Julie Owens (Parramatta, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am just a humble backbencher. When we talk about the economy, for me, in my electorate of Parramatta, it comes down to two basic groups: families—whether they be married couples with children or without children, or individuals—and businesses. The whole economic argument comes down to whether families and businesses are doing well now, whether the government is improving their capacity to do well in the future and whether the government is leaving holes that some of those families and businesses fall through and thus get left behind.

Over the last 15 years, we have experienced an extraordinary period of growth. It is a period of growth that the world has not seen before and probably will not see again for quite some time. It is not just to do with us. The world is being pulled along by extraordinary growth in China and India, a booming world economy and a more-than-healthy commodities market. It is a once in a generation opportunity not just to grow as a nation but also to improve our capacity to do well in the future, to consider our position in the world, to gear up, to retool, to retrain, to improve our position and to make a real difference in our capacity to prosper in future years.

In some ways it is as if we have inherited an enormous sum of money from a rich Chinese relative. Under the Howard government, we have retired to live off the cash. The problem, of course, is that most Australians are not retired or anywhere near it—certainly the families and businesses in my electorate are not. They are trying to build a future. They are trying to do well now and they are trying to make sure that in future they also have the capacity to do well. This once in a generation windfall—this once in a generation opportunity—which has come out of this booming world economy should have been used to assist those two groups in my community to support their future.

When we talk about the economy and the report card of the Howard government, I do not ask the Treasurer because I do not really want a 15-minute comedy routine and I do not want to hear the crowing about how ‘they have never had it so good’. In my electorate, they are telling me a different story. I listen to those two groups. I listen every day to families when I am doorknocking and when I am out in the electorate. I will tell you what they are telling me. They are more in debt and more vulnerable to economic cycles because of that debt. They have far less security in the workplace because of the extreme industrial relations laws, which makes them more vulnerable to changes in the economy. They are facing rising prices in child care and private health insurance. They are facing interest rates that are among the highest in the OECD and ridiculously high costs of education that are prohibitive for some.

Do they feel that their capacity to do well is improving? No, they do not. What they say to me is, ‘If the economy’s going so well, why is it so hard?’ Why is it, if this country is sailing with favourable winds, that families in my electorate feel that they are sailing against the wind? When I talk to businesses I get similar stories. Do they feel that the government is improving their capacity to do well? No. They talk about skills shortages, about lagging behind the rest of the world in broadband, about infrastructure bottlenecks and about investment in our future in this country relative to what the rest of the world is doing, because, as we are sailing in favourable winds, so are the rest of the economies of the world. It is not just about this economy feeling that we are doing well. It is not just about moving forward. It is about moving forward relative to the rest of the world.

You do not even have to listen to business to find out that things are not what they should be. You only have to look at the single best indicator of future capacity, and that is productivity growth. The national accounts for the September quarter show that productivity has failed to grow since the June quarter in 2004. But that alone is not the whole problem, although that is six months of a lack of productivity growth. Productivity has failed to grow since the June quarter in 2004. That is more than two years with zero net productivity growth. But this slowing is not even recent; the story is worse than that. The annual labour productivity growth slumped to 1.6 per cent this decade compared to 2.7 per cent last decade. So, while we have been sucked along by the commodities boom, what we do not see underpinning this apparent prosperity is the conditions that our business needs to do well. We know that that lack of productivity growth has been caused by the failure of the government to invest in education. (Time expired)

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