Mr ROBB (5:40 PM) —I rise to add my support to the Employment and Workplace Relations Legislation Amendment (Welfare to Work and Other Measures) Bill 2005. I do so in a very positive and constructive way. This is a very important piece of legislation and I am very proud to be associated with it. At present there are three major challenges driving the focus of government legislation—three challenges confronting Australia. One, of course, is the threat of terrorism, and that is the subject of other legislation. The other two major challenges that we confront as a community, as an economy and as a population are the ageing population and the continuing strong growth of globalisation.

Let me briefly look at these two challenges. Regarding the ageing population, we know that studies by conservative groups suggest that within five years we will have at least 195,000 more jobs than we have people to fill them. It is a real issue and a real threat to our living standards, and we have to respond in a constructive and proactive way—not put our heads in the sand. The other and related issue is that of globalisation, particularly the very strong emergence of China, India and some other countries in the region. It presents enormous opportunities, but it also presents very serious threats if we do not position ourselves as a country, as an economy and as a people to deal with these opportunities and these threats.

This legislation also goes to a related challenge. I see the challenge that we face as a country is that more and more Australians are beginning to lose the habit of self-reliance. It is a cultural problem that is creeping up on us and it must be addressed. It is, in part, a product of passive welfare. The low participation rate of people of working age in Australia compared with other major OECD countries is a reality. It is something we have to confront, and I suggest that part of the problem is that we as a people are starting to lose the habit of self-reliance.

This Welfare to Work legislation is part of a range of legislation designed to address the two challenges of our ageing population and the growth in globalisation. They need to be seen in the context of a range of legislation. There is no silver bullet that will deal with these challenges. We have to confront this in a comprehensive way across many portfolios. As such, the workplace relations legislation is a central part of this. It is critical to increasing work force participation. It is critical to the flexibility and fleetness of foot required for industry and workplaces to capitalise on the opportunities and to avoid the threats that confront us with the growing globalisation of our economy.

The independent contractors legislation that is in the design phase and has been foreshadowed is part of this pattern. Even something like the super drawdown for people who have reached the preservation age is another really important initiative as part of this matrix of legislation to deal with these challenges. The mature age worker $500 tax offset is another component, in tax policy, as is the senior Australian tax offset. All of these things make up a concerted attempt to deal with these challenges. The Welfare to Work legislation that we are debating in the House at the moment is very much a part of this attempt to increase work force participation, flexibility and the opportunities that are there for every Australian.

There is now a shortage of workers, not a shortage of jobs. This is commonly accepted. This situation will only accelerate with the ageing of the population. As I said earlier, there will be a shortfall within five years of potentially close to 200,000 workers compared with the number of jobs available. In order to meet the skill and labour shortages that the Australian economy will experience, we must ensure that as many as possible Australians of working age are able to participate in the work force to their highest level of capacity and availability. It is an imperative to deal with the challenges, but it is also an imperative for other reasons. At present the net growth in the Australian work force is 170,000 people each year. Yet it is anticipated that by the decade 2020 to 2030 we will have on average a mere 12½ thousand people per year coming into the work force, compared with 170,000 today. It is a very serious looming problem and the ultimate effect is an ever-diminishing tax and revenue base for our governments. This will seriously impact on the ability to provide a range of government services including old age pensions, working age income support, payments and health services. The genuine safety net that has been built up by successive governments throughout our history, which is a proud feature of policy in this country, is under threat unless we acknowledge and deal with this problem that is looming very large and is already on our doorstep.

This Welfare to Work legislation is part of that pattern of legislative response to deal with this. There are currently 2.6 million working age Australians on income support, of which only 15 per cent are required to actively search for a job. I put to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, that passive welfare payments with no obligations lock people out of participating in Australia’s prosperity and condemn them to a lifetime of poverty. Not only that, they contribute to this problem of a diminishing work force that is on our doorstep. They contribute to the acceleration and magnitude of that looming problem.

Despite Australia creating more than 1.7 million new jobs in the last 9½ years, the number of working age Australians receiving the disability support pension and the parenting payment has increased massively. In the 12 months prior to June 2004, 55 per cent of people transferred to the disability support payment from another payment. In the seven years prior to June 2004, the disability support payment grew by 26 per cent and the parenting payment single grew by 33 per cent. There are now more working age Australians on a disability support pension than there are on unemployment benefit. We have 705,000 working age Australians receiving the disability support pension, 630,000 working age Australians receiving the parenting payment, 260,000 aged over 50 in receipt of income support and 500,000 working age Australians on unemployment benefit.

This is not sustainable both culturally and financially. It does underscore in many respects an emerging cultural problem: we are losing the habit of self-reliance; we are losing the sense of self-responsibility. We are losing that great Australian trait of taking responsibility for ourselves to the best of our ability and of defying the odds and persisting. People need to be encouraged to help themselves to the best of their ability. Many cannot work; many have not got the opportunity of work. But we must do all we can as a government and as a legislature to ensure that people are encouraged to help themselves to the best of their ability. Passive welfare is undermining that objective in a very serious way. Something serious is happening which is not good for our country, and those statistics shine a very big light on that problem. In my view, those on the other side of the House have got their heads in the sand. I have listened to many of their contributions, and none of them have addressed this problem. None of them have provided any solution to this problem, this challenge, that we have. There is a critical mass of people who are reliant on passive welfare payments and it is starting to cause an emerging cultural problem in this country.

Australia’s welfare system is designed to provide a safety net for those who genuinely need it. It is generous and it is well targeted by world standards, and of that we should be proud. This legislation does not in any way affect those who genuinely need the safety net. We can remain proud of it and we can remain responsible to those who genuinely need a safety net. But we are going to give some encouragement to people to help themselves to the best of their ability. Our system was designed at a time when most jobs were full time, most unemployment was for a short time and mothers and married women did not work. We have had the increasing availability of part-time jobs and the increasing flexibility of our work force, which was started by the other side of the House in 1993 with Paul Keating’s changes—those opposite conveniently forget that—and continued in 1996 with further changes to the work force rules by the Howard government. We now have another body of changes proposed to increase flexibility in the workplace. All of that is driven by the reality of a globalised world. We are responding as a parliament to what is happening on the ground, to the imperatives on the ground.

Given these changing circumstances and changed opportunities—the importance of and ability to provide part-time jobs—it is important that people with a partial capacity to work are encouraged to do so. Not only will the community benefit but also these people will benefit from the financial, psychological and social benefits of engaging in the work force. The best form of welfare is a job. We must never forget that. It is not a cliche; it is a fact. It is something that should drive our legislative response to these challenges. It underscores the Australian way of life. Employment also increases people’s self-confidence and self-esteem. It reduces anxiety and depression. It provides financial security and, more than anything else, it provides a sense of fulfilment to people. Having a job gives people the ability to do something constructive and make a contribution. This gives a sense of achievement which ultimately leads to happiness. No amount of money provided by passive welfare is a substitute for that. If we can encourage those who have some capacity to work to do so, we will have done a very good thing not only for the country but for those people themselves.

Research conducted in Australia shows that growing up in a welfare-dependent household leads to poor outcomes for young people. There are currently 700,000 children in Australia growing up in households where no adult of working age has a job, and two-thirds of those households are headed by single parents. We can encourage and make a change to that circumstance even with part-time work so that some of those parents can show an example. Most of these people want to work. We have to provide the encouragement and support that will lead these people to take up opportunities. In a time of labour shortage it is even more critical. Young people living with parents on income support are much more likely than average to leave school early, become unemployed, become teenage parents and end up on income support themselves. This is a well-researched and well-documented point. Young people whose parents work, even in a low-paid job, have the benefit of positive role models in their lives and fare much better. Disadvantaged families in which no parent is working are more likely to have mental health disorders, lower rates of immunisation, greater risk of juvenile participation in criminal activity, problems adjusting to schooling, a higher incidence of early exit from schooling and increased risk of youth suicide. It is a slippery slide.

I picked up a survey yesterday of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander youth perspectives. These were young people across Australia in our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. The survey looked at the five most important issues affecting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people in their communities. One hundred per cent of them listed addiction and substance abuse as the major problem, 55 per cent listed crime and justice second, 42 per cent listed education third, 35 per cent listed physical, emotional and mental wellbeing fourth, and fifth was health and wellbeing. Four of the five problems go to personal abuse, substance abuse, addiction, crime and justice. This is a breakdown of community. What has been the problem? What has been identified as the cause of that? It is the cradle-to-grave welfare that is provided, with no obligation, to these communities.

Over the decades, we on both sides of this House have done a great disservice to these communities. The root of their problems is passive welfare. They have forgotten about self-responsibility and personal obligation. We have not learnt anything if we pursue this passive welfare approach across the rest of the community. Those arguing for cradle-to-grave welfare risk doing as much damage to the mainstream community as has been done by imposing the policy on the Indigenous community over the last few decades. We need to reverse this cultural trend. Labor’s answer is to throw more and more money at the problem, as if we have learnt nothing from the debacle within our Aboriginal communities. Labor believe that welfare is an absolute entitlement without obligations. Read between the lines—that is what they are saying. They mouth all the platitudes—‘people who can work should work’—but they defy that prescription in their policy solutions.

The primary cause of low income is not low wages, but joblessness. The argument that minimum wages lead to the creation of a low-paid underclass is not supported by the facts. If people are capable of working, they have an obligation to work. It is good for them psychologically, socially and physically. Labor claims that people moving from a pension payment to Newstart allowance will be financially worse off. This is not true, because the majority of people on pensions do not earn any private income.

This is a wide-ranging piece of legislation. The two principles that underline the measures in this legislation are that people who have the capacity to work and are available to work should do so and that the best form of family income comes from a job rather than from welfare. Australians are losing the habit of self-reliance. We have to recapture the habit of self-reliance. These welfare to work measures are an important contribution to reversing this trend. No decent society forces those who are seriously disabled or caring for young children to go to work. This legislation does not do that. Contrary to what we have heard from the other side, this legislation protects those very important principles of protecting the seriously disabled and those caring for young children. But nor should a caring society hold out the perverse incentive of welfare passivity to those who can work. If it does so, it denies to those individuals a major source of meaning and satisfaction in their lives and risks creating a permanent underclass. If we do that, we not only let down the individuals in our community who should be given every encouragement to do what they can, but we also neglect the challenge that is faced by an ageing population which we must address and take responsibility for. I commend the bill to the House.