Kevin Hogan (Page, National Party, Assistant Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

One thing I agree with the member for Gorton on, and as mentioned earlier in question time, is that Australians, indeed the whole globe, have had an exceptionally challenging year on many levels. I was at the War Memorial today for Remembrance Day, and in the address given there it was mentioned that this time last year, in many parts of Australia, we'd had the debilitating effects of drought and the debilitating effects of the fires, and in some cases, including in my region, we went from a drought to floods. These have been very challenging times, indeed. Then, obviously, a month or two after they went away, we had the onset of a global pandemic, which has been very challenging for many Australians.

We might not all agree on what all the solutions have been, but I think we all in this chamber certainly understand that Australians were very concerned with the onset of the epidemic, were very worried, and had, in many cases, fear about what the future held for them—their jobs, their livelihoods, their businesses, their health. As a government, obviously, in many ways, we've done everything we can. If you look at the statistics internationally, Australia, relative to many other countries in the world, on the health front, we've done very well, albeit there have been some tragic deaths and illnesses.

If you look at the fall in GDP, we went into recession in the second quarter of this year. But compared to many other recessions worldwide, ours has been more shallow, which is great, but we've had more people lose their jobs. Every job loss in this country is a tragedy, but we have done a lot as a government to help try and protect those jobs, businesses, and people's health. Deputy Speaker, I'm sure you would be aware of it, but there has been an unprecedented $507 billion in economic support for people's jobs and people's businesses in this country, including $250-odd billion of it direct.

What does that direct support look like? It looks like the JobKeeper program at $10 billion a month, just for that program alone. It was initially announced as going to go through to September; obviously, we are always trying to be optimistic. Then later on in the year we could see that this pandemic was going to go longer, that there would not be a cure, that businesses would not necessarily be able to open up and, through no fault of their own, many businesses had to remain closed for longer and that put people's job security at risk. Just that one program is a $10 billion-a month-program, a lot of government support. We use the word 'unprecedented', but there has been unprecedented economic support by this government for people's businesses and people's jobs.

Our economy contracted by seven per cent in the June quarter whereas the contractions for comparable countries were: New Zealand, 12 per cent; Canada, 11 per cent; France, over 13 per cent; United Kingdom, nearly 20 per cent. A lot of Australia's success, obviously, was the result of the economic stimulus that we provided. Every job lost has been a tragedy, but our unemployment rate is officially at 6.9 per cent. Again, countries like Spain have a rate of 16 per cent. Canada, Sweden, Italy, just to name a few, are countries that have higher unemployment rates.

I do want to go to what was a bit of a theme at question time—the JobMaker hiring credit. As you would know, Deputy Speaker, this is a subsidy. As the Treasurer said a number of times, if you look historically at any recession in this country, the people who get hit hardest, the people who get hit more than any other sector, are the young, our youth. This program is unashamedly targeted at them. The Treasurer has provided many statistics of how 10 years after the recession that hit the nineties, the unemployment rate for youth was higher and it stayed higher for longer. The JobMaker program is unashamedly targeted at them, with $200 a week if you hire someone between the ages of 16 and 29, and $100 a week for someone aged between 30 and 35.

I want to go through some of the claims that the opposition made earlier today in question time. An employer cannot sack someone and then employ someone in that age group to replace them so they can take advantage of the situation. Through the Fair Work Act and through many other things, that just can't happen. It is only available for additional jobs. You cannot reduce your current workforce and then get someone in. There is no double-barrel disability criteria. It protects both the headcount and the payroll of the business. Hours can't be reduced. That claim just simply isn't true. In every recession, and this one as well, the young are hit hardest, so it is unashamedly targeted towards them.

Besides the JobMaker program, the government has unashamedly targeted apprenticeships, again, at young people. There will be 100,000 new apprenticeships through a $1.2 billion boost in an apprenticeship commencement wage subsidy. If you put on an apprentice, the government will pay a very healthy percentage of the salary of the apprentice in early years. Why are we doing this? We are doing this exactly because of what this topic is about. We are doing this to protect people's jobs and we are doing this to encourage the private sector because we will get out of this. We will grow our way out of this not because of the government; we will grow our way out of this and we will get unemployment back to where it was if the private sector is incentivised to employ people and to grow. Eight out of 10 jobs are in the private sector. Ninety per cent of the spending proposals that we have in the budget will hit the ground within the next two years. The vulnerability of people's businesses and the vulnerability of people's jobs is right now. So we have unashamedly targeted and given a lot of incentives to the private sector to employ people and to employ them now.

I want to go a bit more broadly to people's jobs, their livelihoods and their business and touch on a few of the things that we did in the budget. We gave tax cuts to 11½ million people. Again, that was unashamedly targeted to happen right now. In fact, it was backdated. We want Australians to have more money in their own pocket. That's going to facilitate stimulus to the economy. We unashamedly brought these tax cuts forward because we need them to hit now. The JobMaker hiring credit of 200 bucks is unashamedly targeted at young people because they are the ones that are the hardest hit.

There is the incentive for business to invest, with the instant asset write-off. I remember when this was introduced about four or five years ago, and I think at the time it was for businesses with a turnover of up to $20,000, which was quite low. I remember people in my community, especially small business, saying, 'This is a bonanza—people are starting to come in and order things because of that incentive.' We've obviously put that on steroids, and I think it's one of the great things in the budget, because what we want, unashamedly, is for the private sector to have the confidence to invest. I think the instant asset write-off was one of the highlights of the budget. Small businesses and, in fact, large businesses in my community were thrilled to see that change. The loss carryback changes are a real incentive and a real help for small business.

But it went beyond that. There was also direct stimulus spending from the government into certain sectors. We had a $2 billion investment in R&D. Also announced in the budget was the $1.3 billion Modern Manufacturing Initiative, targeting six areas. The other thing that COVID has done is show us that we want and need to be a more self-reliant country. We produce a lot and we manufacture a lot, but we can always do better. The six areas we're targeting are defence, space, medicine, food, resources technology, and recycling and clean energy. The minister sitting behind me is a great minister in the defence area, and a lot of this is going to be about local procurement and producing local jobs.

Deputy Speaker O'Brien, I know that you are also a regional MP. The regions have had their own challenges throughout the COVID pandemic. In the budget there was a $350 million tourism package. Tourism has been very deeply affected throughout the pandemic. Deputy Speaker, the programs that you and I love—the BBRF, the regional roads programs and the regional bridge programs—were all funded again, and we are looking for projects that are shovel-ready. This isn't about an idea for something you might do in three or four years time. If you have a project ready to go now, let's do it, because we want shovels in the ground and jobs on the ground.

Beyond all that—and it is often missed, because there was so much in the budget—we are putting record amounts of money and resources into aged care, schools and hospitals, with across-the-board assistance. There was $1.9 billion for supporting lower-emissions and renewable technologies. There was extra money for the environment as well, particularly to address plastics in the oceans.

We do face great challenges. People's livelihoods and jobs are at great risk and very vulnerable due to the global pandemic. I am proud to be a part of this government, which has given record support for local jobs.

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