Nationals leader to call for tariffs amid economic policy clash with Angus Taylor
Nationals leader Matt Canavan declared Australia should reject unconditional free trade and reinvest in critical industries in response to the war in Iran, aligning him with the prime minister who last week claimed Australia had been exposed to offshore manufacturing for years.
In his speech on Wednesday, Canavan will call for an “economic revolution” and permanent tariffs to protect domestic manufacturers and reject suggestions that his protectionist stance puts him at odds with the Liberal Party and economically orthodox leader Angus Taylor.
Building on his call for tariffs on Chinese steel in this article last month, the Queensland senator said a rethink was needed on protecting the industry due to aggressive trade practices by US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Currently Australia’s anti-dumping commission can impose restrictions on certain imports, but Canavan said this interim process was too slow to counter China’s massive state subsidies and should be replaced by a “consistent and realistic approach to tariffs”.
“Over the last few years I have been isolated and frustrated as I watched Australia mount its debt, destroy our energy advantages and destroy the strong economy we inherited,” Canavan will tell the National Press Club, according to transcripts.
“I’m not here to tell you what the Liberal Party wants, but I didn’t run to be leader of the National Party to deliver an economic reset. Our country needs an economic revolution.”
In a nostalgia-heavy conversation about policy details, Canavan will lay out his “patriotic agenda for Australian economic recovery”, which comes a month after the Farrer by-election, where Coalition parties are expected to lose to One Nation or a Climate 200-backed independent party.
In his own press club speech last week, Albanese condemned the prevailing economic model that “there will always be someone else… who will sell us what we need cheaper than we can make it”.
The Prime Minister used new language in his speech about Australia’s lack of oil refining capacity, declaring that “there is no security in maintaining the status quo”.
Canavan echoed those sentiments, highlighting a convergence between those on the left and right who want to see even greater fiscal spending on industrial subsidies, which runs counter to the preferences of most economists.
“No wonder we are seeing increasing support for minor parties and alternatives. The Australian people rightly want a change in our politics. Business as usual is not working economically and will fail politically,” Canavan will say.
Canavan and Albanese, whom Canavan calls the ‘captain of the status quo’, differ on critical questions such as the role of green energy in rebuilding blue-collar industries and the government’s target of reaching net zero emissions by 2050.
Major parties are increasingly using direct language to acknowledge the frustration of voters who are increasingly turning to the populist message of One Nation.
Canavan’s words about the need to overhaul the economic system echo those of Liberal frontbencher Andrew Hastie and reflect a growing appetite for transformative change among Conservatives and a challenge to Taylor’s more traditional approach.
He suggested that the opposition’s long-awaited immigration policy would shed light on the possibility that Australia’s immigrant population was growing too quickly compared to the local population.
“Australia is a welcoming country and immigrants helped build it. But we have retained our culture and heritage because there has always been a clear majority here who grew up as Australians,” he will say.
“Our way of life in Australia is at risk if we don’t raise our birth rate.”
Canavan’s remarks could draw the ire of Labor, which has used the Coalition’s rhetoric in campaigns against immigrant communities. The national pageant frontrunner is scathing about Pauline Hanson’s brand of race politics, but admits Australia’s successful multicultural project has been challenging.
Declaring that the “Hawke-Howard era of economic reforms” is over, Canavan will use his speech to challenge the well-established economic principle of comparative advantage.
“The pampered, comfortable, second-rate political class talks as if the worst economic performance since the Great Depression could be fixed with another economic peak, another push for an ‘energy transition,’ or yet another ‘sensible tax reform,’” he will say.
“Our nation’s leaders are trapped in the narrow thinking of the old economic rationalist superhighway. Many of our leaders grew up during the Reagan-Thatcher revolution. Like aging hippies, they desperately want to return to the elixir of youth by performing another economic Woodstock.
“Microwaved Milton Friedman will not solve our economic woes.”
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Paul Sakkal is Chief Political Correspondent. He has previously covered Victorian politics and won the Walkley award as well as the 2025 Press Gallery Journalist of the Year award. Contact him securely on Signal @paulsakkal.14.Connect with: X or email.
