Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

It's always good to follow on from the Australian Greens leader to put some rationality back into the debate. I'm always encouraged by the fact that many truck drivers who keep this nation moving listen in to parliament. What they would have heard just then was 15 minutes of passionate debate, yes, but debate that would have discouraged them, perhaps, from thinking that the nation is going well ahead with trade and discouraged them from doing the grand job that they do for and behalf of this nation in moving goods around. Many of those goods are going to port. Of course, Australia is a trading nation, and we need those goods to go to port, to get on ships and to go to other nations so they can also realise and reap in the benefits of our farmers, our resources and everything else that we put on those ships. I'm always encouraged by the feedback I get from our truck drivers. They've done a magnificent job through COVID-19. The National Transport Commission's code has enabled them to cross borders when others couldn't. It enabled them to continue to ferry goods right across this nation in a timely fashion, often to get vital medical equipment to where it needed to be, particularly in regional Australia and especially in remote areas.

As I said, Australia is a trading nation and it always has been. One in five Australian jobs is reliant on trade. We know that when the government and Labor get on board with something, it must be right, it must be good, and when the Greens are against it, that must give it the big tick of approval—it must, indeed. In regional areas, that number is closer to one in four jobs being reliant on trade. The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, RCEP, agreement is a free trade agreement. Aren't we lucky we've got those free trade agreements and aren't we lucky we've got a Liberal-Nationals government which has been forthright and progressive in making sure that we get even more FTAs signed up, even more FTAs agreed upon? This RCEP agreement is complementing and building upon Australia's existing FTAs with 14 other Indo-Pacific countries. That is a good thing. It is a modern and comprehensive—as the name suggests—free trade agreement covering trade in goods and trade in services. That's important because sometimes, when we talk about trade, we don't think of or remember the many services that we engage in with other countries. The agreement also covers investment and economic and technical cooperation and it creates new rules around electronic commerce, intellectual property, government procurement, competition and small and medium sized enterprises. It has new rules for those areas of endeavour.

RCEP negotiations were launched in November 2012 between the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, ASEAN, and the RCEP agreement includes Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and ASEAN's FTA partners: Australia, China, India, Japan, New Zealand and the Republic of Korea. Even without India, RCEP will still be the world's largest FTA, and that is significant. To give a market snapshot of RCEP, the gross domestic product in Australian dollars is $35.19 trillion covering 2.3 billion people. Indeed, trade with Australia in 2019 figures is $712.65 billion. They're big, big numbers, and we need these markets. We need these export opportunities. That's why the member for Wannon, now the trade minister, and others before him on this side of the House, and I'll give a compliment to those on the other side for what they did when they were in government, have endeavoured to do what's right in the national interest.

A report released on 31 October 2017, four years ago, suggested that trade liberalisation has given Australians higher incomes and more job opportunities. This Centre for International Economics report provided very real and convincing evidence about the benefits delivered by trade liberalisation in the period 1986 to 2016. The report found that average household income, bearing in mind that this report was published in 2017, at the time was $8,448 higher in 2016 than it would have been without trade liberalisation. The report found: one-fifth of the workforce, 2.2 million Australians, at the time, 2013-14, worked in trade related activities; 1.6 million worked in export related activities; and 671,000 worked in import related areas. Those figures are somewhat dated, and we know that what we've done in the meantime has only been good and has bolstered those figures and bolstered the average incomes of Australians, certainly the incomes of Australians in trade related enterprises. Real GDP was 5.4 per cent higher in 2016 than it would have been without trade liberalisation and investments were 11.7 per cent higher. Real wages were 7.4 per cent higher, which is significant. I know those opposite are always talking about real wages—7.4 per cent higher wages, and prices 3.4 per cent lower. We know that when there's a Liberal-National government on the treasury bench we're always going to be promoting trade. Those sorts of figures for real wages and job opportunities are always going to be higher with us in government. We know that.

The report underscored the importance of Australia's long-term commitment to free trade. Deputy Speaker Chester, you and I come from a party that has been very trade focused. 'Black Jack' McEwen was a brave pioneer to go to the Japanese market after World War II, when it was not popular to trade with that nation. Others since have followed that fine tradition. I know you and I are proud of that fact in our party, but we know, too, that regional Liberals are very much reliant on the trade, the opportunities and the market access that our policies promote. Any move back to high tariffs and trade barriers would see job losses—we know that—as well as cuts in household consumption and falling living standards, according to the 2017 report. That is as right today, in 2021, as it was then.

Since the CIE's modelling excludes services of investment and all liberalisation by trading partners, its estimates of the benefits of trade liberalisation are conservative. You can imagine what the figures put in that report four years ago are today. As I say, we've finalised eight FTAs since coming back into office. That is great. We have reached agreement in principle on a United Kingdom FTA, and we're pursuing an FTA with the European Union. That is encouraging for our farmers and for those truckies who are, at the current point in time, driving around those fantastic goods from the fine electorate of Gippsland, which punches well above its weight when it comes to output, and indeed from mine, in the Riverina and central west.

Australia has FTAs with eight of our top 10 trading partners. We have lifted our share of trade—and this is an important statistic—covered by FTAs from 26 per cent to 70 per cent, and we of course have plans to grow it even further. We delivered the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, a free trade agreement between Australia, Brunei, Vietnam and many other countries, including of course New Zealand, our great friends across the ditch. It's the gold-standard FTA in our region, and it came into force in Australia on 30 December 2018.

The RCEP, a modern, progressive partnership with 14 other nations in the Indo-Pacific, is going to cover all areas of a modern free trade agreement, including those difficult areas that are sometimes hard to negotiate between trade ministers. Aren't we lucky, as a nation, that we have the member for Wannon, a coalition colleague from Victoria, doing what he needs to do, travelling far and wide, to organise even more free trade agreements. Specifically, the proposed amendments that we're discussing and debating will provide rules, including product-specific rules, for determining whether imported goods are RCEP-originating goods. This is how importers prove that their goods are produced by, obtained from or include sufficient content from one or more of the RCEP parties. I know former senator John Williams did a lot of work in this regard. We have followed on that work in good faith to make sure that if a good says it's from somewhere, particularly our own nation, then it truly is from that particular nation. Indeed, the line of access from farm paddock to plate is significant, and it has helped our trade arrangements. Satisfying these rules qualifies the goods for a preferential rate of customs duty when imported into our nation. It requires Australian exporters and producers to keep sufficient records to enable them to prove their goods are RCEP-originating goods if they claim a preferential rate of customs duty when exporting their goods to one of the other 14 RCEP parties. That's significant. So it's two-way, in good faith, and this is an important part of the bill that we're debating tonight. It also creates a new schedule of preferential customs duty rates for goods that qualify as RCEP-originating goods. The new rules for determining origin status of goods and recordkeeping requirements for exporters and producers will be added to the Customs Act, which goes back to the year of Federation, 1901.

The new schedule of preferential customs duty rates will be added to the Customs Tariff Act 1995. The Customs Act 1901 will be amended to insert rules for determining whether imported goods are RCEP-originating goods. Satisfying these rules qualifies the goods for a preferential rate of customs duty when imported into Australia. Is that significant? Yes. Making sure that we keep faith with our trading partners is of course one thing that we always take very seriously. Making sure that we continue to provide the freshest, cleanest, best produce is something that our farmers, whether they're in Gippsland or in the Riverina—no matter where they are across this great nation—take very seriously. We are, in fact, very lucky to have the farmers who operate under world's best practice, who make sure that every available drop of water is accounted for, who make sure they're making the best use of every available hectare of arable land.

The main amendment to the Customs Tariff Act 1995 inserts that new schedule of preferential rates. It is part of what we're debating and putting through. When these particular schedules have cross-party alignment and support and the Greens are against them, you know that they are a good thing.

Why are these changes important? Why are they being made now? RCEP was signed by the then trade minister, Senator Simon Birmingham, back on 15 November 2020. We've been acting in good faith with the 14 nations since then to nail down the important side points, the important attributes of this legislation, of this agreement, to ensure that everybody's on the same page. We have cross-party support and we know it's in the national interest and it needs to be agreed to by legislation ensuring the agreement can enter into force as swiftly as possible, because putting this now makes sure we can extract the benefits sooner rather than later. It is in the interests of Australian businesses, consumers and exporters.

They've done it tough in recent times with COVID, with the lack of export opportunities because of the smaller number of planes coming into and leaving our country. That's why we have put in place those arrangements. Whether they are lobster fishers in north-west Western Australia—indeed, Geraldton—or produce the salmon from Tasmania, the sheepmeat from Victoria in your electorate, Mr Speaker, or right across this nation, we put in place assistance measures so that those products could be transported out of Australia. That gave great hope to exporters. The amendments in this bill before the House continue to build on the fine trading export opportunities that we have always put in place and will continue to put in place as Liberals and Nationals in government.

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