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

At the beginning, may I extend my deepest gratitude on behalf of the government to those who have wanted to engage constructively on this bill. I have said to all people who have wanted to talk about it that this is a National Reconstruction Fund and that this is a moment in time where we can all play a part in ensuring the support required to drive the economy longer term, particularly with the challenges we're facing, be those in respect of the climate, geopolitical strategies, economic or those coming out of the pandemic. This is a point where we can all work together. There's an expectation that we will and for those people who have come to the table with that view in mind, I have sought to match that approach. I have very much valued it. I know we can't agree on everything, and I don't think we expected to, but there are some things that we can work through and that's what we have sought to do today. I also extend my apologies to the member for Lyne, who wanted to speak last night and I inadvertently cut him off. He doesn't agree with everything we've said, but I understand where he's coming from and so I was quite happy for him to make his contribution today.

In respect of the amendment moved by the Leader of the Greens, the government accepts it. For the reasons why we are, I might pick up on some of the points that the Leader of the Greens raised, and also those raised by the member for Warringah. This is a fund designed to support the evolution, reinforcement and diversification of Australian manufacturing. It's a fund which is designed to help Australia be a country that makes things. We want to back investment in those firms which have a concept that they've got to the point of commercialisation, where they're ready to scale up and to broaden out the manufacturing activity they're intending to do. This fund will be managed—and I emphasise again—by an independent board. I will not be making the calls as the minister for industry, and nor will anyone who follows after me. This will be an independent board, made up of experienced people, guided by an investment mandate and delivering a return to the taxpayer. The reason I mention this is because it's not just about delivering for the taxpayer. If they're delivering a return, they're delivering for the economy and the communities they serve.

In terms of some of the issues the Greens have raised, the intent of the NRF is not to deal with some of the things that have been raised in the amendment. There may be other vehicles that support that type of activity, but this is about manufacturing activity, so we've been quite open to supporting that.

In reference to the member for Warringah's points around directly investing, there may be some firms that particularly have levered off fossil fuels as their source of their energy, and they want to covert over. Unless they're preparing to manufacture the technology that they will then embed in their operations, this will not be a fund that will support them to bring in new technologies that have already been made by someone else that they just put in to satisfy their energy needs. If they're building the technology, yes, but if they're just bringing it on board, no. There will be other vehicles that can support that.

I hope we do address those concerns that have been raised. But there is a lot of work to do. The fund has, at its heart, $3 billion dedicated within the $15 billion of the NRF that has been factored into our plans to reduce emissions to meet the targets the parliament supported for 2030 and net zero. It's been calculated in that modelling. We would not want to do anything inconsistent with that. Hence, for those people who are wanting to know why the government has agreed to the Greens amendment, we are not going to do anything that runs counter to that $15 billion investment. That is why we've been prepared to support this. It's why the amendment is phrased in the way it is.

Again, it's about anything that is supporting the manufacture of some of those new energy technologies that come with low or zero emissions, and we can scale that up onshore. Importantly, as the Prime Minister has often remarked, we've seen the intellectual property that has underpinned the development of solar technology emerge from this country, and then some other country has gone off and manufactured that. We are rightfully proud of the fact that we have more solar panels on our roofs than most other countries, and yet most of those panels were not built by Australians, even though the idea came from us. We want to support ideas on this country's shores; we want to manufacture that way. That's what this fund is about, and that's why we're willing to support the amendment.

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