Judi Moylan (Pearce, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Will the Prime Minister inform the House of the expected reduction in the number of working families over the next year as a result of a slowdown that we did not have to have?

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Consistent with the production of economic data and forecasts in the budget, you will see that again the forecast for unemployment is to rise to 4.75 per cent in 2008-09. Consistent with what I have said both about growth and about the CPI, and similarly with the unemployment data, the government has been transparent through the budget papers in the budget which the Treasurer brought down in May.

I think what we see evident on the part of those opposite is a bit of a theme. We have had about six or seven questions now in question time—and what is the theme? The theme is talking the Australian economy down. What we have had from those opposite is a series of questions aimed at creating a negative sentiment and aimed at talking the economy down, and doing so pretty selectively against the available economic data.

I said last Thursday, I think, in response to a question from the Leader of the Opposition in question time, ‘Why is it that those opposite in framing their questions do not bother to draw attention to, for example, the capital expenditure data which came out of the ABS last week?’ That capex data projected capital expenditure investment by Australian corporations of some $100 billion for the year ahead. That seems to be missing from the narrative of those opposite. What is also missing from the opposition’s narrative is the matters just referred to by the Minister for Trade.

The Minister for Trade just went through what we have just had by way of the latest balance of payments and balance of trade statistics. A $559 million trade surplus in the June quarter 2008 was the first quarterly trade surplus in over six years.

Brendan Nelson (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The Prime Minister was asked about people, about working families losing their jobs. Could he please come back to that.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Prime Minister will respond to the question.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Surprisingly missing from the economic narrative of those opposite, which is about talking the Australian economy down, is any reference to capital expenditure data from last week, any reference to today’s balance of trade data or any reference to the fact that, in their period of office—if I recall the number correctly from the Minister for Trade—there were 72 consecutive monthly trade deficits.

Simon Crean (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No other government has done that!

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No other government in the history of the Commonwealth has knocked up 72 in a row. We all know the history of the trade balance and the trade cycle and we always know that for Australia this is a challenging set of circumstances—

Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The point of order is on relevance. Could we have an answer about working families and jobs rather than more waffle.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Prime Minister will respond to the question.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

For those opposite, I responded specifically to the question of unemployment data at the beginning of my answer. Coming in right on cue is the member for Menzies, the author of Work Choices, the workers’ friend, he who presided over a set of industrial arrangements in this country which, based on their own survey data, meant that 89 per cent of AWAs surveyed by them resulted in one award condition less. Thirty-one per cent of those AWAs took away rest breaks, 49 per cent took away overtime loadings, 63 per cent took away incentive based payments and bonuses, 65 per cent removed penalty rates and 70 per cent took away shiftwork loadings. Despite the level of bleating from the member for Menzies, that is his contribution to working families.

Kevin Andrews (Menzies, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The point of order is on relevance. Perhaps the Prime Minister can add the 300,000 jobs that were created.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Menzies is warned.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is quite clear that those opposite are not just ideologically committed to Work Choices but that, given half a chance, they would bring it back. Work Choices is etched deep into the heart and soul of those opposite, and they stand at the dispatch box and bleat about the concerns they now profess to have about the circumstances faced by working families. I say to those opposite—particularly to the ever-interjecting member for Curtin—that, when a person is facing the prospect of losing their job, one thing they would like is to have some certainty about redundancy payments. Redundancy payments are one of those things stripped away by the now very bored, very yawning member for Menzies, who regards this as trivial.

The problem with those opposite is that their economic narrative not only is designed to talk the economy down; it also fails to deal equally and in a balanced fashion with the positive economic news that is out there. That concerns capital expenditure data, the data which was produced today on corporate profits and the data on the trade account, which the Minister for Trade referred to. What I would say for the period ahead is that this will be a period of great economic test and challenge, not only for our country but for other countries going forward. There are going to be bumps along the road. When you have the set of global economic circumstances that we face at present, that is unavoidable. The challenge is this: do you have a strategy of action for the future on this—and we have a clear-cut course of action—or do you have, as we do from those opposite, a simple strategy with one objective, which is to talk the economy down? In six questions from the opposition today there has not been a single reference to a policy, not a single reference to an alternative solution, not a single positive suggestion about anything. They have a simple strategy designed to talk the economy down and they hope that they get from themselves a cheap headline on the way through.