Page 4089 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 26 November 2014
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there are good reasons to be confident about the ACT economy. Through careful targeting of government investment, clear priorities and continuing to deliver our election commitments, we are working hard to ensure the economy is strong and continues to grow.
There remains underlying strength in the local economy, supported particularly by our $2½ billion infrastructure investment program that the Treasurer outlined in this year’s budget, and other measures to provide continued local service provision and a number of targeted business assistance measures.
We are, however, seeing the ACT unemployment rate grow to the highest level for some time. We still have the third lowest unemployment rate and the second highest participation rate in the country despite this. Overall, that is good news, despite seeing that overall rise.
Dwelling investment is increasing in line with national trends. There is also sufficient investment in the pipeline, particularly dwelling and ACT government investment, that will maintain economic momentum and resilience in the territory.
The low interest rate environment will support the housing market and hold up private consumption. But there are challenges to face in the medium term, including the reduction in the size of the commonwealth government, particularly direct budget and staffing cuts which have led to a decrease in economic activity recently, and indeed probably a decrease in confidence, particularly from those who may be working in areas where they are seeing these reductions roll through.
There are spillover effects to private sector business hiring and investment decisions are expected as the commonwealth government is a major, and remains a major, employer in the ACT.
We are very lucky to live in the ACT overall. We have been recently ranked the most livable city in the world by the OECD, across 34 nations and 362 regions. And as the Treasurer said, we are the healthiest and wealthiest Australians living in this country. So we do have a lot to celebrate, and we do have a lot of things that mean we can remain positive about future growth.
Canberra is clean, well maintained, unpolluted and very safe, with high quality recreational outdoor environments, educational opportunities, excellent healthcare services, employment and economic opportunities, and it has excellent road infrastructure with minimal congestion. These are all measures which have led to Canberra being ranked the world’s most livable city. And these things do not happen, obviously, by accident. It means the government has been proactive in these areas. We must remain proactive. We must remain engaged with our community and have the vision to build and invest in infrastructure and projects of priority for the people of Canberra, not just for today but for the long term. We will continue to make decisions based on the long-term needs of this city.
In terms of the commonwealth job cuts, we are seeing it on a number of levels, not just in job reductions which are flowing through—we have seen thousands affected in
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