Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy) Share this | Hansard source

The scare campaign is alive and well. After nine months of a carbon price, it is working to bring emissions down, working to create clean energy jobs and working to support families, pensioners and businesses. The fact is that, in the last 12 months, 186,000 new companies were registered, according to ASIC figures. That is an average of over 14,000 new companies created each month. The fact is that, since the introduction of the carbon price, the number of companies going into administration went down, not up. The facts are that, since the start of the carbon price on 1 July last year, more than 158,000 jobs have been created. That is more than 20 every hour since carbon pricing started. Australia has retained one of the lowest unemployment rates in the developed world. The economy grew at an annual rate of 3.1 per cent in the year to December, and average weekly earnings grew by 4.6 per cent last year. Business investment has continued at very high levels, with almost $270 billion confirmed investment in Australia's resources industry alone. It is in the pipeline, according to the Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics. (Time expired)