Don Farrell (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Trade and Tourism) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Van for his question. I don't have those specific details with me today, Senator, but as soon as we leave the chamber I'll get those figures for you and provide them to you as quickly as I can.

This government, of course, has had a key focus on the trade issue and trying to expand our trade—both to restore the trade that we had with China and to diversify or encourage the diversification of trade with other countries. The program you're talking about, the export grants program, is very much a feature of trying to assist Australian companies in that expansion program. We'll see tonight from the budget just how much importance trade has in ensuring that we deliver a surplus in this budget.

This is a government that supports trade. We're a trading nation. We believe we can do more than we're doing at the moment, and we'll be using programs like the one that you've mentioned to ensure that Australian companies get the best possible support that they can from Austrade, from these grants, to ensure that we continue to build on our strong performance in the trade portfolio.