Alannah Mactiernan (Perth, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Prime Minister picks up his pom-poms, puts on his white boots and takes up the role as the cheerleader for Australia's exciting, innovative, science-based future. 'We have to be—and we will be—a country that invests in science and puts it right at the centre of our national agenda,' he tells us. And he goes on, forever saying, 'There has never been a more exciting time to be an Australian.'

But there has certainly never been a less exciting time to be an Australian scientist. Today we have learnt that 350 positions at the CSIRO will be made redundant, after about 1,400 jobs have been lost in the agency over the term of this government. We now are losing 110 jobs from the CSIRO's Land and Water Division and another 110 jobs from the Oceans and Atmosphere Division. Apparently, we already know all we need to know about climate change! Then we have another 130 jobs going from the manufacturing division and from Data61. Data61 is the data analysis team that the Prime Minister lauded just months ago in his innovation statement—and the manufacturing division, which is working with Australian businesses to manage the transition from traditional heavy industry to advanced high-tech manufacturing. I can tell you that this is definitely not exciting. (Time expired)

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