Garth Hamilton (Groom, Liberal National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Will the Prime Minister explain to the House how the Morrison government's economic recovery plan and the delivery of COVID-19 vaccines will work to assist our recovery from the pandemic and support Australians and businesses, including in my electorate of Groom, to create more opportunities for themselves?

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Groom for his first question in this place. I commend him on his maiden speech in this place, so eloquently articulating the great principles and values of the LNP and the Liberal Party. We look forward to his great contributions in this place. He's off to a cracking start.

Australia's economic recovery, our economic comeback, is underway, and it continues to gather momentum. We are emerging from the COVID-19 recession in a way that, frankly, few countries—particularly advanced economies—are, around the world. When you consider that the United Kingdom last year saw the size of their economy fall by 10 per cent, large industrial nations like France, Canada and others are up in the seven to nine per cent and even the United States is up by three per cent, it is not just the case that Australia has had an impressive response to the pandemic from a health perspective in responding to that crisis, it has also been true of the economic response that has ensured Australians have been able to have greater confidence about their job security and their economic future as we have worked to deliver the response. Some 520,000 businesses are no longer on JobKeeper requiring taxpayer funded support, more than two million Australians are no longer needing that taxpayer funded income support that was there when they needed it to get through the worst part of the crisis and 90 per cent of the jobs that have been lost through the course of the COVID-19 recession have returned. There is record workforce participation, rising above pre-pandemic levels, and confidence is being restored.

And that confidence will be further reinforced by the rollout of the vaccination program. The vaccination strategy has been prepared by the medical experts in this country and is rolling out from Monday, following that expert advice. It is in its final touches, the final strokes of that preparation now, as it prepares to be commenced on Monday. It is ready to go. And I know that we all join together in this place to encourage Australians to listen to that expert advice, to gather the information that has been provided by those official sources so they can confidently go about receiving that vaccine in accordance with the strategy, which begins with those on the front line and those most vulnerable first.

But the economic recovery continues also with the rollout of the many programs and plans—whether it's the HomeBuilder program and the jobs it's creating, the $250 billion that has been put into balance sheets which has been unlocked by the confidence that is returning to the Australian economy or infrastructure like the Second Range Crossing up in Toowoomba— (Time expired)