Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

If you look at the data contained in the budget papers, we projected that there would be a softening in employment in 2008-09, and therefore an increase in unemployment from 4.75 per cent. Furthermore, parallel to that, we also projected in the budget papers that there would be softening economic growth. As a consequence of that, we are dealing with softer and more challenging economic times. We have been upfront about that. We have not sought to be evasive about it; that is just the truth. Therefore, that has an effect on all working families. Because of the cost pressures I have run through before at the dispatch box, it also has an effect on, in particular, pensioners and carers, who are trying to make ends meet.

What I also say to those opposite on the question of the employment conditions of working Australians is that the biggest impact over time on the take-home pay of working families is the industrial relations system under which people work. Therefore, noting that we have got softening global economic circumstances, and noting also that we have upwards revisions of unemployment—these are facts—I would ask those opposite: would workers who are, for example, in some of the businesses referred to by those opposite last week, where there have been closures and where people have lost their jobs, prefer an industrial relations system where redundancy payments were guaranteed or one where redundancy payments were signed away? I say that there is a fundamental difference between those opposite and those who stand as members of the government—the fundamental difference about which we fought the last election—which is that we believe, whatever circumstances a business finds itself in, people should have a right to proper redundancy payments.

See this speech in context