Trevor Evans (Brisbane, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Waste Reduction and Environmental Management) Share this | Hansard source

I rise on behalf of the people of Brisbane to place on the record the Brisbane community's support for the Morrison government's policies and leadership during the global COVID-19 crisis. In this pandemic, we face a challenge unlike anything this country has seen in the lifetime of almost any of us. In the face of this rapidly evolving global situation, and in response to some of the unfortunate commentary we've heard proffered over recent days, I think it's worth pointing out once again that there is no playbook for a once-in-100 years pandemic like COVID. There aren't simple answers to the enormous challenges posed to the health, jobs and prosperity of millions of Australians by this insidious virus; we wish there were. To understand this, we need only look at the tragic experiences of so many other countries around the world to which we would normally compare ourselves.

We should treat with some scepticism those who come into this place implying that there are silver bullet solutions on offer or that there is some set of magical policy prescriptions that would result in zero harm, whether on an economic basis or a health basis. And we should extend that scepticism to any who come into this place attempting to sow the politics of division when Australians are asking us to leave our differences at the door and work together to protect lives and livelihoods.

As I said, there is no playbook on how to respond to COVID-19. But I can also say with confidence that in the 20-odd years of my professional career, much of which has involved working in or around government policymaking, I have never before seen policymaking as dynamic or as responsive to the needs of Australians as what I've seen from within this federal government over the course of this crisis. We saw this responsiveness with the rollout of JobKeeper, the largest single support package in this nation's history, designed and delivered by the Morrison government in a matter of weeks to provide to nearly one million businesses and about 3½ million Australians the urgent lifeline they needed during this time of unprecedented economic turmoil.

We saw this responsiveness with the establishment of a national cabinet—the first time in the history of our Federation that leaders of the Commonwealth and of the states and territories have worked in such close and frequent collaboration to make the urgent decisions needed to steer Australia through a crisis. And we saw this responsiveness with the government's fast-moving policy response in so many areas—telehealth, childcare, other support for specific industries, foreign investment and so many other areas.

We've seen the results of that responsiveness on policymaking in the economic results that we are starting to see so far. As the Treasurer noted in question time earlier today, the June quarter GDP figures for so many other like countries are seeing substantial falls right now—figures like more than 20 per cent falls in the UK, almost that in France and 10 per cent in the US and Germany. Yet, here in Australia, we've managed to maintain our AAA credit rating, and, of the 1.3 million Australians who either lost their job or saw their hours reduced to zero since the start of the crisis, more than half of them are now back in work. Without JobKeeper and other government policies—according to Treasury, that support has helped to save 700,000 jobs and the unemployment rate would otherwise have been around five per cent higher in Australia than it is today.

When we consider the challenge, the scale of the challenge, we of course acknowledge that, as we continue to learn and respond to the virus, our response will continue to evolve. What we don't claim—as seems to be being implied occasionally—is that anything short of perfection must be considered total failure. And, like many members of this chamber I'm sure, I've been hearing from thousands upon thousands of local constituents and local businesses who've looked to the federal government for help this year and have been able to rely on the economic lifelines provided by the Morrison government in a moment of such significant need.

I want to take this moment on the public record to pass onto the health minister, the Treasurer, the Prime Minister and so many other ministers who've been working so tirelessly in the best interests of our nation the sincere thanks I've received from so many constituents, businesspeople, charities and sporting organisations from right around Brisbane. We'll keep working hard to save lives and save livelihoods.

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