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November 7th, 2011 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda
Updated
Photo:
The manufacturing sector continues to shrink (Tyrone Siu: Reuters)
The Federal Government and Opposition are embroiled in a bidding war on international trade, with leaders from both sides at odds over Australia’s anti-dumping regime.
Manufacturers of paper, glass, food and steel say they are being hurt by heavily subsidised cheap imports sold in Australia.
Audio:
Interview with Craig Emerson
(PM)
The sector continues to shrink; 50,000 jobs disappeared in the first six months of this year and almost 300 manufacturing firms have gone broke.
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott yesterday unveiled a plan to bolster Australia’s anti-dumping regime, promising the Coalition would help manufacturers lodge anti-dumping cases and reverse the onus of proof in such investigations – all within world trade rules.
He says while international dumping gives the illusion of short-term benefits to consumers, it seeks to exploit Australia’s commitment to free trade.
“We support a competitive open-market economy, but it’s also very important that Australian businesses are competing on a genuinely level playing field,” he said.
“This will be quicker, it will be cheaper and it will be fairer for Australian manufacturing and it will give Australian manufacturing a fighting chance to compete against the rest of the world.”
But Trade Minister Craig Emerson says Mr Abbott “is wrong and he knows he’s wrong”.
He insists Mr Abbott’s plan would violate Australia’s international trade obligations and risk hurting the people the Opposition Leader says he wants to protect.
“We would have innocent working Australians caught in the crossfire as Mr Abbott just wrecks our position with the World Trade Organisation and invites retaliation. It’s totally irresponsible,” he said.
He says Mr Abbott’s policy would inevitably result in Australia being dragged before WTO courts by its trading partners seeking retaliatory action, citing Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade evidence given at a recent Senate inquiry on dumping.
“[Mr Abbott] is doing this to pretend that he’s the manufacturing worker’s friend. Yet of course, Mr Abbott led the vote against the steel industry transformation plan… this is just political opportunism once again,” he said.
But Mr Abbott says his policy is a two-step process.
He says once a prima facie case of dumping is established, if after 60 days the alleged dumper cannot demonstrate that no dumping has occurred, then countervailing duties can be imposed so the onus of proof kicks in in the second stage.
Mr Emerson says lodging such a case “doesn’t take a couple of days, and in fact that’s the whole point”.
“You’d need to have some evidence, and we will, through the reforms that we’ve announced, make it easier for Australian businesses to gather that evidence and put it at the front of authorities,” he said.
“But what we won’t do is have a reversal of the onus of proof that breaches the WTO rules… and risk the jobs of those working Australians.”
Topics:
manufacturing,
industry,
federal-government,
trade,
australia
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