Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I'm pleased to speak in support of this motion. The previous speaker was complaining about no money. Honestly—there was $392 million in the Industry Growth Program to support Australian small and medium-sized enterprises to commercialise their ideas and grow their businesses, and there were billions of dollars announced in relation to the National Reconstruction Fund to help Australia capture new, high-value market opportunities, and the member opposite voted against it in parliament! Don't complain about the fact that there's no money there, when you actually voted against the allocation of the money.

I thank the member for Adelaide. You only have to walk past his office here in Canberra to see the iconic South Australian Rossi boots proudly displayed in the window. That's a company that was formed in 1910, and I thank the member for Adelaide for what he's done.    Historically, Adelaide was a manufacturing powerhouse, although the former coalition government did its best to kill a lot of that by gutting the car industry, for example, goading it to leave, which is exactly what the car industry did. Who can forget the statements of Joe Hockey, the former Treasurer and member for North Sydney? I was there and so were you, Deputy Speaker Wilkie.

Unlike those opposite, we want to see a future made in Australia. We believe it should be a country that makes things again. The fact is we have all the ingredients here. We've got the people, the capability and the natural resources to compete with the best in the world to produce new products, technology and research. We've hit the ground running, putting in place programs and reforms to diversify our economy, boost our sovereign capability and create a new pipeline of well-paid jobs now and in the future, especially in outer suburban and regional communities like mine.

As I mentioned before, the new $392 million Industry Growth Program, which the Minister for Industry and Science announced this morning, is delivering advice and capital support for small firms to help turn ideas into growing businesses. The $15 billion National Reconstruction Fund—that was the amount announced in the parliament and in the bill that we passed—is a co-investment fund that's about adding value to our natural strengths and comparative advantages across seven national priorities, through a mix of loans, guarantees and equity injections. We're committing a huge amount of money across that space. We released Australia's first National Quantum Strategy to support an industry estimated to be worth $2.2 billion, directly employing 8,700 people by 2030. We're working on the National Robotics Strategy, driving an industry that's already contributing $18 billion to our economy. We're looking to support the safe, inclusive uptake of technologies like AI.

To unlock the potential of the NRF, we need to tackle current skills shortages and skill up the digital tradies of the future. To that end we're investing heavily in fee-free TAFE. We want Australians to take the opportunity to get the skills, including in the priority areas of technology and digital. The Deputy Leader of the Opposition described our fee-free TAFE places as wasteful spending. A total of 215,000 Australians took it up within six months, and we've committed ourselves, from January next year, to another 300,000 places. We're going to make sure people in the outer suburbs of major cities and places like Ipswich in my electorate have the tools to access the jobs of the future in industry and manufacturing. We know when we add value we create jobs and stronger businesses. That's exactly why programs like the NRF and the Industry Growth Program exist—to support those great local businesses.

Capral, in my electorate, is a world-leading firm and a terrific example of this. It was great to have taken Minister Ed Husic on a tour of their factory at Bundamba a few months ago. Capral produces aluminium for a wide range of products, both for local customers and for export, from window frames to truck beds. The thing is aluminium will also be important in our transition to a net zero future. It's used in frames found in the solar panels being installed across the country.

Another example is Graphene Manufacturing Group, based in Richlands—in the Speaker's electorate of Oxley, the neighbouring electorate to mine—an innovative firm at the forefront of our national critical minerals and Australian-made battery industry. This site employs over 40 people and is experimenting to develop batteries that charge 70 times faster and have three times the battery life of lithium batteries.

Lastly, medical science is a huge growth industry in my electorate. For example, developers like Springfield City Group in Ipswich have been working with a wide range of partners to develop the Springfield BioPark, an innovative precinct dedicated to advanced manufacturing of high-value medicines like vaccine and blood products. So there's a lot going on. We've taken initiative, and those opposite should get on board.

See this speech in context