Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Innovation, Industry and Science) Share this | Hansard source

It is a week to particularly focus on the crisis that is taking hold in the manufacturing sector. One would think that, at a time when there are so many cost pressures making our domestic manufacturers less competitive against our export competition and against imports, this would be the last time that the government would actually introduce an additional cost of production to manufacturing in Australia in the form of a carbon tax. But what do we have? This government seems to be living in absolute denial on some weird, perverse land on top of the faraway tree, because in the electronic version of the Australian printed out at 2.49 this afternoon the heading is 'Julia Gillard links carbon price to a 'bright future' for manufacturing.' The Prime Minister must be the only person in the country, other than some deluded Greens on the other side of this building, that actually believes that a carbon tax is going to be good for manufacturing.

What we have not heard from the Prime Minister is whether she agrees with that so-called great Labor Treasurer she keeps leaning on, that great so-called reformist Paul Keating, because she refers to all those reforms undertaken by the previous Labor government, not the Rudd Labor government, in trying to link her carbon tax to the reforms of that government and to create some sort of equivalence. In fact she has even tried to link it to the tax reforms of the Howard government. What we have not heard is the Prime Minister saying whether she agrees with Mr Keating when he said on Lateline last month that the new green industries are service industries not the old manufacturing industries. Manufacturing has moved to the east. The service industries are now the new growth industries. We need to hear from the Prime Minister whether that is in fact her view and whether that is in fact the view of the government frontbench.

They seem to be mouthing platitudes about supporting manufacturing, but every single time a manufacturing business or an industry association tries to outline the problems with this carbon tax they are either ridiculed, abused or ignored because there is a frustration in the government. We saw it last week with the member for Isaacs, who was a professional advocate in a former life, who came to this place and was given the very special job of Parliamentary Secretary for Climate Change and Energy Efficiency, presumably to argue the case for a carbon tax. He was unable to convince not only many people in his electorate—I know I was there last Saturday with Senator Fifield and the member for Higgins—but others in the broader Australian community. We see the Labor Party members turn to nasty, vindictive ridicule and mockery.

Yesterday, we had the member for Grayndler make fun of those Australians who had taken time out from work or time out from their farms to come to Canberra and express their anger and frustration with this government. It was not just to do with the carbon tax; it was to do with every single policy area that this government has touched, because we know it turns to the proverbial. Whether it is school halls, pink batts, the carbon tax or the mining tax, these people are sick of it. These people are sick of a government that no longer governs. It is a misbegotten government desperate to survive. It has resorted to ignoring the plight of industry and ignoring the plight of manufacturers.

For so long the Prime Minister has been telling us that we are behind the world. For so long she has been telling us that we have to keep up with the world and that China is forging ahead in leaps and bounds with their carbon tax, and yet in question time she could not even nominate the current carbon tax proposals in China. We see the desperation of the Treasurer trying to justify the existence of this government with a pathetic performance and not one reference to the real world situation out there in manufacturing.

What is happening is that on average we have seen 620 jobs lost each week in manufacturing during the last three years. That is more than 105,000 manufacturing jobs lost over that time, and around one in every 12 manufacturing workers across Australia has lost their job since the Labor Party came to power. We might hear from the other side, 'That happened under your government as well.' Actually, no. This was after 13 expansions in activity during the final 14 months of the Howard government. Labor simply do not understand manufacturing and the strategic importance of having domestic manufacturing capability, and they have no serious plan for its vision or its future. In fact, that very famous self-styled faceless man, Mr Howes, was reported in today's papers as saying, 'Bailouts and calling the ambulance is fine and we appreciate that support but I want our government and our country to be proactive, to actually look forward and say: are we going to be a country which makes things?' It goes on to say: 'He called for a long-term visionary plan for the Australian steel and manufacturing sector.'

Wouldn't you think that a bloke, the head of a union that represents steelworkers would actually put someone in as Prime Minister—use his numbers, use that great political power behind closed doors—who understood the importance of manufacturing, who actually had a vision for manufacturing in this country? Again, it goes to illustrate the shallowness in the frontbench and in the Prime Minister when it comes to understanding industry and the impact that the prospect of a carbon tax is having on them now.

Yesterday at a press conference we had the Prime Minister, Minister Carr and the Treasurer. The Prime Minister and Minister Carr were asked yesterday what they have done and what they were doing for manufacturing beyond the specific announcement regarding BlueScope Steel. Rarely in politics have I seen a more embarrassing encapsulation of a government in complete ignorance of such an important sector of the economy. It was cringing to watch. The Prime Minister fumbled for an answer before finally settling on green cars and cooperative research centres—that is right! Green cars and cooperative research centres. She has not only cut the cooperative research centre program twice in the space of her first year as Prime Minister and put the very viability and future of a number of those CRCs at risk, but also abolished her entire green car program worth hundreds of millions of dollars and without any warning to the industry whatsoever.

So it is not just the adverse effects of the carbon tax. The carbon tax and the manner in which the government has tried to implement it colour every approach they have to other policy. We have heard from manufacturing about the problem with sovereign risk. We saw car manufacturers sit down with a Labor Prime Minister, they opened up their books, they were told to commit to investment in Australia and the Labor government would co-invest. They did that through the Green Car Innovation Fund. Guess what? After the election, without any consultation, without any warning and having made those commitments to international companies that opened up their books and trusted this government, they just cut funding. No wonder manufacturing in this country is under siege when those who supposedly negotiate with the government, liaise with the government, cannot even trust their word. The approach to the green cars has been so bad that the issue of sovereign risk is a serious consideration for those wanting to invest in manufacturing in Australia. And yet, those are the Prime Minister's two key manufacturing policies—basically the sum of her total manufacturing vision for Australia.

And it does not get any better when we look at what Minister Carr said to the same question. Do you know the first thing he mentioned? The first thing he mentioned was that he had changed the name of the department. That is right! What have you done for manufacturing? I changed the name of the department. How imaginative was that! That was the biggest achievement to pop immediately into his head after so many years as the industry minister. The sad part is that the answers are actually grounded for once in reality because they have done absolutely nothing for manufacturing in this country except seek to fulfil the words of their mentor, of their hero, Paul Keating. They do not really want manufacturing left in this country. That is why they will not do the hard work to have the policies and the framework to ensure that Australian innovation and Australian investment in manufacturing can continue. Minister Carr also said that it was important to ensure that we had a steel industry in Australia and that the industry have the capacity to restart operations. Presumably, he meant they could restart export operations, because BlueScope has essentially ended their export industry. How can the domestic industry have the capacity to ramp up when the dollar is in a more favourable position for them and when Australian manufacturing is going to be imposed with yet another cost to production? It is another cost to making steel in Australia that will not be borne by steel that is imported from other countries. So how smart is the minister when he says, 'Oh well, one area of business for BlueScope has gone, but we want to make sure it survives in Australia so it can ramp up and possibly be exporters'? How is that going to happen, Minister, when there is no vision or outline for reducing the cost of production to the Australian steel sector and when in fact you want to impose an additional tax on Australian steel making?

Yesterday the government was arguing that the announcement of BlueScope steel had no connection with the looming threat of a carbon tax. Why is it raiding the very fund that it set up and designed specifically to deal with the impact of a carbon tax? Why is a scheme that, according to its own fact sheet, has been set up to stimulate industry 'investment, including on the acquisition of new or upgrading of existing plant equipment' being used in a case where the reverse is actually true? It is because the government really does not know what it is doing. It is fumbling from problem to problem. In the next few weeks when we have more announcements from innovative Australian manufacturing companies that will not be good news for their workers and the economy, we will have no direction and no vision from this government.

What does this government do? It demonises people. We saw the demonising of protesters against the carbon tax yesterday. The AWU boss said on 21 August that the steel industry in Australia had not innovated since 1983. He referred to the ineptitude and the lack of vision in his own government and his own Prime Minister. He is now so frustrated and angry that he is trying to blame industry, but this is obvious nonsense and it was designed to unfairly demonise the steel industry. When you look at the facts you see that since 2002 BlueScope alone has invested more than $2½ billion in capital equipment.

What does the Parliamentary Secretary for Climate Change and Energy Efficiency do in his electorate? In early August, he turned up at the AGM of the South East Melbourne Manufacturers Association, and when one business owner said to him that their electricity bill was going to increase by $120,000 the barrister, who lives in the seat of Higgins, not Isaacs, said, 'Oh, that's a modest increase in prices.' The arrogance and the inability of this government, this executive, to break out of its own bubble has led to this devastating carbon tax and is leading to policy paralysis that is endangering the viability of many decent Australian businesses.

There was another business owner who explained to the parliamentary secretary that to stay in the market, as they had explained to me, they only made a profit of $15 for an item they exported to Germany. Do you know what the parliamentary secretary said? He said, 'Well, obviously you have other problems in your business,' not that it was the failure of this government in imposing additional costs, in not having vision for productivity or in not having any vision for this economy. We see it right across food processing with the additional costs to Nestle, Murray-Goulburn farmers and all sorts of manufacturing and agriculture across the country. (Time expired)

See this speech in context