Interview with Laura Jayes, AM Agenda

6 March 2024

LAURA JAYES: Joining me now is the Shadow Finance Minister Jane Hume. Does Julian Hill have a point there?

JANE HUME: I don't think Julian Hill knows what he's talking about. Quite frankly, if you're a young person looking to buy your first home right now, the amount you need to save for a deposit is out of reach for for the majority of young Australians, the idea that you might be able to take some money out of your superannuation, to put it in a deposit on your first home, once you sell that home to take that money back out, put it back into superannuation plus earnings, means that you not only have your retirement savings intact, but you also have a home to live in. Because we know that the best indicator of economic security in retirement is owning your home and that's why the Coalition is so committed towards this scheme.

LAURA JAYES: Okay, let's talk about a few other things, we had Luke Howarth suggest that stage three tax cuts as Scott Morrison legislated them could be reinstated. Would that mean that you keep Labor's plan but removed that 37% bracket?

JANE HUME: Well, as we've been saying, for a number of weeks now, we will take a tax package to the election that delivers lower and simpler and fairer taxes that is in keeping with the original stage three tax cuts that tackled bracket creep head on and that's the real key, I think that Luke was getting to here. But before I get into that, I should say that Luke is a very welcome addition to the economic team, obviously, he's run a small business, a family business in the past, and he has some insights into some of the problems in our tax system now that are putting grit in the wheels of our economic growth. So it's fantastic to have Luke on board. The most important thing that we can do is to make sure that the tax package that we take forward actually enables economic growth that encourages aspiration, and is a simpler and fairer system than the one we have. Now, clearly, the government have demonstrated that they are timid when it comes to tax reform, that they have no appetite at all, to tackle that pernicious bracket creep, which we know is going to affect around 4 million people, they're going to be worse off over the next 10 years because of the changes that Labor have made. So we're committed to changing that we're committed to taking a package to the next election, that the Australian people will be able to make their mind up one at a time.

LAURA JAYES: We're gonna get the GDP figures in two hours time, Jane, we've been told to, you know, prepare for a slowing economy. Isn't that a good thing when it comes to interest rates?

JANE HUME: Well, we're already in a per capita recession. I think we've discussed this one before, Laura, if it wasn't for the fact that we had such excessively high migration numbers, we'd already be seeing economic growth going backwards. Now, if you listen to the economists out there, they're expecting a significant slowdown in our economic growth and that's not to be unexpected, that's not unexpected if you're going to have extraordinarily high energy prices, if you have inflexible industrial relations that discourage people from taking on new employees and, you know, of course, if you have a tax system, that sucks the aspiration out of society and inflation that's run rampant and under control now for more than 18 months, well, of course, you should expect your economic growth to slow down and what happens then is that when the when the pie gets smaller, all it happens is that governments slice it differently rather than growing the pie.

LAURA JAYES: But it also means that inflation is coming down right?

JANE HUME: Well you want inflation to come down because you know, there's been 12 interest rate rises under this government, because inflation has been out of control. When, when the RBA has to increase interest rates, use its own monetary policy, when you would, of course, expect the economy to slow down consumption in Australia, private sector consumption is almost at a halt, public sector consumption, not so much and that's what we've been talking about when we say there's been one foot on the brake and one foot on the accelerator. Governments keep spending, but unfortunately, the private sector is slowing right down and that, of course, is going to affect Australia's economic prospects.

LAURA JAYES: So you blame this Labor Government for a number of interest rate rises from fueling that, will you give them credit if we see cuts this year?

JANE HUME: Well, if we see cuts this year, in fact, I was just listening to the radio on the way in and there is some concern because of this slowdown in economic growth that potentially we might not, we might not see, but at the same time, China is continuing to buy our goods, which is, you know, a positive sign. That's the only thing that's propping up the economy. That it might actually be longer before we see interest rate cuts. What we do know is that inflation has been higher for longer because of the decisions that the government has made and interest rates have stayed higher for longer because of the decisions that the government has made, and Australians are paying the price.

LAURA JAYES: All the decisions that the Government has made? Do you accept that some things are outside of their control?

JANE HUME: I have absolutely no doubt that the war in Ukraine was out of their control. But they knew about that before they even came to government. I have no doubt that the war that the conflict in the Middle East has been outside of the government's control, but at the same time, they've failed to, to address that through any meaningful policy response either. At the same time, these industrial relations reforms are slowing the economy right down, putting grit in the wheels and making it harder for businesses to go about what it is that they need to do. Their energy policies have pushed energy prices up that affects households and businesses. Of course, we're going to see slowing economic growth, and all Australians will pay for that.

LAURA JAYES: Okay, we will see in about two hours and four minutes time. Thanks so much, Jane. We'll catch up with you soon.