Nick Xenophon (SA, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

The minister asserts that it is not compliant with the WTO. Can he please tell us how it is not compliant. Senator Carr makes a very fair point: to what extent is it not compliant? These are just broad assertions that do not bear the scrutiny that Senator Carr says that assertion deserves. Also, why is it that we seem to be so much weaker in the way we deal with WTO obligations? I think that the Europeans, the Americans and other countries have a much tougher approach to these issues, rather than taking a literal, fundamentalist view of WTO rules. There is a reason we are joked about in international forums, as being the free trade Taliban in trade negotiations. It is time we stopped that.