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

I rise to support the extension of JobKeeper for another six months because for many of the businesses in my electorate of Macquarie in the Blue Mountains and the Hawkesbury, this is the only thing keeping their heads above water. What has struck me as I travel around my electorate is the unevenness of this recession. People have shared with me their personal and business situations. Some business owners reveal, in an almost confessional way, that, in fact, business has been really good. You get the feeling that they're a bit embarrassed to say it because they know that not every business in the shopping centre they are in is experiencing the same boost.

In areas like mine, where fewer people are commuting for work, there are more people able to shop closer to home, buy flowers, stop for a coffee, buy a painting to decorate those Zoom-featured walls. The natural trend to shop local has certainly been encouraged. But other businesses are openly despairing such as the businesses that have traditionally relied on high levels of international tourism, either coming in or going out—tour guides on one hand, travel agents on the other. Cafes and restaurants have to turn people away because they've hit their COVID-safe limit. These businesses haven't been able to return to anything like normal levels—that's if they've got any revenue coming in at all. And then there are all the variations in between. The accommodation providers are packed at weekends but empty on weekdays, the clothing stores are finding that people aren't going out as much so they're not feeling the need to add to their wardrobes. But masks, which have next to no profit margin on them, are flying out the door. The tradies, who have loved helping people fix all those problems at home that they'd put up with until they'd spent hours and weeks at home, now can't see a pipeline of work. So while we're pleased that the government has not only brought in a wage subsidy in the form of JobKeeper, after we called for it, and that it's now extending it, which is what we've called for, the devil is going to be in the detail of how this is carried out. And the detail, we know, is going to be determined by the Treasurer.

We remember that the Prime Minister and Treasurer did spend a lot of time saying there was no need for a wage subsidy. Back in March, on the 24th to be precise, the Prime Minister rejected calls from Labor, from the unions, from business for a UK style wage subsidy, saying that such a system 'is never done quickly and is never done well, and that will put at great risk the sort of resources we're trying to get to people'. His preference was to send people to the unemployment queue, for employers to sack their workers and for them to line up to register for unemployment benefits. I had employees in tears at that time but I also had employers distressed at the decisions that they were being forced to make because they did not want to lose their staff.

Let's think about the name 'JobKeeper'. While we talk about this in the context of businesses, sole traders, small, medium and large business, let's remember that this legislation and the detail that will emerge are ultimately about keeping people in work and keeping them connected to their employer. But it's not about keeping people in jobs at any cost. I'm pleased to see that, when we called on the government to abandon its proposal to extend emergency industrial relations powers to businesses that had fully recovered, they did listen to our call.

When people have decent and secure jobs, they have money to spend. That goes into so many other businesses and keeps my local economy ticking over. Right now, in spite of the promised continuation of JobKeeper, businesses look to the next few months with fear. They're fearful of the lower level and what that will do to the amount of money people have to spend. The Treasurer must make sure that the workers and businesses impacted by bushfires in my region are not ignored in these JobKeeper changes. The detail needs to give bushfire-affected businesses, who have managed to hang on through the months of COVID, the confidence that they won't be penalised for having had hardly any revenue in the months of smoke and fire that they endured at the end of last year and the beginning of this year. And it's not just in my electorate; that's up and down the country. It needs to be easy for them. People who have been through bushfires have been through so many processes to get support. They've filled in form after form. They've had conversation after conversation with so many different agencies. They really can't take a lot more. What they need is a process that is easy for them to follow and one where they feel supported.

If you want to give my local business owners and workers the confidence that their efforts right now will not be in vain then making sure the process is easy to do, by spelling out clearly how it will work in bushfire areas, will go a long way. No-one wants to see anyone with less money in their pockets, so targeting the support to where it will have the most benefit is crucial. To date we've had some big losers: casuals with less than 12 months; the arts and entertainment workers who have slipped through the gaps; the local government workers; the foreign students, who now rely on collecting food and vegetables from Hawkesbury's Helping Hands; university workers; and the workers who have had no choice but to pull out super—self-employed people for whom that was the only option. We have to make sure that, going forward, the government really targets and nuances support for these people; it's failed to do so in the past.

The government must also resist the temptation to use the cover of COVID to pursue its passion for destroying universal superannuation and workers' rights. The government has a habit of saying no but then saying yes. They did it on bushfire business support. They did it on a wage subsidy. They did it on pandemic leave. They're a bit like Jim in The Vicar of Dibley. They say, 'No, no, no, no, yes.' Let's hope they say yes to things like a social housing program and more support for the construction industry to give tradies a pipeline of work. In a crisis like the one we are facing, it is up to the government to step up. Subsidising wages is a start, but we need more than that. We need a plan from this government on how to create jobs in our economy not just save them.

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