Member for Chuave Open and Vice Minister assisting the Prime Minister, James Nomane raised concerns regarding the high unemployment rate in the country and the adverse effects that follow with the issue. Citing incidents that were widely reported since the beginning of the year, stating that there are many unemployed youths in the country and the government should pay attention to. Nomane made reference to a few instances such as the crowd that gathered at the Stanley Hotel for the walk in interview and the report of 700 university graduates applying for teaching positions at the University of Goroka. “We’ve got a huge youth bulge in the country that the house must take note off. There’s too many young people without any prospects or employment in the country,” Nomane said. Nomane then quizzed Treasurer Ian Ling-Stuckey about the issue, asking if the government had solutions to address these issues. “My questions to the Treasurer; what is the Government’s plan for employment? How do we address this issue of unemployment? What do we do to increase the number of people that are gainfully employed so this can directly address the rising crime rate that we are seeing in the country now?” he stated. In response to the issues raised by the Nomane, Treasurer Ling-Stuckey mentioned that there are a number of initiatives at a very high level that the government has taken to create jobs, adding that this is one of the key areas that they are working to address an must continue to address. The Treasurer believes this can be achieved at the budget level. He added that they continue to restructure the budget and ensure that they pump more money into these economic activities to create Jobs. “I’m referring to our capital budget, which 3 years ago when we took office was sitting at around K4.6 Billion. This year as the Member knows we’ve increased that to K9.7 billion,” Stuckey explained. As Stuckey went on, he reiterated that of that particular budget, the Public investment Project component has also been increased to a little bit from K2billion to around about K6.6 billion. Referencing his response to a previous question along the same lines from 3 years ago, he said that jobs growth by any government will be delivered by pro job and pro-growth policies.