Radio Interview - 6PR Perth Radio - Mornings with Gary Adshead

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
6PR PERTH RADIO
MORNINGS WITH GARY ADSHEAD
MONDAY, 1 JULY 2024

SUBJECTS: 1 July Measures; Budget; Tax Cuts for Every Taxpayer; Energy Bill Relief; Cost of Living; Monthly Inflation Figures.

GARY ADSHEAD, HOST: It’s July 1 and not December 25, it might be Christmas in terms of what you’re going to receive in terms of tax cuts, electricity credits, superannuation as well goes up to 11.5 per cent, not that you can touch that just yet. But there is money that will go into your pocket in some way shape or form because of reforms from the Albanese Government, some of them hard fought. Matt Keogh is the Labor Member for Burt of course, he’s also the Defence Personnel Minister and Veterans’ Affairs Minister and he joins me now. Thanks for your time Matt.

MATT KEOGH, MINISTER FOR VETERANS’ AFFAIRS AND DEFENCE PERSONNEL: Hi Gary, great to be with you.

ADSHEAD: Alright in a nut shell mate, and everyone’s asking it. Why is your Government confident that today’s tax cuts and electricity credits won’t feed into inflation?

MINISTER KEOGH: Well the key thing here is the tax cuts we’re delivering to every tax payer don’t add in any way to the money that was already going to be flowing into the economy from the way the tax cuts had been previously legislated, what’s good though is the 2.9 million Australians earning $45,000 or less are now getting a tax cut where previously they wouldn’t have received a tax cut so this delivers money to people who are really feeling the pressure of the increasing cost of living but we’re delivering that tax cut to everybody. When it comes to energy relief, so in WA that’s $700 - $300 from the Federal Government and $400 from the Cook Government, so from the bills you receive this coming quarter - $350 rebate, the bills you receive in the last quarter a $350 rebate. What’s important about that is it brings down the cost of that bill so it doesn’t have an inflationary effect it has a deflationary effect. Similarly with the freeze to medicines that starts today, not just for concession card holders being frozen at $7.70 but anyone buying PBS medicines being frozen at $31.60, so instead of that going up by CPI again, as well like everything else, that’s being frozen so again that’s a big cost for people, that puts downward pressure on inflation. So the things we’re delivering are putting downward pressure on inflation. Things like cheaper childcare, bringing down the cost to the family budget means that we’re bringing down pressure on inflation. Over the time we’ve been in Government we’ve almost halved the level of inflation in this country. There was a small uptick last month, we always see some volatility month to month, what’s important is the trend. And we’re seeing that fall and that’s because the budget’s we’ve delivered this year and last year have had a downward effect on inflation. They’ve been deflationary budgets but still delivering cost of living relief that families really need.

ADSHEAD: You know, the proof will be in that pudding though won’t it? If the RBA see people out there spending the money from their tax cuts let’s just say and then inflation continues to look like it’s going to be sticky then there’s a chance rates could rise again.

MINISTER KEOGH: Well, the RBA will do what the RBA does. The RBA had already factored in the fact that these tax cuts would be coming because they've been - the legislation of the fact of tax cuts has been around for a long time. We've changed the configuration so everybody gets a tax cut, but the overall input to the economy, if you like, is still the same. That's important to bear in mind. The RBA also has to respond to a lot of international factors that affect inflation in the Australian economy as well as we are actually seeing around the globe right now. So, certainly we expect, and it's why the Reserve bank was given independence by a Labor Government, so that it can appropriately respond to inflationary pressure through the use of interest rates. But what we are doing at the Government side, and that's important as well, is making sure that we're not adding to that pressure. So, yes, there's tax cuts putting money into people's pockets. When they start getting their pay slips this week, next week, and going forward, they'll see that they're getting a bit more money going into their bank. I don't think they're going to hold that against us. I think people really need that because of those increases that they've seen. But the other things, like the $700 off energy bills, like the freezing on the cost of medicines, like the increased subsidy on childcare and the increase in minimum and award wages, they are all things that are going to help people. But there's downward pressure on inflation from the other measures that we've had in our Budget, because we have recognised that it's really important that we don't just deliver cost of living relief, but we do it in a responsible and a restrained way so that we can see inflation return to that target band of between two to three per cent.

ADSHEAD: And so you'd expect then that the next figures out on inflation have to be below four?

MINISTER KEOGH: Well, I would like to see the inflation figure between two and three, Gary. It's about how can we get it there. And bearing in mind that we are but one player in that, because there are global pressures. We are a trade exposed country, everybody knows that. And so we do see those pressures come into the, into the Australian economy from global factors.

ADSHEAD: Why did it, by the way, why did it take so long for both State Labor and Federal Labor to come to a deal on skilled migration places in WA, a deal for 10,000 skilled migration places, when everyone knows that if we're going to have to build more homes, we're going to need the people here to do it? I mean, why has it taken so long to get to that?

MINISTER KEOGH: Well, it's been an ongoing discussion between us and the State Government and we're very happy to be able to provide that additional capability and capacity in the West Australian economy for that skilled labour. And I know personally, not only have I been discussing this with the State Government and the Minister for Immigration, but also a range of industry leaders in Western Australia about the need to make this happen. And it's important that West Australians who really do understand this need, understand that it's also happening against a backdrop where we're getting very different national messaging from the Liberal Opposition about the importance of immigration, which has to be done at a responsible level nationally, we recognise that, but also it’s necessary to relieve some of the very real pressures that we're seeing in the WA economy, especially when it comes to not just building houses, but being able to see our economy expand. It's when you've got constraints in the economy that you see inflation really take off. And so we recognise this. We've been working with the WA Government about what are the particular industries and skills that are necessary and how we could deliver that in conjunction with them. And I think it's a great announcement that we made yesterday with them.

ADSHEAD: Ok, I'll ask the obvious question, though, that people are already messaging through on, and that is if you bring in 10,000 skilled migrants to help the housing construction business, where do they live?

MINISTER KEOGH: Yeah, that's a really real issue and that's why it's important that when I, like, when I talk to housing developers, the thing that they impress upon me the most is without additional labour in this market, we just cannot catch up with demand. So, we can keep going out backwards or we can try and find people that need, you know, a few houses, but then can build ten houses. So, very real issue that we need to confront in our State. We need those people to build those houses. And, of course, each person who comes in to be part of that construction builds more houses than they take up. So, that's the metric that we're working with and we're really responding to industry demand and need so that we can meet the need and demand of Western Australians who need that housing and, of course, the people who need to move to WA to be able to work in those other key industry roles as well.

END

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