Employment Figures

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN (Lee) (14:44): My question is to the Premier. Can the Premier explain why South Australia has lost nearly 10,000 full-time jobs over the past year?

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL (Dunstan—Premier) (14:44): I don't have that information in front of me. What I do know is that we have approximately 848,000 South Australians employed at the moment. As I outlined to the house yesterday, there are a large number of people who are now taking up the opportunity for apprenticeships and traineeships in South Australia. I am not 100 per cent sure how they are reflected in those statistics, whether they are full time or part time, because they are studying. I am happy to take a look at that issue in detail.

As I said previously, we are working very hard to deliver on one of our key issues in the lead-up to the election, which is to create more jobs in South Australia. Despite the issues that are confronting us at the moment, we will never resolve or resile—what's the word, Vickie?

The Hon. V.A. Chapman interjecting:

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: —resile from our position to stay as focused as we possibly can on creating more jobs in South Australia. This is absolutely fundamental to what we were elected to do.

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for West Torrens!

The Hon. S.S. MARSHALL: It is absolutely fundamental, and that is one of the reasons why we have put more than $200 million now into new apprenticeships and traineeships and building up TAFE in South Australi—to create the skilled workforce that we need to meet those future expectations. The statistics move around. They are subject to effects, some of which are within our control and some of which are beyond our control.

We try to focus on all those that are within our control on a daily basis: reducing costs to employers, making sure that we can provide adequate training for those people moving forward and making sure that we can put more money back into the pockets of ordinary South Australians so that they can spend that money in the economy. They can spend it how they want to stimulate economic activity. These are just some of the strategies that we have put in place, and we will continue to look at all plausible strategies to continue to stimulate economic activity during these difficult times.