Total population grew faster than the population of people realistically available for work; those working continued the existing trend of working slightly fewer average hours; the growth of their productivity per hour was a bit slower; and the limits of our ability to generate demand in a private sector already carrying a good deal of debt meant we have been a little short of full employment in the most recent few years.
The effect of much slower per capita GDP growth was obscured for a period by income effects of the terms of trade boom, but as we know that force has been in reversal for some years now.