Jason Wood (La Trobe, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Community Safety, Migrant Services and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I congratulate Rob Sitch, who just won another Logie Award for best comedy with Utopia. When it comes to the name of this bill, the Future Made in Australia Bill 2024, it would just be one that they chose in Utopia. It's just a classic. It's got the right name. The public will like the term. The government would love using the term. When all the members send out their emails and make their speeches, it's just such a great name. When you see the final document, it'll be the right weight and the right texture when it comes to the paper; it'll have the correct font. It's such a perfect document. The problem is, though, when it comes to Labor and their commitments to big projects like this, it is a lot of money, and I am greatly concerned by the way it will be delivered.

I will go back a bit in time to when we had Labor's pink batts insulation plan. It seemed like a great idea at the time. They wanted houses right around Australia to have better insulation. I think in total they insulated 1.1 million homes, and the payment to make this happen was $1.4 billion. Sadly, it actually led to the Royal Commission into the Home Insulation Program it was so bad. It followed the deaths of four workers, aged 16 to 25, who died in separate incidents that may have been attributed to the failure to identify and manage workplace health and safety. It was an absolute tragedy. At the time, when the Labor government proposed this, it sounded absolutely great.

We also already have commercialisation grants. This is so important when it comes to new businesses. To be honest, I've always been firm that if you have an existing business that's gone for a number of years that should be supported with commercialisation grants. Then you have research and development export grants. If someone is doing their research in Australia on new products, when they export those, they get a tax rebate on those.

In the south-east of Melbourne, in my electorate of La Trobe, we're looking at building what is called meta city, which will be home to an industrial park and high-tech area. I am going to talk about Labor when it comes to some of the road projects around that area and the way they have been managed by the state government. Just nearby, we have Dandenong, which is in the seat of Holt, next door to La Trobe. It is probably the biggest manufacturing hub in Australia. For those who don't know, the industrial sector in Victoria contributes around $30 billion to the state's economy each year, which is 27 per cent of the nation's manufacturing output, which is quite incredible. Our manufacturing businesses transform a range of materials and new products that cover food, beverages, petroleum, coal, paper, machinery, metals, furniture, clothes, textiles, pharmaceuticals, planes and boats.

The great concern that I have about this government proposal is this. You have those smaller businesses, family businesses, doing well, and they will be competing with major corporations. We can look at it as a $15 billion slush fund when it comes to corporate giants in Australia who may be listed companies and yet be receiving potentially billions of dollars. Rather than the small mum-and-dad businesses, it is going to go to the big multinationals, even when it comes to critical minerals and hydrogen projects. I don't know why the government would want to help those huge organisations when they come into Australia.

I mentioned that locally we have meta city, which is a proposal to have a very high-tech, industrial area. When it comes to Labor at the state level managing projects, I will give you some costings. Back in 2007—obviously it was a number of years ago—in the electorate of La Trobe we committed $10 million to the Bryn Mawr bridge. That goes over the packing train line. Labor came out at the time and committed, I think, $30 million. It was 2004. It was built in 2007. It was actually built by Casey council for less than $10 million. Then we come to the Clyde Road, which is right beside this meta city I was talking about before. The cost when we were looking at this in 2007 was going to be in the vicinity of $30 million, and then it grew to $80 million. We got the project manager who built the Bryn Mawr Bridge in Beaconsfield down, and we said: 'How much do you think this project would cost? It's a grade separation going over Clyde Road, and it's going to be really important for our industrial area. We've got Enterprise Avenue, which has a number of high-tech businesses in that area.' And they said, 'You can get change from $30 million.' We said, 'But it has actually been quoted now as an $80 million project.' The project manager for Bryn Mawr Bridge said: 'That's just the unions. That's what happens when it comes to the CFMEU.'

So then we go further in time, to when we committed to funding for the project to be built. This is, again, in Casey. The Casey council is a large council and has a big team of engineers. When they put the quotes forward again, it was going to be a $70 million project. The road was going over the Monash Freeway, just a duplication going to the grade separation, and the council cost was $70 million. Under state Labor, where the CFMEU tax and all of the union fees got involved, it became a $250 million project, so, basically, every meter of road cost $250,000.

I haven't got much hope when it comes to Labor and when it comes to them managing a $30 billion so-called 'build in Australia' when we can't even get roads built in a manner which would be cost-effective. Again locally, you think about all the workers going from Berwick train station down to Dandenong. We've talked about that huge manufacturing hub. We committed $15 million to build the train station. The city council in Mitcham built a 400-spot carpark. When it came to Berwick, the cost blew out to $64 million, an incredible amount of money. When it comes to the CFMEU tax, the same thing happened with Pakenham Road, Racecourse Road and McGregor Road. They were $80 million and they blew out to $398 million, and the CFMEU flags were out.

The great concern I have when it comes to this bill and this proposal is: who are going to be the winners? How are the unions going to get involved? Again, we've seen this sort of fake uproar about the CFMEU with the Labor Party now saying: 'Oh, gee, they've been really bad. We didn't know about the bikies and everything.' Everyone knew the bikies were involved in the CFMEU. It came out on 60 Minutes, and I want to give credit to Nick McKenzie and the Age for highlighting the corruption and the intimidation.

How is the government going to ensure that this huge injection of money does not go to those who are leftover from the CFMEU, as they go elsewhere, and to the bikies? How is the money going to be managed without ripping off the taxpayer? It's a huge wad of money, and I believe that the Treasurer has some discretionary spending—billions of dollars, I think. Where is that going to be spent? Is this to appease the teals and make sure they get preference deals to keep them in government? It seems to me to be completely unfair and unnecessary.

In fact, I'm all for renewable energy when it comes to solar and wind. But the thing is, when it comes to Labor's renewables-only proposal, in parts of my electorate, in areas such as Emerald, Cockatoo and Gembrook, we are always having power outages. Back in June 2021, I think the power was out for six or seven weeks. There's no electricity and no mains power there. In winter, there's no solar. There is no area in the place that I'm talking about where you can actually have wind as a meaningful form of energy.

The government's 82 per cent renewable target by 2030 requires 4.5 gigawatts of additional large-scale wind and solar every year. Less than one-third of this will be delivered. It's going to take 58 million solar panels and also 3,500 wind turbines and up to 28,000 kilometres of new transmission lines across the country.

I then come to the point which I've always been concerned about: why won't the government even consider nuclear energy? I must admit that in days gone by I was concerned about the use of nuclear energy and about disposal. But in Australia we have the uranium-mining sector and we export uranium around the world. Look at all these OECD countries—places like Canada and France. Even the new Prime Minister of the UK is espousing nuclear power and saying how important it is to have it in the mix. The Labor government will not even consider it. I don't know why you wouldn't even consider having nuclear power as an option. Rather than just saying, 'Yes, let's just do some research and look at it,' they've completely walked away from that idea.

Another aspect of this bill is the cost of living. Australians are really hurting. In my electorate, people are really hurting when it comes to their power bills and their insurance, both of which have gone up, and when it comes to issues such as rentals. When I went down to Casey Hospital and met the nurses there, who are doing a fantastic job, the biggest issue for international nurses was actually finding accommodation. So things have become a lot tougher, not only for people in my electorate and right across the country but also for businesses, which are really hurting. Every time I go and speak to a cafe owner, I find that they're really hurting.

Then we have this Future Made in Australia Bill, which provides billions and billions of dollars in corporate welfare for some of Australia's wealthiest companies and individuals. I know that is not the best way to help mums and dads and singles and students, who are trying to stay at home and get by and are hearing about the amazing amount of money being spent by Labor on a folly to hopefully make sure they deliver something. I believe that in their own minds their intentions are good, but the danger is that this is so much money. It's just going to hurt so many people. We saw what happened with pink batts in the past, and we also remember what happened when Labor tried to have their Fuelwatch and GroceryWatch. We're going to have this amazing amount of money spent, and who are going to be the beneficiaries of this? As I said, I just can't see it being the mums and dads of Australia.

I just finish on this point: the government really should be looking after small business. In Victoria, small businesses are really hurting as a result of the Victorian Labor state government and the land tax. The land tax is killing small businesses. It's killing those mums and dads who have invested in an investment property. Thirty per cent of houses now sold in Victoria are actually being sold by landlords.

So I have grave concerns about the way this massive amount of money will be spent. It won't help mums and dads and singles in Australia.

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