Susan Templeman (Macquarie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I welcome a focus on manufacturing with this motion—belatedly, seven years into this government, it is great to have them talking about it. COVID has certainly been a threat for some businesses and an opportunity for others. Macquarie is home to about 550 manufacturing businesses—everything from biscuits and lavosh, to caravans, windows and glasshouses and the major packaging company WestRock. We have a large number of small manufacturers with up to five employees and family businesses, often where it isn't unusual to find a husband and wife or a parent and child partnership in action, through to the medium-size businesses that, despite growth, remain very firmly in a family's hands. I want to talk about a couple of these businesses—the people who make stuff—and the commitment they had to their staff when COVID hit, how much they needed support and how they have pivoted.

Frank and Olga have the Teardrop Camper Company. They make fantastic campervans with very comfortable inner spaces to sleep in—much more upmarket than a tent. Frank took a punt in his South Windsor factory. He built seven of them at the start of COVID. That punt has paid off. He is getting orders sight unseen from all over the country to support people in their desire to travel. For him, it was a decision and a gamble to upgrade, and it has paid off.

I'm also fortunate to have several gin distilleries in the electorate. At the request of the government, the Wild Hibiscus Flower Company converted its Gingle Bells Gin distillery to produce medical-grade hand sanitiser. In normal times, their gin's infused with botanicals, but for COVID it was the sanitiser that was infused with lemon myrtle—one of the most pleasant sanitisers to use—and there's a steady supply in my office. So they really stepped up, and, equally, I hope the community supports them now by making sure you've got the wild hibiscus to go into your champagne.

Another distillery, the already award-winning Karu gin distillery in Grose Vale, manufactured hand sanitiser and donated it to essential services, including police and food services, way back in March. It was established in 2017 by young husband and wife team Nick and Ally, who wanted to do something to help. They produced 100 litres, working with the tax office and an analytics company to get it quickly out the door. Speaking to Nick on the weekend at their cellar door, they're on the way to being not only a maker but a tourist destination.

During COVID, I also talked to Karen and Ben Lebsanft from Kurrajong Kitchen. They're the makers of award-winning lavosh which are stocked in major supermarkets right around the country. When I talk to them, it reminds me of how my dad used to talk about the staff who worked with us in our shop when I was growing up. Karen and Ben value their staff. In the early days of COVID, their aim was just to keep their staff on and to keep people employed. They were thrilled more recently to be awarded a federal Manufacturing Modernisation Fund grant. That's allowing them to upgrade their production so they can be more competitive overseas. Theirs is a growing manufacturing business, and it's already employing two generations. They started in 1993 and have been absolutely determined to keep food manufacturing in Australia.

COVID has certainly reinforced for all of us how important it is to have control of production on our own soil. I think that's probably what disappoints me about what the government brought out in its budget this year. It was touted as a major boon for Australian manufacturing, but the six priority areas identified were the same ones identified by Labor in 2012 and adopted in 2013. If the Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison governments had stuck to those key manufacturing areas, rather than getting rid of the plan in 2014, manufacturing in this country would already have more thriving businesses employing thousands of people. We might still have a car-manufacturing industry, if the coalition actually cared about keeping manufacturing jobs onshore.

I hear them talking a lot about manufacturing, and I welcome that, but even today I'm not hearing specifics. What we learnt from the industry minister recently is that only $40 million of the $1.5 billion commitment the government has made will be spent this financial year. That's less than three per cent that will be spent between now and June next year, at the height of a recession. We see the same pattern in another announcement in the budget, the claim of $2 billion in new spending for the R&D tax incentive. In actual fact, the government's simply restoring the $1.8 billion it had planned to cut. Yet again, sadly, what we're seeing are words but no action, and manufacturing in this country deserves more.

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