Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I want to take only a little of the Senate’s time to urge it to support the Australian Trade Commission Legislation Amendment Bill 2006 which makes changes to the governance arrangements of Austrade and which will establish an executive management structure with a CEO directly accountable to the minister and bring the agency under the coverage of the Financial Management and Accountability Act and the Public Service Act. This has happened following the Uhrig report into a number of government statutory authorities and officeholders, and it is part of a long-term approach by the government to have a look at which agencies are better conducted as independent statutory authorities and which should be brought more closely under the department.

I want to use the opportunity to congratulate Austrade on the work it has done over the years. I certainly hope that the new arrangements will be appropriate in continuing to support Australia’s export activities to the world. Over the years Austrade has been in charge of the Export Market Development Grants project, and a lot of Australian exporters have done a lot of work and have been assisted by Austrade. I want to briefly mention Mr Laurie White and his company Austavate International Pty Ltd that has, over many years, done a considerable amount of very good work in promoting Australia’s exports to Asia, and for doing that he has received a number of commendations over a long period of time. He has been very much involved in establishing new industries and exporting Australia’s cleverness, one might call it, to the world.

Mr White is now in semiretirement and I happened to meet him quite by chance a couple of years ago. But he has been working on a project in China. He has made an application for an export market development grant and his application has gone in. I understand those applications are dealt with by the department or Austrade in that they are assessed and, if they are appropriate for funding, they are funded and if they are not appropriate the application is rejected and reasons are given for the rejection.

Unfortunately, in the case of Austavate’s application for an EMDG, the process seems to have gone somewhat awry. On 5 December 2005 there was a routine audit, conducted by a Mr Paul Newby, of the company’s paperwork which would support the EMDG claim. As I said, I understand routine practice is that, following inspection of the papers, the application is either approved or rejected and, if it is rejected, an explanation is given. In this particular instance, this process does not appear to have been followed and there have been a number of unfortunate incidents in the way the application has been dealt with.

On the day following the inspection in Sydney—that is, on 6 December—an inspection in Hong Kong was attempted. Finance inspectors from, I assume, Austrade actually called on the offices of the Hong Kong representative. No appointment had been made, no contact had been made, with the proposed interviewee. He happened to be in mainland China at the time. But these two inspectors came unannounced to interview him. When his brother told the finance inspectors that the man they wanted to interview was in China, they said that they would get back to him. The brother obtained some telephone numbers. Unfortunately, the inspectors did not ring back, so the man to be interviewed actually rang the inspectors and was told that they were returning to Australia the next day and so they could not see him. Since then, these inspectors have demanded that the Hong Kong representative come to Australia to be interviewed with Mr White.

According to my information—and my information comes from Mr RG Strange, an ex trade commissioner and the first chairman of the Export Market Development Grants board; he has given me a complete statement about this—it appears that the processes have been rather inappropriately followed in this matter. I have written to Mr Vaile about the matter and I am sure that Mr Vaile will be pursuing the matter to make sure the application is properly assessed.

As I say, Mr White would like to get the grant, but he is philosophical about it: if he is eligible, he will get it and, if he is not eligible, his application will be rejected and he will be told the reasons for the rejection. But this process where inspectors are attempting to convince Mr White that he should actually withdraw the application, which he refuses to do, all seems to be a bit untoward. Now, it is an area that I am not particularly familiar with, but I have, as I said, referred this to Mr Vaile and I am sure he will fully investigate it.

Of course, it is all relevant to the bill before the chamber at the moment in that we are looking at a new form of operation for Austrade. Austrade has over many years done an excellent job. Its officers are excellent, all working in the interests of Australia. This one little glitch that has been brought to my attention is, I am sure, just that, a glitch, and is not representative of the work that has been done by the Austrade board and the Australian Trade Commission over many years. This bill before us today will bring in a new arrangement for the governance of Austrade, following the Uhrig report on the issue. It is a bill that I think deserves support and I urge the Senate to support it.