Luke Gosling (Solomon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The pandemic has certainly shown us how important our trade relationships are. It has also, obviously, exposed some fundamental weaknesses. Those opposite presided over an increasingly difficult relationship with China, our largest trading partner, that had direct and painful consequences for Australian producers—of everything from wine to barley, cotton, coal and lobsters—many from the electorates of honourable members in the chamber. It's clear that more could have been done over the previous decade to shield Australian exporters from this sort of pain. In fact, prior to the pandemic, the now Prime Minister, when he was the Leader of the Opposition, commissioned me to run an Indo-Pacific trade task force. We prepared a report looking at how we could best diversify our exports. He knew that we were too concentrated on one big market. We started our work in 2019 and watched up close as the 2020 trade shocks hit hard.

Labor's approach is to look at trade as a really important part of nation-building, to modernise the economy and, in turn, change Australian society for the better. I think we have seen that to some extent. However, I think Australia's trade position was weakened by having put too few eggs in too few baskets. Indeed, that was the title of our report. We looked into how we could have more eggs and more baskets. Unfortunately, under the previous Australian government, there was too much 'set and forget'. They turned up for the photo op and the announcements but then didn't do much afterwards. It's not as though it was not something that trade experts had warned us all about for years and years—particularly those non-tariff barriers. But what we ended up with was a narrowing export base of products—facing stiff market and non-market headwinds—concentrated in a handful of key markets. Worse than that, our resilience to trade shocks was eroded, given that excessive dependence on China. I think it was lazy, and it has cost us.

Fortunately, though, the new administration, under Anthony Albanese, has a plan. We've always believed in the power of trade to create jobs and economic development in Australia. We are the party of free, fair and open trade. We want to support our exporters to pursue new markets, because diversification, more eggs in more baskets, is the key. We've already seen a number of senior ministerial visits to major regional trading partners, such as Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia and Japan, and a special focus on revitalising our relationship with India. We'll be establishing a Trade 2040 Taskforce. Recently, ministers for the Pacific Agreement on Closer Economic Relations Plus met to discuss deepening trade cooperation in the Pacific, to support our Pacific family and their region's economic recovery. That group now includes Tuvalu and Vanuatu—important new members that Australia is committed to supporting as borders reopen and they re-engage in trade. This is obviously good not only for our international relationships but also for Aussie jobs, for local jobs. It is a fact that exporting businesses in Australia employ almost a third more staff than non-exporting businesses and, on average, pay 11 per cent higher wages—so good jobs in regional Australia paying higher wages.

There can be no doubt that we have inherited a massive trillion-dollar-debt and cost-of-living crisis, as inflation climbs and businesses struggle to attract workers. It's true that this is what we inherited from the former government. However, we're addressing this through putting in place the outcomes of the Jobs and Skills Summit, held a few days ago. Supporting both diversified and traditional relationships for trade is good for Australian businesses, it's good for Australian jobs, and it's good for Australian wages. Trade is a nation builder. And this government, under Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, will give it its due respect, but we'll do the work—the work that's required to grow our economy into the future.

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