Senator SPINDLER (11.59 a.m.) —I move:

1.Schedule, page 4, after item 16, insert the following items:

"16A. Paragraph 14(1)(b):

Omit `$30,000', substitute `$15,000'.

"16B. Subsection 14(1)(c):

Omit from the formula `$30,000', substitute `$15,000'.

"16C. Subsection 16(4):

Omit from the formula `$30,000', substitute `$15,000'.

"16D. Subsection 16A(3):

Omit `$30,000' (wherever occurring), substitute `$15,000'.

"16E. Subsection 16A(4):

Omit `$30,000' (wherever occurring), substitute `$15,000'.

"16F. Subsection 16A(6):

Omit `$30,000' (wherever occurring), substitute `$15,000'.".

This amendment, as I indicated before in my speech during the second reading debate, seeks to reduce the threshold amount from the current $30,000 to $15,000. The threshold has been increased progressively over the years and clearly it establishes a very significant barrier for small business operators who wish to break into export markets. We have seen items in the newspapers just in the last few days saying that only a small percentage of small business operators are entering export markets and that the potential is very much greater.

  The government, aided and abetted by the opposition, actually puts barriers in front of small business to access this particular scheme which, if not the only one, is one of the really interventionist schemes that the government is pursuing—one that is successful and one that the Democrats support. All we are asking is that small business operators be given access to it.