- like honourable senators opposite are doing tonight- about what the State Government was doing. The result was that Playford, in the environment of a Labor Prime Minister, got a great deal for industry in South Australia. We supported that year after year, but the tide has turned. Nowadays if we want to get Liberal senators to support State matters the State concerned has to be under the regime of a Liberal Premier.

Many paltry issues have been raised by Senator Young. He talked about waste in hospitals. What about the waste by the Prime Minister in purchasing the two Boeing aircraft? They will cost $40m, all because the Prime Minister wants to have an aircraft that is something like Air Force One, of the President of the United States of America. What about the advantage we gained from the establishment of the Land Commission? Senator Young had the cheek to talk about the Land Commission. It was a great Labor venture which made sure that purchasers of land in South Australia, by agreement with the State Labor Government, gained an advantage. They were saved from being ripped off by land dealers. This was the cheapest land in Australia, but the Liberals wanted to dump the scheme. Why? Because they represented the other people. For many months they have been criticising the Land Commission. Its establishment was one of the good things which the State Labor Government and the Federal Government did for South Australia.

But the Liberals have done worse. They talk about their support for the veterans. What have they done with the defence homes land. What have they done with all the land that was acquired by Labor and Liberal governments in the past so that people who could not remain in the services could purchase a house at minimum cost because of the low price of land? The Liberals have sold it all off. In my State millions of dollars worth of land was sold by this Government because it wanted the money. This land was being held for the veterans. Senator Young talks about waste and about computers. Senate committees have already examined the position under Liberal governments of the waste involved in buying computers. That is a common failure of all governments. What paltry arguments will the Liberals put up next?

The surprising thing about this place is that the Liberal members, who are supposed to represent the States, have supported one of the most outlandish things that has ever happened in a State. I am ashamed to think that I am a member of a parliament operating under the Westminster system when the elected government of my State cannot get a proper voice in the media. The Murdoch Press in South Australia, as everybody knows, has almost shut out the Labor Government, and the other newspaper is not much better. Every day in South Australia the Murdoch Press has attacked the Labor Government and talked about left wing control. What left wing control? Are Corcoran, Virgo and Hudson not accomplished and experienced people? Mr Corcoran is an experienced soldier, a commissioned officer. I have heard Senator Messner from South Australia refer to the Premier of South Australia, a man who has fought under very serious active service conditions, as Corporal Corcoran. Senator Messner has made some other irrelevant and disrespectful comments about the Premier of South Australia, a man who fought in Korea and who fought in Malaysia. Those comments were made by people who have never been a member of any service, not even of the Salvation Army. So what is the left wing influence?

The Liberals talk about Duncan. They are still claiming that he is a possible future Premier of South Australia. Already it has been reported in the Press that the South Australian Labor Party has indicated that Duncan himself has said that he makes no claims on the premiership of South Australia. This has appeared in advertisements. Even if he did, how could he depose people such as Hudson and Corcoran? That would be impossible. Why do the Liberals attack people of such experience and such moderation and talk about the power of the left wing? It is just a stunt. It is the same sort of stunt that was used in Tasmania when members of the Liberal Party tried to describe every Labor Party member as a left wing member.

On listening to honourable senators opposite one would think that this Government had never cut allocations for anything. Everybody knowsthe dogs are barking it- that this Government, since it has been in power, has cut back on almost every sector of the economy. Everybody knows that. Despite Fraser promising to do away with unemployment, it is still here and its rate is still growing. It is higher than when Fraser came to power. He was going to turn on the lights. Everybody knows- it is clear- that cuts have been made everywhere. So why do Liberal supporters still talk as if a State can survive under those conditions? South Australia is a producer. It produces motor cars, white goods including refrigerators, television sets et cetera. It is dependent upon the market- upon consumers. But if consumers in the other States do not have jobs, how can they buy the machines which are the products of South Australia.

South Australia is dependent upon the total Australian economy. That is simple; any child could work that out. Everybody knows the position. Tom Playford helped Chifley to build the industries. They are there and they are good. Every honourable senator who belongs to the Liberal Party keeps knocking South Australia and the union movement. It is totally wrong and incorrect for them to do so. I will bet that tomorrow when we see the Press reports of the statements about South Australia which have been made in this place- by the way, we would not have made the comments we have about South Australia had we not been invited to so by honourable senators opposite and by members in the other place- we will find that the Press has not given a fair coverage of what has been said by Australian Labor Party senators as has happened up until now. I will bet that that will be the case even in respect of what Senator Cavanagh said concerning the slump in new industries being caused by changes to the registration requirements. Senator Cavanagh told us that, as proof of that claim, Mr Hudson is reported in today’s Press as having said that there had been an increase in the value of approvals for new business premises in South Australia, yet Mr Tonkin said that there had been no increase. The Press report stated:

There had been a strong rise in the value of approvals Tor new business premises in SA in the 1978-79 financial year, the Deputy Premier, Mr Hudson, said yesterday.

The report stated further:

Additionally, we are all aware of the trend that has taken place in recent years, which is Tor small businesses to be swallowed by big organisations, ‘ Mr Hudson said.

Although the facts were clear and the fall in registrations was because of a change in the registration requirements, a headline in the Adelaide Advertiser referred to a dispute about business approvals in South Australia. What chance do we have in South Australia? Look at the run Senator Young got in the Press last week when we debated this matter in this Parliament. The headline in the Advertiser read: ‘Left Wing “forced” early SA election’. But the significant thing about South Australia is this: It is not the Liberal Party that is in the front line in South Australia; it is not Dr Tonkin because nobody knows where he is. It is hard to find him. They telephoned him. But Corcoran is always about organising. That ex-soldier, who is supposed to have arthritis in his knees or his hands, is out organising. Last night he attended a meeting with the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Hayden. In South Australia 200 people went to hear Corcoran and Mr Hayden. But what happened with the Press? Not a word about that meeting was reported in the South Australian Press, ls that not shocking? Is it not a disgraceful action by people who believe in the parliamentary system? I believe in the parliamentary system. I am a member of the Executive of the International Parliamentary Union. More than once in this place I have stressed the need to advocate that people should believe in the parliamentary system. But in my State the parliamentary system is not getting a go.

It is common knowledge that in another State the leader of the great monopoly is saying: ‘We will take away from Labor in this State some of the seats it holds’. It is not the Liberal Party which is doing the campaigning in South Australia. It is a small group of small businesses or an organisation of the bosses. The bosses in South Australia have had a wonderful go. I speak from experience. I was secretary of the Trades and Labour Council for many years. Being a modest man, I think I can say that my reputation for settling disputes was fairly good. In those days bosses got a good deal from the union movement, just as they are getting now. It shocks me to see all these business people combining to try to defeat the South Australian Labor Government. Of course, they are trying to do that because obviously the Liberal Party is not able to cope with the situation. The leader of the Liberal Party in South Australia, who I suppose is soon to be deposed, cannot face the music in the same way that our friend Corcoran can. Nor could the South Australian leader of the Liberal Party face the music when Dunstan was there.

Everybody knows- it would be clear to any child- that the Australian Government sets the economic climate. If the Australian Government adopts a particular economic approach it affects the whole of Australia. The policies of the Fraser Government have affected every State. Let me speak about South Australia. As Senator Young said, if people left South Australia, where would they go? This morning 1 referred honourable senators to a report from the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace to the Catholic bishops. Honourable senators can read that report for themselves. It contains an extract of figures prepared by the Commonwealth Employment Service, dated as recently as January 1979. The Minister for Employment and Youth

Affairs (Mr Viner) went to South Australia. He was about the only Minister, other than the Treasurer (Mr Howard), who was game to go there. But when Mr Howard got to South Australia he said that he supported the State Labor Government’s worker participation policies, despite anything else he said.

If people left South Australia, where would they go? Mr Viner said that South Australia ‘s unemployment position was worse than that of any other State. From the facts and figures provided by the Commonwealth Employment Service and contained in the report prepared by the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace, it is clear that Mr Viner ‘s State has the highest percentage of unemployed in one area of anywhere in Australia. I repeat what I said this morning on this matter. I asked the Attorney-General, Senator Durack: ls he aware that the figures in the document, which I understand has been shown to the Government, demonstrate that in Hornsby in Sydney, for example, the unemployment rate per job vacancy is 1.69 percent, and in Mount Druitt the figure is 13.46 per cent: in Melbourne in the suburb of Waverley the figure is 2.45 per cent and in Sunshine is 9.37 per cent: in two Brisbane suburbs the figures are 12.63 per cent and 4.64 per cent: in Adelaide suburbs the figure for Elizabeth is 1 3.7 per cent and 5.3 per cent for Unley; and in Perth suburbs at Girrawheen the figure is 13.3 per cent and in Claremont the figure is 6.6 percent?

We hear people talking about South Australia’s unemployment problem. Of course South Australia has an unemployment problem, just as every other State has an unemployment problem. The facts are that until the state of the Australian economy is improved, until some of the restrictions imposed by the Federal Government are relieved, the unemployment situation will not improve. Let me talk about State matters. I refer firstly to funding for South Australia. Honourable senators will remember the criticism concerning funding which the State Premiers levelled at the Commonwealth Government earlier in the year when the State Premiers met. I have a copy of an article which appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald of 30 June 1 979 concerning discussions held in Canberra at that time. The article stated:

State Governments will be forced to divert tax-sharing funds away from traditional areas to maintain capital works programs in 1979-80.

The Premiers left Canberra last night faced with major reviews of programs in the areas where they have the greatest ability to create employment.

That was because of cuts made in funds made available by the Commonwealth Government. This morning Senator Wriedt several times asked the Leader of the Government in the

Senate (Senator Carrick) to answer this question:

Is it not true that the Treasury documents show that this year South Australia will receive in capital payments $302m; that it received $375m four years ago under the Labor Government, and that this year the payments arc down in real terms by $246m under Fraser federalism?

On two occasions Senator Wriedt asked the Leader of the Government to explain the position. What answer did he get? He got no answer because the situation was avoided. I would like to repeat what Senator Cavanagh, I think, referred to.

Senator Cavanagh:

– I have not repeated that.

Senator BISHOP:

- Senator Cavanagh had the wisdom to quote from a report by a Mr Jackson, who is a prominent economist. As recently as February 1979 he talked about the position in South Australia and, after conducting a proper survey, he gave a position which is quite contrary to what has been stated by the Liberals. He said that in examining South Australia’s recent economic performance it is noticeable that the downturn in the State between 1974 and 1977 was less severe than in Australia generally. For example, through 1975 and 1976 the unemployment rate in South Australia was below the national average. Motor vehicle registration levels were higher, as were new dwelling approvals, commencements and completions and also retail trade. More recently the same gentleman referred to this in a report in the Australian Financial Review. This shows again the advantage of having a logical discussion about things and not trying to make figures represent something which does not happen. The report in the Australian Financial Review of 28 August 1979 was headed: ‘Government Projects Keep Building Industry Afloat in S A ‘. It stated:

Figures produced last week by a prominent construction industry economist indicate the extent to which the South Australian building industry relies on government projects.

According to an analysis of major building projects valued at more than $100,000 undertaken by the economist, Mr John Jackson of John Jackson and Associates, South Australia has been the only mainland State where the value of major government building projects has exceeded the value of private sector projects over recent years.

Mr Jackson argued that the high proportion of government expenditure on major building and construction projects in South Australia had probably produced one major advantage for the construction industry in that Stateexpenditures on major projects have been much more stable in South Australia than in all except one other State.

Yet we have this combination of the bosses. I had never used to refer to them as ‘the bosses’, but I have become so sick of their propaganda in the last few weeks that I now identify them as bosses who cannot see the morality of assisting their State and of being fair in election campaigns. There is no doubt that they have spent a lot of their time complaining about the proposed amendment to the State’s Conciliation and Arbitration Act. One of the complaints from the main organiser, a Mr Rundle who is no doubt a strong member of the Liberal Party, was that a large issue was the proposed amendment to the State’s industrial laws which Mr Rundle said would allow industrial democracy in through the back door and would reduce the right of management to manage. The Australian Financial Review of 5 September 1979 stated:

The State Government was confident that industrial democracy would not bc an issue in the election campaign . . .

That was following the statement by the Federal Minister for Productivity, Mr Macphee. At about this time Mr Macphee, a young Minister, went to South Australia. He was asked: ‘What do you think about that industrial democracy proposal which has been put up by Corcoran?’ Mr Macphee said that he thought the proposal was similar to one proposed by the Liberal Government. Fortunately at or about the same time we have support for that from Mr Howard. A report in the Australian Financial Review of 6 September is headed: ‘SA Industrial Democracy Plan supported by Howard ‘. It stated, in part:

The Federal Treasurer, Mr Howard, yesterday defended endorsement by the Minister for Productivity, Mr Macphee, of the South Australian Government’s industrial democracy proposals.

Mr Howard said that there was now ‘more agreement between Federal and State government than a few years ago’.

In addition to that, Mr Corcoran, in trying to be conciliatory proposed a meeting with all these bosses. They sat down and talked about these things. He reported to them, as they well knew, that the amendment had been withdrawn and that nothing would be done until there had been proper consultations with the bodies concerned. That did not satisfy these people and they are continuing their campaign to make sure that the State Labor Government is not going to get a fair go. Unfortunately, as I said earlier, some sections of the media are doing just the same sort of job in that they are denying to the Australian Labor Party proper reporting of the parliamentary contest. I turn to the position of industry in South Australia. As recently as a few days ago- 10 September- Mr Hudson reported on a survey done by W. D. Scott and Co. He was reported in the News of 1 0 September to have said:

Australia’s most reputable management consultants, W. D. Scott and Co. have issued projections showing that in the next five years SA will bc getting a better share of national investment than its population would justify . . .

Everybody knows the Scott company. It has been commissioned by the Federal Government and by other governments. Mr Hudson said that the projections showed South Australia could expect $3,030m in new investment in the next five years, out of $29,430m for the whole of Australia. He said: lt is unfortunate people choose to spread fear and gloom by producing figures which do not give a true picture.

That is the trouble, of course, as Senator Cavanagh pointed out earlier- the use of statistics to suit one’s own ends. It is a pity. In the few minutes I have left I want to talk about the views of the Prime Minister and of other people about the Whitlam Government’s statement that inflation was being caused to a large extent by external forces. In those days Mr Fraser, Mr Lynch and others said: ‘No, it is all domestic inflation, all caused by the Whitlam Government’. For up to two years they kept up this sort of nonsense by saying that inflation is always caused by domestic matters and that they were going to cure all this. They said they were going to cut inflation by this year to 4 per cent, instead of which it is 9 per cent, 10 per cent or 1 1 per cent. They were going to cure the unemployment problem, which they have not done.

As recently as yesterday in the House of Representatives in attacking Mr Hawke the Prime Minister talked about the hostile external environment and the difficult international economic environment. So he is faced with the same external position. In fact we had it first, but he has a continuing situation and it is only now that the Fraser Government is giving any sort of consideration or support to what we were saying when we were in office. How the tide has turned ! How the lights have been dimmed! True it is that if the Labor Party in South Australia could identify those parts of the State’s economy which are being affected by national policies, it should do so. The rundown in the whole economy has resulted in the sort of effect in South Australia that I have spoken about. Everybody knows that. A child knows it and everybody in this place knows it, yet honourable senators opposite who understand that still come out with the same old guff and get the headlines. Last week Harold Young got a great run from a very poor speech, if I may say so, and he is a friend of mine. I remember visiting a country town with him when 1 was Postmaster-General and unveiling a plaque on a post office. I shared the honours with Senator Young because we had been friends for a long time. I am sad to have to say that because of his contributions over the last few weeks I must reconsider my opinion of him.

Senator Messner:

– That is not what the Mail said.

Senator BISHOP:

-Not only the Advertiser but also the Mail report nearly everything the other side says; but very little is printed about what the Labor Party says. If any Australian politician deserves a chance to establish his own premiership, his own government, it is Des Corcoran. Des Corcoran and his father are most admirable people, and their reputation more than compares with that of any other Australian politician. Des Corcoran is a strong man and a good man. Honourable senators opposite talk about the left wing. I ask honourable senators: How many Ministers would suspend bus operators because they had brought on a sharp strike and annoyed the public by an instantaneous stoppage in the pouring rain? Geoff Virgo did that last night. He has told the bus operators that unless they are prepared to play the game they will be suspended. That is strong action by a Labor Minister- a courageous man and a good Minister. We will miss him from the Australian scene, and I know that some Federal Ministers will miss him also.

What about the whole to-do about Mr Hawke and wages policy? I know, and honourable senators opposite know, that for many months Bob Hawke has been saying that, if the Australian Government would agree, the Australian Council of Trade Unions, with its advisers and its economists, would sit around the table with the Government and discuss the economy, jobs and employment, and that they would be only too happy to do it. During the pre-Budget talks which the Labor Government had when it was in office, and since this Government came to power, Bob Hawke has submitted to the Federal Government that he would do this. He repeated that offer again on Monday when he said that the trade union movement is not satisfied with the loss of value in the wage packets of wage and salary earners, which has gone down by about 4 per cent since the Liberal Government came to power, and that it will seek to improve their lot and to make a productivity claim. The Prime Minister (Mr Malcolm Fraser) has attacked Mr Hawke because the trade union movement intends to make a productivity claim. But is it not reasonable for the trade union movement and the workers to argue that if productivity rises their share in the profits of productivity should be increased, and that the claim be argued in the Arbitration Commission?

Senator WEBSTER:
Minister for Science and the Environment · Victoria · NCP/NP

– There is little doubt that the present economic situation is of great credit to the Fraser-Anthony Government. During this evening we have heard speakers from the other side of the chamber finding what comfort they can by attempting to criticise the situation that exists in Australia today. But I think there is a general appreciation by the public that Australia is really on the move and that in this country we have a situation of which we can be particularly proud. The outstanding success of the fight by this Government against inflation is perhaps the highlight of its activity over the past few years, and indeed emphasises the thrust in the Budget which we are debating tonight. That success is perhaps even more remarkable when it is remembered that inflation was about 17.6 per cent in 1975, in the Labor Government’s last year of office. Honourable senators opposite cannot get away from that fact.

Senator Bishop, who has just resumed his seat, was a Minister in the previous Government. I imagine that he wishes to be proud of his activity and the part that he played in that Government during those years. Yet the mismanagement of the economy by the men who stand up and criticise the Fraser-Anthony Government today demonstrated that they had no capacity to control the economy of this country. The public needs to consider that when the Labor Government went out of office it had raised inflation to 17.6 per cent. One of the great thrusts - (Quorum formed). The honourable senator who called the quorum was Senator Douglas McClelland. In the very few minutes that I have available to me before the Senate will adjourn, he attempted, with three members of the Labor Party present in the chamber, to interrupt me. When Senator Bishop was speaking, my side of the House did not call quorums, despite the stupid statements that were then being made. Senator Douglas McClelland could not stand the comments, because he was a Minister in the Government which, during its time in office, saw unemployment rise by 100 per cent. Yet Opposition senators stand up here tonight and attempt to make some criticism of the Fraser-Anthony Government. This Government has received the greatest of credit, nationally and internationally, for the excellent situation that it has brought about during its years of office in relation to the low inflation rate.

It is uncommon that tonight the argument should have been concentrated on the situation in South Australia. It is not a case of criticism of individuals associated with the Government in

South Australia. It must be the fear that the people of South Australia have for the continuation of a socialist government in that State. Something that the Labor Government has not referred to tonight is the policies that have come out of the Labor Party conference in Adelaide. The listening public should direct its attention to the things which are to be found in those policies and which will be reflected should the Labor Party come to power. I know that in South Australia, since the last State election only 18 months ago, unemployment in the private sector has risen by over 5,800 individuals. In other States employment has increased. But what is before the South Australian people if they are to be dominated by a socialist Labor government? Senator Bishop has said that people should forget about the left wing socialists who dominate members of the Labor Party. But their policies are set out in the document that comes from the Labor Party conference, and that document says: Put government financing into political parties’. That is Labor’s policy, and that is what will come about if it is returned in South Australia.

What will it do in relation to the unions? If honourable senators would give their attention to the Adelaide Advertiser today, they would see the questions which are being put to the South Australian Government in relation to the type of industrial legislation that is proposed to be brought in by the Corcoran Labor or socialist Government. There is the intention within those pieces of legislation to remove the right of the employer to obtain redress after being damaged by a union ‘s unlawful actions. These things are carried through in the summary of the Labor Party’s Adelaide conference. It is intended that unions and unionists will be free of the law if they take matters into their own hands while they are pursuing strikes. These are the matters that are scaring the public in South Australia. There is no doubt that the Corcoran Government is a left wing socialist government.

Debate interrupted.

page 639

ADJOURNMENT

Division of Forest Research

The PRESIDENT:

– Order! In conformity with the sessional order relating to the adjournment of the Senate, I formally put the question:

That the Senate do now adjourn.

Senator KNIGHT:
Australian Capital Territory

– I want this evening to raise a matter which was raised in the Senate by Senator Martin on 22 August, in a question without notice to Senator Webster, the Minister for Science and the Environment, and also to refer to a report in today’s Australian Financial Review. It relates to suggestions that the Division of Forest Research of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation might be moved from Canberra. There are a number of issues that I would like to raise with the Minister and upon which I will seek his comments. For example, it has been reported that 100, or perhaps more, permanent officers will be transferred from Canberra, that the transfer will cost $12m and that the construction of a new headquarters in Tasmania, to which it has been suggested that the division might be transferred, might cost an additional $ 7m.

I also understand from reports, and from the Minister’s response to Senator Martin on 22 August, that the Committee on the Location of Australian Government Employees is at the moment considering this question. I simply want to put to the Minister that there seem to be very strong reasons for not transferring the Division of Forest Research from Canberra. Some of these were referred to by the Minister in his response to Senator Martin on 22 August and some have been referred to in Press reports, including that which appeared in the Australian Financial Review today. I would like simply to go through them and seek the Minister’s views upon them.

As I have already mentioned, it seems that the cost will be at least $12m and perhaps as much as $20m when all aspects of the transfer, including the need for new headquarters facilities in Tasmania, are taken into account. The Minister pointed out in his answer to Senator Martin that the CSIRO was opposed to the move. It is opposed, apparently, on administrative grounds and also because of the research activities that are conducted in Canberra, to which I will refer futher. Canberra is in many important respects the centre of forest research in Australia. For example, the Australian National University has a School of Forestry which, as I understand it, has the only Chair in Forestry in Australia. As Senator Martin pointed out, in the course of her question, the Division of Forest Research has probably the best library on the subject in Australia, and represents a very important annexe to the Australian National University School of Forestry and to the other research activities of the University.

The Division of Forest Research also has a very important relationship with the CSIRO ‘s Division of Plant Industry in Canberra. That seems to me, taken with the other reasons, to support its retention in Canberra. A further factor is that the Division of Forest Research has six regional research stations, all but one of which are on the mainland. That, obviously, would present some administrative and research problems for the Division if its headquarters were placed elsewhere. Related to that, and perhaps most important in this respect I would suggest, is the fact that Tasmania has a very small percentage of the varieties of eucalypt in Australia- I understand in the vicinity of 10 per centwhereas most varieties therefore are established on the mainland, particularly in the south-east a region to which Canberra is central. It is for that reason that forest research has been established in the Australian Capital Territory to the extent that it has. The Minister for Science and the Environment has indicated, again in answer to the question asked by Senator Martin, that he feels that there may be a case for upgrading the Division of Forest Research regional Office in Tasmania. But I would suggest that surely there certainly does not seem to be a case for what seems to be at least a $12m transfer of approximately 100 positions. There seems to be too strong a case against it.

In 1977, Sir Bede Callaghan produced a report on the Structure of Industry and the Employment Situation in Tasmania. In doing so, he did not refer to or suggest any such transfer so far as I am aware, though he recognised very explicitly in his report the importance of the timber industry in Tasmania. I quote very briefly from that report. He said:

  1. . the importance or the Tasmanian timber industry to the State and to the nation now, and in the decades ahead, can scarcely be overstated.

I think we would all endorse that statement with respect to the timber industry. Of course, we are now referring to the Division of Forest Research in the CSIRO. In the course of Sir Bede Callaghan ‘s inquiry the Tasmanian Timber Industry Association did suggest, as I understand it, in its submission to the inquiry, that the CSIRO Division of Forest Products, not the Division of Forest Research, might be re-established in Tasmania from Melbourne which is where, as I understand it, that Division of Forest Products was based. However, the Division of Forest Products has since been disbanded by the CSIRO. As I understand it, none of the sections of the Division of Forest Products is contained in the Division of Forest Research so we are talking about two different elements of the CSIRO. The Division of Forest Products and its various elements which have been dispersed are not under consideration in this context.

Sir Bede certainly, as I understand it, did not make any reference to the possible transfer of the Division of Forest Research out of Canberra. Whatever case there may be for the transfer of the former Division of Forest Products from the mainland to Tasmania there seems to me, on the basis of the arguments that I have put already, to be no case for the proposal that we understand is before the Committee on the Location of Australian Government Employees for the transfer of the Division of Forest Research out of Canberra to Tasmania. Yet, from what the Minister said and from other reports, this matter is actually before this Committee. One has to ask how that comes about and why it is now being considered by the LAGE Committee, as it is known, particularly when we take into account the enormous cost that is apparently involved, the managerial and administrative problems that such a transfer would create and the fact that this Division would then be removed from the centre of forest research in Australia.

I can only ask, on the basis of this argument and on the points that I have made to the Senate tonight, whether, in fact, a mistake has been made and what can be done to put a stop to what seems to me to be potentially, at least, a case of administrative madness and an action that would disrupt the work of the CSIRO Division of Forest Research. The Australian National University’s School of Forestry is Australia’s leading school in this field. As I pointed out earlier, the ANU is the only university with a Chair in Forestry. This transfer also would effect the lives of hundreds of people. It seems to me that there is simply no real justification for these suggestions that the CSIRO ‘s Division of Forest Research should be transferred from Canberra to Tasmania. I would simply ask the Minister to give his attention to the points that I have raised tonight and to indicate whether this matter might be urgently reviewed so that the problems which I have suggested might occur are avoided, particularly that the disruption to the lives of the people involved might be avoided and, in the more immediate future, that the uncertainty they face might be ended.

Senator WEBSTER:
Minister for Science and the Environment · Victoria · NCP/NP

– I can find no argument at all with the facts put forward by Senator Knight. Both he and John Haslem have conferred with me on several occasions regarding this matter. I acknowledge their great interest in attempting to protect the interests of those who are employees of the Division of Forest Research within the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation. I do not think that 1 can add very greatly to the comments that I made when I spoke previously on this matter. I have had representations from the employees of the Division of Forest Research itself and the Institute of Foresters in Canberra has been to me and put the facts generally as outlined by Senator Knight. The Federal Government is most anxious to see that there is development of appropriate industry in Tasmania. This was a matter that attracted attention but, as Senator Knight has correctly put it, it was the transfer of the Division of Forest Products that was suggested. It is a division that was based in Melbourne previously. Whilst it is correct, so far as I am aware, that the Committee on the Location of Australian Government Employeesthe LAGE Committee- is evaluating this matter at the moment, Senator Knight has drawn my attention very forcibly to the fact that this matter needs urgent attention. I will attempt to see that the Government gives it that attention and decides exactly the status of this division.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

Senate adjourned at 1 1.12 p.m.

page 642

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS

The following answers to questions were circulated:

Radio and Television: Education Material (Question No. 914)

Senator Ryan:
ACT

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Post and Telecommunications, upon notice, on 17 October 1978:

  1. 1 ) Which radio and television stations in New South Wales broadcast or televised the policy speech of the Leader of the Liberal Party in New South Wales on the evening of Thursday, 2 1 September 1978.
  2. Which radio and television stations in New South Wales broadcast or televised news and/or current affairs coverage of the policy speech of the Leader of the Liberal Party of New South Wales, during the period between the speech’s delivery and 8.00 p.m. on Saturday, 23 September 1978.
  3. Which, if any, of the above stations were granted an exemption under section 1 16 (4a) of the Broadcasting and Television Act 1942, by the Australian Broadcasting Tribunal in respect of the broadcasting or televising of material referred to in parts ( 1 ) and (2 ) above.
Senator Chaney:
LP

– The Minister for Post and Telecommunications has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

  1. 1 ) Information supplied to the Tribunal by commercial radio and television stations and the ABC indicates that the following stations in NSW broadcast or televised the policy speech of the Leader of the Liberal Party in connection with the NSW State election held on 7 October 1 978:

Commercial Broadcasting Stations-2KY, 2DU, 2GN, 2RG,2ST.

Commercial Television Stations- TCN, TEN, CBN/CWN, NEN/ECN, MTN, NBN, RTN/NRN.

National Broadcasting Stations- 2CY, 2FC and nineteen regional stations including 2 WN.

National Television Stations-ABC 3 ACT, ABAV Albury and fourteen other ABC stations (presumably including ABN2 Sydney and ABWN Wollongong).

The Tribunal has no information as to the date each station transmitted the speech.

  1. The Tribunal has no details in connection with this part of the question. Commercial stations and the ABC are not required to provide this information.
  2. Of the stations mentioned in connection with part ( 1 ) of the question, the following stations were not granted an exemption under section 1 16 (4a) of the Broadcasting and Television Act 1942, by the Tribunal in respect of the Werriwa by-election for the period midnight 20 September to close (8.00 p.m.) of poll, 23 September 1978:

Commercial Broadcasting Station- 2KY.

Commercial Television Stations-TCN, TEN.

National Broadcasting Stations-2FC, 2WN.

National Television Stations- ABN Sydney and ABWN Wollongong.

Education: Transfer of Powers to States (Question No. 1078)

Senator Wriedt:

asked the Minister for Education, upon notice, on 23 November 1978:

What powers within the Minister’s jurisdiction have been transferred to the States since December 1 975.

Senator Carrick:
LP

– The answer to the honourable senator’s question is as follows:

I refer the honourable senator to the reply to Question No. 1074 provided by the Minister Assisting the Prime Minister in Federal Affairs (Hansard, 2 1 August 1979, page 48).

Immigration and Ethnic Affairs: Transfer of Powers to States (Question No. 1089)

Senator Wriedt:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs, upon notice, on 23 November1 978:

What powers within the Minister’s jurisdiction have been transferred to the States since December1 975.

Senator Guilfoyle:
LP

– The Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

I refer the honourable senator to the Minister Assisting the Prime Minister in Federal Affairs’ answer to Question No. 1074 in Hansard of 21 August 1979 (pages 48-5 1 ).

Radio Station 3CR (Question No. 1319)

Senator Primmer:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Post and Telecommunications, upon notice, on 2 1 February 1979:

  1. 1 ) Do CCIR (International Consultative Committee on Broadcasting) regulations for radio broadcasting stipulate the need for higher protection ratios (higher fringe area field strengths) for low-power AM stations like 3CR.
  2. Are there areas within the licensed area of coverage for 3CR (10 mile radius) in which it is almost impossible to hear 3CR, let alone listen comfortably.
  3. Did the station, in its promise of performance, wish particularly to provide a service for working people, and migrant workers in particular.
  4. Are there any migrant workers in the western suburbs of Melbourne, within the station’s 10-mile radius, who cannot be served by 3CR due to the low power allowed the station.
  5. 5 ) Has station 3CR been allowed the lowest power of any AM station in Australia.
  6. Was the station accused by the Postal and Telecommunications Department in August 1 978 of illegally increasing its transmission power by a large amount; if so, did 3CR totally refute this allegation and point out that the evidence pointed to illegal interference by someone else on 3CR’s frequency, possibly to discredit the station.
  7. Does the Postal and Telecommunications Department have a high-powered jamming transmitter located within a mile of 3CR’s transmitter at Jolimont; if so, is this position close enough to have caused the interference in August.
  8. Has the station received a reply to its letter to the Minister or the Department since the station refuted the allegation: if not, why not.
  9. What action has the Minister taken to prevent any such interference occurring again.
  10. 10) Did the State Branch of the Minister’s Department recommend that 3CR should be allowed an increase in power because the Department was convinced that the allowed power was inadequate for the station ‘s licensed purpose and radius.
  11. Have other public broadcasting stations had numerous complaints against the Federal Section of the Postal and Telecommunications Department concerning lack of cooperation and inadequate allowance for power.
  12. Does the Federal Section (Technical Branch) of the Department of the Postal and Telecommunications Department refuse to allow public broadcasting stations to have I kilowatt into a non-directional aerial.
  13. Did the section recently license a commercial station on I kilowatt into a non-directional aerial at Port Hedland.
Senator Chaney:
LP

– The Minister for Post and Telecommunications has provided the following answers to the honourable senator’s questions:

  1. 1 ) No.
  2. 2 ) Because of the location of the 3CR transmitter the field strength of the station is low in some suburbs of Melbourne. There are also some pockets within the nominal coverage area which do not receive an adequate service due to factors such as regions of low ground conductivity and abovenormal man-made interference. This is a situation which is largely unavoidable but, equally, there are areas outside the nominal coverage area which obtain an adequate service.
  3. Community Radio Federation Ltd has stated in its initial application for a licence that it is committed to discrimination in favour of the working class, including ethnic groups.
  4. Reception of 3CR in some areas, particularly the western and south-western suburbs where no doubt some migrant workers reside, is affected by the factors mentioned in the answer to (2) above. The level of interference and degradation of the available signal varies from daytime to night time. While interference is evident at night in some areas, reception during the day is quite adequate. The power of 3CR is not the primary factor affecting reception.
  5. 3CR shares the lowest power of any non-national AM station in Australia, along with some other stations. Some ABC AM stations have even lower power than 3CR.
  6. On 25 August 1978, a telegram was sent to the station by my Department indicating that variations in the 3CR power level had been observed and asking the station to contact my Department as soon as possible. Earlier variations had also been observed. No accusations were made by my Department and the station did not accept that it was responsible for the variations. The station claimed that some unknown source caused illegal interference, possibly aimed at discrediting the station.
  7. No.
  8. 1 wrote to 3CR on 12 January 1979 concerning, inter alia, the variations in the power level of the station. In addition, officers of my Department held discussions on this matter with Dr Dayal Abeyasekers, a lecturer in communications engineering at Swinburne College of Technology and consultant to 3CR. Further discussions were held with 3CR representatives at the PBAA Conference in Wodonga on 16-17 December 1978.
  9. Following the observations of increased power, the power output of 3CR was brought under constant surveillance by my Department with the full knowledge of the station. However, no further increases have occurred and consequently the cause of the increased power readings is not known. It is only possible at this stage to carry out intermittent power readings, trusting that the exact cause can still be determined should there be further occurrences.
  10. No.
  11. No.
  12. Australia is a party to the Regional Agreement reached in Geneva 1975 under the auspices of the International Telecommunications Union (The Geneva Plan). The agreement relates to the use of frequencies in the medium frequency bands with a view to improving the use of these bands. There is an agreed need to provide suitable protection and avoid the possibility of interference among MF stations and accordingly a directional aerial is essential in most instances where a power of I kilowatt is used. In regard to Australia, this need is greatest on the east coast where the bulk of radio stations are located. This policy is applied to all MF stations and not only public broadcasting stations.
  13. It is assumed that the commercial broadcasting station referred to is 6NW which, although only recently commissioned, was originally approved in July 1974 by the Australian Broadcasting Control Board according to practices used at that time. It is in an area where the potential of interference to other Australian services is very slight.

Pineapple Industry (Question No. 1417)

Senator Durack:
LP

– On 8 March 1979 Senator Keeffe asked me as Minister representing the Minister for Trade and Resources a question on notice (No. 1417) concerning pineapple imports and production details of the Australian pineapple industry.

In the information provided on 5 June 1 979 to the honourable senator’s question, the statistics of fresh pineapples actually represented imports of dried pineapples. There were no imports of fresh pineapples during 1978-79.

Radio Station 3CR (Question No. 1472)

Senator Primmer:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Post and Telecommunications, upon notice, on 22 March 1979:

  1. 1 ) Has the Minister for Post and Telecommunications given any further consideration to an application by 3CR, Community Radio, Melbourne, for increased transmission power.
  2. When is a decision likely to be made concerning this application.
  3. Is any general policy review contemplated which could result in public and special broadcasting stations being allocated transmission power in the AM and FM bands more in line with power permitted to commercial broadcasters and the Australian Broadcasting Commission.
Senator Chaney:
LP

– The Minister for Post and Telecommunications has provided the following answers to the honourable senator’s questions:

  1. and (2) I wrote to 3CR on 12 January 1979 in response to the station’s application for increased power.
  2. 3 ) At this present time, consideration is not being given to a general policy review in order to authorise an increase in power for public and special broadcasting stations. I am prepared, however, to consider any power increase deemed necessary to upgrade reception within a nominated service area, if it should bc established that coverage of the service area is of an inferior standard.

Ownership and Control of Commercial Broadcasting Stations (Question No. 1653)

Senator Mason:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Post and Telecommunications, upon notice, on 30 May 1979:

Do the ownership and control provisions of the Broadcasting and Television Act 1942 prohibit persons or companies from owning or holding a controlling interest in more than one commercial broadcasting station in metropolitan areas only, and therefore do not apply in non-metropolitan towns and cities: if so ( a ) what are the reasons for this anomaly; ( b ) do the present ownership and control provisions discriminate against non-metropolitan towns and cities because, whilst the independence of capital city radio stations is statutorily guaranteed, radio stations operating within any other city may all be owned or controlled by one person or company with legal impunity; and (c) will the Minister consider amending these provisions to guarantee the same legislative safeguards to non-metropolitan towns and cities as those applying to metropolitan areas.

Senator Chaney:
LP

– The Minister for Post and Telecommunications has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

  1. The ownership and control provisions of the Broadcasting and Television Act prohibit persons or companies from owning or holding a controlling interest in the licences for:

    1. more than one metropolitan commercial broadcasting station in any State;
    2. more than four metropolitan commercial broadcasting stations in Australia;
    3. more than four commercial broadcasting stations in any one State;
    4. more than eight commercial broadcasting stations in Australia.
  2. b ) Except for the cities of Canberra, Newcastle, Wollongong and Launceston, each of which have two commercial broadcasting stations owned and controlled by different interests, at this stage there are no towns or cities outside metropolitan areas with more than one commercial radio station.
  3. I am prepared to consider representations put to me on this subject.

National Engineering Laboratory (Question No. 1663)

Senator Rae:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Productivity, upon notice, on 3 1 May 1979:

What stage has been reached in the preliminary consideration being given to the establishment of a National Engineering Laboratory.

Senator Chaney:
LP

– The Minister for Productivity has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

In November 1977, when the Government announced its 10 point plan for Tasmania, which followed from the Callaghan Report, the concept of a National Engineering Laboratory was under consideration by my Department.

However, the concept was succeeded by a Department of Productivity proposal to establish a network for the coordination, development and promotion of technology transfer to Australian manufacturing industry. In August 1978 the Technology Transfer Council was formed, with the objective of establishing cost effective and practical services which will assist in the effective application of technology in Australian secondary industry. There is a vast amount of specialised expertise in various establishments throughout Australia, in private manufacturing concerns, in Government laboratories and engineering establishments and in tertiary institutions; and the Council is carrying out a program, based on proposals by my Department and the Institution of Engineers, Australia, to make this expertise available to enterprises in a way in which it can be assimilated by the small as well as the large manufacturers.

A technical referral network is being established in the metals industry as a three year pilot program to prove the viability of the concept. The network will include a number of referral centres, which will be linked to organisations having a specialised technological expertise. These are intended to assist metal industry enterprises by bridging them to the most appropriate source of technology needed to meet their requirements. The first six referral centres should be operating by October/November this year, with an additional four planned to come on stream early in 1980. Depending on the needs of industry and the evidence of industry’s increasing support for the scheme, these centres will be extended to serve other metals industry needs and eventually to provide services for other sectors of industry.

With respect to Tasmania, in April 1978 a technical mission from my Department visited four precision engineering establishments in Tasmania. The mission assessed them as having some specialised technological expertise, which could eventually provide an input to the network. No doubt there are other establishments in Tasmania which could also contribute.

My Department’s Director in Tasmania is investigating the requirement by State industry for the setting up of a technical referral centre in Tasmania, and provided there is sufficient evidence of industry support and that funds are available, such a centre could be established in 1980.

While the concept of a National Engineering Laboratory involved a different approach to providing assistance to industry and has not been proceeded with, it is believed that the technology transfer network which succeeded it will be able to provide a much wider service to industry than the laboratory could have done and at much less cost.

Aboriginal Education (Question No. 1677)

Senator Douglas McClelland:
NEW SOUTH WALES · ALP

asked the Minister for Education, upon notice, on 6 June 1979:

  1. How many: (a) male; and (b) female Aborigines are enrolled (i) at each University and College of Advanced Education; and (ii) in each faculty at each university or college.
  2. How many in each category are receiving any technical and further education, at which institutions are they enrolled, and what form of training are they receiving.
Senator Carrick:
LP

– The answer to the honourable senator’s question is as follows:

The following information relates to the number of Aboriginal students who, in 1 978, undertook full time or part time courses at Universities, Colleges of Advanced Education or institutions of Technical and Further Education, with the assistance of the Aboriginal Study Grants Scheme. Information about the total number of Aboriginal students enrolled in these courses is not available to me, since institutions do not generally keep enrolment statistics on the basis of racial origin.

In addition to those students listed, there may therefore be others undertaking similar courses who are in receipt of assistance under schemes, such as NEAT, not administered by my Department.

Australian Broadcasting Commission (Question No. 1718)

Senator Kilgariff:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Post and Telecommunications, upon notice, on 8 June 1979:

Will a representative of the Northern Territory be appointed to the board of the Australian Broadcasting Commission, as an acknowledgement of the Territory’s political and general development.

Senator Chaney:
LP

– The Minister for Post and Telecommunications has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

Section 3 1 of the Broadcasting and Television Act 1 942 relates to the membership of the Australian Broadcasting Commission and provides, in part, for six commissioners comprising, in respect of each State, a person ordinarily resident in that State. Provision is also made for not fewer than three nor more than five other commissioners.

In making appointments to the Commission, the Government will certainly consider the claims of residents of the Northern Territory who might contribute to the deliberations of this most important body.

American Medical International (Question No. 172S)

Senator O’Byrne:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Health, upon notice, on 7 June 1979:

  1. 1 ) Who is the Director of Development for American Medical International in Australia.
  2. Was he formerly a public servant.
  3. In which overseas posts did he serve.
Senator Guilfoyle:
LP

– The Minister for Health has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question: ( I ), (2) and (3) The information sought by the honourable senator was not available within my Department. Some information has been obtained from other sources. This information, while not providing an answer in a strictly current sense, may be of some assistance.

I understand that the post of Director of Development for American Medical International in Australia is currently unoccupied and has been since May 1979. However, my information is that there has been only one holder of the post and that was Mr Noel Harris. Mr Harris was formerly in the Trade Commissioner Service and served in that employment in Calcutta, New Delhi, New York and Manchester(UK)

Australian Citizenship: Form of Oath (Question No. 1741)

Senator Colston:
QUEENSLAND

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs, upon notice, on 2 1 August 1979:

  1. 1 ) What is the current form of oath which is required of persons seeking Australian citizenship.
  2. ) Is the form of this oath set out in an Act or regulations or is it the result of an administrative policy decision.
Senator Guilfoyle:
LP

– The Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

Schedule 2 of the Australian Citizenship Act 1948 sets out the form of oath and affirmation of allegiance to be taken or made by a person to whom a certificate of Australian citizenship has been granted before he can acquire Australian citizenship.

Schedule 2 reads as follows:

Oath of Allegiance

I, A.B., renouncing all other allegiance, swear by Almighty God that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Elizabeth the Second, Queen of Australia, Her heirs and successors according to law, and that I will faithfully observe the laws of Australia and fulfil my duties as an Australian citizen.

Affirmation of Allegiance

I, A.B., renouncing all other allegiance, solemnly and sincerely promise and declare that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Elizabeth the Second, Queen of Australia, Her heirs and successors according to law, and that I will faithfully observe the laws of Australia and fulfil my duties as an Australian citizen.

Superannuation: Government Task Force (Question No. 1755)

Senator Mulvihill:
NEW SOUTH WALES

asked the Minister representing the Treasurer, upon notice, on 21 August 1979:

  1. 1 ) Who are the members of the Government task force which has been entrusted with the examination of superannuation funds, including trade union involvement.
  2. Is there any trade union participation in the membership.
  3. 3 ) Has any time limit been imposed within which the task force must complete its findings.
Senator Carrick:
LP

– The Treasurer has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

  1. 1 ) As the Treasurer indicated in a press release of 12 July the Task Force on occupational superannuation is chaired by an officer of his Department and also includes officials drawn from the Departments of Finance, Prime Minister and Cabinet, Social Security and Industrial Relations, the Taxation Office and the Social Welfare Policy Secretariat.
  2. No.
  3. No. Although the Task Force is expected to complete its work as soon as practicable the complexities of the subject mean that it will be some considerable time before the work of the Task Force is finalised.

Alternative Energy Sources (Question No. 1762)

Senator Walsh:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Primary Industry, upon notice, on 22 August 1979:

  1. 1 ) Which individuals or organisations received funds from the Reserve Bank Rural Credits Department for the study of alternative energy sources for rural industry, referred to in the Minister’s speech to the Rural Youth National Convention, Melbourne, 2 1 July 1979.
  2. ) What are the details of the study projects.
Senator Webster:
NCP/NP

– The Minister for Primary Industry has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

  1. and (2) The financial grants from the Rural Credits Development Fund of the Reserve Bank of Australia for the study of alternative energy sources were in respect of:

University of Sydney- small scale wind energy systems for rural electricity;

Victorian Young Farmers- study of alternative energy sources for rural industry.

Defence Services Canteen Trust Account (Question No. 1763)

Senator Walsh:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Defence, upon notice, on 22 August 1979:

Was a Defence Services Canteen Trust Account established during World War II; if so, was it originally intended that this fund ultimately be distributed to World War II Service personnel, and when was the distribution made?

Senator Carrick:
LP

– The Minister for Defence has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

I am unable to find specific reference to the establishment of such an account. However, the information below may be relevant to your question.

During World War II, the Australian Defence Canteens Service was established and its ‘account’ was initially funded by an advance on temporary credit from the Treasury. That advance was repaid at the end of the War. This ‘account’ was not funded from contributions by servicemen and, consequently, there was no intention that the monies be distributed to World War II Service personnel.

However, towards the end of the War, the Government decided to establish, from surplus canteen profits, the Services Canteen Trust Fund to assist men and women who served in the Australian Armed Forces between 3 September 1939 and 30 June 1947, and their dependants, who were in needy circumstances.

The Services Canteen Trust Fund was established in 1 947 from surplus profits totalling $1 lm. The Fund has to date distributed in excess of$ 18m of its capital, and interest earnings, on welfare relief of eligible ex-Servicemen and women and their dependants in needy circumstances, on education assistance for eligible children and on eligible children suffering from serious afflictions. Distribution has been made through a Board of Trustees and Regional Committees. The balance of the Fund will be distributed in full over the next few years.

Channel Ten, Sydney: Acquisition (Question No. 1769)

Senator Ryan:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Post and Telecommunications, upon notice, on 22 August 1 979:

Did a departmental minute circulated in the Department of Post and Telecommunications suggest that the Australian Broadcasting Tribunal ‘s decision on the acquisition of Channel Ten, Sydney by News Limited would not withstand a legal challenge, as reported in the National Times for the week ending 25 August 1979; if so, was the substance of that minute that News Limited ‘s unconditional acquisition and Colonial Sugar Refining Company Limited, without prior approval of the Tribunal, contravened sections 95F (5) and 92F (6 ) of the Broadcasting and Television Act 1 942.

Senator Chaney:
LP

– The Minister for Post and Telecommunications has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question: lt would bc improper for me to comment on the accuracy of a newspaper ankle purporting to refer to an official memorandum circulated for internal departmental use only.

Department of Productivity and Department of Defence: Offset Program (Question No. 1790)

Senator Wriedt:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Productivity, upon notice, on 21 August 1979:

  1. 1 ) Has the Department of Productivity had discussions with the Department of Defence and manufacturers of aircraft and electronic components about participation in the offset-AIP program in connection with the possible aircraft to be ordered for the Tactical Fighter Force replacement.
  2. Have any tentative proposals been formulated for involvement of Australian firms in offset-AIP; if so, what are those proposals and what firms are involved.
Senator Chaney:
LP

– The Minister for Productivity has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

  1. 1 ) There have been extensive discussions between my Department, the Department of Defence and industry on Offset-AIP programs against the Tactical Fighter Force aircraft requirement. These discussions have been related mainly to work which may be placed on the Australian Aircraft Industry. I am advised that the Department of Defence has also held discussions with the electronics industry on participation in the TFF project, particularly in relation to upgrading Australian industry capability in the avionics area to meet Defence needs.
  2. In view of the competitive situation existing with four aircraft contenders under consideration it is not appropriate for me to provide specific details of proposals which have been formulated. These are being considered within the Department of my colleague the Minister for Defence who will make an announcement at the appropriate time.

Project Australia Campaign (Question No. 1813)

Senator Douglas McClelland:
NEW SOUTH WALES · ALP

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Administrative Services, upon notice, on 23 August 1979:

  1. 1 ) How many advertising agencies were approached with a view to submitting a program for the Project Australia campaign.
  2. ) Which advertising agency is handling the campaign on behalf of the Government.
  3. What is the total expenditure involved in the campaign.
  4. What is the fee paid to the advertising agency concerned for its services.
Senator Chaney:
LP

– The Minister for Administrative Services has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

  1. 1 ) Three advertising agencies were approached by the Australian Government Advertising Service on behalf of the Department of Industry and Commerce with a view to submitting a program for the Project Australia Campaign.
  2. Monahan Dayman Adams Pty Ltd was appointed by the Australian Government Advertising Service to plan and create the campaign. Media placement of the advertising is being arranged through the Australian Government Advertising Service using the services of the Government’s main Placing/Charging agencies, in particular Fortune (Aust.) Pty Ltd and Berry Currie Advertising (NSW) Pty Ltd.
  3. Total expenditure on the Project Australia campaign in 1978-79 was $240,72 1 . This amount included expenditure of $105,879 on costs incurred with advertising agents. Total funds appropriated by the Commonwealth for Project Australia in 1979-80 are $ 1.5m. This appropriation includes $1,030,000 for payment to media and $175,000 for advertisement production.
  4. Ofthe 1 978-79 expenditure referred to in Part ( 3 fees totalling $59,879 have been charged direct to the Department of Industry and Commerce for Monahan Dayman Adams agency services associated with non-media advertising support activity (posters, emblems, et cetera). Separately, the services of that agency for planning, creating and producing advertisements to appear in the media and the services of the Government’s media placement agencies are being paid for from a fund of media commissions and fees on all Commonwealth Government advertising held as a cooperative pool by the Australian Government Advertising Advisory Council, an independent organisation of advertising agents. Amounts paid by that Council result from negotiations between the agencies and the Council and by precedent are considered to be private information.

Core Force Program (Question No. 1814)

Senator Mason:

asked the Minister for Defence, upon notice, on 23 August 1979:

  1. 1 ) Will the Minister outline the Core Force program as adopted for the Royal Australian Air Force ‘s F 1 1 1 C Strategic Reconnaissance Aircraft.
  2. Docs this Core Force program allow familiarity with the technology acquired within industry and the services.
  3. 3 ) Are any other Core Force programs planned or being implemented.
  4. Could a similar program be adopted, as the Minister has previously indicated, using four Fremantle Class Patrol Boats being fitted with Surface-to-Surface Missiles, to allow such familiarity within North Queensland Engineers and Agents (NQEA) shipyards and among Navy personnel so that the other Fremantle Class Patrol Boats may be speedily re-equipped if necessary.
Senator Carrick:
LP

– The Minister for Defence has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

  1. 1 detect in the honourable senator’s question a misunderstanding of what the term ‘core force signifies. ‘Core Force’ is not a planning method. There is no ‘Core Force program ‘ as such. Core Force is essentially a descriptive term for the force-in-being and planned at any one time, that is a force which is judged capable of undertaking peace-time tasks and consisting of those elements and capabilities required to form a ‘core’ for expansion in directions indicated by strategic developments and resource considerations.

The strategic strike force includes twenty FI 1 1C aircraft of which four are being given a sophisticated reconnaissance capability developed specifically for our needs. Many of the features which make the Fill an excellent strike weapon give it great potential in the reconnaissance role.

We are constantly in touch with the United States Air Force to maintain an awareness of opportunities to sustain the technology level of the FI I IC in areas relevant to our strategic circumstances.

  1. Australia has a number of information and technology exchange agreements with advanced overseas countries which enable the Department of Defence and the Services and through them, industry, to remain abreast of international technology developments relevant to Australia’s Defence needs.
  2. ) See my answer to Q( 1 ). The progressive development of the Defence Force as a whole is undertaken on the basis that capabilities we have and plan at any time will form the core ‘ for an expanding force.
  3. 1 repeat my advice to the honourable senator in answer to his question of 6 March 1979 that for the currently planned roles of the Fremantle Class Patrol Boat, the weapons fit is appropriate. I also draw the honourable senator’s attention to the answer to his related Question No. 1815.

I see no justification at this time for directing resources into the fitting of Fremantle class patrol boats with surfacetosurface missiles to the detriment of their peacetime availability and functions. Technological developments in the weapon field make it likely that any specific work carried out now using an available weapon could be inappropriate should a need arise later.

Fremantle Class Patrol Boat (Question No. 1815)

Senator Mason:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Defence, upon notice, on 23 August 1979:

  1. 1 ) Did the Minister state that the Fremantle Class Patrol Boat will be readily adaptable to Surface-to-Surface Missile (SSM) armament.
  2. Does the structural design of the Fremantle Class Patrol Boat contain deck stress points and other structural strengthening to enable missile launchers and pads to be fitted and to operate effectively without alteration; if not, what specific alterations would be required.
  3. Is accommodation allowed, in the construction, for the necessary fire control computers, display units and operators; if not, what alterations would be required.
  4. Have wiring channels been allowed for, in the design of the Fremantle Class Patrol Boats, to permit efficient total connection of SSM-related equipment; if not, what specific alterations would be required.
  5. Does the electricity power supply for operation of computers and radar for SSM fire control exceed normal needs by a magnitude of two to three times.
  6. Will the planned generating equipment on the Fremantle Class Patrol Boats be able to cope with this excess capacity without alteration; if not, what specific alteration would be required.
  7. Will the airconditioning equipment planned to bc placed on the Fremantle Class Patrol Boats be able to sufficiently cool fire control computers required for SSM equipment without alteration; if not, what specific alterations would be required.
Senator Carrick:
LP

– The Minister for Defence has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

  1. In his reply to Senator Mason’s question 1394 on 3 April 1979 the Minister stated, inter alia ‘Should the need arise, missile systems are available which have been proven to be readily and quickly adaptable to patrol craft similar to the Fremantle Class’.
  2. to (7) The Fremantle Class patrol boats were not designed to carry surface-to-surface missiles. However a growth margin has been included in the design for additional or heavier armament.

Due to the constant changes in technical development of surface-to-surface missiles and their associated fire control systems it is not possible to answer the specific points raised in the questions. The answers to the specific points would be entirely dependent upon the system chosen should the need arise.

Fremantle Class Patrol Boat (Question No. 1816)

Senator Mason:

asked the Minister representing the Minister for Defence, upon notice, on 23 August 1979:

  1. 1 ) Were problems experienced by the Royal New Zealand Navy with their Lake-Class Patrol Boats when masthead radar fittings disturbed hull stability.
  2. Docs the design of the Fremantle Class Patrol Boat allow the stability required for Surface-to-Surface missile fire control radar in the masthead; if not, what specific alterations would be required.
Senator Carrick:
LP

– The Minister for Defence has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

  1. 1 ) The Department of Defence are not aware of any stability problems associated with the fitting of masthead radar on the Royal New Zealand Navy’s Lake Class patrol boats.
  2. Yes.

Air Fares

Senator Chaney:
LP

-On 31 May 1979 (Hansard, page 2418), Senator Lajovic asked me, as Minister representing the Minister for Industry and Commerce, the following question without notice: ls the Minister representing the Minister for Industry and Commerce aware that Qantas Airways Ltd and Air New Zealand Ltd have introduced a special low return fare of $A135 to apply during the June-August period. As this period is the winter season in Australia and New Zealand can the Minister provide the Senate with information about the likely effects of this move on the Australian winter tourist industry.

The Minister for Industry and Commerce has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

On 25 May 1979, the Minister for Transport, Mr Nixon, announced new interim off-peak promotional fares for travel between Australia and New Zealand.

The new fares, introduced by Qantas and Air New Zealand on Trans Tasman Services, commenced on 8 June and terminated on 1 5 August. The cost of the new APEX fare Sydney-Auckland, Christchurch/Wellington was $AI32 which represented a reduction of $A49 on the previous off-peak APEX fare. Other new off-peak fares were offered from Brisbane and Melbourne and are provided in the table below.

lt will be some time before a clear indication of travel patterns and preferences emerge. However, the airlines have indicated that they handled a record number of enquiries from New Zealand tourists in relation to the availability of accommodation in Australia which indicates that there was a high level of interest being shown in Australia by potential New Zealand tourists.

The accommodation industry in Sydney and the Gold Coast is reporting generally buoyant conditions. An increase in New Zealand visitors to Sydney hotels and motels has generally been noted, particularly in the middle and lower price areas of the market.

Gold Coast accommodation operators generally reported a slight increase in New Zealand visitor numbers in recent months combined with an increase in domestic tourists.

The Snowy Mountains resorts have reported a poor winter tourist season. The impact of lower air fares to New Zealand in attracting domestic tourists to New Zealand rather than the Snowy Mountains is difficult to assess. However, other factors such as poor snow falls and recent industrial unrest appear to have had a considerably more important effect.

Redeployment of Public Service Staff

Senator Durack:
LP

– On 6 June 1979 Senator Georges asked me the following question, without notice:

Has the Attorney-General’s Department received instructions from the Public Service Board to draft regulations prescribing a reason for redeployment of Public Service staff? If that is the case, would that not be in anticipation and direct contravention of legislation which has not passed this Parliament which states among other things that regulations prescribing a reason for redeployment of public servants shall not be made except after consultation with organisations representing the interests of employees?

The following is in answer to the honourable senator’s question:

Instructions for the drafting of regulations under the Commonwealth Employees ( Redeployment and Retirement) Bill (as it then was) were given by the Public Service Board to my Department on 10 May 1979. Those instructions did include a request for the drafting of regulations prescribing reasons for the purpose of sub-paragraph 7 ( 1 ) (b) (iii). However, the latter regulations have not been made, and they cannot be made until the requirements of sub-section 7(2) of the Bill have been satisfied. That sub-section requires that the Public Service Board engage in consultations with organisations representing the interests of employees. In response to a similar question in the House of Representatives my colleague, the Minister assisting the Prime Minister in Public Service matters, said, ‘This request was made in order that the draft regulations would be available as a basis for discussions with peak councils of employee organisations in the course of consultation between the Board and those organisations as required by sub-clause 7 (2) of the Bill. I am advised by the Board that it is its intention that the consultations required by sub-clause 7 (2) will be frank and comprehensive. It is with this aim in mind that the Board has sought to have a form of words for the regulations available for discussion ‘.

Test Cricket Telecasts

Senator Chaney:
LP

– On 7 June 1979 Senator Douglas McClelland asked the Minister representing the Minister for Post and Telecommunications the following question without notice:

Is the Minister representing the Minister for Post and Telecommunications aware that in many country areas, including areas covered by regional commercial television, great concern is being expressed by sports lovers that they will be denied what to date has been their right- namely, to watch allday telecasts of test cricket matches- because some of the regional commercial television stations have not yet made up their minds whether they will take, on relay, any part of the telecasts from the Channel 9 network? As I understand it, because of that fact no offer has yet been made by the Channel 9 network to the Australian Broadcasting Commission as to picking up the cricket. Because of the great concern being expressed about the matter in country areas, and especially those of New South Wales, will the Minister ask the Minister for Post and Telecommunications to consider calling during the forthcoming parliamentary recess a conference of executives of the Channel 9 network, the Federation of Commercial Television Stations, the Australian Broadcasting Tribunal and the ABC in an endeavour to sort out the problem and ensure adequate telecasts of the test cricket matches next summer?

The Minister for Post and Telecommunications has provided the following answer to the honourable senator’s question:

I am informed that all regional commercial stations have agreed to accept the test cricket proposals negotiated with the Channel 9 network. Details relating to the extent of coverage and scheduling arrangements for the program are of course a matter for the management of the individual station concerned.

Cite as: Australia, Senate, Debates, 12 September 1979, viewed 22 October 2017, <http://historichansard.net/senate/1979/19790912_senate_31_s82/>.