Steve Georganas (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is not a hidden fact that thousands of unemployed Australians are eagerly looking for work. It is, however, not commonly known that there are thousands more Australians who work minuscule hours but who want more work and are looking for more work without any success. These are Australia’s underemployed. The underemployed are defined by the ABS as people, including part-time workers, who want and are available to work more hours.

The unemployment figures published by the Howard government do not tell the whole story. They do not include those Australians who are underemployed and underutilised. As of September 2006, the national underemployment rate sat at five per cent above the unemployment rate of 4.8 per cent, giving us a clearer picture that the percentage of people seeking work but who cannot find work is closer to 9.8 or 10 per cent. The September 2006 ABS Underemployed workers report showed that more than 500,000 Australians working part time would like to be working more hours. According to the ABS data, 57 per cent of part-time workers would in fact like to be working full time, and 61 per cent of underemployed part-time workers wanting to work more hours are women. For 82.7 per cent of underemployed part-time female workers seeking more work, the highest level of educational attainment is year 10 or below. I call on the government to release Australia’s underemployment figures quarterly along with Australia’s unemployment figures. I think the Australian public are entitled to know about the country’s underemployed, the true figures of unemployment in this nation and how many people are seeking full-time work.

Being employed, however, does not translate into having full-time work. The definition of ‘employment’ is civilians aged 15 years and over who during the reference week worked for one hour or more or had a job from which they were absent. I think it is unreasonable to think that working one hour a week is enough to support a single individual let alone a family or paying  the bills, mortgages et cetera and all the other things that we all aspire to here in Australia.

Australians have the right to know about the number of Australians looking for work but who are unable to find work. It is time that Australia was presented with all the facts. The government needs to address the tens of thousands of underemployed and underutilised Australians desperately looking for work. We need to publish those figures quarterly, side by side with the employment figures, so that Australia can have a real notion of what the true figures are of the people who are underemployed or the people who are looking for work but who cannot find work.

The ABS did a survey not that long ago where they surveyed people who were working part time. It showed that eight or nine in every 10 wanted to work extra hours. When the question was asked why they wanted to work extra hours, the answer was because they could not afford to pay their bills, mortgages et cetera. These were ABS statistics. So the real figures of unemployment are far closer to 10 per cent than to the five per cent that we currently and constantly hear from this government in the harping that takes place. The government should release those figures and make them public. (Time expired)