Andrew Leigh

I'm inviting new parents and their extended families to join me for the 2014 Welcoming the Babies.

This is an event I've organised each year since the inaugural event in 2011.

It's a great opportunity to meet other parents and find out about local community services for young children.

Come along on March 29, 10.30am-12.30pm, to the St Margaret's Hall (Cnr Phillip Avenue and Antill Street, Hackett).

Enjoy a day out with the whole family. There will be face painting, balloons, a sausage sizzle, music, playground and a toy library.

In case of rain, we have a backup indoor play area.

Everyone is welcome!

If you want to register your baby or toddler for a certificate, please email Lyndell Tutty in my office - Lyndell.Tutty {AT} aph.gov.au - or phone 6247 4396.

I hope to see you on the day.

I spoke in parliament on Australia's backsliding on climate action, while other countries almost universally do more to address the challenge.

Climate Change, 17 March 2014

I rise to speak tonight on the issue of climate change. As the House knows, the historic Australian climate change legislation, passed under the previous government, has seen significant improvements in our environment. Electricity sector emissions fell by 5.5 per cent over the year to September 2013; emissions from companies covered by the carbon pricing mechanism fell by seven per cent in 2012-13. Inflation was within the Reserve Bank's target band. Growth has continued. Productivity has modestly picked up. And we have not seen any Australian cities wiped off the map. The introduction of the Australian carbon pricing scheme was done in a manner which accords with textbook economics. While putting a price on the negative externality, that of carbon pollution contributing to climate change, we reduced income taxes for low- and middle-income earners to ensure that they became no worse off.

Labor went to the last election pledging to link our carbon price with international schemes. If we compare scrapping emissions pricing with moving to a floating price, the impact on inflation in 2014-15 is less than one-quarter of a percentage point. The government in Australia is running in very much a different direction from most countries around the globe.

A recent report by the global legislators organisation GLOBE, co-authored by the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics, covered about nine-tenths of global emissions. That report catalogued almost 500 laws to tackle climate change—including: flagship legislation in developing countries including Bolivia, El Salvador and Mozambique; and key action in major economies such as China and Mexico. Indeed the report found that 64 out of the 66 countries had put in place or were establishing significant climate or energy legislation. Only two countries were backsliding: Japan and Australia. Japan is stepping away from some of its prior commitments as a result of the Fukushima nuclear disaster and scaling back its contribution to nuclear energy. Perhaps that is understandable given the circumstances of the Fukushima tragedy. Less understandable is Australia, which is walking away from carbon pricing for straight-out political reasons.

We had a consensus in this country for carbon pricing until one of the great tipping points in this debate: the victory by the Prime Minister Mr Abbott over the Communications Minister, Mr Turnbull, in the Liberal Party party room by one vote saw the bipartisan consensus for climate change collapse. Now the coalition are pushing for Direct Action, a scheme which Frank Jotzo and Paul Burke have noted is an attractive political phrase; the combination of two very positive-sounding words. But it is unfortunately fundamentally flawed. The reason for that is that, unlike carbon pricing, Direct Action does not allow us to pick the lowest-hanging fruit of emissions reduction opportunities. As the OECD has estimated, subsidy approaches involve an economic cost per unit of emissions reduction more than ten times higher than under carbon pricing. Because the baseline of what a firm would have emitted otherwise is impossible to verify, the result is that firms are probably delaying emissions reduction investment right now even as a result of the talk of Direct Action.

Direct action is a short-term policy with promised payments for five years worth of claimed energy reductions rather than the long-term solution of carbon pricing. While carbon pricing assists the government's bottom line, making a $3.6 billion contribution to cash receipts in the fiscal year 2012-13, direct action is funded by revenue from existing taxes. What we saw under Labor was a tax switch—and I emphasise the word 'switch' because when I spoke about this previously I was misquoted in a Liberal Party attack ad. A tax switch that sees lower taxes on work and higher taxes on pollution. The reverse system will involve higher taxes on work in order to subsidise polluters. As Professor Jotzo and Dr Burke note:

'Direct Action appears to be an ill-considered clunker, like the hastily chosen gift you bring to your aunty’s fourth wedding ...'

It is complex and bureaucratic as distinct from the simple, free-market solution of carbon pricing, which is, unsurprisingly, favoured by the World Bank, the OECD and the International Monetary Fund.

In a submission to the inquiry into the Direct Action Plan by the Senate Environment and Communications References Committee, Professor Ross Garnaut noted:

The Green Paper does not specify the objective of the Emissions Reduction Fund … The Green Paper makes no effort to meet the elementary requirements of good practice with new regulation:

As Professor Garnaut further noted:

'Rather than a Green Paper, what is before the Senate is a shooting of the breeze: the raising of a few of the questions that would need to be answered along the way to preparing a Green Paper.'

What we have at the moment is a proposal to get rid of a national cap. Without a national cap that we currently have under carbon pricing policies, the baselines and penalties need to set business facility by business facility. It is, as Professor Garnaut noted, 'a huge bureaucratic exercise'.

Professor Garnaut estimates that the lower bound for the budgetary deterioration as a result of shifting to direct action is $4 billion to $5 billion per annum and the upper bound extends several times above that. As a result of this, the emissions reduction targets, the five per cent bipartisan emissions reduction targets, are unlikely to be met, Professor Garnaut notes, unless the fund is as large a drain on budget expenditures as the sale of permits is now a contributor to public finances—that is even to get modest emissions reduction targets, but to meet the five per cent targets may well cost more than that.

The core of the problem is that the government is surrounded by climate change deniers. While the Prime Minister himself now says that he supports the science of climate change, having previously called it 'absolute crap', the renewable energy target is subject to review under a chair who is on the public record with statements that modern science is wrong in its knowledge that human activity is a major contributor to global warming. The scientific consensus around climate change is 95 per cent for anthropogenic climate change—about the level of certainty that scientists have that smoking causes cancer. The Prime Minister's No. 1 business adviser goes further still. In September of last year, Maurice Newman wrote in The Australian Financial Review claiming:

The CSIRO, for example, has 27 scientists dedicated to climate change. It and the weather bureau continue to propagate the myth of anthropological climate change and are likely to be background critics of the Coalition’s Direct Action policies.

These attacks on hardworking scientists are of a piece with the government's attacks on experts. This is a government that has never seen an expert that it did not want to attack. By contrast, under Labor we saw renewable energy grow. Under the renewable energy target, we saw more than a million households installing solar panels compared to only about 7,000 under the former Howard government, and we saw the creation of 8,000 to 16,000 jobs.

Former Treasury Secretary Ken Henry has described the Prime Minister's Direct Action scheme as 'bizarre' and when economists were polled on this at the Australian Conference of Economists a survey found that 86 per cent supported a carbon price or an emissions trading scheme with just six per cent supporting Direct Action. There is, as Matt Wade said at the time, 'near-unanimity among economists' for a market-based solution. That market-based solution is doing the job of reducing Australian emissions and Australia ought not be one of the only countries in the world that is backsliding on tackling climate change.

I spoke in parliament today about the inaugural meetings of the Australia-American Leadership Dialogue in Miami.

Australia-America Leadership Dialogue, 17 March 2014

It was my pleasure to attend, from 5 to 7 March, the inaugural Australian American Leadership Dialogue meetings in Miami, Florida. They were discussions that covered a wide range of topics, as is usual with the AALD, under the Chatham House Rule. Among the topics discussed were the changing role of diversity in the United States, with Miami providing something of an example as to how the rest of the United States may be over the decades to come; issues of infrastructure financing, which both countries face; immigration reform; and the desire of both the United States and Australia to conclude the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

The meetings were also an opportunity to engage in discussion and innovation. It was commented that President Obama's focus on neuroscience will be important for Australia as we look to boost innovation. It an opportunity also, through the lens of Miami, to look to Latin America, where many Australian students are currently studying and Australian firms such as seek.com are operating.

There were many attendees, but I would like particularly to acknowledge Phillip Scanlan, Martin Adams and Julie Singer-Scanlan from the AALD; US ambassador John Berry; and the mayor of Miami, Tomas Regalado, who I hope will visit Perth and perhaps other Australian cities as part of a return visit next year.

This morning, I spoke with Chris Hammer about what's making news this week, notably the Government's repeal plan which confuses regulation that enhances public safety and accountability with burdensome red tape.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

TELEVISION INTERVIEW
BREAKING POLITICS - FAIRFAX MEDIA
MONDAY 17 MARCH 2014

SUBJECT/S: Public polling on Medicare and Qantas; Home Insulation Program Royal Commission and cabinet confidentiality; Red tape and community safety.

CHRIS HAMMER: There's a new opinion poll out today in Fairfax showing the Government and Opposition running neck and neck. Perhaps of more interest is some of the questions further down the poll about peoples' attitudes towards Medicare and the Government helping Qantas. On Medicare, the poll reveals that some 52 per cent of respondents support means-testing bulk billing for Medicare. 49 per cent support a six-dollar surcharge every time someone visits the doctor. And 50 per cent agree that the Government needs to do something to reduce the costs of Medicare. Well, to discuss this issue and others, I'm joined by Andrew Leigh, the Labor member for Fraser in the ACT and also Assistant Shadow Treasurer.

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: Morning Chris.

HAMMER: And, Andrew Laming, the Member for Bowman in Queensland. Andrew Laming, first to you as a former medical practitioner. What does this poll tell you about peoples' attitude towards Medicare and the amount it costs government.

ANDREW LAMING: At the margins, it suggests that the Government's getting its message across about just how important is it to get the budget under control. But I think the bigger picture in health is that you get 50 per cent of people every day of the week supporting means-testing so long as it doesn't it doesn't means-test them. These numbers don't mean much to me and I don't think there's a great deal of savings to be made by introducing a few dollars here and there, given that already a quarter of Australia pay up to $50 to see a GP and overwhelming majority of the rest of them are already bulk-billed and will keep their bulk-billing status. The changes are very, very small.

HAMMER: So, the six dollar surcharge is not something you'd support?

LAMING: Look, it's not a matter of supporting it. It will have an impact in those large city clinics where there's an oversupply of doctors, people pop in and pop out for convenience GP visits. Collecting six dollars from them will raise somewhere in the vicinity of $175 million dollars over four years. It's a drop in the ocean compared to the $120 billion annual health budget. We really need to focus on the big picture in health and this is not it.

HAMMER: Okay. Well, Andrew Leigh, support for Medicare has been very strong over the years. The conventional wisdom is you don't tamper with it. Yet these polling figures people are willing to consider changes to Medicare including means-testing and the six dollar surcharge.

LEIGH: I think it's really important that we maintain a strong Medicare system Chris and it's true that Medicare is something that Australians are passionate about. But we had a huge period of Australian history where we fought about Medicare. Essentially all the elections from 1969 to 1993 are fights about Medicare, before finally the Coalition decides that they'll support the system. If they want to now go ahead and argue for a six dollar GP surcharge then they ought to come forward, put that proposal on the table for the Australian people. If that proposal is contained in the Commission of Audit, then that's one more reason why that 900 page report which is worrying many of my constituents ought to be in the public domain, as the last Commission of Audit report was, rather than sitting secret in the Treasury archives.

HAMMER: But, if a six dollar surcharge or means-testing means that Medicare remains more viable into the future as an entire system, isn't it simply sensible to look at this?

LEIGH: The Coalition needs to put a policy on the table and what I've been concerned about over the last few months and one of the reasons I think that this has been the first Government in my lifetime not to enjoy a honeymoon period is that the Government is floating too many thought bubbles and not enough considered policy development; not putting clear policy proposals out but floating ideas through sympathetic journalists and seeing what reception they get. That's not a good way, by and large, of making public policy.

HAMMER: Okay. Andrew Laming, just to touch on something you said in a previous answer. You said there were big savings to be made and these aren't where you should look. Where should you look in the medical system if the Government needs to save money?

LAMING: Most experts now agree it's in the complex co-morbidity space with people in and out of hospital all the time. Our communications between private specialists, public hospitals and GPs is almost non-existent. It's still done with fax machines. So we've really got to get that area, where the Europe and the US has moved, significantly ahead. We've got to get that in our focus. Back to the other situation, we have most politicians understanding that the health system is limited by what the visiting hours are at the local hospital. Very few of us have had any real in-depth experiences in these large money-hungry monoliths, so understanding how to fix the health system has always been something that causes trepidation amongst politicians. The first step will be to have a hard conversation about how we manage complex chronic disease.

HAMMER: So, do you think this idea of means-testing and the six dollar surcharge being floated, if the Government did pursue that it would obviously come at some political cost. Is your assessment that it's simply not worth the political cost?

LAMING: Well, picking up on Andrew's very good point, we fought over these things in the 1960s. The very point is we don't fight over them anymore. The same is our attitude to Work for the Dole or publically supporting companies with taxpayer money. These things change over time as Australians become more comfortable with decisions that Government is making. The very fact that we can now have an open debate about middle class Australians fundamentally paying the same amount to see a doctor as they do to fill one prescription at the pharmacist, indicates we've moved on this health debate.

HAMMER: Andrew Leigh, it seems if you combine the Medicare question, there was another question in the opinion poll about government assistance to Qantas. Something like forty per cent of people didn't want to give any assistance. Only 30 per cent supported the removal of foreign ownership restrictions. Only 20 per cent supported providing a debt guarantee. Put all this together, it does suggests the Government's message that these are tough economic times, that the Government's got to rein back spending, it's a sort of over-arching narrative, it does suggest that that message is getting traction in the electorate.

LEIGH: Chris, one of the things that makes these polls difficult to interpret is that voters' judgements on issues are also shaped by what political parties say on issues. The classic one is, you look at Liberal Party supporters' attitudes to climate change when Malcolm Turnbull is the leader supporting an emissions trading scheme and after Malcolm Turnbull cedes the leadership to Tony Abbott. The flip on the issue is massive. So I think you want to wary of reading too much into issues polls. But certainly on Qantas I'm not inundated at my street stalls and office meetings with constituents saying the real solution is to make Qantas a foreign owned airline. That's not a strongly popular view in my electorate and I'd be surprised if Andrew Laming, indeed other members of the House of Representatives, have people knocking their door down, saying the best thing to do is to sell off the Flying Kangaroo to people overseas.

HAMMER: If we move on, the Royal Commission into the whole home insulation, the so-called 'pink bats' Royal Commission is starting in Brisbane today.  Andrew Laming, at a time when the Government is sending out this message of restraint and tightening spending. It's $25 million to tell us what we already know sounds like a waste of money, doesn't it?

LAMING: Unless you're one of the families who had their home burnt down as a result of a government decision and we really need to know what happened to the advice, the recommendations and warnings. We all remember the program, $2.5 billion, we were watching teenagers running round with rolls of insulation in the backs of renter-trucks and wondering where our federal money was going and why it was spent this way. It's a small price to make sure this never happens again.

HAMMER: Andrew Leigh?

LEIGH: We've had a range of investigations on this Chris. These have included federal and state investigations. Labor supported it because we are concerned about workplace deaths and these handful of installers who died were part of the tragically, 200 a year who die from workplace injuries. Labor's always committed to making sure we have workplace safety but I am concerned when the Government ends a more than century-old cabinet confidentiality by handing over cabinet documents to the Royal Commission. I think that sets a precedent which this Government might ultimately regret.

HAMMER: So what will Labor do about that, the access to cabinet documents, the potential subpoenaing of cabinet ministers, indeed former prime minister Kevin Rudd to appear before a Royal Commission. What can Labor practically about that?

LEIGH: Well, each of those individuals are now private citizens and they will take their own legal advice and make their own decisions and I'm sure they'll cooperate to the greatest extent they're able to. In terms of cabinet documents, this is just a tradition. It's a tradition that's been upheld by every Australian government until this one. But there is nothing legally that Labor can do to protect the confidentiality of conversations that occur around the cabinet table and the strength of collective decision making that is underpinned by that tradition, now scrapped by this Government that calls itself conservative.

HAMMER: Andrew Laming, it's not a bad point. You know, separated away from the issue of home insulations, accessing cabinet documents so soon after the fact, doesn't that mean that any cabinet minister walking into cabinet this week is going to have to be careful of what they say, that there won't be a full and frank discussion around the cabinet table?

LAMING: That's a genuine concern. I think and that's why it should only be done under extremely critical circumstances. I am not sure if this one crosses the bar. But certainly this is a case that the Government will have to make if and when asked by the royal commission for access to those documents and one middle ground of course is that one of the commissioners can look at that document without the document becoming public. So there is some middle ground there, but we will have to wait and see what happens.

HAMMER: So you think maybe that this issue isn't important enough to cross that threshold?

LAMING: I am in two minds in this one. I think that confidentiality of cabinet documents is absolutely critical, but if the argument is ultimately made for those documents to remain privilege, it will go to a court of law and that is where it will be decided.

HAMMER: Okay, now this Wednesday has been declared ‘Repeal Day’ because the Government is introducing legislation or to amend legislation that will cut up to a billion dollars in red tape. Isn't the timing of this rather unfortunate Andrew Laming, in that, on the one hand we have a Royal Commission into what happens when we there's not enough regulation and on the other hand the government is trying to get rid of all this regulation?

LAMING: Well you got a fair point that we want a responsiveness when warnings were first received. That's a little different to the bigger picture when ultimately I am a Liberal. I just love seeing wheel barrows full of regulations being carried to dumpsters. I mean it is one of the reasons I go into public life. But, in a practical sense, how does that change the lives of Australians. They will be judging repeal day not on the number of pages or regulations but how our ability to enjoy a free and incumbent life for those who lead honest and hardworking lives without the impact of government, people who are trying to start a business and people who are trying to run their lives the responsible way will want to see a difference from these repeal laws. That will be a very strong case that the government will have to make. It will be a challenging one. We will have to convince Australians that repealing these laws make a practical difference to the way we lead our lives. And that's a case that is yet to be made.

HAMMER: Andrew Leigh?

LEIGH: Well as this, your point I think highlights this Chris, that there are many regulations that improve work, health and safety. It worried me yesterday when the Prime Minister gave us one of his main examples of what would occur on repeal day, childcare regulations. Now we have childcare regulations so we keep our kids safe. Now Andrew and I have both had kids in childcare. Regulations such as the regulations that workers need to not have criminal convictions, to make sure that food preparation is safe, that communicable diseases are reported. Which of these bits of childcare red tape would the Prime Minister like to get rid of? I'd like to know.

LAMING: The answer probably is Chris, the areas that overlap between state and local government regulations. So increasingly part of repeal day will be  to find those overlaps.

HAMMER: Isn't that a good point Andrew [Leigh]? That is tends to be that regulation is brought in with all good intentions, legislation whatever, but it tends to build up and accumulate, there's duplication between state and federal and indeed local, that from time to time you really need to go in with a broom and sweep it out.

LEIGH: You have just got to be careful that you look after the kids in that process. In the area of childcare regulations this looking after an incredibly vulnerable set of kids. By and large there’s clarity as to what the state and territories do and what the federal government does. And so really people ought to be make sure that red tape repeal day doesn't make us a more vulnerable society. We have bits of red tape for example that ensure that airline safety is maintained, that trucks are safe on the roads. This idea that red tape is dragging us our society down, flies in the face of the huge rise in safety that we have seen in the Australian community over recent generations.

LAMING: Chris, we make the argument for safety. But in 2007 the roads were safe, the childcare centres were safe but since then we have introduced 975 new laws, 22,000 more regulations. Ultimately we have to try and draw the line somewhere.

HAMMER: But what's the rush? I mean there's sensible, logical, mature all those adjectives that Tony Abbott was quoting on taking government. Why the rush now? Why this big push to try and even have a repeal day. It suggests spin rather than content?

LAMING: It's kind of ironic that whether we are writing laws or repealing them, politicians will always busy. But I argue that whether I come down here to Canberra, and spend time out of my electorate making up new laws, is really building a better society. In the end it's not so much a rush, but we've got an agenda. This won't be the first repeal day nor the last. So these repeal days are likely to be continued into the future.

HAMMER: Andrew Leigh, does this give Labor a political opportunity, that the Government is being too keen in repealing regulations?

LEIGH: Well one of the issues that I have portfolio responsibility is the Australians Charities and Not-for-Profits Commission. That's expected to be on the chopping block on Wednesday despite the fact that it has a red tape reduction directorate. It was set up with the aim of reducing duplication for charities across states and federal. And the Charities Not-for-Profits Commission is set up in order to protect people who donate to charity, to make sure that they are not ripped off by scammers. If the ACNC is removed then Australian charitable donors and good charities - who are the vast majority of charities - will be placed at risk.

HAMMER: Okay, gentlemen thanks once again for your participation.

LEIGH: Thanks Chris, thanks Andrew.

ENDS

At lunchtime on Thursday 27 March, I’ve been invited to speak at the National Press Club, on the topic ‘Battlers and Billionaires: Australian Egalitarianism Under Threat’. I will talk about why inequality matters, and the risk that the wrong set of policies will threaten an egalitarian ethos that is fundamental to who we are as Australians.

I’d be delighted if you could join me. Tickets can be booked at the National Press Club website.

This morning I issued a media release pointing out the Abbott Government's inaction since announcing its long anticipated 'root and branch' competition review in December.

ANDREW LEIGH MP

SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER

SHADOW MINISTER FOR COMPETITION

MEMBER FOR FRASER

MEDIA RELEASE

101 days since Competition Review announced and still no action

The Prime Minister and the Minister for Small Business announced 101 days ago that a review panel would be announced “shortly” to conduct its root and branch competition review.

But since December 4, 2013, there’s been no action.

The Government stated last year that:

"The Federal Government has provided the states and territories with draft terms of reference for a competition review. The review panel will be established shortly so that we can have a final report within 12 months.” [Tony Abbott and Bruce Billson, Joint Media Release, 4 December, 2013]

More than three months later, there are no final terms of reference and no one has even been appointed to conduct the review.

“The delay calls into question the Government’s commitment to a thorough and independent review of competition policy,” Dr Andrew Leigh said.

“This is a critical policy area, which impacts on consumers and small and large businesses from supermarkets to service stations, but seems impacted by the Abbott Government’s ‘go-slow’ approach.

“The Prime Minister said his Government would contain no surprises or excuses. I suppose you can’t be surprised by something that moves at a glacial pace.

“Why the hold up? It appears this Government is too busy breaking its promises on the economy, healthcare and education to pursue long term, sensible economic reform through competition policy.”

“Competition is about good regulation. It underpins productivity and participation. I call on Minister Billson to stop procrastinating and get on with the job,” said Dr Leigh.

“If ‘shortly’ doesn’t mean ‘within 100 days’, perhaps Australians will soon be asking whether Mr Billson is engaged in ‘misleading and deceptive conduct’!”.

Friday, 14 March 2014

On 14 March 2014, I spoke on ABC's The Drum about my Lowy Institute speech on population. The video is below.



On 21 March 2014, I also spoke about it with Luke Bona on 2CC. Here's a podcast.

I spoke with The World Today host Eleanor Hall about population and migration. A podcast of the interview is available here, and the transcript is below.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

RADIO INTERVIEW
THE WORLD TODAY

THURSDAY 13 MARCH 2014

SUBJECT/S: Population; immigration; asylum seekers; taxation; budget sustainability

ELEANOR HALL: The Labor Party's Assistant Treasurer is calling for a new debate on what has long been a contentious issue in Australia: the size of our population, which is now around 23.5 million. In a speech at the Lowy Institute today, Dr Andrew Leigh is calling for a more respectful and fact-based debate about the population and about immigration. He joined me earlier in the studio. Andrew Leigh, in your Lowy Institute talk today you argue that Australia should have a bigger population. How much bigger?

ANDREW LEIGH: Eleanor, I think picking absolute numbers is a mug's game but I certainly think that we ought to be comfortable with current levels of population growth.

ELEANOR HALL: You say current levels of growth, so not a bigger population?

ANDREW LEIGH: The current levels of growth are a bit above the trend levels that we've had in the previous few decades, but principally I think we have the potential to be much more productive if we expand the number of innovative people coming to Australia.

ELEANOR HALL: Do you have the backing of your leader Bill shorten on this because the argument for a larger population is one that's divided the Labor Party previously, particularly under Gillard and Rudd?

ANDREW LEIGH: It's certainly been a perennial issue in the Australian public debate and I think what's important is that we have a sensible conversation in which we look at the evidence on both sides. The Labor Party's not pinning its colours to the mast on a particular number but we're keen to have intelligent conversations with the Australian people.

ELEANOR HALL: You say that the population debate is essentially one about immigration. Is Australia capable of having a rational debate about immigration?

ANDREW LEIGH: I think we are, and we're a nation which is as open to migrants as any in the world. We're a nation where a quarter of us were born overseas and other quarter have a parent who was born overseas. I, myself, am married to an immigrant and I think the skilled immigration system has in particular been good for Australia. It's ensured that we get that big boost to demand that comes from migration but that all of the pain isn't felt by those at the bottom of the distribution, as you see in the United States for example, where migration has put a lot of downward pressure on those who are earning the least.

ELEANOR HALL: You also say you want the asylum seeker issue to become less partisan. What are you and your colleagues then doing to try to diffuse the asylum seeker debate?

ANDREW LEIGH: I think it's really striking when you look at the debate over Indigenous policy and over refugees. If we look back 20 years in Indigenous policy, there were people making some outlandish claims and very nasty language around Indigenous Australians looking to take land through the Native Title system. That's transformed. Both sides of politics have a degree of respect for Indigenous Australians which is really heartening, but we don't see that on refugees. This language of 'illegals' and 'peaceful invasions' I think is deeply corrosive to having a sensible debate over asylum seeker policy.

ELEANOR HALL: Your proposal that the debate should become less partisan hasn't stopped your colleagues trying to make political mileage out of the recent Manus Island violence, for example? I mean, accusing the minister of having blood on his hands?

ANDREW LEIGH: I think it's important that we behave as respectfully as we can in politics and that we also hold the Government to account.

ELEANOR HALL: Are you comfortable though with the approach that the Labor Party has taken on asylum seekers? Do you really think that what the Labor Party has been doing in government and in opposition has helped to make the asylum seeker issue less partisan?

ANDREW LEIGH: What I've argued in this speech is that we ought to be aiming to save as many lives as possible by preventing drownings at sea. At the same time I think we can be more generous, and I was deeply disappointed to see the Government cut back the refugee intake.

ELEANOR HALL: You point out that Australia's asylum seeker intake has dropped from 20,000 to 13,500. Are you calling for an increase beyond 20,000?

ANDREW LEIGH: I think we ought to aspire to that yes. I certainly think that if you're able to prevent drownings at sea then that's appropriate. But we ought to too be working with other developed countries to try and take more people out of those UN refugee camps.

ELEANOR HALL: You say that you want this debate about Australia's population to be on the facts and on the numbers. Even 20,000 in a refugee population around the world of 11 million is absolutely minuscule, and you point out in your speech that in fact the refugee proportion of our immigration intake is around 10 per cent. Why doesn't the Labor Party put those numbers out there?

ANDREW LEIGH: Well, that's exactly what I'm doing in today's speech and I think one of the real challenges with population is facts and respect. I think both of those have been shamefully missing in the debate. The asylum seeker debate has so coloured the broader population debate [that] it's important to have a conversation about that relatively small share of our immigration intake, while also recognising that the largest benefit that migrants bring to Australia is through the skills and innovation that come through our skilled migration program, which is a majority of our permanent migrants.

ELEANOR HALL: Now as assistant treasurer for the Labor Party, what do you make of Ken Henry's warning that government spending is 'unsustainable', and that Australia's Federal Government needs to either increase taxes or cut government spending or both, and that an increase in the GST must be part of this?

ANDREW LEIGH: We've been pretty firm that Labor doesn't support an increase in the GST but I do think that it's important that the budget remain in a sustainable footing.

ELEANOR HALL: You just said the Labor Party won't support an increase in the GST; yesterday Bill Shorten wouldn't commit to keeping the mining tax. If the Labor Party's not prepared to increase taxes, then if you're going to balance the budget, you must be saying you're going to cut spending?

ANDREW LEIGH: Well we have in Parliament voted in favour of keeping both the carbon price and the mining tax. Profits-based minerals taxation is something which is supported by economists in general.

ELEANOR HALL: Andrew Leigh, thanks very much for joining us.

ANDREW LEIGH: Thank you Eleanor.

ELEANOR HALL: That's Labor's assistant treasurer. Andrew Leigh.

ENDS

My speech at the Lowy Institute looks at population size, immigration flows and refugee policy.

Does Size Matter? An Economic Perspective on the Population Debate*

Lowy Institute
13 March 2014

Andrew Leigh
Shadow Assistant Treasurer
Federal Member for Fraser
www.andrewleigh.com

I’ve wanted to say something about this rather controversial topic for a long time. Now that I take to the podium, I can’t help thinking of an epitaph Dorothy Parker penned for her gravestone: ‘Wherever she went, including here, it was against her better judgment.’

A great epitaph for a writer. Perhaps not so much for a politician. Nevertheless, I hope what follows shows that my belief in evidence is stronger than my desire to avoid tough questions.

If there’s one thing that’s really big in the population size debate, it’s the size of the scare campaigns made by both sides.

A big Australia, one side tells us, is a ‘catastrophe’[1] that ‘risks destroying our traditions and even our common language’.[2] Immigration has ‘undermined our higher education system, [and] put intolerable pressure on an overstretched health and transport system’.[3] Some go further, blaming ‘limp-wristed citizenship requirements’ for ‘ethnic crime waves sweeping across our nation, where samurai swords and machetes have become part of the media lexicon’.[4]

Not to be outdone, the other side of the debate argue that: ‘Putting caps on growth would turn Australia into a stagnant, ageing and inward-looking country – a basket case to rival the declining states of Europe.’[5] Some have warned that if population growth is too slow, the share market would stagnate, small businesses would be unable to fund their ventures, taxes would rise, and debt would balloon.[6]

And just in case overheated claims didn’t make the discussion difficult enough, each side delight in building straw men. Perhaps it makes people feel better when they take a stand against ‘unchecked population growth’ or ‘zero population growth’. But in reality, hardly anyone publicly advocates uncapped immigration, and few population commentators argue for zero immigration. The serious conversation is whether we want our population to grow modestly or significantly. But it risks being derailed by those who caricature their opponents to score a cheap point.

Perhaps one reason the Australian population debate is so odd is that because – from a population standpoint – Australia is an odd country.

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This morning I spoke with 2CC's Mark Parton about revelations that Prime Miniter Tony Abbott and Treasurer Joe Hockey ignored John Howard and Peter Costello's advice to keep Treasury Secretary, Martin Parkinson. I discuss the decision and affirm the great work of the public service.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

2CC RADIO INTERVIEW
WEDNESDAY 12 MARCH 2014
SUBJECT/S: Martin Parkinson and the Australian Public Service; Tasmanian election and jobs.

MARK PARTON: I don't think Andrew Leigh is going to be reinventing himself any time soon; driving a taxi or working in a bakery. He is these days the Federal Member for Fraser in Federal Parliament with the ALP. He is on the line right now. Morning Andrew.

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: G'day Mark. It is my third career. I was a lawyer for a while. I was a professor for a while -

PARTON: Yes it is. I'd forgotten about that -

LEIGH: And we haven't even gone into my fruit picking and newspaper delivery days -

PARTON: You talk about people who've had to reinvent themselves. Let's talk about Martin Parkinson, the Treasury Secretary, because we learnt some fascinating things in this story in the last 24 hours. The Abbott Government apparently defied the advice of a couple of learned gentlemen on the right side of politics, in John Howard and Peter Costello. It is our understanding that they recommended Martin Parkinson should stay on as Treasury Secretary but for some reasons Tony Abbott and Joe Hockey said, 'No, you don't know what you're talking about.’

LEIGH: I think it was real a mistake of the Coalition to fire Martin Parkinson. Remember there's a story from the last recession where basically the only two people who are still around in senior economic policy making a couple of years ago were Ken Henry and Martin Parkinson. The only two people who had been through a recession, and now there's just Martin. I've argued personally to Joe Hockey that from his own self-interest he'd be well served to keep someone like Martin Parkinson who has faithfully served both sides. So it's this sort of vindictiveness that I think saw the Government come in and immediately get rid of four agency heads. We didn't do it in 2007. We hadn't appointed most of the secretaries but we took the view that public servants basically work hard for which ever government is in power and the sort of partisan firings are not wise in the long run.

PARTON: Obviously, Stephen Conroy was not involved in those conversations because he certainly demonstrated a different view point on that in Senate Estimates. I understand and concur with what you're saying and I think there were some knee jerks. Why have they gone down this route? It must be said Martin Parkinson is still there in the role and he finishes up in the middle of this year.

LEIGH: He does and part of today's report is the suggestion is he might be held on for longer and I think that if the Government were to change its mind on that then they would be well served by that backflip. I think they were quite angry with Martin Parkinson over the 2010 election costings where Treasury found that there was a massive hole in Coalition costings and I think some of the sort of the hardline warriors in the Liberal Party never really forgave him for that. But it's a mistake from their standpoint because this is somebody who is a first-rate public servant, like so many of the public servants that I meet in mobile offices and chatting away by phone and email. People who would have their own partisan preference but they know their job is to serve the country. It's public service at its best.

PARTON: Is it a reality though that despite the fact we've got some exceptionally well performing public servants at high level, that in their hearts they all have an ideology; in their hearts they all either fall to the left or the right?

LEIGH: I think everybody has their own personal ideology but that doesn't mean they can't do a good job of producing policy. You saw that through the Howard years and indeed through the Rudd and Gillard years. There were certainly Liberal Party supporters who did a good job of working for the Labor Party during our time in office. Good public servants are able to do that. I think this kind of ideology that you sometimes see the Coalition running around with in other places, that public servants are bloated fat cats, just misses the real reality of what Canberra public servants do. I'm enormously proud of the public servants here. As you well know Mark, the number of public servants per Australian didn't rise under Labor and so the idea that we've got an over-staffed public service is just bonkers.

PARTON: The political tide in this country has definitely shifted to the right in recent months and years and we're about to see a couple of state elections in Tasmania and South Australia. As Malcolm Farr pointed out about 10 minutes or so ago from News.com.au, at the end of the those elections Katy Gallagher may be the highest ranking Labor politician in the country.

LEIGH: Certainly possible. Those governments have the challenge of being in office for a long time. So it just becomes successively harder to make the case for another term the longer you've been in office. But I think also that those people in those states and looking at what's happening federally and they're looking at the cutting of the SchoolKids Bonus to middle and low income households and then the giving of a parental leave scheme, $75,000 to the richest families to have a baby and they're saying maybe these aren't the sorts of values that I hold. They are not the sort of basic values of an Aussie fair go, making sure that governments help those most in need not, rather than give the most to those who have the most.

PARTON: But Andrew, you've seen these primary polling figures from Tasmania. Wow, Labor's on the nose there, isn't it?

LEIGH: Well, I don't take a great deal of notice of polls but I think on the fundamentals it's always a challenge to win an election after being in government a long time and it's particularly a challenge if you've been in coalition. The coalition with the Greens was pretty tough for Lara Giddings. I think that's something that she's working on in differentiating herself in the election.

PARTON: Why was it tougher for Labor in Tasmania than for Labor here in the ACT to do that? Granted there is only one Green in this Legislative Assembly, but there were many more than that last time round and the train stayed on track.

LEIGH: Let me give you an economic answer because I kind of think about things as an economist. I think the Tasmanian economy is in much worse shape than the ACT's. Part of the challenge is them making the transition from logging. That logging peace deal was a historic deal but gee it bruised a few people around the place, to actually get loggers and conservationists sitting at the table striking a deal I think was a good thing. But where the jobs come from in Tassie is a bigger challenge than perhaps for than any other part of Australia. Education levels are perhaps a little bit lower. Productivity is one of the lowest anywhere in Australia. So Tassie has got some challenges whoever wins office. I think the Federal Government needs to be working hard in Tassie. These suggestions that maybe Tony Abbott will rip some more GST money away from Tassie are a real concern.

PARTON: Thanks for your time this morning Andrew, as always.

LEIGH: Thank you Mark.

ENDS