Melissa McIntosh (Lindsay, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Today, the national accounts have shown just how much we've been affected by this once-in-100-years pandemic. This is why the Morrison government has been implementing an economic package throughout the pandemic that has assisted, I'm really pleased to say, 4,500 businesses in my community. Many of them have spoken to me about this package being a lifesaver or throwing them a lifeline so they can continue to employ local people and continue to do the important work they do across our community. As the Prime Minister says, we are fighting a war on two fronts: on the health front, to defeat the virus, and, on the economic front, to promote jobs and stability to the millions of Australians who have felt the impacts of the coronavirus. To achieve these, we need to deliver projects that create jobs and support the thousands of local businesses, including in my electorate of Lindsay and including our new emerging industries.

Yesterday, the Minister for Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business announced a new $62.8 million local jobs program. This program helps Australians reskill and upskill and find employment as quickly as possible. It's really encouraging that at home in Lindsay we will now have a local employment facilitator. The facilitator will use local expertise to connect jobseekers in Western Sydney with training, job opportunities and other support. They will chair a local jobs and skills task force made up of government representatives, Indigenous representatives and community organisations. The task force will develop a local jobs plan to identify priorities, opportunities and skills gaps. They'll build pathways for local people, and pathways are so important. I've seen this, working in a social housing organisation: how to step out of intergenerational welfare and have financial independence. These pathways will help people enter industries with jobs on demand. Our local recovery funds will support and develop projects that place jobseekers at the forefront of our economic recovery.

As the Minister for Population, Cities and Urban Infrastructure said today in question time, the delivery of the Western Sydney Infrastructure Plan, the building of the Western Sydney Airport and growing industries that will create jobs in the Aerotropolis is how we create jobs. In Lindsay we're looking at the jobs of the future in emerging industries around space, defence, advanced manufacturing, STEM, research, start-ups and more. These industries will play an important role in Australia's roadmap beyond coronavirus, creating jobs and supporting local families. We're creating 200,000 jobs by supercharging the Aerotropolis and the Agribusiness Precinct, building the skills in our local community through new educational opportunities to ensure that the jobs of the future in Western Sydney stay local and that people don't have to do that long commute that 300,000 people in Western Sydney do every day for their jobs.

The construction of the airport will create over 11,300 direct and indirect jobs and 28,000 full-time jobs within five years of opening and, on top of that, the Sydney Metro Western Sydney Airport line, which runs through my electorate of Lindsay, will create 14,000 jobs. I created the Lindsay Jobs of the Future Forum to bring together small business owners, employment, education, training and manufacturing across Western Sydney to collaborate on ways our kids can be trained and educated in the jobs of the future that are coming to Western Sydney, because of the infrastructure investment that the Morrison government is making.

Recently, I held a teleconference meeting of the Lindsay Jobs of the Future Forum, and we discussed the important opportunities that are coming. This was where we established the Advancing Manufacturing Taskforce. This will investigate, promote and advocate for policies that create local, national and international opportunities for local Australian manufacturers.

Australian innovation, value and quality set us apart from our foreign competitors and give us that competitive advantage. By educating and training our kids in the jobs of the future, we can sustain and generate generations of local jobs through advanced manufacturing. This is what I'm committed to doing through my community and through the Advancing Manufacturing Taskforce.

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