Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Hansard source

Having listened to the Assistant Minister for Employment run through a number of matters, I am assuming by his response to my earlier questions that he is taking almost all of those on notice. I certainly will be keen to hear the answers on those matters. He did make the point that the money for the youth employment initiatives outlined in the budget was new money. That is surprising to the opposition in light of the budget's own expenses in table 2.1.1, which goes to the forward estimates for expenditure for Job Active last budget compared to this budget.

I just want to place on the record the variations in the forecast of expenditure in the budget this year compared with last year. In the 2015-16 year, expenditure as outlined last year was to be $1,767,184,000. That has gone down from $1.76 billion to $1.45 billion in that time. Therefore, that is a shortfall of about $170 million in that year. I have asked the assistant minister to explain why there has been an alteration in the expenditure for the next financial year.

In the following financial year 2016-17 the original forecast in last year's budget was approximately $1.86 billion. That has come down to $7.7 billion so, again, there is about a $70 million or $80 million reduction in the forecast for that year. I would ask the assistant minister why that would be the case. Also for the 2017-18 year, there is also a further reduction of about $160 million, from $1.93 billion to $1.77 billion, so there have been very significant reductions in the expenditure as forecast by the budget. That is at a time when the budget's own papers forecast unemployment to rise to 6.5 per cent. One of the reasons might have been that the forecast would fall because of the forecast reduction in unemployment, but that is not the case. Unemployment, according to the budget papers, is to go up in the next financial year to 6.5 per cent, a 14-year high. Therefore, that would not account for why you would reduce the expenditure in the new program jobactive. Therefore, I ask the assistant minister to explain exactly why that is the case.

As I am on my feet, I would also ask the minister about some of the matters he raised in his answer to the member for Hinkler. Firstly, wage subsidies. I think wage subsidies can work and sometimes they do work. As I have said before, we support the government if they are able to find successful initiatives that lead to good outcomes. I ask the minister now or perhaps on notice if he does not have all the figures with him, but I would hope he would have them, how those wage subsidy programs are going. Sometimes they are hit and miss; sometimes they work. Given the forecasts that were made about the uptake of those opportunities for employers to subsidise wages to employ more people, we would of course like to see that work. We ask the minister to table or to provide answers as to how those programs are going to date.

In relation to the national rollout of Work for the Dole, again, Labor does support work experience. We do not believe it is the only measure that can work for people who are out of work. We do not necessarily believe that it is the best approach for someone who has been 30 years in the labour market and who may have been retrenched recently. We think that person, to be reconnected to the labour market, is more likely to need new skills. They do not need a work culture. They have spent three decades in the labour market. That is not a person who really needs to know how to work in teams, under supervision and to turn up for work. They have been doing that for many years. But having said that, we do accept that the Work for the Dole programs, if well structured and targeted at the people who do not have a work culture, can be effective. We would ask, insofar as the rollout is concerned, which areas are going to be targeted first in relation to that national rollout.

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