Howard hands Vaile trade job

By Greg Ansley

Canberra bureau chief


Australian Prime Minister John Howard has moved to quash a growing row over the appointment of a new Trade Minister by handing Agriculture Minister Mark Vaile one of the Government's toughest jobs.

The appointment comes ahead of September's crucial Apec forum in Auckland, and the start later in the year of a new World Trade Organisation (WTO) bid to further open global markets.

With the added row over lamb imports with the United States, the job is also important to New Zealand, whose own efforts to reduce trade barriers are closely tied to Australia.

The decision to give the trade portfolio to Mr Vaile after last week's sudden resignation of Deputy Prime Minister and National Party leader Tim Fischer also reduces tensions within the ruling coalition.

Neither the National Party's new leader and Transport Minister John Anderson nor Mr Vaile wanted the post, leaving Mr Howard with the option of either handing a traditional National portfolio to the Liberals, or giving it to a junior and far less experienced minister.

Yesterday Mr Howard said Mr Vaile had never been as reluctant to accept the job as had been suggested and that he would be an energetic Trade Minister.

Mr Vaile, a former jackaroo and stock and station agent, whose political star has risen sharply since his election to federal Parliament in 1993, also played down his previous public reluctance to switch portfolios.

"I've always been interested in the trade portfolio but I never expected to get the opportunity so soon," he said.

Mr Anderson said the appointment ensured that Australia had the senior ministerial clout needed for the next round of WTO negotiations.

But shadow Trade Minister Peter Cook said Mr Vaile was an "unproved conscript" whose previous record showed a greater interest in protectionist sentiment and local constituency pork-barrelling.

"Internal Coalition politics seems to have triumphed at the expense of Australia's need to shape the international trade agenda with more authority than Vaile will bring," Mr Cook said.

In other ministerial changes announced yesterday, Community Services Minister Warren Truss was promoted to agriculture, to become the third National MP in Cabinet. Larry Anthony, son of former Trade Minister Doug Anthony - one of the architects of the CER agreement with New Zealand - replaces Mr Truss in community services.