Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Hansard source

Australia has managed to strengthen its position, and I acknowledge that in a number of areas that's been bipartisan policy. Yes, the trade deals have usually been—in fact, nearly always—struck under our government. The Labor Party, in their previous six years in government, failed to commence and conclude a single trade agreement in that time. They have, by and large, cooperated, but what we saw late last year at Labor's national conference was a change in Labor policy—a change in Labor policy that will make it significantly harder for the Labor Party to do new deals in the future and even a threat that a future Labor government, if elected, would open up every trade agreement that we currently have and seek to try to renegotiate them. So just as Australia is at a time where our exports are at record highs and our trade successes at record levels, along comes the Labor Party threatening to undo that. Just as their tax policies are a threat to the economy, their trade policies are also a threat to the economy, and with that a threat to the jobs of Australians.