Jim Chalmers (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Holt for her question and also for all of the work that she has done on behalf of the ordinary working people of this country before she came here and since she arrived here. I pay tribute to her and to her contribution.

Australians are under pressure from the rising costs of living, and governments need to strike the right balance in providing responsible cost-of-living relief without adding to inflation in our economy. This is the point that the Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank was making earlier this afternoon at estimates when she described our approach as sensible and appropriate to the times that we confront. Because of this challenge, the budget provided cost-of-living relief in a responsible and targeted way: $7½ billion across cheaper early childhood education, cheaper medicine and the expansion of paid parental leave, as well as a whole range of other measures around housing. But perhaps most important of all is getting wages moving again in our economy. That is, as I said yesterday, a deliberate design feature of our economic policy. That's why, in the budget, there were policies to enable people to train for higher wage opportunities; there was cheaper child care so that parents can work more and earn more if they want to; and there were investments in industries where the secure well-paid jobs of the future will come from. And also, of course—and we saw this today with the passage through the House of the minister for industrial relations' legislation—we have put our backs into making sure that, across all those areas I nominated in the budget as well as in industrial relations, we are getting wages moving again in this country.

For too long in Australia, wages growth has been stagnant. For too long wages growth has been too low. For too long in this country, ordinary working people who make the biggest contribution to our national prosperity have not been getting the reward they deserve for their efforts. For too long in this country and in this economy, ordinary working people have been copping it in the neck at the same time as profits have been rising. So what we want to see in this country is everybody getting just reward for their efforts so that, when we grow our economy, Australian working people get a slice of the action. That's what the legislation that passed through here this morning was all about, that's what the budget was all about and that's what this government is all about.

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