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

My question is to the Deputy Prime Minister. How seriously does the government take the skills crisis and the inflation challenge, and what is the government doing to manage the economy and reduce inflation?

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Hindmarsh for his question. I note the interest of members in the House in the question of fighting inflation. As members in the House would be aware, one of the key problems in fighting inflation is the skills crisis. We of course know that wage pressures are most acute in those segments of the economy where skills shortages are most acute. Consequently, if we are to fight inflation, we need to fight inflation by ensuring that we are investing in skills development, particularly in those sectors which are facing acute shortages.

Given the interest of the current opposition in the question of inflation, they may try to explain to the Australian community at some point why it is that we are facing such critical skills shortages in the economy after 11 years of their government. The current Leader of the Opposition and the current Deputy Leader of the Opposition, as the last two education ministers of this country, may choose to explain their personal complicity in creating these skills shortages which are putting upwards pressure on inflation. It would be a very interesting explanation to hear, given their interest in inflationary pressures. Of course, we know that these skills shortages were unaddressed by the former government, unaddressed by the current Leader of the Opposition and unaddressed by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition. They have come to the Rudd Labor government to be addressed—and be addressed they will.

Today it was my pleasure to introduce into the House a bill to create our new leadership body, Skills Australia. Skills Australia will be fighting the inflation challenge by ensuring that we have additional training places available to get people skilled up in the areas of the economy where we need them most. Skills Australia will guide the allocation of the Rudd Labor government’s 450,000 additional training places over the next four years. So serious is the Rudd Labor government about fighting the inflation challenge and ensuring that we are addressing the skills crisis left to us as a legacy by the former Howard government, the current Leader of the Opposition and the current Deputy Leader of the Opposition that 20,000 of these places will be made available in April.

This is part of the Rudd Labor government’s five-point plan to address inflation. Of course, the other components—setting a fiscal target for the surplus of 1.5 per cent of GDP, increasing incentives for private savings, taking an active role to address infrastructure bottlenecks and looking at ways to lift workforce participation—are the things that the Rudd Labor government needs to do to fight inflation. There is no greater challenge than the skills challenge. It has been left to us as a legacy and, yes, we are going to fix it, and we started today.