MADELEINE MORRIS:
We’re joined by the Federal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, good morning to you Treasurer, thanks for your time.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Good to be with you Madeleine.
MADELEINE MORRIS:
First of all, let me just ask you about that issue which is still really an issue for Labor, any last minute changes, decisions, to include those 1.1 million short term casuals in the JobKeeper payment ?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
We’ll be putting the legislation to the Parliament as we previously announced. That means it’s a $1,500 flat payment for part time workers, for full time workers, for casuals who have been connected to their employer for 12 months or more, for sole traders and for not-for-profit organisations. See Madeleine, this is a program at $130 billion, it’s unprecedented in it’s scale and it’s scope and around six million workers should be able to use this program to stay in a job and to keep the connection with their employer which will help build that bridge to the recovery on the other side.
MADELEINE MORRIS:
But does that inequity of that worry you? So people who are on short term contracts, so many in the arts industries as we know, 1.1 million Australians will only be able to get JobSeeker at a lesser rate, but someone who might have done a shift in a bakery once a week for four years earning $250 a fortnight, they can now get $1,500?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well there’s a couple points I’ll make. Firstly we’ve provided additional support to businesses based on the size of their wages roll and that includes payments of between $20,000 and $100,000 to hundreds of thousands of businesses. So they will have access to this money to help meet the wages bill of some of those casuals that you’ve referred to. At the same time the JobSeeker payment is also very substantial and we’ve effectively doubled the size of the safety net. There’s also the ability for people to work a little while they’re also on that JobSeeker program. So we believe it’s a very fair system that we’ve laid out, it’s a very substantial system, it’s a very generous system, but it does reflect the significant economic challenge that the country faces at this time and that’s why we’ve gone ahead with it…
MADELEINE MORRIS:
…well its certainly, sorry to interrupt, it certainly is very generous, but to that point, someone who has been working, maybe getting $500 a fortnight, is now going to be able to access $1,500 paid for by the taxpayer, is that fair?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
I think it’s very Australian to ensure that it’s a flat payment and no one is getting paid more because they’re on a higher income. As you know, some of the schemes overseas adopted that approach. What we have tried to do is adopt an approach which has a flat payment, which uses the existing tax system which will be much more efficient and effective to implement and we’ll get the money into people’s pockets sooner rather than later.
MADELEINE MORRIS:
Can I just ask you about unemployment. We’ve seen various predictions from various economists, the RBA warning about it yesterday. With the implementation of this JobSeeker payment now, do you actually have a projection for what you think unemployment is going to get to over the coming months?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Look there’s no definite number on that because things are still very fluid. Obviously the health restrictions that we’ve put in place have had a severe economic impact, but we’ve pulled out all stops to do what we can, to keep people in a job and maintaining that formal connection between employer and employee is going to be really important and that’s why this legislation is so important. I mean, today is one of the most important days in the history of the Australian Parliament as we come together, across the political divide, to save millions of Australian jobs.
MADELEINE MORRIS:
Just on that, a lot of our viewers are very concerned about the fact that this is going to be the last day of Parliament sitting for four months. How are you going to be able to work this? Surely there is a technological way of making it work so that we can have adequate oversight for these huge spending plans that are being implemented?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well of course there’s oversight and we’ve supported the establishment of the Senate Committee…
MADELEINE MORRIS:
Not Parliamentary, sure, there is a Senate Committee, but not Parliamentary oversight, Treasurer.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well the Senate’s in the Parliament the last time I looked. I mean the point is we are obviously putting all the information out there that comes to hand and the Prime Minister made that very clear in his statement yesterday after National Cabinet. I mean this is truly a national crisis that we face. An economic and a health crisis simultaneously, effectively like fighting a war on two fronts, and I believe that the Australian people are with us as we go forward. The Parliament will meet as required to pass important legislation just as we did a few weeks ago.
MADELEINE MORRIS:
Just a final question. As Treasurer you’re presiding over the spending of $214 billion in one month, that’s one for the CV…
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
It’s not something I was looking to put on my CV, I can promise you!
MADELEINE MORRIS:
I’m sure it’s not. Two questions, the Prime Minster said that he wants this to roll back after six months. One, how do you know that’s going to be enough time? And two, how are you actually going to do it?
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Well in terms of the legislation, there’s sunset clauses that are in place, but clearly the measures will be rolled back when it is safe to do so in terms of the health advice that’s coming to us and the subsequent economic impact that it’s having. I mean what we are absolutely focused on is getting the support to people who need it most and we’ve had effectively three separate packages, Madeleine, of support measures. They’ve all been different in nature and in scale and in scope. Obviously today’s legislation and the JobKeeper payment is the most significant. We’ll do what is necessary but we’ll also continue to take the best possible medical advice.
MADELEINE MORRIS:
Okay we’ll have to leave it there, thank you very much for joining us on a busy day for you Treasurer.
JOSH FRYDENBERG:
Thank you.