Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have received a letter from the honourable member for McMahon proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely:

The impact of the Government's failed economic management on jobs and the cost of living.

I call upon those honourable members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

When this Treasurer's time in office comes to an end, probably at the hands of his own party in the not-too-distant future, he will be remembered for a few things. He will not be remembered for bringing down a surplus, because he will not be doing that. He will never bring down a surplus. But he will be remembered for the times that he was allowed out and gave his views on economic policy—the times when the Prime Minister's office, those rare occasions, authorise the Treasurer to go out and make public comments. There was a time when he said, 'Poor people don't drive cars.' He will be remembered for that. But even more than that, he will be remembered for his great advice to young Australians in particular about housing affordability: to go get a better paying job. That advice was taken so well by so many millions of Australians because they had never of it! They had never thought of going and getting a better paid job to give them a better chance of getting into the housing market.

But what was most insulting about that Treasurer's intervention, what Australians have found most angering about his contribution, is that on his watch it has become harder to get a job and harder to get a better paying job, because unemployment is up and wages growth is down on his watch as a result of his actions and his policies. We have the highest rate of unemployment since 2002, when the now Prime Minister was minister for employment. It is the highest rate since then. We have 800,000 Australians unemployed. That is the most since 1994. Since the last election, 114,000 Australians have joined that unemployment queue—114,000.

Government Members:

Government members interjecting—

Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The government scoffs. They mock. They engage in their childish games. And, as they have done so, more than 114,000 Australians have joined the unemployment queue. We have got youth unemployment, which can soberly, carefully, objectively be called a crisis, because it is at 13.8 per cent. There are 300,000 young Australians unemployed—young Australians who should be getting into the labour market, who should be building their skills and building their experience. Instead, they are engaged in soul-destroying youth unemployment, which sees their self-esteem attacked, which sees their opportunity evaporating, which sees them thrown on the scrap heap in their younger years—the dispiriting scourge of youth unemployment. Yet, we get this Treasurer who insults them and simply says: go get a better paying job. That is his economic plan: go get a better paying job.

Well, he needs to go get a jobs plan. He needs to go get a plan for a better and stronger economy. That is what this Treasurer needs to do. Sometimes international events can see unemployment go up. Sometimes there are global recessions and unemployment goes up, and a Treasurer and a government is limited in what they can do. But we have been through that period. We went through that period of the global financial crisis, and unemployment did not top six per cent once during the global financial crisis in Australia. It certainly topped six per cent elsewhere. We saw the UK at eight per cent, the US at 10 per cent and Canada at nine per cent. But in all those countries unemployment is now coming down as Australia's unemployment rate continues to go up. We see unemployment coming down right around the world but going up in Australia on this Treasurer's watch. That is the circumstance we are faced with in Australia. That is the circumstance that unemployed people are faced with.

What the government are doing is having rhetoric-led recovery. They are strong on the rhetoric. They have lots of things to say about our economy. They have plans to do all sorts of things. Let us go through a few of those. We know on this side of the House that one of the areas in which you can create jobs, one of the areas with good paying jobs and in which jobs of the future can be created is a thing called 'renewable energy'. There are these wind turbines, which are apparently a blight against humanity according to some. The Treasurer has declared war on them. He hates them. They are ugly compared to all of the things he loves, but they actually can create jobs, as can solar technology. Renewable energy right around the country is creating jobs, and this government hate it—and they have wrecked it. We have gone from being one of the top four countries in the world for investment in renewable energy under the previous Labor government to 10th under this government. Their prejudice against science and renewable energy has wrecked renewable energy. The Labor Party—the member for Port Adelaide, the member for Brand and I—had to step in and negotiate a better renewable energy target to save them from their own incompetence.

Then we have infrastructure. Remember we have the infrastructure Prime Minister! We also have the Indigenous affairs Prime Minister! Those are both areas that he has cut. He is the minister for women as well! During question time we saw the approach to taxation from the Treasurer and from the Prime Minister for women as well. Two years ago yesterday, the then Leader of the Opposition said:

What we want to do is build, build, build so that there are jobs, jobs, jobs for Australians.

What he has done is nothing, nothing, nothing! We have had nothing, nothing, nothing from the Prime Minister. We have public spending on infrastructure at 3½ per cent of GDP. That is just barely above the record lows since records began. In 2010—just five years ago—it was 5½ per cent. Under this infrastructure Prime Minister, it is 3½ per cent! There is no plan there to build jobs.

Then we have the Treasurer, old 'huff and puff'! Remember we had the G20 in Australia? It was a good thing. It was secured by the previous Labor government and held in Brisbane. It was a good thing to have the G20 here, but the Treasurer could not help himself. He went out and puffed his chest, and he said: 'I have reached an historic agreement. I have got every finance minister in the world to agree that we are going to add growth to the world economy.' They had not thought of it before coming to Brisbane! It had not occurred to them that it was a good idea! They needed this Treasurer to explain it to them! He said: 'This is historic—a great step forward. We are going to add two per cent to growth.' What has happened? Nothing, nothing, nothing yet again. It was all words. Joe Hockey's great global plan for growth, which he engineered, has turned out to be absolutely nothing.

This is a government that is completely bereft of ideas and of a plan for jobs and growth. They talk about it; they do not understand it. They do not understand the need to plan for the future. They do not understand the need to plan for jobs of the future. On this side of the House, we understand the challenges and the opportunities. We know that 40 per cent of all Australian jobs are at risk from automation over the next 15 years—that is five million jobs which may not exist by 2030—but new jobs will be created. Australian people should be optimistic. New jobs will be created. The question is: will we be creating young people who can win those jobs, who are skilled to get those jobs and who can create the jobs in an age of entrepreneurialism? Can they do that? This government certainly cannot. When we have outlined plans to teach coding in school, to lift the qualifications of teachers in maths, and to give young people the chance to study science, technology, engineering and maths debt-free through our university system, what did this Prime Minister do? He said, 'This is outrageous. You are going to teach children to code and program. What do you want to do? Send them to work at age 11?' That is his answer for jobs of the future. He is so completely stuck in the past that he does not understand that encouraging young people to learn, and teaching them about, science, technology, engineering and maths helps them to prepare for the jobs of the future and that it helps them to prepare for a rapidly changing world.

This is a Prime Minister who is so stuck in the past, so stuck in previous decades, that he does not understand the opportunities that are arising for Australia. Instead, we have a Prime Minister and a Treasurer who mock, who scorn and who insult. They tell Australians, 'Go get a better paying job.' They tell Australians, 'Poor people do not drive cars.' They tell Australians: 'We all need to tighten our belts. The age of entitlement is over.' They divide Australians between lifters and leaners. Australians deserve better than that. They deserve a government which unites Australians. They deserve a government which concentrates on the opportunities for the future. They deserve a government which has a plan for infrastructure; has a plan for science, technology, engineering and maths; has a plan for job creation; and has an optimistic focus on the future. They deserve a government that is not stuck in the past, that is not stuck in division and that is not stuck with insults, like this failed Treasurer is. They deserve a government that actually understands that Australia's best years can be ahead of us. The best years of those 800,000 unemployed Australians can be ahead of them, but they will not be ahead of them when they have a Prime Minister and a Treasurer who simply do not understand what it means to have a jobs plan for Australia. They do not understand the opportunities. All that they understand is division, prejudice and, most of all, chaos.

Josh Frydenberg (Kooyong, Liberal Party, Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Look at what Labor does not what Labor says. Its six years in office saw more than 500,000 jobs lost in small business alone. Labor rotated ministers like no tomorrow—one every year. Labor saw businesses, big and small, suffocated by more than 21,000 new regulations. This is the Labor Party that brought to you the carbon tax and the mining tax—those jobs-destroying taxes which sent investment offshore. This is the Labor Party that gave us Grocery Watch, Fuelwatch, overpriced school buildings, and the tragic pink batts fiasco. So, when it comes to looking at what Labor says, it is more important to look at what Labor does.

In contrast, the Abbott government, in two years in office, has delivered more than 330,000 new jobs. This year alone, 163,000 new jobs have been created—nearly four times the pace of new job creation under those opposite. If you look at female workforce participation, it is now at the highest level since we started recording those numbers: 171,000 more women are in jobs today than at the time of the 2013 election. The shadow Treasurer talks about the unemployment rate of 6.3 per cent, which we accept is too high and which we are trying to get down. Let us not forget that when the shadow Treasurer was the Treasurer, on 2 August 2013 in his economic statement, he predicted 2014-2015 unemployment numbers to be 6.25 per cent. So the rate is very much consistent with what the Treasury numbers were when Labor was last in office.

Then if you look at our headline economic numbers, the March GDP quarter growth was 0.9 per cent. That is higher than it was in other comparable developed economies, including all the G7 economies. We have seen retail sales up 4.9 per cent over this time last year. Export volumes are up five per cent year on year, as we see the dividends from the heavy investment. 223,000 new companies were registered in 2014. Ten out of the last 12 months have seen rises in the job advertisements, project approval times have been halved and we have seen $1 trillion worth of projects approved by this government. The most recent project we are debating in this chamber is one that will create 10,000 jobs as a result of the Adani investment in coalmine in Queensland. If Labor would get out of the way, those jobs would actually be created.

If you think about small business, one of the things that we need to do is to introduce more flexibility into our labour markets, so we said at the last election that we will get the Productivity Commission to produce a report into the workplace relations sphere. What the unions and the Labor Party do? They kiboshed it before the report even hit the desks of those in this place. Some of the issues it talked about were unfair dismissals, penalty rates, greenfields and statutory contracts. They were all on the table from the same organisation that gave us the NDIS, namely the Productivity Commission. But those opposite will not undertake any reform in the workplace relations sector unless, of course, it betters the position of the union movement, who they are beholden to.

The union movement only represents about 12 to 13 per cent of private sector workers in this economy and in this country, so 88 per cent of private sector workers decide not to join the union. But the other side of the political divide is completely dominated by former union officials and union members on their side of politics, and that dictates their bad policy in this place. If we are serious about getting youth unemployment down from around 14 per cent—where it is today—and if we are serious about getting unemployment down from 6.3 per cent, we need serious workplace relations reform.

In the other place—the Senate, where the red seats and the red carpet rule—those opposite blocked the reintroduction of the Australian Building and Construction Commission, which was effectively a cop on the beat that came out of the Cole royal commission in 2004 and which produced a $6 billion annual productivity dividend to the Australian economy. But what did Labor do when they got into office? They got rid of it. Not because it was not creating jobs—it was—and not because it was not policing building sites—it was—but because it was a bit uncomfortable for their friends in the union movement.

Did you know that the number of days lost to industrial disputation per 1,000 employees before the ABCC came into existence was 224 days? 224 days were lost to industrial disputation per 1,000 employees before the ABCC came into effect; after the ABCC came into effect, that number fell to just 24. That is what job creation is about: less dimes spent industrial disputation, lower costs for buildings and more of a green light for investment.

I could go on. What about our infrastructure projects? Just listen to these numbers. The WestConnex project—and I see the member for Bennelong there; it is in his state of Sydney—creates 10,000 jobs directly and indirectly. The Bruce Highway, with a $3.6 billion contribution from the Australian government, will create 10,000 jobs. This Pacific Highway duplication will create 4,000 jobs and 12,000 jobs indirectly. NorthConnex will create 8,700 jobs. The Western Sydney airport, which we made a decision on after half a century of indecision, will create 4,000 construction jobs and 35,000 jobs by 2035. What about in my state of Victoria, where the East West Link was shovel ready to create 6,000 jobs? Those opposite basically turned a blind eye when their friends in the Labor Party and Daniel Andrews, the Premier of Victoria, ripped up that contract and introduced serious sovereign risk into my state.

What about Labor's job-destroying multinational tax policy, which will cost jobs? The deputy secretary of Treasury, Rob Heferen, was at Senate estimates on 2 June 2015. When asked, 'Would this policy cost jobs?' Mr Heferen said, 'Yes.' What about what the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry said about Labor's policy on multinationals? They said that it will make Australia a less attractive place for international investment, thereby pushing projects offshore and hurting jobs. What about what the BCA said about Labor's tax policy? They said that it has the potential to slow economic growth and further diminish Australia's competitiveness.

Mr Husic interjecting—

Colleagues on this other House, if you want to know why those opposite and the member the Chifley are not ready for government, it is because of this very question that was put to the shadow Treasurer. The shadow Treasurer was asked this at a doorstop interview on 6 June:

The Treasury deputy secretary said a senate estimates this week that Labor's multinational tax policy would cost jobs if it was ever implemented. Given this revelation, are you still committed to the policy?

Chris Bowen, the shadow Treasurer, answered: 'Absolutely.' That says it all. The Labor Party has a $50 billion-plus blackhole in their costings. They left us a legacy of escalating debt that is reaching $667 billion and an interest bill of $1 billion a month that is growing to $3 billion a month, which means that money flows offshore that cannot go to hospitals, roads or schools. That was their legacy and now they have the hide to come into this place to move a motion about jobs.

There is one last point I want to mention, because this is the red carpet to job creation in this country: our free trade agreements with China, Korea and Japan—three booming and strong economies in our region. We know tens of thousands of jobs will be created by the China free trade agreement. We heard in the parliament today that the Leader of the Opposition, when it comes to free trade agreements, says one thing in private and another thing publicly to his friends in the union movement. We support jobs and we are the only party that delivers real jobs.

Ed Husic (Chifley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am worried about my friend the member for Kooyong. He did not deliver that with much vim or vigour. You are not your usual self, Member for Kooyong. Normally you are bursting out of the gate! Even he cannot come here today and defend this government against its tawdry record, against a failing record and against what everyone knows: this government is not up to the job of delivering jobs. It is nearly two years since this government has been in place.

Tim Watts (Gellibrand, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They think they are still in opposition!

Ed Husic (Chifley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They are, member for Gellibrand, acting like they are still in opposition. They are always causing a fight and they always want to find a way to create division. For nearly two years they have been trying to get through their first budget—a budget that shocked the general public because of the fact that it was such a contrast to what was being promised, to what was being suggested would happen when this government got into office, to what they were planning to do. They shocked and stunned the public massively.

But I have got to say, when you think about that stalled budget, I like reading The Australian Financial Review, especially on the weekends. It is a very good read. What I like about it is that editor Michael Stutchbury has got a sense of humour—he does! I looked at it on the weekend. The person who had trouble getting his first budget through, who spent most of the two years in office trying to get a budget through—do you know what they called him? They called him the 'delivery man'. They called Joe Hockey the delivery man. Stutch has got a great sense of humour. This was a 'crackalackin' read!

Look at growth. It was spluttering along, and the RBA was softening us up for lower growth. Joe Hockey's quote in this article is, 'Our economy is more robust today than it has ever been.' That is the Joe Hockey quote. He reckons it is more robust than it has ever been. This is what the man who struggled to get his own budget through said: 'Look what we have achieved in the first 22 months and no-one could accuse us of standing still.' This is a Treasurer who counts going backwards as momentum. He will take that; he will count going backwards as momentum.

Look at every single measure. Joblessness is now higher than it was in the GFC, the highest in 20 years—backwards on that. He is going to count that as momentum. Growth, as I have mentioned, is already softening and is nowhere near the level that will help sustain job growth. Living standards are quite a shock and should have received a lot more focus, when you consider what is happening on that front. You can see here that the living standards of Australians—as measured by real, net national disposable income per capita—have gone backwards for four straight quarters under this government—backwards! Look at what is happening with wages. Wages are growing now at the lowest rate of growth since the RBA began records, the lowest rate of growth since 1995. The Treasurer is claiming we are not standing still. He is right. He is not standing still—the economy is going backwards, growth in wages is flattening and the jobless rate is higher. Also, debt and deficit; they do not talk about that much anymore. Where is the old debt and deficit line that you used to have? Where did it go? They are right; they are not standing still. Debt and deficit has gone up. They told us it would go down. It is up. So on every measure this government has failed us. And the 'delivery man'? What is he delivering?

Michelle Rowland (Greenway, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Bad news!

Ed Husic (Chifley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Bad news, as the member for Greenway rightly says. Always, all of the measures have gone backwards. We have here the member for Kooyong as the Assistant Treasurer. Again, they are saying, 'We are not going to stand still.' Member for Kooyong, the public wants to see us have a tax system that is fit for purpose and that is not being gamed by multinationals. They want to see some response. The member for Kooyong spent most of his time defending inaction—a failure to actually act on that rate. He mentioned project approvals, like that was the hard work of the government. The government had to tick off on an approval, and they are claiming credit for it. They are not claiming credit for all the other stuff that is happening in the economy that is going backwards—they are not acknowledging that. This is the problem with the government: they have no creativity, imagination or ability to guide the economy through. All they will do is deliver us division, argument and politicking, but they will not deliver what the people want: jobs, growth and a stronger future.

Karen McNamara (Dobell, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Chifley. Denial, denial, denial—'denial' is not a river in Africa. Once again, all we see in this place is those opposite trashing the Australian economy and the jobs market. You are more focused on your union-led propaganda and your protection rackets; that is all you care about. Since coming to office this government has created 330,000 jobs. There are 330,000 people who, under you, had no jobs. Australia's job growth over the past year has been stronger than that in the US, in the UK, in Canada and in every G7 nation. We have seen job creation at four times the highest level it was in Labor's last year in office. Since the beginning of this year around 163,000 new jobs have been created—that is more than 38,000 new jobs last month. We have seen the labour market continuing to perform strongly in the first seven months of 2015, after a strong 2014.

We talk about the free trade agreements. A recent report commissioned by the government estimates that the China-Australia Free Trade Agreement will, when combined with trade deals finalised by this government with Japan and Korea, create an average of almost 9,000 jobs per year and will create 178,000 jobs by the time the agreements come into full force in 2035. But what do those opposite do? They are behind this negative advertising campaign full of scaremongering. They are not telling the truth. The truth is the FTA with China will create jobs. In my electorate of Dobell, for example, we have got this new company called SpotGo. They are ready to expand into China. It means creating new Australian jobs in my electorate of Dobell. If you want to have a go about 457 visas—the hypocrisy!—well, we are talking about jobs too. The former member for Dobell, Craig Thomson, has got a new job. Do you know what he is doing? He is selling 457 visas. That is what he is now doing for a job. Craig is out there creating jobs—but they are not Australian jobs.

Ms Owens interjecting —

I'm talking about jobs in my electorate and your absolute hypocrisy. We are doing some great things in Dobell. Work for the dole—amazing. These young people are getting skills and getting into employment. When I became the member for Dobell, I invited someone from one of the departments to come into my office. I said to them: how much was spent by the previous government over the last 12 months on job creation funding for young people in the Dobell electorate? They could not answer. All they said was 'millions and millions and millions'. That was under those opposite. Our program to get kids off the streets and teach them to fly aeroplanes was a huge success. We are looking at practical solutions that are going to get young people into long-term sustainable jobs. Those on the other side are laughing. Well, I don't think trying to get kids off the street to learn how to fly aeroplanes is a joke.

In this budget the government has committed $50 billion to infrastructure. That is really important for my electorate. We have been starved for the last six years. Under the union controlled former Labor government, under the sadly lacking leadership of Craig Thomson, we got nothing for six years in Dobell, and for 16 years under the state Labor government. And now we are hearing about this unprecedented $30 million of union membership money that is going to be spent on, basically, scaremongering and lying in marginal seats. Shame on you! One thing I will not do is allow Dobell to ever come under union control again. They are already taunting me that they are going to have an HSU member running against me. Good luck to them! We will not let it happen in our marginal seats. We will tell the people the truth. We are here for the Australian people and we are here to create jobs, and that is what we intend to do. All you lot are interested in doing is creating union membership and then using $30 million of union membership money to run a rubbish campaign full of lies.

Ms Owens interjecting—

There is no cut for health. We are increasing funding in education. I go into my schools and I know what they want. For the first time, they are getting proper representation. (Time expired)

Andrew Leigh (Fraser, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Recently scientists have been exploring a creature known as the sea squirt. It is a fascinating creature. It is a simple creature whose job in life is to try and locate a place on the sea floor, where it will sit and feed for the remainder of its life. It takes a little while to discover that place, but once it does, it begins absorbing parts of its body. It absorbs its tail, its eye, its spine and, finally, it eats its brain. That is right, the sea squirt gets to where it wants to be and then eats its own brain.

I am sure I not the only one in this House who, when I hear about the sea squirt, starts to think about the history of the Abbott government. They had a brain that was devoted to getting where they needed to be and, once they gained power, they just ate their own brain. You can talk to Labor Party supporters who are appalled by this government, but you can also talk to plenty of Liberal Party supporters who say, 'What is this mob doing!' They gave a knighthood to a duke. They goaded Holden to leave the country. They promised that submarines would be made in Adelaide. But they had a defence minister who said the Australian Submarine Corporation could not built a canoe—despite being headed by one of their own—and that they would not build submarines in Adelaide. They said they would create jobs. But now we have got the highest unemployment rate in more than a decade and the highest youth unemployment rate in more than two decades. They said that, under a coalition government, taxes would always be lower. But when you look at their own budget papers they do not show that picture. In fact, they show taxes going up every year and they show that the tax share is going to be higher under this government than it was under the former Labor government.

Before the coalition came to office—back when they had that small brain that was trying to get to where they wanted to get to—they said that the election of a coalition government would be like 'a shot of adrenaline'. Now the best they can say is 'The consumer confidence figures are really good; they're nearly as good as they were two years ago.' Oh wait, they fell after this government was elected! They said at the G20 that they would deliver two per cent growth—that is two per cent growth over five years, so it is a mere 0.4 per cent a year. But we now read in the 'Government Gazette'—I mean The Australianthat there is no chance of that target ever being met. They reckon that, despite the fact that they have increased the unemployment rate, they need to punish young people into work. 'Six months without the dole,' they said. But then they said, 'No, we'll be really generous to you: you only have to live in your car for a month before you get the unemployment benefit!' They said that there would be no cuts to health, education, pensions, the ABC or the SBS. That has turned out to be less a promise and more a to-do list. We have had cuts to health. We have had cuts to education. We have had cuts to pensions. We have had cuts to the ABC and cuts to the SBS—the very same firm whose camera Mr Abbott was looking down when he made that promise.

Oh, I missed one thing from that list, and that is the GST—the tax that Mr Abbott said 33 times before coming to office he would 'never ever' increase. And now Mike Baird says it is a 'sensible idea' to increase the GST by 50 per cent. So much for 'never ever' increasing the GST; it is fast becoming clear that Mr Abbott's economic strategy is to starve the states in supporting a GST increase. We have ambitious growth targets in the budget projections—so ambitious the Reserve Bank is now saying they do not think they can be met. And we have got a tax debate. The government has put out a tax white paper saying, 'Let's look at whether superannuation tax is fair and sustainable.' Many business groups say that is a good idea. Many tax experts say that is a good idea. The government now says they definitely would not touch the superannuation tax concessions—despite the fact that they called for a debate on those tax concessions in their own tax white paper. This would be funny if it were not so serious, if there were not serious challenges such as housing affordability, innovation and inequality facing Australia. Australia deserves better than this 'sea squirt' of a government.

Luke Howarth (Petrie, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise with pleasure today to talk on this MPI from the member for Bowman: 'The impact of the government's failed economic management on jobs and the cost of living'. I have to note that the member for Bowman comes into this place today—

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Luke Howarth (Petrie, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I mean the member for Bowen, and his contribution is to attack the Treasurer in a very personal way and bring up what he will be remembered for—'He'll be remembered for this; he'll be remembered for that'—in a really nasty, aggressive way. The member for Bowen is not showing leadership. That is not the leadership that the Australian people want to see—personal attacks. I say the member for Bowen is not fit for leadership. We heard from the member for Chifley and we heard from the member from Fraser, and they were able to construct an argument in a decent way, but the member for Bowen comes in here and criticises in a really personal way.

Opposition members interjecting—

I mean the member for McMahon. It is very funny. I am sorry. Forgive me; I am a new member. The shadow Treasurer is not fit for leadership, but I will not go on. He says that the economy is not going well—we see the Labor Party continuing to talk down the economy. He spoke about RET. What have they done for the last two years? They have only spoken about how we are not going to achieve it and how it is not going to be reached. We came up with a target we are on track to achieve, and the next minute they say it is going to be 50 per cent—no plan, no modelling; overnight a 50 per cent RET target. How they are going to pay for it? No idea. We see what the unions have been doing in relation to the CHAFTA, the China-Australia free trade agreement. The member for Moreton, who is a good fellow, came in here the other night and, in the adjournment debate, he was quick to attack the member for Dawson. Some members opposite ignore the xenophobia and fearmongering that goes on from the unions in relation to CHAFTA. There is hypocrisy in that. Talking down the economy is not the way to go.

In relation to jobs, we are all about jobs. We have a high target of one million jobs in five years. I am happy to say that, because it is something that we want to achieve. We have things in place like the Green Army, like Work for the Dole, like the $5 billion jobactive program to help the over 50s, and like our work experience program—which the member for Bowman is a champion of and is about to implement. As members here, we want to see our electorates do well. We want to see that, when people wake up on a Monday morning, they have a place to go. We saw, last month alone, 38,000 new jobs created. I think we are at 330,000 jobs, which is slightly below our target but I believe we will get there.

In relation to the cost of living, we have to look at Labor's record. We saw increased taxes on business and the mining tax. Right now the mining industry is in a bit of a downturn. Did the mining tax have something to do with that? Maybe it did. The carbon tax had an effect on the cost of living—not just on electricity and gas bills but when you go down to the local shops to buy food or you go out to have dinner at a restaurant. Last week the AMWU came and saw me in relation to shipbuilding in this country. I strongly support shipbuilding in this country. They said that we have a five-year gap where there are no ships being built. The Defence budget was cut significantly and, as the Prime Minister raised in question time today, not one ship was ordered. That is why we have a five-year gap.

Member for Chifley, I will raise Labor's debt and deficit. I promised I would. That does push up the cost of living. You talk about the GST. We should not be increasing any taxes until we can get a government that spends less than we earn. We have schoolchildren up there in the gallery. They know and their parents know that you cannot spend more than you earn year in, year out. We are at eight years and all we get from those opposite are more unfunded policies, higher taxes, 'Let's increase super' and everything else. We stand for lower taxes.

Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to address some of the comments made by the member for Petrie//Bowen/Bowman opposite. I want to put a few things in context, because he touched on the fact that he is a new member. So I will go back to two years ago, because he has been a member for two years, and point out a couple of things. For a start, in those two years, debt has increased by $108 billion on your watch. Let us compare a few other things from two years ago, when you were democratically elected by the people of Petrie. The unemployment rate when you were elected was 5.8 per cent. Now it is 6.1 per cent—the highest since 2002. Youth unemployment when we were voted out was 12.4 per cent. Now it is at 13.5 per cent. All of those young lives damaged because they have not been given real jobs, real opportunities. The last time it was that high was when Tony Abbott, the member for Warringah, was the employment minister. There is a bit of a trend developing here. Real net national disposable income per capita has decreased for the last four quarters. Growth in average weekly earnings is at 1.5 per cent, the lowest for nearly 20 years. The dollars that we get in our pocket are buying us less. Government debt is now at $381 billion, an increase of $108 billion in two years, or a 40 per cent increase. If there had been a debt and deficit disaster—the narrative that Joe Hockey clung to for the first five minutes that he was in office—if that had been the case and they had stopped borrowing and stop spending on programs, I could understand; but there are all those borrowings and still unemployment is at 800,000—ridiculous levels, frightening figures. The GDP back in September 2013, when those came opposite to office, was at 2.6 per cent. It is at 2.2 per cent at the moment. These are the facts that I just wanted to lay out for those opposite, because this is how the economy has changed under their watch.

We saw the Deputy Prime Minister stand up today and give us the carbon tax talk. It was like being taken back to four or five years ago. He was reliving the hits of 1970 or something like that. It is because those opposite do not have a plan for the future. Every single week that Tony Abbott has been Prime Minister 1,000 extra people have become unemployed. How is that for a figure? It is a horrible figure. As I said, that is 800,000 people. In July, another 40,000 people joined the unemployment queue.

Before the election, the member for Warringah said that he would deliver jobs. But, instead, he has done a job on the Australian economy—a shameful job. Since this government took office, the 1,000 people who have been forced to join the unemployment queue in electorates like Moreton and Petrie have been asking, 'What is the plan? What is the government's plan?

It is obviously not going to include renewable energy. Large-scale renewable energy investment has fallen by 88 per cent. At the same time world investment in renewable energy has increased by 16 per cent, investment here dropped by 88 per cent. What did that translate to? Lost jobs.

Mr Hutchinson interjecting—

I am sure they will remember that down in Tasmania. Under Labor, we went through the global financial crisis, the worst economic time since the Great Depression, but still unemployment did not go over six per cent. This government is negligent.

Let's compare ourselves with other countries. Unemployment rose to eight per cent in the UK, to 10 per cent in the US and to nine per cent in Canada. Let's look at them now. The unemployment rate in the UK is 5.6 per cent. The unemployment rate in the US is 5.3 per cent. The unemployment rate in Germany is 4.7 per cent. They are comparable countries.

Under this government's stewardship, we are going backwards and there is no positive plan for the future. Obviously the Prime Minister has no vision. He is a boxer looking for an opponent. That is what he likes. He likes to 'fight against' rather than 'work for'. This country does not have time for him. We need a leader who is able to make the right decisions. (Time expired)

David Coleman (Banks, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today's discussion is about jobs, so let's talk about jobs. There is nothing more important to jobs in Australia than trade with our Asian partners and particularly with China. What this government has done through the free trade agreement is create an historic opportunity for the creation of tens of thousands of jobs.

Let's look at what those opposite say. Let's shift our attention to the normally very civil environment of the Federation Chamber, where just a couple of nights ago the member for Bendigo gave an extraordinary, divisive, completely unfounded and damaging speech about the free trade agreement. There was so much in that speech that I would hesitate to repeat, but one of the things she said was that:

It is also alarming for consumers to think that you could call an electrician to come to your house and not know whether they have Australian qualifications and safety standards or those of another country.

That is a very, very serious claim. That is basically trying to scare people and say that the electricity environment will not be safe because of the China free trade agreement. But we know from the Australia-China Relations Institute, headed up by Bob Carr, that, under the China FTA, the skill level of 457 visa applicants from China will be assessed in exactly the same way as those from 150 other countries around the world.

We have an agreement here that is going to create 178,000 jobs. We have signed a trade agreement with our biggest trading partner. It is twice as big or more than our second biggest partner. It accounts for more than one-quarter of our entire trade. We have signed an extraordinary, blockbuster agreement with China that is going to create an extraordinary number of jobs right around the country, nowhere more than in my electorate of Banks where this agreement has been greeted with much enthusiasm.

We have a member over on the other side scaremongering and making appalling statements about this free trade agreement. If the Leader of the Opposition has any courage or capacity to pull his members into line, he should publicly rebuke his member for those appalling statements.

We are talking about jobs. The story on jobs is a very good one. We have the strongest rate of job creation in the G7. The G7 includes the biggest, most powerful economies in the world and Australia's job creation rate is the strongest. We got rid of the carbon tax, which has significantly improved the lives of ordinary Australian families and saved them $550 per year. We are also going to crack down on this absurd practice of fly-in fly-out litigation where environmental groups with no relation to a particular project can fly in and slap down a legal order and delay and frustrate projects that can create tens of thousands of jobs.

The Minister for the Environment has approved projects worth $1 trillion since taking office two years ago. He has approved $1 trillion worth of projects because he knows that the last thing we need is obstructionist, fly-in fly-out litigation. We need to get projects happening, construction on the ground, workers on the ground and cranes in the air. Last year we had record new-company creation—the highest since records were created. We had a 10 per cent increase in a year from 2013.

There is an alternative proposition on the other side. We as a society want to encourage people to save for superannuation. Those opposite want to smash hundreds of thousands of Australians with a new tax on superannuation. We want to encourage people to build assets. About 70 per cent of household assets are in housing—either owner occupied or investment. They want to hit people who invest in housing with a new tax through changes to negative gearing. We want to protect the environment through smart strategies that actually work, like Direct Action. They want to hit them with a new, souped up electricity tax scheme.

Tax reform is not about tax increases. Tax increases are tax increases are tax increases are tax increases. They are not tax reform; they are very, very different things. This government is committed to real tax reform to drive productivity and business formation. They just want to charge more tax.

Clare O'Neil (Hotham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am really pleased for the opportunity to participate in the matter of public importance today because it gives me a chance to reflect on what we have seen in the last, shall we say, eventful fortnight in politics. I think I speak for most Australians when I say that those of us on this side of the House did not believe that this government could get any more hapless, but then we got to August and the switch was flicked to craven, incompetent and, frankly, at times pretty damn weird. We hear a lot during MPIs and question time that the dynamic feels a little jovial, but I have to say it does not reflect the real attitude of people on this side of the House to what is happening in politics today. The truth is that we are worried—very worried—because what we see on the other side of the chamber is a government that has completely lost its way. Having lost its way, it has become consumed with things that are essentially meaningless to the lives of ordinary Australians. We have seen these things that the government obsesses over from day to day while real, serious issues are affecting the lives of Australians out there in the community.

Let me run through some of the examples. One of them is this awful leaking that we have seen from the cabinet over previous days. We have the Prime Minister coming out, as he does, all bluster, saying that he is going to crack down on people who leaked from cabinet, and then what do we see? Half an hour later what happens in cabinet gets leaked again. Day after day we are seeing the lines that get sent around from the Prime Minister's office leaked out into the broader community, and all they are doing is just eating themselves up. But what is probably even more worrying than all this is the fact that, all the while that they consume themselves with these problems, the government have no agenda. We saw it earlier with the leaked cabinet document. Basically, the cabinet met to talk about a few matters that were not really that important. There was no substantive policy on the cabinet agenda, and then the last note on the cabinet agenda was that the next meeting of cabinet was to be cancelled. We do see that down here in the House because we are scratching around a bit looking for legislation that we can talk about, when all of the things that are really critical to what is happening in this country at the moment are not getting debated and discussed in this parliament.

I do not want to gloss over one of the most awful and disappointing things we have seen in the last two weeks, and that is the scurrilous attempt to shut down the debate about equal marriage that should be happening today in this parliament. We have seen the Prime Minister, who is meant to be the statesman and to be showing leadership to this country, using his power as the leader of this country to try to stymie debate in his party room and to stack the party room so that the people of Australia do not get the debate that millions of them want to see in this chamber. The reason this is so worrying to us as Labor people is not that we really care what sorts of fights the people on the other side have between themselves but that there are fundamental problems facing this country that are not getting the attention that they deserve.

The critical problem facing this country today is unemployment. There are 800,000 Australians who are unemployed in this country today. That is an absolutely staggering figure and any government worth its salt would spend every minute of every day trying to work out what to do with these people and how to get them back into work. Yet what do we see? They just fight amongst themselves. That is not the end of the employment problems that we have in this country. One million Australians are underemployed and another 800,000 Australians are getting the disability support pension. All these problems are dramatically more difficult to solve than when we had the global financial crisis, when global conditions were so much more challenging.

We can never, ever forget when we face an employment issue in Australia the terrible plight of young people who are unemployed. We know that when young people spend significant time out of work they bear scars of that for their entire working lives. We look at these people when they are 40 years old and, if they spent significant periods unemployed in their youth, they are getting paid significantly less and have a much patchier employment record for the rest of their lives. It is a scourge on this country to have so many young people unemployed. Many of the people in this chamber would represent electorates where 20 per cent of young people are out of work. I feel this very acutely. When I talk to youth organisations, they tell me there are young people in their services who believe that they will never get a job.

What we have on the other side is a government that is consumed with its own particular controversies, and it is just not good enough for this country. It is not good enough.

Eric Hutchinson (Lyons, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It gives me great pleasure to speak on this matter of public importance because, indeed, jobs and the cost of living are things that are important to everyday Australians. They are important to people in my electorate as well, but the people in my electorate and the people in Tasmania lived it. They lived through the destructive misery that was created when we had the double whammy of a Labor-Greens government in Hobart and a Labor-Greens government in Canberra. They saw the damage that was created when that situation occurred. They saw the lack of jobs, they saw the opportunities taken away and they saw the incentive for people and small business to invest removed from them, because there was no incentive. The answer was always 'No'.

I see it here today and I hear them today. We saw in question time that the way they operate on the other side is by scaring good people with mistruths and misrepresentation of fact. They scared pensioners about things that this government has done. This is not why I got into this business; it is not why I was elected to represent the people. This is the same modus operandi that the Greens use in their fundraising campaigns. We have seen it on the Great Barrier Reef and in the good work that Greg Hunt has done. It is not about the Barrier Reef; he has removed from them the ability to scare people and, therefore, generate revenue for the causes that they want to prosecute. That leads us into the discussion around Adani. We lived it for six long years, where we had the Greens wagging the tail of the Labor dog. It was a disgrace. We saw that with the forestry industry. We have the best managed forests in the world in my state of Tasmania. It was never just about the people who were working in those forests. It was about workers in the takeaway shops. It was about the people working in the tyre businesses in Sorell. It was about the engineering shops in Launceston. These were the businesses. So, when they talk about the numbers of people employed, they never mention the broader impact that these sorts of industries had.

It is the same for Adani and Queensland. I heard a figure quoted the other day—I think it was by the Greens: 'There're only 2,000 jobs.' In fact, I got an email at my office the other day saying, 'There's only 2,000 jobs,' or 1,500 jobs. The figure we are quoting is 10,000 jobs, because it is not just about the people working directly in the mine; it is about all the other jobs there. It is about the transport operators. It is about the family businesses. It is about the subcontractors who work there, and I know that well. Whether it is Bell Bay Aluminium in the north of the state, whether it is Norske Skog at Boyer in my electorate, whether it is Nyrstar in the good member for Denison's electorate, we live this. The job-destroying tactics and misrepresentation by those on the other side is simply palpable.

Tasmania has turned the corner, I am very pleased to say, with small businesses once again having the confidence to invest—and it is little wonder, with the good work that this government has done, particularly in the last budget, with things like employee share schemes, the instant asset write-offs, the tax cuts and the discounts.

Unemployment is coming down. When we came to government in September 2013, unemployment in Tasmania was 7.9 per cent. Today it is 6.6 per cent. It is working, and every Tasmanian, if they are honest, knows it. They know we are working collaboratively with a government in Hobart that is absolutely committed to jobs and growth and they know we are working with a government here in Canberra that is absolutely committed to jobs and growth. My state and the good people of my state deserve so much better but were dealt a dud hand under Labor and the Greens for six long years.

We are turning the corner. Confidence is returning. As for services, we have seen tourist numbers in my state set new records this year. On education services, our very important University of Tasmania is attracting more students. These are things that will expand under the free trade agreements that we are negotiating. We have already done that with China, Japan and South Korea. Yet we have those on the other side, at the behest of the unions, trying to knock off the China free trade agreement. It is a disgrace.

Ross Vasta (Bonner, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The discussion has concluded.