Jess Walsh (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

We asked questions today about the government's plans to snap back the JobKeeper program, as calls from their backbench grow to snap back and cut back vital support to the Australian people. This is a program that the union movement and the Labor Party advocated for and pushed the government to adopt—a program that the backbench Liberals, the ideologues in the Liberal Party, can't wait to get rid of. They are desperate to snap back the government's support. They are desperate to let the markets rip again, and they are desperate to do this at a time when Australians need their government to back them up the most.

With even the Reserve Bank now projecting unemployment to reach 10 per cent in just a couple of months, it is a good thing—a very good thing—that Labor and the unions advocated for this wage subsidy program. Right now, today, a third of people have lost their jobs in the hospitality sector alone. There is no-one in hospitality, be they hospitality workers or hospitality employers, who think that that sector is going to snap back any time soon. There is no-one in hospitality, be they workers or be they small businesses, who think that we can snap back the JobKeeper program in September or even earlier, as the ideologues on the Liberals' backbench are now arguing for. There is no-one in the hard-hit arts sector either that thinks that that sector can snap back straightaway and that we can snap back the JobKeeper program in sectors that have been hard hit by this coronavirus crisis. It is going to take time and it is going to take a plan for these sectors to recover.

Having sectors like this continue to struggle is not only bad for the workers and for the businesses in those sectors; it is bad for the whole economy—an economy that was already struggling under the plans or lack thereof of this government. This week, Deloitte Access Economics also warned against a snapback strategy. They highlighted how important it is for our recovery that there is ongoing support for workers, for vulnerable Australians and for the broader economy. They warned against the quick withdrawal of support programs like JobKeeper and also the jobseeker program. If these programs were withdrawn overnight, we know that we would see hundreds of thousands of Australians moving on to Newstart, a payment that is so low that it actively impedes people's ability to find employment.

So today we have to ask: is the government's plan to snap back to the old Newstart rate of $40 a day? Is that really the government's plan for workers in Australia today? Is that the plan for our country today? The government have the opportunity and they need to take a new approach. Their old approach, which they are desperate to snap back to, meant that we actually entered this crisis from a position of economic weakness, not one of strength. So let's not snap back to the lowest wage growth on record. Let's not snap back to an explosion of insecure jobs, of casual jobs of gig jobs. Let's not snap back to our manufacturing jobs continually being offshored. Let's not snap back to sluggish and weak economic growth. Let's not snap back to unlivable social security payments.

The Prime Minister told us, when launching the JobKeeper program, that we're all in this together. Well, right now that couldn't be further from the truth. We are not. People are doing it tough. Millions are already going without the support that they need. They need a government that will stay the course with them. They need hope for a better future. This government doesn't have a long-term plan for our recovery from this crisis. It didn't have a plan for growth and good jobs before this crisis. If its only plan now is to snap back then it doesn't have the plan for the future that all Australians need.

Question agreed to.