Lisa Chesters (Bendigo, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I will pick up where the previous speaker, the member for Charlton, just finished. Thirteen countries manufacture cars from beginning to end. All of them had some form of co-investment. Our nation that had the lowest. Now our nation, because of this bill, will have no co-investment. That is the final nail in the coffin of an industry that currently employs 50,000 Australians.

This bill and this government's vision for this industry is not only unfair—because it places thousands upon thousands of Australian families onto the unemployment line—it is also economically reckless. It will cause the rapid withdrawal of those high-skilled wages from communities that can least afford those wages to be withdrawn. It is an economically silly reason as well as being a socially silly reason.

As I said, Ford, Holden and Toyota currently employ 50,000 Australians. There are 150 component manufacturers, including some in my electorate. In Bendigo we do not have as many as other electorates. There are lots of electorates throughout Victoria that have car component manufacturers. Their entire markets have been the big three—Ford, Holden and Toyota—and those jobs are also at risk. Once those manufacturers lose that market we will lose an entire industry and those jobs.

About 200,000 jobs rely directly on the business created by the auto industry—from fields including metal manufacturing to scientific services. In my own electorate we have a small manufacturer that creates some of the mufflers. Another manufacturer creates some of the rubber components. They are looking to new industries and new opportunities because they do not want to close their doors.

One in four of Australia's top selling cars is made locally. That is a point that the government has failed to highlight. This is not an industry that just exports. This is an industry that makes our own cars. Australians are quite proud to own a car. I am not too old but I can remember the debate people had when they first got their licences: would they buy a Holden or a Ford? Is was a classic debate—a debate that has gone on for generations. At the time it was a debate about Australian cars but in the future it will be a debate about cars that are imported.

As I mentioned, only 13 countries including Australia make cars from beginning to end. That is something that we have always been quite proud of in this country. Auto is the largest contributor of R&D in the manufacturing sector—contributing almost $700 million annually.

This government keeps saying that workers will go from good jobs to better jobs. What jobs are they talking about? What are these better jobs that they keep talking about if we lose our R&D capacity and our science capacity? The government talk about jobs being created in the construction industry—an industry that they quite like to demonise. The union is in there working to ensure that jobs in the construction industry are high-skilled high-paid jobs. This government likes to criticise them for being union jobs but at the same time the government says they are highly skilled and highly paid. But they are temporary jobs.

As has been mentioned, members on the other side of the chamber keep talking about the jobs that they are going to create with the dud tunnel—the East West Link tunnel. Again, they are temporary jobs. What happens when that tunnel is built? Do we build another tunnel? Do we just keep building tunnels? Building tunnels is not a decent policy for creating jobs in this country. We actually need to have industry.

It is really simple economics. If you want to have a service industry, you need another industry for that industry to service. If you are someone who works in hospitality, if you are someone who works in cleaning, if you are someone who works in one of our many service based industries, there needs to be other people employed in other work for you to actually have a job. The strength of any economy is its diversity. That means having a strong manufacturing sector. That means having a strong service sector. That means having a strong retail sector. That means having a strong agricultural sector. We need to be doing well across the board. You cannot put all your eggs, all your jobs, in one basket and say, 'That will be how we keep Australians employed.'

This government fails when it comes to having a vision for industry. It also fails to acknowledge that government has a role to play in income investment. The reports from both academics and industry show that it would cost the government more to see industry fail than it ever would cost in support. That is that pragmatic economics policy that this government fails to have and which previous government on the other side did have—that pragmatic, economic view where it will cost more economically and it will cost the budget more long-term if we fail to support the industry.

The greatest impact will be in my state of Victoria, where an estimated 100,000 jobs will be lost—and that is in the same state where youth unemployment is already at a 15-year high. If we go more locally to where these jobs are—in the seats of Corio, Corangamite, Hotham, in parts of Dandenong and my own electorate—we see that youth unemployment is even higher, because, due to the uncertainty created, employers in the component manufacturer industry have not been taking on young people.

That is my next point on youth unemployment. We need industry if we want to have skilled people in the future. One of the reasons that we do not have as many apprentices today is that they do not have an opportunity to get an apprenticeship. One example of where this really stands out in my own electorate is Bendigo Thales. In their day, when they were an Australian defence manufacturer, they had 100 apprentices—25 in each year level. There was a fraternity of apprenticeships and an apprenticeship system. Today they have two apprentices. Where are we going to be in a generation's time if we are not recruiting, training skilling up apprentices? What this bill does, and what this government is doing, to the auto industry is shutting down another avenue for skilling up future tradespeople.

Again, I call on the government to explain exactly where they plan to get these better jobs from. Being in government has to be more than just about rhetoric. If you are going to stand up and say that people are going to go from a good job to a better job, then you need to say what that better job is. It cannot just be construction jobs; there has to be some other form of better jobs. We are seeing attacks on universities, attacks on TAFE and attacks on industries that are high skilled. We are seeing job cuts in the Public Service and job cuts in the CSIRO—the scientists who are working in this space of innovation—and cuts to any single form of innovation fund. Where exactly is this government going to create these better jobs?

The gross regional product in Adelaide and Melbourne will not recover until 2031. That is nearly two decades away. That is what the academics are saying about completely losing this industry—again, another example of pragmatic economics and how bad this decision is for this country. Employment levels will not recover until 2020 in some of these areas. Yet, with, the panic going on in Geelong, we get, 'That is okay; we'll put our hand up for the Land 400 contract—a defence manufacturing contract.' At best, that contract will have 200 high-skilled, high-tech jobs—not production jobs. That does not make up for the 2,000 people currently working for Ford. That does not make up for the 50,000 people working for Ford, Holden and Toyota, and it does not make up for the tens of thousands of people working in components manufacturing. So that solution is not going to help solve this problem going forward.

The Automotive Transformation Scheme was legislated to encourage investment and innovation in the automotive industry. This scheme was about keeping up with the other 12 countries that manufacture cars. These are countries that have high labour costs—countries like Germany and Great Britain. Because their governments actually had vision, they were able to work in partnership with industry to ensure that they continued to have an auto industry. This scheme provides assistance to form co-investment to firms for the production of motor vehicles and engines and to invest in eligible R&D, plants and equipment. If this bill is passed it would cut $500 million in funding from the ATS between now and 2017 and, in the government's shocker budget, $200 million will be cut instantly.

It is critical for this government not to pre-empt the closure of the industry and put at risk an early closure. That is another point: this bill, coupled with the bill that was debated yesterday in the House, the fair entitlements guarantee legislation and the recently negotiated Korea-Australia Free Trade Agreement accelerates the withdrawal of this industry. It will cause a knock-on effect in this industry that will quickly place more people on the unemployment line. That is the thing I find really frustrating about this government. Rather than seeing a growth in an industry, rather than seeing it survive—or the slow wind-down of an industry and transformation to a new industry—what we will see as a result of this government's bad policy is a rapid knock-on collapse. When you have a rapid knock-on collapse and loss of jobs very quickly you create panic and unemployment, and it will not allow some industries, in the components sector, to survive and find new markets.

Cutting millions of dollars of funding from the ATS now risks premature closure of motor-vehicle producers and hundreds of firms in the auto supply chain, sending thousands of jobs offshore. It is as though the government's policy is about creating jobs offshore not about creating jobs onshore. The wilful neglect of this government is a major reason behind the decision for Toyota to end its car manufacturing in Australia. To foster industry you need to have multiple people in the space to create industry. We are seeing from this government a lack of understanding of that very basic principle.

The Prime Minister will go down in history as the Prime Minister who cost Australia its car industry and changed the direction of this nation for the worse. This is because it will take a generation—decades—for these regions to return from very high unemployment and to return economically. The PM's vague talk about boosting road-infrastructure projects and replacing good jobs for better jobs will not see people from the car-components area employed. You cannot just down tools on building a Ford car and pick up new tools to become an electrician on a construction project called the East West Link Tunnel. You cannot just go from being a painter of a Holden car and pick up a hammer and nails to start constructing a tunnel. They are two very different skill sets, two very different apprenticeships and two very different jobs. For one to replace the other is just not possible.

This government does not have a jobs plan. What we are seeing from this government is attack after attack on our industry. If this government is serious about creating better jobs it needs to work with industry—not shut the door. We need a government that believes in investing and partnering with industry and the community to ensure that we have good jobs, jobs that people can count on into the future.

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