I acknowledge the First Australians on whose land we meet, and whose cultures we celebrate as among the oldest continuing cultures in human history.
It's great to be back in Western Australia for this, my 16th visit as Prime Minister.
On average, I've been in the West every two months since the last election.
And the reason is simple - WA is a driving force of the Australian economy for the 21st century.
WA is a major Australian gateway to the world.
This great international city of Perth.
Its great public universities.
Great centres of innovation.
Outstanding tourist areas like the Margaret River, which now rivals the vineyards of France.
WA's mighty mineral and energy fields which make such an important contribution to our nation's exports and our national economy.
Western Australia has always been characterised by the spirit of enterprise.
Always by a willingness to have a go.
And all Australians share a sense of pride in this State's nation-building achievements.
WA has had to overcome the tyranny of distance from the major population centres of the East.
And it has done so in spades.
WA has become Australia's gateway to India.
To China.
To Indonesia, and the rest of South East Asia.
This is a State with unlimited potential.
Today, I want to talk to you in a very concrete way about what we have done together so far.
And what we can do together for the future.
Always, my overriding goal is to build a stronger economy that delivers a fairer share for working families.
We came to office with an ambitious agenda because we believe Australian families deserved better: better economic opportunities, better health and hospitals and better schools.
And the Government has made progress.
We've ended Work Choices.
And that means a fairer share for West Australian workers.
Let me give you as an example what that has meant locally.
More than a thousand employees work with the Activ Foundation in over one hundred facilities across Perth and regional towns like Albany, Busselton, Kalgoorlie and Manjimup.
These workers have challenging jobs providing respite care, home care and full accommodation services for people living with disabilities.
WorkChoices delivered them individual contract AWAs that gave them little or no access to penalty rates, permanency or personal leave.
Home care assistants were on as little at $15.53 per hour.
But now, under the Fair Work Act, the union and their employer have negotiated an enterprise agreement delivering them better pay, penalty rates, long service leave and access to permanency.
And relations between management and staff have improved.
The Government has also cut income taxes three years in a row.
Again, that has made a difference for around one million West Australian taxpayers who are battling cost of living pressures.
That means someone on $50,000 will now pay $1,750 less in income tax.
In other words, an 18 per cent tax cut - or almost one in every five dollars being paid in tax three years ago, is now back in their own pockets.
Nationally, we've boosted our investment in the health and hospitals system by 50 per cent compared with the previous government.
Here in the West, we've increased hospital funding for Western Australia by 55 per cent.
We're funding an additional 1,000 new nurse training places every year nationally.
We are raising the number of GPs being trained to 1,200 a year - more than double the cap imposed by Mr Abbott as Health Minister.
And we've investing to help the WA Government build new hospitals and health facilities, including:
- the new rehabilitation unit at Fiona Stanley Hospital; and
- a new general hospital to replace the existing Swan Districts Hospital.
- new GP Super Clinics in Cockburn, Midland and Wanneroo.
And we are improving the access and support for cancer patients in rural and remote parts of the state with two Regional Cancer Centre projects at Bunbury and outside the South-West, with a multi-site network of rural cancer centres to improve services in Albany, Northam, Narrogin, Geraldton and Kalgoorlie.
As a government, we're also delivering for West Australian families.
When we were all threatened by the global financial crisis, the Government did what we had to do to support jobs and keep our economy strong.
We acted decisively to support families here in Western Australia and across the nation - with an economic stimulus that injected $5.3 billion into the West Australian economy.
Almost every other advanced economy went into recession.
Australia didn't, and the reason we didn't was because as a
nation, we all came together, governments, business, unions and local communities.
The Government took decisive action.
As a result, Australia has come through stronger than almost every other advanced economy in the world.
Although let's be clear - many families and small businesses are still doing it tough because recovery has been so uneven.
In the rest of the world, millions of jobs have been lost - as much as 16 million in the OECD.
But in Australia, since the global recession began in 2008 we've been creating jobs.
There's almost 225,000 more jobs today than there were then.
West Australian families were hit hard by the global recession - with the unemployment rate almost doubling in the 12 months after September 2008.
But since then, 25,000 West Australians are back in jobs and unemployment is now below the nation's average, at 4.7 per cent.
As a government, we know we haven't been able to do everything that we planned - and some things didn't go according to plan.
But we are determined to get on with the job.
We've got much, much more to do to keep the economy strong and deliver a fairer share for Australian families.
It all starts with maintaining a strong economy.
This is critical given the storm clouds gathering over Europe and the uncertainties of global financial markets arising from concerns over some European sovereign debt and public discussions of the risks of default.
Here in Australia, we're getting the budget back to surplus in three years' time, three years ahead of time - to keep the economy strong.
Australia already has the lowest debt and the lowest deficit of all the Major Advanced Economies.
Australia's budget will return to surplus ahead of all the major advanced economies.
Australia's debt levels are lower when compared with the debt levels of all the major advance economies - peaking at less than one-tenth the average of the major advanced economies.
In fact, because our economy didn't go into recession, our net debt will peak at less than half of what was projected 12 months ago.
By keeping the economy strong, tax revenues have held up better.
By keeping people in jobs, we've spent less on unemployment benefits.
That's all helped bring the budget back to black in three years - three years ahead of time.
We're also investing in schools, in training, and in universities, so our kids have the skills they need for the jobs of the future.
We're currently delivering Trades Training Centres for 102 West Australian secondary schools.
We're building better primary schools for our kids - with 2,985 projects across 1,067 West Australian schools.
New libraries, new science centres, new language centres.
We are investing in major building and infrastructure works at West Australian universities, including an Engineering Pavilion at Curtin University of Technology.
We're also investing in nation-building infrastructure for Australia's future after years of governments failing to invest enough in our roads, railways and ports.
The Nation Building Program has increased the national investment in West Australian roads and railways by more than two thirds.
This investment includes projects like the Great Eastern Highway upgrade.
We have committed to new Australian Rail Track Corporation infrastructure in the goldfields region.
We've committed to the development of Oakajee Port, to service mines in the Mid West.
Another example is the Fitzgerald River National Park project.
In early 2009, Premier Barnett came to me and expressed his concern about BHP Billiton's decision to close the Ravensthorpe nickel mine during the worst phase of the global financial crisis.
We resolved to work together to upgrade the roads and facilities within the Park - and support the local community.
The Australian and WA Governments are working together to rebuild and seal 80 kilometres of road, and develop a coastal walking trail from Bremer Bay to Hopetoun.
The project will support more than 80 local jobs.
And it means this outstanding natural asset will become an even more attractive destination for both domestic and international tourists.
And we are committed to making housing more affordable.
We have introduced the Housing Affordability Fund (HAF), to lower the cost of building new homes.
So far, the Government has funded 59 projects across Australia.
A quarter of these - 15 projects- are in Western Australia.
Last month, I visited the Newhaven Development at Armadale, where we are enabling the City of Armadale Council to relocate powerlines, build roads and drains, and install water, power, sewer and gas services.
In this one location, this will allow 59 home buyers on low and moderate incomes to buy homes for under $300,000, with a saving of almost $30,000 per home.
And as I said, this is one of fifteen housing affordability projects we are rolling out across WA.
We are also building around 2,000 social houses in WA, and carrying out repairs and maintenance on around 10,000 existing homes.
This is critical to tackling the shortage of public housing in this state.
And despite setbacks, we will continue to act on climate change.
We are expanding renewable energy so that by 2020, renewables will generate enough power to meet the electricity needs of all Australian households.
And with major investments in renewables like solar energy - building one of the world's largest solar power plants here in Australia.
This morning, I announced a significant investment here in Perth to support the renewable energy component of Australia's bid for the $2.5 billion Square Kilometre Array radio telescope.
As you know, this is a global, competitive project and we're up against South Africa.
Part of the bid criteria is to require the use of sustainable energy in the project.
So the Australian Government's $47.3 million investment announcement today is to build the nation's single largest geo-thermal facility to power the Pawsey High Performance Computing Centre in Kensington - as well as a full scale solar/storage/diesel energy generations system at the Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory.
This is one of dozens of renewable energy projects the Government is supporting across the nation - all part of the Government's continued response to climate change.
Each one of these investments matters because each plays a part in building a stronger economy that delivers a fairer share to working families.
I know that families in this State face cost of living pressures and there are times they are anxious about the future.
Today, I want to talk to you about that future and about the Government's proposal for a Resources Super Profit Tax.
But before I do, let's learn a lesson from history.
The first Premier of Western Australia, the great explorer and geographer Sir John Forrest, was determined to ensure that the great mining boom of the 1890s built enduring foundations for Western Australia's future.
That boom almost quadrupled the West Australian population in the decade from 1894.
Forrest supported mining but was often opposed by goldminers for his commitment to using the proceeds of the gold rush to leave a lasting endowment for the whole of Western Australia.
Forrest was determined to make lasting investments in
public works such as railways, bridges, jetties, telegraph lines, pipelines, hospitals and lighthouses.
As his biographer Frank Crowley notes:
"Forrest wanted to make the prosperity of the present pay for the hoped-for success of the future... This did not endear him to goldminers."
But in the long run, those investments helped build this great State.
These are things to learn from the debate of a hundred years ago.
I understand that in this State there is community concern about the Resources Super Profits Tax proposal.
And I also understand that in certain quarters there is outright opposition to it.
And I am here today to listen to those concerns, and to respond to them.
This great State, this great nation has been big enough to work our way through these big debates before.
And I believe we will do so again.
Stripped of all the harsh words and loud noise this debate couldn't be simpler.
The fact is we have now entered a second phase of the mining boom that began nearly a decade ago.
The last mining boom delivered very large profits both in Queensland and in Western Australia.
But not all the working families of Queensland and Western Australia benefited from the boom.
People like Richard Dow, a 57 year old employee of the Activ Foundation - helping people with disabilities in a group home in High Wycombe in Perth, and getting by on an income of just $35,000 per year.
For hundreds of thousands of West Australians like him, the mining boom meant higher rents, bigger mortgage debts, and increased costs of living.
So it's important as a nation that in this boom we do better than in the last boom.
And particularly, we do better in making sure all West Australians get a fair share.
There's a core principle here - the people of Western Australia actually own these resources.
Furthermore, they are finite resources - you can only take them out and ship them off once.
That means acting now to get a fair share of the proceeds for Australian families.
It means acting now to get a fair share for Australian businesses so they can employ more workers.
And it means acting now to see truly first class infrastructure in the resource states.
There is a lot of sound but often not a lot of light in the public debate so far.
I believe that responsible sections of the resources sector now accept that the sector can pay more tax than at present.
I believe that there is also acceptance that a tax based on profit rather than a tax based on volume of ore extracted is a more efficient tax.
These are important foundations stones on which to build.
And in building on this foundation, the Government is determined to implement tax reform which is designed to build a stronger and more enduring foundation for long term economic growth.
The Government's vision for tax reform is to deliver tax benefits right across the WA economy.
Tax reform that will mean we can cut taxes to make Australian companies and small businesses more competitive - to help with their bottom line.
We will cut the company tax rate from 30 to 28 per cent.
Here in the West, at least 50,000 companies stand to benefit from such a tax cut.
Furthermore, we are cutting taxes for small business - all 2.4 million Australia-wide and more than 160,000 here in WA.
For those 160,000 small businesses and tradies here in WA, that means increasing their ability to instantly write-off the purchase of business assets from $1000 to $5000. This really helps, straightaway, with the bottom line for a small restaurateur buying an oven, fridge or a new computer.
These small businesses are an important driver of the Australian economy.
And cutting taxes for small businesses will increase their profits and give them more resources to invest in growth.
Reducing the company tax rate will make Australian businesses more competitive with others they compete with around the world.
The second key element of our reform package is to lift the Superannuation Guarantee for all Australian workers, from 9 per cent to 12 per cent over the next decade.
That means better super for 700,000 WA workers - a better and more secure retirement.
This will boost our national superannuation savings pool by $85 billion over 10 years.
For a 30 year old on a wage of $50,000 today, that will mean an extra $108,000 in their super nest egg for retirement.
Good for the economy.
Good for working families.
Third, because of tax reform, we will fund investment in essential infrastructure that will help build a stronger and more productive economy.
These are the three key endowments that will come from the Resources Super Profits Tax.
They are benefits that will reach every Australian home and every Australian business.
And - more importantly - they will reach into the future, conferring advantage upon our nation through this generation and beyond.
Including here in Western Australia.
My vision for tax reform includes building a fund to invest in new infrastructure that is essential for West Australian families, WA communities and for this State's future.
To use some of the proceeds from the mining boom to build the road, rail, ports, and the infrastructure for the workforce that supports the mining industry, and which supports WA's future growth.
The Australian Government is determined to ensure that mining communities benefit from the resources boom.
It is not right that the regions and towns producing so much of Australia's wealth, should suffer from a poverty of investment.
I believe it is time to put something back into the mining communities, and those communities which support them, that give so much to Australia and make our national economy strong.
It is my intention that the lion share of the infrastructure fund generated by the Resources Super Profit Tax should go to the major resource states of WA and Queensland - consistent with each state's share of total mining production.
That is why the Government can announce today that we will be directing a bigger share of the proceeds of a resurgent resources boom back into resource states through critical infrastructure to boost our export capacity across the wider economy.
The Government will therefore establish a new $6 billion Regional Infrastructure Fund.
The Regional Infrastructure Fund will invest in projects with potential partner funding from States, private investors and/or local governments.
The Fund comprises $5.6bn of revenue from the Resources Super Profits Tax commencing in 2012-13, as previously announced.
Today I am pleased to announce an additional $400 million for the fund between 2010-11 and 2013-14.
These are funds that have already been provided for in the Budget.
This takes the total fund to be worth a massive $6 billion.
And it means investment can start now, to address our urgent infrastructure needs, rather than waiting for revenue proceeds of the Resources Super Profits Tax to flow.
Today I also can announce that Western Australia should expect more than $2 billion in additional infrastructure investment from this fund.
That means more rail, roads, ports, and other crucial infrastructure to support the workforce in critical mining regions and in communities that support mining regions.
Infrastructure Australia will be consulted on projects.
Projects will be selected based on the following criteria:
- Promote development and job creation in mining communities, and communities which support the mining sector;
- Provide a clear benefit to Australia's economic development, and to investment in Australia's resource or export capacity;
- Address potential capacity constraints arising from export production and resource projects.
For example, I know that Premier Barnett has identified the need to upgrade infrastructure for the Pilbara Cities of Karratha and Port Hedland - including airport upgrades, water and communications infrastructure, and land servicing.
Another demand is upgrades to road links to the expanded Perth Airport, which is also a critical part of WA's infrastructure to support the mining sector.
It is high time that the regions in this State that generate so much of our national wealth got their fair share of the proceeds of the mining boom - and that is what our tax reform plans will deliver.
Reforming the taxation of resources also constitutes a significant national economic reform.
The existing system of inconsistent state royalty taxes is inefficient and unfair.
It disadvantages mines with higher investment requirements and higher extraction costs.
And it imposes a tax before they've even made a dollar of profit.
The Resources Super Profits Tax will tax profits, not production.
And it won't impose one dollar of tax until companies have made a normal return on investment.
Typical resources projects earning less than 10 per cent returns will therefore pay less tax under this reform - as Treasury's analysis has shown.
Distortions in investment decisions will be reduced, and West Australian resource development will be promoted.
Long-term reforms are rarely popular - but as economists have confirmed, the long-term impact of this reform will be a stronger economy and a stronger mining sector.
It will mean a more secure and comfortable retirement for Australian working families.
In addition, the RSPT will ensure that mining companies pay their fair share for the resources they rent from the Australian people, including the people of WA.
So that when global commodity prices rise and profits boom - as they did earlier this decade, and are doing again now - Australians will get a fair share for our resources.
But if prices moderate and profits fall, as occurred last year, mining companies will also be paying less.
This reform is about efficiency, it's about economic reform, it's about a stronger economy and it's about West Australian families getting their fair share.
The Australian Government is determined to continue the job of building a strong economic future for Western Australia and ensuring West Australian families get a fairer share.
We're continuing with the job of getting the budget back to surplus and delivering better economic opportunities, better health and hospitals and better schools for West Australian families.
And we will ensure this great State of Western Australia and its mining communities benefit from the resources boom you are working so hard to deliver.
I come to this State keen to talk with miners, workers and members of the community about my plans for the future and the details of our Resources Super Profit Tax.
And I've come to this State keen to listen.
But I am sure that through our conversation it will become clear that we believe in and are driven by the same goals.
A resources boom that support all WA companies by lowering company tax.
A resources boom that benefits working families in Western Australia by boosting super.
A resources boom that delivers a $2 billion plus Regional Infrastructure Fund that re-invests that money in WA's future infrastructure needs.
A fair share too for mining companies that take on so much risk and have to strive to be the best in a competitive world.
A fair share for those who work in mining.
A fair share for mining communities that see the benefits but also feel the burdens of rapid economic growth.
A fair share for Western Australia.
And a fair share for the owners of the mineral wealth in the ground - and that's each of us and all of us.