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

I want to talk about jobs in South Australia. It has been a pretty tough week for South Australia and for jobs in my state. We see that in steelmaking, we have seen that in shipbuilding and we have seen that in the vehicle production industry. The common link in all these things is a government that is defined by its malice to blue-collar workers and by its inaction on these industries. I went up to Whyalla last Friday to visit Arrium, to visit the AWU and to talk to the local member, Eddie Hughes, about the South Australian government's plans in this regard, particularly around procurement and co-investment. What is going on in the steel city of Whyalla is that they have already lost 600 jobs—600 important blue-collar jobs—from that town. They are looking down the barrel at trying to protect the remaining 1,100 at that site.

We know that, around the world, there is a flood of cheap, inferior and subsidised steel, mainly from China. Just today there was a headline saying that in China they were going to sack 1.8 million coal and steel workers—500,000 steelworkers. That is what they are talking about doing in China, which gives you an idea of the massive oversupply in steel. There are all these state-owned industries pumping out steel and then, obviously, when it is not being used in the domestic market, pumping it out into export.

What this industry desperately needs is a bit of government attention. We would expect the member for Grey and the member for Sturt, the industry minister, to start engaging with the South Australian government and start engaging with the town of Whyalla—with Arium and with the workforce there—about how sensible government action can protect Australian jobs, whether it is in antidumping, whether it is in procurement, or whether it is in co-investment. They are the things that need to happen and, sadly, we see complete inaction in this area.

I am incredibly sensitive to the automotive industry. I come from a car-making city—not a steel-making city. I heard the sad news when I was coming back from Whyalla. I was in the airport and Holden rang to tell me that they were discontinuing the production of the Cruze. It is not unexpected because we all knew when this government told GM to leave—when then Treasurer Hockey told GM to leave—that this was an inevitable consequence of that—job losses, the discontinuation of production, in this case of a model, and the slow closing down of the industry in the run up to 2017.

We knew that was going to be the consequence and we knew it was going to be devastating, but every time you are told about these things it hits you in the guts. If you are a worker, or a family member of a worker, or you know someone at that plant—as I know many at that plant—it kicks you in the guts when you hear about those job losses and when you see those consequences of the coinciding of Tony Abbott being Prime Minister, the dollar being high and an investment decision having to be made. If we had taken out any one of those three things we would have had a very different outcome. We would have still been making cars in Australia because the dollar is now 60 or 70c. We would have been exporting cars to the United States rather than seeing the slow destruction of cars and the car-making industry in this country—

Ms Henderson interjecting—

Nothing those opposite say can get them out of their responsibility for the demise of the car industry. They can sit there laughing, but nothing you can do can remove the dirty stain of removing Holden and Toyota from this country. It was your actions. You should own your work and not try to hide from it.

Sadly, in ship building we saw another 70 go from Australian warfare destroyers and another 40 from the Collins class.

We see the leaks out of this government this week on Defence. The leaks and the division—two prime ministers, two treasurers, three Defence ministers, a revolving door on your National Security Committee and an immigration minister who is not on the National Security Committee. What a divided, disgusting, useless bunch you are!

Ms Henderson interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Corangamite can cease interjecting, particularly when she is not in her seat. The very tail end of that contained some unparliamentary remarks and I will ask—

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

I am happy to withdraw but I was being provoked.