JIM CHALMERS MP
SHADOW TREASURER
MEMBER FOR RANKIN
MORRISON AND FRYDENBERG ARE RISKING THE RECOVERY
Today’s economic growth numbers are welcome and expected but this recovery, built on the substantial sacrifices of Australians, is put at risk by the Morrison Government’s dangerous failures on vaccinations and quarantine.
There is still a very long way to go to repair the damage of the recession and years of sustained economic mismanagement and weakness under the Liberals and Nationals.
Today’s improvements are despite the Morrison Government, not because of the Morrison Government, which threatens to make the recovery worse not better.
Crucially, today’s National Accounts confirm:
- Wages growth remains stagnant off the back of record lows, with the Budget confirming real wages will actually go backwards over the next four years;
- Real GDP remains 2.4% lower over the last year compared to the previous;
- Business investment is down 23% on what the Liberals inherited and remains at record lows as a share of the economy; and
- Victoria’s economy remains well below where it was this time last year, even before this state-wide lockdown.
Australia won’t achieve stronger growth without fewer lockdowns, and we won’t have fewer lockdowns until we finally fix the failures with vaccines and quarantine.
Australians can’t bank on a first-rate economic recovery when their Government is ranked 113th in the world when it comes to getting vaccines into people’s arms.
This is a race for the Victorian businesses being strangled by Scott Morrison’s failures on vaccines and quarantine – a race for survival.
Those bungles are chipping away at the foundations of our recovery, and having done so much to help each other through this pandemic and recession, Australians can’t afford for the Morrison Government to now squander those hard-fought gains.
Even before this state-wide lockdown in Victoria, two million Australians are looking for work or more hours to provide for their loved ones and 56,000 more Australians on JobKeeper lost their jobs when Scott Morrison and Josh Frydenberg cut the critical wage subsidy.
Now, more than ever, working Australians need and deserve a Government that is on their side.
Instead of a plan to create secure, well-paid jobs, the Morrison Government’s cuts to pay, cuts to superannuation, attacks on job security, and yet another Budget riddled with rorts, will only make things worse.
Only Labor is fighting to build an economy that is stronger and fairer after this pandemic than it was before.
