Pat Conaghan (Cowper, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

If we've learnt one thing from COVID, it's that it has put many things into perspective and has really enhanced a sharper focus on our local communities around Australia and, most acutely, on the need to build Australian resilience by securing sovereign capability and capacity for the national interest. In the words of the member for Goldstein, a rich country is a strong country, and I couldn't agree with him more. Australian industry as a whole needs to scale up in order to achieve this. Sometimes we see silver linings out of devastating circumstances, and this is a silver lining that we can see from COVID. I can guarantee you that most teenagers prior to this pandemic would never have heard the word 'sovereignty'—sovereignty of our borders, sovereignty of our people and sovereignty of our manufacturing industry. We've recognised through that adversity that we must lay the groundwork now to become more competitive and self-sufficient in order to cement our nation's job security not just in the short term but, importantly, for future generations.

We saw the $1.5 billion Modern Manufacturing Strategy established by this government in October 2020, specifically for that purpose—specifically for our future generations, to supercharge our manufacturing industry. To date, ISA has made an important contribution to furthering Australia's innovation in science capabilities and has helped inform the government's investment strategy to enhance Australia's science, technology and innovation capabilities. The potential for ISA to more broadly advise the government around strategic investment has been restricted to date. This bill, the Industry Research and Development Amendment (Industry Innovation and Science Australia) Bill 2021, seeks to expand ISA's remit and update its name to Industry Innovation and Science Australia. This change of name is part of a broader policy reform to focus on Australian industry as a whole. The change of name will bring with it the appointment of new board members, a new statement of expectations and the critical provision of advice to government on the Modern Manufacturing Strategy—again, a good result, a silver lining to difficult circumstances. IISA's advice will continue to complement and be informed by the work of other advisory bodies such as the National Science and Technology Council, but, importantly, it will now specifically focus on the needs of businesses to support greater uptake and development of new technologies, products and services. We know businesses are the backbone of the Australian economy.

The introduction of this bill provides the opportunity to highlight what this government has already done in recent months to propel Australia's competitive advantage to new heights through strategic investment in science, technology and innovation. The 2021 budget, announced in October last year, made a record investment of $11.9 billion in science research and innovation. It should be noted that this represents hundreds of millions of dollars more than when the opposition was last in government. The 2021 budget has continued to expand on this, with investments including $116.7 million in continued support for the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, to maintain Australia's sovereign nuclear science and medicine manufacturing capabilities, and over $42.4 million over seven years to boost the next generation of women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. I'm very pleased to say that I get involved every year with the Girls in STEM in Port Macquarie and Coffs Harbour—its first year was a huge success at the Charles Sturt University campus—and I will continue to champion that cause. It gets bigger and bigger every year, and we need to see more girls and more women in science, maths and technology.

Importantly, the government is committed to improving Australians' digital skills, with an investment of over $100 million to create education options for reskilling and upskilling for the current market of in-demand jobs. This government's investment will continue to underpin a strong research and intellectual capital base and support the commercialisation of good ideas—good ideas like the world-leading innovations already in this country, including wi-fi technology, the bionic ear and the vaccine for cervical cancer. We have the expertise, the drive and the know-how, and this bill is a step towards ensuring that we have the human capital and physical infrastructure to locally deliver on ideas like these into the future.

This place quite often presents opportunities and experiences that you wouldn't ordinarily see outside of this place. I'm privileged enough to be on the Standing Committee on Industry, Innovation, Science and Resources, previously chaired by the Deputy Prime Minister. We have recently completed an inquiry into space. When thinking about space, one often thinks that it's a group of intellectuals in a room, working on a chart with mathematical equations that nobody understands. What this inquiry showed the committee was that space is the future and that there are opportunities for our future generations not just in engineering but in electrical, in design and in computing, and the vast evidence was that we cannot get enough people. We cannot get enough youth into the space industry, because they think of that whiteboard with those mathematical equations.

On the day when the rover Perseverance landed on Mars, we had a tour of the Australian Space Agency and we spoke to the people who work there. Some of them were electricians and some of them were engineers. But what it said to us was: for future generations, the opportunity is there for you. The opportunity is there to be able to make a difference in the future. When we think about space, we think about satellites. To simplify it, the satellites are up there driving your wi-fi and driving the tractors out in western New South Wales with nobody in them: that is the future. At the moment, there are fewer than 1,000 satellites in the sky; within a decade, there will be over 100,000 satellites going around this globe. So you do get that privilege, and this is something that we as a government and we as a nation need to harness to become that economically strong force and that economically strong country.

One of the other things that you get to see are the local examples: those tiny little factories tucked away in the industrial centres that you may drive past day after day and not know what's in there. One example is a company called Blue Bins in Port Macquarie. Over 90 per cent of landfill comes from construction and renovations and building materials going into the ground. This company, through their hard work, has reduced that from over 90 per cent to 12 per cent by recycling that material and putting that back into the building industry. So not only are they saving on landfill; what they're actually doing by recycling is limiting the amount of timber and plastic that's required. Day after day, you see industries such as that. Through the government's funding and programs, we need to harness these to ensure that we can use best practice and ensure that these companies can thrive and create jobs in our economy.

Over the last month in my electorate of Cowper, I've seen this government's investment in a paper and oil recycling program. Coffs Harbour Paper and Oil received joint federal and state government funding totalling $636,000 under the Recycling Modernisation Fund. This project is specifically about easing pressure on our environment by recycling more materials including plastics, tyres, glass, cardboard and even coffee cups. Importantly, it is about creating jobs and economic investment. This project alone will increase the state's recycling capacity by an estimated 120,000 tonnes every year. This is an example of the $190 million investment into the Recycling Modernisation Fund which will create approximately 10,000 new jobs over the next 10 years across Australia.

I'm also proud to say that Cowper is the home to Louise Hardman, who is a scientist, inventor, innovator and waste-free plastics educator, and who is New South Wales' Local Hero nominee in this year's Australian of the Year Awards. Louise founded Plastic Collective, a social enterprise to stop plastics entering our oceans. Plastic Collective is changing the way people think about plastics. Louise is an expert in grassroots community engagement, the chemistry of plastic and the circular economy. She invented the shruder, a mobile recycling machine that shreds and extrudes plastic onsite. Using the shruder and Louise's working with plastics program, communities are transforming plastic waste into products for local needs and generating revenue through selling processed plastic shred. This was made possible by the almost $2.5 million provided to Plastic Collective as part of the Cooperative Research Centres Program.

This same program awarded $950,000 to local winery Cassegrain Wines, and I can attest to the high quality of their wines. The 2019-20 bushfires affected prominent wine regions in the ACT, New South Wales, South Australia and Victoria. Without scientifically proven treatments for smoke taint, the issue remains an ongoing threat to the long-term economic viability of the Australian wine industry. Vineyard exposure to bushfire smoke can taint grapes, and therefore wine, due to the unpalatable smoky ashy characters leading to revenue losses in the hundreds of millions of dollars. The funding has provided the ability to evaluate promising strategies for mitigating smoke taint, including novel winemaking additives and treatment processes that remove smoke compounds from the wine, therefore reducing the sensory perception of smoke taint. Outcomes from this research will provide economic and social benefits to the industry.

By playing to our strengths, strategically investing and harnessing our own homegrown, world-class science and research, we can build our national resilience into a stronger economy and take more of our quality products to the world rather than relying on others to manufacture for us. I expect there to be no opposition to this critical amendment to the industry research and development bill. There has never been a more paramount time to ensure Australia's future success by creating the framework from which the Modern Manufacturing Strategy can truly impact Australian opportunities now and into the future.

See this speech in context