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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2012-07-12 Daily Xml
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Grievance Debate

SOUTH AUSTRALIAN ECONOMY

The Hon. I.F. EVANS (Davenport) (15:03): In my grievance I want to touch on the state of the economy and the government's position on the economy, given today's question time and today's employment figures. The poor old minister for employment, you have to feel sorry for him. To give you an illustration of how bad this government's economic message is, you only have to look at the minister for employment. According to the minister, the economy went from being relatively strong at 11 o'clock this morning, when he was speaking to the media, to struggling by quarter past 2 this afternoon, when he said that the economy had been 'struggling for the last 12 months'. 'I have been saying that repeatedly,' the minister said.

So, within three hours, he has gone from saying that the economy has been strong to saying that the economy has been struggling for the last 12 months. I must say that, out of those two positions, I accept the second position of the minister for employment. You only have to look at this month's employment figures to see how badly the economy is going in South Australia. There are 11,400 fewer full-time jobs; full-time jobs have dropped by 11,400 in the last month. Unemployment has increased by 10,700 people in the last month.

The reality is that this government's economic program is simply not working in South Australia. Why would the employment figures be going in the wrong direction if their economic strategy was working? This was the government, of course, who had the brainwave to cut the payroll tax exemption for apprentices and trainees in the state budget, a clear message about employment and unemployment within the state.

Madam Speaker, you only have to look at the figures over the last 12 months. The government is going to run around saying, 'Oh, the $10,000 figure and the 12,000 figure, that's just a blip,' but what the poor old Treasurer would not answer was the question about the 12-month figures, and the 12-month figure is no blip. The Treasurer said, 'I'll answer it how I want.' Then he went and answered the monthly figures. He would not address the 12-month figures. Well, let us look at the 12-month figures.

The 12-month figures, only six weeks ago the Treasurer said in his budget, they expected the last 12 months to come out at 0.5 per cent employment growth, 0.5 per cent positive. In actual fact, it has come out minus 1.3 per cent; that is a 15,000 job difference. How did the Treasurer get it so wrong? He would have access, through his agency, to up-to-date figures on a regular basis. So how did the Treasurer get it so wrong just six weeks ago that employment was going to be 0.5 per cent growth? In actual fact, it has gone backwards 1.3 per cent.

Then he has got the gall to stand up in the house and say, even though we have gone backwards by 1.3 per cent over the last 12 months, he is absolutely confident that even though we could not achieve 0.5 per cent last year, we are going to achieve 0.75 per cent next year after the introduction of the employment-killing carbon tax, after the introduction of the carbon tax. This must be the only Treasurer in Australia who is suggesting that you will have higher employment after the carbon tax than before the carbon tax. The budget figure on employment you now have to seriously question, and if you are going to seriously question the employment figure in the budget, logically you have to go to the question of payroll tax receipts, because if employment is not growing then payroll tax will not grow to the same level as expected by definition.

This government is simply out of touch. Look at the last four or five days and the announcements that have come out from all the independent commentators. The Minister for employment is quite right when he says the economy is struggling. The reality is that housing finance commitments to the six months to May show a drop of 0.9 per cent, the worst performance in Australia by South Australia. The building approvals figure is the lowest for 11 years, a drop of 23.6 per cent. Engineering construction work, worst of all mainland states, shows a 2.2 per cent drop, and retail figures show the worst performance with a 0.63 per cent drop.

The employment and economic situation in South Australia is going backwards, and you only have to look at the two tragic announcements today: the Dunes golf course development going through and the ADCIV engineering company being put into voluntary administration. That is a clear sign that what this government is doing through its high tax agenda simply is not working in South Australia and is crippling businesses in South Australia and hurting people through higher unemployment.

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