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

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

The Government’s failure to provide employment opportunities for young Australians.

I call upon those 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—

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

If anyone should apologise to young Australians for the position they have been put in, it is that side of the House. That side of the House owes a massive apology to young Australians who have been denied the opportunity to get work in this country right now.

Let's have a look at what the government has done in terms of youth unemployment. There were a lot of lofty promises and a lot of indications that youth unemployment would be recognised as an issue and that those opposite would deal with it. We had, for example, the Minister for Employment, Senator Cash, saying:

Youth unemployment, both globally and in Australia, is unacceptably high. We know that early intervention is fundamental, particularly for those who need additional support …

And in the budget speech this year, the Treasurer said:

It is worth trying new ways to get young people into real jobs.

The government has said all along that it recognises that it is a problem and that it was going to fix it. But what is the reality? The reality is that youth unemployment is almost double the national average. Youth unemployment is somewhere near 12 and 13 per cent, because of this government's inability to create real jobs.

There are a number of people in this place who represent the regions who would be able to tell you that that figure is even worse in their area. It is even worse in the regions. In the Illawarra, for instance, youth unemployment is close to 17 per cent. This is a scandal—17 per cent in the Illawarra. In Moreton Bay, north of Queensland, it is over 16 per cent. In the Barossa, in Adelaide, it is nearly 14 per cent. South-west of Perth, in Fremantle and Rockingham, it is 14 per cent.

The youth labour market participation rate is at 65 per cent—a massive drop of over five per cent since last December. This is huge. According to the government itself—this is the government saying to Senate estimates what the reality is about youth unemployment—there are nearly 300,000 unemployed young people between the ages of 15 and 24 in this country right now. On top of this, the department acknowledged that there are another 170,000 who have been unemployed for more than a year and who are so disillusioned by that fact that they do not even bother to look for jobs—jobs that are simply not there.

Lisa Chesters (Bendigo, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They give up.

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

They just give up, as the shadow assistant minister says. So there are 170,000 on top of the 300,000, all admitted to by the department—all admitted to and acknowledged by that government over there.

And then we look at entry level jobs. A recent report from Anglicare shows that there are very few entry level jobs advertisements compared to the number of people actually looking for work—that is, the kind of work that young Australians would be targeting to get their start. That report shows that there is only one job advertised for every six low-skilled jobseekers in Australia—only one. That is the bleak picture that young Australians face under this government. Thirty-eight thousand competed for 22,000 entry level jobs advertised across Australia in May alone. In South Australia and Tasmania, that situation is even worse. In South Australia there are nine jobseekers for every job vacancy and in Tasmania there are over 10 jobseekers for every job vacancy.

If we look at the overall picture in terms of jobs in this country, the figures for this year show that, in the 10 months to October, 90,000 full-time jobs were lost as a result of the failures of those opposite. The bulk of the jobs created in this country this year, as acknowledged by the Reserve Bank, are part-time. Who has part-time bills? No-one has part-time bills. No-one has a part-time mortgage. There is massive underemployment in this country. We have record underemployment, record low wages growth and we can see what is happening in terms of jobs. Those opposite say that they are here to help, but this is how they have helped young people. Remember when they brought in the idea that they would stop young people from getting Newstart for six months?

Mr Bowen interjecting—

Then their answer was, shadow Treasurer, that they would bring it down to five weeks—because you do not have to eat for five weeks. That is the ridiculous situation that we have. What else happened? They cut $1 billion out of support for apprentices; apprentice numbers plummeted by roughly 130,000. We urged the government, for instance, to fix VET FEE-HELP so that young people could get access to vocational education and not be ripped off for it. They dragged the chain on that and did not help at all. Then, for young people who want to get a job, skill themselves up or go to university, what do they do next? They tried to bring in uni deregulation to price young people out of university. In their heart of hearts, they still believe that there should be $100,000 uni degrees—that is it. In their heart of hearts, that is their answer.

Further, the government savagely cut programs that would have made a difference for young people to get into work, programs like Youth Connections. Youth Connections was a tragic victim of their first budget, in 2014. Only when the damage was done did they slink back in here and re-fund it, but they did not call it Youth Connections; their big move was to call it Youth Connect. That was their big move.

Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Very innovative.

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

Absolutely—very agile, Member for Hunter. The government's other signature program, Work for the Dole, is failing badly. This program is absolutely tanking. Three months after being in that program, only 11 per cent of the people who go through the program get a job. That means nearly 90 per cent of the people who go through Work for the Dole do not get a job three months after they have done it. What is the point of the program? Let's go to the Secretary of the Department of Employment. When asked, 'What do you think about Work for the Dole?' she said:

The purpose of Work for the Dole is not necessarily to lead directly to a full-time job.

That is the Secretary of the Department of Employment saying Work for the Dole is not about getting a job. This is why youth unemployment is a problem. Right throughout the government, they have no answer as to where they will actually deliver on youth unemployment.

Talking about Work for the Dole, we learnt of the terrible, tragic fatality of a young person on a Work for the Dole site earlier this year. The government have undertaken an internal review and they still have not released the findings of that review. When are they going to step forward and say what changes have been made to give assurances to the rest of the country that anywhere this program is operating people will be safe? We have had no answer, but what we do know is that they are getting ready to move to a new program, called PaTH, which is designed to be an interns program, where they are basically going to pump 120,000 interns into the job market. And do not think they will be interns in the normal sense of the word; these will be intern waiters, intern baristas and intern construction workers.

Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They will just keep churning them over.

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

They will just churn them over. The interns will be paid less than the national minimum wage. They will get equivalent to $14 an hour, where the national minimum wage is $17. You will have subsidised interns going into a labour market where there is record underemployment and record low wages, and there will be no protection for those interns. That is why there was a Senate report this week that condemned the government for it. We have no assurances, for example, that those young people will get adequate workers compensation coverage or any other protections on the way through. This is where we are at. The government are failing on everything they touch. They have no idea.

It has been a long year for those opposite. This has effectively been a wasted year. You can tell it has been a long year because, as the year goes on, they shrink further in their seats. There is only one person on that side of this place who is smiling. It is not that person; it is not that person; it is not the member for Bowman; it is not the member for Berowra; is the member for Warringah. He is the only one who smiles these days. Why wouldn't he? He does not have to be Prime Minister anymore. I know those opposite love outsourcing; I never thought they outsourced amongst themselves. Basically, the member for Warringah has outsourced his entire policy framework to the Prime Minister. I never thought I would say this about the Prime Minister, but he has actually become a poor man's version of Tony Abbott. There he is, doing everything that Tony Abbott would. He has not got a clue.

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Chifley will refer to members by their titles, thank you.

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

I absolutely will. The problem is that the Prime Minister has spent all this time chasing a version of the member for Warringah by trying to bring the ABCC in but not looking at the things that matter to people. Families want to see their young get a job, get trained and find a way to get ahead. All that has been neglected in pursuit of an ideological obsession by those opposite. Young people are paying a price, and that is why I am saying: those opposite owe an apology to young Australians for failing them in their efforts to find work. The government simply have no answers and we will hear none from that side today. (Time expired)

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Assistant Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on what is a very important matter of public importance—very important indeed. The issue of youth unemployment is an endemic problem that this government is absolutely committed to addressing. The PaTH program, I believe, is a revolutionary program that is addressing the root causes of youth unemployment. When I used to get around to businesses and talk to employers, they would say to me that young people are presenting at the gates of their businesses without the necessary skills to hold down a job—skills that those of us who have been fortunate enough to have a job for many years take for granted, such as how to behave in the workplace, turning up on time and how you dress for work.

Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Why not give them skills and a job?

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Assistant Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I know the member for Franklin is not serious about unemployment. She is not serious about addressing the problem; she can only squawk and whinge and moan. The PaTH program addresses the key factors that are creating the challenges and keeping young people out of the workforce—those basic skills. Under the PaTH program, young people will have intensive training in what employers are expecting, like knowing to turn up on time, knowing how to dress in the workplace and knowing how to get on with your workmates—those very basic issues and very basic skills that are keeping them out of the workplace.

Opposition members interjecting—

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Lindsay and the member for Lyons are out of their places. One more peep and they will be evicted.

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Assistant Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is an important issue, and it is too important for catcalling from those members opposite—too important for that. The issue of internships is really important because so many young people are lacking the self-confidence to go out and get a job. They are lacking the self-confidence to go into the workforce.

Here you are dancing to the tune of your union masters—

Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Why not pay them a proper wage?

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Assistant Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am coming to that. If you would be quiet for two minutes you might learn something, member for Franklin. Why we have an internship program is that it offers young people the opportunity to get into the workforce while still retaining a strong link with the social security system so that they can remain on benefits and, at the same time, get work experience and earn additional income to compensate them for the effort that they are putting in, the effort that they are making in investing in their own future.

Many young people are scared about the prospect of going into the workplace. The internship program keeps that link with the social security system, helping to increase their confidence. The system also provides an incentive for employers to take on a young person. Many employers have had unhappy experiences taking on young people in their businesses, but the internship program allows them the opportunity to put on a young person for four to 12 weeks and see how they go, to offer them the opportunity to learn some new skills, to allow that employer to see how that young person is performing on the job and to see how that young person can contribute to their business.

The next concern that is often put forward by employers is the issue of the high cost of putting on a young person when they are not productive. Under the PaTH program there are wage subsidies of up to $10,000 to overcome those costs when a young person comes into a business and is not as productive as they might be after having a long period of experience in that job. The PaTH program is multifaceted. Firstly, it addresses the issue of employability skills, which are keeping so many young people out of the workforce. Secondly, it addresses the issue of offering an internship, which allows them to make a move into work but still retain that link with the welfare system, boosting their confidence and giving an employer the confidence to take on a young person. Thirdly, it addresses the issue of wage subsidies, which could make a difference between a young person getting a job and not getting a job. It is a great program. It is a massive commitment by this government in the employment of young people. It is offering around 120,000 places—

Mr Husic interjecting—

What is so upsetting about offering 120,000 young people an opportunity, member for Chifley? What are you so scared of? Are you scared that your union donors are going to get all upset, that they will be pulling the strings and there you will be, dancing to their tune, as you always are? We know you are dancing to the tune of your union mates. What do they say at the CFMEU you need to do? Their wish is your command—isn't it, member for Chifley?

Emma Husar (Lindsay, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Do you know why unions are there? You're an idiot!

Rob Mitchell (McEwen, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Lindsay will withdraw that comment.

Emma Husar (Lindsay, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw.

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Assistant Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This PaTH program shows our commitment to young people—$750 million says that we are serious about addressing the issue of youth unemployment. We are serious about addressing that issue. We are serious about addressing the barriers that you could not care less about. You are too busy taking your instructions from your union mates to look at what works, to look at what employers are saying, to look at what people in the industry who need to get people into work are saying—

Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Worse under you. Worse under you.

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Assistant Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You will have your chance in a minute, member for Franklin, I am sure. You are not interested in what—

Mr Husic interjecting—

Youth Connections was a failure. I heard the member for Chifley extolling the virtues of Youth Connections. It was an unmitigated failure.

The very subject of this MPI shows that they do not understand how jobs are created in this economy because it is not government that creates jobs, it is the private sector that creates jobs. That is why we on this side of the House are getting the budget back in the black—despite members opposing us at every turn in our efforts to get the budget back in the black. That is why we are investing $50 billion in infrastructure, creating thousands of jobs in the construction phase and creating thousands more as a result of the efficiencies—

Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He's misleading the House.

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

The member for Franklin might want to restrain her comments. It has been constant for seven minutes.

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Assistant Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

and many of those jobs, potentially, are going to young people. That is why we are reducing red tape—to free up businesses to do what they do best, to get on and deliver services to their customers and, in doing so, employ more young Australians. That is why we are entering into a free trade agreement—to provide export opportunities to create more jobs. We are absolutely committed to the free trade agreement, and that is why we are cracking down on the lawlessness in the building industry. Why should our construction costs be 30 per cent higher than they need to be? It is because the members opposite have their strings tugged by the good old members of the CFMEU and all their other union backers.

We are serious about ensuring that we have an efficient, effective construction sector that can offer more apprenticeships, that can offer more traineeships and that can offer more opportunities for young people. Those opposite are about marching to the tune of their union mates. This government, since we have been elected, has created some 467,000 jobs and at a rate faster than those on the other side of the House when they were last in government. But youth unemployment is a vitally important issue that we are absolutely addressing, and the PaTH program is a unique program showing the quantum of this government's commitment—$750 million—showing the expansiveness of this program—some 120,000 participants.

This can make a real difference to the level of youth unemployment in this country by giving young people the skills that will make them employable, by taking away the risk to employers, by allowing them to put on a young person through an internship system, by providing financial support to employers to participate, helping offset the cost of the supervision that a young person will need when they are first in the workplace and that all-important wage subsidy to bridge the productivity gap when the young person goes into the workforce. It is an excellent program.

But what do we hear from the members opposite? Negative carping and just being the mouthpiece for their union mates, rather than coming on board. I think this program is a game changer. I think this is going to mean many more young people in work, many more young people moving on to bigger and better things in their career. What we want to see is young people getting that first step into the labour market. We want to see them have the opportunity to get that very first job and keep that job, so that they can enjoy the benefits that work can bring.

It is not just about the money. It is about the self-esteem that comes from having a job. It is not just about the money. It is about being able to hold your head up high and say: 'I have a job. I am contributing to the economy. I can make my own financial decisions. I need not be dependent on the welfare system.' The welfare system should be a safety net not a destination for our young people. We are absolutely committed to addressing the issue of youth unemployment, and the PaTH program is a very dynamic and very effective program that is going to assist a lot of young people.

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Vocational Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Across this country in communities like mine, and in communities like the member for Cowper's local area, youth unemployment is an extremely significant and important issue to families, to communities and, I would hope, to members of this place. If the member for Cowper thinks that banging the drum again, carrying on about trade unions and criticising the opposition are going to cut it with people who are seriously concerned about youth unemployment, he is very, very wrong.

I found it quite disappointing to see a cheap shot at trade unions taken in a speech on an MPI about youth unemployment. If the evidence does tell us anything in this place, it is that the trade union movement, as too many families who have young people who have been injured at or died on a workplace know, has been at the forefront of protecting young people from being exploited and ensuring that they work under fair conditions and return home safely at the end of the day.

I am not going to stand here and have members opposite stand here in a debate on youth unemployment and use the trade union movement as some sort of battering ram just because their talking points say to bang on, bang on, bang on attacking the union movement. I know, as should every member in this place, that one of the most vulnerable categories of workers in the workplace are young people, who are often desperate to get a start, often really concerned to retain a job. They need and deserve the backup of the trade union movement, which has delivered in spades.

Students are finishing school as we speak. They are doing their end-of-year events, getting dressed up, hiring outfits, celebrating the end of their school years. But the reality for this cohort of young people is that they will face a much tougher job environment than any of us in this place have ever faced. It is getting tougher and tougher for young people to get a break into the workforce. There are two things that a government can do to really help with that. One of them is to ensure that they leave school with the best possible schooling they could have achieved in order to make them as well prepared as possible for the postschool world.

One of the most important things that we could be doing to make sure that happens is supporting the Gonski school funding reforms. Those reforms were about ensuring every kid in every school, regardless of sector or state, reached a funding standard that guaranteed them a quality of education, so that they were well prepared when they went out into their postschool world. We have seen the government fail dismally on that, run and hide and make excuses. The reality is that they have made significant funding cuts across that sector.

The second thing you can do as a government is then make sure that the postschool sector is well resourced and well organised to support them in getting the skills they need for the workplace. As the member for Chifley outlined, the government's record is just as appalling there. It infuriates me that the opportunities for skilled occupations which create good jobs and great careers have been decimated by this government time and time again. Do not talk to me about pathways and internships. You are a government that could not even go to the last election with a single policy on vocational education and training or apprenticeships—not a single policy.

As we saw, 130,000 apprentices disappeared out of the system. Many of those were in regions like mine, in regions of other members here and in the member for Cowper's area—regions where there was a real pathway to a long-term, good career. They were decimated because you cut a billion dollars out of the system. You have let TAFE be destroyed. You have no policy on TAFE. You have nothing to say about TAFE, yet it is such a significant pathway for young people to get skills and training. Indeed, in my own state of New South Wales, we found out today that the state Liberal government, under a National Party minister, had cut over $200 million out of TAFE there as well.

These are the things you could be doing, but you are not. You want to bang on about unions and attack us, but you are doing absolutely nothing to deliver real opportunities to young people.

Keith Pitt (Hinkler, National Party, Assistant Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a great pleasure to see you in the chair, Deputy Speaker Coulton. I always enjoy an MPI. It is an interesting process. Certainly, like everyone, I use the normal sort of process. You have a look and you listen to those opposite. You take a few notes for a couple of minutes, you counter that and then you deliver your own message. So I listened very closely to the member for Chifley for 10 minutes. What did I hear? I heard a litany of complaints. I did not hear a single idea—not one. I thought, 'This is actually a serious issue.' I know it is in your electorate; it certainly is in mine. I thought that perhaps I could come and hear something important from the member for Chifley, but, no; all we got was a litany of complaints.

Alan Tudge (Aston, Liberal Party, Minister for Human Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Don't have such high expectations.

Keith Pitt (Hinkler, National Party, Assistant Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, I will not have high expectations. I certainly will not have them again. The member for Cunningham came in to talk about worker exploitation. But, as you know, Mr Deputy Speaker, the people on this side actually did something about worker exploitation. I know because I was one of them. We delivered Taskforce Cadena. We delivered the Migrant Workers Taskforce. We delivered the extra $20 million to Fair Work to help them crack down on the people that are doing the wrong thing. Now, I did not see any sign of the unions, not one. What we saw from those opposite, when they were in government for many years, were more reports—more reports, more reports, more reports. We have taken real action.

Once again, when we look at the frontbench of those opposite, what we see is the 'Ministry for Complaints'. I cannot let an opportunity go by. I was in here with the shadow minister for agriculture earlier when he was talking about the backpacker tax. I said to the shadow minister: 'You've really taken an opportunity now. This is about your time in the sun. It's not about an outcome for the people we are here to represent; it's about you.' Where has he been? He has been hiding away in the far corner, with nothing to say, for a long period of time. In fact, he dragged out a list of rural members. He was a few short. He got to 20. It was not quite enough. I did suggest to the shadow minister for agriculture that I would send him a map so he could perhaps use that to help him find his way in rural Australia to actually talk about what agreed positions mean, the NFF—all those types of things. We took months of consideration, months to talk to those stakeholders, and what happens? They blow it up. What do they come up with? 10½ per cent. That did not come from anything real. You just made it up.

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

Youth jobs.

Keith Pitt (Hinkler, National Party, Assistant Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is about jobs. They took advice from Senator Lambie. Can you believe it? We had the member for Rankin here, that absolute bastion of economic advice, who gave us so many outcomes for this nation! Absolutely terrible. But, when we get around to it, we need to deliver better and stronger economies. How do we do that? We do that with trade. On this side of the House, we focus on things that deliver long-term employment opportunities. We have signed free trade agreements with Japan, South Korea and China. In fact, agriculture, at some $46 billion worth of exports, is now second only to iron ore. That delivers jobs, because, in the regions, they are the things that are important. Whether it is the construction industry, the agricultural industry, the education sector or services, it is about the more that we can deliver in trade, because trade equals jobs and more trade equals more jobs. They are the things that we intend to be focused on and we will continue to deliver. When you come from a regional area, as many of those on this side and the other side do—as I know you know, Deputy Speaker Coulton—it is a very important issue for youth.

When we talk about the Youth Employment Package, I think it is important that those opposite support it, but in fact they do not. I have been advised that they will not be supporting the youth jobs package of $840 million over four years. As someone who was an employer, who came through the system, was an apprentice, worked his way through to become a tradesperson, put himself through university, bought farms, owned small businesses and actually employed people, I know people need to have those basic skills. Every employer I talk to tells me that they will give our youth an opportunity, but they need to have the basic skills. They need to show up on time. They need to be prepared for work. They need to want to be there. They need to be willing to put their phone down for a few hours. This program will provide those opportunities: six weeks of training to get them job ready, to prepare; work experience, with 30,000 internships for up to 25 hours per week; $200 extra for jobseekers; $1,000 up-front for business, for the risks that they take, for the things that they have to do. It is not free to employ people; you have to put importance and value into what they do. There is also the youth bonus wage subsidy: $6½ thousand if I hire an eligible job-ready jobseeker. Deputy Speaker Coulton, I know you come from an area where this is an issue.

We are doing real things as a government. As a coalition government, we are delivering for our people, we are delivering for the regions and we are certainly delivering for those who are seeking a job. The Youth Employment Package is certainly a great component of that.

Mike Freelander (Macarthur, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Many of the people who voted for me in the last election were patients I had seen as children. The fact that they gave me their vote was personally very gratifying, but to me it was a sign that I must do the best I can for them. I know what will make their lives and the lives of their families better, possibly for generations: good health care, good housing and, most of all, work—especially work.

There are over 36,000 people aged 15 to 29 in my electorate. Our economy is changing. TAFE has been decimated. Many adolescents and young adults are struggling to get adequate jobs, training and long-term work. Traditional manufacturing industry is going, never to come back; farming, once a powerful force in my electorate of Macarthur, is less and less significant; and apprenticeships are few and far between. Many young people leave school aware that they will struggle to find meaningful work or post-school education. I know, as a father of six, how stressful it is for the entire family to have to find training and work after school for adolescents. I believe that my generation did not have the pressure that this current generation faces to find work. I know that many are disappointed and may face years of looking for jobs with only a poorly-paid part-time job as their reward. I know the stress that that will cause to families and children, and the poor self-esteem that long periods searching for jobs and the demeaning social security atmosphere promoted by this government will cause.

When I was an adolescent we lived not far from the Postmaster-General's training college, where many thousands were trained as telephone technicians. About three kilometres away—or two miles in the old money—were the Chullora Railway Workshops, where many thousands were trained as metalworkers, boilermakers, electricians, carpenters and toolmakers. I know those days have gone, but I recognise how important those jobs were to my schoolmates and to local families. I know how important meaningful employment is to young people. I have seen the despair that comes from months, even years, of looking for work. I know we can do better to foster employment.

Instead of encouraging young people to train, this government has cut assistance to apprentices by nearly a billion dollars. We have seen apprentice numbers plummet by nearly 130,000. In New South Wales, we have seen TAFE funding cut dramatically even in the last few weeks—job losses, course cuts and a dramatic increase in fees. For many young Australians, particularly in my electorate, TAFE is no longer affordable. We are told we are facing a housing construction boom—much of it is going to be in in my electorate of Macarthur. However, we are not training nearly enough electricians, carpenters, plumbers and builders. Will we have to import them from overseas? The government tells young people, time and again, to get a job, but it has done very little to develop those jobs and provide meaningful and affordable training.

Youth unemployment has been an issue in Australia for some time. The rate of youth unemployment is between three and 3½ times the general rate. However, it is important to realise that the problems go far deeper and are now far more complex than a simple statistic tells us. Reasons to note for that are that young, unskilled jobseekers are very vulnerable to any economic downturn; that they are very vulnerable to exploitation, particularly as a consequence of low levels of unionisation—again, fostered by this government; one problem we never hear them talk about is youth exploitation—and that underemployment and the lengthy spells of unemployment are worsening, almost of a daily basis, and have been in the last three years. We must do better for our youth.

A tick up in economic activity—the sort of selective economic stimulus hinted at by the Reserve Bank in recent months—would make a huge difference. It would make the problem of youth unemployment simpler and easier for governments to address. It would make a huge difference to the unemployed and to the next batch of graduates and school leavers who are standing on the cusp of the job market for the first time. Many of them have a future that is very problematic, and when that future— (Time expired)

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I concur with some of the sentiments of the member for Macarthur. He is right: youth unemployment is a problem. But where he is wrong is in what we need to do about it. The wording of this MPI gives away Labor's failure. The wording is: 'The Government's failure to provide employment …'. We are not Cuba, North Korea or Venezuela. The government does not create jobs. I know that may be something that is a bit of a newsflash for those on the other side of the House. All that we can do on this side is set up an environment which encourages business and entrepreneurs to take risks to employ someone. The idea of just borrowing and spending and creating more public servants is not the way to create jobs. That is the way to destroy jobs.

Let's have a look at the ABS records to test this theory. The last year that Labor was in government was 2013.

Mr Conroy interjecting—

I hear the member for Shortland over there, so let's have a look at the year 2013. There was no GFC, member for Shortland—nothing. You had all the Labor stimulus. That should have been a great year for creating jobs. What do the ABS numbers say? At the start of 2013 there were 11,439,000 jobs. At the end of the year, after all Labor's great policies of job creation, there were actually 15,000 jobs fewer. The policies of Labor did not create a single job in that year; they destroyed 15,000. Now, compare that to the last full calendar year, 2015. In that calendar year, 285,000 new jobs were created. That is 285,000 new jobs against 15,000 fewer jobs in 2013.

The simple reason is that those opposite do not understand what it takes to create a job. It takes an entrepreneur or employer prepared to take a risk to employ someone. All those opposite have done all the time is make it harder and put more red tape and more burdens on the people who do the employing in this country. To have this MPI today shows their complete hypocrisy. This is a day when the Labor Party want to lower the rate of tax on foreign backpackers to 10 per cent, yet they complain if we want to reduce the tax on small business from 30 per cent to 27½ per cent. So there is a big problem: we cannot reduce the tax rates for small businesses in this country with turnovers of more than $2 million by two per cent, from 30 per cent down to 27½ per cent, yet they want foreign backpackers to be taxed less. And they complain about youth unemployment!

Then there is the hypocrisy of their crying crocodile tears on the 457 visas. We saw the numbers yesterday. When Labor were in power, they were giving out 457 visas to Hungry Jack's, KFC and McDonald's. The heads have gone down; they are very quiet over there now. They gave out 74 457 visas for workers at Hungry Jack's, 88 at KFC and 285 at McDonald's. You come into this chamber and you complain there are no jobs for young Australians, and we find out you have given 285 457 visas for foreign workers to work at Donald's.

Opposition members interjecting—

It should not get any worse. Then, above all else, their plan is used to slug this economy with a 50 per cent renewable energy target. They are quiet again, because we know what the cost of that is. We saw the numbers from Bloomberg finance. They were a $2,000 cost for every man, woman and child in the country. I know the member for Macarthur has great sympathy for the people in his electorate. I ask you, sir: how are the people in your electorate each going to find $2,000 to pay higher electricity bills; how much will that cut in their expenditure with local retailers reduce employment; how will employers that have that cost burden put on them find more jobs?

The coalition is getting on with the job. Our Youth Jobs PaTH program is helping with youth unemployment. The alternative, the Labor Party, is just an absolutely clueless rabble and no idea whatsoever. (Time expired)

Matt Keogh (Burt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As I listened to most of this debate from my office, all I heard from the other side of the chamber was some criticism of the former Labor government. But as I listened to the speeches from those opposite I did not hear any mention of any concrete policies to create any actual jobs. Their only job creation strategy seems to be to transplant several hundred jobs from here in Canberra to the Deputy Prime Minister's electorate up in Armidale. That is not job creation; that is just job transference.

I want to paint you a picture of the south-eastern suburbs of Perth that make up my electorate of Burt—suburbs from Canning Vale, through to Gosnells, down to Armadale, out to Piara Waters and Harrisdale and everywhere in between. My electorate is the home of many mineworkers and construction workers and those working in mining related services. Unfortunately, many of them have been made redundant over the last year or so. Under Labor we had unemployment at under six per cent. Now in my area it is over seven per cent. That is higher than the WA average. It is higher than the national average. And the picture is even worse when it comes to youth unemployment. It is more than double. It is over 15 per cent.

Thousands of young Western Australians are graduating from high school, TAFE and university with nowhere to go. The days when every young person could walk into a job on the mines are a distant memory for young people today in Western Australia.

For all of its innovation and agility, the Liberal government has not assisted WA to diversify its economy or broaden employment opportunities away from mining. Neither, of course, has the Barnett Liberal state government. As was remarked to me by Liberals during the election, 'You can't go and tell a guy who's been laid off from a mine site to go and put on some skinny-leg jeans and develop an iPhone app.' The only attempt at a solution that the government is offering is the PaTH internship program. Well, that is tantamount to working for nix. Otherwise, the Turnbull government's attempts to help young Australians looking for work has seen them trying to deny access to Newstart payments, cutting assistance to apprenticeships by about a billion dollars, cutting apprenticeship numbers to less than 130,000. We have also seen them fail to step in swiftly to stop the VET-FEE rorting where students were being charged astronomical amounts for an education that they never actually received. And of course there is always the continued pushing of $100,000 university degrees, as well as further savage cuts to programs like youth connections. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is about it from this government. That is all they are offering the young people of Australia today.

But Labor offers a different approach. Labor is fighting for what matters to Australians. We are fighting for local jobs. We are fighting to protect Medicare. We are fighting to build a strong economy that delivers for everyone in Australia. We will build Australian first. We will buy Australian first in our contracts. And we will employ Australians first. Because Labor understands that, at a time of high unemployment in Western Australia, stagnating wage growth, below-target inflation and with economic bottlenecks aplenty, the time is right—nay, it is required—that we embark on building nation-building infrastructure. The economic benefit of investing in WA's infrastructure is there. Last year, the Infrastructure Australia audit found that seven out of the top 10 roads with the biggest congestion costs in the country by 2031 are all going to be in Western Australia.

The experts know that we should be investing in infrastructure. The new Reserve Bank governor, Philip Lowe, told a parliamentary committee this year that monetary policy simply was not doing the job to boost the economy. He said:

You can keep doing more of something in the hope that it finally works, and my judgement is that that has not been particularly useful.

Well, the old maxim is that insanity is to keep doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results, and this is apparently true in our economy and it is the approach being taken by the Turnbull government. They are playing the same old tricks as every Liberal government, and unemployment in my electorate just keeps getting worse. Instead, Mr Lowe called on the Turnbull government to start spending on infrastructure to create jobs. And just this month the IMF said that we should do exactly the same thing. In fact, they said:

A more sustained, multi-year increase in spending on efficient infrastructure also at the Commonwealth level would be desirable …

That was quite polite language to say: 'Just get on with the job, Mr Turnbull.'

Alas, this government is not listening to the many people across this country, like those in my electorate, who keep saying: 'My children haven't been able to find work since leaving school; what is the government doing about finding kids work?' or, 'All of the job ads ask for people with experience, but I need to pay my bills too,' or, 'I've just got a degree and I can't find a job,' or, 'I've been made redundant and there's no jobs out there,' or, 'I've got laid off, but they kept the guy on the 457 visa,' or, 'We've all been laid off, but we've been offered new contracts as casuals at 20 per cent less than before.' When it comes to a job plan, the Turnbull government has a plan for themselves while young Australians have to fend for themselves. (Time expired)

Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As the gallery dwindles to single figures, we are either doing a fabulous job of boring them or they have decided who has won and they have left. It is a very important topic, unemployment, and I accept that. And, as to youth unemployment, there is never a time that we should not be focusing on it. But, to be honest—and for those just refilling those seats in the gallery and getting us back into double figures again—this is an area where there should be way more agreement between the major parties than there appears to be today.

Youth unemployment is something that every OECD nation struggles with, and typically it just follows how the economy is going. It is generally a reasonable benchmark of economic opportunity. You will remember that, back in 2009 when we had the GFC, youth unemployment just jumped instantly from single figures up to 12 or 13 per cent. At the time, we were not highly critical of the government for that; we knew that that was a temporary and passing jump in unemployment that ultimately would come down—as it did, with mining employment. So, too, when mining, iron ore and coal prices fell in 2013, we saw an instant jump in both general unemployment figures and youth unemployment.

The absence of a counterfactual means that anyone can sit here and chop up the figures however they want and try and come up with a month when it goes up, and complain it is the government's fault; that is usually what oppositions do. But in reality what you actually need is a comparator economy, and probably the best one that we have at our disposal is Canada. It is an economy of roughly the same size, with a typical resource and service mix, similar to Australia's. So let us see how Canada is going. Canada's unemployment, unlike Australia's at 5.7 per cent, is rigidly stuck at 7-plus. And you might say, 'Let's have a look at the blend that the first speaker here referred to, of part-time and full-time work.' Let us assume that part-time work is terrible, as they would make out, and full-time work is the Holy Grail. Over in Canada, of their 140,000 new jobs created just this month, 124,000 were part-time. Let us duck across to Australia's figures, where unemployment fell and overall employment went to nearly 12,000,000 Australians. Our full-time employment rose by 41,000 to 8.blip million, and part-time employment decreased by 31,000 positions. Yet, if you listened to the speakers here on the other side, they would make out that the world was falling apart because all the employment is part-time. There is only one problem with that: the stats are telling you precisely the opposite—that part-time jobs were falling last month and full-time work was increasing.

Let us go back a step. Let us not just stick to that. Let us come back to the Labor Party preoccupation that everything that is part-time is bad—because there is never ever a carer of children or a mother who wants to return to work part-time, is there! The problem with part-time work is: they do not pay union dues. That is the great problem with part-time work. The problem with contractors and part-time and flexible hours is that you cannot rip money out of them for union dues, which is exactly what, for these guys, pays their way—#credit card, #Chinese restaurant. 'If you can't get union dues out of them, it's not a real job'—and that is what underpins this attack today: that casual work is no work at all. The fact that young Australians can have two part-time jobs and then transition to a full-time job and then go back to part-time while they study is of no concern to the Labor Party over here; it is just that it is a full-time unionised job or there is no job at all. Of course, these solo flights of employment policy, from mobs who have basically got a university bachelor degree and moved into advising a federal minister, come from the fact that they have never worked in the private sector. So none of them over there have ever employed anyone. And anyone who has ever worked over there has, basically, been on a public salary.

So let's zoom up to Queensland where we can learn a little about what is going on under a Labor model. With Labor today we discover that their job creation is 80 percent public sector. When Labor gets rid of unemployment they just employ more bureaucrats. That is right. You get a few more pot plants, a couple of executive toys and a little water bubbler over here, and then you fill the desks with public servants. That is the solution to unemployment on the Labor Party side. We have 243,000 bureaucrats in Queensland—13,000 more than there was even before Campbell Newman came along. Let's break the numbers down. No, they are not all doctors and nurses. No, they are not all teachers. Here we go: 8,783 new Queensland public servants; 1,000 of them in health are doctors, nurses and allied health workers. How on earth can you employ that many people in health and not accidentally run into a patient? For goodness sake!

Let's fly across to education. We have 850 new people in education. Two hundred of them are teachers and 400 of them are teacher aides. How do you squeeze another 250 people into Ann Street and public service and education? They are doing what—high intervention programs on the computer for education? For goodness sake, get real! We are trying to employ people in the private sector. You do free trade agreements. The Labor side was an ideas free zone for six years. You signed one free trade agreement. That was Korea. It took you four years to do it. We have done every other one. Jobs come from free trade. That is what we are delivering.

Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I must say that I am a little stuck for words as I rise to follow the member for Bowman, who has been on a flight of fancy that has left all of us over here a bit jealous, to tell you the truth, Mr Deputy Speaker Coulton.

An opposition member: And beyond!

Yes! I am not going to say it folks. But what I am going to say is this: for a man who went to an election campaign running around his electorate screaming 'jobs and growth', he has very little today to say about growing jobs in this country.

This is an important MPI. It is a critical MPI for the young people in my electorate. The young people in my electorate—member for Bowman, you might want to listen—do not care about Canada's economy. They do not care about Queensland's economy. They care about the local economy and their chance to get a job. That is what the young people and their families in my electorate care about. They care about it because the unemployment rate in my electorate has been hovering above 15 per cent.

In 2011 when we last had a census—I know it is hard not to do the joke—there were 30,000 school students in the electorate of Lalor. For next year the projection just in the state school sector is 30,000. So I am predicting there will be, probably, 40,000 school-age people in Lalor next year. That is an intense number of people. If you think about that 30,000 going through since 2011, it is an enormous number of kids who have left school and supposedly gone on to their rosy future.

I saw some hard things in schools when I worked in them, with teachers trying to support kids to leave school and get into employment. But since I became a member of parliament I have heard the most heart-breaking stories. I have seen that with a number of young people who left school and got into a part-time job—perhaps they carried it over from school—some of them lost that job when they turned 18 because lots of franchises are not interested in employing kids on full wages.

It is really hard to sit opposite every day and have silence from the other side about youth employment. Then when they do come up with a solution it is an exploitative solution. It is not a solution that is going to grow jobs; it is not a solution that is going to create jobs. They have this mythical notion that if you cut everybody's taxes it is like watering weeds—jobs will just grow everywhere. I am afraid they will not. Let me take you through this. I had a recent conversation with a family in the electorate, and they asked me a really good question. They said that once upon a time when we built infrastructure in this country we built into that infrastructure build jobs for young people. We built in training opportunities and apprenticeships. So where are the training opportunities in the NBN? There are not any training opportunities in the NBN because this government is loath to put anything in place that will support or ensure that companies take the responsibility for the future that we expect them to take. We expect them to be good corporate citizens. We expect them to join hands with the rest of us and create a future for all of us, not just a future for some.

We have heard a lot over there and we have heard a lot from members on this side, too, about the billion dollars cut from apprenticeships and training—which is absolutely appalling. The lack of commitment to school education where we have retention targets—we have reached 80 per cent in Victoria. The money will be ripped away after 2017. Will that retention rate plummet? I suggest it will. We will have less qualified children leaving our schools. The thing that really gets under my goat in this place every day, along with the silence from the others opposite, is this notion that they are building a country based on individual freedoms. There are a lot of young people in my electorate. What those on the other side have been building since they took government is a freedom to fail. They are giving kids permission to fail. They rant, they rave and they exhort young people. They denigrate young people in this chamber—'Put your phone down and you will get a job.' If it is as easy as that, I will go house to house, and we will put them all into a box. It is a joke.

The other part that really disturbs me is a notion from those opposite that young people can live on $264 a week and be independent or develop the independence that is required to live away from home. The kids in my electorate come from families with a median income of $52,000. Their salaries are actually needed to contribute to the rent or to pay the mortgage in those homes. At $264 a week, those kids are, (a) never leaving home, and, (b) never going to be independent.

Julian Leeser (Berowra, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am delighted to participate in this matter of public importance, particularly as somebody who grew up in the 1990s—as somebody who grew up with the background of the 'recession that we had to have'. I think it is particularly ironic to be receiving a lecture from the Labor Party on youth unemployment given that they were a party in the Keating years that gave us a record 34 per cent youth unemployment for a generation of school leavers who wondered what they would do for a job. What was then Prime Minister Keating's solution to all this? It was to tell a group of students, 'Go get a job.' But, unfortunately, there were no jobs to have.

That was the record of the Keating government. But the poor record of Labor in the youth jobs area continued in the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd years. What they did to apprenticeships in those years is an absolute scandal. Apprenticeships are a great pathway for employment. Yet Labor's record of mismanagement in apprenticeships continued. They cut employer incentives, incentives for people to take on people who had not had a job before or who were in the middle of training. They cut those not once, not twice, not thrice, but nine times. They cut effectively $1.2 billion out of employer incentives to hire apprentices, and a quarter of a billion of that money came during the time when the now Leader of the Opposition was the relevant minister.

And what was the effect of that? When you cut incentives for employers to take on apprenticeships, commencements fall. In fact, commencements halved. That is Labor's record in relation to apprenticeships. But Labor has tried to towel up this side of the House in relation to the VET FEE-HELP scandal, but this was something that occurred on Labor's watch: the VET FEE-HELP scandal, where the Gillard government failed to create adequate regulation of VET FEE-HELP and saw this massive growth of a spivocracy, where people came along and preyed on the most vulnerable people in our community, signed them up into courses that they had no chance of completing and left them with massive debts and no qualifications. This was Labor's management of a key youth employment pathway through VET FEE-HELP.

Now, under this government, Labor in opposition continue to oppose youth employment programs. They oppose the PaTH program. We heard many speakers on the other side denigrate the PaTH program. But the PaTH program provides great skills for people who have never had employment before to get a job. The PaTH program will help 120,000 job seekers aged under 25. It gives them the basic skills to make them employable—to turn up on time, to behave properly and in a professional manner.

It gives them a trial internship. It is not a wage that they will be paid on their internship; it is a welfare supplement of $200 per fortnight to take these internships. I do not know why the Labor Party is so opposed to internships, because by my calculation 68 per cent of shadow ministers and parliamentary secretaries have interns or volunteers on their staff. If it is good enough for them to take on interns, why isn't it good enough to have this great employment pathways program?

The third thing that the employment pathways program will do is to create youth bonuses, those employer incentives. Employers tell us that, effectively, it is difficult to justify taking on people who have no real skills. So the employer incentives, the youth bonuses, provide them with an opportunity to do that.

Who is in favour of the PaTH program? The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry is in favour of it. The Business Council of Australia is in favour of it. And why wouldn't they be? They represent the people who actually employ people, who actually give them jobs. But it is not just employers who are in favour of it. The Brotherhood of St Laurence is in favour of it. The Brotherhood of St Laurence is hardly a neoliberal organisation. It is an organisation that is noted for its charitable and welfare effects.

But who is opposed, and who is driving the Labor Party's opposition to this? It is our old friends at the ACTU. When the ACTU says, 'Jump,' Labor say, 'How high?' I think this is a terrible portent, a sign of things to come, of what Labor would be like in government. Whenever the union movement wants things—even if the Brotherhood of St Laurence wants it, even if business groups want it, even if it is good for the country—they will give the union movement what it wants. It is just like 457s, an issue that was raised in this debate as well. We had from one member the idea of what I would call 'economic Hansonism', Australian jobs for Australians. It was effectively a dog-whistle attack on 457s, which are a key employment visa to fill skills in our economy. We need that, and we need to carry on with the government's important youth pathways programs.

Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The time for the discussion has concluded.