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

I acknowledge the member for Robertson. I recently had the opportunity to visit her electorate. We visited a business called Terrigal Electric. We met with the first female apprentice electrician that was taken on by that particular business, again, with the support of the coalition government.

There are more than 50,000 taxpayers in the electorate of Robertson that got a tax cut last night. There are more than 16,000 businesses in the electorate of Robertson that will be able to access the business tax incentives that we announced last night, and in last night's budget we announced a series of measures that are part of our plan to create 250,000 more jobs across the Australian economy, building on the 500,000 jobs that have been created since the last budget.

The labour market has shown enormous resilience. We've seen real gains across the economy as we've managed to suppress the virus, but the virus still runs rampant around the world. Europe has gone into a double-dip recession, and we cannot be complacent here in Australia. We have to lock in those gains, otherwise we could lose those gains. That's why last night we saw record investment in skills, record investment in infrastructure, record investment in providing further tax relief to Australian businesses with investment incentives, more investments in energy and, of course, more support for child care to boost workforce participation.

The budget was well received by a number of key stakeholders. This is what Infrastructure Partnerships said about the budget last night:

The Federal Government has walked its talk on infrastructure funding backing up last year's record spending with an even bigger outlay in this year's Budget …

This is what the Housing Industry Association said about last night's budget:

The extension of the Boosting Apprentice Commencement wage subsidy to allow more new apprentices and trainees to start their career in a trade will help to grow the next generation of tradies and home builders.

This is what the Business Council of Australia said about last night's budget:

This budget propels Australia out of the pandemic and lays the foundations for a jobs-led recovery …

And the Australian Industry Group said of last night's budget that it 'locks in the recovery from recession and shifts gears from emergency measures to investing in the economy for the longer term.'

Last night's budget was for all Australians. Last night's budget was to create more jobs. Last night's budget will create more jobs.

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