Kevin Hogan (Page, National Party, Shadow Minister for Trade and Tourism) Share this | Hansard source

I commend the member for Blair for moving this motion. I note that at the end he acknowledged the current minister, Don Farrell. I commend the current government for ratifying this deal, because it was important that it went through the parliamentary processes to be brought into force.

I'm somewhat disappointed, though, that the member for Blair couldn't mention the previous government, who actually negotiated and signed the deal. We can be bipartisan here when we know there were certain factual things that happened. Well done to the member for Blair for mentioning the deal. I agree with everything he said about the importance of this deal and everything that was done with this deal. I'm disappointed that he couldn't bring himself to acknowledge the previous government—in fact, the minister at the time, Dan Tehan, who negotiated this deal, signed it before we left government—but what he said was correct: this was an exceptionally important deal for Australia. In fact, I think it's the template for a free trade agreement. The liberalisation we got across a whole range of products was really important.

I remind the chamber that one of the great achievements of the previous three governments, from 2013 to 22, was in the free trade area. When we came to government in 2013, around 25 per cent of goods and services that we exported were covered by a free trade agreement. By the time we left it was close to 80 per cent, with the last two of those being significant. One of those deals was the deal with the UK and the other one was the preliminary deal with India. Both were really important deals.

I acknowledge what the member for Blair said. He mentioned the EU deal, and I say that the template they need to use for the deal that the current government is trying to negotiate is the UK deal. We will be measuring the achievements of the new government, in this free trade agreement they do with the EU, against what we achieved with the UK. There are some great things there, and with all due respect—I actually have great personal admiration for the current minister for trade—he does have his work cut out because we know there are elements of the Labor Party that do not like free trade agreements, and I say this respectfully; I respect their opinion. The CFMEU are on the record for having criticised the UK deal. They appeared before a parliamentary committee on the deal, when it was going through ratification, and spoke against the deal. So I know the minister has his work cut out.

In the deal that the current minister is negotiating with the EU, measuring it against the deal we did with the UK, I'll look for some of the products the member previously brought up—the complete liberalisation of sugar, the complete liberalisation of beef and the complete liberalisation of sheep meat. Let's look at those as the starting point. Again, the deal we did with the UK is the template.

I get the sensitivity around all this in the ag sector. The ag sector is very important to us, Deputy Speaker Freelander. To give you some figures on trade, the four biggest trading commodities in our economy—not necessarily large exports to the UK—are coal, gas, iron ore and ag. Those are the four sectors that drive our trading performance. I'm going to use ballpark figures here: ag is a bit under $100 billion, while coal and iron ore, depending on prices, can be well over $100 billion, but let's say the four of them generate about $400 billion of exports in our country. Again, the trade deals that we did from 2013 to 2022 have helped that. We have a lot of investment into export areas. Those four sectors drive a lot of economic activity. When you look at royalties, when you look at company taxes and when you look at the personal income taxes of the people who work in those sectors, we're probably talking over $100 billion from those four sectors alone.

The previous minister for trade has just walked in, the member for Wannon. To the previous minister, I acknowledge you for doing this deal. The member for Blair, who moved this motion, couldn't quite bring himself to do it, but I will. This is the template that we should be using; the deal that the member for Wannon did with the UK is the template that we need to use for the deal that the new government is doing with the EU. You've raised a bar in the deal that you got, and it's a high bar. We look forward to the current government getting the same types of results.

I will end here by reiterating the importance of trade and the importance of being a low tariff and low taxing economy. That's what drives this economy. I commend the previous minister for doing this wonderful deal.

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