Mrs GASH (Gilmore) (20:53): Whilst I certainly support some parts of the member's motion, I rise to speak against the subtle thrust of other parts of his motion and remind the House that last Thursday the Member for Throsby made a statement in an MPI on the impact of the carbon tax on Australian industry. I would like to take umbrage over some of his then comments in relation to this motion. My reason for doing so is that he and I share an interest in the economy of the Illawarra. The northern end of the electorate of Gilmore now encompasses parts of the old seat of Throsby, so I cannot allow him to go unchallenged with the rather rosy picture he is trying to paint of conditions there. The motion he puts forward is constructed on a denial of events affecting his own constituents, constructed on platitudes and not an honest assessment of what is needed. The member seems oblivious to the state of the manufacturing industry, especially in his own backyard. He is oblivious to the fact that BlueScope Steel has just cut 800 jobs from its operations in Port Kembla. He is oblivious to the fact that another 69 jobs have just gone from the Australian Steel Mill Services at Port Kembla, with many others in the pipeline. He is oblivious to the effect this is having on contractors and subcontractors who have lost their livelihoods because of failed government projects. He seems oblivious to the fact that the unemployment rate for the June quarter in Throsby is pushing 7½ per cent and that will rise as the steel works job losses start feeding in. The Shoalhaven is at 10 per cent and rising, and the government has no answers. He is oblivious to the no-show of trade centres that we were promised. He cleverly ignores the fact that Regional Development Australia gave nothing to the Illawarra even with the solid evidence of dramatic job losses under their noses, even without a carbon tax. Yet there he was last Thursday berating the opposition for being all doom and gloom. We have every reason to be so for next year when the carbon tax kicks in. Is the member suggesting unemployment is going to fall in the Illawarra? Is he suggesting that the manufacturing industry in his backyard will not rationalise some of its operations in response and that part of that rationalisation will mean job losses? As a former union official, he would have tracked the gradual decline of industrial activity in Port Kembla over the years. He would have seen jobs whittled away from a time when the steelworks employed 23,000 people, through the recession we had to have, to a figure of about 10 per cent of that. If he was any sort of trade union leader, he would know that the figures he spruiked on Thursday relied heavily on the mining industry. In his motion he is warning that we should not let the performance of the mining industry eclipse the poor performance of the rest of the economy. My question to the member is: if that is the case, and you are fully aware, why aren't you doing something about it? Take mining out of the equation and what would be left? Surely he must be now aware of an article in Friday's Australian Financial Review which reports that, and I quote from a comment by Commsec economist, Savanth Sebastian, who said: The prospects for the manufacturing industry are not good. This is a highly professional economist who did not just pluck that statement out of thin air. He has been watching industry for some considerable time, analysing data, assessing, forecasting, and working the figures. The only thing the member for Throsby has been working on is the desperate regurgitation of spin in the face of all the evidence to the contrary. Mr Jones says the government's economic modelling is predicting 1.6 million new jobs will be created by 2020. The question is: are these actual extra jobs, on top of what we have now, or are they going to be the mickey mouse green jobs this government is going to fabricate to save face? A recent study in the United Kingdom shows that, for every green job that is created, almost four real jobs were lost. I put that observation to the Prime Minister, but she refused to directly answer the question. The Australian Financial Review reported that for the three months to August, the economy shed 14,000 jobs—the biggest quarterly decline in seven years. Over the past 3½ years, 136,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost in Australia; yet the motion calls for training. Great—if you have a job or you can get a job. Yet in his motion, the member for Throsby states that Australia should have open and transparent tendering arrangements so that Australian industry can compete on an equal basis with international companies for major resource projects. What a joke! How can Australia be competitive when most of our competitor countries do not impose or will not impose this carbon tax on production costs? Over the past year alone, 53,800 manufacturing jobs have been lost in Australia. Over the past six months, the period that coincides with the time during which Australia has been under the threat of the introduction of the carbon tax, 49,400 manufacturing jobs have been lost and, overall, the total number of manufacturing jobs is now down to 945,600. These are verifiable Bureau of Statistics figures. Westpac has noted that household unemployment expectations have risen 8.5 per cent this month. People think things are going to get worse. Their economist, Justin Smirk, says that 'the reading was consistent with other measures of a deteriorating labour market.' Hardly a rosy picture being painted by the experts and certainly totally opposite to the yarn the Member for Throsby was trying so hard to push. It is also reported that the government has resisted growing pressure to conduct an inquiry into the future of manufacturing. Can they be afraid of what might be revealed? But apparently it has scheduled another one-day talkfest on jobs for October 6th. One day! The member is either deluding himself, his electorate or is just panicking and grasping at straws. Yet his colleagues in the trade union movement are worried and have been calling on government intervention in the manufacturing industry. If the farce of the hastily convened joint select committee on the energy bills is any guide, then the government is going to resist any inquiry that is bound to cast even more doubt over this ill-conceived carbon tax. But the Member for Throsby is not worried. It is not his job on the line. The previous day, the member was also waxing lyrical about what fantastic things were happening at Port Kembla—but again made no mention of the job losses that were happening at the same time all around him. He is still prattling on about how Australia was set to achieve a five per cent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2020. Yet this government's own modelling shows that emissions will increase from 578 million tonnes in 2012 to 621 million tonnes in 2020, despite the carbon tax. Apparently this minor inconsistency should not stand in the way of a good story. He said in his Wednesday statement that it was no secret that he has a lot to say about the manufacturing industry, but he omitted to share with us the details of his government's plan to fix the problem. His motion calls for policies. Well, Member for Throsby, where are they? You are in government after all. All words and no action. It is just unfortunate that what he is saying seems to have little bearing on the unfolding reality. Make no mistake: the manufacturing industry in the Illawarra is in decline, and it has much to do with the self-serving spin of Labor politicians like the member for Throsby and the member for Cunningham, who prefer to sweep problems under the carpet so that issues are not realistically confronted until it is too late. It is a far cry from what his predecessor and former colleague, Jennie George, had to say and also a far cry from the brutal assessment of the former state Labor member for Kiama and former Mayor of Shellharbour, Bob Harrison. Neither was afraid to put the needs of their constituents ahead of party politics, because they understood what was really happening at the grassroots level and actually listened to what was being said. Our rate of manufacturing production has not only begun to stall; it has gone backwards. In a listing of industrial production for 42 countries in the most recent issue of the Economist, we were ranked 41st, only in front of Greece. One of my constituents has just returned from Germany and says that nearly everything you buy there—clothes, food, hardware—is made in Germany. If you see two Japanese cars, it is a rarity. How do we compare in Australia? This rather cleverly constructed motion pretends to be doing something when really nothing practical or timely is being done. They are an inept and incompetent government and no amount of their grandiose statements will change the fact. The member's motion is deliberately loaded to give the impression that they care. They do not. Take part 1(c) of the motion, which says: the Australian Government has an agenda for nation building, innovation and improving the productive performance of business and industry, but … more can be done in this area; Sorry, but I have to disagree with that observation. I would have to say that the only positive initiative would be to have the guts to call an early election. The government's policies are about nothing more than desperately preserving the status quo of power. What good, Member for Throsby, is compensation if you do not have a job?