MANUFACTURING CRASHING AS LABOR STUNNED INTO PARALYSIS

01-September-2011

Labor’s impotence and incompetence on manufacturing policy has plunged to a new low, following the release today of statistics pointing to another decline in the sector.

The Australian Industry Group - PricewaterhouseCoopers Performance of Manufacturers Index for the month of August has revealed that, since Labor was elected in 2007, there have been 26 monthly contractions in manufacturing activity in Australia.  This is an extraordinary figure considering it has been in office for 44 months.

Labor’s record also represents a stark contrast to the 13 expansions in manufacturing activity that were experienced in the last 14 months of the Howard Government.

Even under Labor godfather, Paul Keating (whose demeaning statements that manufacturing is an ‘old’ industry with no future presumably serve as an inspiration to Julia Gillard), the situation was never this bad. 

“Manufacturing has been drifting for months under this aimless and paralysed
Government – and there continues to be no serious response to the deepest crisis in the sector since the Great Depression,” said Shadow Industry Minister Sophie Mirabella.

“They show supreme indifference to groups such as steel makers and fabricators: their Steel Industry Advocate position has been left vacant for nine months and the Steel Industry Innovation Council hasn’t even met for six months to discuss problems at businesses such as BlueScope and OneSteel.

“The Government is now refusing to even hold an inquiry into the crisis and possible ways out of its mess, and is rejecting deafening calls to dump its job-destroying and
confidence-crushing carbon tax.

“It is staggering that, against the backdrop of rapidly increasing anxiety among Australian manufacturing workers about their employment security, Ms Gillard and her Industry Minister Kim Carr are interested only in clinging on to their own jobs.”