Sarah Henderson (Corangamite, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to celebrate the significant investments the Turnbull government is making in local manufacturing across the Corangamite and Geelong regions. Last week I was joined by the Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science, Greg Hunt, to announce nearly $2.7 million in manufacturing grants to boost local jobs.

SNF Australia in Lara is investing a total of $22 million to develop a major liquid acrylamide plant to treat wastewater, supported by $2.17 million from our government's Next Generation Manufacturing Investment Program, part of our $155 million Growth Fund.

After Australian Lamb Co.'s exciting announcement of a 10-year supply deal with Coles, one of Colac's biggest employers will receive $516,000 to support a new robotic-processing operation. In total, 37 new jobs will be created.

The minister and I also visited Ford's proving ground, a state-of-the-art global facility where Ford is investing another $10 million. Combined with its Research and Development Centre, Ford will continue to employ around 500 people in Geelong—engineers, designers, researchers and scientists. We are also very proud of the $250,000 which will go to an Advanced Fibre Cluster in conjunction with the Advanced Manufacturing Growth Centre at Deakin University's Waurn Ponds campus. These are all signs of the very strong investment the Turnbull government is making in manufacturing in our region.