Bill Shorten wants to link Adelaide with Asia through $1 billion fund to create manufacturing jobs

LABOR Leader Bill Shorten is proposing a $1 billion fund to help manufacturing firms expand and create jobs in the wake of Holden’s closure.

BILL Shorten wants to link “Adelaide and Asia” through a $1 billion fund designed to kickstart manufacturing industries after Elizabeth’s Holden factory closes next week.

The federal Opposition Leader will announce plans for an Australian Manufacturing Future Fund in an address to the South Australian Labor State Convention in Adelaide on Saturday.

The fund would provide concessional loans, loan guarantees and equity to help ­manufacturers in all states divers­ify, grow their businesses and create jobs.

The investments could help SA car component suppliers retool and diversify into other industries, food manufacturers package new products for export and metal fabricators prefabricate houses.

Federal Opposition Leader Bill Shorten visits an industrial chemicals plant in Adelaide last week. Mr Shorten will use a Labor conference in Adelaide to announce plans for a $1 billion manufacturing investment fund Picture: AAP Image/Dave Hunt

“You’ve got a massive network of small and medium component makers, who should be aiming to make the link between Adelaide and Asia,’’ Mr Shorten will say.

“We will get behind South Australian skills and South Australian jobs.

“And we’ll deliver the real dollars to drive new growth.”

The fund would be closely modelled on the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. It would seek to help companies attract private investment by lowering their risk profiles.

Mr Shorten will say SA is the nation’s “manufacturing heartland” but is feeling the rough edges of economic change.

“Our plan will help new small and medium manufacturing enterprises get off the ground and existing ones compete on the world stage,’’ he will say.

“And above all, it will ensure that Australian skills and Australian ideas create Australian jobs.

“Because there’s one three-word slogan I want to hear a lot more in the years ahead: ‘Made in Australia’.”

Mr Shorten will say that joining up global supply chains would help ensure SA was recognised as an international headquarters for specialised design and high-qualify technology.

Labor intends that the manufacturing funds to become financially self-sufficient by adopting a commercial approach to its investments.

Originally published as Bill Shorten wants to link Adelaide with Asia through $1 billion fund to create manufacturing jobs