Senate debates

Tuesday, 9 May 2006

Adjournment

Prime Minister: Visit to Ireland

8:29 pm

Photo of Ursula StephensUrsula Stephens (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Science and Water) Share this | | Hansard source

This evening I want to talk about something we have recently learned about. The Prime Minister, sometimes unkindly referred to as Junket Johnnie, is about to embark on another grand tour in a few days time. Rather than stay here and defend the government, Mr Howard will travel with his spouse to the USA, Canada and the green fields of Ireland, which is the land of my birth.

No doubt he will learn the art of fishing from President Bush, who recently claimed that the landing of a huge bass was his greatest achievement while in office. After some sightseeing in Canada, he will depart for the most exciting and rewarding leg of his trip—four days and four nights in Dublin. He could learn much from the time he spends there. For a start, the Irish value and conserve their environment. They do not lock up asylum seekers, or play ‘Cocky Laurie’ with those who try to gain entry to Ireland, as we saw this weekend with the three men detained on Boigu Island in the Torres Strait. The Irish keep their noses out of other people’s wars, and they can relax at night with a jar of Guinness knowing that they will still have a job in the morning.

Like the millions of Australians of Irish descent, I am delighted that Mr Howard is finally going to that country in his capacity as Prime Minister. I certainly hope that the trip will widen his horizons and open his heart. He has only visited Ireland once before, in late 1977, although he has made more than 20 trips to Europe. The Prime Minister has to date demonstrated that he is actually quite uninterested in the Irish. He is not inclined to attend Irish events in Australia, and I wonder if he even knows that two Australian dancers recently won the World Irish Dancing Championships in Belfast. When he addresses a joint sitting of the Dail and meets with the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, and President Mary MacAleese, he will find that much has changed since his last visit.

Importantly, the 2006 census has recorded a population as high as 4.2 million, the highest since 1871. Unlike in our country, where the continuing economic boom has been of very little benefit for the average Australian and yielded a rather ordinary growth rate of three per cent and an environment for interest rate rises, the recent economic turnaround of Ireland, often called the Celtic tiger, has meant huge lifestyle changes among the ordinary people, who enjoy a sense of security and wellbeing that their Australian counterparts can only envy. The past decade or so has seen remarkable economic progress in Ireland. From being the second poorest country in Europe, Ireland’s per capita income is now above the EU average. Buoyant revenues have given the government an opportunity to significantly boost spending across the board. At the same time, the Irish government recognises the importance of keeping inflation in check if the country is to remain an attractive location for foreign investors.

Ireland has experienced a huge influx of non-Irish nationals, who are welcomed and are contributing to a new, vibrant multicultural society. So no doubt Mr Howard will be interested in learning more about Ireland’s successful economic management during his few days in Dublin: how its productivity growth has been generated; its investment in the education and training sector, science and research systems; and its management of the public sector. The Economic survey of Ireland 2006 reveals that Ireland’s fiscal position is very healthy. The government savings rate is one of the highest in the OECD, being around four per cent of GDP last year. There has been a high rate of public investment in infrastructure, and an estimated surplus of half a per cent of the national income in 2005. Gross debt is low: 33 per cent of GDP in 2005.

So great is the change in circumstances that instead of the Irish emigrating to Australia for a better life the reverse is now the case. Ireland’s most important imports are now its people coming home. Our young people want to go there as much as its young people want to come here because Ireland values its diaspora, and Mr Howard would do well to do the same. While Ireland has welcomed skilled Australians, at the same time it has carefully invested in developing the skills of its own people and capturing the highly educated young Irish who have travelled abroad and have much to contribute to their home country. I hope that when he is in Dublin the Prime Minister intends to learn about this policy, too.

The impressive gains in labour productivity that have boosted Ireland’s economic growth since the early 1990s have been underpinned by a steep rise in the educational attainment of the working age population, achieved by the provision of free secondary education to all and a policy of and commitment to lifelong learning that is now an underpinning principle of the Irish economy. Ireland has an education policy that fosters learning from cradle to grave. Undergraduate tuition fees were abolished in 1995 in an attempt to improve equality of access across social groups. This is a huge fiscal challenge. Ireland is actually looking now to the international experience of higher education funding to bring much-needed resources and make higher education institutions more innovative and responsive to the needs of students.

Perhaps the Prime Minister will be able to advise the Irish government of how his government’s higher education RQF framework can help them achieve these outcomes. But he will discover that a distinctive feature of Ireland’s skill set is the difference in educational attainment between the young and the old, and the Irish government’s continued emphasis on the importance of vocational education and training. He will certainly hear during his important meetings that, while the productivity performance has been stunning over the past decade, foreign corporations have been the main generators of innovation and research. Public funding of research and development has grown quickly, but economic output has been so fast that it has been all local research and development can do to keep pace with the challenge to deliver commercially oriented innovations. Ireland recognises that more innovation has led to better results, and has continued investment in research and development as a national priority.

Ireland is also going through a transition period, during which it is upgrading its physical infrastructure. The country’s rapid economic growth has brought with it pressures on infrastructure which I am sure will be of interest to Mr Howard. If he had the chance, as I did a year or so ago, to spend some time travelling around Ireland’s back roads on a good-looking BMW, he would discover that, just like in Australia, road congestion, poor broadband access and a shortage of waste disposal capacity are all presenting challenges and could threaten long-term growth. But Ireland is tackling these challenges by setting high targets for investment in public infrastructure over the medium term and working with the private sector to ensure that nation-building infrastructure investment is part of the continued growth planning of the country. As well as the physical infrastructure, Ireland is also involved in upgrading its social infrastructure. Women are joining the labour force in large numbers. The rise in female participation since 1990 has been amongst the strongest in the OECD.

The Prime Minister might also look at how Ireland looks after its workers. I refer not only to the absence of these barbaric new IR laws which have Australian workers shaking in their boots, but also to Ireland’s system of pensions and public payments. For instance, my own father gets a better pension from Ireland than he does in this country, despite slaving away here for most of his working life. This is a disgrace from a country which we are constantly being told is faring so well, is riding high on the minerals boom and has a budget surplus so obscene that we do not know what to do with it to get the most votes.

But Mr Howard might discover that in Ireland child support is paid whether the parents are working or not. To help parents, Ireland’s 2006 budget introduced a new cash transfer for families with young children. Similar to the existing child benefits, the early child-care supplement is paid universally regardless of parents’ labour force status and regardless of whether or not they are purchasing child-care services. It is not a solution that is eaten away by an anomalous effective marginal tax rate when women return to the workforce.

So, it is clear that there is plenty for Mr Howard to learn during his four-day stay in Ireland that would be of benefit to his constituents here in Australia. One of his own cheer squad, Gerard Henderson of the Sydney Institute, said:

... next time he is in Britain he should cross the sea to Ireland. To learn more about Ireland today. And Australia’s yesterday.

I reflected on the role of the Irish in Australia at an ecumenical service at the Australian Centre for Christianity and Culture on St Patrick’s Day, and again I had the pleasure of being reminded of Ireland’s continuing contribution to Australian society when I opened the fourth open day of Canberra’s Irish associations at the Canberra Irish Club on Sunday.

So I fervently hope that this trip helps to ease the bilateral chill that has existed between Australia and Ireland for the period of Mr Howard’s prime ministership and provides him with the chance to re-examine his views of Ireland and the Irish. Could we hope that it might lead to the reopening of Australia’s visa office in Dublin? Perhaps not, but I certainly do hope that this trip is more than a final lap of honour in a beautiful country, among friendly people, for Mr Howard to enjoy at the Australian taxpayers’ expense.