Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It's hard to believe I left my office, where I was listening to former president Barack Obama make an inspiring speech about hope, to come in here to listen to a shadow minister make a less-than-inspiring speech, following many others from those opposite. They drive down hope. Speaker after speaker from that side, when speaking on this piece of legislation, is showing Australians what they are really about. They don't trust Australians. They don't believe Australians can do things. What they're demonstrating is that they don't believe Australians can make things. After 10 years in government, driving manufacturing out of our suburbs, out of our regions and out of our country, they come in here to criticise a piece of legislation—the Future Made in Australia Bill 2024—that is deliberately made to build hope in our suburbs and our regions—legislation about a future made in Australia and about the return of manufacturing.

I remember the dark days of the pandemic. I remember lots and lots of planning and talking about sovereign capability. There were lots of woeful moments where we realised that we were at the bottom of the supply chain and we couldn't get our hands on things that we needed in this country. I was listening yesterday to people on the other side who talked about increased costs of housing, without factoring into that the shortages of things that we need to build things in this country because we are at the bottom of the supply chain and, for decades, we have allowed ourselves to not build, create or make the things we need here to ensure we are safe in dangerous times.

This piece of legislation is about just that. It's about building hope. It's about building things. It's about Australia returning to a place of sovereign capability. It's about Australia returning to being a country that actually believes in its people and believes its people can innovate, can create and can make things here. For two days now, I've seen those opposite walk through the door and come in here, and I've listened to them making speeches about this legislation, and they need to understand that all I hear is their absolute lack of faith in the Australian population to do the things we need to do.

Unlike those opposite, we believe in Australians. We believe in our capacity to innovate. We believe in our capacity to get things done. We believe in our capacity to collaborate, most importantly. We believe in our capacity to collect around an idea and to make things happen, and that's what this legislation is about. It is about a plan for a future made in Australia. It is very simple. We want Australia to be a country that makes more things here because it will grow our economy and create good jobs. That's what drives us. It means we'll be a country standing on our own two feet and spreading opportunity. It means that we'll be making the most of what we have and making more things here. It means that we will be more than a farm and more than a quarry. As the member for Macarthur said earlier, those opposite are quite happy to dig things out of the ground, but they don't have the faith, the drive or the energy to believe we can value-add to those minerals and create new markets. We just heard from the member for Fairfax, who doesn't believe that we can compete.

See this speech in context