Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

What the company assured me last night—and I am sure that, if the Leader of the Opposition had met with Toyota last night in this building, he would have had the same assurances—is that the jobs are not going tomorrow. They are not going next week or next month or even next year. These jobs will finish in 2017. I deeply, deeply regret that, but the important thing is to create the conditions in our economy where those workers can move from good jobs to better jobs, and that is exactly what this government will do.

As I said, we are going to get the fundamentals right. We are going to get rid of the carbon tax. We are going to get rid of the mining tax. We are going to restore the Australian Building and Construction Commission, which created $6 billion worth of productivity improvement in this sector. We will support the East West Link, which will create 3,500 jobs in its construction phase. So I ask the Leader of the Opposition what is his position on East West Link. Does the Leader of the Opposition support East West Link? If he supports it, he supports 3,500 jobs. If he does not, he is against job creation in Victoria.

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