Tracey Roberts (Pearce, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Resources and Minister for Northern Australia. How will the Albanese Labor government's production tax incentive for critical minerals grow a new industry here in Australia? What are the barriers to delivering a Future Made in Australia?

Madeleine King (Brand, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Northern Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the remarkable member for Pearce for that question. The road to net zero runs through the Australian resources sector. Australia has all the critical minerals and rare earth elements the world needs to decarbonise. There are no solar panels, wind turbines or storage batteries without them. We have a generational opportunity to move beyond extracting to concentrating our valuable ore to create a new critical minerals processing industry right here in Australia. The Albanese Labor government will encourage processing onshore through a 10 per cent production tax incentive that will drive the creation and resilience of this new industry, built on this country's traditional resources of coal, gas and iron ore that are the cornerstone of our economy.

The critical minerals industry faces challenges. We face market disruption, market manipulation, price fluctuations and supply-chain disruptions that are also affecting our trading partners around the world. These challenges will not disappear with wishful thinking. That's one barrier, but another major barrier to our growing critical minerals industry here in Australia is those opposite. The Liberals and the Nationals in this House and in the other place have turned their back on the resources sector and have opposed a production tax incentive.

So, what do they have? That is a very good question. The shadow Treasurer is reading off the opposition's east coast script and the Leader of the Opposition is reading off the west coast script. But we really look forward to that WA package that might deliver us a gold medal in backflips; it could put us up the table in the Olympics gold medal list!

But up there in Queensland, unlike down there in Collie—maybe the member for Flynn could tell us a bit about it? He might feel differently about the production tax incentive. After all, Alpha HPA is starting Australia's first high-purity alumina processing facility in Gladstone, in his electorate. Yesterday he spoke about the Future Made in Australia, but he spoke more about uranium than he did about critical minerals. Queensland, as we all know and as you know, Mr Speaker, is a great resources state. In contrast to the member for Flynn and others, the Prime Minister and I visited Alpha HPA earlier this year to see their work.

And what did the member for Capricornia have to say about the production tax incentive? Well, absolutely nothing, of course. And what did the member for Leichhardt have to say about it? Despite the fact that he has a tungsten mine in his electorate that wants to go to processing, we haven't even heard from him. The Queensland Resources Council are behind the production tax incentive. I want to be very clear. What each and every member of the LNP in this House and in the Senate are doing is doing people in your electorates out of jobs and money. By not backing the production tax incentive you are putting your own people behind. (Time expired)