Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

We have an employment crisis for young people in this country. To look back over the last few years, it is always the case—in fact, it's been the case since they've been keeping statistics—that youth unemployment is higher than general unemployment, and you would expect that. You would expect, because of where young people are at in their lives, that they may find it harder to get a job or may not be looking quite as actively as others. They may not be experienced and educated and so on. So youth unemployment, if you look back over the graphs, always sits higher than general unemployment.

What we also find, though, is that, whenever there's an economic downturn or a recession, it hits the young proportionately harder than it does for everyone else, and the two lines on the graph diverge. Unemployment goes up generally for everyone when we reach tough economic times, but it goes up more for young people. So young people find themselves in a proportionately worse position. What you also find, as you look back over the last 50-odd years of economic history in Australia, is that, given a couple of years, the lines come back into sync again. Youth unemployment comes back to about the same level compared with general unemployment, as more and more people find jobs and the economy picks up and recovers.

But, when you look at what's happened in Australia since the GFC, something very different has happened. Unemployment for young people spiked after the GFC but, unlike every other time in recorded economic history in Australia, youth unemployment has not come back into line with general unemployment. In other words, not only did young people get especially hit hard when the GFC happened and found themselves experiencing rates of unemployment around 12 per cent but also, a year after the GFC, that has not come back into line; it has continued to grow. Youth unemployment was around 11 per cent or 12 per cent immediately after the GFC and it is now higher—it's now around 13 per cent. But, meanwhile, general unemployment has flattened out. So young people in Australia have found it very, very hard to get a job since the GFC.

When you consider that the way they count the unemployment statistics means that, if you are working an hour a week, you are counted as employed, and, when you dig a bit deeper, the picture becomes even worse. When you start asking about underemployment and you start asking young people who have a job, 'Would you actually like to work more?' you find that the figures become even more alarming—and, again, it's got worse since the GFC. So we now find ourselves in a situation in Australia where underemployment for young people is around 20 per cent. So 20 per cent of people who are lucky enough to have jobs are saying, 'I'd actually like a bit more work and a bit more money.' Back in 1978 that figure for young people was about four per cent, and it's now 20 per cent. So 20 per cent of young people are finding themselves underemployed. So, when you add together the unemployment rate and the underemployment rate for young people, we get a rate of something like 30 per cent. So, close to a third of young people in this country are saying, 'I want a job but can't find one' or 'I've only got a couple of hours work a week and I'd like more.'

That's not surprising when you consider how expensive housing is now and how difficult it is for young people to find a place where they can live—and that's just renting in many cases. For most people, buying or owning a house is now just a dream. When you consider how expensive housing is, when you consider that, under this government, wholesale power prices have doubled in the last four years—and young people need electricity as well—and when you consider that young people, if they are lucky enough, go on to TAFE or university, it is not surprising that often young people are finding themselves in huge debt.

We've got a situation in this country where it is felt that we are turning our backs on young people. They are screaming out for more work and better pay and they are not getting it. It is at record numbers. As I say, there's a 30 per cent underutilisation rate. It has not been that high for a very, very long time in Australian history. So what does this government do? The government could turn around say, 'We're selling our young people out. We are not creating the jobs that they need, we're not giving them the incomes they deserve and we're leaving the ones without jobs on unemployment benefits that are below the poverty line.' In fact, as many have said, they are a disincentive to get work. You end up living in poverty and you spend all of your time just trying to make ends meet and you can't afford the extra money to do that bit of extra training or to get a haircut or to buy some new clothes to go to a job interview. Everyone is saying that—not just the Greens. The Business Council of Australia is also saying that.

The government could say: 'We've got a bit of a problem, with 30 per cent underutilisation of young people. Clearly, the jobs aren't out there for them. Clearly, people want more work and more jobs and are not getting them. So let's put our shoulders to the wheel and work out how to create more jobs.' But, no; instead, this government turns around and says, 'We are going to blame young people for not finding jobs'—jobs that weren't there in the first place. If you had unemployment or underemployment rates of two or three per cent, then, maybe, the government could stand up with a straight face and say, 'If you can't find yourself in work, then we're going to treat you in a certain way.' I wouldn't agree with that, but the government might have some logic in its argument. But, when 30 per cent of young people are saying, 'We'd like some work, or more work, but we can't find it,' what does the government do? The government turns around and says, 'We are going to treat young people and anyone else who's fallen on hard times, and can't get a job, as potential drug addicts, and we are going to randomly drug test you. If you fail that random drug test, woe betide you, because you may find yourself without income.'

Instead of having a bit of a self-reflective look at the fact that it is presiding over a 30 per cent underutilisation rate amongst young people and saying, 'Maybe this is our fault as the government and we might want to turn it around and do something to fix it,' the government turns around and says, 'We are going to blame young people and everyone who is doing it tough.' Because it's performing so poorly in the polls and doesn't have the guts to do the hard work to create meaningful work for people in this country or to lift people out of poverty by lifting the level of unemployment benefits, it does the usual tabloid thing. It picks up the playbook of every conservative government and says, 'We're going to blame the unemployed, stigmatise them and treat them all as potential drug addicts.' What does it do then? It does compulsory drug testing.

If the government understood the first thing about people who are addicted to drugs, it would know that when addiction has got a hold of you, especially on some of the really tough drugs, you do anything to feed your addiction. You steal from your friends and your family, and you burn bridges there. You steal from your employer sometimes. And then, when that all runs out, you break into other people's houses to nick their stuff and sell it in order to feed your addiction. Once you've run through all of your friends and your family and you've potentially got yourself a criminal record, maybe you end up in prison or, if you've managed to avoid the law, maybe you find yourself out on the streets with no meaningful source of income at all. That is what addiction does to people. It makes them behave in a way where the only thing that matters is getting the next hit. If you really care about getting people off drugs, the crucial thing is to try and grab people when they are in that situation and get them into treatment, because we know treatment works.

But what the government is doing is saying that, if it happens to find you in that situation, then it's going to make life even worse for you and, potentially, take away the only source of income that you've got. It's not going to turn around and give you additional treatment—there's no extra money coming from this government to fund additional treatment services or to take steps to ensure these people find their way into treatment. No; this government says, 'We're going to put you even further into desperation.' If someone is addicted to a drug, to the point where they're prepared to burn their family and friends, where they're prepared to commit criminal acts, what do you think they're going to do when this government takes away their money? This is a government that is forcing people into crime. When the crime statistics go up, when there are more break-and-enters as a result of people no longer having an income, blame this government. Blame the Liberal and National parties, because they will have put people in the situation where they know that they'll do anything because they're in the grip of a drug, and the government says, 'We don't care. We're going to make your life even tougher.'

Of course, because this is only an electoral ploy—it's about saving money and about trying to win votes; the government is going for the double whammy here—the government isn't interested in looking at the real problem with drugs in this country or how one might solve it. If the government was, it would have listened to everyone—everyone from medical health professionals through to people who work with people who are on drugs—who fronted up to hearings into this bill and made the point that the best thing you can do is fund a proper drug treatment sector and get people into treatment and into health.

If the government were interested in doing more than simply playing the politics of it, they would have listened to the CEO of the Ted Noffs Foundation who said: 'If we're going to do drug testing, is it going to apply universally to everyone?' He made the point that in some places ice use has plummeted, but the drug that has gone up in some places is cocaine. He said to the committee: 'Who uses more cocaine than anyone else? Canberrans.' Clearly, this government is not interested in tackling addiction or excessive drug use because, if it was, it would be applying it across the board. It would be applying it across the board and saying, 'Hang on, maybe drug use is getting out of control in the kinds of drugs that might not find their way onto the front page of a tabloid and might not be good conservative fodder because they are actually drugs that rich people use.' No, the government is not interested in that. The government is only interested in trying to boost its standing in the polls by taking the stick to people who are doing it tough.

I will come back to what I said at the start. We have an unemployment and underemployment crisis in this country amongst our young people. If you go to some regional areas, that 30 per cent underutilisation rate that I was talking about before is up above 50 per cent. Go to some of the public housing estates in my electorate. At one, the woman who runs the community centre told me that, in the last survey she did, there was nigh on 82 per cent unemployment and underemployment. People just can't find work. When you understand that is the kind of society that we are creating—that the Liberals are presiding over a society where the gap between the haves and the have-nots is growing and where we have an extraordinarily large class of young people now who, since the GFC, have never been able to find a decent job—then we're at a fork in the road in Australia.

We could have the courage, as the government and as the parliament, to say, 'We've got to act in the public interest. There's a looming crisis here, and it's our job to make sure that, in the 21st century, no-one is left behind.' And that means lifting the level of welfare so that people aren't below the poverty line and making sure that there are decent, meaningful jobs. That's the Greens' proposal—to actually offer people a bit of choice, a bit of hope and a bit of meaning in their lives and to say, 'If you fall on hard times, the government is there to help you get back on your feet. And if you or your son or daughter find yourself in trouble with drugs, we will help you get the treatment that you need.' But, instead, this government only knows one thing—and that's the big stick. When, as I said, the crime figures go up, blame Malcolm Turnbull, blame the minister, because they are pushing people towards crime.

See this speech in context