Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Defence Industry. Will the Minister update the House on the government's Defence Export Strategy and the opportunities which are available in the United Kingdom? How does the government's commitment to trade and other measures help grow the economy, wages and jobs?

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Fisher for his question. Today and last night I had the opportunity to meet with the UK Secretary of Defence, Gavin Williamson. Our defence industry relationship with the United Kingdom has improved markedly in the last couple of years. We've initiated the Australia/United Kingdom Defence Industry Dialogue for the first time. I had the first couple of meetings, and it will meet for a third time in the first half of this year.

There are real opportunities for Australian businesses to export their defence platforms into the United Kingdom. There are a few examples that are well known to members, such as: the Thales Australia's Bushmaster, which is currently bidding for a tender into the UK but has been purchased by the UK before—in the member for Bendigo's electorate; or CEA's phased array radar, produced here in Canberra, which is being evaluated for the United Kingdom's type 31E platform for frigates; or BAE and the Defence Science and Technology Group's Nulka, an anti-ship missile decoy which has passed a billion dollars worth of value for exports from Australia around the world. There are smaller companies, too. In fact, in the member for Fisher's electorate, Praesidium Global is currently trying to break into the UK market with an unmanned ground vehicle for Defence personnel out in the field.

The Defence Export Strategy that the Prime Minister and I launched in January is just one of the ways that we are assisting Australian businesses trying to break into the defence exports market. Another one, of course, is the reduction of the company tax rate. It is a very important economic measure that will drive jobs, higher wages, investment and growth in the economy. It wasn't so long ago that the Leader of the Opposition was, in fact, in favour of company tax cuts. In 2011, he was the Assistant Treasurer in the Gillard government. In March 2011 he gave a speech to ACOSS's national conference. In it, he said:

… lowering the corporate rate for smaller businesses only (as the Greens propose)—

so that was when he wanted to have different policies to the Greens, as opposed to now—

creates an artificial incentive for someone to downsize.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Again, someone from the Labor Party calls out 'boring'. It is amazing, as the Treasurer said before, that the legacy of the Hawke-Keating government was to have economic credibility, to put behind them the Whitlam legacy, and the modus operandi of this opposition is not to care about economic credibility whatsoever. They have embraced Chavez and Guevara and they've rejected Hawke and Keating.