Summary

• A recent emergency state declared in Victoria put new challenges to the Australian health and economy.
• JobTrainer program is expected to create more jobs that will be needed in the future.
• Mr Morrison is planning to invest a lot of money in new infrastructure projects.
• Big businesses will need to help their employees and suppliers if they want to stabilise once the pandemic is over.
• Encouragement for building a new home provided to people by Morrision government by granting them A$25k, as a part of HomeBuilder programme.
• Doctors and nurses to be rewarded after the pandemic, as they have been working tirelessly since the beginning of the pandemic outbreak.

Australia got somehow fortunate with the coronavirus pandemic compared to the number of cases in the rest of the world. Being an island surrounded by water, it got relatively isolated from the worst-case scenario after Morrison’s government closed all states’ and territories’ borders in March this year.

Despite the optimistic predictions for handling the COVID-19 situation, an emergency state recently got declared in Victoria, which is frightening for both health and economic reasons. A stage 4 lockdown and curfews from 8pm-5am in Melbourne are measures that the rest of the continent has not yet seen in these unprecedented times.

With the new lockdown and other restrictions in the state of Victoria, a quarter of Australia’s total income has put the whole nation in a serious economic danger. The economic recovery will not be as simple as some expected, and the Prime Minister’s recovery plan will be trickier than ever.

Free or low-cost training for new skills

One of the most recent plans for the economy to bounce back is a JobTrainer program, introduced on 16 July.

The idea behind this A$2bn investment is to provide training for new set of skills that will be either free or remain low costs for people that left school or those who would like to get a qualification in a different field. PM Scott Morrison stated that the new program will ensure more than 300,000 training spots in industries that will require more employees.

Apart from reskilling new people, JobTrainer will be designed to secure existing apprenticeships, while providing learners with safe salaries and training.

The main emphasis of JobTrainer is to create more jobs, aiming that the economy will improve after the Australian society faced many obstacles since the start of the pandemic.

Infrastructure spending

Many infrastructure projects are announced as a part of Mr Morrison’s plan to help the economy recover. About A$72bn are planned to be invested in a new rail that will connect Melbourne and Brisbane, water projects that will secure future water safety, and several other plans that are yet to be revealed. Improving Australian roads is also on the priority list, with a budget of A$500m.

By introducing new infrastructure ideas, Morrison expects to create about 66,000 jobs that would boost the economy and give people confidence about the future.

Big businesses and corporations asked for help

According to Morrison, big businesses will be crucial in the economic recovery.

He urged large companies to keep their people in business because now doing so is more important than ever. Once the pandemic ceases to exist, those companies will need their employees in order to regain stability.

Prime Minister Morrison also encouraged securing small businesses by paying them on or ahead of time. They are important for supplying the bigger fish, and in the next six months, it will be crucial to keep small firms in the flow by letting them feel assured and secure.

Along with medium-sized companies, there are plans to support small enterprises by spending billions of dollars for tax incentives.

HomeBuilder

Morrison’s Government is giving away A$25,000 grants to people who are planning to build a new house and those who want to renovate existing residences. By providing the grants, it is expected that more people will be encouraged to start a new life by building or renovating their homes.

According to the Australian Government Business, the applications will need to be signed by the 31 December and will need to start within the period of three months since the agreement has been endorsed.

The project should generate more jobs in the building industry and enable more builders into creating new homes.

Health and aged care investments

Since the coronavirus pandemic started, investments into health and aged care have been highly encouraged, considering they needed to take extra costs and precautions regarding keeping the people safe.

The Australian Government is planning to invest hundreds of millions of dollars into health and aged care system. Doctors and nurses have been front-line workers since the start of the pandemic, working tirelessly for long hours, and this will be Australia’s way of saying thank you.

Bring back the economy

As the unemployment rate reached 7.4% in June, Australia needs to find a way back to its feet and stimulate the economy like it used to before the pandemic crisis.

PM Scott Morrison and MP Gladys Berejiklian both agree that the lockdown era is over for New South Wales, saying it would be impossible to think about the recovery if the businesses do not function Morrison defended his approach by stating that New South Wales had a better tracking system for coronavirus, compared to Victoria. Unfortunately for them, Victoria’s Government was forced to put the economy on hold until COVID-19 cases begin to drop.

By choosing the suppression rather than the elimination strategy, Morrison’s government managed to bring back 210,800 jobs in the land down under by letting more businesses to open their doors.

Even though statistics say that the unemployment rate at this time is 2.2% higher than at this moment last year, Morrison believes that Australia is on the right path to recovery. COVID-19 recession will be felt globally, but it is up to us to make the best out of the worst situation and leave the pandemic holding our heads high.