Josh Frydenberg (Kooyong, Liberal Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Rankin for that dorothy dixer! There were 178,000 jobs created last month—including jobs in the construction industry due to HomeBuilder, which the member for Rankin and the Labor Party didn't support. The reality is that 80 per cent of the 1.3 million Australians who either lost their jobs or saw their working hours reduced to zero at the start of this crisis are now back at work.

When it comes to JobKeeper, it has been an economic lifeline for the people of Australia. It has been a remarkable program. They are not my words; they are the words of the Governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia. There were 3.6 million Australians benefiting from JobKeeper in the month of September. From the ATO data for the month of October, there are 1.5 million Australians on JobKeeper. There are over two million fewer Australians on JobKeeper in October compared to September because the economic momentum, the economic recovery, is underway, because there is a comeback in the Australian economy. It is showing remarkable resilience.

Our AAA credit rating has been reaffirmed. The Governor of the Reserve Bank has said that the Morrison government is on the right track when it comes to fiscal policy. And we continue to undertake and to announce significant new initiatives, like the one today to support travel agents around the country and like the one on Sunday extending HomeBuilder for another three months.

In the budget there were more measures—immediate expensing for businesses with turnover up to $5 billion so that they can invest. Of course there was also the loss carry-back measure. There was support for apprentices right across the country. I can inform the member for Rankin that today consumer confidence is up by 2.9 per cent. It has now been up 12 of the last 13 weeks. We have also seen strong building approval numbers, strong house price numbers and business confidence coming back.

The member for Rankin asked me why we are celebrating the fact that people are back in work. It is because we on this side of the House stand for jobs—jobs, jobs and more jobs. That is what the Morrison government is doing and that is what is occurring across the economy as we are coming back from the biggest hit in over a century.

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