Marise Payne (NSW, Liberal Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator McGrath for his question. I particularly want to congratulate Papua New Guinea on their successful hosting of the APEC summit, which saw hundreds of meetings, and thousands of visitors, in Port Moresby particularly, over the last year. They have done an outstanding job. I also welcome the release of Prime Minister O'Neill's chair's statement. APEC was a timely opportunity to engage with regional counterparts and to encourage closer economic integration, free trade and investment, and sustainable and inclusive growth.

It was also a very important opportunity to engage leaders on the government's new Pacific initiatives. We are strongly committed to working closely with our Pacific neighbours to build a prosperous and resilient region. As the Prime Minister announced recently, the Australian Infrastructure Financing Facility for the Pacific will significantly boost economic development opportunities and help to address major infrastructure financing gaps facing our regional partners. We will be expanding our diplomatic presence to every Pacific Island Forum country, with new posts in the Cook Islands, Niue, French Polynesia, Palau and the Marshall Islands.

We're focused on strengthening our people-to-people links, which are so powerful between Australia and the Pacific, across a range of activities in sports—including rugby league, rugby union, netball, football and basketball—and at a community level we'll be working to build stronger church partnerships. In fact, I have already met with church leaders to share views on how they could work with Pacific churches further to provide community support and services. These are real demonstrations of our government's commitment to working with our partners across the Indo-Pacific to build a region that is more prosperous, more stable and more secure.