Ewen Jones (Herbert, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Just a couple of weeks ago, just before Anzac Day, a group from my region spent a week in southern China, in Guangdong Province. It was organised on the back of Trade and Investment Queensland. We had representatives there from local government, Townsville City Council and Charters Towers Regional Council. We had the Townsville Port Authority, Townsville Enterprise and me. The minister for primary industries in the state government was also in attendance.

This is what the budget is about. A $5 billion concessional loan facility for regional Australia and the north of the country is exactly what we are talking about here. This is what my region is doing: getting on with the job. What this says to me is that we are in that part of the world where we have to really be aggressive in the marketplace to look for those jobs. What we will be doing is backing small business to accelerate their movement into here with infrastructure, getting those things that need to be done to facilitate trade, because government does not create new jobs; business creates jobs. What government does is set the circumstances around which business can operate, and from there employment is created.

We have a real problem with youth unemployment in this country, and we need real solutions. We have to have a very serious talk about this, and it is the same with senior unemployment, among over-50s, and underemployment. The things we are doing in this space, with the help of this budget, will see this country develop brilliantly. I thank the House.