Natasha Griggs (Solomon, Country Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House:

(1) commends the fantastic work that the Minister for Trade and Investment and the Government have done to secure the monumental Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with China, Australia's largest trading partner;

(2) acknowledges that the China-Australia FTA provides significant advantages for Australian businesses, particularly by:

(a)removing tariffs on key agricultural exports such as beef, dairy, lamb and horticulture;

(b) providing certainty for the resource and energy sector by locking in zero tariffs on major exports such as iron ore, crude petroleum oils and liquefied natural gas; and

(c)securing new or improved market access for service providers in areas such as banking, insurance, hospitality, health and travel;

(3) recognises the opportunities that this agreement presents for Australian businesses to grow and create new jobs, providing increased economic prosperity for all Australians; and

(4) condemns the union movement's reckless misinformation campaign, backed by Labor, for jeopardising this agreement and the opportunity that it presents to create new jobs for Australian workers.

I would like to start with a fact. Australian exports to China were worth $107.5 billion in 2013-14. Under the new agreement, 95 per cent of Australian goods exported to China will be tariff-free, which means there will be good opportunities for resources, agriculture, manufacturing, knowledge and service industries.

It is always hard to deal with people who tell deliberate lies, as is the case with this China free-trade agreement. We have unions and their Labor members of parliament in electorates like mine telling deliberate lies. Another example of this deliberate campaign of lies comes from an MUA member posting on a Facebook site Darwin and Surrounds—Buy, Swap and Sell, organising a rally and telling my constituents that I am responsible for selling TIO. Not true. They say I am responsible for sacking teachers and nurses—also not true! As you know, Madam Deputy Speaker, the federal government does not employ teachers or nurses. The unions are misinformed and should stop telling lies. Here in this room we are bound by standing orders, particularly regarding the language that we use. We must tell the truth and there are certain words we cannot use to describe our opponents, even if they are true.

Out there on the streets of my electorate where the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union is distributing pamphlets in the letterboxes of Darwin and Palmerston residents, where Labor politicians and their staff are going on radio and TV, where the Maritime Union of Australia is going door to door telling people that hordes of Chinese workers are about to arrive and take their jobs, they do not appear to be bound by conventions or indeed the truth. That is certainly evident by their behaviour on this campaign.

We are used to seeing certain degrees of conflict in political dealings. Those on that side of the chamber will often have a different opinion to us on this side; it is called an adversarial process. Through debate and the exchanging of ideas we arrive at an outcome that should be in the best interests for all Australians. But never before in the two terms that I have served in this place, or during my time in local government, have I ever seen one side resort to such hysteria as that seen from the Labor Party and the union campaign about the China-Australia Free Trade Agreement. Make no mistake: this is not about unions helping workers; this is about the union movement as the puppet master, with the shadow frontbench and their members as the puppets.

Similar agreements are already in place with Korea, Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand, the United States, Chile and Indonesia. I do not ever remember the Maritime Union going door to door in Darwin warning about boat loads of Chilean electricians stealing Australian jobs. I do not recall the CFMEU letterboxing in Palmerston about the dangers of the Australia-United States Free Trade Agreement. Did Labor even vote against any of these? No, they did not. There was bipartisan support and Labor voted for these agreements. Labor has supported all the free trade agreements which have gone through in recent times. Why are they opposing this one? God only knows.

Some of the Labor luminaries have said some interesting things about this agreement. We have Bob Hawke, who said:

I am all in favour of it …The party must not go backwards on this issue … Talk of opposing it is just absolutely against Australia’s best interests.

Victorian Labor Premier said:

The Chinese free trade agreement is good news for Victorian jobs and I support it …

The Labor Premier of South Australia endorses it, former Labor minister Simon Crean endorses it and Martin Ferguson endorses it. Even Bob Carr has publicly said, 'The Labor Party is overblowing this campaign.' Could it be that, once again, unions are not acting to protect workers but protecting their allies in the Labor Party? Could it be a coincidence that anyone whose preselection or election funding does not depend on one or more of the militant trade unions is endorsing this legislation? I will leave that to the public to decide. But I have got to tell you: even a Northern Territory Labor opposition member has said that he supports this agreement. It is good for Territorians and Senator Peris should come out and say that she supports it and so should her staff.

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