Thanks, Deputy Speaker.

Well, the pandemic has certainly shown us how important our trade relationships are, and it also obviously exposed some fundamental weaknesses.

Those opposite presided over an increasingly difficult relationship with China, our largest trading partner that had direct and painful consequences for Australian producers with everything from wine and barley to cotton, coal and lobsters, many from the electorate to vulnerable members in the chamber.

It's clear that more could have been done over the previous decade to shield Australian exporters from this sort of pain.

And in fact, prior to the pandemic, the now Prime Minister, when he was the Opposition Leader, commissioned me to run an Indo-Pacific trade taskforce when we prepared a report looking at how best we could diversify our exports because he knew that we were too concentrated on one big market.

So we started our work in 2019 and watched up close as the 2020 trade showcase hit hard.

And Labor's approach is to be look at trade has been a really important part, a tool of nation building to modernize the economy and then in turn change Australian society for the better.

And I think we have seen that to some extent.

However, I think Australia's trade position was weakened by having put too few eggs in too few baskets and indeed that's what was the title of the report.

And we looked into how we could have more eggs in more baskets.

And fortunately under the previous Australian government it was too much sort of set and forget they turned up for the photo op in the announcements but then didn't do much afterwards.

And it's not as though it was not something that trade experts had warned us all about for years and years, particularly those non-tariff barriers.

But what we ended up with was a narrowing export base of products facing stiff market and non-market headwinds concentrated in a handful of key markets.

Worse than that, our resilience to trade shocks was eroded.

Given that excessive dependence on China, I think it was lazy and it has cost us.

Fortunately, though, the new administration under Anthony Albanese has a plan.

We've always believed in the power of trade to create jobs and economic development in Australia.

We are the party of free, fair and open trade and we want to support our exporters to pursue new markets because diversification, more eggs in more baskets is the key.

We've already seen a number of senior ministerial visits to marginal regional trading partners such as Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia and Japan with a special focus on revitalising our relationship with India.

We'll be establishing a trade 2040 task force and recently Ministers for the Pacific Agreement on Closer Economic Relations Plus met to discuss deepening trade cooperation in the Pacific to support our Pacific family and their region's economic recovery.

Now, that group now includes Tuvalu and Vanuatu, import new members that Australia is committed to supporting as borders reopen and they re-engage in trade.

This obviously isn't just good for our international relationships.

It's also good for Aussie jobs, good for local jobs.

Exporting businesses in Australia employ almost a third more staff. They do. It is a fact then those non exporting businesses and on average pay 11% higher wages.

So good jobs in regional Australia paying high wages.

It is true, Mr. Deputy Speaker, there can be no doubt that we have inherited a massive trillion dollar debt and cost of living crisis as inflation climbs and businesses struggle to attract workers.

It's true that that is what we inherited from the former government.

However, we're addressing this through putting in place the outcomes of the Jobs and Skills Summit held a few days ago.

Supporting both diversified and traditional relationships for trade is good for Australian businesses, it's good for Australian jobs and it's good for Australian wages.

Trade is a nation builder and this Government under the Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will give.

It is due respect.

It will do the work, the work that's required to grow our economy into the future.