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Job situation could get worse
Submitted 5/01/2009
AAP
But Ms Gillard said the Government had taken action - including the $10.4 billion economic stimulus package and the bailout of the car industry - to help see Australia through the worst of the worldwide economic downturn.
She said the Government had already forecast that unemployment would rise to five per cent by the middle of the year, and to 5.75 per cent by the end of the year.
But she would not comment on predictions from some economists that the jobless rate could nearly double from 4.4 per cent to eight per cent, saying the Government's figures released in the Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook in November were the most up to date.
"The economic security statement, the stimulus package, all about keeping the economy moving, keeping people employment," she said in an interview today.
"The car industry package, the same. The investment in local governments, about local jobs.
"And then of course we have got the big infrastructure investments as well as the COAG money flowing through. So it is all about keeping that economy moving, keeping people in work."
But she said Australia could not be quarantined from the global financial crisis.
"Now obviously the global financial crisis is feeding through, and it's feeding through into unemployment," she said.
"The loss of any job is a huge problem for the individuals involved and what we do as the government, is be out there investing in jobs, protecting jobs, and helping people who lose their jobs in one part of the economy to get into the parts of the economy that are still growing."
Opposition treasury spokeswoman Julie Bishop says the Government must update its forecast for unemployment in light of the predictions.
"Today the Government has refused to refute these recent economic estimates of unemployment reaching eight per cent by 2010 - that's a million people unemployed, we haven't seen figures like that in a decade," Ms Bishop told Sky News.
Melbourne Business School professor Mark Crosby says that unemployment could rise through 2009 towards eight per cent, taking the number of unemployed to more than 900,000.
"Unemployment of eight per cent in 2010 is on the cards. It's quite likely," told The Australian on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, Access Economics economist Chris Richardson said the economic situation was likely to worsen during the next 12 months and into 2010.
"So far we've just seen sharemarkets halve, we've seen some sectors like retailers and car dealers hard hit, most people are still doing okay - 2009 will change that," he told ABC Radio.
"This will be an ugly year. Growth will slow, income growth will slow a lot, unemployment will rise, profits will fall quite sharply."
Mr Richardson said Australia's economy would fall into recession.
