Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It's a great pleasure to stand up and speak on this important piece of legislation, the Commerce (Trade Descriptions) Amendment Bill 2018. Before I was elected—in fact, if I go all the way back to my old university days—I have always had a passion and an interest in opening up markets and advancing the cause of free and open trade. The reason is straightforward: we know that free markets and free trade are the pathway to prosperity for every society in the past, and so it forever will be in the future. No society has ever taxed itself into prosperity or aided itself into prosperity, but it has traded itself into prosperity.

Even this piece of legislation, which may not seem like the compelling, overarching framework of all things we need to do to advance the cause of free and open markets across the world, is nonetheless yet another brick in the bridge we are trying to build to try to increase the amount of free-flowing goods and services between our great nation and those who seek to engage with us. Free-flowing goods and services have been and always will be responsible for the wealth of this country. We have always been a nation that cannot consume everything that it produces. If we want to see an advancement in our material prosperity and the material prosperity of so many other countries we engage with, we need more traffic on our international trade highways, not less.

To make sure that we have that advancement of free and open markets and trade, we need rules and standards which are universally understood and which minimise the behind-the-border obligations and regulations which can undermine the capacity for business to get on with it, for enterprises to get on with it and for entrepreneurs seeking to build standards, products, goods and services that they can trade across the global marketplace to get on with it. The lesser the regulation, always the better. The more consistency and harmonisation between standards, the better, because it removes an obstacle and a barrier. If there's one truth, it's that, if you have more complex regulation, like more complex tax, all it does is favour established interests, as people seek to use and manipulate those regulations or taxations in their interest, and burden those people who are merely starting out, trying to get their fair share and their fair go. That's why this piece of legislation is important; it seeks to achieve that harmonisation and remove unnecessary barriers that sit at the heart of our economy for those people who want to export.

We need more competition for goods and services domestically, but, more critically, we need more competition for goods and services globally, not higher restrictions on our importers and our exporters. We need to rebuild, frankly, Australia's free trade consensus. I'm sure many people in this chamber have watched as that free trade consensus that was built after the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War has become tested and challenged by countries that now seek to impose tariffs and regulations on other nations for exporting basic goods and value-added goods like steel. And that risks a global trade war, because we know that, when you see countries resort to protectionist measures, whether it's by simple tariffs, quotas or regulations, countries will eventually respond in kind, and every person on this planet will end up paying more for less. They will have a reduced standard of living. They will see costs and obligations shifted upon them by those political masters who only seek to buy votes in advancement of the interests of their constituencies but at the expense of living standards and always at the greatest expense of the poor. Anything we can do to undermine that cause and that crusade by those people who seek to use trade to their political advantage is worthy and just.

That returns us to this bill and its potential and objectives. Even at a basic administrative level, it is one of the bricks for building the bridge of an international free trade highway. We need to rebuild consensus for that free trade highway. If we do, the principal beneficiary will be the Australian consumer, and that includes real people living across this great continent who seek merely to achieve the highest standard of living that's available to them. It's the family of four who are always looking for good deals in supermarkets and shopping centres and don't want to pay overly inflated prices, carrying the cost of tax, regulation, tariffs and other measures. It's those people who are vulnerable and just trying to get ahead. It's the student who's starting out and having their first kick at life, living away from home and trying to live a happy, healthy lifestyle on a tight household budget. They are the victims of protectionism. Just like single-income families who are feeling the cost-of-living pressures firm on their shoulders as they manage the great costs in their life, not just managing housing stress, whether it's rental or mortgage stress, but the costs of energy and electricity. And, let's face it, our political opponents are doing little to help us try and reduce those prices, but let's get past that. There's also the burden and cost of education and the burden and cost of making sure people can afford basic staples and supplies to feed and clothe their family.

When you increase regulations and barriers, they are the costs that go up—those that are most sensitive, those things that are produced by people in other parts of the world where Australia does not have a comparative advantage, where we are not competitive and rely on the ingenuity and the capacity of other nations. But, let's face it, even if we increase those costs and they don't go directly to the household, in the end they become costs that burden businesses in Australia that seek to be competitive in a global marketplace. At every step, at every stage, they suffer the consequences, whether it's the family of four, the student, the single-income family or the pensioner.

No matter who has a tight budget, protectionism only rewards one group of people: the established interests and those who are rich and powerful. That is why, as a Liberal, I will always defend a freer, more open market economy and freer and more open trade. It is people who are seeking a sense of opportunity in society that we must always stand up for. The more we empower those people to export and import across boundaries and barriers, the more we empower those people to live better lives. And the more we empower importers to change the status quo, the more we drive competition. Too many people in trade policy are only interested in focusing on exports, because they think that is the only way to achieve prosperity, without recognising the important power that drives competition in domestic economies. Australia is a great emblem across the world for delivering. We cannot produce everything ourselves but what we do produce we do well and we sell in the global marketplace with a premium. But when we import things it value-adds and contributes to the development of our domestic industry to be competitive across the world.

We want to see cheaper prices for goods, as well as protecting consumers against misleading information about where something is made. It is about clarity and transparency so people can make those informed decisions. This bill forms part of the government's broader reform of country-of-origin labelling. Labelling information gives consumers protection against misleading and deceptive conduct. Regulation governing these rules should be the same for imported and domestic goods. It is about harmonisation, it is about informing consumers and it is about making sure that behind-the-border measures aren't acting as a sneaky or tricky way to not only confuse consumers but also add costs onto the Australian consumer.

Therefore it makes sense to ensure that there is consistency between the Competition and Consumer Act and the Commerce (Trade Descriptions) Act. The bill would have the effect of providing a defence for importers who get caught up in the importation of goods with a false description. The alignment between the two acts will reduce the complexity of enforcing origin marking requirements at the border, allowing Australian Border Force to focus compliance activities on goods that don't meet the safe harbour defences. In short, this bill gives our importers the freedom to make a claim about the origin of their goods similar to those permitted under the Australian consumer law.

This bill isn't just a brick in the bridge to advance a free trade international superhighway. It is a bill that seeks to reinforce Australia's existing commitment to free and open markets and trade and say to the average Australian that they should pay no more than necessary for those basic consumer goods that they enjoy, particularly those that are most sensitive to prices and which most dramatically are consumed by average Australian households, the vulnerable and those on fixed incomes, and that is food. And that's the basis on which I support this bill.

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