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

I haven't seen the quote attributed to Senator Canavan, and so I won't take at face value the extract without seeing the full context of the remarks that Senator Canavan is likely to have made. As I said before, we do recognise the importance of the trade relationship with China. Indeed, I'm happy to give the Senate some of the detail that I took on notice before in relation to Australia's total two-way trade for goods and services export, valued in 2019 at $251.4 billion. Our goods exports in 2019 were $149.2 billion and, over the latest ABS figures, which are for the 2018-19 period, there were some 8,184 Australian merchandise exporters engaged in trade with China. So indeed these are important jobs.

It's also important that Australia act at all times to behave consistently with our values and our national interest across all spheres. So we do that, seeking to absolutely protect our values as a trading nation: our willingness and desire to engage openly and in a rules based manner, to trade with as many nations as possible and for them to reciprocate in doing so. But we also take very seriously the need to protect our critical infrastructure and our communications system, and to have foreign investment laws that are appropriate and that withstand different strategic challenges that we will face as a nation from time to time. It's crucial that as a country we stand strong, clear and consistent in the approaches we take to those types of issues. That's the approach that our government brings—a steady hand in relation to all aspects of Australia's values and our position—and that is exactly what we'll continue to do, whether it be across strategic spheres or economic spheres.