Paul Neville (Hinkler, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is high time the Gillard and Bligh governments got serious about unemployment. Last month Wide Bay Burnett's unemployment rate hit a seven-year high, climbing to 12.3 per cent. It is the worst regional unemployment rate in Australia. It also has the highest female unemployment rate in the country, sitting at 11.4 per cent. At the same time last year Wide Bay Burnett had a jobless rate of 6.7 per cent, so it has almost doubled in the past 12 months under the watch of federal and state Labor governments.

When the Coalition came to power in 1996, the Wide Bay region had an almost unbelievably high unemployment rate of 19.9 per cent. When we left government we had whittled it down to 3.5 per cent—a huge turnaround based on our real support for small business and industry. Now we are right back in the trenches again, to the great concern of civic and industry leaders as well as residents who are seeking jobs or working hard to hold jobs they already have.

Unemployment affects families, local communities and the regional economy. The high rate shows that there are many people doing it tough. It trickles down through small business into other avenues of the community, and I can assure the House that many operators are struggling in Bundaberg, Hervey Bay, Childers and the coastal strip. I have been collaborating with regional development organisations to find a solution to the problem, but the crux of the matter is we need an effective government response to reverse the jobless trend in Wide Bay Burnett.

A couple of projects are already in the pipeline, including the attraction of fly-in, fly-out mine workers, and I would like to see them come to fruition as soon as possible, though I concede this is not the best way of stimulating employment.

There have also been a few big-ticket projects approved in the Hervey Bay and Bundaberg areas, but we need to look at long-term solutions to our unemployment challenges. We need programs which focus on building up the region, not stripping away the wealth such as through Labor's mining and carbon taxes. The government must do more to ensure that those who want a job can get a job.

I am calling on the governments, state and federal, to offer immediate assistance by way of (1) targeted programs of investment to create jobs; (2) the provision of seed funding for new industries based on local resources or supply services to industries—for example, mine engineering; (3) the provision of assistance to small business; (4) the removal of red tape from the development and building industries—and in Queensland that has to be seen to be believed; (5) bringing forward works programs like the Bruce Highway and; (6) specific help for tourism. But it is not just my home region which is suffering at the moment; Queensland recorded a half a percent increase in unemployment during August. You might not think that is much but last month the jobless rate, seasonally adjusted, climbed to 6.2 per cent, which is exactly half a per cent higher than in July. Only 1,800 new jobs were created in Queensland in August, but 14,900 were lost. Right now, there are 24,500 more Queenslanders unemployed than at the same time in August, 2009. That is a very worrying trend.

We are effectively experiencing an explosion in the number of people without jobs and I am asking: exactly what is the Bligh government doing about it? They seem to be very busy. They are concentrating on shifting the deckchairs to make way for Paul Lucas's leaving and Andrew Fraser's taking up of the position of Deputy Premier. Instead of working on creating jobs and wealth for Queenslanders, the Bligh government is looking inwards on itself and doing everything it can to shore up its chances at the next state election. The ALP always promotes itself as the party of the worker but evidently there are far fewer workers on Labor's list of priorities at present. In times of economic uncertainty, people look to the government to provide strong leadership and security, but that is not happening.