Laurie Ferguson (Werriwa, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased that the member for Petrie is very congratulatory towards this government reintroducing programs for youth unemployed that it basically abandoned in its first year after election. Equally, I want to put on the public record the way in which I deplore the abolition of trade training centres, which were very crucial in electorates such as my own. Yes, the Abbott government has at this stage renamed and rebadged a few programs that it thought there was no need for in the last budget. That is a recognition of the realities we now face.

We had a contribution for the member for Herbert, who came in here and started to lecture us about security being more important than unemployment. That is an interesting contribution from a government that allowed 100-plus jihadists to leave the country and has been explaining their numbers to us ever since—whether there are 113 or 110. But I believe that a more timely contribution in regard to unemployment came from the chairman of the Australian Catholic Social Justice Council, Bishop Christopher Saunders. He said of unemployment and this government:

Society fails its citizens where the economy does not generate sufficient employment and when government does not adequately intervene to promote job creation and maintain basic wages …

He further commented:

Just leaving it to the market will not ensure the benefits of prosperity flow to low-paid and unemployed workers.

In an article in Justice Trends, he went on to note:

Youth unemployment has risen dramatically following the global financial crisis: 290,000 Australians under the age of 25 are now unemployed. That's an unemployment rate of 14 per cent. The level is much higher for 15 to 19 year olds at 20 per cent—about 160,000 young Australians

Unfortunately, the approach in Australia—

he is talking about this government—

has been to argue for some of the most punitive measures for young unemployed people.

So they have accomplished very high unemployment, particularly amongst young people, but the whole strategy of the government has been to demonise these people and to basically say: 'Let's reduce their rates when they're unemployed. Let's make them go for six months without any payments whatsoever.'

I agree with Bishop Saunders when he says of the Intergenerational report:

This is a worthy initiative, but it does raise a question about the lower priority given to the need to skill up and employ younger workers.

When we talk about what the government is doing, we had another very timely contribution from ACOSS, the Australian Council of Social Service. I cited this in a recent speech here, but I want to go on to quote what they say about the suffering of people on Newstart and youth allowance in regard to the payments that already operate without the attempt by the government to further marginalise, stigmatise and persecute young unemployed people, under an unemployment level that they themselves have accomplished. An ACOSS survey of Newstart and youth allowance recipients in regard to housing—it also looked at many other measures of welfare—found that 27 per cent of them said, 'I spend more money than I receive,' in regard to their housing. Forty-eight per cent of them said, 'I break even most weeks,' and only 16 per cent of them said, 'I am able to save some money most weeks.'

We have a situation here where the current unemployment pattern in south-west Sydney is close to seven per cent. Most worryingly, in the Hunter and Newcastle region it is over 12 per cent. In January, the worst month of recent times, we saw 28,000 full-time jobs lost, whilst about 16,000 part-time jobs were created. The underemployment rate is therefore nearly unchanged from where it was at its record worst, having only dropped to 8.5 per cent. In sheer numbers, 750,000 Australians are in unemployment queues and almost two million are not working to the extent to which they wish they could.

We have a Treasurer of this country, at the usual distance he is from the Australian people, telling people: 'Don't worry about the housing price crisis in Sydney and nationally. Go out and get a good job.' This is a government which has said to unemployed people: 'We're going to basically strip you of your humanity. We're going to make sure your payments are in some ways not adequate, because you're a shirker, and we are appealing to those people who are financing welfare.'

Youth unemployment remains much too high, at 13.5 per cent. While it is down from its record high levels for this century, earlier in this very government's tenure, it is still at a level not seen since 2002. So I commend the member for Charlton for raising the question of unemployment in this country. The government have accomplished something which the current Prime Minister's hero, Prime Minister Howard, accomplished: record levels of unemployment. At the same time, they are reducing people's conditions while they are unemployed.

See this speech in context