Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Chairman of the Coalition Policy Development Committee) Share this | Hansard source

I have a series of further questions if the minister would please respond. The government took a step yesterday on one of the measures—that is, the departure tax, which is now known as the people movement charge for some reason—in the budget. The government chose to remove the proposed indexation of the people movement charge at a cost to the budget over four years of an estimated $157 million. In addition to that, this morning we saw the government withdraw a major bill which had proposed to increase the tax on proceeds of investments in managed investment funds from 7½ per cent to 15 per cent. This measure was estimated in the budget papers to deliver savings of around $256 million.

I ask the minister: how does the government intend to meet its budget commitment to a budget surplus of $1.5 billion by 30 June 2013 given that these two measures alone over the last 24 hours come at a total cost of $413 million? Or has the government, alternatively, decided to revise downwards its budget surplus forecast to $1 billion and $77 million?

The second area of questioning concerns the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. Currently the government plans to allocate $2 billion per year over five years commencing in the 2013-14 financial year. Minister, can you guarantee that under no circumstances this funding profile will change? For example, will we possibly find that as an election approaches these borrowed funds are not brought forward to enable costly contracts to be locked in prior to the next election? Can you explain why there is a funding program almost identical in purpose to the CEFC which is both outlined as a budget measure and factored into the budget bottom line where, as you know, the Clean Energy Finance Corporation is off-budget and the expenditure associated with it does not go to the bottom line?

That existing program, the Renewable Energy Venture Capital Fund, is in the 2011-12 budget, page 304, budget paper No. 2. In explaining it, the paper says:

The Government will provide $108.7 million over 14 years to support the development and commercialisation of renewable energy technologies by making early-stage equity investments that leverage private funds.

Minister, this would seem to us to provide a clear precedent and I ask you: does it not provide a clear precedent as to why the CEFC and its $10 billion in funding should be treated on budget. I cannot distinguish any feature between the Renewable Energy Venture Capital Fund and the Clean Energy Finance Corporation which separates the purpose, in many ways the execution, and one is treated on budget and the other one is treated off budget. Finally can you provide any information about planned staffing arrangements for the CEFC, and can you confirm that key senior appointments will not be made by multiple-year contract, whether they be two, three or four? Finally, can the minister may please explain a matter in today's Financial Review report of the RBA minutes. One of the key claims of the government has been that its budget management, including its commitment to bring back the budget to surplus, has somehow been a factor in interest rate reductions, yet we have seen in the paper today the minutes of the RBA. I ask the Minister how can they be reconciled with what the RBA have said at their recent board meeting? (Time expired)

See this speech in context