Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

In raising this issue in the parliament, you wonder why people hate politicians. I do not know if people have noticed it, but in our home state of Queensland we change our Premier every 2.3 years, and we are getting close to that now in the federal parliament. It is a vote that people hate you; it is a vote that they do not like you. They will vote one mob out. They will just vote against whoever is there. The next mob will go in and they will vote against them. In Queensland, we had one change of government in 90 years. Clearly we liked what we were getting. The great labour movement dominated our state in those days. We owe so much to that great labour movement which swept out of Queensland and took over the running of Australia.

I have to mention in speaking to this bill my worthy colleague from Denison. In this place, the people have a voice. Those voices happen to be the few of us who are sitting here. The others are just silly, because they get up and say something, like the last speaker said we should be doing something about labelling. We have moved motions in the House again and again and we cannot get a single vote from anyone. In a survey of your electorate, 90 per cent of people want it, but people in this place do not serve the people; they serve a political party. Here is a classic example of it. The laughing stock of Australia is the government. A government that hands out Australian flags which are made in China. This is a government which has the boots of its soldiers made in China. It is a government that buys a Steyr rifle—we are the only country in the world buying Steyr rifles—it is actually made in Australia, but of course all the detailed fabrication is done in a foreign country.

What this bill will do, if we could get some people to break party lines and vote for the welfare of the Australian people, is that it creates—and let's be specific and talk about the submarines. I am told—I have read in the newspaper; we cannot get any information out of the government—that there are some 4,000 jobs involved in this operation. If we are getting light ships built—patrol boats—there is Cairns, there is Tasmania and there is Fremantle. They are all capable of doing the job at the present moment. But if government contracts do not go to them then they will lose the technology and the capacity to build anything.

This is an interesting period in Australian history, because in the last six months Australia has made its last motor car. In the last six months Australia has made its last washing machine. This country can no longer produce whitegoods—refrigerators, washing machines, stoves or whatever you like—and it can no longer produce a motor car. In the OECD countries, they have an 'elaborately transformed' column. But we really do not have a column any more, because we do not 'elaborately transform' anything! We moved out of the OECD countries into the Third World countries, that have no industrial capacity whatsoever!

If you produce the submarines in Australia, there is a great quote. It was in the context of the argument about whether Australia should make its own motorcars. This quote was from a huge argument in America over the Brooklyn Bridge. The chief protagonist, a senator from New York, said, 'All I know is the British may be able to make better bridges than we Americans, but if we build the bridge then we have the money for the bridge and we have the bridge. If the English build the bridge, well, we got the bridge but they got the money.'

Therein lies the foundation argument for the submarines. And if the argument is that we do not have the technology, well how the hell are we ever going to get the technology unless we have a go at it? Unless we face the challenge?

I see the hypocrisy of the government with their innovative advertisements on the television. Innovation! How can you innovate when you have no market to innovate for? When there is no production market out there I see very little point in innovating. But 4,000 jobs are to be created, so somewhere in Australia 4,000 people go off the welfare rights. And if that is $40,000 per person, we are talking about thousands of millions of dollars that are saved automatically because people somewhere will come off the welfare rolls; if 4,000 extra jobs are created then somewhere someone has to come off the welfare rolls. Whether you use the figure of $30,000, or $40,000 or $60,000 a year for a person on welfare, or a family on welfare, I will leave that to other people in this place.

When you pay those 4,000 workers, you get tax revenue from them. In fact, one quarter of what you pay them comes back to the government by way of tax revenue. So when we compare the real cost of getting the Germans or the Japanese to build the submarines, take out a quarter of the labour costs because that comes back to the government by way of tax.

I remember a great quote from the Chancellor of the Exchequer in Britain. He resigned because he could not serve under Margaret Thatcher anymore. And to some degree it was about the closure of the coal industry. He said, 'I could not convince her that, when you take a person off work, you lose the tax revenue and then you have to pay them on welfare.' If you add both those factors up, you end up behind: it was better to keep the coal mines working, even though they were running at a loss. He said, 'I failed to convince the woman.' That he did not have a high respect for her intelligence and her thinking capacity was fairly obvious in what he was saying.

Finally, if Australia is to have a technology industry and a defence capability, it needs these things to be built in Australia. At least we could make the boots in Australia! The member for Denison served his country well and proudly in the Army. Three years ago, I was speaking to the Warrant Officer at the catafalque party on Anzac Day in Charters Towers. I said, 'Is it true that the soles fell off the boots of 2,000 soldiers while they were marching in the Anzac Parade in Townsville?' He did not say anything. But he lifted his foot up. He had been walking on his socks. All he had was the uppers of his boots! I mean, what sort of country purchases its boots from a communist country that we have traditionally been on the other side of the fence from? We fought a war against them in Korea. The last serious war that this country fought in was the Korean War. To have them making our boots puts a whole new slant on 'Pig Iron Bob' attacks on the government!

In all seriousness, for our country to go forward without the capacity to have any sophisticated technology whatsoever is a disgrace to every single person in this parliament. And for them to contemplate for even a single second having our submarines built outside Australia is appalling. (Time expired)

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

Is the motion seconded?

Andrew Wilkie (Denison, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the remarkable member for Kennedy's bill and reserve my right to speak.

Debate adjourned.