Peter Whish-Wilson (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by the Minister for Human Services (Senator Payne) to questions without notice asked by Senator Bushby and the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate (Senator Wong) today relating to the China Australia Free Trade Agreement.

The last thing that this country needs is more spin from the trade minister, Andrew Robb, on so-called free trade deals. We get enough of that from all his press conferences, from his Press Club appearances and from some of the nauseating information that is given out by people in this chamber—the relentless rollout of the messaging around the so-called benefits of these free trade deals.

You have to ask yourself, why is the government spending $24 million of taxpayers' money to sell something that is not even signed yet, that has not even been passed into law? The deal has not even been closed. I will tell you why they need taxpayers' money to sell it: because they have failed to convince the Australian people that this deal is actually going to benefit them at all. It is the third trade deal they have signed, and now they have to go out and spend $24 million of taxpayers' money to sell it. They are not doing this because of a union advertising campaign against the China free trade deal. If this deal was as good as it sounds it would stand on its own merits. They are doing this because it has failed the pub test. This deal, just like the Korean deal, has failed the pub test, just as I am sure the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement—another secret deal that has been signed behind closed doors—will also fail the pub test. They will fail for a really simple reason. It is because these deals are secret and there is no information. Nobody knows what is going on behind closed doors.

The special interests that had the minister's ear might get what they want. While that is good for them it is not necessarily in the national interest. People are sick and tired of hearing about it. This is a government that said in its Governor-General speech it was going to hang its hat on being the government of free-trade deals. There was a rush to sign them, a rush to have as many headlines as possible, press conferences standing next to flags, standing next to national dignities—