Tim Ayres (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I appreciate being given a few minutes at this juncture to make some comments on behalf of the Labor Party. I, too, will try to finish in time to give Senator Patrick a few minutes. On the face of it, Senator Roberts' notice of motion is pretty anodyne. Labor will be supporting the proposition. I did have some misgiving, though, that it would be the vehicle for the kind of bellicose language that Senator Roberts is prone to giving, and those misgivings proved to be well-founded. He did cite an article by Mr Gottliebsen yesterday that talked about people regarding Australia as foolish. I don't accept that characterisation. Senator Roberts has made no small contribution himself to the view that many countries across the region have about some of the darker recesses of Australian thinking in relation to the region.While he's free to speak his mind, words have consequences. It didn't take too long there to move from views about the government of China to an alleged one-world government, across to the Bradfield scheme and the usual rhetorical flourishes that Senator Roberts has about things that move from the real to the world of conspiracy theories very, very quickly.

As the resolution says, this is a more deep-seated problem than a trade spat. The language 'trade spat' I think is an effort to diminish the seriousness of the economic issues and trade issues that confront the country. Peabody coal announced today that it would be standing workers down at its Helensburgh mine for eight weeks—very high-quality metallurgical coal exported around the world. That is a very serious issue in the Hunter Valley. The resolution touches on timber, wine and coal. But lobsters, sugar, copper, beef, wheat and barley are all important regional industries and important regional employers. Many, many tens of thousands of jobs rest upon those industries. What I want to see is a more thorough, thoughtful, careful and strategic debate within this parliament over the course of 2021. And I want to see a more thoughtful, strategic approach and, indeed, a plan from the Morrison government, about how we're going to deal with not just the trade questions but about Australia's relationships across the region, including our relationship with China.

The problem is that the Morrison government has failed to prepare Australia for the new realities in the region. Mr Morrison has no plan to diversify Australia's export markets and no plan to deepen our relationships with the other countries in the region. Just today the Morrison government has put a bill through the Senate that confirms it's solely responsible for foreign relations. That means Mr Morrison and the minister need to show leadership and actually take responsibility, instead of just using foreign policy as another vehicle for slogans and splashy headlines. As a result, Mr Morrison has made a bad situation worse.

Foreign policy and strategy are not just about events. When significant events have occurred, the Labor Party, our leader, Mr Albanese, the leader here, Senator Wong, and our spokesperson on foreign policy have supported the government in a bipartisan way. Whether it's events like the disgraceful tweet from earlier this week, the Labor Party has provided bipartisan support. But strategy isn't about events; strategy is about having a clear view of what the national interest is, a clear construction of what is in the interests of Australia and Australians and then prosecuting a strategy that delivers a good outcome for the country in terms of our economy and in terms of regional peace, stability and economic growth across the region—of course, a strategy that's consistent with Australia's values. The problem is that there has been a clear articulation of those positions across previous governments but there has been a sense of strategic drift and lack of a policy approach from this government over the course of the last seven years.