E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TV INTERVIEW
SKY NEWS AM AGENDA
THURSDAY, 9 APRIL 2020

SUBJECTS: Impact of Coronavirus on the economy; JobKeeper legislation; Labor’s constructive approach; Parliamentary oversight of Coronavirus response; Australian Government debt.

ANNELISE NIELSEN, SKY NEWS AM AGENDA: Jim Chalmers, thank you for your time. Now, this was an historic package last night. Labor didn't get its amendments up to protect those additional casual workers and those on temporary visas. Is this an option down the road, or does last night's passage through Parliament mean that that's done?

JIM CHALMERS, SHADOW TREASURER: No there are opportunities Annelise for some of these groups of workers who have been excluded from what passed the Parliament last night to be included. All that's necessary there, given the legislation provides the Treasurer with the power to include some of those groups, is literally the stroke of the Treasurer's pen. Whether it's casual workers who've been in the same job less than 12 months, council workers, people in the arts and entertainment industry, construction, casual teachers, all of these groups have missed out on what is otherwise really welcome support for Australian workers. They do have the opportunity to keep the pressure up and keep the pressure on Treasurer Josh Frydenberg because he does now have the power to include some of those groups who have been unfortunately excluded so far.

NIELSEN: Now, there isn't just this endless pool of cash, even though we have had record spending of $130 billion. What's wrong with those casual workers, who haven't had an ongoing relationship with an employer for 12 months or those who are temporary visa holders, going onto the JobSeeker allowance as opposed to a JobKeeper?

CHALMERS: We want to maintain the relationship between the employer and the employee as much as possible. That's the objective of these wage subsidies. It's why we've been calling for them for some time. It's why we welcomed the Government's change of heart when they said that they would implement a wage subsidy in the form of this JobKeeper payment. One of the difficulties for casual workers who might be excluded from the scheme so far, maybe a casual teacher who's been doing that work for longer than 12 months but might have technically different employers working in different systems, they are excluded. That's not a good outcome for the objectives of the policy, but particularly for that casual teacher. It's also very common in areas like construction, and arts and entertainment that people might work as casuals for longer than 12 months in that industry but the name of their employer changes over time. We welcomed and supported the JobKeeper payment, indeed we called for it. We welcomed their change of heart when they got on board. That's a good thing and a very welcome outcome for millions of Australian workers but let's not stop there. The Treasurer now has the power to include some of these other workers as well. If we cared about maintaining a relationship between a worker and an employer in these other categories, then we should care about it for some of the excluded categories of workers as well.

NIELSEN: Now, we've seen the prudential regulator direct banks that they should be seriously reconsidering whether to pay out dividends. It looks like the banks are going to follow that directive. That means there's $7 billion that won't be paid out to shareholders. A lot of those are self-funded retirees. They were really critical to the Government's support at the election. They're also feeling the squeeze on their investment properties. Is the Government doing enough for self-funded retirees?

CHALMERS: There's a few things there Annelise. For a lot of people there's a heap of anxiety right now and a lot of people's personal finances have taken a big hit as a consequence of this health crisis. We do understand and we do acknowledge that, and there's a lot of unhappiness in the self-funded retirees community about the APRA directive around dividends. We understand that, too. But the point that APRA is making and the point that my colleague Stephen Jones made earlier in the week is that the big priority here needs to be to make sure that banks have sufficient money to lend in this difficult time to help businesses get through to the other side of the crisis. That's what their objective is here. It's not making everybody happy but our overwhelming priority has to be to save as many jobs and as many businesses as we can. That's how we restore confidence in the economy and in the markets. Since the start of the year the stock market's lost 21 per cent in value or something like that which is a big hit. We need to get things back on track in the broader economy and that will flow onto confidence in the markets.

NIELSEN: Speaking of confidence in the markets, we've seen S&P have some pretty grim reading for Australia, that we are likely to face a recession, saying that we could potentially lose that AAA credit rating. Do you think that there's more that could be done to be shoring up that rating now?

CHALMERS: I think the Standard and Poor's commentary that came out yesterday is important in the sense that it does point to some really big amounts which the Australian Government with our support is spending to try to work our way through this crisis. We think that's the overwhelming priority, to support workers, pensioners, families, businesses and communities but it does come with a large price tag. What Standard and Poor's said when they put Australia and the Australian Budget on negative watch is that a lot of money has been spent on this occasion. The most important priority, in recognising that that's our priority and that's going to cost a lot of money, is to make sure we get the oversight right. The Parliament has appointed a committee led by Katy Gallagher, the Shadow Finance Minister, to make sure we're scrutinizing this spending, making sure it's high quality, responsible, finding its target, that it's not being rorted, and all of those sorts of things. I think that's important. That's how we send a signal, not just to the ratings agencies, but more broadly that these eye-watering amounts of money which are being committed by the Parliament are being spent effectively.

NIELSEN: Just finally, as you mentioned, we are facing this enormous debt burden. Do you think we are looking at raising the GST at this point, and should we do that?

CHALMERS: If the Government went down that path, we wouldn't be in the cart for that. Jacking up the GST disproportionately hurts people who spend all of their income. We've made that point repeatedly for some years now. That's not a new position that we're taking. I think as well we need to recognise that an increase to the GST would flow to the states, it wouldn't flow to repairing the Budget or paying down debt. No doubt there will be a conversation about how all this debt is repaid. We want to make sure that those efforts to pay down debt when that's appropriate don't hit the most vulnerable people the hardest. No doubt in the months and years ahead, there'll be a lot of debate about the best way to go about it.

NIELSEN: Well indeed. Shadow Treasurer Jim Chalmers, thank you for your time. 

CHALMERS: Thank you, Annelise. 

ENDS