Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

Last week Ipswich awoke to a story on the front page of The Queensland Times about skyrocketing unemployment in our community: 'Jobless rate hits 23% high'. On page 4 was 'Jobless on the rise in Ipswich'. The numbers are stark and terrible. In the Ipswich suburbs of Leichhardt and One Mile, unemployment had reached 17.6 per cent; in Bundamba 13.9 per cent; in North Ipswich 13.6 per cent; and in Riverview, in the Eastern Suburbs of Ipswich, 23 per cent. Overall the unemployment rate in Ipswich now sits at 9.29 per cent. Many families in our community face a difficult and uncertain Christmas.

These numbers underscore that the Queensland LNP state government has been disastrous for our community. Before the 2012 election in Queensland, Campbell Newman promised to reduce the unemployment rate in Queensland to four per cent over six years. At the time he set this target, the unemployment rate in Queensland was 5.5 per cent; in Ipswich it was 4.8 per cent. These figures are under the Labor government, both federally and in Queensland. But they did not last under Campbell Newman's slash-and-burn budget. By then it was clear his plan for jobs began and ended with sacking thousands of Queensland public servants. So far he has slashed nearly 20,000 public service jobs. About 3,000 of the public servants who lost those jobs live in Ipswich. They were sacked after Campbell Newman told them they had nothing to fear from the LNP. An LNP election brochure promised to:

… guarantee job security for all hardworking public servants, with no forced redundancies. Restructuring will be managed through natural attrition, career advancement and training opportunities.

What rubbish that turned out to be. After the election, Campbell Newman and his government slashed jobs. They slashed front-line services. They slashed employment programs like Skilling Queenslanders for Work, which assisted the Ipswich City Council, the Salvation Army and other organisations to provide necessary job training and jobs in the Ipswich area. This is a $53 million program slashed before the Deloitte Access Economics independent analysis was actually produced. And that analysis indicated $1.2 billion in revenue to the Queensland economy by 2020 if this program had continued. This program had delivered 8,000 jobs for long-term unemployed people, and 57,000 Queenslanders had obtained jobs. I am pleased the Labor opposition, should they win government next year, will bring back Skilling Queenslanders for Work. In my community alone, the LNP state government ripped $4.5 million in employment support from the Ipswich community, making it harder for people to find work. Therefore the LNP local members in Ipswich, Ipswich West, Nanango and Lockyer should hang their heads in shame and start speaking up for the Ipswich community. Finally, do your jobs. I urge them to do it.

See this speech in context