Treasury Laws Amendment (Doubling Penalties for Accc Enforcement) Bill 2026

Katy Gallagher

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

I seek leave to have the second reading speech incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The speech read as follows—

Today, I introduce the Treasury Laws Amendment (Doubling Penalties for ACCC Enforcement) Bill 2026.

This bill amends the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 to double maximum penalties for misconduct under competition law and the Australian Consumer Law, from $50 million to $100 million.

These laws help tackle price gouging at its source, outlawing:

The even stronger penalties we are introducing will empower the ACCC to throw the book at any companies who illegally and unfairly increase their prices.

Since the start of the war, we have seen much higher prices for petrol and diesel across the country.

It has put more pressure on motorists and families already doing it tough.

Our message to petrol retailers has been clear: you are on notice; do not use the conflict to take advantage of Australians.

Now they'll face penalties up to $100 million per offence if they do.

These penalties apply across the economy.

This will help ensure all retailers and suppliers, from fuel companies to supermarkets and the entire supply chain in between, do not use the war in the Middle East as an excuse for illegal and unfair pricing.

The states and territories share the Albanese government's sense of urgency. Reforms to the Australian Consumer Law require agreement of the states and territories, and I want to thank every one of them for swiftly confirming their agreement to support these reforms.

The ACCC has been clear they won't hesitate to take action to protect consumers and markets, and they'll seek the highest penalties appropriate in any case they take to court.

This bill is an important way we are protecting consumers and securing Australia's fuel security, but it's not the only way.

We have already:

The bill also brings Australia's competition law penalties into closer alignment with comparable economies.

It's the latest step in our strong track record of competition and consumer reforms since coming to government in 2022.

We have already legislated the single biggest reform to Australia's merger laws in 50 years.

We're introducing unfair trading practice arrangements to protect consumers and small businesses, including farmers and producers.

We've increased ACCC funding by over $30 million to go after supermarkets using misleading pricing tactics.

We're strengthening the Unit Pricing Code to tackle shrinkflation, and have made the Food and Grocery Code of Conduct mandatory, with tough penalties to stop supermarkets from unfairly squeezing suppliers.

We're reforming non-compete clauses and other employment restraints.

We're extending the right to repair to agricultural machinery.

We're making it easier for new businesses to enter the market by incentivising the states and territories to cut commercial and industrial planning and zoning red tape under the revitalised National Competition Policy.

Backed by our $900 million National Productivity Fund, we're working with the states and territories on:

All of this is about making sure Australian families get a fair go and easing the pressure where we can.

My message to fuel companies is clear.

If you do the right thing by your customers, our government is here to support you.

But if you take advantage of foreign conflicts and take Australians for mugs, the ACCC will throw the book at you.

That's what these laws are all about.

Full details of the measure are contained in the explanatory memorandum.

I commend this bill to the chamber.

Claire Chandler

I rise to speak on the Treasury Laws Amendment (Doubling Penalties for ACCC Enforcement) Bill 2026. Let us be abundantly clear. This bill exists because Australia is in a fuel crisis, and the Albanese Labor government failed to act early enough to prevent it. The coalition will not oppose tougher enforcement, but it is not going to pretend that doubling penalties fixes the underlying problem that Australians are facing at the bowser today. This bill is the result of failure. It comes to this parliament only after fuel prices have spiralled beyond control and after Australians have already started to pay the price. The coalition supports staff enforcement, and it always has, but good policy anticipates problems rather than reacts after the damage is done. The coalition will not oppose this bill today, but it will use this opportunity to hold the Labor Albanese government accountable for a serious and growing cost-of-living crisis.

This bill proposes to double the maximum penalties available for breaches of competition and consumer law. That is a significant change and is one that the parliament should examine carefully. Penalties matter. They are meant to deter serious misconduct. Simply increasing penalties does not on its own create deterrence. What matters is whether those penalties are targeted, proportionate and backed by evidence and sound policy. Those questions matter even more in the economic environment that Australians are living in today. Australia is facing a genuine national fuel crisis. In many parts of the country, petrol prices are about $2.50 a litre, if not more, and diesel is well over $3 a litre and rising. Prices are changing so fast that these figures are very quickly outdated. In fact, they might be outdated even now. This hurts families, farmers, freight operators, manufacturers, small businesses and entire regional communities across this country. Australians understand that global pressures exist. But when those pressures hit Australians expect clarity, urgency and leadership from their government.

Instead, in recent weeks, Australians have been told different things at different times by different ministers while fuel prices have continued to climb higher and higher each and every day. This is why Australians are fast losing trust in this government when it comes to fuel. This government didn't warn Australians. They didn't act early. Let us not forget that their solution was to tell people to buy less fuel. This fuel crisis didn't emerge overnight. The warning signs were there, and this government chose not to act. That does raise a serious question about whether what we are debating today is considered reform or simply a reactive response to a crisis that this government has failed to manage. Doubling penalties is by definition retrospective. It punishes misconduct after the damage is already done. It will not put one extra litre of fuel into the Australian market, and it will do nothing to lower Australia's fuel prices today. That doesn't mean the penalties are unimportant, but we must be honest with Australians about what this bill can do and what this bill cannot do.

The ACCC already has significant enforcement powers, and courts already impose serious penalties when misconduct is proven. That makes this government's delay impossible to explain, because if these tools existed all along then why did the government wait until Australians were paying record prices to act? The coalition's position is clear. We support strong enforcement. We support penalties that deter real misconduct. But we don't want to see enforcement being used to mask policy failure. That is why, while we will support this bill today, we will continue to hold the government to account for its failures in regard to this fuel crisis, because this is a real crisis that Australians are facing right now. It is a crisis that is affecting households, small businesses and entire sectors of the economy. As I say, for that reason the coalition is not going to obstruct necessary measures, but we are not going to stay silent while Australians pay record prices because this government acted too late, spoke too loosely and is now legislating after the fact.

Nick McKim

Fair dinkum! This Senate is existing in some kind of alternative reality in relation to this war, in relation to who started the war, in relation to Iran's actions and in relation to the fuel price and availability crisis currently being endured by the Australian people. This Senate is living in an alternative reality.

The real facts are these. Fact 1 is that the Labor Party supports this war. The Prime Minister was one of the first global leaders out after the US and Israel illegally engaged in an unprovoked attack on Iran saying he thought it was a good idea. He has been joined by the Liberal Party, the National Party and One Nation—the parties of war in this place. What we are getting today from all of these parties is that, somehow, the fuel crisis in Australia manifested out of thin air. Well, it didn't manifest out of thin air. It was an entirely predictable consequence of the illegal aggression against Iran perpetrated by the US, perpetrated by Israel and cheerled by our sycophantic, mediocre Prime Minister. That's fact 1.

Fact 2 is that Iran didn't wake up one morning and decide to start bombing petrochemical facilities in the Gulf region. What actually started the war was an unprovoked, illegal act by the US and Israel. That's what started the war. Iran's actions are not a provocation; they are a retaliation to an illegal provocation from the US and Israel, cheerled by the Labor Party. The Labor Party used to oppose wars back in the day, but they haven't seen a US war they didn't love in the last couple of decades, because they've abandoned their roots. They've forgotten where they came from as a political movement. They're far more interested in sucking up to Donald Trump than they are in calling for global peace and an end to the suffering, the death, the misery, the injuries and the displacement of millions of people across Iran, Southern Lebanon and elsewhere.

Do you know who's paying for the warmongers—for the Labor Party, the Liberals, the Nationals and One Nation? If you want to just look in a domestic context, do you know who's paying? It's the people who are trying to get fuel at the moment. They're the people who are paying. No-one who supports this war should come in here and pretend that the fuel crisis is somehow happening in isolation. This was an entirely predictable consequence of the illegal invasion and bombardment of Iran perpetrated by Israel and the United States and cheerled by the Labor Party, cheerled by the Liberals, cheerled by the Nationals and cheerled on by One Nation. This was so obviously what was going to happen.

All of the wargames that have been conducted for decades said this was going to happen. Don't pretend you did not know this would happen. Of course it was going to happen. Of course Australians were going to pay the price at the petrol bowser. But I want to say, very clearly, to Australians unfortunately and tragically for the people in the Gulf region, we have not seen nothing yet. The human consequences overseas, the economic consequences and the material pain for Australians have unfortunately barely begun. There is no scenario where things go back to the way they used to be anytime soon, and there is every chance that this war is a cataclysmic black-swan event for the global economy. And it will be because of the war criminals Trump and Netanyahu, and because no-one in this place, apart from the Australian Greens, had the stones to stand up and say, 'We want peace, not war.'

Well, you reap what you sow. Every one of you should be held responsible by the Australian people for the economic pain they're feeling, let alone the people over there who are being murdered—

Slade Brockman

Senator McKim—

Nick McKim

and smeared across the landscape—

Slade Brockman

Senator McKim! Resume your seat.

Nick McKim

and bloodily dismembered in their thousands—

Slade Brockman

Senator McKim! Senator McKim, I will remind you that we do need to behave in a way that reflects the chamber. Could you also please move your second reading amendment, if you so desire.

Nick McKim

I move:

At the end of the motion, add ", but the Senate:

(a) notes that:

(i) price gouging is not banned under Australian law except in relation to supermarkets,

(ii) this bill will do nothing to stop fuel corporations from price gouging because it only increases penalties on existing offences, and

(iii) Labor ministers that claim this bill will stop fuel corporations price gouging are misleading the Australian public; and

(b) calls on the Government to:

(i) stop backing President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu's illegal war on Iran, which is a key driver of skyrocketing fuel prices, and

(ii) extend the supermarket price gouging ban across the whole economy, including to fuel corporations".

Long debate text truncated.