Tony Abbott plans an attack on youth welfare so that young people "volunteer to give up their benefits" in return for a guaranteed job.
His stated intention is to "break the youth welfare subculture" if elected.
The unemployment rate among people aged 15 to 19 who are looking for work is 16.9 per cent, three times the national average rate. Among those 15 to 24 it is 11.5 per cent, double the national average.
As a minister in the Howard government, Mr Abbott vastly expanded the Howard government's work-for-the-dole program, where unemployed people wasted hours every week keeping a diary of their attempts to find work.
Productivity
Mr Abbott said helping young people move from welfare to work would not be only an important social reform, it would also be a serious economic advance by improving the level of workforce participation.
He listed three related measures: "What you are seeing us build in the course of this campaign is a strong productivity agenda.
"We will have my paid parental leave scheme. And there's more in the pipeline in trying to break the youth welfare subculture. And our incentive payments for seniors is a productivity measure.
"So if we've got productivity reform for women, for seniors and for young people, I think we have the building blocks of serious economic progress in the years ahead."
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