Claire Moore (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, Senator Carr. Can the minister inform the Senate how innovation can contribute to making Australia stronger?

Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Moore for the question. Innovation is critical. It is critical to solving problems like climate change, critical to the maintenance of jobs and prosperity and critical to achieving the levels of productivity we need to remain commercially and internationally competitive.

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Abetz interjecting—

John Hogg (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Senator Carr, resume your seat! Senator Abetz, you will cease interjecting. Thank you.

Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Commonwealth support for innovation collapsed under the previous government and productivity growth came to a standstill. In 1993-94 the great reforming government of Paul Keating spent the equivalent of 0.75 per cent of GDP on science and innovation.

Opposition Senators:

Opposition senators interjecting—

John Hogg (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Resume your seat, Senator Carr! It is question time. I know some people get a little bit excited during question time on both sides, but the questioner is entitled to be heard asking the question and the minister is entitled to be heard answering it.

Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Keating government spent the equivalent of 0.75 per cent of GDP on science and innovation. In his last budget the member for Higgins—or is that ‘Hamlet of Higgins’?—provided the equivalent of 0.55 per cent of GDP for science and innovation. That is a 27 per cent drop. The previous government’s neglect of innovation has hurt Australia badly. The report of the National Innovation System, which I released last week, points out:

Sometime around 2002 Australian productivity went from growing substantially faster to growing substantially slower than the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) average.

It goes on to argue:

... had it not been for the hunger the emerging giants of the developing world have had for our resources, we would have felt the effects of our complacency more directly as stalling living standards.

I would ask senators opposite to ponder that for a moment. The only thing holding up the Australian living standards has been the resources boom. Does anyone here seriously believe that that is an adequate foundation for Australia’s future? Quite clearly those opposite do. Does anyone believe that we can afford to neglect infrastructure, skills and innovation capacity and stake everything on selling iron ore to China? Those opposite clearly do. This government takes a different view. We see that innovation is the engine of social and economic transformation. That is why we are supporting entrepreneurial firms and innovative workplaces through Enterprise Connect and Clean Business Australia. That is why we are building human capital through one of the most ambitious programs of educational investment and reform ever seen by a national government. That is why we are strengthening research capacity and platforms by establishing the Education Investment Fund, by creating new Future Fellowships and the Australian Laureate Fellowships, by doubling the number of Australian postgraduate awards, by safeguarding the independence and the integrity of the Australian Research Council and public sector research agencies and by internationalising Australia’s research efforts. Innovation is about harnessing creativity to build a future that is better than the past. It is about guaranteeing Australian living standards long beyond the resources boom, and it has an essential role to play in the government’s nation-building agenda.