Susan Templeman (Macquarie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I listened to a CEO recently who was asked about the wage levels of his sector and when he expected to see wages in his sector rise. They've been very flat and there's a lot of casualisation. He was asked what he thought might have to happen before wages would become more secure and wages would rise. His response was: 'Well, profits have to get better.' That seems to be a bit of a catchcry for the corporate world—that it all depends on profits being better. But you have to ask yourself how much better they need to be.

Official data show that wages are actually going backwards, while company profits are surging. At the end of last year, in particular with mining and construction leading the trend, the Bureau of Statistics business indicators for the December quarter showed a massive 20.1 per cent surge in profits over the quarter, while wages fell 0.5 per cent. I guess that's got me asking—when does the trickle start? When does it start to go down from on high and catch workers? When do they get to feel any bit of dampness or moisture? Right now they're not getting it. That's what this enterprise tax plan relies on. It relies on trickle-down economics. All the evidence would suggest to us that it just ain't going to happen. If you're not getting it when you're seeing a massive 20.1 per cent surge in profits, you've really got to ask when are you going to get it?

When I think about this whole idea and whether minimum wage earners will get a trickle-down treat from company tax cuts, whether new jobs will be created by this trickle-down that is meant to happen thanks to this legislation, it is really hard to see what might happen. History and international experience would tell us that you have to be optimistic to think that it's a thing. It assumes that the benefits of any productivity growth that are associated with any increased investment will actually come through, and we're just not seeing it. That really is the framework in which I look at this piece of legislation. I think it is rather ironic that this came out of the so-called jobs and growth agenda, which of course we haven't heard much of lately. We've got different three-word slogans that have replaced that. There's been a variety—reliability and something and something.

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