Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the former minister for Work Choices for his question, because there is no doubt that if the government had not taken action last year with the Economic Security Strategy things would have been far worse in the national accounts. Might I add, that is something which is accepted by Westpac in their analysis. Also, the figures show this quite strongly, because if you have a look at consumption in the December quarterly accounts and compare it here to the rest of the world you can see straightaway how strong, on a comparative basis, consumption was in this country.

Those opposite are continuing to play this silly political game. The first part of it is that we should not engage in any economic stimulus to support jobs. They have this proposition that Australia should simply sit and wait and see as a global recession rolls over the country. That is the proposition that those opposite are putting. This government has the view that it will do everything it responsibly can to support employment, to support business and to support demand in our economy at a time when global demand is collapsing.

Just take the World Bank report yesterday. The World Bank report yesterday talked about the sharpest contraction since World War II and it pointed to trade figures that showed the worst outcome in 80 years. On the face of that, this government moved decisively last December, and all of the evidence in the national accounts points to the fact that we strengthened demand in the economy and we supported employment. This is a bit embarrassing for those opposite because every major employer in the retail industry says that it did but the opposition think they know better. In fact, when you listen to them dismiss the retail sales figures from December and January, you get the impression that they do not think there are many people employed in retail. There are something like 1.5 million Australians employed in retail. So in the December quarter Australia had a positive outcome for consumption, when right around the world it was collapsing.

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