Kate Thwaites (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Treasurer. Why is a future made in Australia so important, and what alternatives has the Albanese Labor government rejected?

Jim Chalmers (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thanks to the member for Jagajaga for her question and for representing the 77,000 people in her local community who get a tax cut this week because of this Prime Minister and this government.

I was proud to introduce the Future Made in Australia legislation earlier today. A future made in Australia is all about secure jobs and more opportunities and a new generation of prosperity in an economy powered by cleaner and cheaper energy. It's all about maximising our geological, geographical, geopolitical and meteorological advantages. It's all about broadening and deepening our industrial base and becoming a renewable energy superpower. It's all about making ourselves an indispensable part of the global net zero transformation—the biggest change in the global economy since the Industrial Revolution—and ensuring that our people and businesses are beneficiaries, not victims, of that change.

The legislation we introduce today is all about imposing rigour, robustness and discipline on the public investment which is necessary to leverage the private capital we will need, to ensure that investment benefits our workers and our local communities. It's a very important day because a future made in Australia is absolutely central to this Prime Minister's vision for the future of our economy. Our economic plan is all about relief, repair and reform: relief this week with substantial, meaningful and responsible cost-of-living help; repair of the budget which sees us turn two big Liberal deficits into Labor surpluses; and reform to modernise our economy and maximise our advantages.

We cannot afford, as a country, to waste another decade of denial and delay, but that's what those opposite are proposing by going down the nuclear path.

Milton Dick (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Barker is going to cease interjecting.

Jim Chalmers (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They are choosing the most expensive, the most divisive, the least viable option that takes the longest and squanders Australia's unique combination of economic advantages. Their nuclear policy is equal parts ideological extremism and economic insanity. So is their plan to rip up the emissions reduction targets. Both those things together would blow up investor certainty in our economy, and that's why their angry incompetence sends a shiver up the spine of investors here and abroad.

Our economic plan is mainstream and it is methodical. It is about certainty, and it is about clarity about the government's vision and our nation's ambitions for the future. The bills that I was proud to introduce today with the Minister for Climate Change and Energy are an important part of that effort.