THE HON SUSSAN LEY MP
DEPUTY LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION
SHADOW MINISTER FOR INDUSTRY, SKILLS AND TRAINING
SHADOW MINISTER FOR SMALL AND FAMILY BUSINESS
SHADOW MINISTER FOR WOMEN
FEDERAL MEMBER FOR FARRER
The National Reconstruction Fund has celebrated its first birthday without spending a single cent on a single project despite an insolvency crisis engulfing Australian manufacturing.
At the last election, Labor promised the National Reconstruction Fund would provide funding to deliver on strategic projects, from rebuilding Australia’s industrial base to delivering a third of all promised emissions reductions policies to reach 43 per cent by 2030. Labor told the Australian people that the National Reconstruction Fund was the policy that could do it all.
In the months after winning the election they doubled down on the rhetoric. Over 480 days ago, the Minister for Industry Ed Husic proclaimed at the National Press Club:
By investing in Australia we will have mass and we will have momentum. And we’re not going to let it fall away…The NRF is the connective tissue between human capital and technological potential that shapes my portfolio….We have missed opportunities in the past. We are determined we do not do that again.
Yet two years into the Albanese Government and a year after the National Reconstruction Fund passed the Parliament not a single cent has been spent on a single project despite Anthony Albanese claiming in January that “money is available now”. This milestone demonstrates a significant public policy failure.
Labor’s mishandling of the National Reconstruction Fund has seen:
Not ONE cent spent on ONE single project – as per evidence given at Senate Estimates on February 15 2024, “there have been no decisions taken in relation to investment inquiries”;
ONE big lie from the Prime Minister – the Prime Minister and his ministers repeatedly lied about the status of the NRF claiming that it was “open for business” and that “money was available now”. It took the release of secret government documents under FOI to confirm that the PM’s comments were deliberately misleading; and
ONE dodgy board appointment – Just days after it was revealed Trade Minister, Don Farrell, handpicked an unqualified former Labor Senator over an experienced senior woman for a key overseas appointment, Labor appointed Glenn Thompson, the Assistant National Secretary of the Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union, to administer the NRF Corporation through a dodgy process which is the subject of ongoing scrutiny. It has been revealed Glenn Thompson was appointed in a hastily arranged process months after the NRF Board was first announced.
While Labor’s National Reconstruction Fund has been flailing, Australia's manufacturing sector has been going to the wall and facing Global Financial Crisis-era conditions:
Insolvencies have tripled across Australian manufacturing since Labor took office;
Ai Group’s Australian Industry Outlook for 2024, revealed that 85% of businesses expect energy prices to keep rising throughout 2024 – this is the highest score in the history of the survey;
According to the ACCI-Westpac survey, a majority of manufacturers now expect a deterioration in economic conditions over the next six months with sentiment running at its lowest level since the GFC; and
Industry has reported a decline in new orders dropping to the lowest rate since the GFC.
The Albanese Government made significant promises about the role the National Reconstruction Fund would play in “rebuilding Australia’s industrial base”. Instead they have failed again and again.
Labor can’t manage the Australian economy because they don’t understand Australian industry.