Richard Marles (Corio, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I will do that. In the electorate that I represent, in Geelong, we have a very large car industry. Through the $6.2 billion car industry plan we have seen an enormous change in the way in which the car industry in this country operates. Of that money, $1.3 billion is going to the Green Car Innovation Fund and $3.4 billion is going to a greener and better targeted Automotive Transformation Scheme. The plan led to an extraordinary announcement by Ford, one that I am sure the member for Moncrieff will be interested in. In July-August of 2007, after 11 to 12 long years of the Howard government, when the car industry was completely demoralised, we saw a decision made by Ford to close the engine plant in Geelong, with the consequent loss of hundreds of jobs. It was a decision which absolutely rocked our city. Yet within just a few days of this government announcing its car industry plan, within just a few days of Ford realising that they have a government which is willing to work with them, to have an activist industry policy and to invest in the industry they work in—and listen for it, because this is where it comes—Ford reversed their decision. They reversed their decision with a consequent saving of 1,300 jobs in my electorate: 400 direct and 900 indirect jobs which would have been lost if that engine plant had closed. I know those people. That is the result of an activist industry policy and a government which cares about jobs and changing people’s lives.

Doesn’t that stand in stark contrast to the way in which the Howard government, the now opposition, ran industry policy over those 11 or 12 years where we did not see any industry policy to speak of? All we saw was flat-earth economics which went a long way towards creating an industrial desert in this country. It has been sprinkled with random acts of stupidity, such as those of Senator Michael Ronaldson, the Liberal duty senator for the area where I live, when he said that what the government ought to do is have only hybrid cars in its fleet. Forget the fact that we do not make hybrid cars in this country yet. That is a comment which, if acted upon, would mean that the government would not buy a single Australian made vehicle at all. How that would go in helping jobs in Geelong, how that would go in helping jobs in Australia, is anybody’s guess.

The Rudd government has a plan. The Rudd government, through the Economic Security Strategy and the Nation Building and Jobs Plan, has been investing in this economy in a way which sees jobs being created. The Rudd government has a plan for creating jobs in this country. It stands in stark contrast to the rolling circus of garbled quotes without any direction whatsoever which characterises the way in which the opposition has gone about its business in opposition. The Rudd government cares about jobs and it votes for them. The opposition cares about political opportunity, and that has only led it, at the end of the day, to vote against jobs. (Time expired)

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