One of the less discussed recommendations from the Commission of Audit is their recommendation number 41 related to disaster relief. The Commission recommends replacing the current Natural Disaster Relief and Recovery Arrangements (NDRRA) with a Commonwealth grant for each disaster of between 25% and 33%. Under the current NDRRA arrangement …read more
Overnight the first (of three) estimates of US GDP growth in the first quarter came in well below expectations at +0.1% annualised (down from +2.6% in the previous quarter). While markets had expected a slowdown caused by the severe winter weather, the actual result was weaker than most had anticipated. Nevertheless, …read more
Today saw the release by the QLD Premier’s Office the latest quarterly Renewal Program Achievements report for the first quarter of 2014 (although much data relates to the period up to Dec 2013). At first glance there appears to be much to celebrate with good news stories abounding in the …read more
Today saw the release of the Dec 2013 International Visitor Survey from Tourism Research Australia (available here). This has been delayed for almost 2 months due to a change in ABS methodology for data collection related to international visitors. The results are something of a mixed bag.Headline International Visitor numbers …read more
Today’s release by the ABS of the Cost of Living Indexes show that the cost of living is starting to more closely reflect the measure of inflation (as measured by CPI). In previous quarters we have seen cost of living increases for most households holding well below the rate of …read more
Mark Beath over at Loose Change has written an excellent piece on a Courier Mail story regarding unemployment (and tourism jobs) in Cairns. The paper runs with the idea that unemployment in Cairns has fallen by 16% (from Dec ’12 to Dec ’13) based on an analysis of the Small Area Labour Market data …read more
Following a wonderful, if rather rough, week out of touch in the Coral Sea, we’re back in the saddle today. Looking back at last Thursday’s regional jobs data for March (which we commented on at the time), I have today taken a look at the youth (15-24yr) jobs data which had …read more
After the positive national and state jobs data for March released last week (see here), once again we are faced with very disappointing regional data in the Far North. The headline unemployment rate for Cairns is back above 10% (10.1%) for the first time in 2 years. The headline number …read more
After the surprise strength of last month’s jobs data, the markets were bracing for a disappointing set of jobs numbers this morning for the March data. In fact the result has once again surprised on the up-side with jobs up 18,100 (expectations had been for +2-7,000) and the headline unemployment …read more
Regular readers will know that we are in no way politically aligned but that we will take issue with “facts” being touted by pollies that are (at best) misleading. On Wednesday Minister for Tourism in QLD, Jann Stuckey, put out a press release spruiking the pick-up in QLD tourism data …read more