SPEECH: Job Creation
Mr LANGBROEK (Surfers Paradise—LNP) (Leader of the Opposition) (11.30 am): This morning we have come into this place and listened to the government talk about its target of 100,000 jobs which the Premier has provided to the House. She of course provides the colour and then we look to the Treasurer to provide the detail and more specifics. The Premier is big on targets—and has been in her previous portfolios, as we all know, of education and families—but when it comes to the detail sometimes the targets are not always lived up to, and I think the expectation is that the people of Queensland will just forget what the targets were.
Let us have a look at what has happened this morning in the House. The honourable the Treasurer spoke about the 119,000 infrastructure jobs that were mentioned in the budget papers last year that would be provided by the infrastructure plan. To the end of March, nine months into this financial year, only 1,700 jobs have been provided of those 119,000. What did the honourable the Treasurer say? ‘Oh, no. Those 119,000 jobs will be jobs that will be supported throughout the economy.’ He is not going to be held to the ABS statistics on those jobs figures because of something that was written in the budget papers back in June, even though we have had the commitment from the Treasurer that the ABS statistics will be the ones that he is happy to be governed by when it comes to the target of 100,000 jobs. I think he uses the ABS statistics when he wants to and disregards them when he wants to.
That is the pattern we have seen from this Premier in the past. She told Queenslanders only a month ago that they could count on her. When it comes to energy prices, let us have a look at that history.
In 2005 the honourable the Premier, who was Deputy Premier at the time, said, ‘It does not matter where you live. Nobody—not one Queenslander—will be worse off under the government’s proposal.’ That was the proposal for deregulation of electricity prices. What has happened since? We have 30 per cent increases in electricity prices. Now we have a mooted increase. It could be 15 per cent. And all the Minister for Natural Resources could say this morning was, ‘Well, at least it is not going to be anywhere near 48 per cent.’ Do not look at what they say; look at what they have done.
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