Thank you very much Harry, and I acknowledge the presence of my Parliamentary colleagues, Ron Boswell, who spoke to you yesterday, the Leader of the National Party in the Senate and John Anderson's Parliamentary Secretary and Warren Entsch, the Federal Member for Leichhardt, where this meeting takes place.
I hadn't originally planned to be here this morning. When I heard on my arrival in Cairns yesterday that the Convention was taking place, both Warren and Ron asked me to come along and listen for a few moments this morning, very directly from your President and from you, about some of the problems that confront your industry. And I welcome this, albeit brief, opportunity this morning to hear what Harry has had to say and to also address some brief remarks to you.
It is true, as Harry has said, that the national economic environment is quite strong. We have had good growth in Australia. We've generated more jobs. We've got our Budget into surplus. We've reformed our industrial relations system and we're in the process of - commencing on the first of July, undertaking a major reform of our taxation system. And all of those things will work very much to Australia's further economic benefit. And if you look at the national economic scene, it's a very strong one. But in looking at the national economic scene it's my responsibility and that of my colleagues to also look at the regional economic scene and to look at the problems that confront particular industry sectors. I'm familiar, because of my past responsibilities both as Prime Minister, as Treasurer, as Opposition Leader and way back in the 1970s as Minister for Business and Consumer Affairs, I'm very conscious with the torture through which the sugar industry of Australia has frequently gone and the difficulties it faces.
You are a victim of a fairly corrupt world market system. I share to the full the exasperation expressed by Harry about the Seattle Trade talks. There was a lack of American leadership at that meeting, which was a matter of intense disappointment to Australia. Because of the size of the United States' economy and the dominant role played by the United States in determining the shape of international trade negotiations when the American giant on the trade front gets idle then not a lot is going to happen. What we're endeavouring to do is to lead up of the Cairns Group. That is a group of countries as you well know, who have a vested national interest, a world wide interest in expanding trade liberalisation for agricultural producers and agricultural exporters, what we're endeavouring to do is to keep alive the flame of more access for our products. We're continuing to persist with that and it's a message that I'll be taking to Korea. I'm departing for Seoul at 12 o'clock today from Cairns and I'll be having a three-day visit and during that time I'll be reinforcing the message of trade liberalisation to the Korean Government. Of course Korea is a very good customer of Australia's. Over the last ten years Korea has bought more from us than any country in the world, other than Japan. And it remains a very important trade focus for Australia, and a very important partner.
But I do understand the world trade difficulties. I also understand the vagaries of the weather that have so badly effected this part of Australia and particularly effected your industry. Ron Boswell made an announcement yesterday regarding the excise on ethanol which is designed to open up a new avenue of hope and incentive for the industry. And it is an announcement that I know has been well received by the industry and it is an earnest of our determination to do what we can. Now I know that your industry is putting together some proposals to put to the government and I haven't come along here to make any announcements additional to what Ron said yesterday. We'll examine those proposals very carefully. Governments have numerous submissions put to it. We're not always able to accede to all of those submissions and I can't at this stage and I always deal directly and candidly with people, it's the only basis of communication between industry and governments.
I can't make any commitments in advance except to say that we will very carefully assess what the industry puts forward to us. We are very conscious of what you've gone through. We are also conscious of the importance of the sugar industry to the economic and social infrastructure of Queensland, particularly of Far North Queensland. You have a very sagacious and energetic advocate in Harry, who has led your industry with great energy and great enthusiasm over a long period of time. You will be aware of a number of the other assistance measures that the Government has afforded to the industry in recent years. But I am conscious of the particular pain and difficulty through which the industry has gone over the past 12 months and the particular impact of the very low world prices which are really are at levels that might not have been foreseen even amongst the gloomiest only a couple of years ago and their forecast has been confirmed at the quite recent ABARE rural outlook conference.
There are just two other things that I want to emphasise before concluding my remarks. And the firs to of those is that the programme of economic reform that the Government has been embarked on since it was elected just over four years ago, is not some kind of exercise in achieving an A plus in economic theory. Or winning the approval of the doyens of the economics profession, but rather the purpose of economic reform is to build a stronger Australian nation. And the purpose of economic reform is to lift the living standards of Australian people. Now, I am very conscious that when you reform an economy, not every part of the economy shares equally in the benefits of that reform. But as I look around Australia, I find some areas, as I said at the beginning of my remarks, that are very strong economically and are really brimming over with prosperity. I see other parts and your industry in certainly in that area, other parts of Australia that are not sharing.
And it is the role of government as best as it can to spread the benefits of economic prosperity as fairly and evenly as possible while always recognising that a government that believes in free enterprise and open markets is a government that does not to try to micro manage individual economic outcomes. No government can guarantee any industry or any individual a certain level of return. What a government can guarantee as best within its power is an economic environment and an economic framework which is more conducive than any other to people securing decent returns on their investment.
And that's what we've set out to do and that's why we got the Budget back into surplus and in the space of five Budgets we will have wiped out 50 of the $80 million of government debt that we inherited in March of 1996. I know that interest rates have gone up recently. I also know that they still remain vastly lower than they were in the early 1990s than they were in early 1996. We have changed the industrial relations system. I know that from time to time competition policy gets a bit of stick as you move around the regional areas of Australia. I understand that. I also understand, of course, that competition has brought a lot of benefits to all of Australia, including rural Australia. There is more competition now in the banking system than there used to be. Although there is not as much competition there as I would like to see and that is why the Government remains opposed to any relaxation of the Four Pillars banking policy until we see much stronger evidence of more competition. The great competition in telecommunications has met with all of the legitimate aspirations that people with rural Australia have for even better communications services has meant significant improvements in that area. But it remains a goal of the Government that those conditions be even further improved.
But I simply make the point, ladies and gentlemen, that pursuing economic reform is not some kind of ideological exercise. We are not ideological zealots but we are people who believe that sound, sensible economic policy in the long run is more likely to return a social dividend for the Australian community than the alternative of heavy government intervention. And I know very much that people in your industry are people who want the Government to provide you with a decent economic climate, to be sympathetic when you are overwhelmed by circumstances beyond your control, but by and large leave it to the initiative and the resourcefulness of individual investors and individual producers to achieve what they can.
I admire what the industry has done for Australia. I appreciate the contribution that it's made over the years to our export effort. I do understand the difficulties that you are going through at the present time and I thank you very much for this welcome opportunity to hear from your President speaking on your behalf and also to address a few remarks to you to put into perspective some of the Government's attitudes.
I wish you well. I know that I'll hear from you again, I hear very regularly from Harry. He's a regular correspondent, a very frequent advocate and a very persistent representative of your industry.
Thank you very much for listening.
[ends]