‘We’ve got your back’: Treasurer’s Budget message to QLD
Local infrastructure projects, tax cuts for families and business and help to get women and young people back into jobs - this is what Treasurer Josh Frydenberg promises will be in the Budget for us. Here’s everything we know so far.
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There will be tax incentives for families and business, record investment on infrastructure projects, cash for drought resilience and help to get women back in the workforce, in a historic Federal Budget focused on “delivering jobs in the here and now”.
While Queensland has been hit with drought, fire, flood and now COVID-19, Treasurer Josh Frydenberg promises “we’ve got your back”, revealing there will be specific major projects targeted at getting the state back on its feet.
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While JobKeeper and other measures have cushioned the economic blow from the COVID-19, Mr Frydenberg told The Courier-Mail the budget coming down in four days’ time was about the next step in the recovery process.
“This is about rebuilding our economy, and building for the future,” he said.
“Unemployment goes up the elevator and down the stairs. In the 1980s it took six years to get back below six per cent, which is where they started.
“It’s really pleasing to see jobs coming back around the country. We’re now moving to the next phase of the economic recovery.”
The budget will have five pillars - jobs through infrastructure spending, tax cuts, reforms, resilience and health.
There will be specific measures aimed at Queensland, Mr Frydenberg said.
“Queensland has been hit hard. Floods, fires, drought and now COVID-19,” he said.
“The Government has got your back. We’re determined to get more people back into jobs and we will be supporting Queensland families, Queensland businesses and regional Queensland.
“There are important infrastructure projects for Queensland, there’s important measures that will help businesses and families across Queensland.”
Expanding the already record 10-year, $100 billion infrastructure pipeline will be key to the budget’s job creation promise.
“Investing in infrastructure that not only creates jobs today, but also builds our capacity into the future, including the Melbourne to Brisbane Inland Rail which is all about getting product from the paddock to the plate faster,” the Treasurer said.
Reform measures include the already announced changes to make securing credit and loans easier, ‘gas-led recovery’, manufacturing strategy and digital economy, while resilience will look at measures for drought.
“We’ve continually invested in water infrastructure, in drought relief,” Mr Frydenberg said.
Measures to help women get back into the work force are also expected.
“Women have been hit hard, they have felt the real impact of this crisis, but there are some encouraging trends with female employment numbers,” he said.
He said that 54 per cent of the jobs lost at the height of COVID-19 belonged to women, while 38 per cent came from young people aged 15 to 24.
But 60 per cent of the jobs which have come back since went to women and 39 per cent to youth.
“Young people who have been hit hard, we have to help them get a job and get in there quickly.
“We want to avoid that scarring effect on the economy.
“That’s all about supporting the here and now.”
While unemployment dropped slightly to 6.8 per cent, he said it would rise again, as the impacts from the Victorian second wave are felt, but not as high as the 10 per cent previously predicted.
“This budget is all about jobs, it’s about the here and now. We’ve been hit with this once in a century economic shock. We came into this crisis from a position of strength that allowed us to spend as we did in order to keep businesses in business and people in jobs.”
