Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I ask the Treasurer: would he outline to the House how the Morrison government has taken action to ensure that the Australian economy and our financial system are well prepared to respond to the coronavirus?

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

I thank the member for Menzies for his question. He is the Father of the House, a former minister and the chair of important committees on the NDIS and family law.

The spread of the coronavirus is a global health crisis with a significant economic impact on major economies around the world. Here in Australia we are seeing disruption to supply chains, we are seeing disruption to our tourism markets and we are seeing disruption to international students who have not been able to get to Australia to start their course. We've also seen significant volatility in credit and equity markets both here and globally. We've seen the International Monetary Fund downgrade their forecasts for global growth. Australia will meet these challenges posed by the spread of the coronavirus because we have prepared. We approach the challenge ahead of us from a position of economic strength. As recently as January, the International Monetary Fund was forecasting Australia to grow faster this year than the United States, Canada, Japan, Germany and France. We are in our 29th consecutive year of economic growth, we are one of only 10 developed economies around the world to have a AAA credit rating from the three leading credit rating agencies and we have delivered the first balanced budget in 11 years. When it comes to the labour market, since we have come to government we have seen the creation of more than 1½ million new jobs, unemployment has fallen from 5.7 per cent when we came to government to 5.3 per cent today and employment growth, at 1.9 per cent, is nearly double the OECD average and nearly triple what we inherited from the Labor Party.

Our fiscal response will be considered, responsible and targeted, in stark contrast to the reckless spending that we have seen from those opposite. The Australian people can trust us to manage the economy and to steer it through this very challenging period.