DANICA DI GIORGIO:
Treasurer, thank you for joining us. Is this now an acknowledgement from the Prime Minister that the Federal Government has botched the vaccine rollout?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well, certainly it has not gone as fast as we had hoped, but, as you know, there are things we’ve been able to control and things that we haven’t been able to control. And the good news is that one million doses have been delivered over the course of the last week. That means that it’s now faster than ever before and compares to 45 days for the first million doses to be delivered. So the Prime Minister yesterday, he accepted responsibility. He acknowledged the challenges that the program has had. But at the same time, we’ve also got to acknowledge that Australia has saved some 30,000 lives that would have otherwise been lost if we had replicated the experience with the pandemic that we’ve seen across other countries in the OECD. We’ve also seen around one million new jobs being created as our employment levels are now higher than they were going into that pandemic. That has not been achieved by any other advanced economy, and it goes to our successful economic as well as health response. But we’re not out of this pandemic yet. And the fact that 13 million of our fellow Australians are right now in lockdown with businesses closed, kids working from home and not in the classroom, and, of course, families being apart, means that there are some tough days still ahead.
DANICA DI GIORGIO:
The Prime Minister yesterday has asked ATAGI to change the advice on AstraZeneca. Overnight, we saw New South Wales Minister Stuart Ayres criticising ATAGI for its messaging. Do you think that that peak body has been responsible for the messaging changes for AstraZeneca in Australia?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well, they’re the expert panel, and we have been taking their advice. And Australians would expect that we would follow under medical advice. But we are now dealing with a situation where there is, you know, a spread of the virus across three of our states, and the case for ATAGI to look at their advice and make any changes that they deem appropriate is there. And that’s why the Prime Minister said what he has said. But people can go and see their doctor, receive the proper medical advice as to whether the AstraZeneca vaccine is appropriate for them. But the good news, too, is that we are getting more Pfizer vaccines, more mRNA vaccines, each and every day. A million have arrived over the course of the last week. Another million will be coming next week. And so the number of vaccines coming to our country builds.
DANICA DI GIORGIO:
Treasurer, millions of Australians in New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia now in lockdown, as you said. How much will these shutdowns cost the economy?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Treasury estimates that around $300 million a day is being lost as a result of the lockdowns in New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia. We expect to see the flow-on impacts in our national account numbers for economic growth as well as in our unemployment numbers. Bearing in mind that last month the unemployment rate fell to a 10‑year low at 4.9 per cent. So the fundamentals of the Australian economy are strong. They’re sound. We have bounced back strongly in the past. We will bounce back strongly in the future. But we are going through a pretty difficult time. And to see our largest economies being subject to this lockdown are, of course, going to have economic impacts even beyond those states in question - namely, the border closures, the investment decisions that might be deferred or delayed, the impact on supply chains are all very real. And that’s why we’re working through it. But that’s also, Danica, why we’ve provided significant economic support to both households and to businesses.
DANICA DI GIORGIO:
Well, you mention it’s a difficult time. And it certainly is for many people. Some have said that they’re simply falling through the cracks on the individual payments that are on the table. Does it now need to be tweaked?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well, we have made some changes to our payments on both the income support side and, of course, we have our business payments as well. And I don’t discount in the future making even further changes. But what we do have right now is some very effective support mechanisms that are in place that are helping people in need. These disaster payments of $600 and $375 go directly to workers who have lost in the case of a $375 payment between 8 and 19 hours of work and someone who’s lost 20 hours or more of work will be eligible for the $600 payment. More than half a million of these payments have already been processed, and Services Australia has brought to the task more than 14,000 staff. We’ve seen 93 per cent of people apply online. Just yesterday we had another 70,000 applications. So we’re moving through this case load very quickly. Payments are being made, in some cases as quickly 40 minutes. And that is really ensuring that people who need that support get it. And when it comes to the business payments, they vary between $1,500 and $10,000 a week. We’ve agreed a cost-sharing arrangement with the states. It’s based on the fall in turnover of those businesses. It approximates to around 40 per cent of their payroll and, therefore, it is providing them significant economic support to meet both their fixed costs like rental, utilities, as well as helping to compensate their staff.
DANICA DI GIORGIO:
All right. Well, support is available for businesses, it pays for the overheads. But how do you expect people to feed their family and pay for their mortgage? Because if you’re on a family payment and you’ve lost all of your hours, how are you supposed to live on $450 a week?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well, when it comes to the welfare payments, as you know, if you’ve worked more hours, that reduces your welfare payment. So if you are now no longer working those hours because of the lockdowns, then your welfare payments can increase in certain circumstances. And that’s the way that system is designed. We can’t make everyone be put into exactly the same position that they were prior to the lockdowns. But in these payments that we’ve provided we’re seeking to provide sufficient and significant support to people, and hopefully we can get on top of this virus and those states can come out of the lockdowns as quickly as possible.
DANICA DI GIORGIO:
You said you might consider changing things down the track. Would that include a re-introduction of a JobKeeper scheme, the exact same one that we saw last year?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well, I’m not often quoting Daniel Andrews, but he did say earlier this week that what we’ve put in place is effectively JobKeeper. So before the Labor Party runs out there talking…
DANICA DI GIORGIO:
There are changes, though. It’s different.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
That’s what a Labor Premier has said. And he also said that this process is as simple as can be. They’re his words, not mine. And the fact that we’re delivering payments in 40 minutes is a lot quicker than what we were delivering payments for JobKeeper. You see, JobKeeper was based on the decline in the businesses’ turnover and then payments were made effectively to the worker. What we’ve done here is provide them directly to the worker, not dependent on a business’s decline in turnover. Indeed, I was contacted by a business yesterday that has more than 50 pubs across New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia – the three states that are in lockdown – more than 2,000 staff. And they said to me that because their turnover is still quite high in the other states they wouldn’t have been eligible for the payments under JobKeeper, yet their staff today are eligible for the payments under our disaster payment system. So there’s a good case where thousands of workers in pubs across the three states in lockdown are getting payments that they otherwise may not have got under the JobKeeper arrangement in similar circumstances. And these payments also are going to people who are casuals, for example, and not all casuals were captured in the JobKeeper arrangements. So we do have an effective response. It is being progressed very quickly with more than half a million payments out the door – more than $200 million already out the door. And, of course, our objective here with these payments is the same as it was with JobKeeper, namely, to get support to the people who need it most.
DANICA DI GIORGIO:
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, thank you for joining me this morning.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
My pleasure, Danica.