Employment Minister Michaelia Cash has latched on to new economic figures that show record high employment despite the jobless rate edging up to 5.8 per cent.
The rise in unemployment was the first increase this year and follows three months of stability at 5.7 per cent.
Total employment grew by just 7900 in June as a 34,800 jump in full-time employment was pared back by a fall in part-time workers.
"Almost 12 million Australians are in jobs and that is very good news," Senator Cash told reporters in Perth on Thursday.
But she said the government is not about to rest on its laurels.
"That is why every policy we took to the election was very much a policy that was based on how do we stimulate business to create jobs," she said.
Labor's employment spokesman Brendan O'Connor viewed the jobs result cautiously given a change of sampling undertaken by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
Even so, he said unemployment remains stubbornly high compared with the 5.1 per cent average under the previous Labor government even when it was dealing with the global financial crisis.
He said the Turnbull government's jobs and growth slogan was a cliche.
"Underneath that slogan there is literally nothing," Mr O'Connor told reporters in Canberra.
