While the Morrison government is rightly earning praise for its strong, principled stance against the Chinese regime, the fact remains that it is struggling to overcome a “silent invasion” that has spent decades white-anting Australia’s institutions, at every level.
Whether it’s political parties taking literal shopping bags of cash from Chinese businessmen, universities selling their souls to the Chinese Communist Party, or legitimate Chinese community associations being taken over by CCP strongmen, Beijing has insinuated itself into nearly every aspect of Australian political and civil society.
But if the Manchurian candidates in government and academia are bad enough, the Quislings in business are even worse.
Just how deep in China’s pockets some Australian businessmen really are was shockingly demonstrated when mining billionaire “Twiggy” Forrest slyly snuck a Chinese diplomat in to ambush a speech by Health Minister Greg Hunt.
A new report shows just how much of China’s filthy lucre the business sector is grabbing with both hands.
A report into Australia’s trade relations which has been a year in the making was released today and it provides sobering reading on the extent of our reliance on our major trading partner and investor, the People’s Republic of China[…]
Good advice when investing in stocks and shares is to diversify your portfolio and make sure you don’t have too much stock in any one industry or company, lest it fall over and you lose the bulk of your investments.
Unfortunately, Australia’s portfolio has become less and less diverse over the years, and a big chunk of it is invested in a volatile stock, communist China.
That stock is not just “volatile”, it’s toxic.
The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed weaknesses, though, in our nation’s approach to trade. China’s boycotting of Australia’s barley, coal, wine, and beef exports during times of elevated political tensions has raised question marks over who we should choose to trade with and what the term ‘partner’ means. It seems as a nation we’re more vulnerable when we put too many of our economic eggs into the one basket. That vulnerability is exacerbated when the basket is woven by a totalitarian communist state that uses trade as a political weapon[…]
It’s a question of trust: can we trust the Chinese Communist Party with our strategic infrastructure? Can we trust the Chinese Communist Party with our education institutions? I don’t think that there would be many right-thinking Australians who’d say yes. In fact, I don’t think there’d be many right-thinking Chinese people who would say yes.
This helps throw the growing “Quad” alliance into focus. While the Quad – the US, Australia, India and Japan – are mostly focused on defence, PM Scott Morrison is also building up new trade alliances in the region. Far from punishing Australia, China’s trade bullying over the past year has opened some Australian eyes to the fact that there are markets other than China.
The [Joint Standing Committee on Trade and Investment Growth] has considered opportunities for Australia to diversify its export markets. India, Vietnam, and Indonesia in particular present value opportunities for Australian businesses. As such, ensuring that access to these markets is available and should continue and be fostered has got to be a high priority for the Australian government.
The committee has also made recommendations aimed at protecting Australia’s national interest and national security, particularly in sensitive and critical sectors. Notably, there are recommendations in this report that go to serious concerns regarding state-owned enterprises and state-linked enterprises funding our universities and owning or leasing our strategic infrastructure, including the Port of Darwin. Given the ongoing tensions with communist China, it is an unacceptable security risk to have Chinese state-owned and state-linked enterprises involved in our universities and strategic infrastructure.
The Good Sauce
Australia just cannot afford to deal with China any more.
Not if it wants to keep, not just its national security, but its soul.
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