Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Treasurer. I refer the Treasurer to his statement last year that the budget was about jobs, jobs, jobs. Given that 2011 was the first year in 20 years when Australia had no net jobs growth, given that he has now admitted that his estimates in the budget on job creation were dead wrong, will the Treasurer now admit that the carbon tax will cost Australians jobs, jobs, jobs?

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the shadow Treasurer for his question because there is nothing more central to the Labor Party purpose than jobs. They go to the very core of the quality of life and the security of families. We understand that and, because it is based on our values, we put in place the response to the global financial crisis and the global recession which protected jobs in this country. On this side of the House, we understand how damaging high unemployment can be, what it does to our skills base and how it destroys communities. There is nothing more central to us, as a Labor government, than creating prosperity, which generates jobs and spreads opportunity to every corner of our country.

There is nothing we are more proud of than the fact that we have unemployment at 5.2 per cent. If those opposite had been in power three years ago, it would have gone through the roof and great parts of this country would have experienced very high unemployment. Because of our concern for jobs, we acted swiftly. We got the big economic calls right and now we are entering a new phase in our economy, as the Prime Minister was saying before. We have low unemployment but there is pressure on our economy. A higher dollar is causing stresses and strains across a numberof sectors of our economy. We understand it is our responsibility to work with industry, to work with local communities, to work our way through these issues. We are committed to an auto industry in this country but we also understandthatit faces great challenges in terms of global demand, challenges in terms of competitivenessbecause of a higher dollar. We also understandthatthere are challenges in tourism, education export and so on, but we are planning for the future. We are putting in place the reforms which will make our industries competitive.

One of the things I cannot understand when we get this question from the shadow Treasurer is that we are about to bring in a substantial tax cut for 2.7 million small businesses to make them more competitive and they want to stop it. But it is worse than that. They want to give a tax cut to Clive Palmer and Gina Rinehart —just one example of the twisted priorities of those opposite.

We on this side of the House are committed to a competitive Australia, one which creates jobs with decent and fair working conditions and one which provides opportunities to our children and our grandchildren .