Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

The 2018-19 budget is designed to ensure Australia is well positioned to achieve the objectives set out in the 2017 Foreign Policy white paper. This is the first comprehensive review of Australia's international engagement in 14 years. It sets out our priorities and interests, underpinned by values, and reaffirms the government's commitment to delivering more global opportunities for Australian businesses. As my friend and colleague the Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment knows, Australian business has to be internationally competitive. The budget includes a $15 million business engagement package to continue tackling non-tariff barriers faced by Australian exporters and to increase the competitiveness of our service exports in particular.

The Turnbull government is pursuing the most ambitious trade agenda in Australia's history, having concluded or upgraded seven trade agreements since we were elected in 2013, including the historic Trans-Pacific Partnership 11. This morning Minister Ciobo launched formal free trade agreement negotiations with the European Union. We are pursuing these job-creating deals because we know they drive economic growth, they open doors for Australian businesses in growing markets around the world and they create jobs. Our thriving tourism industry is supporting 600,000 jobs. In fact, under the Turnbull government 16 times as many tourism jobs have been created as under the previous Labor government. The Turnbull government is continuing to provide record funding for Tourism Australia, and is supporting $45 million in grants through the Building Better Regions Fund to help move even more tourists into our regional areas. The budget will also fund work to identify solutions to grow our cruise sector, which contributes $2.7 billion to the economy each year, and to create many jobs through our creative industries through the $140 million Location Incentive Funding Program. We're very excited about this because it's going to encourage more international productions to film in Australia, underpinning our creative sector.

The budget also further delivers on the government's largest diplomatic expansion in over 40 years and the white paper's commitment to open more overseas missions over the next 10 years. We are providing $10.8 million for a new consulate-general in Kolkata, India—that brings to four the number of diplomatic missions in India—and $8.4 million to open a high commission in Tuvalu. The new consulate-general in India will help Australian businesses access opportunities in India's growing mining sector. We're also protecting our interests in the ever-changing Indo-Pacific region. Tuvalu is a key member of the Pacific Islands Forum and an important partner in the Pacific, and this will bring to 14 the number of missions that we have in the Pacific.

We're stepping up our efforts to create a more resilient and prosperous region, and the Pacific will benefit from over $1.3 billion in aid in 2018-19. This is Australia's largest-ever contribution to the Pacific, and it represents over a quarter of Australia's total aid program. It includes funding for undersea telecommunications cables for Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands, and this is all about delivering more reliable communications infrastructure and providing economic development benefits for our partners in the Pacific.

We'll also invest an estimated $4.2 billion in total eligible official development assistance in 2018-19, including $410 million for humanitarian funding and, in this increasingly dynamic and volatile world, we need to have funding to help those in need after a crisis. The aid budget is responsible, it's affordable, it's targeted and it's delivering sustainable outcomes in health, education and gender equality.

We're also providing $10 million over three years for the new Australian Aid: Friendship Grants scheme—I think this will be welcomed by all sides of the parliament—which will enable Australian community groups like service clubs, diaspora groups and civil society entities that are not currently registered with DFAT to deliver aid in conjunction with funding from the Australian government.

Finally, the white paper also seeks to promote and protect the international rules based order, and I'll just mention one area where this is of concern: the Turnbull government continues to seek justice for the victims of the downing of Malaysia Airlines MH17. We're providing $50.3 million over four years to support the Dutch prosecution of those responsible and assist the next of kin to participate in court proceedings. The coalition government will continue to advance Australia's security and prosperity in a highly competitive world.

See this speech in context