Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. I remind her that the latest IMD World Competitiveness Yearbook shows that Australia's competitiveness has slumped to its lowest ranking in 17 years, with poor local business and investor confidence, red tape and inefficient government decision making cited as the reasons for this decline. Can the Prime Minister explain how her government's carbon and mining taxes, amongst 39 new or increased taxes and 21,000 new regulations, have improved Australia's competitiveness?

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

I thank the Leader of the Opposition for his question. As a government we focus on competitiveness and productivity and the Leader of the Opposition ought to be aware that, in the productivity statistics in recent times, there have been some good emerging trends. There is obviously volatility in short-term figures, but I direct the Leader of the Opposition's attention to the actual facts and figures. They are not something to guffaw about; they are something to absorb.

What makes a difference to competitiveness? A series of things. You need to have the best of infrastructure, which is why this government is making record infrastructure investments. You need to have the infrastructure of the age in which you live, not yesterday's infrastructure, which is why we are rolling out the National Broadband Network, doing it once, doing it right and doing it with fibre.

In order to be competitive and have productivity you need working people to have the best of skills, which is why I am very proud that there are more apprenticeships and traineeships out there than ever before and that we held apprenticeships and traineeships, despite the global financial crisis where around the world so many people were thrown into unemployment and so many young people missed out on a chance of training. Here in this country, through things like the Apprentice Kickstart Initiative, we have kept apprentices and trainees getting the skills they will need for the future.

We have also grown university places. There have never been more university places in Australia's history than there are now—a truly great thing for our international competitiveness and also for fairness to our people, because we have increased the number of people from poorer homes going to universities, something people said could not be done. But we have achieved it.

Our school reform agenda, the National Plan for School Improvement, is about every child reaching their full potential. It is also about the strength of our national economy for the future and our competitiveness, because we simply cannot be a strong and prosperous nation in the future if our kids do not get a world-class education.

We have also worked on a seamless national economy agenda, making sure not only that is there appropriate regulation but also that it makes sense for the national economy—things such as transport regulations not changing at state borders.

When it comes to taxation we have ensured that we are pricing carbon in the most efficient way: a market-based mechanism. In the minerals area what we are taxing is super profits—that is, when investments are at their most profitable stage. This is an appropriate taxation response and this comprehensive suite of policies is a stark contrast to the lack of plans— (Time expired)