Kate Thwaites (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Can the Prime Minister update the House on how the government is responding to economic circumstances, helping people with cost-of-living challenges and setting Australia up for the future?

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I congratulate the member for Jagajaga on her re-election to this place. Australians are worried about the cost of living. When they go to the checkout, compared with a year ago, they might have to put some goods back because they simply do not have enough cash to pay for them when the total comes up on the cash register. That is happening every day. They are worried about if they can afford to put a roof over their heads and they are worried about rising interest rates.

Indeed, we inherited a challenging economy and we didn't attempt to hide the challenges that would be ahead of us, because the RBA had already said prior to the change of government that there would be an increase in inflation and an increase in interest rates. But, of course, there are two things that impact, particularly for working people, the standard of living. One is the cost of living. The second is what their wages look like, and that is why we have a plan to lift wages, as opposed to the previous plan, where low wages were a deliberate design feature of the economy. We have a plan to deal with that. But we also have a plan to create economic growth and we want to do that in an inclusive way.

I spoke to the Business Council of Australia this morning, and they are very much looking forward to participating in the jobs and skills summit we will host in Parliament House in a bit over a month's time, because that is how you bring society together. You bring business, unions, civil society together so you can increase profits and increase wages but only if you are lifting productivity at the same time, and we have a plan to lift productivity. We have a plan to deal with clean energy, to use that clean energy to enable new industries to grow and thrive. We have a plan, through our National Reconstruction Fund, to build back stronger and to identify where we can make more things here in Australia through advanced manufacturing. We have a plan for cheaper child care and we will be introducing legislation to achieve that outcome down the track. We have a plan, of course, for cheaper medicines as well. We have a plan to make sure that Australians can fill the jobs that will be created in these new industries through the creation of Jobs and Skills Australia, through fee-free TAFE and through additional university places.

These are all important if you want a high-wage, high-productivity economy that delivers for the Australian people. That's our plan—one in which we use our common purpose in order to shape the future instead of letting the future shape us. That is the way that you build a better future, and my government is absolutely determined to do just that.