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Legislative Council - Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2)
2015-06-16 Daily Xml
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Unemployment Figures

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD (15:12): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Employment, Higher Education and Skills a question regarding unemployment levels in South Australia.

Leave granted.

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD: The state's recorded unemployment rate of 7.6 per cent is up from the national average of 6 per cent and is the highest unemployment figure recorded in the state in the last 14 years. This sets an estimated number of 66,100 people in South Australia currently unemployed. There have been significant job losses throughout the mining sector, as well as others. Additionally, production and manufacturing sectors have seen significant job losses, with century-old Custom Coaches ceasing production in South Australia in recent times, Aldinga Turkeys moving their processing to New South Wales, and Caroma closing completely. These are of course just a few of the many South Australian businesses that have determined that the economic climate here is untenable.

The Australian local government report by National Economics found that the lack of job opportunities in Adelaide in particular prevented the state from, in their words, 'realising its potential to play a key role in easing Australia's housing affordability crisis because people were reluctant to move to a city struggling with high unemployment'. The report further noted the potential for large scale private investment to bolster jobs as well as government investment. My questions to the minister are:

1. What is the government doing to combat these significant unemployment figures and change the interstate perception of our spiralling unemployment problem?

2. What role will the government take to address issues of structure, governance and effective management to ensure South Australians can get back to work?

The Hon. G.E. GAGO (Minister for Employment, Higher Education and Skills, Minister for Science and Information Economy, Minister for the Status of Women, Minister for Business Services and Consumers) (15:13): I thank the honourable member for his most important questions. It was an extremely disappointing outcome to see May's unemployment figures for South Australia increase to 7.6 per cent, an extremely disappointing result. No doubt that is contributed to by the fact that South Australia's economy is so heavily reliant on that traditional automotive manufacturing base. There is a whole range of features that have operated to heavily impact on that in a way that is causing it to contract considerably.

Members interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Order!

The Hon. G.E. GAGO: Also, the downturn in our minerals as prices have dropped has had quite a devastating impact as well. It was very concerning to see those figures. I have said in this place before that in South Australia we do have a jobs plan. We remain steadfast in our commitment to ensuring that all South Australians have an opportunity to find meaningful employment.

This commitment is supported by our strategic policy for training, employment and skills; investment; the diversification of our economy; encouraging further investments; and the transformation of our automotive industry. We have invested considerable money into our jobs plan to help stimulate the economy and encourage investment, grow business, and build a skilled workforce.

We announced our jobs plan around the automotive industry and the six actions in relation to that, and that was about accelerating the transformation of our manufacturing sector into advanced manufacturing through support of clusters, funding for collaboration and other innovation; accelerating significant infrastructure projects to create jobs during that transition to help lift productivity; the creation of our new jobs accelerator fund to help drive growth in jobs in key industry areas; and retraining displaced automotive workers to help secure new jobs in emerging sectors and helping the transition of automotive supply businesses into new markets.

We have also invested quite a lot into our businesses and continue to explore ways to work better and grow our business sector. We have developed detailed plans for jobs and supported that through a raft of measures to help grow business. We have supported business growth with investment through things like payroll tax concessions, reforming WorkCover at an estimated $180 million of savings to business, building a skilled workforce, supporting skilled migration, and providing more help for businesses to win government work through initiatives such as Tender Ready in collaboration with Business SA.

We have conducted small business roundtables that help better collaboration and communication between state government and the small business community. Of course, we have also put in place the new private sector development coordination role for the chief executive of Premier and Cabinet to assist lodged projects valued over $3 million to help clear bureaucratic hurdles, and of course the establishment of a new, simpler regulator unit to work with industries to remove and improve regulations so that businesses can better support jobs growth.

There are a number of initiatives that we see on the horizon. We have a Major Developments Directory which lists 326 projects that will result in considerable jobs. We see a number of councils investing in significant projects, particularly infrastructure projects, and we see a number of other businesses expanding and doing well. So, we continue our work around jobs growth and stimulation to our economy to help diversify our economy to attract investment, grow business and grow jobs.

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