Future Made in Australia (Production Tax Credits and Other Measures) Second Reading Speech

I move:

That this bill now be read a second time.

Today is an incredibly exciting day for Australia—the passage of this bill will set in place the final legislative building block in the foundation of Future Made in Australia.

The Albanese Government is focused and determined to build a better Australian economy, stronger Australian industries and create and protect good blue-collar jobs.

The world economy is changing: countries are grappling with how to move to low and no emissions industries.

They are playing a more active role in shoring up their manufacturing and industrial capability.

And they are playing a greater role in attracting and crowding in the vital and significant investment that is needed in these new and changing industries.

That’s because the nature and scale of the challenge demands it.

As does the nature and scale of the opportunity.

The reason that we advance Future Made in Australia is grounded in security.

Security for Australia in an uncertain world, and in our region, which is now the subject of more contest and competition than at any time in recent history.

For Australia to be secure, in strategic and economic terms, regular Australians and Australian firms need to have more capability.

They need to be able to do more things than simply being an exporter of resources and commodities.

To make more things here.

To build on the backs of our mining and resources sectors.

And to re-industrialise our regions and outer suburbs, refining value-added Australian metals and making more complex manufacturing products.

To include those former manufacturing strongholds in the task of building Australia’s future, and in the process, delivering good jobs in new firms and factories in industrial and mining regions and suburbs around the country.

Recent events demonstrate that the world is becoming a more turbulent place, where violence and trade coercion and protectionism mean Australia’s interest and our progress cannot be taken for granted.

Complacency is our enemy.

Does anyone sensibly think that Australia and Australians can be secure and prosper if we don’t seek to reindustrialise and diversify our economy?

Our opponents, Mr Dutton’s Liberals and Nationals, who will vote against this vital piece of national interest legislation are complacent, lazy and partisan.

For all this fake patriotism, when it really matters, when the security interest of Australia and the good jobs of regional and outer suburban blue-collar workers is at stake, they will as always put the Liberal and National Party interest first, and the national interest last.

The Liberals and Nationals, who weakened our security interest in the Pacific and isolated Australia in the world.

Who cheered on the decline of manufacturing, killing tens of thousands of good jobs in the process, in the lost decade of Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison.

Who now want to undermine the task of national reconstruction in the face of such an obvious national imperative.

Just when Australia needs politicians to pull together in their interest, you will hear the same old tired, complacent and lazy lines from the entitled, self-centred ideologues.

Deliberately misleading slogans like “Billions for billionaires”. Gainsaying our national future.

This is a simple choice. Political interest or national interest. Good jobs and economic opportunity in the regions, or rust belt decline.

Peter Dutton’s Liberals and Nationals have become too reckless in their complacency. Reckless about security questions that are central to the national interest. This week’s intransigence over Future Made in Australia is standard.

Their only message is pull your socks up and hope for the best.

The Albanese Government in contrast is focused on backing blue-collar jobs and Australian manufacturing.

Australia has a significant comparative advantage that can help us set our country up—and our regional and outer suburban communities up—for a prosperous economic age.

We have the world’s cheapest and most abundant renewable energy resources in wind and solar, backed by batteries and backed up by gas.

We have almost every critical mineral that’s needed and in high demand in this changing global economy—

Lithium for batteries, and the copper that is used in wires in every corner of the world.

All of the critical minerals. All of them.

We have a world-leading mining sector—

A critical contributor to the global economy and to global supply chains—

A crucial employer and one that is vital for our economic and regional security—

And we have a highly skilled workforce, and the world-class training institutions to make sure our people are match fit for the opportunities knocking at our door.

And we have a long history of making things here—with our industrial capability and our business know-how—be that aluminium in Gladstone and the Hunter, or steel in the Illawarra.

Our regional communities are well set up to benefit from this economic change. Like those just mentioned, as well as the Latrobe Valley, Upper Spencer Gulf, Collie and the Pilbara in WA.

Funnily enough, the Coalition loves to talk down the Production Tax Credits on the East Coast, but when they head West, they go strangely quiet.

The WA Chamber of Minerals and Energy knows how good support for critical minerals will be for Western Australia—in a submission to the Bill’s Senate inquiry they called the introduction of this Bill “necessary”.

This opportunity will come only once. This decade, the train will leave this station only once.

It will take us all working together—business, investors, governments, unions, workers, communities and First Nations people to work in the national interest.

We want to make sure that communities that are hosting new industries or renewables benefit.

That’s why a key part of the Future Made in Australia agenda is the Community Benefit Principles.

Again—something the Coalition is allergic to. Despite community asking to be better consulted, a framework be established. The coalition would rather sow division.

The Senate Economics Committee reviewed this Bill and recommended it be passed. Of course, the Coalition didn’t.

Our Future Made in Australia agenda is all about making Australia indispensable to the global net zero transformation.

We will do that by attracting and enabling private investment—not replacing it.

Well-targeted public investment is an important and substantial part of our plan.

But it is only a small part of what is truly needed.

Our primary goal is to win the private sector capital that is needed to attract new industries in our regions and outer suburbs and help our traditional heavy industries evolve their energy needs.

Major employer and business groups back our approach.

The Minerals Council of Australia understands this. They support the critical minerals production tax incentive because “it is a positive step towards attracting investment in the critical minerals industry”. (Senate Inquiry)

We will continue to consult widely on the design of the Community Benefit Principles to make sure they best meet the needs of all parties involved, for the benefit of community.

Despite what the Coalition thinks in its committee review of this Bill.

And in regard to its fear mongering on compulsory union agreement requirements, we will again consult widely on the Principles.

This is our chance to bring these pieces together: our productive workforce, our community needs, our investor community, our critical minerals and our government support.

That's what this legislation and our production tax credits are all about.

This bill does three main things.

Firstly, it will establish a critical minerals tax incentive worth 10 per cent of the value of relevant mineral processing and refining costs for the production of any of Australia's 31 critical minerals.

By adding more value to our critical minerals before shipping them offshore, we have the opportunity to create tens of thousands of blue collar jobs, and strengthen our regional economies.

Critical minerals like rare earths, cobalt and tungsten, processed into metal products here, rather than just shipped as raw material.

We can harness our abundant cheap and green energy to keep our heavy industries competitive and onshore.

Using bauxite transformed into alumina and Australian made aluminium—with smelters powered by Australian sun and wind—means that these jobs stay here in regional Australia.

Secondly, this Bill will also incentivise the production of green hydrogen (hydrogen made using renewable energy).

Hydrogen is a key energy source to help energy intensive industry move away from coal and gas—and with our renewable resources, it will be cheap, too.

The hydrogen tax incentive will be worth $2 for every kilogram of renewable hydrogen produced by eligible projects that have reached a final investment decision before July 2030.

The best thing about these incentives, is that they will only be paid on successful delivery. It is payment for results.

It is not a free for all.

Thirdly, it will expand the role and remit of Indigenous Business Australia to help support more investment into First Nations communities.

Our First Peoples have not always been worked with as partners in Australia’s great economic transformations.

This is our opportunity to change that. To make sure they are set up to gain from the transition—and this Bill will help that.

The passage of this Bill sets in place the final building block in the legislative foundations of Future Made in Australia.

This legislation provides industry the certainty and the clarity to invest in Australia—in critical minerals and renewable hydrogen.

To be confident that we are a reputable and serious player in this changing world.

Coalition chaos destroys confidence.

And while we’ve been building the foundation, we’ve been getting on with the job.

Our recently announced $2 billion in Production Credits will support Australian-made green aluminium.

Our fee-free TAFE and New Energy Apprenticeships program will make sure school leavers and workers have the skills they need for changing industries.

Our Net Zero Economy Authority has a focus on our industrial regions to make sure they get a fair share of the opportunity.

This is not a time for Back to the Future. To take us back to the uncertainty, and the chaos of ten years of inconsistent energy and industrial policy, or 1960s nuclear policy.

This is a time to Build Australia’s Future—

To secure our future prosperity—

To seize the opportunity before us.

I am excited to present it to the Senate on behalf of my colleagues.