11 October 2019

Interview with David Koch, Sunrise, Channel 7

Note

Subjects: Council on Federal Financial Relations meeting; infrastructure projects

DAVID KOCH:

Treasurer, what do you want to achieve at the end of the day today?

JOSH FRYDENBERG:

Well, we're putting our political differences aside and we're coming together to put the interests of Australians first and that means focusing on strengthening the Australian economy. As you said in your introduction, Kochie, one way to do that is boosting productivity. And if we can get our productivity up to what is our thirty-year average that is going to be worth more than $3,000 a year to Australian families. So looking at infrastructure projects, looking at health reforms, looking at heavy vehicle reform and, of course, co-operating on bipartisan important social reforms like the NDIS.

DAVID KOCH:

Okay. So, take us back to productivity because that seems to be a cornerstone of what you want to achieve today. How can you increase productivity? Is it cutting red tape? Is it about streamlining employment?

JOSH FRYDENBERG:

Well, there is a series of ways. Investing in infrastructure is a key way because that gets people home to their families sooner and safer and we know that people are spending more time in traffic than ever before. So, that's an important part of the co-operation agenda. Also, in terms of de-regulation, environmental approvals take a long time for projects and that means jobs aren't created in the meantime. Now, that doesn't mean cutting the environmental protections in any way, it just means streamlining those processes. But there are a number of other ways, particularly in health reform, focusing on patients and keeping people out of hospital could save the economy hundreds of billions of dollars. 

DAVID KOCH:

Yeah, because it is so important. The Reserve Bank is really throwing down the challenge to you and the other state treasurers, hasn't it, and said 'look, we can cut interest rates to zero, surprisingly enough, but we need help from governments. We need you to do this to boost the economy.' It's a real challenge for you.

JOSH FRYDENBERG:

The structural reforms are the hard ones, that's why governments have probably baulked at them in the past. Now that we've had the federal election, now that they've had the state election in New South Wales, both since we last met as Treasurers', I got a sense from the dinner we had last night that there's a real positive mood among my colleagues to get things done.  

DAVID KOCH:

Okay, and what an honour you've just received yesterday; number one ticket holder at the Melbourne Storm. Congratulations on that, you must be chuffed.

JOSH FRYDENBERG:

I probably put all your Queensland and New South Wales viewers off right there.

DAVID KOCH:

Alright, good luck with it. Thanks for joining us.

JOSH FRYDENBERG:

Thank you.