Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Jobs and Innovation) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Paterson for his question. As Senator Paterson and those on this side of the chamber would know, when it comes to putting in place the right policies so that businesses are able to prosper and grow and create jobs for Australians, the Turnbull government is doing exactly that. Since September 2013, when the coalition was elected to office, the economy has created in excess of one million jobs. In fact, we're almost at 1.1 million jobs. This doesn't happen by accident. This happens because you put in place the right policies. As a result of our strong economic management, we've also seen an improvement in the number of manufacturing jobs in Australia. And today members and senators would have seen pleasing reports that Holden Engineering is now increasing its workforce in Australia by 150 employees. So, what we're going to see is Holden's engineers in Australia working on the next generation of autonomous, electric and hydrogen vehicles that will then be sold on the global scale.

Senator Kim Carr interjecting—

Senator Carr, I'm delighted to take your interjection because, under the former Labor government, under which you were minister, we actually saw one in eight manufacturing jobs disappear in this country. Under Senator Kim Carr, we saw one in eight manufacturing jobs disappear in this country. Senator Carr, you may well like to know that in the last 12 months under the Turnbull government we have seen the number of manufacturing jobs in Australia increase by 47,700. Again, this doesn't happen by accident. It happens because you put in place the right policies, which allow our businesses to prosper and grow, and, when they prosper and grow, they create jobs.