Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased to speak in support of the Social Security Amendment (National Green Jobs Corps Supplement) Bill 2009. This bill introduces a new supplement to assist low-skilled job seekers as they take part in the youth environmental work experience program National Green Jobs Corps. This is a terrific program giving young job seekers hands-on work experience and the opportunity to conserve and preserve Australia’s natural environment, particularly in urban areas.

I have met the Green Corps crew down at Rocky Waterholes at Salisbury in my electorate a couple of times at graduation ceremonies and the like. They are a terrific bunch of young people who are eager to learn new skills and contribute to the community, to Australia and even beyond. At Rocky Waterholes there are 10 young people working to restore a creek. This creek goes through Rocklea, near Archerfield Aerodrome, so it is an urban part of the city of Brisbane. It is surrounded by factories and it has really gone bad over the last 50 or 100 years. These young people are working to regenerate local native plant species through weeding, planting and water quality monitoring. When you plant native species, it brings back native wildlife. It also gets rid of the weeds that continue to propagate and go all through the watercourse. It is amazing to see the different stages at the Rocky Waterholes and how much change has taken place with these young people working together. There are before and after photographs. You can see that the parts of the creek they had not yet worked on were an incredible wilderness with car wrecks, lantana and every introduced weed you can think of. But what they have turned it into is incredible. These young people are also helping to increase community awareness of the value of our natural resources and to build an appreciation of the variety of plants and wildlife that can populate the Oxley Creek catchment area.

As well as their work along the creek, the participants are also receiving accredited training in courses such as conservation and land management and occupational health and safety. Obviously these things are very important, because they are using scrub-cutters, whipper-snippers and heavy equipment down on the creek. They are picking up skills that are easily transferable. Ultimately, this training is designed to lead to full-time work opportunities. When you talk to these guys they are often not as engaged as most young people at school. Because of their new-found ability to work as a team and to take on a task and stick with it—to get out of bed every day and come along and do some hard yakka down on the creek—they have acquired confidence and skills. These guys, both males and females, talk about acquiring new skills and taking them overseas. It is amazing the difference a little bit of guidance from the government can make.

As I said, this bill introduces a supplement to help support participants in the Green Corps. It will be available to youth allowance, Newstart and parenting payment recipients who take part in the program. They will receive an extra $41.60 per fortnight. I understand that this will cost about $3.7 million over the life of the program. As I detailed earlier, it is money very well spent. It is a good seed investment that will help develop good taxpayers and good contributing members of society. It will be a useful incentive to encourage more young people aged 17 to 24 to take part in programs such as this. The payment will also help cover the costs incurred in participating in the program, such as travel. Many of the participants have not yet saved up to buy a car, and sometimes public transport can be a bit of a problem because of the hours at which they start. As you know, Mr Deputy Speaker Scott, in the Queensland environment it is a good idea to start nice and early, before the sun starts to bake. A program like this is very important for young people, particularly those who are unemployed and those who struggle with traditional education and training regimes. They can not only gain skills on the job but learn a work ethic, gain self-confidence and a sense of achievement and can walk tall to their next job interview.

And they are making a real and lasting difference to our environment. Green Corps participants have propagated and planted more than 15 million trees—I will say that again: 15 million trees—removed thousands of hectares of weeds like lantana, put up more than 8½ thousand kilometres of fencing, collected more than 11,000 kilograms of seeds, and built or maintained more than 6,000 kilometres of walking tracks and boardwalks. These are valuable blows against dangerous and extreme climate change, and there is much more to come. This training supplement will be available for participants for two years, from 1 January 2010 until 31 December 2011. Before I finish, I understand that this supplement has been advertised and is expected to begin from 1 January next year. It is important that the parliament pass this bill this year to ensure eligible recipients can receive the supplement.

I want to thank the Parliamentary Secretary for Employment for introducing this legislation and this scheme. It is obviously a scheme that allows young people a second chance. Because they were not particularly engaged in school, this is another opportunity for them excel, to pick up some skills and to pick up some teamwork strengths and to make some mates as well. They are people who possibly are not engaged at school, but they are able to come together, work out how to get ahead, work out how to change an environment and make these creeks and similar areas more useful for the community. I commend the Parliamentary Secretary for Employment for introducing this legislation and I commend the bill to the House.

See this speech in context