I acknowledge the Ngunnawal people, the Traditional Owners of the lands from which I’m speaking.

I acknowledge Elders past and present, and extend my respect to any First Nations Australians present at Kirkton Park today.

I’m delighted to have this opportunity to speak and exchange thoughts with all of you, who play such an important role in providing Australia and Australians with technological literacy and leadership in a fast-moving world.

And while I’m sorry not to be in the room with you right now, the fact that I’m coming to you live from 400 kilometres away probably helps to underscore my confidence and optimism about the role technological change will play in helping Australia meet its most pressing national challenges in the years to come.

I want to say something briefly about the perspective that I bring to these questions as minister for industry, innovation and science.

I grew up in regional NSW on a family farm that bore no resemblance to corporate Sydney, let alone Silicon Valley.

But as a teenager in the 1980s, I keenly watched the Hawke Labor Government lead the world with its unique blend of profound transformative economic reforms and inclusive, supportive social policies.

I was even an avid reader of the Australian Financial Review – if I recall correctly, I was that publication’s sole subscriber at McInerney’s Newsagency in Glen Innes.

The Hawke Government set the right tone and offered the right leadership for the times – backing in Australian industries and workers as they embraced the sometimes difficult challenge of becoming more outward-looking, more competitive and more productive.

As an official with the AMWU, I saw first-hand the enthusiasm with which working Australians – including those in blue-collar occupations – adopted new technologies and embraced the challenge to improve Australia’s productivity.

Australia met that challenge successfully.

Productivity performance in the mid-1990s was spectacular.

Manufacturing exports grew.

New information processing and computing technologies transformed the world of work and connected Australia more meaningfully to the rest of the global economy.

Now, not everybody enjoyed the fruits of that success equally.

Some workers and their communities, particularly in rural and regional Australia, felt alienated after two decades of massive socioeconomic change.

Today, we are on the threshold of a technological transition more profound, more transformative than anything that was contemplated in the 1980s and 1990s.

AI, quantum computing and machine learning are already transforming the way we live and work.

AI and quantum technologies will revolutionise production as the steam engine or electricity did a couple of centuries ago, and it will revolutionise our information and innovation ecosystems the way the printing press did a few centuries before that.

And if adopted strategically, these technologies present an unmissable opportunity from which all Australians can benefit together.

An opportunity to lift Australian productivity after more than a decade of less than stellar performance.

An opportunity to advance the government’s wider Future Made in Australia agenda, which will benefit from the AI-driven acceleration of innovation across the entire economy.

An opportunity to enhance existing national capabilities and develop new ones that are crucial to the national interest – including advanced manufacturing, critical minerals processing and clean energy production.

An opportunity for Australia to strengthen its own tech sector, supported with investments in digital infrastructure and data centres that will make this country a major player in this sphere.

An opportunity for Australia to shape the global frameworks around AI in partnership with likeminded countries within and beyond our region.

And an opportunity to bolster Australia’s own national economic and strategic resilience.

If we lean in properly to these opportunities, then the new technologies, new platforms and new ways of working will do so much to advance Australia’s national interest.

It’s no surprise to me that, as the debate around AI heats up, people and organisations have taken the opportunity to articulate their specific or sectional interests.

But in my experience, these organisations can see the shared national interest questions that are at stake in the debate over AI, and are bringing a constructive spirit to their contributions.

Australian businesses, workers and communities want to know that the benefits of AI will accrue fairly to them, and that it won’t impair our social cohesion along the way.

If we all work together to adopt early, invest strategically, and give workers, businesses, managers and researchers the capacity to use AI effectively, we will ensure that the benefits of AI accrue to everyone, not just some.

It is incumbent on all of us – in government, in business, in the union movement, in civil society groups and think tanks, and especially in the media – to build the confidence of Australians as we work through all the questions that AI brings up.

And to ensure that Australia’s medium and long-term national interests, and the interests of Australians themselves, are served well by the uptake of this new technology.

I’m really looking forward to the discussion we’re about to have.

Thank you.