GARETH PARKER:
Now the federal budget is on next Tuesday. Josh Frydenberg will stand at the dispatch box and tell us what the next 12 months and four years of the economy look like, and the expectation is, of course, that the book will remain in the red for some time. Though, Western Australia's iron ore miners are doing the work in helping that budget- well look better than it was going to. There's all sorts of spending initiatives that are announced before the budget, and this morning, the Federal Government are talking about investments in the digital economy. I wonder what the digital economy means to you. Do you run a digital business? Tell me about it – 9221 1882
On the line, the Minister for the Digital Economy, Jane Hume. Minister, good morning.
JANE HUME:
Great to be with you, Gareth.
GARETH PARKER:
Thanks for your time. Do you reckon people have got their heads around what the digital economy actually means?
JANE HUME:
Well, actually, I think most Australians already participate in the digital economy, although they may not realise it. If you think about it, just in the last 24 hours, have you used contact card payments or have you bought something online? Is your business online? Have you used a QR code? That's all part of the digital economy, and last year it was estimated that because of COVID, Australians actually vaulted their digital uptake forward by about five years in a space of about eight weeks, which is quite extraordinary. So the Digital Economy Strategy, which we're launching today, is all about harnessing that new, brunt of digital technology, just to improve standard living, to create jobs, and also to make access to government services much, much easier.
GARETH PARKER:
So you've got more than a billion dollars on the table here for a range of different bits and pieces. What are the highlights from your point of view?
JANE HUME:
Well, there's some exciting investments in things like artificial intelligence, which is - that's the real technology of the future, and it's something that can be used across a number of different industries. It's not just an industry on itself. We're also growing the games industry. Around the world, the gaming industry is worth around $250 billion a year, yet at the moment, Australia only makes around $144 million. So, we want to really encourage that games industry by giving them tax incentives to come here, and that's really transfer of skills. It enhances local talent and it will benefit the entire economy. There's more, there's the Consumer Data Right, which we've already started with open banking. But we've got to roll that out further to open energy and then telecommunications as well, and that will potentially save households thousands of dollars because they can easily switch between providers, just by comparing online, by sharing their data safely and securely with a third party provider.
GARETH PARKER:
So just to understand that, because I think that's quite important. That's basically when you pay your phone bill or whatever it might be, your gas bill, you've got pretty good data, or the companies who provide you, have pretty good data about what you actually do, what activities you do. So if you've got access to that data as a customer, you can then go and plug it into the website of the competitors, and you can figure out if you can get a better deal.
JANE HUME:
That's exactly right. We know that there's a real loyalty tax for staying with your provider, particularly in banking. For instance, if you change your home loan, you can save around $1000 a year. If you change your credit card, you can save around $200 a year.
But people don't - it's really sticky. But the Consumer Data Right allows you to safely and securely take your data from your provider and share it with a third party to see if they can do you a better deal.
GARETH PARKER:
Okay, now, the downside of this digital transition, of course, that we will have to deal with cyber attacks, and we know that at this company, at the moment, we've been on, not so much on the radio side, but on the TV side of Nine, they're still dealing with that cyber attack. This is something that all businesses and not just businesses, but individuals, households, are going to have to grapple with.
JANE HUME:
Yeah, that's exactly right. But we've already made significant investments in cyber security, both in safety and in trust. And that includes a $1.6 billion cyber security strategy, and the world's first e-safety commissioner. We did that last year, and that new level of security and safety in trust is something that will really enhance - it's a foundation stone investment so that businesses can leverage that new level of cybersecurity investment that we've made. We've also got further investments in things like systems and regulations, just making sure that things like single touch payroll and invoicing, modernising business registers, it all makes doing business in the digital world so much easier.
GARETH PARKER:
Minister, thanks for your time this morning.
JANE HUME:
Great to be with you Gareth.