Mr BEAZLEY (3:01 PM) —My question goes to the Prime Minister's previous answer, when he maintained his primary concerns were for the workers in the area. What action do you intend to take concerning the workers of Scone Fresh Meats, who were terminated on 14 January this year and who are likely to receive just 40 cents in the dollar of their accrued entitlements? As this plant is located close to National Textiles, will you guarantee that the workers will be considered a special case and that you will allocate the approximately $630,000 necessary to assist them? What are the criteria you will apply to determine whether these workers and any others in a similar position will be entitled to a special top-up to bring their recovery of legal entitlements to 100 per cent, and will you table these criteria today?

Mr HOWARD (Prime Minister) —I thank the Leader of the Opposition for that question. It enables me to make one or two observations in the course of answering. The first is that, if you lot were still in office, those workers would get nothing. That is the first observation to make. The second observation to make is that, if that closure has occurred since 1 January, in accordance with the announcement made by the minister they will be entitled to the benefit of the safety net scheme. The question of whether they, like the workers at National Textiles, will be entitled to anything in addition will depend on an assessment of their situation in accordance with some of the criteria I have mentioned. It will also depend somewhat on the attitude of the New South Wales government.

Mr Beazley —We have a new policy now!

Mr HOWARD —You had no policy on this. The Leader of the Opposition says that we have a new policy. At least we have a policy. Those who sit opposite had 13 years. As I indicated on 8 February and as the minister indicated, we have the safety net scheme in place from 1 January. Any top-up would be considered against the background of the criteria I outlined in that news conference. I would remind the Leader of the Opposition that the top-up in the National Textiles case involved a contribution of 50 per cent of the top-up by the New South Wales government.

Obviously, the circumstances raised by the Leader of the Opposition in that particular case will be looked at and will be looked at by the minister in his normally careful and compassionate way. He has a concern. It remains to the very great credit of my colleague the Minister for Employment, Workplace Relations and Small Business that he is the first minister with that responsibility in Australia to actually put in place a safety net scheme. Senator Tierney, the Liberal senator who is resident in the Hunter region, reported to our party room this morning that he spoke to a lot of the National Textiles employees at the weekend. He said they are very grateful for what the government has done—and they are rather upset at the attitude being taken by Kim Beazley.