Josh Frydenberg (Kooyong, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I'm pleased to inform the member for Rankin and the House that we have the first current account surplus in more than 40 years, we have the lowest welfare dependency in 30 years, we have the biggest tax cuts in more than 20 years; and we have the first balanced budget in 11 years. The member for Rankin referred to the time before the coronavirus. That includes the month of December. That includes the job numbers for the month of December. We created 29,000 new jobs and unemployment fell to 5.1 per cent.

What was unemployment under Labor? It was 5.7 per cent. Employment growth today is at 2.1 per cent. What was it under Labor? It was 0.7 per cent. Today employment growth is around three times what it was under Labor and around double the OECD average. Under Labor, the gender pay gap was 17.2 per cent and rising. Today it is now 14 per cent, and we are seeing that women are about $1,000 a year better off in that particular bracket. Under Labor, non-mining investment was in freefall. It fell 10 per cent over their six years in government. Since we've come to government, growth in non-mining investment has been over 30 per cent. Under Labor, in their last year, 62,000 small businesses shut their doors. Under us, in the last reported year, 75,000 small businesses were created. Under Labor, living standards, as measured by real net national disposable income per capita, had fallen by 1.2 per cent. They are 3.3 per cent higher through the year today. Under Labor, in their last four budget outcomes, the budget deteriorated by about $80 billion; whereas, in our last four budgets we've seen an improvement of over $10 billion.

Growth in the Australian economy continues and we've seen more jobs created. Under Labor, you'll always see higher taxes and fewer jobs.

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