Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Industry. I refer to Holden managing director Mike Devereux's comments to the Productivity Commission this morning when he said that the federal government has the figures for what is needed to keep Holden in Australia. Minister, isn't it the case that the government's $500 million cut to auto assistance will make the industry unsustainable?

Ian Macfarlane (Groom, Liberal Party, Minister for Industry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The answer to that question is 'no'. The reason that the answer to the question is 'no' is that the member for Wakefield does not actually know what is required. He, like many opposite, is more than happy to just walk down the road spraying around taxpayer money with no measure, no process and no outcome.

Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise on a point of order on relevance, Madam Speaker. It is here in the SMH: 'It's in the government's hands, says Holden.'

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am sorry, but a point of relevance is not what is in the SMH. I call the minister.

Ian Macfarlane (Groom, Liberal Party, Minister for Industry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There are many authorities on the car industry sitting in the gallery above us; perhaps on all sides there are many authorities on the car industry! But what I like is a measured, purposeful approach. That way, you know exactly what you are setting out to do. If you set out to do it in a methodical way you will get an outcome that is sustainable.

I have not got time to go through the list of projects that the Labor Party has hurled money at, some at the last minute during the election campaign, in a desperate attempt to silence the industry sector. There were no outcomes promised. There were no long-term prospects for jobs. They just threw money at them to try and shut them up. We are not in that process. We are in a process of ensuring that the car industry has a long-term future. Everyone involved in that process, including the general manager of GM, Mike Devereux, knows how that process is working. We have a Productivity Commission inquiry. The Productivity Commission will report to the government, as the commissioner said this morning at the beginning of the hearings, on 31 March and the government will respond to that report.

What we are seeing here from the Labor Party is an attempt at a self-fulfilling prophecy. Mike Devereux has not said that Holden is leaving Australia. But over there all the way through question time yesterday—and I suspect all the way through question time today—they are putting up a self-fulfilling prophecy to try and get Holden to go. We have a process and we are going to stick to it.