Andrew Leigh

The first Breaking Politics show of the year was a big one, as Andrew Laming and I thrashed out the lessons parties should be taking from the weekend's remarkable result in Queensland. Here's the transcript:

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ONLINE INTERVIEW

FAIRFAX BREAKING POLITICS

MONDAY, 2 FEBRUARY 2015

SUBJECT/S: Abbott Government leadership ructions; Queensland election; Labor’s positive plan for 2015

CHRIS HAMMER: We're joined now in the studio by Andrew Leigh, the Shadow Assistant Treasurer and Member for Fraser here in the ACT, and Andrew Laming, a Queensland federal Liberal MP from the seat of Bowman. Good morning to you both. Andrew Laming, to you first: the Queensland election result, how much do you think that was affected by federal issues and federal politics?

ANDREW LAMING, MEMBER FOR BOWMAN: Well Chris, you'll be surprised to hear me say: very little. The reason was Campbell Newman was such a towering figure, and overwhelmingly this result was all about whether you liked him or not, his tone and his style. Obviously asset sales became a significant issue due to a really big union campaign. So while we may have national thoughts about the relative leaders, Tony Abbott didn't play a big role in Queensland. Certainly he didn't come up during the campaign, and secondly people were firmly focused on Campbell Newman's three years in government.

CHRIS HAMMER: Ok, so in that case the federal government doesn't have to change anything, does it? Because that was just all Queensland?

LAMING: Well there are still important portents from the Queensland election. First of all, we've seen that significant social policy changes or restructures aren't going to be bought easily by the electorate in the name of fixing Labor's debt. There's general agreement, I think, that we need to do that. But in Queensland for the first time we've actually got a Queensland Labor government having to wear the debt of the Labor predecessor just three years earlier. That's historically quite a new thing post-John Howard, to see Labor sorting out Labor debt. It'll be very interesting viewing. 

HAMMER: Given what's happened in Queensland and what happened in Victoria in November – two first-term governments kicked out of office – do you now fear that the federal government could be a one-term government? Is that a real fear?

LAMING: Look, it's not a direct correlation but clearly Australians are not going to hold onto governments simply because they've only had one term. I mean, two very different situations here: the Victorian state government was just plain terrible, whereas Campbell Newman was, if anything, just too ambitious. Australians, and Queenslanders certainly, like governments that are seen but not heard. They don't want governments making massive structural reforms unless they're absolutely convinced of them. Clearly, both at the state and federal level we haven't achieved that. That narrative hasn't been right. I've said this before: on Budget Night last year I had to go and check, as a medical specialist, to see if Medicare was truly unsustainable because no-one had been saying it prior to the budget. That wasn't the right language to get budget changes through. 

HAMMER: Ok, so what has the federal government got wrong and what does it need to get right?

LAMING: Well it firstly needs to be pointed out that we're having this discussion two years out from an election. That's when you want to have the discussion. Not, as Labor did, three months out. Secondly, we obviously have great economic credentials, voters know that and they'll always vote for a Coalition government when the economy is at stake. But ultimately, Coalition governments are voted out when they get their social policy in a muddle. They've got to get their social policy right to stay elected. They're not at the moment. The mistake we have made is to presume that Australians will brook massive social policy changes simply because of a Labor government's failures in a previous term. In Queensland that simply did not wash.

It's always good to speak with 2CC's Mark Parton about the news of the day - here's the transcript from today's chat:

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RADIO INTERVIEW

RADIO 2CC

THURSDAY, 29 JANUARY 2015

SUBJECT/S: Abbott Government’s unfair policy agenda; Multinational profit shifting; Benefits of the sharing economy

MARK PARTON: Andrew Leigh is the Federal Member for Fraser and there's a couple of things we wanted to catch up with him about. He's on the line now, g'day Andrew.

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: G'day Mark, how are you?

PARTON: Excellent. I think maybe you need to lay off the Prime Minister. I think maybe you need to tone it down, give him some space because I'm worried for you guys, Andrew, that if enough Liberal people believe that they're not a hope in Hades of winning the election with him there, that they will dump him in ALP fashion, a la Rudd and Gillard. But he may be your best asset, maybe you should leave him be?

LEIGH: Well Mark, I'm much more concerned about the set of policies than who's occupying that chair. Let's face it: if the Coalition makes a shift to Scott Morrison or Julie Bishop or Malcolm Turnbull, they're still going to have a set of policies that take from the most vulnerable to give to the most affluent.

PARTON: But Andrew, in reality you know that if there was a shift of leadership, unless it was to Scott Morrison – and wow, god help 'em then – the whole voter mood would change in terms of their perception of the Coalition. Because that's what happens, isn't it?

LEIGH: I'm not sure that's right, Mark. If there was a change in the fundamental philosophy of the Government, then that would be true. But so long as you've got a government that wants to make university degrees more expensive, wants to stop people going to the doctor and thinks that it's okay to put young people out in the streets for six months if they lose their job, then that's going to be a government that is out of touch with Australian values, no matter who is at the helm.

Following new reports about alleged multinational profit shifting out of Australia, I joined Richard Glover on ABC 702 Sydney to talk about what governments can do to tackle this global challenge. Here's the transcript:

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RADIO INTERVIEW

ABC 702 SYDNEY

WEDNESDAY, 28 JANUARY 2015

SUBJECT/S: multinational profit shifting; opportunities in the sharing economy

RICHARD GLOVER: The iPhone maker Apple has seen sales surge over the three months to December. Revenue jumped almost 30 per cent in that period to USD$76.4 billion. It was much higher than analysts had forecast; they thought it might come in at a lazy $58 billion. Quarterly net profit came in at US$18 billion. Now, I guess the question in some Australians' minds might be: we all applaud success, but how much tax will they pay in a country like Australia on this record profit? For instance, Apple paid just $80 million in Australian tax last year, despite making more than $6 billion in local revenue, according to accounts with a corporate regulator. Andrew Leigh is the Shadow Assistant Treasurer and he joins us on the line – Andrew, good afternoon.

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: Good afternoon Richard.

GLOVER: You've been concerned about this for some time?

LEIGH: Absolutely. I think the issue of multinational tax is one of the central challenges of our age. In part, that's because the movement of profits around the world is becoming easier as a result of globalisation and technological change. If you think of the old-fashioned manufacturing firms that produced widgets, they had a permanent establishment in the place where their biggest factory was. But that's just not true if you're an intellectual property firm, as three of the five biggest companies in the world now are. It's increasingly easy for firms to move profits around. Labor has taken the view that we need a set of laws that keep pace and which maintain government revenue at a time when some firms are trying to do the wrong thing.

As the Abbott Government gets down to work on their second budget, ministers like Josh Frydenberg are already talking about making new and deeper cuts. But they wouldn't need to do that if they hadn't said 'no' to real and significant sources of revenue, as I explain in this op-ed for The Australian.

When you're in a hole, stop digging, The Australian, 27 January

As Australians continue to rage about the unfairness of the Abbott Government’s first budget, Treasurer Joe Hockey is preparing to hand down his second one in just four months’ time.

His new Assistant Treasurer, Josh Frydenberg, has flagged that spending may again be slashed in the 2015-16 fiscal plan. He seems determined to prove that this government’s entire economic strategy can fit into one four-letter word: cuts.

Then again, that’s about the nicest four-letter word Australians have been using to describe the government’s economic strategy.

Australians who have watched the government rip $80 billion from schools and hospitals, $23 billion from pensions, $11 billion from foreign aid, $5 billion from universities and $3 billion from Medicare in its first year alone will rightfully be worried about where Mr Frydenberg’s fresh round of cuts will come from.

With the government announcing a Productivity Commission review which looks set to hack into unions, the minimum wage and unfair dismissal laws, I joined Linda Mottram on Sydney's ABC 702 to talk about why these things are an important protection against growing inequality. Here's the transcript:

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RADIO INTERVIEW

ABC 702 SYDNEY

FRIDAY, 23 JANUARY 2015

SUBJECT/S: Productivity Commission review; minimum wages; inequality

LINDA MOTTRAM: Joining me now is the Shadow Assistant Treasurer Andrew Leigh. Andrew, good morning.

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: Good morning Linda, how are you?

MOTTRAM: Well thanks. Now, what do you make first of all of the review itself – is it necessary?

LEIGH: I don't believe so, Linda. If we look at the story of the last couple of decades, it's been a period in which we've seen much slower growth in minimum wages than we have in average earnings. We've seen a rise in inequality and we've seen a fall in industrial disputes. Union power is lower now than it was in the past, and the union density rate is the lowest that it's been in my lifetime. So the notion that when we've got the slowest wage growth in a decade, the real problem for Australia is a ‘wages breakout’ just seems to be askew from the fundamental facts of what's going on in the economy. 

“When Australians spend the first six months of the year working for the government with tax rates nearly 50 cents in the dollar it is a disincentive. You’re working July, August, September, October, November, December just for the government and then you start working for yourself and your own household income after that.” – Joe Hockey, 3AW, 19 January

Joe Hockey's suggestion that Australians pay almost half their incomes in tax doesn't stack up, so why does he keep repeating it?

Why applied maths is too taxing for Joe, Daily Telegraph, 23 January

Since Joe Hockey claimed Australians pay almost 50 cents in the dollar in tax, plenty of people have pointed out the flaws in his maths.

But is it true that the man running Australia's economy really doesn't get the basics of our tax system? Or is he just so focused on the wealthiest Australians that he's lost sight of everyone else?

The first thing wrong with Hockey's claim is that Australia's top tax bracket is 45 cents in the dollar.

Factoring in a further 2 per cent each for the Medicare Levy and the government's high-income levy gets you to 49 per cent. But that would still only apply to people earning more than $180,000 a year; the back of my envelope suggests that less than 2 per cent of Australian adults have an individual income that high.

On the back of news today that the Abbott Government is going to wave through a big increase in private health insurance premiums, I joined David Speers on Sky PM Agenda to talk about why that would be bad for everyone's health. Here's the transcript:

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TELEVISION INTERVIEW

SKY PM AGENDA

THURSDAY, 22 JANUARY 2015

SUBJECT/S: Tony Abbott’s attack on Medicare; spike in private health insurance premiums

DAVID SPEERS: Let me bring in the Shadow Assistant Treasurer now, Andrew Leigh, our guest this afternoon. I wanted to talk to you about health insurance premiums. But can I just pick up though on the Medicare changes firstly. What is Labor's approach to any sort of co-payment? Even if there was further change to only apply it to wealthier Australians, is it something you would contemplate at all?

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: David, all we have got at the moment are thought bubbles from the Government. I mean, the Government apparently thinks today that its main problem is that the prime minister doesn't ‘skite’ enough. I think what the Australian people want from their Prime Minister is not more skiting, but more considered policy development. We know in the case of the co-payment, that doctors are against it, patients are against it and the health experts are against it. They don't want patients being priced out of going to the GP and ending up in the emergency room. That’s the more expensive bit of our health system, and the bit where – compared to other developed countries – we spend far more of our health budget.

My ACT Labor colleagues and I are really worried about the Abbott Government's moves to privatise public service functions. All Canberrans know what that means: even more jobs on the chopping block.

JOINT MEDIA RELEASE

PUBLIC SERVICE BRACES FOR MORE JOB CUTS

Labor’s Federal representatives are extremely concerned about the Abbott Government’s plans for privatising public sector functions, which will ultimately lead to more job losses in Canberra.

The Abbott Government is making plans to privatise tens of thousands more public service jobs as part of its ‘contestability program’.

Reports out over recent days suggest more than 30,000 Commonwealth Government jobs may be lost over the next few years as a result.

There is no doubt this will impact services across the country.

Thousands of workers in Canberra now have little to no job security, placing them under enormous personal strain. This new threat comes on top of the rolling redundancy program which is already underway, and will see 16,500 public servants laid off over the next few years. 

Australians rarely have much sympathy for public servants. But as I outline in this piece for the Canberra Times, they're real people and are facing real challenges because of the Abbott Government's public service cuts.

Public service recruitment freeze keeps Canberra locked in uncertainty, Canberra Times, 19 January

At one of my regular mobile offices in Gungahlin, I met a young couple – let’s call them Jess and Dan. Jess struck me as the kind of person employers are always crying out for: bright, well-spoken, professional, passionate about her work.

Like a third of all Canberrans, Jess works for a federal government department. She has three degrees and has volunteered overseas, as well as having years of experience in the public service which she gained by working on short-term contracts. She’s obviously seen as a great asset to her current agency, because in October last year her bosses ruled her eligible for a permanent position.

Unfortunately for Jess, that news came on the same day that the Abbott Government declared a total hiring freeze across the public service. Federal public servants are always amongst the first to be sacrificed when Liberal governments are looking to make savings, and the current Government has proven itself no exception. Having said they would axe 12,000 jobs, the Abbott Government is cutting 16,500 positions from the public service over the next few years. The Government has put a hiring freeze in place as a way to get to that target.

Despite being pinged for this last year, Joe Hockey has repeated wrong claims about how much tax Australians have to pay. Let's set the record straight on this.

MEDIA RELEASE

ANOTHER HOCKEY CLAIM UP IN SMOKE

Treasurer Joe Hockey has resorted to outright mistruths in an effort to sell his unfair budget.

In an interview with Melbourne’s 3AW radio, Mr Hockey falsely claimed that Australians are paying “nearly 50 cents in the dollar” in tax.

Based on that incorrect figure, he went on to claim that: “Australians spend the first six months of the year working for the Government.”

These claims are false, as Mr Hockey well knows.

Australia’s top marginal tax rate of 45 per cent takes effect only when a person’s annual earnings exceed $180,000. In 2011-12, the most recent year for which tax statistics are available, just 293,540 Australians earned above that threshold.