A senior leader has been blasted as “ridiculous” after criticising a multibillion-dollar plan to triple two-way trade between Australia and Southeast Asia.
Anthony Albanese will on Tuesday announce a $2bn fund to boost trade and investment, with a focus on clean energy and infrastructure, when he addresses a gathering of 100 business chiefs at the ASEAN Special Summit in Melbourne.
Ahead of the major announcement, the Coalition honed in on the plans to argue that Australia needed to increase its focus on local infrastructure spending, citing concerns raised by Thai officials about Labor’s new car pollution standards during Monday’s meetings.
“Listen, it’s great to have ASEAN nations in Melbourne hosting their great regional partners. This guy is busy cutting infrastructure over here at home and then spending local taxpayers’ money to build infrastructure in Ho Chi Minh City,” Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie said.
“He’s the Prime Minister. That’s what you get with a Labor government.”
But independent MP Monique Ryan said it was “ridiculous” to suggest Australia should not be engaging with Asia.
“We need to be responsible about all of our spending. But I also think that Bridget is, you know, very much locked in the 1960s,” she said.
“If she thinks that we shouldn’t be looking to Asia as major trade and financial partners for this country, it would be non-forward thinking for us to take that attitude.”
Treasurer Jim Chalmers said the $2bn Southeast Asia investment financing facility would help to “turbocharge” trade between the two regions and the government would engage with Australian businesses to make clear how they could access the funding.
“It’s about making sure we can make this two-way investment more attractive to people, de-risk it where we can,” Dr Chalmers said.
“It’s in the interests of every Australian we get the two-way investment and trade happening the best it can be. Our future lies in this region.”
Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham said it made “enormous” sense for Australia to strengthen its investment ties into Southeast Asia.
“The details of this fund is something we will closely scrutinise so we can understand the budgetary impacts,” he told Sky on Tuesday.
While the ASEAN summit will largely focus on trade and economic security, Australia has expressed concerns about China’s claims over the South China Sea amid increasing maritime tensions with the Philippines.
While Foreign Minister Penny Wong did not directly name China in her address to the Maritime Cooperation Forum on Monday, she warned that the “region’s character” was under threat.
“We see claims and actions that are inconsistent with international law, particularly the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea; the legal order for the seas and oceans,” Senator Wong said.
This came as Australia unveiled a series of announcements to boost Australia’s presence in Southeast Asia, including $46m to boost maritime partnerships in the region.
On Tuesday, the government is expected to unveil $140m over four years to extend the Partnerships for Infrastructure Program.
The program has helped fund transport, clean energy and telecommunications projects since launching in 2021.