Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party, Minister for Education) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Sturt for his question. He knows that trade means jobs. Australia has 13 free trade agreements in force. Another two are concluded but not yet in force, including the historic agreement with Indonesia. We know what that is going to do: help build trade between Indonesia and Australia and create more jobs. Four are being negotiated, and there's a prospective UK-Australia agreement in the pipes, which will also be incredibly important, given Brexit.

Since coming to office, the coalition government has started and concluded seven free trade agreements. More than 50 per cent of the free trade agreements that this nation has concluded have been concluded by our side in our term of government. Where does this count? ABS data last week showed Australia posted its largest ever calendar-year trade surplus in 2019—$67.6 billion. It also marked a record-breaking run of 24 consecutive monthly trade surpluses. You have to go back to 1972-73 to get such a run. That is what our government has delivered. What does it mean to important sectors of our economy? Resources are up over 17 per cent. Manufacturing exports are up over nine per cent. Rural exports are up $225 million to almost $48 billion. And what about our services exports, which grew by 8.9 per cent? For the first time, our services exports are over the $100 billion mark. That is what our government is doing.

Why are we doing this? We are doing this because we know that trade creates jobs. That's why we are doing it. One in five jobs in Australia are reliant on trade, and, for regional and rural Australia, it's one in four jobs. That is why we want to make sure that we are putting the trade agreements in place.

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