This week the Chinese Communist Party’s English language newspaper, The Global Times, published an article endorsing Labor leader Anthony Albanese as the preferred option for Australia’s Prime Minister.
On its Twitter page, The Global Times promoted the article by saying that Anthony Albanese “positively shines compared to Morrison.”
It should be no surprise that the Chinese Communist Party would prefer a Labor Government in Canberra. Just over 2 years ago, Labor’s Deputy Leader, Richard Marles, gave a speech where he proposed that Australia should explore defence cooperation with China. It wasn’t clear if that would include joint war games with China at Shoalwater Bay.
In contrast, the Liberal National Government has reduced Australia’s dependence on China in a determined fashion. We have said no to a number of Chinese foreign investments, the first Australian Government to do so. We were the first country to refuse to let Huawei, China’s telecommunications company, build our 5G network. And, we called out China’s gross lack of transparency on the origins of the coronavirus, which to date has killed 6 million people worldwide.
For China, it is not a close race. The Liberal National Party has refused to be bullied, whereas the Labor party always seems to defer to the Middle Kingdom when pressed.
For example, when China banned Austalian coal and beef exports in 2020, Labor Members of Parliament rushed to blame the Australian Government for letting this happen! I remember in Parliament Labor predicting Armageddon in Central Queensland as a result.
Unlike Labor, we did not tear our shirts and wail to God about our fate. The LNP instead knew that it was best to defend our independence, even if it were to cost us some trade. We were also confident that the quality of our products, and the enterprise of our farmers and miners, would mean we would find other countries to do business with on more friendly terms.
Our judgement turned out right. Beef prices have never been higher. Queensland’s coal exports have grown by 35 per cent in 2021 as we have found other markets for our high quality coal in India, Japan and South Korea. Coal companies say they are unlikely to return to the Chinese market even if the bans are lifted because the risks of doing business in China are too great.
As Ian Macfarlane, the CEO of the Queensland Resources Council, said “It’s all taught them a good lesson but luckily they didn’t have to learn it the hard way. There was obviously some pain in that, but they were able to diversify their market quickly.”
The Labor party reckon that we are politicising national security by pointing out their lack of judgement on China. This is ridiculous. Our relationship with China is clearly the most important strategic question our nation faces. And Labor never complained about politics when it was criticising the government for raising issues around the origins of COVID, or blaming us for Chinese export bans.
The scorecard is clear. The Labor party have shown poor judgement in opposition on how to manage China. Labor’s Deputy Leader proposed military cooperation between Australia and China before coronavirus but it was while China was cracking down on democracy protests in Hong Kong, they were oppressing Uyghurs in Xinjiang and threatening the territorial integrity of Taiwan and countries in the South China Sea.
Labor has shown a shocking level of judgement on our most important national security issue and they cannot be trusted to defend Australia’s interests at this time.
