Matt Thistlethwaite (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Financial Services) Share this | Hansard source

Australia is in recession. Millions of Australians are out of work or have been stood down, but the scariest statistic is that between now and the end of the year another 400,000 Australians will join the unemployment queues. Australians don't blame the government for the pandemic, but Australians are justified in blaming this government for its lack of a credible plan to get people back to work as quickly as possible. They've got a plan to withdraw support from JobKeeper and JobSeeker but they don't have a plan to get people back into work, and that is the problem with this government.

All of the speakers on the other side have claimed that this government is for jobs and that this government is for Australian workers, but the facts prove that those claims are simply not true. Darrin Lenton is a single dad with two kids who lives in my electorate. He has worked for Qantas for 23 years. Last week he was told by Qantas that he would lose his job, along with 2½ thousand of his co-workers. In the ultimate insult, he was told by Qantas that the jobs will go to a foreign corporation who will employ people to do the work that Darrin was doing on lower wages and conditions.

When you're in government and you sit by and you allow Australia's national airline to do that to its workforce, you're not for Australian workers' jobs at all. When you allow penalty rates to be cut for the lowest-paid workers in the country so that they take home less pay each week to feed their families with, you're not for Australian workers' jobs at all. When you're the party of Work Choices—and many of those on the opposite side came into this parliament and voted for Work Choices, voted for a program that forced people onto individual contracts so that their wages and conditions could be cut—you're not for Australian workers' jobs. When you're the party that, in 1998, conspired with a company to sack its entire workforce on the wharves overnight and bring in dogs to keep people out of work, you're not for Australian workers' jobs at all. When you're advocating for a cut to a promised rise in superannuation for Australian workers and you happily pocket 15 per cent superannuation yourself, you're not for Australian workers' jobs; you're a hypocrite. So don't come in here and say that you're all for advocating for Australian workers' jobs. When you've got people on your side advocating for temporary flexibility workplace measures—that have been put in place with the goodwill of the unions, to provide support for Australian workers to get through this difficult period—to be made permanent, you're not for Australian workers' jobs.

When you do these sorts of things to Australians, you're in fact the opposite; you're anti jobs. When you tell Australian workers that you're supporting their jobs and you go about and do these things to workers, you're not for jobs; you're not for Australian workers. In fact, you're a coward, because you're telling mistruths to the Australian people and asking them to believe you, when it's simply not true. The Australian people deserve better from their government, particularly during the time of a pandemic. They deserve a plan, a road map out of this recession, a plan that supports those that can't return to work and prioritises jobs growth so that those that are able to return to work can get back into jobs as quickly as possible. Importantly, we need a plan that boosts demand in our economy as soon as possible, and that's what's sadly lacking from this government.

There is a blueprint for this—there's a way to do it—and that's how Labor did it during the global financial crisis, when we acted quickly and decisively, with programs like Building the Education Revolution to support the construction of the education facilities that we all still visit in our electorates every single day when schools are open, and investing in social housing, ensuring that you're boosting assets and providing roofs over the heads of Australians that are struggling. They are programs that you could implement almost immediately to support Australian workers' jobs in the construction industry. If this government were fair dinkum about supporting Australian workers' jobs, then they'd get on with the job, quick smart, of boosting our economy and providing a road map out of this recession, particularly around the construction industry.

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