Scott Buchholz (Wright, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In continuation on the Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011: unsurprisingly, Labor jumped on our proposal and accused us of being in breach of the WTO agreement. It should come as no surprise that these allegations were completely false. Not only are the preliminary affirmative decisions consistent with the WTO provisions; they are consistent with what Labor was advocating just a few months before. I imagine that must have been quite embarrassing for the honourable members involved.

Labor's disastrous record on manufacturing policy is best reflected in the 28 separate months of contraction in the sector and the loss of more than 136,000 manufacturing jobs in Australia since 2008. Those people who choose to listen in on parliamentary debates or choose to ferret through reams and reams of Hansard would now be starting to question and scratch their heads as the previous speakers, when they were debating the urgency of the need for the government to restore confidence in their management of the Australian economy, were saying something completely in contrast to that. Speakers in this House who will precede this part of the Hansard were making the point that a Labor government was actually creating jobs. Now I have got up as the next speaker and said that 136,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost. Someone is wrong.

I support this bill and I support the truth being told. I support this Customs amendment bill, as we do a number of bills, but the reason I want to make the point that so many jobs have been lost in the manufacturing sector is that last year we had a 0.02 per cent growth rate in employment. So when we hear people on the other side saying that these jobs have been created, they are telling half the story. They are talking about the jobs that have been created and neglecting the truth that for every job that has been created another job has been lost under their leadership by determination of a 0.02 per cent growth rate. We can all spin until our heads fall off, but the truth of the stats will never escape us.

Sadly, this is a government that has already seen fit to punish manufacturers relentlessly by increasing regulation, discouraging commercialisation, slashing incentives for research and development, and, worst of all, introducing a job-destroying carbon tax. It shows no signs that it will be interested in fighting for the growth of an Australian industry. Nevertheless, it is the view of the coalition that the amendments under consideration here today go some of the way towards addressing a few of the stakeholders' concerns relating to the national antidumping system, and I am happy to give my support to the bill. I am happy to give my support, because there are so many times that I have stood in this House for the betterment of the nation and supported bills that have been put up by this government.

I also bring your attention, Mr Deputy Speaker, to the government's continual line of the negativity of the opposition when I stand here giving support for a bill. We constantly hear the drone from the government that the opposition is so negative and it is 'no, no, no, no'. I am thinking, 'This is wrong,' because I know myself that I stand in this House and support bills. So, to add some fact to the debate, I went to the Parliamentary Library at the end of last year and I asked them to correlate for me (1) the number of bills that went through the House and (2) how many bills were supported by the opposition and how many were opposed. An interesting fact came out, and this is not party spin; this is actual fact from the Parliamentary Library. From memory, the opposition supported 97.4 per cent of the bills. So that is a far cry from the rhetorical spin that the government puts on about the opposition having this 'no, no, no, no, no'. When you go through and actually have a look at the bills that we said no to, including the cognate bills, I think the climate legislation had 15 or 21 pieces to it. I am counting those, but if you put that together and call it one bill then it actually means that we opposed only 13 per cent of the legislation that went through this House. So it is a far cry from the 'no'. If anything, the tide is actually starting to turn for who is saying no. Today, when we put up a suspension of standing orders, it was this parliament that said 'no, no, no' for the 42nd time to a suspension of standing orders.

Andrew Leigh (Fraser, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker, I rise on a point of order on relevance. It seemed to me that the member for Wright was continuing the MPI.

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is no point of order. The member is speaking on the bill. I remind the member for Wright of the bill before the House. I would also say that I thought I heard him say 'lying' during his address. If that was the case, I ask him now to withdraw that reference to the government benches.

Scott Buchholz (Wright, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If I did say that, I do withdraw out of respect for your deputy speakership, sir. There is no way I would do such a heinous—

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, you will just withdraw it.

Scott Buchholz (Wright, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw it. You are dead right: there was no point of order. To conclude, I support the amendment.

Andrew Leigh (Fraser, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is my pleasure to rise to address the Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011, a piece of trade legislation that sits proudly in a Labor legacy of trade reform. The opening up of Australian markets which has been so much to the benefit of Australia's workers and consumers is fundamentally a Labor story. It was Gough Whitlam in 1973 who first cut tariffs, and then Bob Hawke and Paul Keating who continued through the tariff cuts. But they did so with a view that open markets would be good for Australia but that that process of dropping the tariff walls would entail transition costs. So they put in place a car industry plan and TCF plans, recognising that industry would need time to adjust. Those changes have been enormously beneficial for Australian families. They have put on average $3,900 per annum into the pockets of Australian households, according to a report by the Centre for International Economics. Open markets have also meant that Australian industry has become more competitive. That has meant more export jobs. It has meant more opportunities for Australian workers.

But it is also important that the government ensure that Australian companies are protected from unfair trade practices by other countries. This legislation is making the most important improvements to Australia's antidumping regime for more than a decade. The improvements will include an increase in Customs staff working on antidumping by 45 per cent. It will include increased funding to hire experts and to assist Australian manufacturers in lodging applications for remedies against injurious dumping or subsidisation. The government has established an International Trade Remedies Forum that will provide advice to the government on the effectiveness of the improvements to the antidumping system and will report on options for further improvements. That forum has met a number of times, considered various discussion papers and worked in cooperation to develop an anticircumvention framework.

Underlying all of this is our compliance with Australia's World Trade Organisation obligations. It is absolutely critical that we comply with WTO laws, because those WTO deals have been so important in underpinning our future prosperity. I am proud to say that I worked for 18 months for the late Senator Peter Cook, who negotiated for Australia the last WTO round of tariff cuts, the Uruguay Round. I am equally proud to say that it was my predecessor as the member for Fraser, Bob McMullan, who stepped into Peter Cook's shoes at the very end and whose signature appears for Australia on the Uruguay Round agreement. Trade talks can sometimes seem a little arcane, but underpinning them is the notion that we are taking rocks out of harbours. It is good for us to take the rocks out of our own harbours; it is better yet if we can get the rocks out of the harbours of other countries.

But the opposition seem not to recognise this. They have announced that they intend to reverse the onus of proof in antidumping cases, in clear breach of Australia's international obligations. The sharper knives in their drawer know that this cannot be done without risking other countries taking us to the WTO for retaliatory action. They know that they would involve punitive tariffs on Australia's agricultural or manufacturing exports. When you are allowed to impose punitive tariffs, countries think pretty hard about how to hit their neighbours. There is a famous World Trade Organisation case in which the European Union was allowed to impose retaliatory tariffs on the United States for a breach of WTO rules. It was an election year, so the Europeans decided to impose their retaliatory tariffs on exports from key swing states like Florida's orange juice concentrate. It did not take long before the Americans capitulated and complied with WTO obligations. Much the same would happen to Australia were we targeted with retaliatory tariffs. It is very clear that this would be the case. In a public submission to the Senate committee looking at this issue in May last year, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade was unequivocal in its advice. It said:

Australia cannot impose an onus on the importer to prove the goods have not been dumped …

The opposition claims that, from two months into an investigation, preliminary affirmative determinations can create a shift in the balance of an investigation requiring the foreign producer, rather than the Australian company that believes it has been damaged by the dumping, to prove its conduct has not hurt Australian industry. That is not correct. PADs are already used in accordance with Australia's WTO obligations, but these obligations make it clear that it is still necessary to make a preliminary finding that there is dumping and consequent injury to a domestic industry.

The opposition have a desire to ride roughshod over our international obligations when it comes to antidumping. It is just one of a series of incidents in which the opposition have threatened to tear up the international trading rule book—the rule book which has done so much to bring prosperity to Australia; the rule book which has ensured that Australia could export almost $300 billion worth of goods and services to the world last year.

Last August, the coalition supported an antitrade private member's bill on compulsory palm oil labelling. That would have breached Australia's obligations under the World Trade Organisation. It would have slugged Australian businesses with compliance costs of $150 million. Just before that, the shadow agriculture minister drafted a bill which sought to overturn a World Trade Organisation ruling that New Zealand apples be allowed into Australia, subject to scientifically based quarantine conditions. Had that private member's bill gone ahead, as the opposition well know, it would have put Australian trade in jeopardy.

It is just another piece of the puzzle as to how the Leader of the Opposition has consistently taken the antimarket view. He has taken the antimarket view on climate change, the use of voluntary water buybacks to alleviate desalination of the Murray-Darling Basin, the use of countercyclical fiscal policy to save Australia from recession when the global financial crisis hit, and the use of good economics that tell you that when you go to an election you should have an independent parliamentary budget office look at your costings rather than a team of accountants that has been fined or a catering company. Each day it is more and more clear that the opposition have lost all economic credibility and are willing to put at risk Australia's trading relations for simple pointscoring.

I turn to some observations which have been made on the issue of antidumping by the Chairman of the Productivity Commission, Gary Banks, when he spoke at the annual dinner of the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry on 23 November last year. I have to say that Mr Banks is not particularly complimentary about antidumping, but it is important to look to his statements to see where he regards the real problem lies. He said:

In its recent report on anti-dumping, the Commission nevertheless recognised that notions of unfairness had become so entrenched that retaining some form of anti-dumping system was inevitable, and on balance may serve to prevent something worse (as is sometimes said of FIRB). We therefore opted simply to moderate its potential to impose costs on Australian industry and consumers …

Mr Banks went on to talk about some of those costs. He then said:

However, no such ambiguity is to be found in the Opposition’s recently announced policy, which pushes the boundaries of allowable restrictions. Getting the right balance in anti-dumping policy between addressing perceptions of fairness and avoiding actions that would be costly domestically—and harmful to our bilateral relationships (including with China)—is a very difficult challenge for policy makers and always has been. Unfortunately the Opposition’s policy falls well short of the balance required, and has now made harder the Government’s own efforts to hold the line.

Mr Banks has highlighted the real problem with the coalition's economic populism in the area of trade—that is, it not only threatens our economic prosperity but threatens our diplomatic relations. In this century, the Asian century, we are—

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker, I rise on a point of order going to relevance. This is about antidumping. I do not know what the speaker is talking about, referring to the coalition's policy.

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is no point of order. I have been listening to the member for Fraser. He has been talking about customs tariff. I have noted the first reading speech and the member for Fraser is in order.

Andrew Leigh (Fraser, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I refer again to the speech on antidumping by the Chairman of the Productivity Commission. That speech highlighted the very real risks of the opposition's strategy—the opposition's growing economic populism. Getting the balance right on antidumping is critical in this century, the Asian century. It is absolutely vital that we preserve strong economic and diplomatic relationships with the countries in our region. We are enormously fortunate that growth moves in the world from Europe and North America to Asia, to be concentrated in the fastest growing region of the world. The Asian century presents challenges to Australia, to be sure, but the opportunities are far greater—the opportunities to engage in strong trading relationships with countries of our region. We have great potential in services exports, education, finance, law and architecture—all of these sectors will benefit greatly from our strong trading relationships with the countries of our region. Getting the balance right on issues such as antidumping is absolutely critical. Australia's trading relationships are critical to our economic prosperity. In 2011, our exports to North Asia rose 18 per cent, with shipments to China rising 24 per cent, to Japan rising 16 per cent and to ASEAN countries rising 23 per cent. Australia's trade is projected to more than double by 2025. This strong trade performance is only made possible in a rules based trading system.

Australia is a founding member of the global trading system, and we play by those rules. We may not like it when we lose the Ashes, but we still play by the rules of cricket. In the same way, we do not always like every decision made by the World Trade Organisation, but if we take our bat and ball and go home we hurt the jobs and the prosperity of many Australians.

There are now over 150 members of the World Trade Organisation, and many more are joining up. It is a rare country in the world that wants to thumb its nose at the World Trade Organisation, but that what those opposite want to do. They have chosen the low road, the economic populist road, at every possible turn. Australia's alternative Deputy Prime Minister, the Leader of the Nationals, condemned the Trans Pacific Partnership as a 'thought bubble'. Well, Deputy Speaker Scott, I can tell you it is a thought bubble that is being advocated by President Obama and something that should seriously be considered for the welfare of Australia. The day after the Deputy Leader of the Opposition said the government should accelerate negotiations on a trade deal with China, the Leader of the Opposition repudiated her and said it should be put on the backburner. It really reflects the fact that those opposite are not that interested in economics or the fundamental reforms which will raise the prosperity of our nation.

Estimates by the Centre for International Economics found in 2009 that one worker in seven in Australia was involved in the production of exports and one in 10 in import related activity. That makes one in five workers involved in trade related activity—exports, imports or both. Just imagine a set of policies that would lose one in five workers their job, that would shut off Australia's trade with the world and that would jeopardise our international trading relationships. That is what we face with the economic populism from those opposite. They are willing to say anything in order to win a vote but not willing to have the long-term conversation with Australians about the great benefits that will come to this nation in the Asian century. I commend the legislation to the House.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the Customs Amendment (Anti-Dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011. According to the explanatory memorandum, this bill seeks to implement a few new aspects to Australia's existing antidumping regime, including establishing a new appeals process to replace the existing appeals mechanism; establishing the International Trade Remedies Forum, which will be a stakeholder body of representatives from manufacturers, producers and importers, as well as industry associations, trade unions and relevant government agencies; and providing for flexible extensions to time frames for an investigation, a review of measures, the continuation of an inquiry or a duty assessment. Those extensions are to enable robust analysis where investigations involve particularly complex arrangements or involve large numbers of countries or interested parties, and to enable consideration of a response to critical new information that could not reasonably have been provided earlier.

Although the coalition will be supporting this package of modest amendments, I would like to make a few comments on the bill: firstly, to dispel the misinformation being peddled by the government about the effect that these changes will have to Australia's antidumping regime; secondly, to highlight the government's hypocrisy in terms of their claim to be protecting Australian industry; and, thirdly, to highlight the further hypocrisy in the alarming degree of divergence of our legislative approach to dumping on an international and domestic basis.

To start with, the purpose of Australia's antidumping regime is to protect Australian manufacturers and producers from dumped or subsidised imports that would affect their viability. We all support that. However, the explanatory memorandum to this bill states that dumping:

… occurs when an overseas supplier exports goods … at a price that is designed to ultimately lower competition.

This is simply incorrect. Under the World Trade Organisation's definition, dumping is not just selling goods below cost for an anticompetitive purpose. The World Trade Organisation's definition of dumping also includes merely selling a good for a lower price in a foreign market than is charged for the same good in the exporter's domestic market. Effectively, antidumping legislation attempts to ensure that a firm makes the same level of profits on an export sale as it does on a domestic sale and that the export sale is not subsidised.

Under World Trade Organisation agreements, dumping is, rightfully, condemned if it merely causes or threatens to cause material injury to a domestic industry of an importing country. There is no threshold under WTO regulations to prove that a firm alleged to have engaged in dumping had a substantial degree of market power, that the dumper had a substantial share of the market, that the dumping continued for a sustained period, that the dumper had the purpose of damaging a competitor or competition or that there existed a dangerous probability of recoupment. All that is required for dumping to occur, under WTO rules, is that goods are sold for a lower price in a foreign market than is charged for the same goods in the domestic market and that there is the possibility of it causing material injury to a domestic competitor. Essentially, dumping is merely geographic price discrimination on an international basis—the selling of the same goods at different prices in different markets—where the markets are able to be segmented by international borders.

If we are to stand here in this parliament, with speaker after speaker condemning dumping—geographic price discrimination —across international markets because it causes or threatens to cause material injury to an Australian business, we must also condemn geographic price discrimination when it occurs internally, within our borders, and causes or threatens to cause material injury to an Australian based business. Otherwise, we in this place are hypocrites.

Yet, while we legislate for strengthening our provisions to deal with international geographic price discrimination under our own domestic competition laws, we have all been all but silent on the issue of geographic price discrimination when it occurs internally, within our own borders. This silence and inaction has allowed the Australian supermarket duopoly to use the anticompetitive practice of geographic price discrimination, or dumping, across segmented domestic markets, to destroy competition and to cause material injury to small Australian businesses.

In the home of free market capitalism, the USA, the Robinson-Patman Act has a specific provision against geographic price discrimination. That act provides, in part:

It shall be unlawful for any person engaged in commerce, in the course of such commerce … to sell, or contract to sell, goods in any part of the United States at prices lower than those exacted by said person elsewhere in the United States for the purpose of destroying competition, or eliminating a competitor …

American legislators have considered a violation of this act so detrimental to competition, to economic opportunity and to consumers that any person engaged in such geographic price discrimination can, upon conviction, be subject to one year's imprisonment. Likewise, EU competition law has provisions to deal with geographic price discrimination within internal boundaries of the EU. Yet under our competition laws here in Australia we have no effective provision to deal with geographic price discrimination. Therefore, across Australia today, we see the supermarket duopoly using the anticompetitive weapon of geographic price discrimination to drive their more efficient small business competitors from the marketplace, after which they slug consumers with excessive price increases.

Just one example is in Western Sydney, which I am sure the member sitting at the table, Mr Bowen, will remember. A survey found that one member of the supermarket duopoly was charging between 51 per cent and 402 per cent higher prices in one market than it was charging for the same items in another market less than four kilometres away. This caused material injury to a smaller competitor by driving it from the market, after which prices were jacked up by close to 100 per cent. Although such discrimination is not only anticompetitive and manifestly unfair and unjust to the general public, especially the elderly and the less mobile, when it comes to acting to repair Australia's competition laws to ensure that we have an effective provision against geographic price discrimination this parliament has gone missing.

For that small business in Western Sydney, once it was driven from the market, what did it matter whether the goods were dumped into its market by an overseas based firm or by a larger competitor operating in thousands of domestic markets? It made no difference at all. Under our existing laws, that small business would have a remedy if the dumping were undertaken by a larger foreign competitor, but it would have no remedy if this were undertaken by a larger domestic competitor.

An effective and workable dumping regime treads a very fine line. An antidumping regime that is too complex can easily be used as a protectionist measure which harms the Australian economy. For example, many Australian manufacturers rely on imported components to manufacture goods in Australia. However, an antidumping regime that is too complex can result in these manufacturers being tied up in red tape defending a dumping claim made against a vital business input that they have obtained from overseas.

We also need to tread very carefully before finding a foreign company guilty of dumping and before imposing countervailing duties. We need to be very careful before implementing such an overvigorous antidumping regime that is burdensome to free trade, as other countries may implement similar measures against Australia. In the past, Australian exports have rarely been subject to antidumping duties, and only one product from Australia has ever been subject to countervailing measures by a WTO member. This was back in 2000, when the European community imposed countervailing duties on synthetic polyester fibres exported from Australia.

However, as one of the few people in this place who has had to make things in Australia and export them into international markets, and having participated in international trade fairs across the globe, I can assure you that it is the practice of many Australian exporters to sharpen their pencils when competing in an international marketplace, and they are prepared to accept lower levels of profit on exports that they are on domestic sales. Under WTO rules, sharpening your pencil for an export order or selling goods in an export market for less than you would in a domestic market is considered dumping.

We also need to be very clear about this bill. It is not about stopping cheap imports. It has only the potential to stop goods being imported into Australia when they are sold below cost or below the price for which they are sold in a foreign market. Therefore, I am greatly concerned by the 'Don't dump on Australia' campaign being waged by the leaders of the Australian Workers Union. The union's website makes the following assertion:

The fate of AWU members rests with the creation and enforcement in Australia of a strong anti-dumping regime.

The truth is that the fate of AWU members has very little to do with the creation and enforcement of a strong antidumping regime. The fate of AWU members, and that of workers around Australia, rests with Australian industries remaining internationally competitive.

If the Australian Workers Union were truly concerned about the fate of its members it would be doing everything humanly possible to make sure Australian industries can remain internationally competitive, and they would be voicing their opposition, loud and clear, to this government's policy of burdening Australian firms with the world's largest carbon tax. Instead, we have had absolute silence from the AWU on the introduction of the world's largest carbon tax, which will simply place Australian industry at a competitive disadvantage. We can have the strongest antidumping provisions in the world, but if we have a government that is prepared to inflict upon Australian industry the world's largest carbon tax, placing it at a competitive disadvantage, this will allow firms to produce goods overseas at lower costs than they can be produced for in Australia, and this will cost Australia jobs. Yet officials at the Australian Workers Union are abandoning their union members by failing to stand up to this government and oppose its carbon tax.

There is also the practical difficulty of determining when goods are dumped. What is the normal price for a good? How is that calculated? Is it the price last week, is it the price last month or is it the price last year? For commodities, is the price going to be in the future? What about exchange rates? How do you calculate exchange rates, especially in the current market, where we see such extreme currency fluctuations?

How do you calculate the price in the domestic market, where different costs may result in the same goods being sold at different prices in different regional markets in the one country? And then there are the terms of sale. How can any price differential be explained by different trading terms, credit risks or statutory warranties? Was there a discount for quantity? This makes it very difficult, if not impossible, for an Australian Customs official to determine whether a good is being exported into Australia at a price that is different from the exporter's local market.

And when determining whether goods are being sold at higher prices in foreign markets, how do you compare apples with apples, as many products exported to Australia are simply not the same as those being sold in home markets? Where an apples to apples comparison cannot be made, Customs officials can look to the price charged by an exporter in another country to make a calculation based on a combination of the exporter's production costs, other expenses and normal profit margins. It is simply impossible for an Australian Customs official to accurately determine what the price would be if the good were theoretically available in a foreign market. Thus, any estimation of prices by Customs is purely an arbitrary figure. These are just a few of the difficulties that our Customs officials face in implementing this legislation.

If this government were serious about having a new and beefed up antidumping regime, you would think the government would be giving Customs new resources to adequately investigate claims of dumping. But the government is not actually increasing the resources available to Australian Customs officials to deal with these added responsibilities. The only conclusion is that the government is not serious about having an effective antidumping regime in Australia. This bill and the AWU's Don't Dump on Australia campaign are nothing more than a smokescreen to divert attention from the undeniable fact that imposing the world's largest carbon tax on Australian industry will make it more expensive to manufacture goods in Australia and will send production offshore, resulting in more and more goods being imported into Australia. That is the complete hypocrisy of this government, for which they stand condemned.

Amanda Rishworth (Kingston, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was interesting to hear the last speaker. Early in his speech I was not sure if he was calling for the nationalisation of the supermarkets and outlawing discounts altogether. But I want it to be clear to the House that he made an incorrect statement. He said that this government has not increased the resources going to Customs. He should have read the last bill, which we introduced in March 2011. It increased staff working on the antidumping regime; in fact, there was a 45 per cent increase in staff working in this area. I wanted to clarify that point and put it on the record because we have been working very hard at increasing the resources to actually deal with this problem—something the Howard government ignored for their whole 11 years in office.

I am very pleased to support the Customs Amendment (Anti-Dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011, which builds on the legislation already introduced by this Labor government to improve Australia's antidumping system. Dumping has a negative impact on local Australian businesses, especially small businesses, in the areas of manufacturing and primary production. I think it is important to make a distinction between the concepts of dumping and promoting free trade, because they are two entirely different things.

Australia is an exporting nation and, as a result, it has been in our interest for many years to gain access to more markets around the world to export our goods and services. Trading with other nations has increased our national prosperity and has insulated us, especially during the global financial crisis. As a result, there has been a longstanding bipartisan commitment over many decades to reduce trade barriers through agreements and cooperation. Since Paul Keating, in 1994, did the trade negotiations through APEC, we have seen the reduction of trade barriers in our region and a huge opportunity for Australian companies, with around 18,500 doing business in ASEAN countries.

However, the practice of dumping is not trade liberalisation; it is the manipulation of markets. Dumping is a practice whereby overseas companies deliberately and maliciously sell products in foreign markets at grossly below their normal value and in an overabundance which is deemed predatory to normal competition. Injurious dumping is a problem; in short, it leads to the manipulation of markets through predatory pricing.

I believe this is something that we need to tackle. What we have seen as result of dumping is that damage is done to domestic producers, weaker competitors are driven out of the market and the surviving business, usually the business doing the dumping, looks to recoup its costs by raising prices well above competitive levels, leading to a big monopoly in the market. We have seen that this is a problem here in Australia. Australian Customs dumping notices in Australia last year showed that manufacturers of paper, glass, food and steel were hurt, with most of the dumping being done by companies from Russia, China, the US, Indonesia and Thailand.

These unfair practices have been and continue to be a great threat to our national economy and to Australian jobs. That is why this government has acted to strengthen our antidumping regime to prevent this anticompetitive behaviour. As I said, this is after years and years of inaction by the Howard government. We have seen the coalition in recent days cry some crocodile tears in this area. But during their whole time in office they were not interested. It took the election of a Labor government for something to be done in this area.

The World Trade Organisation recognises that dumping can cause material injury to domestic markets; indeed, the WTO allows countries to take action against dumping that causes material injury. Here in Australia, any industry that believes dumping is occurring and is threatening, or could threaten, material injury can apply to the Customs department to investigate and impose measures to redress the situation. The measures are designed to offset the effect of injury in the form of a duty or the importer accepting an undertaking that future trade will be done at or above the minimum export price. It is of critical importance that our antidumping system is working efficiently and effectively to ensure that our domestic markets are not adversely affected by this predatory behaviour. This is of particular importance in the current economic climate, where, as a result of the strong Australian dollar, sections of our economy are under pressure. One of those sections is manufacturing.

As I said, it took this Labor government to focus on what we need to do. We asked the Productivity Commission to look into our antidumping system. After very extensive consultation with all the stakeholders, this Labor government acted to improve our antidumping system with our first tranche of reforms, introduced in March 2011.

There were five key areas of these reforms. The first was to improve timeliness, through, as I mentioned before, a significant increase in the numbers of Customs staff able to work on antidumping issues; the introduction of provisional measures at the earliest opportunity, to remedy the negative effect on dumping sooner; and the introduction of a 30-day time limit for ministerial decisions on antidumping cases.

The second area was stronger compliance, through a dedicated resource within Customs to boost monitoring of measures to ensure compliance and combat attempts to circumvent any antidumping duties.

The third area was to improve decision making, through the greater use of trade and industry experts in investigating complaints; the introduction of a more rigorous appeals process supported by more resources—once again something that the previous speaker failed to recognise; clarifying the list of injury factors that can be claimed by domestic industries; clarifying Customs' approach to injury determinations; and providing flexibility in allowing extensions of time to complete complex cases.

The fourth area was better access to the antidumping system, through a new support officer to support small and medium business and downstream manufacturers and producers to actively participate in antidumping investigations; improving access to imports and subsidies data; clarifying the data requirements for making an application; clarifying the parties who can participate in investigations, to include relevant industry associations, unions and downstream industries; and providing a more flexible basis for parties wishing to seek a review of existing measures.

The fifth area that we focused on was providing greater consistency with other countries, through regular consideration of the practices and decisions of other countries and allowing Australian companies to combat a wider range of subsidies.

These were the amendments that were focused on in our first tranche of reforms, and the bill before the House today adds amendments that build on the excellent work already done. There are a number of new areas that this bill looks at. The first is a new appeals process. The second is an International Trade Remedies Forum. The third is more flexibility in seeking an extension of time to investigate dumping claims.

I will briefly go through each of those. The first involves the implementation of a review panel that will have at least three people to replace what is now just one officer carrying out investigations. This amendment will provide a further tier to the review process and allow trade unions and downstream industries to participate in the administrative reviews. I think this is a very important addition and will allow for claims of dumping to be properly investigated.

The second is the establishment of an International Trade Remedies Forum. This is an important aspect of the improvements. The International Trade Remedies Forum will constantly monitor the system's effectiveness and provide advice and feedback to the government. It will oversee the implementation of our reforms into legislation and ensure that we continually consult with business, industry, employee associations and trade unions.

The third involves time extensions. We have seen some very complex cases in the area of dumping. This amendment allows the CEO of Customs to ask for an extension, or more than one extension, with the approval of the minister, so that they can investigate very complex cases.

All in all, these amendments build on the government's great work already in this area. I certainly support them. After years of the coalition's inaction and ignoring of this area, I was quite surprised that the Liberal Party, when the government announced its reforms, quickly came out and decided to have a policy. Unfortunately it was a hollow policy which seemed to renege on their many years of bipartisan commitment to free trade. In fact, the coalition's policy was not only ill thought through but, if it were ever implemented, could make Australia violate its international trade obligations and risk retaliation against Australian exporters, which would inevitably result in trading partners taking Australia to the World Trade Organisation. This would put at risk millions and millions of dollars worth of exports—for example, $110 million worth of sugar, $39 million worth of Tasmanian chocolate and $52 million worth of automotive exports. That is what the coalition's policy is going to put at risk. It will not benefit consumers. It will not improve the system. It would be a responsible action of the opposition to leave their policy behind, to support and get behind these amendments and to stand up for our manufacturers, whether they be domestic producers or exporters, and work properly on this issue, not just try to get a headline for the day.

I am pleased that this government has looked at this, to improve the system so that many people—including industry bodies and downstream manufacturers—have better access to our antidumping system and so that we get fast outcomes from this. I commend the bill to the House. I hope that the opposition supports these changes.

Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I too rise to speak on the Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011. This is a bread-and-butter issue for the people in my electorate because, after all, we are the food bowl of Australia and we find ourselves constantly being attacked by product brought in from overseas which is offered at below the costs of production and all of the other costs involved in getting the product to Australia. This is a serious problem.

Of course, we, along with New Zealand, do not subsidise our farmers. We have product constantly knocking on our door which comes from, say, the eurozone, where they are trying to diminish their levels of subsidy but there is still a very significant level of support for their growers, whether it is for preserved and processed summer fruits or for dairy product. We find ourselves constantly having to look to government to provide some sort of protection through a good antidumping regime.

I am very pleased that the Labor Party have at last understood the difficulties of people who try and make things in this country—the manufacturers and the food growers. They have come very late to this scene, so I suppose it is not a great surprise that again they have got it pretty wrong. Of course we agree with having a robust and timely antidumping regime in Australia. The problem is that there has to be acknowledgement that that also needs resourcing.

It is all very well to invite us to get excited about the fact that trade unions are now going to be invited to take part in appeal processes. I am sorry; I do not get very excited about that, because of course trade unions are only involved in some areas of manufacturing in Australia, and almost every year we see that level of involvement going down as the workers walk away from trade union membership. But that, apparently—we are told by the previous speaker—is something to be very proud and pleased about and is, she says, a hallmark of the success of the government's changed legislation.

I say that a hallmark of good legislation and a real change for antidumping regimes in Australia would have been if they had said that there were genuinely additional resources to make an antidumping regime work. We know they are robbing Peter to pay Paul. They are going to be taking away resources currently dedicated to quarantine services, to Biosecurity Australia, and they will be putting them across to the antidumping regime. There is just one other element for my food producers which cannot possibly be any further reduced in terms of government service—that is, the biosecurity or quarantine services.

We have an extraordinary problem in Australia, being an island nation and being a nation with a climate from Mediterranean right through to a tropical type seasonal regime, so we are vulnerable to a whole range of pest species, feral animals and new insects. We need a robust and vigorously upheld quarantine system, a system that has inspections, a system that makes sure that there is more than the odd container occasionally looked at as it comes through the wharves. Unfortunately, we are now experiencing some pests and diseases like the new, terrible myrtle rusts, which are affecting our eucalypts and the Asian bee invasion. We have new species of feral animals and insects coming into Australia, where we can only imagine the damage that is going to be wreaked over time because there has been no biosecurity or adequate quarantine response.

Of course, our greatest fear is apple and pear fire blight. While we have managed through the industry to have the demand for fresh apples from New Zealand dampened by an appeal to fellow Australian consumers not to touch that product, we were also appalled to find that, after the announcement when Julia Gillard stood up in the New Zealand parliament and said, 'I'm sorry we've been keeping your apples out; we promise we won't be bad anymore, and you can come in when you like,' we saw the first flood of attempted exports of fresh apples from New Zealand to Australia and, lo and behold, there was over 30 per cent contamination of the cartons of fresh apples that they tried to land on us. They included the insect the leaf curling mite, which is a major problem. We can only imagine that some of the trash within the boxes contained the European canker we dread and, of course, the bacterial infection of apple-pear fire blight itself. It cannot be seen by the naked eye, so, if the trash was in the boxes and if there were living, breathing insects which were designated pest species, heaven help us when it comes to the bacteria itself.

This legislation, the Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill, has to be given additional new resources if we are to take it seriously. But we are told no, the resources are going to be shifted across from biosecurity and quarantine services. That is just not on. I am in great fear and dread of the consequences of that for the phytosanitary condition of our products in the future and our chances to fight away disease.

I am also very concerned about the fact that the real issues for my manufacturers and for my growers have not been addressed at all with these changes. The real problem is: how does a tomato grower or, as we were told today on ABC Rural News, an Aussie citrus grower compete against a cheaper import when they have to go overseas and try and find the evidence, perhaps from a country with a central management, a country that has a very non-transparent set of costs associated with its manufacturing—in the case of China—from paddock to plate? How does that Australian grower or small manufacturer extract from that other country the cost of its labour, the cost of all its other inputs, the cost of the storage of its product and the full cost of transport to land it in Australia? Yet that is what we are still expecting an Australian manufacturer or grower to do. You need more than a couple of individuals helping out in that process. They say, 'Look, we're shortening time frames; it's going to be quicker and easier.' The point is that it takes quite a bit of resource, effort and indeed time to prove your case that the product from overseas landed in Australia is being sold at under the costs of production for that product.

Today we have the Australian citrus growers angry to find more cheap produce arriving in Australia. Egyptian oranges are reportedly selling for $10 a case at the Sydney retail fruit market, compared to $16 for an Australian case. Riverina Citrus believes the oranges have been dumped and wants the Australian government to check if the Egyptians have subsidised the exports. The group claims most local fruit this season is already being sold at below the cost of Australian production and therefore these cheap imports will further damage their industry. Australian citrus growers have had a very hard time in recent years. They just do not have the resources to head off to Egypt any time soon. So they are begging the Australian government to check out this situation for them. I say good luck, because there is no indication at all that the International Trade Remedies Forum that we are being told to celebrate is going to be able to step in and do anything fast.

We are told that there will be changes to extension of time for reviews, which will allow Customs and Border Protection more flexibility in dealing with complex matters and scope for consideration of new information. I have already mentioned we are told to celebrate the fact that additional stakeholders will be allowed to be involved in consultation going forward. In particular, we are to celebrate trade union involvement in there. Well, none of that helps the Aussie citrus growers from the Riverina who, right now, cannot survive too many weeks of not being able to sell their product because they have a new contestant in the marketplace selling oranges for $10 a case when they are taking—rock bottom, below the cost of production—$16 for an Australian product. This is our dilemma.

The only way we can actually do right by Australian manufacturers—the workforces, the owners of Australian manufacturing who still make things in this country—and the only thing that will really help them get a fair go in this country is through a properly resourced antidumping regime where the government of the day holds their hand in getting information out of other places, often information that belongs to the governments of other nations. That onus of proof of dumping, of material damage to the Australian product, is hard to do for an under-resourced, struggling Australian manufacturer.

We have to understand that a lot more resource has to be put into this. There has to be a lot more listening to the industries themselves, whether they are small manufacturers of gadgets and widgets or the last of our Australian food manufacturers, who are trying to hold up their end despite the problems that they face with the high Australian dollar and with food labelling in Australia, which allows consumers to have a guess at what 'made from imported and local ingredients' really means. These are the problems also confronting them right now.

Meanwhile, we know that if we do not get this right, if we do not get genuine antidumping improvements soon—if we lose our citrus industry or our pear industry—we are not going to be able to recover quickly or ever in the ongoing history of Australian food security. It takes more than 10 years for a pear tree to come into production; it will go on bearing for 90 years. But if you knock out the viability of that pear orchard now, you are not going to see anyone stupid enough to try again in the near future if our government policies remain as enemies of the people.

In conclusion, we, the coalition, understand the incredible importance and significance of having a robust, properly resourced antidumping regime. We want to see adequate resources put into this. We have real concerns about Labor's unwillingness to resource Customs and its decision to fund its changes through cost shifting. We want to see a much better approach. We are going to launch our new policy for the next election and we certainly are not going to sit back and say, 'There has been a bit of lip-service paid, the unions can now have a say, so the job is right.'

Kelvin Thomson (Wills, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I heard the member for Murray talking the talk in relation to support for local manufacturers and producers, but the fact is that she was a member of a government that was in office from 1996 to 2007 and therefore had 11 years in which to strengthen Australia's antidumping regime, but it took no action to do so. So it is one thing to talk the talk now but another altogether to walk the walk when the opportunity was there.

The Customs Amendment (Anti-Dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011 represents the second tranche of legislative reforms implementing the government's policy of streamlining the antidumping system. I spoke in the parliament last year on the first tranche and I am speaking again on this tranche because I consider that this is an important issue at a time when manufacturing is under significant pressure in this country due to the high exchange rate caused by the mining boom. As I said back then, the fate of Australian workers in trade exposed industries rests with the creation and enforcement in Australia of a strong antidumping regime in order that nations do not take advantage of our generosity of spirit in trade matters.

Dumping occurs when an overseas supplier exports its product to Australia at a price below the price it charges in its home market or below the cost of production. Where dumping causes material injury to an Australian industry producing similar goods, action in the form of additional customs duty can be applied. The Howard government neglected Australia's antidumping system for its 12 years in office. A lot of right-wing politicians and economists who advocate globalisation and free trade do not actually believe in any rules or any government action at all. They want the market to sort everything out and they deride any measures which assist or safeguard or promote Australian manufacturing as protectionist. They do not actually believe there is anything wrong with dumping; they think it is just another manifestation of the free market at work. They think that the lower priced import will be good for consumers. But I believe we cannot have it both ways. We cannot allow our eyes to light up at the prospect of cheap imports yet at the same time bemoan the fact that we have over 600,000 people on unemployment benefits and over 800,000 people on disability support payments.

There is quite understandable dismay at the job losses which are occurring at the moment in our manufacturing industries. We need to understand why this is happening or else it will continue and could indeed get worse. It is not good enough to say that the job losses are a consequence of the high Australian dollar. Saying that is not untrue, but it is a recipe for passivity and inaction. The high Australian dollar in turn is a consequence of right-wing political and economic approaches which have dominated Australian policymaking for a long time. If we do not actively seek to have a manufacturing sector and manufacturing jobs, we will lose them. I agree with the economist Dani Rodrik, who says that countries ignore the health of their manufacturing industries at their peril. He says that high-tech services demand specialised skills and create few jobs, so their contribution to aggregate employment is bound to remain limited. Manufacturing, on the other hand, can absorb large numbers of workers with moderate skills, providing them with stable jobs and good benefits. For most countries, therefore, it remains a potent source of high-wage employment. Indeed, the manufacturing sector is also where the world's middle classes take shape and grow. Without a vibrant manufacturing base, societies tend to divide between rich and poor—those who have access to steady, well-paying jobs and those whose jobs are less secure and whose lives are more precarious.

Dani Rodrik says that in the United States the fall of manufacturing's share of employment has been damaging to productivity because labour productivity is substantially higher in manufacturing than in the rest of the economy. The bulk of new employment in the United States has come in personal and social services, which is where the economy's less productive jobs are found. The migration of jobs down the productivity ladder has shaved 0.3 percentage points off US productivity growth every year since 1990. In Latin America, redundant workers have ended up in the worst performing activities, such as informal services, causing economy-wide productivity to stagnate.

I want to add my voice to the concerns being expressed about the offshoring of Australian manufacturing. I agree with that e economist Herman Daly, who says that offshoring production is not trade. No goods are traded. It is absurd that offshoring should be defended in the name of free trade. Offshoring increases imports, increases the trade deficit and lowers either employment or wages. The policy of free trade is based on the doctrine of comparative advantage and one of the premises on which the doctrine of comparative advantage rests is the international immobility of capital. But offshoring involves moving capital abroad—if we were fair dinkum about free trade as a policy we would restrict capital mobility and offshoring.

The idea that manufacturing jobs are degrading and that everyone is going to be re-educated to become a mining engineer or an investment banker is delusional. Manufacturing jobs are worthwhile jobs holding families together, holding communities together, and we should not let them slip away.

The Productivity Commission released a report making 20 recommendations to improve Australia's antidumping system. The Labor government has consulted with industry stakeholders widely about the improvements needed, and now the government is acting to strengthen our economy for the future by making it harder for dumping to occur in Australia. In June 2011 the government announced a package of reforms to Australia's antidumping regime. These reforms will result in better access to the antidumping system for industries, including for small to medium sized businesses; quicker and better dumping decisions; improved quality of decision making; greater consistency with other countries; and stronger compliance with antidumping measures. These are the most important improvements to Australia's antidumping system in more than a decade. These changes will improve the system's effectiveness. They will improve the way we administer global antidumping rules in Australia and better align our laws and practices with those of other countries.

Our suite of improvements will keep our economy strong and provide greater support and greater certainty for our local industries, workers, families and communities against unfair dumping practices. The changes will provide certainty and confidence for business while at the same time ensuring that we meet our World Trade Organisation obligations. Better support can be provided to our industries and workforce with a modern, rigorous and better resourced antidumping system. We will provide more certainty for local manufacturers and primary producers and therefore more confidence to invest in the future, because the rules against unfair dumping practices by foreign firms will be more effectively applied.

We want to maintain confidence in international trade and that means having confidence in the rules. All WTO member countries have the right to take action against unfair trading practices. Many governments, and in particular the Chinese government, intervene directly and extensively in their country to the benefit of their own industries. According to the WTO rules, however, WTO members, including China, can only do this in a manner which does not cause or threaten to cause injury to foreign suppliers of like goods. Of all the WTO members, China faces the most antidumping actions because of the dumping of product below what is regarded as normal value and because of their recourse to export subsidies. In recent months both the US and Canada have begun to adopt a more aggressive position on China's disregard for WTO rules. This could make Australia a greater target for the dumping of goods, further undermining Australian industries and jobs.

There are two main ways in which Australian manufacturers of like goods can be injured or threatened with injury by exporters assisted through government policies—first by dumping and second by industry subsidies. I have had concerns expressed to me by the company Advanced Cables Pty Ltd in relation to conclusions released by the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service following an investigation into the dumping of electric cables from China into Australia. Advanced Cables has requested that Customs examine actual sales transactions to determine whether dumping has occurred. The Australian cable making industry has suffered injury in the form of loss of profits, loss of profitability, staff retrenchments, loss of market share, underutilisation of plant capacity, an inability to raise capital, price suppression and price depression. Customs, in its visit report following its investigation of Advanced Cables, has found that the injury suffered was due to damage inflicted on the market by imports from the importer, Electra Cables Pty Ltd of New South Wales.

The Australian cable manufacturing industry has been attempting to compete with dumped imports from China for six to seven years. Figures provided to Customs confirm that the industry has lost millions of dollars in sales to imports from China, and Customs has confirmed that the industry has suffered on a number of fronts. So it is absolutely foreseeable that unless action is taken to force the Chinese to compete fairly with Australian manufacturers the industry will eventually succumb. All up, the cable making industry in Australia employs over 800 people and it is probable that the majority of these jobs, if not all, will be lost if these trading practices are allowed to continue. I have asked the government to re-examine this issue, and I repeat that request here. The ACTU has highlighted antidumping measures in their Union Action Plan for Jobs, which recognises that the commodities boom will not last forever and that 'a hands off, leave it all to market forces' approach to the issues in our economy would be a high-risk venture. We know from experience that taking a hands-off approach to the future of Australian jobs will mean that the number of workers in insecure work will continue to grow. They have recommended that we build on the establishment of the International Trade Remedies Forum to clarify the meaning and proper implementation of key WTO provisions and to commission a detailed examination of at-risk companies and communities to make recommendations that will help to maintain and expand manufacturing employment in those areas. We should provide unions with a statutory right to petition for dumping investigations and review and identify the anticompetitive barriers maintained by other countries in sectors such as meat processing with the aim of urgently negotiating their removal.

The Australian Workers Union should be acknowledged for its Don't Dump on Australia campaign, which has highlighted the issue of illegal dumping so as to give local manufacturers the chance to compete on a level playing field. The AWU has been working with the AMWU, the CFMEU and industry to put a spotlight on the threat to the economy and local jobs from illegal dumping. The AWU is very supportive of the government's reforms. It says:

Unions will be able to bring cases, where dumping is occurring, to the attention of the customs department and have the matter dealt with in a timely manner.

The changes will result in a more responsive and effective antidumping system, one that is easier for companies to access when bringing their cases forward. More staff and more market expertise in Customs will lend higher priority to antidumping cases, and it is clear that Australian manufacturers need more support in turning these cases around.

The changes are in line with Australia's World Trade Organisation obligations. They will also provide greater consistency with the antidumping systems of other jurisdictions, such as Canada, the EU and the United States, and deliver stronger compliance mechanisms. The AWU has been pushing for this reform for some time now. The fate of their members in manufacturing rests with the creation and enforcement of a strong antidumping regime in Australia.

The government's improvements to the antidumping system take account of the recommendations of the Productivity Commission report tabled in 2010, Senator Nick Xenophon's private senator's bill, the views of state and territory governments and submissions made to the government by stakeholders. The government has accepted, either in full or in part, 15 of 20 recommendations of the Productivity Commission's antidumping report. The reforms will reduce costs for Australian business seeking remedies against dumping and improve timeliness and transparency for all parties to antidumping investigations.

Local industry is worth defending. The Labor government is committed to a strong manufacturing industry. Australia-wide the industry employs around one million Australians. Manufacturing is central to a balanced economy. We need to be conscious of the structural pressures on manufacturing which flow from the mining boom, the high value of the Australian dollar and global economic conditions. We have seen these pressures manifest recently with job cuts in the car industry and with Alcoa announcing a review of its Point Henry operations. All countries have the right to take action against unfair trading practices and get a genuine level playing field. Dumping is not acceptable, and I commend the government for bringing this bill forward and I wish it a speedy passage.

Ewen Jones (Herbert, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I also rise to speak on the Customs Amendment (Anti-Dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011. This bill makes three sets of minor changes to Australia's antidumping system, aiming to improve the effectiveness of the current system. The coalition recognises that there are concerns with the framework that Australia currently has in place to deal with dumping problems, and supports measures taken to ensure fairness for Australian companies and their workers.

Dumping is a serious problem for Australian manufacturers and across a large range of industries. It takes place when an international manufacturer floods the local market with their product at a price below that which they charge in their own country, forcing out local manufacturers who simply cannot compete in the unfair match-up. This poses a threat to North Queensland's and the nation's manufacturers and is something that, as a part of the coalition, I want to see strong action taken against.

There have long been problems with our antidumping regulations as they currently stand, and this has had negative consequences for Australian businesses. To date it has taken extensive pressure, not just from the coalition but from industry groups, businesses, unions and everyone affected by Australia's trade, to finally see action from the government. One problem has been the process for having an investigation made over a claim of dumping, which has been a source of frustration for many companies. The time frame for this process is often drawn out over an unacceptable length of time and the result is frequently seen by those involved to be ineffective. There are also substantial costs incurred by businesses that raise possible cases of dumping for investigation. It is a lose-lose situation for North Queensland businesses that are suffering financially as a result of dumping—they can either continue to fight the losing battle or further suffer financially to pay and have something done about it. This cost burden is preventing companies from being assisted by an antidumping system that should exist entirely to help them.

Our current system also has a greater expectation on local businesses to prove the case of dumping in a market rather than placing the onus on the accused foreign competitor to prove that they are not involved in illegal dumping. This is where the coalition makes the point that, at a certain level, the investigation should be taken away from Customs and given to the department of industry, which can follow up these things—because the first thing that Customs should be doing is protecting the country.

This bill represents the government's second lot of changes to antidumping regulations. It provides for the introduction of a new appeals process and establishes the International Trade Remedies Forum, a new body that will allow for a discourse between representatives from each stakeholder group, including producers, importers and government. And it aims to provide flexible extensions for the time frame under which investigations take place. We support the establishment of this body as an opportunity for industry to articulate problems they experience with antidumping measures and how these can be fixed.

This bill also makes amendments to the rules in place related to the time frame for dumping investigations. We also support these measures, but I am wary of the risk that the extensions to the time frame may be granted too freely. I hope that the government does not allow a relaxed approach like this to take place.

Finally, the bill makes changes to the appeals process. In response to this, the coalition are well aware of the problems that exist in Australia's current antidumping provisions and consider making appropriate amendments to this a matter of priority. That is why we support the initial steps being taken in this bill. We have our own comprehensive antidumping policy which goes further than the government's current plans. To begin with, we need to see the government shift the administration of dumping investigations away from Customs to the Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research.

The Customs and Border Protection Service already has its hands full and this pressure has only been increased as a result of this government's extensive cuts to the agency's budget. Dumping investigations are also more appropriately handled by a department that has economic and industry knowledge. It is the job of the department of industry to have this industry awareness and it makes sense for them to take over antidumping measures, allowing Customs to focus on the core purpose of border protection that it is designed for. We also need to see a shift in the burden of proof that dumping has or has not occurred away from local businesses and onto foreign competitors defending themselves from dumping allegations. Importantly, this should be dependent on the department of industry having a reasonable level of evidence that dumping may have taken place. This protects foreign companies from accusations that have no grounding, while taking the cost burden associated with proving the existence of dumping away from the companies that are the victims of such measures. This measure would bring us into line with the system that other countries have in place and would mean that Australia's antidumping regulation will help Australian businesses.

The coalition would also commit an additional $2½ million per year to hire an additional 20 specialist antidumping staff to improve the quality and speed of dumping investigations. That is what we are after here—so that once a thing is identified, we are able to act on it as quickly as is humanly possible. These additional resources are badly needed, despite the government's continuous funding and job cuts to the Customs and Border Protection Service. We also believe that the 40-day limit on submissions to an investigation should be more strictly adhered to. In the current system extensions to that deadline seem to be too easy to obtain, unfairly dragging the process out. Better penalties are also needed against those who do not cooperate properly with an investigation.

In Townsville we are looking to expand our international reach. We want to capitalise on the benefits of trade and increase our inbound tourism, but this government's customs regulations have hampered us at every turn. In 2010 we got direct international flights out of Townsville airport when Strategic Airlines started flying to Bali. This was a huge opportunity for the city's tourism market. To get this in place, Strategic had to fly Customs officials up to North Queensland and put them up for a few days while they made their inspections. Some would say that was just the usual practice of throwing up barriers in front of a new business venture or that this was just paying for a government junket for the weekend. But we needed their numbers in Townsville then and we need their numbers now, and we need them permanently.

Clearly with trade opportunities in a city like Townsville, we have to be looking at having Customs services based in the city. I was speaking to Chris McMahon from North Queensland Customs Services about this issue. He has been working with Customs in Townsville for around 40 years. He believes that the city's staffing has slipped from 27 to about half that number. We must remember that Townsville is still an international airport. Customs are there to make sure we are all safe and they are there to facilitate trade. If we do not have the staff, we cannot process the products in and out of our airport and the port. This gets back to the point that we are still using Customs staff to do the investigation. We can get Customs to do what they are supposed to be doing. If staff want to specialise, they can move to the department of industry and specialise. Customs staff are better used in protecting our borders and making sure we are safe from disease and other things that come into our county.

I also spoke to Barry Holden who, in his capacity as CEO of the Port of Townsville Ltd, reiterated the importance of Customs in keeping disease out of Townsville. He said that, in his experience, the Customs officials in Townsville are doing a great job and that, contrary to Chris McMahon's report, at the moment the number of staff there are adequate. He did, however, point out that, as Townsville grows and the port expands, with more container traffic will come a need for a greater Customs presence.

The Asian honeybee is an example of something which has come in through the Townsville port. Could Customs have got on top of that with their staff numbers? Could they have found it? That is the big question which everyone wants an answer to. The Mount Isa to Townsville Economic Zone has just released a 50-year plan—real plans producing real growth which must be supported by all levels of government. We must get Customs doing what they are supposed to do. They must hand the responsibility to the department of industry to make sure this can happen.

We are seeing massive growth through the North West Queensland Mineral Province. We are talking about the expansion of not just our port but also the port at Abbott Point. We are talking about major things happening in Townsville. Customs should not have to deal with these particular issues. They should be getting back into facilitating trade. We must make sure that the people of Townsville and North Queensland and the North West Queensland Mineral Province have hope and opportunity every time to progress their businesses.

Finally, I spoke to Patricia O'Callaghan from Townsville Enterprise Ltd, who focused on the importance of growth in trade in the region. She said that, from a TEL perspective, Customs officers are doing their best in Townsville to assist with keeping the country safe from imported pests and other risks associated with bringing goods into the country. TEL are trying to grow our trade and tourism sector. Knowledge and educational tourism with our nearest neighbour, PNG, is a top priority for the city. We must ensure that our Customs officers are on the ground working hand in hand to ensure our port and our international transport is handled efficiently. We have situations at the moment where people with tuberculosis are arriving in Townsville and Cairns. We must get on top of these things. We have it all through Torres Strait. This is what Customs people are going through. I want changes made to the department of industry to take the bureaucratic work away from the Customs department—they flag it, they get on top of it and away they go.

I will also take this opportunity to thank the North Queensland Toyota Cowboys, who on the weekend will be hosting 97 Papua New Guinean trade students, who are currently undergoing certificate II and III courses at Barrier Reef Institute of TAFE in Townsville. This is an example of what can happen when two cities come together. Townsville has a sister city relationship with Port Moresby. Our institute of TAFE is doing fantastic work bringing these people in. We are increasing our relationship with Ok Tedi and getting their management people to Townsville to increase their level of training so that the Papua New Guinean nationals can then progress up the ladder. This is a great two-way trade that we should be participating in. Customs play a very real part in it.

The key message coming from everyone I have spoken to about this in Townsville is that we need to be working on building our international connections to drive our economic expansion in the region. How can we strive for trade growth in North Queensland when our Customs presence is going in the other direction?

The antidumping legislation is not about xenophobia or being anti trade; it is simply about fairness to Australian industry. It is good to see the government finally respond to the coalition's fight in this area. I know we do have arguments over who starts what and that sort of thing, but let us put that to the side. I support this bill for the measures it takes, but it cannot afford to stop here when it comes to working with Customs to help local businesses.

Trade is crucial to the economic prosperity of Australia and I want to see Townsville harness the opportunities that the trade of goods and services provides. To encourage this we need to make trade as easy as possible. We need the right infrastructure and we need fewer regulations, ones that enable rather than hamper trade prospects, as much of it currently does. A strong and efficiently run Customs in the city will help us achieve this. This bill is a good step, but it is not the end of the road for antidumping measures or for building up a robust Customs agency.

Stephen Jones (Throsby, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Australia is a country that enjoys the benefits of trade with the world—we always have, at least since European settlement. Our country has been a better place because we have traded with our neighbours and partners. In 2012 it is the source of our prosperity. It is the reason we have low unemployment. Indeed, our unemployment is half that of most of our trading partners. I am thinking of the United States in particular. It is the reason we have jobs growth in this country, while other countries, and particularly Europe, are adding daily to the queues of the unemployed. It is the reason we have GDP growth in this country while in Europe and other places their economies are stagnating, if not in recession. It is one of the reasons Australia continues to call itself a lucky country. Anybody who has travelled overseas in the last 12 months and come back to Australia will look through the shrill calls from those opposite about how bad things are here, because they will know that the reality is that Australia has come through the global financial crisis in remarkably good shape and we are well set up to prosper over the decades ahead.

In simple terms, trade means that we can produce and sell more than we consume domestically and earn income. It also means that we can buy and consume many goods domestically that we could not produce here or could not produce at a price that would be affordable to people who come from backgrounds like my own. It produces income, wealth and prosperity.

But you cannot have an open trading system without rules. Trade is distorted if countries manipulate their currency. A number of people who have contributed to this debate have observed the fact that there are countries with which we trade that manipulate their currencies or appear at least on the face of it to have a currency that is significantly depressed, which means that our exporters are at a significant disadvantage when it comes to competing with them on global markets. Our domestic producers are significantly disadvantaged when they are competing with goods coming from their shores.

We also have a breach of the system when a business dumps goods in Australia at a lower price than it costs to manufacture them. When a business or a business with the support of a country dumps goods on our markets at an abnormal price, that is not fair trade nor is it free trade. That is simply rorting the rules to the great detriment of this country. It wipes out jobs and it wipes out businesses—good decent businesses that are struggling to compete in a highly competitive international market, and workers who have dedicated their lives to honing their skills working day in and day out producing goods in the workplaces they are dedicating themselves to. They simply cannot compete against somebody who is cheating or rorting the rules. That is why we on this side of the House in our role as advocates for a fair and open trading system need to ensure that our industries have the tools to deal with alleged dumping and ensure that Australian goods are not facing unfair competition.

The Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011 represents the second tranche of legislation brought forward by this government to implement important reforms to Australia's antidumping system. It follows on from the package of reforms announced by the government in June last year. These reforms are designed to provide better access to remedies for Australian industry and to ensure those remedies are available as quickly as possible. I note that in your contribution to this debate, Mr Deputy Speaker Thomson, you referred to the antidumping campaign that is being waged by the three main unions in the sector: the Australian Workers Union, the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union and the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union. The government's response, with these two tranches of legislation, is in part a recognition of the validity of the campaign being run by that coalition of unions. I might also say—and I know this from my personal dealings with the union representatives as well as the businesses and the business organisations—that the claims being put by these unions have the full and wholehearted support of the business community and the union movement, as does the legislation we are putting in place.

We are aiming to improve the robustness and transparency of antidumping and to introduce stronger compliance mechanisms. In short, we are trying to make the system more responsive, easier to use and easier to navigate to get an outcome—because that is what it is all about. The bill before the House will provide improvements in the robustness and transparency of antidumping decisions made by the minister or the CEO of the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service. The bill will implement a new appeals process to replace the existing mechanism and will provide more flexibility in seeking extensions of time during the course of investigations.

The bill also provides a legislative basis for the International Trade Remedies Forum, which met for the first time in August last year. This second tranche of reforms directly responds to the community concerns about the appeals process. I have had a number of businesses in my electorate raise these concerns with me—as I am sure you have, Mr Deputy Speaker, in your electorate, because I know you have a strong manufacturing base in the electorate of Wills, as I do in the electorate of Throsby. They have concerns about the appeals process and the provision of adequate time for investigations and for ensuring stakeholder consultation in the future. I know you would be aware, Mr Deputy Speaker—and I know that the minister, who is also in the chamber at the moment, would also be aware—that businesses do not lightly enter into antidumping actions. They do not lightly enter into these actions, because they are costly, because they are complicated, because they divert resources away from the main game of the business—which is to produce and manufacture goods—and because they come with the very real prospect of damaging relationships with suppliers and clients. So when an allegation is made by a business you can bet your bottom dollar—and in some instances it is the business's bottom dollar!—that they are alleging a serious case. We as a government, as well as the agencies of government, should be responsive to these allegations.

The bill implements a number of changes to the process for appealing decisions of the minister or of the chief executive officer of the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service. A review of decisions made by the minister will be made by a new three-member panel, appointed by the minister on the basis of relevant expertise. Under the new appeals framework in this bill, in order to initiate an appeal the panel will need to be satisfied that the applicant has established that the minister did not make the correct and preferable decision. This higher threshold for appeal will help deal with the current situation whereby around 80 per cent of ministerial decisions are appealed to the Trade Measures Review Officer by one of the parties to the proceeding.

The bill will also ensure that the panel will make recommendations directly to the minister as to whether the original decisions should be affirmed, revoked or substituted. Where reinvestigation of a particular finding is required, the panel will direct the branch to reinvestigate that finding and to report back to the panel to inform its recommendation to the minister. This measure will deal with the perception that the International Trade Remedies Branch is conflicted in reinvestigating its own decisions.

The second group of reforms in the bill will allow more flexible extensions to the time frames of an investigation, review of measures, continuation inquiry or duty assessment. Australia's antidumping system contains one of the shortest investigation time frames anywhere in the world at 155 days. At present only one extension to that time frame can be sought, and it must be prior to the publication of the statement of essential facts at day 110. This can mean that extensions, where required, tend to be for significant periods to anticipate any possible further need for an extension. So what we are proposing in this bill implements the recommendation of the Productivity Commission to allow for more flexible extension of investigation time frames.

I have mentioned that a part of the bill is aimed at introducing and providing statutory recognition for the International Trade Remedies Forum. There is currently no stakeholder body to provide feedback to the government on the operation of the antidumping system. The government, in its earlier policy announcement, announced that it intends to remedy that absence. The government has established an International Trade Remedies Forum to provide strategic advice and feedback on the implementation of the reforms. This is important because it provides an ongoing dialogue between the industry and the government about how we continue to refine and improve the system. It will also provide some important feedback that might be dealt with through other means if there are serious and systemic breaches that may not need to be dealt with through the antidumping legislation but through other means available to government.

We have heard a lot over the last six months about the government's commitment and the opposition's alleged commitment to manufacturing, but there are some stark differences. We have a package of reforms and policies that are aimed at addressing the challenges that are being confronted by manufacturing. I—and I know you too, Mr Deputy Speaker—say that more needs to be done. But let us not overlook some of the excellent work that is being done. Let us look at the antidumping legislation—the second tranche of bills that is now before the House. This is a significant reform that deserves, and should enjoy, the support of the entire House. Late last year the Prime Minister convened a manufacturing jobs forum here in Parliament House, inviting stakeholders, particularly stakeholders from the manufacturing sector, to focus on what practical steps can be taken by government to assist the manufacturing sector, which is going through one of the most difficult trading environments and structural adjustments at any time in its history. I am very pleased to see that a renewed focus on Australian industry participation plans is also going to be looked at to ensure that that massive pipeline of investment in the resource sector and the jobs and prosperity that are being generated by that also flow back to the manufacturing sector so that people who work in fabrication shops and in steel mills in electorates like my own will gain some of the benefits of that massive pipeline of investment. Quite simply, we want a chop of some of the contracts that are being let in the north-west and in Queensland at the moment as a result of the resources boom.

We can pause and look at the fact that we have finetuned and improved the research and development tax incentives, making it more attractive for existing firms and new firms to invest in the stuff that is going to make a difference—in research and development, and new processes and new technologies which will enhance productivity and enhance their competitiveness in domestic and international markets.

As for my own electorate, I am delighted to have been a part of the parliament which put in place the Steel Industry Transformation Plan. I would have preferred that we never had to. I regret that we had to, but we had to put in place the Steel Industry Transformation Plan, voted for by all of those on this side of the House and voted against by those on that other side of the House. It is a plan with $300 million worth of assistance for our two primary steel producers, BlueScope and OneSteel, to restructure their businesses to ensure that we continue to have a steelmaking capacity in Australia, particularly in my electorate. The BlueScope steelworks at Port Kembla continue to produce high-quality steel at a competitive rate for the domestic market.

There are the Clean Energy Future funds, with over $10 billion to be made available over the out years to ensure that our domestic manufacturing industry has the funds available to assist in innovation, to ensure that we are lowering energy use and using clean energy as part of our manufacturing future. Again, I am very pleased to say that, as a part of this government's response to the announcements by BlueScope that they would be exiting the export steel market and focusing on the domestic market and making redundant close to 800 workers, the government put in place an important regional investment fund to provide over $30 million in assistance and an initial $10 million for the workforce to assist it in these very difficult times. So this is a part of our overall program for manufacturing, and I commend the bill to the House.

Patrick Secker (Barker, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Customs Amendment (Anti-Dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011 even though it is 2012. This is the No. 2 bill of who knows how many more as this government is drip-feeding this legislation. Late last year I spoke on the first bill, which detailed four changes, and now this bill in front of the House legislates a couple more of the 29 total changes outlined in June last year. So that is six out of 29 in nearly nine months. I ask this of the responsible ministers, which could be anyone given the mess on the other side currently—but I will assume that those responsible are still home affairs minister Brendan O'Connor and trade minister Craig Emerson—when will the rest of the changes be legislated? Over six months have passed since the first bill was debated and with the two bills combined we are not even halfway through Labor's 29 changes proposed in June 2011.

Australian businesses will have to wait another two years for all the changes to be legislated. This is exactly the uncertainty that I hear businesses in my electorate talk about when they tell me their fears of this government. Back in 2008, Labor indicated that it wanted revisions to the antidumping system. It has taken far too long and we have this huge period of inaction: first the Productivity Commission review of Australia's antidumping regime in 2009 and then the 18 months that Labor took to respond. As I mentioned earlier, Labor made some changes in June last year and as we are nearly in March of the next year I believe this government lacks the determination and commitment necessary to deliver reform and to deliver it in a timely manner.

I have always believed in free trade—but it has to be fair. International dumping is the enemy of free trade as it undermines business and public support for free trade. That is why we have to have the World Trade Organisation and the rules on the basis that, where a product is proved to be dumped and harming a local industry, you can use tariffs to fight against that unfair trade. I come from a free-trade basis. In fact, it is the issue that got me really interested in politics all those years ago. But I also believe it has to be fair, and that is where we need policy that combats illegal activities of overseas businesses who seek to sell into Australia by selling below cost.

Australian businesses are generally resilient and tough, and have become so from reforms over the last 30 or so years, and I give credit to both sides of parliament for those reforms. So there is no doubt that if they are given a fair go they will withstand that pressure, innovate and produce. However, it is very difficult for Australian businesses to move forward in the current climate when they come up against forces such as a cheap product being dumped into the country on top of the looming threat of a carbon tax, the two-speed economy and the price of the Australian dollar. I believe that, with appropriate measures in place, Australian businesses would feel confident that they had the backing of a government that understands the issues they face and is willing to support them. This government is giving businesses no such feeling.

It can be a difficult decision for businesses to launch a case against dumping. The current process is too cumbersome, slow and prohibitively expensive for many businesses to actually utilise. When rulings are made, they are often too late and do nothing to address damage to a business or industry. Certainly the feedback I hear around my electorate is that the time and money invested just in putting a case together is hugely consuming. I am not saying it should be dead easy, but I think everyone recognises it is way too hard, it is way too expensive, it takes too long and by that time the industry can be in such a situation that it will not survive.

An example of this in my electorate is Kimberly-Clark, which I have spoken of often in this place. Millicent is a town with just over 5,000 people, about 700 of whom are employed in the Kimberly-Clark factory. Many more are employed in related industries. The factory uses a lot of wood products which are grown in the local area and it is a very strong part of the whole economy down there. In fact, the forest industry alone is worth more than $3 billion a year to the local economy. It is not a small industry. It is not just a very substantial part of the direct local economy around Millicent; it is also important for another 100 kilometres around the area, where there is a lot of forestry. The factory takes those wood products and makes tissues, toilet paper and those sorts of things. In fact, I believe they are the only Australian manufacturers of those things.

This government's own Productivity Commission report showed that other countries were dumping tissue and toilet paper in Australia to quite an extensive degree. They were dumping not at five or 10 per cent—in fact I think most companies in Australia can still compete with that—but at up to 60 per cent below the cost of production. Kimberly-Clark spent over $100,000 alleging that cheap toilet paper was being dumped on the Australian market, but it was unsuccessful in getting any action on dumping by this government, even though it was proven. That is not to forget that in early 2009 this government overturned a previous ruling to prevent the importation of thousands of tonnes of cheap toilet paper into Australia from China and Indonesia. The same offending paper undercut the Australian product and tens of millions of the rolls were sold. But even after Kimberly-Clark undertook a costly and consuming process it was unsuccessful. The end result was that the Kimberly-Clark mill announced a shutdown of two of its paper tissue machines at the Millicent tissue mill and lost 170 workers. The mill was supplied by the Tantanoola pulp mill which is basically next door and the mill was subsequently put up for sale, placing a further 65 jobs at risk. Kimberly-Clark said the system 'certainly hasn't worked' and:

Dumping has occurred, the (Australian) industry has suffered, and the gates are open for imported competition which is effectively unfair competition.

The high cost in having to fund an investigation means it's only open to the larger companies - smaller companies can't afford it and have to put up with the unfair competition.

The government should be well informed about this issue, considering that they commissioned the report into dumping. I was certainly floored that, even after the government's own Productivity Commission report saying that product was in fact being dumped in Australia at up to 60 per cent below the cost of production, Labor chose to take no action. Here we are, well over 12 months down the track, and this government has made some changes to their antidumping policy, but it is nowhere near enough and there is no indication of when further changes might be legislated.

In contrast, the coalition will set about ensuring a level playing field for Australian industry by repealing job-destroying taxes, providing competent government—something that this mob would not know anything about—and giving industry policy certainty. The coalition's plan will, firstly, transfer antidumping responsibilities from Customs to the department of industry. The coalition will make the department of industry responsible for Australia's antidumping regime. Antidumping is currently administered by Customs, an agency which is already under pressure dealing with large numbers of illegal boat arrivals. Those pressures have only been exacerbated due to cuts to the Customs budget. Customs also lacks the economic and industry knowledge that is often needed to successfully investigate and pursue antidumping actions. By transferring antidumping responsibilities to the department of industry, Customs can better focus on border protection, while the department of industry can bring its expertise and resources to bear to enforce a more effective antidumping regime.

Secondly, we will reverse the onus of proof in dumping investigations. Provided that the department of industry has sufficient evidence to show dumping is reasonably likely to have occurred, we will require foreign businesses subject to an antidumping action that has lasted for at least 60 days to demonstrate that they are not dumping goods in Australia. The department of industry will make preliminary affirmative determinations, where appropriate, in dumping cases that have lasted beyond 60 days. Preliminary affirmative determinations are expressly allowed under article 7 of the WTO antidumping agreement and do not breach Australia's free trade obligations. That is a very important point.

Under the current system it is incumbent upon Australian businesses to prove that rival imported products are being sent to Australia at below cost price. This disadvantages local firms by forcing them to mount often complex, onerous, expensive and time-consuming actions if they want to demonstrate that they have been adversely impacted by dumping. There is a significant imbalance in the obligations faced by local businesses. Cases can last for years and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, and by that time it might be all too late. Our competitors have better and more effective antidumping regimes and, by reversing the onus of proof, the coalition will make Australia's antidumping regime more effective, more responsive to the interests of Australian businesses and jobs, and better aligned with antidumping systems adopted by other nations.

Thirdly, we will commit more funding to dumping investigations. The coalition will provide an additional $2½ million dollars per year to the department of industry so that more resources are available to improve the number, quality and speed of dumping investigations. Since coming to office, Labor has weakened Australia's antidumping regime by relentlessly cutting funding to Customs. For example, in the 2011-12 budget Labor axed a further 90 staff from Customs on top of the 250 that were cut in the 2010-11 budget. Fourthly, we will hire an additional 20 specialist antidumping investigators. The coalition will provide an additional 20 specialist personnel within the department of industry so that dumping investigations can be thoroughly pursued. These will be new personnel devoted to antidumping enforcement.

Fifthly, we will introduce more stringent and rigorous enforcement of deadlines for submissions. The coalition will make dumping investigations faster and more effective by mandating a 40-day limit on party submissions to the department of industry. Under the current system, submissions by all parties are due within 40 days of the start of a dumping investigation. However, Customs currently offers a wide range of potential grounds for extensions to that deadline. This means Australian businesses can face lengthy and damaging delays in resolving dumping cases. Our major competitors apply far more stringent and rigorous standards on deadlines for submissions. We will tighten submission rules and grant extensions only in those situations where there is a compelling case for them to be allowed.

Sixthly, we will crack down on those overseas producers who do not cooperate with dumping investigations. The coalition will more actively apply penalties against parties who fail or refuse to cooperate with investigations. We will also ensure that the sanctions imposed on non-cooperating parties are substantially higher than those applied to other parties. This will strengthen Australia's antidumping regime, more closely align it with those of other countries, and ensure our industries and businesses are not disadvantaged by recalcitrant foreign parties.

Seventhly, we will strengthen enforcement of the provisions of the WTO agreement on subsidies and countervailing measures. The coalition will more actively apply penalties against parties who fail or refuse to cooperate with those investigations. We will also ensure that the sanctions imposed on non-cooperating parties are substantially higher than those applied to other parties. This will strengthen Australia's antidumping regime, more closely align it with those of other countries, and ensure our industries and businesses are not disadvantaged by recalcitrant foreign parties.

Not long after we announced our policy, the former Minister for Home Affairs, Brendan O'Connor, and the former Minister for Trade, Craig Emerson, were out there spreading untruths. This government falsely claimed that our proposed use of preliminary affirmative determinations contravened WTO rules. They do not. In our antidumping policy, we stated that, where satisfactory evidence exists, we would require foreign businesses subject to an antidumping action to demonstrate that they are not dumping goods in Australia. Interestingly, not long after, Michael O'Connor, who is Brendan's brother and National Secretary of the CFMEU, publicly supported our plans to reverse the onus of proof in trade disputes. (Time expired)

Natasha Griggs (Solomon, Country Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011. As my colleague and friend the member for Barker said, the coalition supports the amendments as a measure towards improving a system that at present is too slow, too cumbersome and prohibitively expensive for many Australian businesses to use.

Australian industries and business, particularly in the manufacturing sector, have been disadvantaged by a flawed antidumping regime—a regime where rulings are often made too late or provide no leverage to address damage caused to a business or industry. In July 2008 at the 22nd COAG meeting, a commitment was made by all Australian governments to continue with national competition reforms consistent with the economy-wide reform agenda. At the same time a review of the effectiveness of Australia's antidumping system was referred to the Productivity Commission, which finalised a report at the end of 2009 with a public release in May 2010.

It took the government 18 months to respond with some changes introduced in June 2011, even though the Labor government indicated in 2008 its intent to revise the antidumping system. In the period from July 2008 to the report completion in late 2009, one company in particular felt the impacts of a cumbersome antidumping system. In December 2008 the then Minister for Home Affairs, Bob Debus, as the result of an investigation conducted by the Australian Customs Service, imposed dumping duties on Indonesian and Chinese tissue products. It had been found that Chinese imported tissue products undercut the Australian market by between two and 25 per cent, while Indonesian tissue products undercut the local products by some 33 to 45 per cent. Unfortunately, in 2009 the decision was reversed and the dumping duties relating to the imported Chinese and Indonesian products were removed.

Kimberly-Clark unsuccessfully pursued the dumping of this cheap imported tissue product through all channels, including advising state and federal government representatives about the potential damage to the local industry. In early 2011 Kimberly-Clark shut down two paper tissue machines at the company's Millicent Tissue Mill in South Australia, with the loss of 170 jobs. As reported by the ABC at the time, a company spokesman stated:

Dumping has occurred, the (Australian) industry has suffered, and the gates are open for imported competition which is effectively unfair competition.

They further stated:

The high cost in having to fund an investigation means it's only open to the larger companies - smaller companies can't afford it and have to put up with the unfair competition.

It is quite clear from this case study that the current antidumping system failed and resulted in 170 manufacturing sector employees losing their jobs.

It should be noted that the decision to reverse the dumping duties in 2009 came as a result of a review by Customs, which reported 'material injuries to the Australian Industry by the goods exported to Australia from China and Indonesia is not foreseeable and imminent'. However, from my perspective, the loss of 170 jobs, indeed the loss of any job, is material and damaging to this particular Australian industry. The loss of any Australian job is of great concern to us on this side of the House. The manufacturing industries in my own electorate of Solomon cover all sectors of this space—from small business operators to large multinational companies. While the market is small in national terms, it is fair to say that any impact felt is nonetheless real and tangible. Remoteness does have its disadvantages. Freight costs, travel times and a high cost of living, including rents, impact significantly on business and industry across the board. Although our market is small, the dumping of product exported from overseas localities has the potential to find its way into local economies around the country. Going back to the Kimberly-Clark example, tissue products in this instance could well have made it into the local Darwin market.

In circumstances where, for example, goods might be supplied by the multinational food companies, local small businesses struggle at best. But when dumping of products occurs, this further undercuts already extremely tight margins. As I have said in this place before, you only have to look around the Darwin CBD to see the number of small businesses closing down. While this is not a direct result of any product dumping, it is a clear sign of a highly volatile business sector running on extremely tight margins. My point is that small markets are a barometer of how an economy is situated.

The potential impacts of dumping of exported goods into the Australian marketplace extend to a ripple effect impacting more broadly than on just one specific market. Referring back to the Kimberly-Clark case, if a national company such as Kimberly-Clark states that the costs associated with an investigation are high and prohibitive to small businesses, it could be said that the present cumbersome antidumping system is not accessible to smaller business and industry and therefore is not supportive of all Australian businesses and industry sectors.

Furthermore, the current system makes it incumbent on Australian businesses to prove that the products exported from outside Australia are being sold at below cost. This is an onerous responsibility requiring at all times a complex and expensive investigation. An investigation conducted by Customs currently requires all parties to provide submissions within 40 days. However, an array of options exists by which Customs can extend this date, leaving Australian businesses to face often lengthy and damaging delays. At present, the role of undertaking investigations and providing advice to government is administered by the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service.

Customs is already under pressure arising from border protection issues and the enormity of the issues regarding illegal boat arrivals. It is also worth considering what impact cuts to the Customs budget are having on the delivery of its core business and whether antidumping should be the responsibility of Customs. Over the course of the budgets for 2010-11 and 2011-12, a total of 340 jobs have been axed by this Labor government, while at the same time it has reduced the overall Customs budget. The government has stated it will increase staffing to the relevant Customs branch by 31 to 45 positions. However, this was not based on the provision of additional funding but on redeployment of existing resources from other areas within Customs, further adding pressure to border protection capability.

It is the coalition's assertion that this function should be moved to the Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research—a portfolio which has the necessary industry acumen to pursue antidumping actions. The coalition will provide an extra $2.5 million per year to the Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research with the addition of 20 specialist personnel to pursue dumping investigations with increased speed and vigour.

Additionally, the coalition will introduce a more stringent and rigorous enforcement deadline, including a mandatory 40-day limit on party submissions to the department relating to investigations. In addition, the coalition will apply more penalties, including sanctions against parties that fail or refuse to cooperate with investigations. The onus of proof for such investigations will be reversed. These measures, in part, are designed to move Australia's antidumping regime more in line with other systems in place across the globe.

In nations such as the USA and a number of EU member states, it is not uncommon for relevant authorities to introduce countervailing measures at the point that they are able to argue that any subsidised import threatened harm to local industries. Using Canada as an example, the system in place has a greater national public interest focus or test which is applied prior to the consideration of any action. This public interest test is bounded, in that a presumption in favour of measures exists if dumping and material injury is determined.

Australia, as an active member of the World Trade Organisation and a signatory to relevant agreements, automatically accedes to the Anti-Dumping Agreement, or ADA, as annexed to the final act embodying the results of the Uruguay round multilateral trade negotiations of 1994. In 1995 the government of the day enacted changes to antidumping legislation to conform to the ADA. It is noted that the relevant minister at the time advised the House that Australia's implementation of the ADA did not alter the antidumping legislation in any fundamental sense.

Successive governments over the years have inserted new amendments in line with ADA as required. The coalition will strengthen the enforcement provisions of the World Trade Organisation agreement on subsidies and countervailing measures, thus strengthening Australia's antidumping regime and aligning it more closely with other signatory nations.

The amendments offered in the Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill (No.2) are broadly supported by the coalition. However, it is evident from my input and the input of other coalition members to this debate that we on this side of the House are willing to show the political will necessary to deliver meaningful reforms. Australia has a global responsibility for fair trade but also, and more importantly, we have a responsibility to our own business and industry sectors. We on this side of the House offer Australians hope, reward and opportunity. We must ensure that, when the dumping of products from offshore exports occurs, companies, businesses and industries have the knowledge and faith that a strong, fair and competent antidumping regime exists—one that is timely and decisive.

John Cobb (Calare, National Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture and Food Security) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on the Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011, which the coalition has expressed its in-theory support for. I say 'in theory' as the coalition is sceptical that the key changes agreed to will actually be implemented in a timely fashion. Labor's track record on swift execution is nothing to write home about. But as a whole I am pleased that the government has finally realised that there is an urgent need to make changes to Australia's antidumping system, which the coalition has pushed for for some time.

Dumping means Australian businesses face unfair competition from imported products sold into the domestic market at below production cost, a tactic which, while it may provide short-term benefits to the consumer, risks shutting down domestic industries, leaving us dependent on imports that are often of inferior quality. Even more worrying is that ongoing international dumping seeks to exploit Australia's commitment to free trade. The overall aim is to eliminate the local competition and increase product prices, which will eventually lead to local job losses.

What Australia's businesses and industries need is stronger action to ensure a level playing field. We cannot have underhand activities from overseas businesses undermining Australia's commitment to free trade. Labor indicated three years ago, in 2008, that they wanted revisions to the current antidumping system. This was largely welcomed by the coalition, but it was followed by a long period of inaction. Amendments were only made known in June last year, yet the government has still failed to show how these reforms actually would be delivered.

With this in mind, I along with the coalition, agree that these changes are a good starting point. However, we will continue to pressure the government into swift action so as to get the new system up and running as quickly as possible. At present, Customs have failed to act in a timely and effective manner when responding to reports from Australian businesses regarding antidumping activities. This has meant many antidumping cases have gone under the radar. It is simply not acceptable. It is hoped that Labor's amendments to the antidumping system, which outline changes in three different areas, are able to combat these issues.

The amendments include the introduction of a new appeals process to replace the existing appeals mechanism, the establishment of the so-called International Trade Remedies Forum and the creation of new guidelines for extensions to be allowed in certain circumstances. Again, I stress that the coalition is broadly supportive of these changes. They seem sensible and practical and will go some way to addressing the inherent faults in the current system.

However, there are a number of other changes that we would like to see implemented and which we believe would genuinely make the system more compelling—in particular, providing extra resources to Customs. We need to ensure we have a robust policy which provides strong action against the illegal activities of overseas businesses who seek to sell in Australia at below cost. Our nation's industries must be aware of the dangers of dumping. It is the enemy of free trade, as it undermines business and public support for free trade.

The coalition's antidumping taskforce consulted extensively with a range of stakeholders to formulate our policy guidelines. Such organisations included BlueScope Steel, the Australian Food and Grocery Council, the Australian Industry Group, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, SPC Ardmona and various others. As a person on that task force, I think we got a very good outline of how it is very hard currently for industry to go the full gamut. It is expensive.

From my point of view, there is no industry that suffers more as a result of dumping than agriculture. For agriculture, these new antidumping arrangements are pivotal to the sustainability of our sector. What our agriculture sector need is transparency, like the others. We need checks and balances in place, and this is why tightening the reins on the antidumping measures is essential. There are a number of cases where our domestic production is under threat from imports, and we need to reassure our industries that it is not because of dumping practices.

We have Italian tomatoes for sale in our supermarkets cheaper than they are on the shelves in Italy. We have Californian and Brazilian orange juice and concentrates selling at below the cost of production for our citrus growers, while our fruit rots on the tree, with the producers unable to match the imported market prices. These are just two examples, but there have also been many complaints about imported seafood, pork and numerous other imports. You only need to walk down the aisles of any major supermarket to see the plethora of imported foodstuffs. While I, like many consumers, enjoy lower prices and food variety, we cannot foster this pleasure over the viability of our country's industries, especially if it involves dumping.

With the high Australian dollar and myriad government regulations, our producers are under enough pressure without also facing dumped products from foreign markets. Our nation's producers are genuinely concerned about the increase of foreign imports. With overseas products being dumped on the market and selling at ridiculously low prices, local producers are finding themselves no longer competitive and no longer sustainable, and this is threatening entire industries.

Australia's industries, including agriculture, need a level playing field, and the continuation of dumping is impacting on the livelihoods of our farmers and the jobs of employees and those in allied industries. We need to be able to help secure a viable and sustainable future for our nation's industries, and the coalition is determined to ensure this. As far as manufacturing is concerned, the Labor government say they are supporting the industry, but they need to make sure they are supporting it, not pretending to. Over the past 3½ years, 136,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost, which has not given the manufacturing sector much confidence. A string of iconic manufacturing companies, including BlueScope Steel, Mitsubishi, Pacific Brands, Heinz, Bosch, Golden Circle and Bridgestone, have either closed or scaled back their Australian operations. The introduction of changes to the antidumping system may be a step closer to securing the trust of Australia's industries. Through Labor's Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011 the coalition wants to see that individual companies are able to take action against foreign manufacturers who seek to export products into countries at a price which is either lower than the price they charge in their home market and/or lower than their costs of production. Far too often we have seen industries avoid action against dumping due to the time, cost and complexity of pursuing their case.

On top of this already perilous trading environment, Labor has decided to force through the carbon tax. Many Australian industries are already operating on wafer-thin margins, struggling to function in a very tight pricing environment. This tax will only add fuel to the fire, forcing some of our largest operators to further tighten their belts, with the only way out being further job losses.

The government must guarantee the swift implementation of an antidumping system to ensure that Australia's industries are able to compete on a level and fair playing field. In the long run, the impact of poor policy implementation only means further pain for all Australians. Job losses, which I guarantee will result should action not be taken, will only make it harder for everyday Australians to make a living. The coalition wants to see more done to assist our industries and hopes that this can be achieved in time. We want assurances from the Labor government that the new systems can be implemented. Will Labor be able to provide clarification as to a set time frame? We eagerly await their answer.

Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It gives me great pleasure to speak on the Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011, which seems to be part of an incredibly incoherent and inconsistent trade policy on the part of this government. In trying to piece together where the government's current trade policy is at, I have become extremely perplexed by what the government is trying to achieve. Just to point this out, I want to go back to the Labor Party's platform for the election in 2007. In that platform it said:

In trade negotiations a Rudd Labor government will focus on achieving the best possible outcomes for the nation and for Australian business, particularly through multilateral structures. Labor believes there is an ongoing role for bilateral and regional agreements, especially where they are consistent with and can contribute to multilateral outcomes.

I remember that during the 2007 campaign the future government said about the coalition's approach—which had been a very practical approach whereby we were looking for trade liberalisation and investment liberalisation where we could find it, whether it be regionally, bilaterally or multilaterally—that, no, the Rudd government knew best. They were going to refocus multilaterally. That was going to be their approach, as was documented in their election 2007 platform. Somehow things did not quite work out. They found the going a bit difficult. So what did they do?

In the 2010 election we saw some subtle changes to the government's approach. We saw the Gillard government trade policy approach:

We will also fight for better market access through whichever process will deliver the best gains, whether through global trade agreements, agreements with groups of countries and bilateral agreements with individual trading partners.

So we saw a complete reverse. They were back—although they would not admit it—to adopting the very successful Howard government trade policy agenda. I must say that it was good to see that they had recognised the errors of their ways, even if they were not prepared to admit it and say that they had gone back to borrowing their trade policy approach from the Howard government.

That all looked reasonable in 2010. It looked like, 'Okay, we're happy to admit that we got it wrong and we're going to try your approach because, you never know, we might actually achieve something from it.' It looked like we might be going to get some consistency from this government in how it dealt with trade policy. That all seemed fine at that stage. We had had that commitment in 2010 during the election. But then we got to September 2010, and the Australian Minister for Trade said that he was going to use services to kick-start global trade talks. I quote:

The Minister for Trade, Dr Craig Emerson, today urged a focus on services trade liberalisation to kick-start the stalled WTO Doha Round of trade negotiations.

'There was not enough on the table to conclude the Round in 2008,' Dr Emerson said.

'We need to ensure that Doha delivers commercially meaningful outcomes for the services sector, as well as for agriculture and manufacturing.'

So all of a sudden they had gone from an approach whereby they were going to do multilateral, they were going to do regional and they were going to be bilateral; then they were going to start redefining how they were going to take their multilateral approach. They were going to focus first on services.

Anyone who knows anything about multilateral trade negotiations knows about the dangers of taking a single sectoral approach, because it will then be cherry picked and we will not get the outcomes across the board. That is the single biggest difficulty we have had with getting meaningful agricultural trade reform. So Dr Emerson, after agreeing that, okay, the coalition got it right, then started heading down his own path when it came to multilateral trade reform—a very, very worrying development. That was in September 2010.

Where did we get to next? We got to October 2011, and they had a new approach again. They were not going to use a sectoral approach and the services sector to try and get Doha started again; they were going to head down what is called a 'new pathways' approach. What were the types of new pathways we should head down? We were going to have new WTO rules on bilateral free trade agreements and regional free trade agreements. This was the path that we should single out and try and get meaningful agreement on. I quote again:

Agreeing on new disciplines for WTO-consistent bilateral and regional trade deals should not depend on or wait for the success of negotiations on manufacturing industry tariffs, farm subsidies, export subsidies or anything else. It should be done for its own sake to prevent the further degradation of the non-discrimination principle.

…   …   …

A new approach involving an initial down-payment, further instalments and the parallel negotiation of selected agreements is a realistic way of achieving further liberalisation.

Obviously his sectoral approach with services did not work, so he headed down the path of seeing if we could change the rules around bilateral and regional agreements. That was in October 2011. In December, we got a different approach again—the new pathway approach. Then he looked at whether we could change the rules around regional and bilateral free trade agreements. Then we got a statement:

Mr Chair, there are many paths to the mountain top and Australia has been advocating a new pathway in recognition of the fact that the Round has stalled.

So, we strongly support the WTO General Council statement of 30 November, which has actually been agreed by all Members, and it has several essential features.

First, it embraces the notion of different approaches, of a new pathway.

Second, it provides a focus on components of the Doha Declaration where we can reach agreement on a provisional or definitive basis earlier than full conclusion of the single undertaking.

And third, it says we fully respect the development component of the Doha Round.

So, once again, we have a different strategy from the trade minister. All we are seeing is mass confusion. We are seeing panic. We are seeing: 'Okay, we are not achieving anything. We'll try this, we'll try that.' What is missing is the actual hard work in getting countries to agree to a single undertaking.

It is all very well for the trade minister to criticise the coalition, as he did, for not having concluded Doha. Yet five years on, what have we seen from this government? We are further away from a conclusion than we have ever been. It is worth examining exactly why. It is because, sadly, our trade minister is full of talk but will not do the hard work or take the action to get the agreements that we need, to get confidence back in the Australian public that meaningful trade liberalisation is good for our local economy. Instead, what do we get? We get pledges. At the same time as we headed down another path to try to get more meaningful trade liberalisation we also got a pledge—the pledge on 15 December 2011against protectionism. Yet here we are today debating the legislation in front of us.

So what has the trade minister been doing since the pledge on 15 December? It is interesting. I went to the minister's website and had a look at five of the transcripts there. You would think that the trade minister's transcripts might be about trade. But what are they about? The first four of them are about leadership. I thought: 'Oh, this will be good. They are about leadership. They might be about this bill. They might be about the government's trade policy and where it is heading and whether we might get some consistency with it.'

Dick Adams (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The honourable member will come back to the bill.

Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, I will come back to the bill. But I would like to talk about the need for leadership in making sure that we get proper direction in our trade policy. I assume this bill is the Minister for Trade's.

Jason Clare (Blaxland, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Home Affairs ) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, it's not.

Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Disability Reform) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It's not—you don't even know what the bill is.

Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Well, I am sure that the Minister for Trade was consulted with regard to this bill.

Ms Macklin interjecting—

You can say that, but what does it go to the heart of? It goes to the agreement on antidumping. Where do the antidumping rules come from? The World Trade Organisation. It goes to the heart of our trade policy.

Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Disability Reform) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Talk about the bill.

Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am talking about the bill, and I will get to the point of the bill. We are here debating this bill because of the failure of the government's trade policy agenda. We have the minister pledging on protectionism, yet the failure of the government's trade policy agenda has led us to where we are today.

The first four transcripts on the minister's website were on leadership. I thought: 'This will be interesting. Maybe they are about the need for leadership on antidumping or the need for leadership on trade policy.' Sadly, no, they were not. They were about the ALP leadership.

Before we go to specifics in introducing antidumping legislation, we need a broader, more coherent trade policy. Instead of having to put in measures to protect us from other people's trade policy approaches, we should be on the front foot making sure we are getting the type of access to markets that does not mean that we have to be defensive in how we go about our trade policy. It is all right for us to preach the purity of trade liberalisation, but if our actions do not follow that then, as we have seen today, we will have to take antidumping measures. We have failed to advocate in our trade policy fora—whether they be multilateral, regional or bilateral—the benefits of a proper trade liberalisation approach. That is what has led us to being here today debating this bill. I would hope that the Minister for Trade was consulted on this bill. I would hope that he will now admit that his approach to advancing Australia's trade liberalisation has not worked and that we need to see some action rather than some words. Turning to the bill specifically—

Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Disability Reform) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

One minute!

Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

One minute and 35 seconds, actually. I have not heard where this bill fits within the government's broader agenda. It just seems to be a very ad hoc approach—it does not seem to have any broader meaning. Where does it fit within the broader economic narrative of this government? Where does it fit within the broader approach of this government? Nothing in the debate on this bill has given us that information. Everyone is left extremely confused. We have all this direction and all these statements, but when it comes to actions we have the stand-alone bill on antidumping. From what I can gather, it does not fit into the context of the government's broader narrative. This bill represents a failure of the Minister for Trade, and it is no wonder he has passed the buck of taking it through the chamber to the customs minister, making him carry the can for it. At least he has not been afraid to come in and do that.

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I know that the ministers at the table, the honourable member for Blaxland and the honourable member for Jagajaga, will be delighted to know that I am now going to speak on the Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011. I know they understand that Australia—regional Australia—needs to be able to produce fresh food for the Australian domestic market into the future. I realise that antidumping issues cover far more than just fresh food, including vegetables, but certainly where I come from, in the electorate of Riverina, the people want to see this place pass regulations and laws so that they can continue long into the future to do the job they do so very well—produce fresh food for the Australian domestic market.

Anything that can improve antidumping laws must be pursued and pursued vigorously. This is the Australian Year of the Farmer, and in a year when we are recognising farmers and their worth to the national economy we should be doing everything we can to help and promote them. Putting in place antidumping laws which help and promote Australian farmers has to be seen as a tremendous thing. Protecting farmers against dumping is a good way of showing the value we as a nation and we as a parliament place on what they do and the products they make.

Riverina Citrus in my electorate has only today written to Australian authorities requesting that an immediate investigation be launched into possible below-cost dumping of Egyptian oranges. Currently at a Sydney retail food market a case of Egyptian oranges is selling for $10. Riverina citrus growers cannot see how such a price is possible unless the fruit is being dumped in Australia at below cost. If so, it is shameful. If you take off the $10 retail price the 30 per cent the shop makes, the percentage the agent makes and then the percentage the importer makes, and you add shipping freight and other import costs, it is hard to see how you do not have a product which is being dumped into Australia. Australian growers across all commodities are already struggling with the high Australian dollar. As Riverina Citrus Chairman Frank Battistel said this afternoon, the last thing we need is other countries dumping their produce here. He emailed me:

If trade in and out of Australia is to be free, it also must be fair.

If the Australian Dollar continues at its high level and we continue with this flawed free trade concept without a level playing field there will be no growers left in a few years.

They are the wise words of Riverina Citrus Chairman Frank Battistel just this afternoon. I wholeheartedly agree with him. He is rightly worried about the future for Australian farmers. Mr Battistel is concerned that growers, pressured by banks, pressured by falling margins, pressured by the vagaries of weather and pressured by the uncertainty of future water availability—and in my view pressured by a carbon tax that we neither need nor can afford—will have no choice but to, as he says, 'sell up to foreign ownership or sell their water to government and get out of farming and Australia can rely on imports for all our food'.

At present the ratio of food imports against locally grown food is too high. The Australian Made labelling regulations have too many loopholes, but that is another matter. Dumping means Australian businesses face unfair competition from overseas goods and food items. While it may provide a short-term boon for Australian consumers, in the long term it leads to Australian companies and farmers going out of business. This point was lucidly made by the shadow agriculture minister and shadow minister for food security, the member for Calare in regional New South Wales, in his speech tonight. On this side of the parliament we realise that food security is extremely important. It is a shame that on the other side of the House we do not have a minister for food security, because food security is going to be one of the great moral challenges and dilemmas we face. It will be an important factor into the future.

As the member for Calare pointed out, dumping is the enemy of free trade. It certainly is the nemesis of fair trade. Australian industries and businesses do not want handouts—they just want a fair go and a level playing field with our overseas competitors. We in this place should be ensuring a level playing field for Australian industry by repealing job-destroying taxes, providing competent government and giving policy certainty to industry. The first order of business in that respect is to rescind Labor's carbon tax. This will ensure that Australian industries will not pay an additional cost which no other country imposes on all of its own industries. The coalition, in government, would reform Australia's antidumping regime to ensure that our industries are not unfairly disadvantaged by foreign competitors either dumping imports at below production cost or unlawfully subsidising goods.

The current antidumping regime is flawed and disadvantages Australian industries and businesses. Some of the things in this bill are good and they need to be pursued vigorously so that we do not have the spectre of foreign companies dumping food and unwanted items on Australian shores. As I say, sometimes that provides a cost reduction for consumers, but in the long run it destroys Australian business. Currently the antidumping laws are too cumbersome, slow and prohibitively expensive for many of our businesses to utilise and to understand. When rulings are made they are often too late and do nothing to address damage to a business or industry—that is, when an investigation into a dumping accusation is actually undertaken.

What we need is a more effective antidumping regime, a regime that ensures good Australian businesses get a fair go. As the Leader of the Opposition said just yesterday, we do have a great country and we do have great Australian businesses, but they do need a fairer go. The coalition's plan to strengthen Australia's antidumping regime involves a number of things. It involves providing an additional $2½ million per year to the relevant departments so that more resources are available to improve the number, quality and speed of dumping investigations. When I came back into Australia from New Zealand on 21 October last year, after looking into the situation where apples are being imported into Australia for the first time for 90-plus years, I spoke to a Customs official at the airport who pleaded with me, when he found out that I was a member of the federal parliament, to do something about strengthening Customs laws and strengthening staffing levels so that they could do their job more robustly and more effectively. I sympathise with his views, which is one of the reasons I have come in here to speak on this very important bill tonight.

We also should provide more specialist personnel within the relevant department over and above the number of personnel currently working in Customs so that more dumping investigations are pursued. Investigations need to be faster and more effective by mandating a 40-day time limit, for instance, for parties to lodge submissions with the relevant department. Stricter sanctions against producers who fail to adequately cooperate with requests to provide information about their export of goods under antidumping investigation laws also need to be put into place. And the enforcement of provisions of the World Trade Organisation on subsidies and countervailing measures needs to be strengthened. That needs to be strengthened because, as I say, we need fair trade rather than just open free trade.

The Labor-Greens government wants to make our industries less competitive by imposing an economy-wide carbon tax that no other country has introduced. It is a job-destroying tax which will hurt regional Australia severely and put many hardworking Australian businesses way behind the eight ball. It is not needed and it will not do anything for the environment. On top of its carbon tax hit, the Labor-Greens alliance has failed to ensure that an effective antidumping regime gives Australian industries and businesses a level playing field. Labor indicated back in 2008 that it wanted revisions to the antidumping system but it then embarked on a long period of inaction. That was unfortunate. First it commissioned a Productivity Commission review of Australia's antidumping laws, in 2009, but then took 18 months to respond. When it finally made some changes in June last year, it again failed to show the political will necessary to deliver more worthwhile reforms. Hopefully, this bill goes some of the way towards doing that, but more is needed—we must protect Australian farmers and we must protect Australian businesses more and more.

Every year it has been in office, Labor has not only cut funding to Customs, the agency that administers Australia's antidumping system, but has done so at a time when the organisation has been under ever-increasing stress and pressure in the area of border protection. The impact on manufacturing has been devastating. We have heard so many times in this place in recent weeks how 136,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost during the past 3½ years—an astonishing rate of nearly 750 jobs per week. When asked about that the Prime Minister put it down to 'growing pains'. It is more than just growing pains. That remark was most offensive. It is about Australian workers, Australian families, having the right to earn an income which can put their children through school, which can give their kids a decent holiday, which can pay off their mortgage—and, at the moment, Australian families are doing it tough enough with cost-of-living pressures.

Manufacturing activity has contracted in recent years and we need to do everything we can to ensure that antidumping measures are put in place which effectively protect Australian farmers and Australian businesses, who do so much for not only our domestic market but also for our national economy and for the confidence and certainty that Australia is desperately seeking into the future.

Jason Clare (Blaxland, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Home Affairs ) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank all members for their contributions to this important debate. The Customs Amendment (Anti-dumping Improvements) Bill (No. 2) 2011 is very important legislation. It deals with dumping, and dumping is cheating. It gives the companies that do it an unfair advantage and it is contrary to the principles of free and fair trade. That is why the government is delivering a series of reforms to improve the operation of Australia's antidumping system. Last year we passed the first tranche of legislation. This bill is the second and I will soon bring forward a third.

These reforms are based on the advice of Australian industry, Australian unions and their respective peak organisations. They improve the application and appeals process and, importantly, they comply with Australia's obligations to the World Trade Organisation. Together, the reforms we are undertaking will form the most important improvements to Australia's antidumping regime in more than a decade and will improve the antidumping system's effectiveness. The reforms in this bill establish a new appeals process to replace the existing appeals mechanism in legislation. The bill establishes the International Trade Remedies Forum and it allows for multiple extensions to time frames for investigations, reviews of measures, continuation inquiries or duty assessments to accommodate more complex matters or new information. These changes will improve the way we administer global antidumping rules in Australia and better align our laws and practices with those of other countries. Australia is a strong advocate and supporter of open trade. We are a trading nation. Last year our exports were more than $313 billion. International trade relies on rules. All WTO member countries have the right to take action against unfair trading practices. So it is important that these reforms meet our WTO obligations and they do that.

As I said, this is the second tranche of our antidumping reforms. There are more to come. To this end I am working not only with the Customs and Border Protection Service but also with the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Australian Industry Group, the Australian Workers Union, the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union and other key stakeholders in this area to bring forward the next tranche of antidumping legislation in the autumn session.

Once again, I thank all members for their interest in this matter and for their support. I commend the bill to the House.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.