Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

Some of the things we first confronted on coming to government were the capacity constraints on the economy and the absolute failure of the previous government to invest in skills and training. Failure to invest in infrastructure had left our economy constrained and our potential for growth constrained. By establishing Infrastructure Australia, the Building Australia Fund, trade training centres in schools and 700,000 new training places, we have focused on building the Australian economy, reducing those terrible constraints on the capacity of the economy—positive, nation-building actions that will ensure that our kids have a better future because they will have higher skills, have higher wages and have an economy that is growing, because we have invested in those nation-building projects that were ignored under the former Howard government.