House debates
Thursday, 11 March 2010
Questions without Notice
Employment
2:32 pm
Darren Cheeseman (Corangamite, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
My question is to the Minister for Education, Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations and Minister for Social Inclusion. Will the Deputy Prime Minister update the House on Australia’s recent employment performance and the need to provide certainty for working families?
Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I thank the member for Corangamite for his question. I know that he would have followed today’s news that the unemployment number for last month, the month of February, remained effectively steady at 5.3 per cent, in line with market expectations. This unemployment number obviously indicates that our economy has done far better than many would have expected at the start of the global financial crisis and global recession, the worst global recession in more than 75 years. These figures show that our economy has outperformed virtually every other advanced economy during the global recession. We know that this performance would not have been as strong if it had not been for the quick and decisive action of this government in investing in our economy and supporting Australian jobs. Without that quick and decisive action, hundreds of thousands more Australians would have been unemployed. This action has helped give Australian families certainty during very uncertain times.
But, whilst today’s figures are encouraging, they remind us that there is nothing that should be taken for granted. There are 128,000 Australians who have become unemployed since the global financial crisis hit in September 2008. What these unemployment figures are telling us and what we know from around the nation is that many working families face significant pressures and uncertainties as they seek to build a future for themselves. That is why the government is so determined to continue to invest in nation-building infrastructure to stimulate local economies and to support jobs, and it is why our reforms are well designed and costed, because we believe in providing certainty and support for working families around the country.
This is a stark contrast to the attitude of the opposition, which is not focused on building the nation; it is focused on saying no to absolutely everything—no to economic stimulus to support the jobs of working Australians; no to the Fair Work Act, because it would rather go back to Work Choices; and then this week we have seen a debate break out about the opposition acting to deny working parents paid parental leave. We know that the risk to paid parental leave in this parliament is the Leader of the Opposition, who is shaping up to block the bill to deliver paid parental leave. Out of his own mouth, the Leader of the Opposition has said, ‘We’ll be amending it to try and make it our scheme’—his scheme being one that would put cost of living pressures on working families because it would put up the price of bread and milk and the basic groceries that they rely on. I thank the members of the opposition backbench who are nodding their heads in agreement because they understand that.
The Leader of the Opposition is a risk to the budgets of working families. This is a man that the former Treasurer Peter Costello viewed as being such a risk to the economy that he would not even have trusted him to be his deputy. No doubt the former Treasurer Peter Costello formed that view because, when the Leader of the Opposition was minister for health and he used to be asked about how they were going to fund health policies, he would just shrug his shoulders and say: ‘Peter will provide. He always does.’ Well, Peter has gone now and, with Peter gone, the Leader of the Opposition is looking to put these burdens directly onto working families to fund his hastily cobbled together schemes. When I say ‘hastily cobbled together’, no-one in the Liberal Party knew about it. You really have to try hard to make the member for Wentworth look like a model of inclusiveness and consultation, but that is what the Leader of the Opposition—
Wilson Tuckey (O'Connor, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I refer you, Mr Speaker, to page 553 of House of Representatives Practice and the advice we all receive there that past Speakers have considered it appropriate to consider comment on the opposition benches as an irrelevance.
Wilson Tuckey (O'Connor, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Speaker, we now know why there is a problem with literacy when you hear that. In completing my remarks, Mr Speaker, I would say to you that you have just demonstrated to the member for Dickson, quite properly, your power to call upon a member who is breaching precedent and the standing orders to resume their seat. You need no other. This minister is now transgressing. She has nothing positive to say. All she can carry on about is what this side is doing.
Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
The member for O’Connor has raised a point of order—and he at least sat down before he continued to develop a debate. I apologise to him that I will now read a bit that he will have to put back in context. He raised comments on page 553, which then goes on to say:
On other occasions such comments have been permitted.
Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Order! It is not offered simply for entertainment or mirth.
Daryl Melham (Banks, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
For literacy!
Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
The member for Banks is warned! I only mentioned that to indicate the difficulties there are in indicating to members that the chair is simply trying to be consistent in something that is not completely an exact science. The Deputy Prime Minister has the call. She will respond to the question.
Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I can guarantee to the House that comprehension will figure prominently in the national curriculum. The reason that I am commenting on the policy of the opposition is that it does seem to me a little bit interesting that now they do not want to talk about paid parental leave, as the policy has crumbled before the eyes of the Leader of the Opposition. On Monday he made his big announcement, on Tuesday he thought it was okay and now, of course, they do not really want to talk about it anymore. The problem with their policy is that it is a threat in the Senate to us delivering our paid parental leave scheme. There was no consultation on this policy. There was no consultation with the member who approaches the despatch box.
Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Mackellar, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Seniors) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I also refer to page 553 of the House of Representatives Practice and the part referred to by the member for O’Connor on a point of relevance and your additional comments from that page, when you said:
On other occasions such comments have been permitted.
But I would read the rest of it, which says:
... although a question should not ask a Minister about opposition policy as the Minister is not responsible for it.
It is clearly out of order.
Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
I thank the member for Mackellar for reminding us that the standing orders are very precise about what can be in questions. They are not, regrettably, so precise about what can be contained in an answer. I have made mention of this on many occasions. The House could take some action if they felt aggrieved by the standing orders by suggesting that perhaps the Procedures Committee revisit question time.
Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
We have.
Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
This side has.
Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Therefore the standing orders are as such.
Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Mr Pyne interjecting
Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
Order! The member for Sturt is warned! He really must learn that every occasion is not an opportunity for him to interject. I am pleased that, as yet, he is reluctant to interject on the Clerk. The Deputy Prime Minister has the call.
Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source
In conclusion, I was asked about certainty for working families and risks for working families. A clear risk is that our paid parental leave scheme legislation will be blocked and we will be unable to pay benefits to people next year. Of course, this is because of the attitude of the Leader of the Opposition—the man who says he will consult with his back bench and then does not; the man who says that there will be no new taxes and then announces a huge, new tax; the man who actually explains all of this by saying—his words not mine: ‘You have to make departures from principles.’ I thank the Leader of the Opposition for his straight talk about his lack of principle, but working women will not thank him if he blocks paid parental leave.