Ms BURKE (Chisholm) (21:12): I welcome the motion moved by the member for Throsby because it goes to the heart of a matter of great concern to many in my electorate of Chisholm: the decline in manufacturing jobs. Unlike the previous speaker, I have seen where Australian industry partnership agreements have worked in practice in a range of cases rather than been forced down the throats of companies or individuals. People have seen the benefits of having long-term, stable relationships with their suppliers. For an example I only need look to Toyota and its relationships with many of its suppliers—in particular, in my electorate, its relationship with Unidrive. Unidrive has 300 employees, and they are guaranteed ongoing work because the company has developed a long-term, stable relationship with their major deliverer of component parts. Toyota comes on a yearly basis and trains up people at Unidrive in their skills and techniques; they also send staff from Unidrive to Japan on a very regular basis so that they can see how quality control is implemented there. Half the staff now refer to many of their processes in Japanese lingo, because that is how it is done in Japan. So relationship building is really important, and that is what we are talking about. We also need to look at why Australia's economic credentials remain strong. The federal government's action during the global financial crisis and the resilience of the Australian economy mean that our economy continues to outperform other advanced economies. Australia's unemployment rate is incredibly low regardless of what those on the other side are saying. Recent national accounts figures said that jobs in manufacturing had increased, not declined. We also have low government debt and record terms of trade that show that our fundamentals are strong and our economic prospects are bright. We are indeed the envy of the developed world. In light of the potentially difficult global economic climate, this government understands that high-skilled, high-wage jobs ensure diversity and adaptability and prepare us for an uncertain future. We know that we cannot afford to put all our eggs in one basket, and that diversity ensures that economic benefits spread to all Australians. We also need to realise that there are more jobs in manufacturing in Australia than there are in the mining sector. We need to realise where the jobs actually are. There are also more jobs in the service sector, and we need to remember the decline in the service sector and where we need to put money. We are looking at innovation representing a key element of building upon our current and future economic prosperity. Nowhere is this more evident than in my electorate of Chisholm, which features highly-skilled innovative research and development work. I recently had the opportunity to visit the polymers CRC in my electorate, which has been in operation since 1992. You only need to look at the joint venture between its current participants, which includes nine universities, government research organisations, CSIRO and ANSTO and its commercial arm with many businesses. It draws on world-competitive teams, comprising leading researchers from its industry participants and the best researchers in Australia, drawn from across universities and government laboratories, for delivering its planned research outcomes. Their major emphasis is on developing technologies and products to improve health, to enable greater food and water security and for producing low-cost solar energy. The use of products based on CRC technology has provided a range of benefits including productivity gains and the creation of high skilled, high-value manufacturing jobs. I also recently visited CSIRO, which has one of its largest headquarters in my seat of Chisholm. It is also the key precinct in Clayton, which is my electorate, for materials and manufacturing science. We need to look at science and research as leading to greater industry and greater development, not with this complete negativity. At CSIRO in my electorate one of the things they are working on is titanium alloys—they are light and strong and the current production methods are too costly to expand their use beyond the aerospace market. Leading researchers from the US have been attracted to CSIRO to work on this titanium product. There is market capitalisation going on that will lead to many jobs, and we need to look at this as the way forward. Part of the motion tonight looks at how to develop all these things together. We are doing many things in this sector that we need to be proud of instead of talking it down all the time. We need to talk up the Australian economy. We need to talk about where the jobs are, how to develop them and how to create them. Tragically I, like others before, have seen manufacturing jobs lost from my electorate. The recent announcement by Bosch that 360 jobs are going to go by the end of the year is a crying shame. They do not actually need to be going. The recent closure of Australian Envelopes, which was a money grab by the company, did not need to happen. We also need to look at what manufacturing employers do to their own staff.