ALAN JONES:
Treasurer, good evening, thank you for your time. Can I thank you, Scott Morrison and Greg Hunt on behalf of many people out there for the tremendous job you have done. It is bearing fruit on the figures; negative growth and the deaths as the proportion of the number of cases, 0.41 per cent. So you’re making progress, more to be made I guess.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Absolutely. These are very difficult times for so many Australian families. Good to be with you Alan, good to be with you Richo. But Australia is fighting a war on two fronts. We face simultaneously a health and an economic crisis. But as you can see from the leadership of Scott Morrison and the entire team, Australians know that we’ve got their backs.
ALAN JONES:
Josh, just one point. I mean, they always say Government doesn’t consult and you don’t listen to anybody and you don’t talk to people. Just explain to our viewers what happened that night when you put the package together because you spoke, I know, personally, to four of the biggest employers in the country.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well, that’s true, Alan. When we were working on the JobKeeper package, we wanted to talk to the business leaders who tragically were closing their doors and laying off their staff. So I did speak to a number of them; Justin Hemmes, Solly Lew, and I also spoke to Rob Scott at Wesfarmers and Richard Murray at JB Hi Fi. Between them, they employ around 150,000 Australians and through no fault of them, no fault of their staff, but as a result of this global pandemic, they had to close their doors. And they were pretty emotional about it in many cases and we knew then that, of course, we had to continue to support the employee.
GRAHAM RICHARDSON:
Supporting the employee has generally speaking been a Labor trait. But you guys have stepped up pretty well. It’s very hard as a Labor person to complain. Josh, I think you should switch mate. I think we’re ready for you.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
The best thing you can do for someone out there is help them get a job and that’s what our focus has been, Richo, all along is to keep Australians in jobs and businesses in business. The JobKeeper payment is designed to keep the employer and the employee formally connected so that when we get to the other side of this coronavirus crisis we can bounce back stronger than ever. Having those discussions with the business leaders, it was really important because we wanted them to receive the JobKeeper payment and then use their existing payroll systems, which is the most efficient and effective way to then pass that money through to their employees. That’s what was really helpful from those conversations.
ALAN JONES:
Josh on that though, the $750 starts from Monday, that’s from the beginning of this week, and the employer is to pay that money. Now, they don’t get it back until May. There are many employers who are saying to me, we can’t survive until May. I’ll ask a double barrel question here. Then of course is the issue of people saying, hang on, I’m a full-time employee, I’ve worked my backside off for god knows how long, I’m only getting the same amount as the bloke who works five hours a week as a casual, the part-timer. Why were they all, everyone is treated the same. It’s almost like a Greens policy here, uniform wage for everybody. So on the first instance, how does the employer manage if he doesn’t have the dough and why are we paying everybody the same?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
The reason why this policy was designed that way was because it’s the most efficient and effective way to get the money to people with a flat payment. But also it’s a very Australian way, Alan, that everyone gets their $1,500 regardless of their wage. Now, in relation to somebody in the retail space or the hospitality space or the tourism space, the $1,500 a fortnight is nearly a full replacement wage, about 100 per cent of the median wage. Now in other sectors, it may be around 70 per cent of the median wage. In those retail and hospitality sectors, that’s where people have been hit hardest. We’ve obviously got lots of casuals in those spaces, lots of part-timers as well as full-timers, and we decided to have the most efficient and effective mechanism through the existing tax system, and Scott Morrison was very, very strong about that. We have to use our existing systems to get the money out and that’s why we did it that way.
ALAN JONES:
Alright now Josh, just let me take this point which is, I suppose, a very simple point. There is a business and it closed down because there has been, the economy has gone into a coma. So the business closes down, the employees are all put off and the businessman decides, ‘look, I’m not going to go back, I mean it’s too much hassle, bugger it I’ve had enough.’ Now, this is to connect the employee with the employer. What about that bloke that has been put off because the employer doesn’t want to reopen? You can’t connect him. Does that employee who has lost his job get the $750?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
They’ve got to be connected to their employer and their employer could have stood them down, so they may have closed their doors, but unless that employer is in liquidation, then that employer hopefully will reopen once the coronavirus is over.
ALAN JONES:
He said he won’t. He said he won’t, Josh. He says he won’t reopen, so the bloke’s out of a job. Does he get his $750, or does he go to $550 for Newstart?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well if that business is not reopening and that relationship is not continuing, then the JobKeeper payment does not apply. But you will find in many cases, overwhelmingly the vast majority of cases, you’ve got businesses that have had to close because of the health related restrictions that have, you know, reduced social gatherings very dramatically and in those circumstances that business wants to reopen on the other side of the coronavirus. And this is what the JobKeeper payment is designed to help. And we’re talking about six million workers who could benefit from this particular scheme. And Alan from Monday night, we’ve already seen more than 400,000 businesses register their interest.
ALAN JONES:
But Josh there are 2.2 million small businesses in this country…
GRAHAM RICHARDSON:
But I just wonder how many businesses will be left? I mean, I can see that you’re trying to do the right thing but, you know, there’s going to be an awful lot of businesses closed who just aren’t going to reopen.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well our absolute commitment is to get as many of them to reopen as possible. That’s why we have spent $320 billion. That’s more than 16 per cent of GDP.
ALAN JONES:
I understand that.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
That’s more than the United States, that’s more in terms of the percentage of GDP of direct support, it’s more than so many other countries, Alan, because this is unprecedented what we’re facing. So we have undertaken a series of measures that are unprecedented in scope. We want to keep as many Australians in a job.
ALAN JONES:
Sure. Josh no one is criticising you here. I’m just simply saying I think Graham is right. You’ve had a mass of applications from those employers, over 300,000.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Sure.
ALAN JONES:
But there are 2.2 million small businesses in this country, and there are many of these people who have decided it’s too much and they’re not coming back. And there’s a whole heap of people out there who have got to pay their mortgage, they’ve got to pay their energy, they’ve got to pay their electric light bill, and they do that, what, on $550 a week? It’s, when you’ve been on $80,000 or $90,000 a year, it’s pretty tough stuff. There’s going to be a lot of social consequences as a result of this whole coronavirus episode.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
You’re not wrong about that, I mean these have been…
GRAHAM RICHARDSON:
Can I just say too, it’s not just a matter of looking at the economics of it, you’ve also got to look at what’s going to happen with the domestic situations of a lot of people. Because when you get really strong financial pressure, it puts enormous pressure on relationships. And you find then, a lot breakdown, that’s when you get violence, that’s when you get real problems. So we’re not just facing here a money problem, this is a societal problem that’s really, really big.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Look, Richo, I couldn’t agree with you more. I’m absolutely concerned about people’s wellbeing and so is Scott Morrison and that’s why we announced just the other day, over $1 billion of additional health measures, including greater support for domestic violence support services, greater support for mental health and wellbeing services. We are absolutely focused on that human challenge as well as that economic challenge. But I want to say to you and all your viewers tonight, that our support for small businesses is not just the JobKeeper payment, it’s actually cash payments up to $100,000. There are wage subsidies for 117,000 apprentices, we’ve partnered with banks like the CBA, with Matt Comyn, to co-guarantee loans to small businesses of up to $250,000 with no interest payments for the first six months, all designed to help those small businesses get back on their feet. And you know that JobKeeper payment, it’s available to sole traders. So that plumber, that carpenter, that sparky, they’re all going to be able to access that JobKeeper payment so that they can get to the other side.
ALAN JONES:
Josh, just before we go, I was surprised when the Prime Minister announced the messaging service WhatsApp, and he gave credit for this Cannon-Brookes and his technology company Atlassian, now I nearly choked. Are you aware that Atlassian allegedly earns $1 billion a year in revenue and has reportedly structured so as to pay no corporate tax in Australia? Is this the sort of person the Government is hobnobbing with?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well look, can I just say what we’ve got to be focused on is delivering results for the Australian community. This is a team Australia moment Alan, you would understand that. I mean people are feeling very anxious and it doesn’t matter if you’re Labor or Liberal, right, doesn’t matter if you’re Alan Jones or Graham Richardson, it doesn’t matter if you’re Mike Cannon-Brookes, or anybody else. We’ve got one job, and that’s to support our fellow Australians at this time, and I make no apologies for that.
ALAN JONES:
(inaudible) to pay their tax.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Sure, everybody’s got to pay their tax…
GRAHAM RICHARDSON:
But you can only support Australians, Josh, if they’re paying taxes. You can’t support Australians if no one’s paying tax.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well you remember that bloke Kerry Packer, you know, and he talked about mugs and taxes. Well can I just tell you everyone should pay their tax and we’ve got to scoop it up, we’ve got to scoop it up, because we’re certainly spending it.
ALAN JONES:
I know you are. Gina Rinehart paid $352 million in company tax in 2018 then state royalties on top of that. This bloke’s doing a favour for the Prime Minister, I might add he’s also a belligerent critic of the Prime Minister. Josh thank you for your time, it’s very much appreciated, good luck, a tough job that no one’s underestimating the difficulties you face and we wish you well.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Good to be with you. Thank you guys, all the best.