Full transcript - Final - Queensland Parliament - Queensland ...

9 Mar 1999 Trans-Tasman Mutual Recognition (Queensland) Bill 351
that the rest of the world will go away. It does
not work that way, and not one job will be
created by taking the path that One Nation
suggested today.
Hon. P. D. BEATTIE (Brisbane Central—
ALP) (Premier) (3.19 p.m.), in reply: I thank
honourable members for their contribution to
this debate. In particular, I thank the
Opposition for its support for the Bill. I will not
respond to the point that the Leader of the
Opposition made about the delay with this Bill.
I think he waited two years before he
introduced it, but those trivial matters do not
deserve to be raised in this House. As he
knows, I promised new standards and I do not
intend to raise those sort of issues.
Having said that, the Leader of the
Opposition did raise some interesting points in
relation to National Competition Policy, and by
and large I share his view in relation to them. I
think I should advise the House that I have
written in the strongest terms to the Prime
Minister, urging him to review the role and
authority of the National Competition Council. I
have implemented policies which ensure that
only those competition reforms which pass a
public benefit test will be implemented. I have
maintained Queensland's position in respect of
major reforms to achieve our competition
payments without selling off all our assets, as
they have in Victoria. This is a very important
point.
In many respects the sale of public assets
in Victoria, such as the electricity industry, is
going to deprive future generations of their
opportunity to control that industry in their own
State. My concern is that it will be controlled by
the boardrooms of New York and London, and
I do not think that is in the interests of regional
development or Australian development. In
particular, I think National Competition Policy
works very much against States such as
Queensland. If one considers that Melbourne
has something like 70% of Victoria's
population, one sees that changes that can be
made in smaller States—and in a sense it is
almost a city State, if you look at the size of
Melbourne—cannot be made in States such
as Queensland, where only approximately
46% of the population live in the capital city.
Therefore, when one is trying to maintain
services to regional and country Queensland,
there must be Government control of natural
assets or resources, such as the electricity
industry. Water is another one. At the moment
we are constantly battling with the
Commonwealth over water. As the former
Premier will know, this was an issue that he
had to deal with. I know the difficulties that he
had from what I have seen; we are having the
same difficulties, because we do not want to
see people out there paying for water which is
going to undermine their ability to survive.
The honourable member for Burnett
spoke about this—one of the things that I put
on the hold. Had the National Competition
Policy gone ahead in letter form, a lot of
farmers around Bundaberg—and I know the
member for Bundaberg would share this
concern as well—would have been the first hit.
I would not, and the Cabinet would not, let it
go ahead for that very reason. We were
concerned about what it meant. We have
written to the Prime Minister. There have been
some changes in terms of the implementation
program, and I want other changes in terms of
National Competition Policy so the farmers in
the honourable member's area are not
disadvantaged. They do not generally support
my side of politics. That has nothing to do with
it. This is bigger than politics; this is about
getting a system of Government where we, in
fact, control it.
I totally agree with one of the things that
the Leader of the Opposition said. It will stun
him as much as it will stun other members of
this House. The control of National
Competition Policy should be taken back to
the Premiers. It should not be handled by
some independent body over which the duly
elected people have little control. We have to
remember in all these things that National
Competition Policy on its own can lead, as it
has in Britain, to large private monopolies in
the control of water and other natural assets, if
one wants to put it in those terms. What is the
point of having water in the control of a private
monopoly? How does that improve the lot of
people's lives? It does not.
At least if someone is unhappy about the
electricity supply they are getting or unhappy
about the quality of the water, what do they
do? They can get on to their local member of
Parliament, they can turn it into a public issue
if it is of such significance and they can
change Government. Governments have been
changed on the basis of the provision of these
sorts of services—important, life threatening
services in some circumstances, or certainly
services that impact on people's quality of life.
Governments have been changed on the
basis of them. That is the ability of an
electorate to change the Government if they
do not like the services they are getting.
National Competition Policy removes the
control, and we need to do something about
that. I have to say that it is time that all sides
of politics in this country at a State and Federal