Topics: Royal Commission, Victoria’s economy, ABS Labour Force figures
E&OE
Kieran Gilbert, Host: And one person that thinks they should be looking at that trillion-dollar debt level and start and put some fiscal rules in place is Bran Black. He’s the CEO of the Business Council. I caught up with him earlier about that issue, but also about the Royal Commission into the Big Build in Victoria.
Bran Black, Chief Executive: It does look as though the terms of reference are sufficiently broad. This is something we’ve been calling for for some time, indeed 18 months. It’s absolutely necessary. We just don’t know where the bottom of this scandal is. And the great thing about royal commissions is that if they’re done well, then they have the powers, they have the transparency and the openness to get to the bottom of the challenges and make some findings and recommendations to avoid the problems.
Kieran: Now, as you say, you’ve been calling for this for many months. Your members are members of the construction industry, corporates in Victoria, have known that something stank in Victoria for some time, and we’re not talking about small amounts of money, it’s more than $100 billion, the State Government’s Big Build?
Bran: Well, indeed, and when you think about the comments that have been made by Watson SC when he was providing his reports into these matters, he indicates that it’s about $15 billion, on his estimate, that has been lost in public funds as a consequence of this corruption. So this has real consequences for Victorians. That’s schools that haven’t been built, it’s roads that haven’t been able to be completed, it’s so many missed opportunities. It’s a higher stamp duty rate. It’s all of these things that ultimately mean the state is less competitive. That’s the cost of corruption.
Kieran: It’s the cost. What’s the benefit of the Royal Commission potentially, because I’m sure you’re the same, I’ve been hearing about the heavy hand of some of the union behaviour in Victoria for decades, not just the last few years in terms of these claims of corruption, but a much broader sort of impact on the private sector. Do you hope this Royal Commission will lead to a new era for Victoria?
Bran: I really hope so. So the key thing with a royal commission, of course, is that it does have increased powers to compel documents, people, it can access information that it needs, and provided the terms of reference are indeed sufficiently broad in practice to facilitate that, then that’s a great thing.
But the one important point that I’d make there is that even with a royal commission, or even if the Premier were to go so far as to ditch the work from home Bill, which is something else that we think is absolutely critical, what those things do is stop Victoria from going further backwards. And as we saw yesterday, the figures were confirmed in terms of unemployment: 5.1 per cent. Victoria again leading the country in terms of the unemployment rate. If you want to change that, you’ve got to start taking steps that take Victoria forward, and that means looking at the competitiveness of its overall investment attraction settings.
Kieran: Yeah, indeed, and even the retailers have been telling me about the retail crime dramas in Victoria. You’re talking about the unemployment issue. In your fundamental problem with the State Government’s work from home legislation, what’s wrong with it? Does it need to be thrown out in its entirety?
Bran: That’s absolutely right. It does need to be thrown out in its entirety. There are challenges, of course, with the drafting, but more broadly, it creates a layer of uncertainty that is really of concern to businesses.
And I can’t stress enough: I’ve heard from manufacturers, I’ve heard from information technology businesses, finance businesses, small businesses, they’re saying that they would actively consider moving their operations out of Victoria in the event that this Bill is passed.
We don’t want to see that. Victoria has been historically the nation’s powerhouse, its driving force for economic growth. We’ve got to get back to that because when Victoria does well, the whole country does well.
Kieran: Yeah, indeed, it is a great state, a great city. Let’s hope that these developments will help get it back on track where it needs to be.
Bran Black, CEO of the Business Council. Thanks so much for your time, appreciate it.