20 February 2014

Interview with CNBC, G20, Sydney

Note

SUBJECTS: Small business and competition

MINISTER BILLSON:

The G20 will take forward the outstanding message of our Treasurer Joe Hockey that there really is a need for practical action. We’ve come out of the GFC phase – it was all about risk management, harm minimisation but now we need to look at the finance systems - the oxygen for enterprise. What can it do that can carry forward the stability and predictability message and better support and resource growth, enterprise, job creation and wealth. That’s the focus of my contribution.

JOURNALIST:

You’re obviously the small business Minister, which is a very large employer and Australia’s small businesses make up a very sizeable percentage of the workforce. With the economy like it is both domestically and globally – what are the challenges for small business right now?

MINISTER BILLSON:

Well a key one is regulatory over reach – spending much of their time focused on compliance burdens not on creating opportunities. Access to finance, is a particular focus of my contribution, has tightened considerably some of the prudential framework which is particularly hostile to small business lending and yet small business is a huge job driver, huge creator of wealth, innovation and prosperity and finance is its oxygen. What can we do that maintains stability and predictability but actually gets that finance into those enterprising people who represent the engine room of the G20 economies and where jobs growth is going to come from and what we can do to support that enterprise.

JOURNALIST:

How hard is it at the moment for small businesses because we’ve been talking over the last couple of weeks about manufacturing shutdowns – Toyota and the like, Alcoa just in the last few days. So how much of a challenge does those big businesses exiting create for the smaller guys?

MINISTER BILLSON:

Well that puts the spotlight on those small and medium enterprises. They are the drivers of future jobs growth, that’s where innovation will come from, that’s where that renaissance in enterprise is needed, not only in the Australian economy but across the G20 economies. That’s where we will see livelihood opportunities improve, wealth created and that’s why we need to make sure the settings, particularly in terms of access to finance, support and encourage that enterprise and that’s what I will be encouraging participants to focus on.