Julie Owens (Parramatta, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It's tempting to respond to that load of tripe, but I think we have important things to talk about here, which is the reality that our communities face. I say respectfully to the minister and to the shadow minister: you need to get out more. You really need to get out more. Let's talk about reality here. On the government's own figures, there are 19 job applicants for every entry-level job. Back in 2006, 22 per cent of vacancies were entry-level jobs, and now it's 10. Ten per cent of job vacancies are now entry-level jobs. They're the jobs that young people go into. They're the jobs that people who come from disadvantaged communities who haven't had the educational opportunities go into. It's dropped from 22 per cent in 2006 to 10 per cent now, and there are 19 applicants for every one of those jobs. Tell me anything in the government's 'plan'—and I'm using inverted commas because they don't have one that actually addresses that issue. Fifty per cent of job vacancies now require a university degree. That's a massive increase.

The Department of Employment told a Senate committee last week that the average time that a person spends on Newstart is 159 weeks—that's three years. The average time a person spends on Newstart is three years. Long-term unemployment—which was 13 per cent in 2009—is 23 per cent today. Nearly a quarter of people on Newstart are now long-term unemployed. The minister and the shadow minister need to get out more, if they think the answer is 'get a job'. They should go and talk to these people who are desperate to get jobs, and can't find them because the jobs don't exist. The jobs do not exist. Show me anything in the government's plan—if it says it's so fantastic at creating jobs, show me where they are. They don't exist. It also shows up the statement that the government makes over and over again, that the Newstart payment is just a holding payment to last people a few weeks while they get another job—it shows that up as the extraordinarily dishonest statement that it is. If the average number of weeks that a person spends on Newstart is 159, Newstart is no longer a transition payment. There's something going on in the economy on this government's watch which means that people are spending more and more time on Newstart. It's about time the government got out and spoke to some of their community about that because this is an appalling failure of this government. But what we get instead is: 'Let's drug-test them.' I can tell you, if there are 19 applicants for one job, and the government is not changing that, then what difference does it make to those 19 people? They need more jobs.

I want to talk about my electorate. I know my electorate very well, and I want to talk about two suburbs in my electorate in particular. One is Parramatta, where just under six per cent of households had their electricity disconnected in the three years from 2015 to 2018. Nearly six per cent of households had their electricity disconnected in those three years because they were unable to pay their bills. Nearly 15 per cent of households in Parramatta earn less than $650 a week, and the unemployment rate is 9.5 per cent. The unemployment rate there—in a CBD in the centre of my electorate!—is 9.5 per cent. Why don't you go out and tell them to get a job! They want jobs. Jobs are not there for entry-level applicants at all. Worse than that is South Wentworthville: for nearly 24 per cent of families there, the family income is less than $650 a week. That's nearly a quarter of the people in that suburb who have a household income of less than $650 a week. The unemployment rate there is 9.8. Nearly one in five households there are sole-parent households.

Again, to any of those government members over there that think 'get a job', 'do a drug test' and 'it's just a transition payment' I'd suggest: go and talk to the people that live in these suburbs. I do. I doorknock them. I talk to them. I know how desperate they are to get work. And those that do have work want more work. We're not talking here about underemployment, which is even worse. On the numbers we're talking about, a person is employed even if they only work one hour a week. (Time expired)

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