Speech by The Hon Lindsay Tanner MP
Minister for Finance and Deregulation
Melbourne
Tuesday 29 September 2009
Good morning and thank you for the opportunity to speak today at the start of what I understand is a full two day program.
From the quality and variety of speakers you have presenting over the course of this conference, I am sure you will all be able to pick up some great ideas that you can take away with you and implement within your own communities.
Because ultimately, that is what economic development is about – communities - and the reason you are all here is to learn something that you will be able to take away and help your own community with
Whether it is a remote indigenous settlement, a regional and rural township or one of the urban areas in which the majority of us live, economic development is the basis for building, and strengthening, communities.
It is for this reason that I am pleased to see an organisation such as Economic Development Australia grow to a point where it can make a significant contribution as I understand it to have done with the communities ravaged by the Black Saturday bushfires.
If we are going to rebuild those communities, we are going to have to rebuild the economies of those communities – the two go hand in hand – without jobs and industry, communities will not be able to rebuild.
I can assure you that the Rudd Government understands this and has economic development of our communities, our regions and our country as a whole at the forefront of our agenda.
I would like to take the time I have with you this morning to outline a few of our key initiatives in supporting and ensuring that economic development to occur.
At a macro level the Government has been preoccupied over the past 18 months with managing Australia’s response to the global recession. As a result of early and decisive action we have to date managed to steer clear of the worst of the global downturn.
The combination of the Government’s early decisions to guarantee wholesale borrowing by the banks and bank deposits; the aggressive easing of monetary policy by the Reserve Bank of Australia; and the Government’s stimulus packages have worked in tandem with hard work by Australians to protect our economy from the worst of the downturn.
You are probably well aware of the debate emanating out of Canberra over the size and direction of much of the stimulus package but I think there is one part of our strategy that is often overlooked, and I think would be of interest to those here today.
The design of the package means that the economic impact of our stimulus plan has been felt all over Australia, in every town and every suburb. That is absolutely key.
Large scale infrastructure programs, such as building a bridge or a road, often have the problem of both long lead times and the quarantining of immediate economic benefits to relatively small geographical regions.
The single largest part of the Government’s stimulus package, the Building the Education Revolution involves investing in every single community in our country.
When formulating the $16 billion program we could see three main advantages:
Whether you come from Melbourne, a regional city in South Australia or a rural town in far north Queensland, you will have seen these projects taking place and they will have had an impact on your community.
Also of interest to those of you in this room from Government’s stimulus package is our $650 million Jobs Fund.
The Jobs Fund provides grants to support innovative social or infrastructure projects that create jobs and employment opportunities in communities most affected by the economic downturn.
One-off grants off up to $2 million are available to invest in projects that build local infrastructure and create jobs within communities across Australia.
This targeted approach will ensure that entire communities are not left behind in the wake of the global financial crisis.
But ensuring ongoing economic development is about more than seeing off this current crisis, we need long term micro-economic reform and the infrastructure backbone to drive growth and development across the country.
It is for that reason that we have committed billions of dollars to road and rail projects around the country and in increasing the capacity of our ports. These are the building blocks on which this country’s future prosperity will be built.
Among this all of the investment in infrastructure that the Rudd Government is undertaking there is one project that I believe offers the greatest potential boost to future economic growth in Australia.
The National Broadband Network will bring communities across Australia closer than ever before and make distance less of an economic disadvantage.
The opportunities created by the a super fast information network are limitless – the talent, skills and imagination of people in communities all around Australia will be unleashed – driving local and national economic growth.
It will create new opportunities for business, for education, for health and aged care, for infrastructure management and for energy conservation.
For regional economies, it will be the greatest single boost since the steam locomotive replaced the horse drawn carriage, cutting travel times down from days to hours.
The Australian Local Government Association has undertaken research that illustrates how important broadband is for regional Australia.
It has estimated that $3.2 billion and 33,000 jobs are lost to regional areas every year due to inadequate broadband infrastructure.
The reality is that the new industries, new approaches and new methods that will become possible with super fast broadband mean that the benefits to regional economies may well exceed these figures.
I am originally from Orbost in Eastern Victoria and when I was growing up, anyone who wanted to access further education opportunities or work in “non-traditional” industries had no other choice but to move away.
It is this constant migration that stunts the growth of regional and rural communities, it sometimes kills them.
The fact that ninety per cent of Australian homes, businesses and workplaces will benefit from the high-speed Fibre-to-the-Premises broadband network, including those in our regional centres, cities and towns across the country will absolutely change this.
Some things will change quickly, others more gradually, but the ability of young kid in Orbost today to access the world, to get an education, to run a global business without having to move away will have a huge impact on our communities.
As the Minister for Finance and Deregulation one of my direct responsibilities is the Government’s deregulation agenda.
While the work we are doing in this area probably isn’t going to make front page news, the value of better quality regulation in driving productivity growth and economic development should not be overlooked.
Business has long indicated concerns with obstacles to competitiveness through costs generated by inconsistent and duplicative regulatory regimes across the Commonwealth, states and territories.
The Commonwealth is taking a lead role in reducing the burden of ineffective and inefficient regulation, a role that sits squarely within the themes of this conference - we are about creating collaborative solutions for job creation.
The COAG Business Regulation and Competition Working Group, which I co-chair with Dr Craig Emerson, is overseeing these reforms, all of which are aimed at enhancing productivity, reducing business costs and ultimately creating jobs in all jurisdictions.
So far some substantial progress has been made, including in areas that may be of interest to those here today:
The global economic stresses we face remind us of the importance of delivering micro-economic reform efforts that enhance productivity and improve the environment for economic development to occur
Once again, good luck over the next two days in exploring new developments and ways of approaching economic development. Your work and your thinking will be critical to our ability to harness the benefits of our investment in infrastructure and ensure that all Australians, no matter where they live, can enjoy a prosperous future.
| Media Contact: | Website: |
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| Nardia Dazkiw - 0418 144 690 | www.financeminister.gov.au |
