Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Nick Xenophon Team) Share this | Hansard source

It gives me great pleasure to rise and talk on Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2017-2018 and the related bills. In particular, I would like to acknowledge my Senate colleagues—Senator Xenophon, Senator Griff and Senator Kakoschke-Moore—for the collective effort that the Nick Xenophon Team has made to negotiate and lobby particularly hard for specific measures to be included in this budget. And to outline those specific measures that the Nick Xenophon Team negotiated for, I am pleased that we have secured $100 million for the advanced manufacturing growth fund targeting South Australia and Victoria to assist with the industrial transition and transformation of our two great manufacturing states in this nation.

While Australia has shifted towards a more service centred economy, the Nick Xenophon Team has not given up on the critical role that manufacturing, particularly advanced manufacturing, plays in the heart of our Australian economy. This fund will provide $47.5 million over two years for grants to South Australian and Victorian manufacturers to undertake capital upgrades that make their businesses more competitive. It will provide $24 million over two years for advanced manufacturing research projects that stimulate the development of new products and manufacturing methods. It will provide $13.5 million over five years to reduce tariffs on imported vehicles and components to boost design and engineering activities for the development of global platform vehicles, and will provide $10 million over two years for two advanced manufacturing innovation labs that will test new manufacturing products and services and will build the capabilities of manufacturing businesses. Finally, this funding will provide $5 million over two years for student research scholarships to ensure that Australia maintains a pool of automotive design engineers for its automotive components businesses to draw upon. These measures will reinvigorate the innovation and design prowess for which Australian manufacturing been known in the past. It will help to support and create real 21st-century jobs in Australian advanced manufacturing.

Sadly, the end of Australia's car manufacturing will happen this October, with the last Holdens rolling off the production line. With that closure, the work at the advanced manufacturing growth fund will become even more critical. However, the Nick Xenophon Team recognises that this is just the beginning of a journey that Australian manufacturing must take, and we will continue to advocate for the government to adopt an integrated and collaborative model for the manufacturing sector, which creates active partnerships between industry and engineering universities, their research teams and of course Australian manufacturing businesses.

I am proud that our team was able to advocate for the reinstatement of the apprenticeship mentoring program. We secured $60 million of funding, which will provide 45,000 apprentices with valuable mentoring to support them to complete their apprenticeships—their qualifications. Past mentoring programs have improved completion rates from around 50 per cent to an impressive 91 per cent. My Senate colleague, Senator Griff, incisively highlighted that axing the program in 2014 was a 'dumb choice'. As Senator Xenophon further commented, it was 'the worst form of false economy', because we saw plummeting apprenticeship rates. The decline of group training for apprentices, coupled with less training done by trades schools, the person-to-person contact for apprentices meant that it was very hard for them to see the light at the end of the tunnel of their apprenticeship. This mentoring will provide great support. It will help businesses. It is a win for businesses and a win for young people.

A budget measure that is very close to my heart—and one that will greatly support regional South Australia and my electorate of Mayo and one that I personally fought very hard for—is the reinstatement of the supplementary road funding for South Australia. Again, this was cut in the 2014 budget. South Australia has 11.8 per cent of the local road network nationally. We have 7.1 per cent of Australia's population but we were only receiving around five per cent of the nation's road funding. The resumption of the supplementary road funding for South Australia is a big win. It is worth $40 million to my state over the next two years. This will help bring back some equity to our local roads. In my electorate I have the following councils: Adelaide Hills, Mount Barker, Victor Harbor, Yankalilla, Kangaroo Island, the Barossa, Alexandrina, and the city of Onkaparinga. They will use this money on their 5,500 kilometres of local road networks that are in my electorate.

The Nick Xenophon Team has also argued and fought very hard for the solar thermal plant in Port Augusta, and through our negotiations with government we have secured a $100 million equity loan to help get this project off the ground. The project is a win-win—for the environment, for advanced manufacturing and for jobs in regional Australia. The current projections are that it will create just over 1,000 jobs in the construction phase and a further 3,000 jobs through the multiplier effect. It is a sign of the possibilities for both South Australia and Australia and a sign that the legacy of the coal-fired power plant in Port Augusta can be transformed through solar technology. It will power, I believe, over 100,000 homes, so this is incredibly exciting.

Another exciting announcement in the budget is for proton therapy. This was something that we advocated very strongly for. With our support, South Australia will receive the first proton therapy unit in the Southern Hemisphere. This will be at the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute, known as SAMHRI. As I said, it will be the only unit in the Southern Hemisphere, and it will assist people who are undergoing advanced cancer treatments with highly targeted, high-energy proton beams. Currently, people needing this treatment are flying to other parts of the world. This will assist greatly not just the people who will be working there, in the extra jobs from it, but children who are undergoing treatment for rare cancers, cancers in the spine and cancers close to the heart and lungs. This will save lives and is a tremendous part of the budget. We are very, very excited about the $68 million that was announced.

I would like to talk about something that my colleague Senator Skye Kakoschke-Moore has been advocating for tirelessly, and that is to assist Defence Force members who are victims of sexual and physical abuse. I commend the energy of Skye Kakoschke-Moore in advocating for victims of sexual and physical abuse in the Australian Defence Force. Her efforts have secured $30 million for the Defence Force Ombudsman to continue the fund that was previously set up by the Defence Abuse Response Task Force. The extension of this fund will allow victims of abuse who missed the arbitrary cut-off dates to apply for compensation. Money alone will not make up for the horrendous acts of sexual and physical violence against them that these Defence Force victims experienced, but it will go partially to redress and provide formal recognition of the wrongs that were perpetrated.

Another great win for South Australia and for Australia has been supporting nuclear test veterans. Senator Xenophon has long been a campaigner for nuclear test veterans, those who were at Maralinga, Montebello or Emu Field—those who were in the presence of nuclear tests—as well as those veterans who served in post-World War II occupation forces in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The culmination of Senator Xenophon's tireless advocacy for these veterans has meant that these veterans will now receive the gold card, finally reversing the burden of proof that they have struggled against for years in paying their medical bills. This measure is worth $139 million, and it is long overdue. I wish to personally thank the government and Senator Xenophon for working on this and particularly my colleague for not giving up the fight. These veterans were exposed to nuclear radiation, and at last they now have some meaningful support with the gold card.

Community radio is very close to my heart because when I was in my twenties I was actually on community radio for years, and it provided me with a great deal of confidence. I do not think I would be in this place if it were not for community radio. We had a great win for community radio in the budget. Funding is now going to support those 600 Australians who are employed by community radio and also the 20,000 volunteers who are connected with community radio. If you are in an electorate in regional Australia, you know that community radio is the lifeblood of your community. This is an excellent training ground for young talent. The $6.1 million that has been allocated to community radio over the next two years is an excellent spend by government.

With respect to the legislation, obviously we are still going through it line by line, detail by detail, as the measures come through the parliament. Of course there are a number of things that are not in plain view. There are a number of cuts, so we need to look very carefully at it.

We are very supportive, however, of the government's bank levy. We support this additional contribution from Australia's most profitable sector and feel that the bank levy will go a long way towards assisting budget repair, but it should be applied not only to the major banks but also to international banks. Why should major foreign banks be exempt from this levy? I have heard the argument that foreign banks provide more competition to the Australian market; however, the super profits currently enjoyed by Australia's financial and banking sector are so enticing for foreign competitors that they will not be deterred by a level playing field. This levy should also apply to major foreign banks that operate in Australia. That is only fair. As someone who, alongside my Senate colleagues, has spoken to so many victims of financial malpractice, I believe that there needs to be a compensation scheme from the funding that could come from these foreign banks. It will be around $800 million over the forward estimates, which could provide a last-resort compensation scheme for victims of such financial mismanagement and fraud.

Lastly, I would like to talk about infrastructure. The federal government has touted their budget as a nation-building budget and as an infrastructure budget. I would like to know why the federal government does not consider South Australia to be part of its infrastructure nation. Why were we forgotten? Of the $70+ billion headline spend over the next 10 years, South Australia will receive just $3.1 billion. This is less than our population's share, and none of it is new funding for new projects. South Australians appear to be the forgotten people. How ironic that the federal coalition government has forgotten us! We are getting neither the infrastructure share nor the rail that we deserve. Australian steelmakers are an obvious place to start. The new Commonwealth Procurement Rules negotiated with government by the Nick Xenophon Team came into effect on 1 March. The new rules will apply to government tenders over $4 million and will go some way towards ensuring that the local social, environmental and economic benefits from Commonwealth procurement will assist South Australia; however, much more needs to be done.

This government is failing older Australians. Despite the massive increase in demand due to the rapidly ageing population, there appear to be no new policies to meet the rising need for aged care residential places. Worse still, the Aged Care Financing Authority has concluded that we are providing only enough funding for half the required number of places. There are no new measures for in-home care and support. These are issues that I, as part of the Nick Xenophon Team, will be strongly advocating for in the months ahead. I would also like to say I am deeply concerned about the cuts that are going to happen to volunteer management: 10 out of the 12 volunteer management groups in South Australia will cease to operate. This is just over $500,000 worth of funding. This provides $5 million into our economy just in South Australia, $290 million nationally, and is being cut. It beggars belief.

In conclusion, if I were a student, I would give this budget a B minus. On its report card I would say it has made great strides since the 2014 budget, but that there is still significant room for improvement. We will work together with government, as we always have, from the sensible centre. We will work tirelessly and constructively with government, and with all of the other parties that are in this great place, for the benefit of our country. We never oppose things for political gain, we base ourselves on evidence, not ideology, and we look forward to working with government for the betterment of all Australians.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

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