Janelle Saffin (Page, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The humbug and the hypocrisy of the opposition in putting forward, through the honourable member for Groom, such a matter and in talking about ‘the failure’ of the government just astounds me. The failure is on the part of the previous government and the now opposition—failure not only in trade but on all policy counts. They abdicated the field in trade. They had no trade policy. So to sit here and listen to the humbug that I have to listen to is a bit surprising.

One of Labor’s election commitments was a comprehensive review of all existing trade programs—I cannot say ‘policies’, because there were no policies—and that was welcomed. That is what we have done. The Mortimer review has been completed. Who better to lead such a review than David Mortimer, in concert with Dr John Edwards? I know that all my colleagues in this place would agree with me on that point—maybe not on much else, but on this one I am sure.

Under Minister Simon Crean, the Rudd Labor government has instituted an approach to trade policy that is premised on twin pillars of trade liberalisation at the borders and domestic economic reforms behind the borders that are aimed at improving our international competitiveness. That is where the failure of the previous government is so evident.

I remind those members opposite of the trade figures under their stewardship in the previous government—and of not just the trade figures but the interest rates, where we had to endure 10 interest rates rises while the 20 RBA warnings on inflation were ignored. It is worth reiterating some of those figures. Under the last six years of the Howard government, despite the resources boom—which we all welcome and benefit from—the total export revenues grew at an annual average rate of only 5.8 per cent compared with 10.7 per cent in the 18 years following the floating of the dollar in 1983. Goods exports grew at an annual average rate of 6.4 per cent compared with an average growth of 10.3 per cent since 1983. Service exports grew at about a third of the long-term average. And manufacturing exports collapsed in the last six years of the Howard government, growing only three per cent compared with 13 per cent since 1983.

What did all this result in? It resulted in a trade deficit for five consecutive years. Their parting gift as they went out of office last December was a trade deficit of $6.9 billion, which was the worst quarterly trade deficit on record—the worst on record! We talk about failures. That is where the failures were: completely on your side.

I have just had to sit here and listen to the honourable members for Mallee and Ryan. They talked about the Labor Party. They were saying that we could not possibly comprehend commercial and economic matters. That is complete humbug. I will take you through what we are doing now in terms of economic management and commercial matters. Our current policy of responsible economic management is a five-point plan which includes fighting inflation and protecting the surplus from those who want to raid it. It does not matter what leader the Liberal Party has. It is a different leader but the same clothes, the same policy approach: raid the surplus. We have to protect the surplus to cushion us during these times. We have also not embarked on the reckless spending that the previous government did in its last years in office, trying to stay in there. It did not work.

And it is worth going back and talking about the previous Labor administration. The Labor Party in government at that time opened up the economy, floated the Australian dollar, cut tariffs, deregulated the financial sector and achieved wage restraint via the accords with the trade union movement to lock in low inflation. Low inflation is not something that those on the other side seem to know or care about. It also instituted—(Time expired)

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