Sam Birrell (Nicholls, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Future Made in Australia Bill 2024. I start by commending the government on the name of the bill; I think it's very clever. Once you dive into it, I think there are all sorts of issues that would be dangerous for Australia's manufacturing future. I will get to the legislation soon, but first it invites a discussion and a debate about how we encourage and invest in manufacturing in this country, what's worked in the past and what will work in the future. I think allowing the market to understand what consumers want and letting them manufacture is one thing, and what has been described by some media commentators as crony capitalism is another.

But first I want to invite all of those listening on a virtual tour of the industrial precinct of my home town of Shepparton. All members in this place are invited to come to Shepparton and getting the car for the real tour with me. We're going to drive down Old Dookie Road—and I do this to explain how manufacturing is thriving and what's led to it thriving. I think that can give us some pointers to the future. We drive down Old Dookie Road and turn to our right, and we see Noumi, a leading Australian producer of dairy and plant based milks, nutritional products and ingredients. Noumi sources the milk from the farms around the Goulburn Valley and creates, particularly in my area, UHT products that get exported and are also for the domestic market.

You're looking at Noumi on your right—fantastic manufacturing facility. You look on your left and you see J Furphy & Sons, an iconic Shepparton business. They great thing about J Furphy & Sons is that they built the stainless steel tanks that set Noumi up to do the milk production and the food production that they do. So we've got a great little hub. We've got one business with innovation and know-how built up over 100 years that is supplying another business that is just getting going with some relatively new technologies.

As we keep driving around, we will see Pental, recently acquired by the DuluxGroup. Pental has proudly supported Aussie homes for over 100 years, and they've got brands such as White King, Country Life, Velvet, Lux and Jiffy. Where would our homes be without those? They also have a contract manufacturing division, which manufactures to company specifications for private label or store brands. They were able to pivot during COVID to develop and produce a White King disinfectant spray and a Country Life antibacterial hand cleaner. There were in particularly high demand in China, and we had the capacity to do it.

Then we turn the corner and look around, and there's our favourite iconic company: SPC, the Shepparton Preserving Company. For over 100 years, they've been taking fruit from orchards and putting it into cans—more and more now, snack packs—as well as with tomatoes and all sorts of healthy processed foods that Australians and people around the world enjoy. I reiterate my invitation to everyone in this place to come and do the peach challenge: to try the imported Chinese products against the SPC in my office for all members.

We drive past a company called Rubicon, which designed, built and installed water efficiency and management solutions in 20 countries around the world and makes irrigation efficiency equipment in Shepparton. We go to Campbell Soup, making a pantry staple. Everyone knows Campbell Soup. Then we turn around and see MC Pipes. Established in 1948, Midland Concrete, or MC, Pipes began life as a small concrete precast manufacturer of pipes, but they've grown into a huge business, and their pipes are necessary for the new housing developments we see around the country.

The reason that I have taken you on that bit of a tour is to have a think about how those businesses were set up and succeeded and what threatens them. Then we can discuss how we can have a real future manufactured in Australia. They need reliable and cheap energy, which they have had over many years. That's now threatened. Energy prices are going through the roof, particularly under this government. I am worried about where they are going to go in the future. I am worried about gas. I am worried about electricity. Most of them have done as much transformation to solar as they can, but they still need that base-load power. That threatens their very viability.

Industrial relations legislation that this government has put in place is making it very difficult for some of those businesses to manage. The red tape, the bureaucracy and what you have to go through with your workers is making it really difficult. The lack of flexibility is making it really difficult for people to run those businesses. The government investing in infrastructure is what set those businesses up. Instead of the government going in and saying, 'You should set up this kind of business,' or, 'You should set up that kind of business,' what the government did over 100 years ago was set up an irrigation system, saying, 'We'll get water to you and then you can decide what works and you make it work, whether it is growing peaches, apples or pears or having dairy products.' Then, all of a sudden, that creates a product and a commodity, which then creates manufactured and processed food. That's processed in a healthy way, I might add, with apples, pears and dairy. In some cases, there has been limited government support, and that is always leveraged off what a company decided was a good idea anyway. For example, the previous coalition government had modern manufacturing grants. That helped a company set up an abattoir called Greenham in Tongala in my electorate.

The reason I bring that up is that Australia has had a proud and strong manufacturing industry, and the coalition government always supported it. But the coalition will oppose this bill because, the more we hear about it, the more we see it as a plan for pork-barrelling, not for a strong economy. This is a plan for more government, not more business investment. It is a plan for more inflation at a time when Labor is already making it worse.

What our great manufacturing businesses need is affordable and reliable energy, flexible workplaces, less regulation and an incentive based tax system. That's what they need. What we're getting is policies on energy, industrial relations and tax that are making Australia a less attractive place to do business. We can see that because insolvencies are up and productivity is down. Those are facts. Insolvencies are up, productivity is down and businesses are struggling just to keep their doors open. So we see Labor's Future Made in Australia plan—great name—as a bit more about spin than delivery. Economist after economist has criticised this policy. The government can't solve the cost-of-living crisis by throwing hard-earned taxpayers' money around on ideological pet projects. This bill does nothing to alleviate the current pressures on struggling families and small business.

What's in this legislation? These bills expand the role of Export Finance Australia and ARENA. They establish a national interest framework. That retrospectively underpins the government's Future Made in Australia policy. The accompanying omnibus bill expands Export Finance Australia's remit to fund domestic industries and nominate the Minister for Finance as an additional responsible additional minister. The omnibus bill also expands ARENA's functions from pure R&D and demonstration into supporting manufacturing deployment and commercialisation. So this legislation really expands the role of government and ministers, and I think that's a dangerous thing to do.

Take ARENA, for example. It's always been a research and development agency. Labor in opposition opposed even expanding that remit to cover sensible net zero related R&D expenditure into, for example, carbon capture and storage and blue hydrogen. But, now they are in government, they want to extend the remit even further into deployment of manufacturing because it suits the interests of their donors.

This bill gives the minister for climate change the ability to boost its funding at the stroke of a pen, with no parliamentary oversight and no scrutiny. Have a think about what that could mean. The government can roll up to $3.98 billion out the door. Let's just think when that might be. Possibly before an election. I think we call that a slush fund where I'm from.

Labor's own investments just don't stack up. The Productivity Commission says a $1 billion commitment to make more solar panels in Australia under the Albanese government's Future Made in Australia program should be retrospectively subjected to a tougher National Interest Framework test. At a time when productivity is down and struggling, I think we should listen to the Productivity Commission. We should also listen to them on irrigation and water in the Murray-Darling Basin. You might think I would say that, but that's something that enables business. The Labor government's attacks on the Murray-Darling Basin and those irrigation systems deter business, deter manufacturing and deter us making and growing future things in Australia.

To look at some examples, the Solar Sunshot program is already in trouble, with serious doubts we can produce globally competitive solar panels. The biggest booster of green hydrogen, Fortescue, is scaling back their ambitions for green hydrogen despite the promise of tax credits just for existing. Labor's production credits are failing to deliver for the struggling nickel industry, with the promise of future subsidies not holding back the tide of international price pressures and rising domestic costs through energy, tax and workplace laws. Key elements of Labor's Future Made in Australia agenda include the PsiQuantum contract, which bypassed the National Interest Framework and sector assessments. There's some serious questions to answer about decisions to make these investments. These things aren't necessarily bad. We don't know what the best technologies of the future are going to be. I would argue they're not necessarily for governments to completely decide, but to allow the market to find out.

We must get back to economic basics. Australians want and deserve something better. In government, the coalition government would do three things. We want to steer our nation out of our current domestic crises. We don't want to simply talk about the challenges of our time; we want to meet them head-on with action to carve out a more secure future. More importantly, we want to make decisions that set up our nation for success for generations to come. We're looking to build a nation which is a mining, manufacturing and agricultural powerhouse and a leader in technology and innovation. That's what we do really well. When we set things up for private enterprise to succeed by making sure they have the tools to do what they want to do, then we see real success.

I would argue that Australia has been on a pathway to success since the early 1980s. The Hawke-Keating government deregulated the economy. What we see now is the reregulation of the economy, and nowhere in the world has that worked. I recall a senator of this place, Mathias Cormann, talking about why he joined the Liberal Party. He said he joined the Liberal Party because it's the party of free enterprise. We in the Nationals are the party of free enterprise in the regions. He said it was because as he was driving around Europe as an older teenager of 18 or 19, he looked at what the policies had led to in East Germany and he looked at what the policies had led to in West Germany. In one, the government tried to get involved in everything, had its fingers in every pie, worked out who'd do this, who'd do that, who'd have this industry and who'd have that industry. West German governments, based on free market principles, were there to invest, support and provide energy, provide infrastructure, but then let the free market do its thing, finding out what consumers want, and creating products and services that consumers will then pay for.

Even now when you drive around Germany you see the difference in prosperity. Prosperity is what it's all about—prosperity for our futures and prosperity for the generations ahead. We absolutely do need to reduce our emissions but there are better ways to do it than government's trying to pick winners. We're also seeking to help build a nation where the tax contributions from the surging industries help us to build the infrastructure of the future.

In closing, we oppose this bill because it goes against the principles of the free market, the principles of allowing the market to decide what to invest in, the principles of innovation driving change not government deciding what it is. There is a complete lack of transparency about how this money would get allocated and who gets to allocate it. I think government's role is to create the right environment for business around energy, IR and infrastructure and then to just get out of the way. I don't think this bill advances that, and that's why we'll be opposing it.

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