Judith Troeth (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to Senator Abetz, the Minister representing the Minister for Workforce Participation. Will the minister update the Senate on the latest employment figures released today? And is the minister aware of any threats to continued low unemployment in this country?

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Troeth for her question and the very keen and close interest that she continues to take in employment, especially in her role as the chair of the Senate committee on employment. I am pleased to advise Senator Troeth that, in trend terms, today’s official employment figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics show that more Australians than ever before have a job—10,287,400 of our fellow Australians are in employment today. This means that the unemployment rate is now just 4.6 per cent—a new record 30-year low.

The last time unemployment was at this level was May 1976. It is a pity that Senator Conroy is not here because he and I remember that at that time ABBA’s Fernando was the No. 1 single in Australia, Gerald Ford was the President of the United States and, as Senator Kemp has reminded me, it was before the likes of Ian Thorpe and Lleyton Hewitt were even born—although I think Senator Kemp may have been born before then! A whole generation of Australians have never experienced such a low unemployment rate.

It took Work Choices to crack the five per cent barrier and put unemployment in a further downward spiral. Just imagine how low the unemployment rate would be if the unemployment queues were not being bolstered by all those sacked state Labor ministers! But I remind the Senate and the Australian people what those opposite falsely predicted about Work Choices. On 26 May last year, Labor wannabe Mr Shorten made his now infamous statement:

Make no mistake: today’s green light for mass sackings ...

The facts show that Work Choices has been the green light for mass employment. A few months later, Mr Beazley, taking his cue from the trade union movement as he always does, said, ‘Work Choices will not employ more Australians.’ A bit of gratuitous advice to Mr Beazley: do not slavishly follow that which the trade union movement tells you—because once again Mr Beazley was wrong. Then on 27 March this year, on the John Laws show, when asked, ‘You don’t agree that these changes would provide any sort of job growth?’ Greg Combet said:

Oh I can’t see it.

Maybe Mr Combet needs stronger glasses, although I do admit that the unemployment figure is getting harder to see. But I would say this: we as a government are still very focused on ensuring that it is driven down even further. Those on the other side have preached doom and gloom about every single one of this government’s initiatives and they have been wrong each time, especially about Work Choices. At the next election the people of Australia are going to have to make a choice between the leader of a party, Mr Beazley, who when he was employment minister—or should that be unemployment minister—presided over one million of our fellow Australians on the unemployment scrap heap, and Mr Howard, who has driven down unemployment to a generational low. Mr Beazley has told the Australian people that the reform lemon has been squeezed dry. Those opposite lack the vitality and energy that this country needs; we still have it and we will continue to have it. (Time expired)