Page 4063 - Week 13 - Thursday, 10 November 1994
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We have also established a help line aimed at offering immediate advice from one central point to those young people, whether they are looking for a job or looking for a place in the Institute of Technology or one of our universities. There is a large range of activities that the Government is engaged in that are aimed at assisting to bring down our unemployment figures. Madam Speaker, I will say to you that I do not pretend that the Territory Government can do it on its own. There are clearly other factors, national factors, even international factors, at work here, the same as there are for every other State and Territory in Australia.
MR STEFANIAK: I have a supplementary question, Madam Speaker. Firstly, might I correct the Chief Minister in relation to last year's figures? In fact, in October last year there was 6.9 per cent unemployment in the Territory. Now it is 7.6. Chief Minister, my supplementary question relates to our highest youth unemployment rate, at 40.6 per cent. Will you concede, as a result of that particularly high rate now, that something more than just your public relations exercise of the so-called youth employment strategy is needed to address the very real problem here of youth joblessness?
MS FOLLETT: No, I do not concede that, Madam Speaker. I think it is amazing to see the Liberals putting forward that kind of a scenario when, of course, they have no alternative. We saw what their alternative was in the last Federal election, when they had their youth wage - slave wages. That was their only option. If they believe that this is just window-dressing, they clearly have not been listening, or else they are blinded by their own ideology. Madam Speaker, I would also like to say that Mr Stefaniak has used the figures that he wants to use. What he used in purporting to correct me was, in fact, the original series of figures for unemployment, which are highly unreliable. If he looks at the trend series - - -
Mr De Domenico: You have used them. They have not been fiddled with.
Mrs Carnell: You use them when it suits you.
MADAM SPEAKER: Order!
MS FOLLETT: Madam Speaker, I use the trend series of employment figures because they are the more reliable figures. If he looks at those, he will see that the statement that I made about unemployment this October being lower than it was last October is quite correct.
Pre-Election Period Arrangements
MR MOORE: Madam Speaker, my question is also to the Chief Minister. It refers to a letter that the Chief Minister wrote to us today, where she discusses what we refer to as the caretaker period. She suggests that it should commence 36 days immediately before polling day, namely, 13 January. Chief Minister, in the arrangements that you attached you did not deal with paid advertising or information. Will you assure this house that there will not be any government paid advertising or information programs which include reference to any Minister or Government member during that caretaker period?
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