Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I rise to second and support the member for Fairfax, the chair of the Trade Subcommittee of the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade, in tabling the report From little things big things grow, and I wholeheartedly endorse all of the comments made by the member for Fairfax. It's been a wonderful subcommittee to work with. As stated, there were 16 public hearings all around Australia. Several of the subcommittee were Queenslanders: Senator Macdonald; the subcommittee chair; and me, the deputy subcommittee chair. Obviously we had a national focus, but there was a strong Queensland flavour throughout. The 16 public hearings brought in a range of evidence. As noted by the member for Fairfax, there was a particular focus on individual companies that don't have time to write submissions but had time to attend a hearing and provide evidence. I will give a shout-out to one of those. My brother-in-law, Peter Shearer, would never have time to write a submission—he is too busy doing the work of exporting—but came along and provided good evidence, like the evidence in the 153 submissions that we received and the other evidence we garnered in the public hearings. We focused on turning thriving local businesses and the opportunities that come with them into being our business ambassadors.

I thank Andrew Dawson and the secretariat for the great work that they did all around Australia, and I endorse what the member for Fairfax said—that we would be turning these small businesses into a part of Team Australia where we will be able to make sure we trade everywhere we can throughout this nation in all sorts of businesses. I thank the member for Fairfax for his leadership of this subcommittee and look forward to working with him in the future.

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