Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party, Minister for Workforce Participation) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Hughes for her question. Of course, the member for Hughes knows that her current unemployment rate is just three per cent—an extraordinary outcome. Indeed, in Hughes there are some of the lowest unemployment rates in 30 years, significantly lower than when Labor held that seat, prior to 1996. In 1996 the Howard government inherited a moribund, tired Commonwealth Employment Service—the CES. The old CES was not doing anything for unemployed job seekers, nor for those who had vacancies and wanted to see them filled.

A key priority of the new government was to put those unemployed into real jobs for their own sake and also for the sake of the country. In 1998, therefore, the coalition put in place a revolution in the form of a private sector driven Commonwealth employment service, and we called it the Job Network. How has this Job Network performed? Let me tell you: the latest figures show that Job Network has, since February last year and over the last 12 months up to February 2006, helped over 650,000—

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