Ed Husic (Chifley, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Industry and Science) Share this | Hansard source

I know we're not intending to do a back-and-forth on this, but there were some very good points raised in that contribution and it is important to get it on Hansard. In terms of the priority areas, I take on board your point that there's a bit of time gone since the report that informed our thinking, but if you look at the priority areas—value-adding resources, agriculture, medical sciences, defence industry, energy, low-emissions technology, the transport arena, and enabling capabilities and critical technologies—the need for us to invest in that areas is still present and will be for some time. That will be important.

In response to your point about cost of doing that and whether or not the end cost will be very high if we manufacture locally, I have a number of things. Advanced manufacturing and the use of automation has changed the labour component in a lot of these areas, so the world has moved a bit. I mentioned batteries earlier—it has been suggested by the Future Battery Industry CRC that our capability to manufacture locally with batteries has been improved because of automation. The skills required to be paired—the human capital side—in an international context are, when you look at remuneration, very competitive. I don't think the concerns that you have will necessarily be the same as we experienced in times before, when we saw a lot of manufacturing go offshore—they went to one country because the wage rates were completely different. That was 20 years ago. The world has moved, and I think the world is also determined to reduce our dependence on those concentrated and broken supply chains.

I would also add, as you are well aware—I know this for a fact—the world is thinking differently about shipping and the emissions impact of that. If we don't have capability onshore and we're importing a lot of product, we will be importing that product at higher prices. As I've remarked in times previous, Member for Wentworth, given our manufacturing self-sufficiency in the OECD is amongst some of the lowest, we have a big job to do to repair that so we can sidestep that importation of inflation, if I can put it that way.

In terms of some of the remarks that have been made about the NRF potentially contributing to inflation, there are two points I would submit: (1) we're trying to deal with the very supply-side issues that have driven inflation through some of this work; and (2) this is investment in capability. It is investment. It's not us putting out grants and pumping out money into the economy. The propositions have to stand on their own two feet, they have to deliver a return to the taxpayer, and they're an investment in capability to address some of the inflationary issues. The way we have staged those investments, too, and the way we have put that money in, as we have privately discussed, is happening over a period of time—so there's that. It won't all be at once. We wouldn't have the ability to pump out those investment decisions in one year, anyway, because it's going to take a bit of time. So it gives that insurance on the inflationary side.

The final point I'd make in response to the points the member for Wentworth has made is that the member is absolutely right: we are proud of the fact that we have one of the largest savings pools on the planet because of superannuation. It's not just been important for people's post-retirement incomes; it's provided investment capital to help businesses here and abroad. We need to team up with them. VC, as you know, have been making re-evaluations of their investments and have pulled money out. We've seen that translate into job losses, where firms have had to lay off people because they don't have the investment runway that they once counted on. We need to change that. We need to have money in there that can pair up. We are crowding in; we are not crowding out. We will work with super, VC and PE—that's private equity—and make this happen.

I might remark on the number of times I've had venture capital firms say to me, 'Why don't we do what other countries do and set up a co-investment fund?' We are doing just that. We're making that growth capital available for firms to grow and, importantly—and I'll end on this point—to back Australian know-how. Do not have firms with good ideas leave our shores because they don't feel like they've got the support that they can get. The number of times I hear firms say they couldn't get capital here, but they could get not just other firms but other governments to invest in their propositions—that burns so much. I know it burns in a lot of people around this chamber, regardless of their politics. We should back our own, stand on our own two feet, build a stronger, longer term economy and not be the importers of other people's ideas but the exporters of great ideas that come from Australia.

Question agreed to.

Bill, as amended, agreed to.

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