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

I thank Senator Farrell very much for his question. I reject the premise of Senator Farrell's question, because Senator Farrell has failed to acknowledge this important next step in the government's national economic recovery plan, which is about supporting businesses, workers and regions who are still finding it very difficult in the post-COVID-19 pandemic period. The package's mix—whether it is discounted airline tickets, loans for business or direct support to keep planes in the air and airline workers in their jobs—is an important part of building that bridge back to a normal way of life for Australians. The centrepiece of this package is a demand driven program—as the senator said, 800,000 half-price airfares—to actually enable Australians to travel, to actually support tourism operators, businesses, travel agents and airlines who have been dealing with these challenges.

I don't understand why those opposite do not support that initiative, to actually engage with those businesses, to actually enable those Australians to travel. The package ultimately will take more tourists, whether it is to our hotels and our cafes or to go on tours, to explore our own backyard. That does mean more jobs and investment for the tourism and aviation sectors. It is a win for local communities, and local communities that were spelt out here earlier in the week, in the chamber, don't understand why those opposite don't support those local communities and don't want to support them with this package. The half-price ticket program, initially operating to 13 key regions, and other new measures in the support package, include that new international aviation support to assist Australia's international passenger airlines to maintain over 8,000 core international aviation jobs; support for regular passenger airports to meet their domestic security costs; a new aviation services assistance support program to help ground-handling companies to meet the costs of mandatory training certification and accreditation— (Time expired)