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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 13 Hansard (5 December) . . Page.. 4456 ..

Mr Whitecross: What has happened in the last 12 months?

MRS CARNELL: Mr Whitecross, or Mr Who, had to spend $30,000 on a brochure to tell people who he is. People ring my office and say, "Who is this bloke Whitecross on the brochure that has your photo on it?". It is fairly amusing.

Mr De Domenico: The printer is still waiting for his photo. He thought it was a mock-up.

MRS CARNELL: That is certainly true, Mr Speaker. When those opposite come up with one new idea on how to create a job, maybe we will listen to them; but they have not come up with one yet.

MR BERRY: When will you admit that the loss of 5,600 jobs in the last 12 months, 2,700 more people on the unemployment list, a growth in unemployment to 8.5 per cent since you came to office, more than 50 per cent youth unemployment for three months in a row, 640 jobs lost in our own Public Service in 1995-96 and $1.3m in your redundancy pool all blow a big hole in your so-called jobs budget, and when will you table details of the number of jobs lost, and from which agency, and how many more will be lost in your Public Service during 1996-97?

MR SPEAKER: This is very hypothetical.

MRS CARNELL: Mr Speaker, it is very hypothetical.

MR SPEAKER: In fact, it is almost impossible.

MRS CARNELL: It is almost impossible, Mr Speaker. I think the bottom line really is that there are 600 more jobs in our system at this stage. We brought down a budget that had $1.547m in labour market programs, including $200,000 for three open access centres, $165,000 on Youth Joblink, $116,000 on the new futures in small business program, $250,000 for 50 additional temporary trainees within the ACT Public Service, and $114,000 on the women's work force development scheme. Six hundred extra jobs have been created over the last 19 months.

Also in the budget there were significant new initiatives for business, to get business up and running, to get business employing. Those opposite, when they were in government, made the point regularly that the future of employment growth in this city was in the private sector. Ms Follett said that regularly. Over the three years she was Chief Minister, in 1992-93, 227 staff accepted redundancies worth $8.668m; in 1993-94, 453 staff accepted redundancies worth $17.85m; and in 1994-95, 339 staff accepted redundancies worth $11.235m. I made the point before that it was $34m-plus. The actual figures for the three years of the Follett Government from 1992 to 1995 are that 1,019 staff accepted redundancies worth $37.753m. Mr Berry, before he gets up and makes a fool of himself again, should understand the figures. I come back to the point I made before. Those opposite cannot come up with one new idea to show that there is a better way. This Government is getting on with it. This Government is showing that our approach is in line with the interests of the community.

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