Ms GILLARD (Lalor—Prime Minister) (14:22): Members across the government raise with me all the time issues of interest to their constituents. You would expect that, and it occurs. But because it is the Leader of the Opposition who is asking the question we all know where this is going. He is going to keep pursuing his scare campaign about people's jobs. It is absolutely irresponsible of the Leader of the Opposition to keep pursuing this kind of scare campaign. Here he is today pursuing it again, trying to personalise it to individual electorates, but it is the same scare campaign. I understand that as the Leader of the Opposition pursues his scare campaign he is making people anxious. I would say to those people who have heard his words and who have become anxious from those words: remember the scare campaigns past that came to nothing. I have pointed out one today about Kakadu—a scare campaign by the Liberal and National parties that came to nothing. I was in this parliament as the shadow minister responsible for our workplace relations campaigning during the days of Work Choices. Day after day they came into this place, including the Leader of the Opposition, saying that if one word of the Work Choices act were changed—just one word—then jobs in this country would go backwards, there would be more unemployment, growth would go backwards, we would end the mining industry and there would be no more investment. Let us look at the track record compared with those words. Mr Hockey: Mr Speaker, a point of order that goes to relevance: surely this cannot be related to the question she was asked. The SPEAKER: The standing orders require the Prime Minister to directly relate her response to the question. She should keep that in mind. Ms GILLARD: The track record of that Work Choices scare campaign is now before all of us: 750,000 jobs created during a global financial crisis, half a million more to be created in the next two years and a boom in mining. Of course local members raise with me the situation of the steel industry. If the Leader of the Opposition was trying to tell anything like the truth, he would know that the truth for the Australian steel industry is that it is under pressure because of the high Australian dollar. The steel industry recorded losses last year and is looking at recording losses this year. Mr Pyne interjecting— The SPEAKER: The member for Sturt is warned. Ms GILLARD: This is because of circumstances for the industry. The Leader of the Opposition cannot say that financial results from last year were somehow impacted by the government's plans to price carbon. Yes, it is a tough time in steel; yes, businesses have been losing money; yes, of course there is pressure from the high Australian dollar; and, yes, I listen to the views of the local members who represent the steel industry in this place when we talk about how we can support the steel industry. I also say to the Leader of the Opposition that his gross irresponsibility is to pretend that those real issues for steel are something to do with carbon pricing. It is actually contemptuous of the workers in steel and contemptuous of the Australian steel industry. I am sure that the people who represent steel in this place will be going back to their electorates to make that perfectly clear. He could not care less; it is just fodder for his fear campaign.