Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

That was an interesting performance. I noticed the minister touched on the ABCC bills, which was one of the last things I expected to hear really. You would have thought the minister might have talked about the catastrophe that is going on in the Australian car industry, which was one of the big contributors to research and development and a big employer of Australians—some 50,000 Australians, many of them in Victoria, of course—

Mr Hunt interjecting—

as the honourable member interjects. But the minister did not talk about that industry, because this government has presided over a catastrophe. It is interesting—I remember the headline very well: 'Hockey dares GM to leave'. I remember that day very well and I remember only about a week ago when the particular section of the line at GMH Elizabeth that manufactured the Cruze—Australia's small car—stopped. There will be no more Cruzes off the line. These are all things that worry Australian workers; these are all things that worry Australian industry. And we worry that the government is in denial. I notice the minister made a speech in the Spencer Gulf, I think, recently where he set out his views. I did read it.

Mr Hunt interjecting—

We might talk about some of that later on. I find it interesting. He says:

As the car sector shows, government grants will not help a business to survive in the long run if it is not competitive.

It is interesting that he talks about competitive forces. I do wonder what role he thinks the Australian dollar played in the demise of the Australian car industry, which was one of the factors that Holden talked about when they announced the closure of the factory.

It would be interesting to know what the government's view is on the movements of the Australian dollar and whether assistance should be given to ride out those conditions or whether he thinks that the cabinet should have considered them in the light that the dollar, when they made the decision not to provide any further assistance to GMH, was about $1.08 and today it is 70-something cents. That is a big difference in the competitiveness of our industries. I can tell you that if we had had a billion dollars worth of investment in the Australian car industry—if the government had facilitated that—we would have currently been exporting our heads off. We are already exporting cars to the United States, but there would have been many, many more exports were the government to have backed GMH in.

From a philosophical point of view, I would be interested to hear the minister's position on that.

I would also be interested to hear if the minister's department or if the government had actually got any estimates of the cost to the whole of government—including income taxes, social security costs, retraining costs—on the closure of the car industry. Has his department done that or thought about that? Has the cabinet done that or thought about that? There seems to be a contribution to the Growth Fund—I think that is what they are calling it—and they are claiming it is $155 million, even though it also includes money from GM Holden and state governments in the figure. I would be interested to know if his department has looked at any of those costs, what those costs might be and, in particular, what the employment options are for employees in that industry. How are the retraining packages going? Are any of those employees being employed in any of the next gen manufacturing opportunities that are coming up from the grants? They would all be interesting answers to hear, to see if the government actually knows what is going on.

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