INDUSTRY POLITICS

We make great things in Australia and we make them well.

And as the Prime Minister and I have been saying; we want to continue to make great things here.

That belief is central to our Modern Manufacturing Strategy, and indeed all of the policy decisions we make to support our manufacturers.

When I’ve been on factory floors over recent months, our manufacturers have told me how much they appreciate the way our Government is backing them to succeed.

The recent Budget included billions of dollars in support designed to encourage all businesses, but particularly our manufacturers to invest and grow.

Our extension of the instant asset writeoff is seeing manufacturers invest in new equipment, upgrade production lines and bring work home to Australia.

THE HON. KAREN ANDREWS MP – PARLIAMENT OF AUSTRALIA, MINISTER FOR INDUSTRY, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

They’re benefiting from our record investments in skills to ensure we have the workers they need.

We’re also working to make energy more affordable and reliable, opening up overseas trade markets and addressing the industrial relations framework.

It is basic economics – and something often lost on our opponents – that no policy will help businesses to succeed if the economic conditions are not right.

But our Strategy also acknowledges that for Aussie manufacturing to grow in the connected world we now live, we need to make science and technology work for industry.

A wonderful example is Sunshine Coast company Naturo, which I was delighted to visit last month.

This Queensland business is pushing the envelope of the possible and embracing science to create a world-first right here at home.

Naturo has developed technology that can extend the expiry of fresh milk to more than 60 days, while making the product nutritionally superior.

The company is using $1 million in matched funding from our Government to build a pilot manufacturing plant in Coolum, before expanding into Tasmania.

The amazing thing about Naturo, is not only are they creating more jobs in their business, they’re opening up exciting export opportunities along the supply chain for our dairy industry to take on the world.

The federal government is backing female-led startups across Australia with $52.2 million in support to help them scale up and grow their businesses.

The Boosting Female Founders Initiative is supporting 51 female-founded startups that are majority owned and led by women, with grants of between $25,000 and $480,000.

It is hoped the grant will help female entrepreneurs overcome the disadvantages faced in getting access to finance and support, to grow their business. Round 1 will see $12 million become available for grants.

Minister for Industry, Science and Technology Karen Andrews said Australia’s dynamic startup sector played a crucial role in creating new jobs, developing innovative products and boosting the Australian economy.

“The road from business idea to global product is already a tough one. But we know female-founded startups face even greater challenges in getting the finance needed to reach their full potential,” she said.

“The range of startups being supported is incredible, from an Indigenous-designed digital skills training program for schools, to a project creating 3D printed, customised and comfortable breast prostheses made specifically to fit women’s bodies and mastectomy bras.

“If we don’t capitalise on great business ideas from half of the population, Australia’s startup and innovation ecosystems will only be half as good as they could be. This investment will strengthen our economy and empower more female entrepreneurs to create more jobs for all Australians.”

Minister for Foreign Affairs and Minister for Women, Senator the Hon Marise Payne said the Boosting Female Founders Initiative formed an important part of the government’s 2018 and 2020 Women’s Economic Security Statements, which provide targeted, specific and additional support for women.

“Our 2020 Women’s Economic Security Statement includes a further $35.9 million so that the Boosting Female Founders initiative can support up to 282 additional startups and 4,300 women entrepreneurs,” she said.

“These targeted grants will help some of the best and brightest women in Australia launch bold new and innovative ideas, and I am very pleased to support this initiative.”

The recipients were selected by an independent selection committee of experienced women entrepreneurs led by Professor Jana Matthews, ANZ Chair in Business Growth and Director of the Australian Centre for Business Growth at the University of South Australia.

“We were all delighted by the strength of response to this Initiative – both in the sheer number of responses received, and the extraordinarily high calibre of our successful applicants,” Professor Matthews said.

“These successful applicants all presented viable concepts, with strong business plans showing great potential for growth and job creation. The selection committee and I look forward to tracking their progress and applauding their success.”

The expansion includes a new mentorship element, supporting more than 4000 mentoring opportunities for women entrepreneurs to help them continue to succeed and grow.

The objectives of the program are to:

• stimulate private sector investments into innovative startups led by women

• help female entrepreneurs overcome the disadvantages faced in getting access to finance and support to grow their startups

Naturo is also helping redefine to everyday Australians what manufacturing is – it’s innovative, it’s highly-skilled and it’s underpinned by research and technology.

Embracing technology is also central to the second round of the Manufacturing Modernisation Fund.

There’s been a tremendous response with over 500 applications currently being assessed.

Successful applicants will receive between $100,000 and $1 million to improve their processes, grow their businesses and create jobs.

It’s just another example of the Morrison Government backing our manufacturers with practical support, rather than rhetoric.

Because it’s action not words that will see us keep making things well – and by making things well we build a stronger Australia.

• enable female founders to scale-up, expand into domestic and global markets, and become self-sufficient

• boost the economy through increasing the diversity of startup founders.

The intended outcomes of the program are:

• increased number of startups founded by women

• new products and services are brought to market by startups founded by women

• increased financial investment in startups founded by women

• women improve their earning potential through entrepreneurship

• increased job creation and economic growth.

One of the drawbacks to owning an electric vehicle is the lack of charging infrastructure in remote locations. Well, Western Australia has an answer to that!

A desert dash through the outback in your electric car is on the horizon after the state government announced a $21 million electric vehicle strategy, which will include the creation of Australia’s longest EV charging network.

“This announcement represents an exciting time in Western Australia, with the state contributing some of the most significant funds of any Australian jurisdiction towards charging infrastructure that will facilitate the uptake of this environmentally sustainable technology,” Innovation and ICT Minister Dave Kelly said in a joint statement.

The charging network will run from Kununurra in the north to the state capital Perth, then down to Esperance in the south and to Kalgoorlie in the east – some 4,130 kilometres total.

The EV charging initiative will be accompanied by a target of acquiring at least 25 per cent electric vehicles across eligible vehicles in the state fleet of passenger and small commercial vehicles (but not including police department). EV charging stations will be installed in government buildings.

The WA government is looking to join the global shift to electric vehicles, seeing opportunities to create “battery minerals”, as well as possibly a battery manufacturing industry in the state.

“The global uptake of electric vehicles is one of the most exciting opportunities for Western Australia to create jobs and support economic growth the economy as part of the lowcarbon transition,” Labor premier Mark McGowan said in the joint statement.

“Electric vehicles provide a pathway towards decarbonising road transport and improving air quality in Western Australia. The industry also has huge potential to create jobs for Western Australians.

“Western Australia has the skills, infrastructure and standards to become a key player in the global battery value chain.

The state government will also invest in two hydrogen refuelling stations, launch investigations into vehicle-to-grid charging, and the trial of electric buses on a small route in Perth.

The policy document notes that there are already more than 500,000 electric buses on the roads across the globe and that EVs are likely to be already competitive with fossil fuel cars over the lifetime costs of the car, and that they deliver significant benefits.

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THE HON: BRENDAN O'CONNOR - MP PARLIAMENT OF AUSTRALIA, SHADOW MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT AND INDUSTRY DEFENCE MUST REDUCE OUR RELIANCE ON OVERSEAS MANUFACTURING

Since I last wrote for Industry Update Manufacturing Magazine there have been some significant changes to my role within the Federal Labor Party.

In January I changed portfolios to become the Shadow Minister for Defence and Ed Husic has now become the Shadow Minister for Industry and Innovation.

This is a great fit for Mr Husic who has a long-held interest in technology and science and has been vocal about the need for Australia to think ahead about the impact of technology on business, jobs and communities. I know he will be a fantastic champion for Australian manufacturing.

Even though I have changed portfolios I am very pleased to be able to transfer my knowledge and experience with Australian manufacturing to the defence industry, one of the largest industry sectors in Australia. There are currently over 3,000 business already working in the Australian defence industry.

In my new role I will advocate for Australian industry content within defence, along with my colleague Matt Keogh the Shadow Minister for Defence Industry, to ensure the Government implements contractual requirements that compel defence prime companies to do defence industry work here in Australia and work with local companies.

The Australian Government is spending $270 billion on defence procurement and we need to maximise the local component of that spend.

We are committed to ensuring major defence project contracts and procurements contain measurable, enforceable, audited and transparent Australian industry content requirements.

We know the Morrison Government has broken its promises on local content and does not have a serious plan for Australian defence industry, and for this we must hold them to account.

Through COVID-19 we have seen the need for Australia to become not only more self-reliant, but also more ambitious to protect and promote our interests in the world. As an island nation, it is important that Australian defence manufacturing becomes more self-sufficient.

Labor wants to ensure that our defence industry has the local content to increase our sovereign capability and reduce our reliance on overseas manufacturing.

To build this sovereign capability, Australian businesses need a fair go at winning defence contracts. We want to see local manufacturers have access to these contracts and be a part of the Australian defence industry supply chain.

When we talk about Australian industry content this is more than just about creating local jobs and an opportunity for Australian businesses to be a part of the local supply chain for assets being built here in Australia, it is also the ability to be a part of a global supply chain.

We want to see an Australian defence industry that is building our own sovereign capabilities with the capacity to not only deliver the best for the Australian defence force, but also exporting Australian products to the world.

I want to see our local manufacturers provided opportunities to not just supply our local defence market, but also the international market, and to build our export opportunities.

We know there are limitations with some Australian manufacturing competing with lower cost nations. However, I believe it is in the advanced manufacturing sector where Australia can not only compete, but outperform other countries.

To do that we need to see a serious commitment to workforce development, making sure we have the right people with the right knowledge. Defence has a series of long term projects, such as our Future Submarine program, that needs long term thinking with workforce skills and training. We need a significant workforce not just in the skilled trades but with advanced technical knowhow and capability. Labor will work constructively with the Government and provide bipartisan support to efforts to ensure Australia has robust defence resilience.

But when they fail to offer the promised local content, fail to prepare our workforce for the future or fail to deliver projects on time or on budget we will hold them to account.

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As Australian industry clicks back into gear after the lockdowns and disruption of 2020, it is important to reflect on the way the pandemic has changed the way we are governed.

Governments have played a vital role in suppressing community transmission of Covid-19, thereby making a safe return to work possible. The lockdowns were necessary even though they caused hardship.

But there is a more worrying aspect of government activity that is likely to outlast all the lockdowns and travel restrictions, the mask-wearing and the social-distancing rules.

It is something that affects all Australians and the industries that employ them, yet few people are aware of it.

In a democracy like Australia, people expect that when governments want to change the laws under which we are governed the proposed changes will be submitted to the scrutiny of Parliament.

A Bill – a draft law – becomes an Act – the law of the land – after it has been debated in, and passed by, Parliament. At least, that’s the theory. But it is not always how the system actually works.

In a complex modern society like Australia, laws have to be constantly tweaked and fine-tuned to work effectively. There is always more legislation than Parliament can deal with by debating it fully.

The solution has been for Parliament to delegate some of its powers to ministers and the senior public servants who advise them, so that laws can be changed by regulation rather than legislation.

This happened even before the pandemic, and it happens in other democracies with which we usually compare ourselves – in the US, for example, President Biden spent his first day in office signing a stack of executive orders that reversed many decisions of the Trump administration.

The pandemic has, however, made a difference. The amount of delegated legislation has increased, partly because Parliament sat less often in 2020 but also because the Government had to act quickly.

What is worrying is that the safeguards intended to prevent abuse of the system have been weakened too.

The Senate Standing Committee for the Scrutiny of Delegated Legislation, a bipartisan body, monitors laws made by the executive, and these can be disallowed by a vote in Parliament. Disallowance votes are the chief means by which Parliament keeps control of delegated legislation.

Yet about 20 per cent of the 249 items of delegated legislation made in response to Covid-19 were exempted from disallowance by Parliament.

That is an alarmingly high figure. It includes six rules that allocate $2.13 billion of public funds, and other rules removed from the oversight of Parliament included travel bans on citizens and limits on entry to certain areas.

Australians should be especially concerned by Covid-19 measures made under the provisions of the Biosecurity Act, which confers extremely broad powers on the executive branch of government.

Under this Act, the Government can make delegated legislation that severely restricts personal rights and liberties, and which overrides any other Australian law.

THE HON. SENATOR KIM CARR, FORMER MINISTER AND SHADOW MINISTER FOR INNOVATION, INDUSTRY, SCIENCE AND RESEARCH

Kim Carr is a Labor Senator for Victoria and a former Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research. He is Deputy Chair of the Senate Standing Committee for the Scrutiny of Delegated Legislation.

All such delegated legislation is exempt from disallowance, and failure to comply with the Health Minister’s directions can incur a fine of up to $63,000 and imprisonment for up to five years.

It is the exemption from disallowance that is pernicious. In times of extreme danger, such as wars and pandemics, some rights and liberties we normally take for granted might have to be temporarily curtailed. But that makes the safeguard provided by a disallowance vote even more important.

The growth in the amount of delegated legislation, which began even before the pandemic, is affecting the livelihoods of Industry Update readers too.

Under a 2020 amendment to a delegated instrument known as the Disability (Access to Premises – Buildings) Standards 2010, four Australian Standards and Volume Three of the National Construction Code are incorporated into the instrument.

Anyone who has had to consult Australian Standards knows that there are contentious issues about obtaining access to them and whether it can be done for free. Yet the amendment does not enlighten potential users on these matters.

Nor is it made clear how the National Construction Code is to apply. Will it be Volume Three of the Code as in force at a particular time? Or as it is in force from time to time?

These are technical questions, but those who work in manufacturing and construction understand how much depends on technicalities.

The Standing Committee on Delegated Legislation has written to the Attorney-General asking him to clarify what should have been made clear in the amendment.

And, the committee is conducting an inquiry into the deeper issue of the mushrooming growth of delegated legislation. The inquiry’s interim report was tabled in December.

About half of all legislation is now delegated. For the sake of Australian democracy, it is time for Parliament to insist that where greater power is given, greater scrutiny must go with it.

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