Bert Kelly, “Breaking down barriers,”
The Bulletin, September 13, 1983, p. 124.

One disadvantage of being a farmer with little training in economics is that I often get confused when important, high-protection spokesmen make important statements. Neil Walford, the head of Repco, has often puzzled me and, no doubt, that is my fault, not his. It was he who alerted us to the evil influence of the dreaded “new class”, trying to stop tariff deals in smoke-filled rooms in Canberra. It was he who expressed concern, in a widely circulated advertisement last October, about the alarming free-trade tendencies of Liberal and National Party politicians. He added this pregnant threat and I quote him: “I can see many businessmen and, indeed, other independent people, careful of their country’s future, supporting Labor at the next election.”

This statement really would have frightened me had I been a candidate. The heads of Repco always have been powerful people. The previous head, Sir Charles McGrath, was powerful indeed — being treasurer of the Liberal Party while taking an active part in raising money for the headquarters of the Country Party. You have to be at the top of the tree to behave like that. So, I always listen with particular respect when the heads of Repco speak.

However, I still get confused. In October, Walford seemed to be encouraging businessmen and others, careful of their country’s good, to vote Labor at the next election. But, during the election campaign in March, he sent Malcolm Fraser a long telex making a powerful plea for the Liberal Party to adopt a policy of protection at almost any price and said: “The consequences of a Labor government are so awful and the Western Australian elections an augury that cannot be ignored, that I implore you to believe that this policy, properly presented, is probably the most powerful initiative you can take.”

In October, Labor is good; in March it is awful. My confusion is not surprising.

In the bush, we call this “running with the hare and hunting with the hounds” — but we are not very bright in the bush.

The statements of another high priest of protection also confuse me. Brian Powell is director of the Victorian Chamber of Manufacturers and is a very powerful person. Twice I have appeared on the same platform and he is a most impressive speaker. All the same, he confuses me when he castigates the government for interfering in business and, in the next breath, asks for more government interference in the form of tariff protection. Evidently, there is a subtle difference between government intervention and government interference which is too deep for my modest intellect.

However, my mild criticisms of Powell’s logic were soon forgotten when I skimmed a piece he wrote in The Australian on July 29. I could not help getting excited when I read: “The system of (government purchasing) preferences … promotes low volume and uncompetitive manufacturing operations to the detriment of our national interests … Apart from the crippling misallocation of capital investment, productive capacity is being fragmented and is preventing the economies of scale which are needed to maintain competition.”

When I read this, I imagined Powell was talking about the mess we made protecting our car industry and so I thought the tariff scales had fallen from he eyes. I rushed round to give Eccles the glad tidings. “Rejoice, rejoice, Eccles!” I crowed. “With Powell with us, who can stand against us?” But Eccles didn’t rejoice. I don’t think he knows how to go about it. He took the Powell statement and, holding it carefully as if he feared some kind of infection, read it carefully. It then became clear that Powell was protesting about the damage we do to ourselves by erecting barriers to the trade between States. Powell thinks we are doing this too often and are weakening our industries, our economy and our national health. It was to prevent this kind of behaviour that Section 92 was written into our Constitution. So it was trade-barriers between States worrying Powell.

Eccles pointed out that, though Powell’s criticism of trade-barriers applied only [for Powell] to barriers between States, the same criticisms would apply to barriers erected between countries.

All such barriers weaken the economies of the country or State involved, they lower living standards and they lead to the trade warfare that if worrying Powell and becoming more obvious all the time.

Powell can see the damage we do with barriers to interstate trade. I wish he could see, with the same clarity, the damage we do to ourselves and our trading partners by the barriers we impose on our international trade.