ALICIA PAYNE:
Good morning, everyone. I’m Alicia Payne, the Member for Canberra. It’s my great pleasure this morning to have Julie Collins, the Minister for Small Business, here at the magnificent Scott Leggo Gallery with Scott and Philippa Leggo, to talk about what our government is doing for small businesses, including small businesses here in Canberra. This gallery is one of Canberra’s most loved small businesses, where you can get Scott’s magnificent photography either in a beautiful piece for your wall or small gifts or even jigsaw puzzles, and they’re all Australian-made. Talking to businesses, we know that they’re doing it tough at the moment. Today, we want to focus particularly on the energy rebate that we’re providing to small businesses of $325 to help with their energy bills. Here in Canberra, our businesses are some of the people most passionate about our capital, and working really hard every day to make this such a wonderful place to live. This energy rebate is just one of the things that our government is doing for small businesses, and it will benefit around 18,000 ACT businesses. So, it’s my great pleasure now to hand over to the Minister.
JULIE COLLINS:
Thanks, Alicia. It’s terrific to be here with you. Alicia has long been a big supporter of small businesses here in Canberra and, indeed, around the country, and we’ve had quite a few discussions about how government can support small businesses. I also want to thank Scott and Philippa for letting us be here at the Scott Leggo gallery today. As Alicia has said, there’s some beautiful pieces of work here today. But importantly for the conversation that we’ve had about small businesses and how small businesses are travelling at the moment. One of the things that we can do as a government, of course, is put downward pressure on inflation, which is what we’re doing with our Budget. The budget is on track to deliver a second surplus, which is critical also for economic management and putting that downward pressure on inflation. But importantly today, as Alicia has outlined – energy bill relief. We want to provide small businesses with targeted support. It’s outlined here in our Small Business Budget Statement, over $640 million in targeted support for small businesses here in Canberra and right around the country. Targeted support, whilst also putting downward pressure on inflation and, of course, preparing Australia for a Future Made in Australia in the longer term. That’s what our Budget is about and we know that energy bill relief is important to small businesses. This comes on top of the energy bill relief that we had in last year’s Budget. As Alicia has outlined, $325 for every small business that is eligible will flow from 1 July. Here in the ACT, it’s around 18,000 small businesses, around the country it’s around 1 million small businesses, that will benefit and will receive this energy rebate. Importantly, we know that that will help small businesses with their cash flow, but it will also put downward pressure on inflation. It’s terrific, as I said, to be here with Scott and Philippa in their small business today, and I’m happy to hand over to Scott just to say a few words about small businesses at the moment.
SCOTT LEGGO:
Thanks very much. A big thanks to the Minister and Member for Canberra for supporting our business and taking the time to be with us this morning. So look, obviously, it’s a tough time at the moment for small businesses in this country, so any relief that we can get as a small business owner is always welcome. We’re very big on promoting Australia – it’s a core, central part of our business and, you know, for us, anything that we can do that is Australian-made, and that continues to support not only our small business, but the other small businesses that are part of our supply chain is welcomed from our point of view. So big thanks to the Minister for your support this morning.
JOURNALIST:
Minister, we know small businesses are struggling at the moment and one of the big reasons is people are spending less. Retail trade figures have dropped and we’re expecting new data out today from the Bureau of Statistics. How does the government realistically stimulate spending and growth without risking a rise in inflation?
COLLINS:
Well, that’s what you’ve seen in our Budget. It’s about targeted support to improve small businesses cash flow. Things like the energy bill relief that we’re here talking about today, things like the instant asset write‑off up to $20,000 for small businesses with a turnover of under $10 million, extending that for a further year. But also, critically, important support such as mental health and wellbeing, financial counselling and support for small businesses, cybersecurity support for small businesses. We want to make sure that we’re doing what we can do to put downward pressure on inflation, but targeted support for small businesses in a way that’s meaningful. And of course, we know that small businesses and, indeed, many taxpayers around the country will be benefiting from the tax cut on 1 July, where we will see more Australians get a bigger tax cut because of decisions that we’ve made. We know that this will impact small businesses, importantly, around productivity, because we do expect that people will do more hours and we know that there is a skill shortage that is impacting small businesses. When I go around and I talk to small businesses right around the country, they say their biggest issue is accessing skilled and appropriate labour and their second issue is about input costs and inflation. That’s why we’ve seen the Budget that we’ve seen, where we’re putting downward pressure on inflation, but also providing targeted support for small businesses. That includes our energy bill relief of $325 for eligible small businesses from 1 July.
JOURNALIST:
And what about spending? How can you get more people to invest in local Australian-made companies, like Scott’s?
COLLINS:
Obviously, we want to support small businesses, and we would encourage all Australians to shop locally and to support their local small businesses, which is why we’re here at a local small business in Canberra today. What I would say is, is that we do need to put downward pressure on inflation, which is why we have the Budget we have, and we also have that targeted support to support small businesses at a time when we know that some small businesses are doing it tough.
JOURNALIST:
And just on another matter – detainees. Minister, one in 5 of the detainees have been charged with new offences. Why hasn’t the Albanese government used preventative detention laws? How much worse does this situation have to get before something’s done?
COLLINS:
Look, we’ve been busy cleaning up the mess we were left in migration. We have 2 reports to say what a mess migration was in when we came to office. We’ve been busy cleaning it up. What you’ve seen from our government is a methodical, calm way of cleaning up the migration mess that we were left. What we also know, of course, is that we argued against these detainees being released and if we had our way as a government, they would never have been released from detention. We argued against the release of these detainees in the High Court.
JOURNALIST:
Is the fact that one in 5 former detainees are being released and reoffending really cleaning up the mess, though? It seems like the problem is just getting worse.
COLLINS:
The decisions that you’re referring to were decisions made by the independent tribunal. They were not decisions made by the government. If we had our way, the detainees would never have been released.