Andrew Leigh

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RADIO INTERVIEW

2GB MONEY NEWS

MONDAY, 25 FEBRUARY 2019

SUBJECTS: Labor’s plans to make mergers fairer; Banking Royal Commission and Labor’s Banking Fairness Fund.

ROSS GREENWOOD: I want to take you to the Labor Party and its policies. As you know and as we saw today, Labor remains well ahead in the polls and so you've got to watch the policies to understand what's taking place in a prospective Labor Government after the May federal election. Now a few of them are important. One of them quite clearly is in regards to banking. And this is about though the government saying or rather Labor saying that if elected it would actually hit the banks to pay some $640 million to create a fund to allow more Australians access to compensation if the wrong thing is done to them by their banks. Now this would include more broadly - not just the big four banks, but it would include the likes of Macquarie, the Bendigo and Adelaide Bank, the Bank of Queensland would be in there as well, contributing to this fund. Now that tops up what is already available through the Australian Financial Complaints Authority, which has been increased in terms of its payouts in the last little while. Second thing is also, as a part of this, Labor will fund more financial counsellors that will help people and small businesses to take on the banks. So at the moment there is a a number of them out there, say there's 500 or so, they’re saying they'd like to see a thousand out there. But on top of that also a few other bits and pieces, say for example when big companies merge, is competition taken out of the marketplace or not? We’ll again hear Labor as saying they want the ACCC to go back and review mergers and after they've happened see whether the desired consequences have actually occurred. Now to help us out here, let's bring in Andrew Leigh, the Shadow Assistant Treasurer and the Shadow Minister for Competition and Productivity is on the line right now. Andrew, as always, many thanks for your time.

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: A pleasure, Ross. A lot to get through there.

GREENWOOD: There is a lot to go through. Let's start with your portfolio specifically and that's this area of the ACCC and mergers. Now clearly there are some mergers that take place you look back in hindsight and say it was actually just a concentration of power - they got more power, they were able to basically clean up their competition. Is that the desired you know sort of effect of what you're trying to achieve here?

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 20 FEBRUARY 2019

Last Tuesday, on a perfect Canberra morning, it was my pleasure to join the Indigenous Marathon Foundation's Closing the Gap Fun Run and Walk. It was 7 am on a crisp day and there we were at the shore of Lake Burley Griffin at the aptly named Reconciliation Place.

The Indigenous Marathon Project, run by the Indigenous Marathon Foundation, was established by Rob de Castella and has, to date, sent dozens of young Indigenous Australians through its training program. The capstone is the New York marathon, but Indigenous Marathon Project participants then go back to their communities to set up Deadly Fun Runs. It is both a leadership program and a community engagement program. I commend Rob de Castella, one of my great heroes, for his initiative in setting it up.

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 18 FEBRUARY 2019

Canberra's 59 service stations charge petrol prices that are on average 7.4 per cent above the national average. Like many Canberrans, I've grown sick and tired of the excuses given for these high prices.

I commend the Barr government for its announcement that it will put in place a select committee inquiry, commission a detailed analysis by the Independent Competition and Regulatory Commission and immediately act to reduce misleading petrol signage at petrol stations, where petrol stations attempt to lure people in with headline prices that customers can't receive.

As Andrew Barr has pointed out:

Canberra families are paying hundreds of dollars more than the equivalent New South Wales family each and every year.

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 18 FEBRUARY 2019

  This is a great day for small business, because Labor's access to justice amendment has passed the Senate and looks as though it may now pass the House. This is a great opportunity for the 45th Parliament to come together and address the market power imbalance between large business and small business.

A bit of history. In 2017 the Senate passed Labor's private senator's bill to provide access to justice for small business. There was no crossbench opposition. It was a bill that united Centre Alliance, the Greens and Senators Bernardi, Leyonhjelm and Hinch. Even Senator Gichuhi supported the bill prior to her joining the Liberal Party. Yet, when it came to this place, the Liberals refused to debate it.

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 18 FEBRUARY 2019

Whistleblowers play an important role in enforcing our corporate laws. When investigative journalist Bastian Obermayer received millions of leaked files from Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca, he set in place events which would shake the foundations of many tax structures around the word. The release of the so-called ‘Panama Papers’ showed that shell countries were perpetrating tax fraud and dodging global sanctions. It led to the resignation of the Icelandic prime minister and other prominent officials. Within Australia, the Australian tax office began investigations into 800 people identified in what became known as the Panama Papers.

Indeed, the very notion that whistleblowers may be protected and even rewarded provides an incentive for firms to do the right thing. A recent economic study by Eli Amir, Adi Lazar and Shai Levi looked at Israel's tax whistleblowing scheme and found that it significantly increased the amount of tax paid, particularly in industries that were especially prone to tax evasion.

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TELEVISION INTERVIEW

ABC NEWS BREAKFAST

MONDAY, 18 FEBRUARY 2019

SUBJECTS: Medivac bill; IPSOS poll; Labor’s plans to help small business.

MICHAEL ROWLAND: To talk about this and other issues, the Shadow Assistant Treasurer Dr Andrew Leigh joins us now from Canberra. Good morning to you.

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: Good morning, Michael.

ROWLAND: Looking at this IPSOS poll first, has the Labor Party pulled the wrong reign here on asylum seekers?

LEIGH: Michael, I haven't commented on opinion polls in my nearly nine years in politics. And in my six years as an academic before that I wrote papers arguing that polls get too much attention. I’d be the last person to think that that ought to be our guiding star. Labor is focused on the big issues, on the stagnant wages, stagnant living standards and the fact that debt is going up while we're seeing living standards flatlining. They are the big issues for us.

ROWLAND: So the narrowest gap in six months, a four point drop in the Labor Party's primary vote does not concern you at all

LEIGH: We'd like to see the issues that matters to the Australian people implemented. Australians want the findings of the Hayne Royal Commission put into legislation. We would like to see parliament sit, not 10 days over 8 months, but sitting as the time that it takes in order to get the Hayne recommendations done. As you mentioned before, we will be grilling the government on this $500 million given to a company with headquarters in a shack on Kangaroo Island. It certainly smells a bit fishy to me.

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DOORSTOP

PARLIAMENT HOUSE

MONDAY, 18 FEBRUARY 2019

SUBJECTS: Labor’s plans to help small business, upholding competition laws, petrol prices, Medivac bill.

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: Good morning. My name is Andrew Leigh, the Shadow Assistant Treasurer. Three years ago, Labor announced our Access to Justice for small business policy. It’s a policy that makes sure small business can take on the big end of town in competition litigation. Australia doesn't have enough private litigation upholding our competition laws. One of the reasons for that is that small business are scared about the prospect of being bankrupted by the other side’s legal costs. Labor's Access to Justice for small business policy has been welcomed by COSBOA, who say access to justice is a huge issue. It's been welcomed by the Small Business Ombudsman, herself a former Liberal chief minister, who has said that it's important to level the playing field between small business and big business. It’s also been welcomed by a range of Nationals - Barnaby Joyce, Keith Pitt, Andrew Broad and Llew O’Brien have said that they support Labor's access to justice for small business policy.

And yet Scott Morrison and the Liberals have been fighting against access to justice for small business for years now. They voted against it in the Senate as recently as Thursday night, they voted against our bill, when we brought it to the other place. And they have fought hard against small business, just as the Liberals fought hard against the banking royal commission. Let's not forget, Scott Morrison is the guy who voted against the Banking Royal Commission 26 times and only backed it after the big banks said they wanted a royal commission. Labor’s always been the party of small business. We've got a policy of data sharing for independent mechanics that ensures that they have the data they need to fix cars and stay in business. We've supported a mandatory code for auto dealers, levelling the imbalance that exists between the multinational manufacturers and the franchise operators that sell new cars. At the next election, small and big business will face the time same tax rates regardless of who wins. But under Labor, small business - and big business for that matter - will have access to the Australian Investment Guarantee, allowing more rapid depreciation of new purchases.

MATTER OF PUBLIC IMPORTANCE

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 12 FEBRUARY 2019

Last December I was contacted by the parents of a young man in my electorate who was given a $40,000 loan by one of the big four banks. At the time, he was sleeping in his car. He had precarious employment. According to his parents, ‘his understanding of finance and law was minimal’. He now finds himself hounded by a debt agency for that $40,000.

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TELEVISION INTERVIEW

ABC NEWS WEEKEND BREAKFAST

SATURDAY, 9 FEBRUARY 2019

SUBJECTS: Banking Royal Commission, closing unsustainable tax loopholes, Tim Wilson’s abuse of parliament, Kerryn Phelps’ amendments.

JOHANNA NICHOLSON: To discuss this and more we're joined now by Andrew Leigh, who's the Shadow Assistant Treasurer and federal Member for Fenner. Thanks so much for your time this morning. Let's start with the banking royal commission. Labor has indicated that it will accept all of the recommendations at least in principle and look at implementing those recommendations from the Royal Commission. If Labor goes ahead and bans bank payments to brokers, won't that save the banks a lot of money? And are you concerned about that?

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: Johanna, this is an important report. It was hard hitting, but not as hard hitting as some had anticipated - after all, bank shares rose on the announcement of the Hayne Royal Commission report. So Labor believes it’s appropriate to implement it in full, including the recommendations around mortgage brokers. They can play an important role in the industry, but they need to be acting for the customer and the point that a royal commissioner made was that too often they seem to be acting for the lender rather than for the borrower. But it's so true to form that the Coalition, even with this royal commission report, is unable to say that they'll go ahead and implement it. Already they're looking at how they can back in the special interests rather than the interest of all Australians.

ANU CLIMATE UPDATE

AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, 8 FEBRUARY 2019

It’s not easy keeping up with the bad news about climate change.

Last summer – the summer of 2017-2018 – was Australia’s second-hottest since record-keeping began.[1] And after that summer was over, the records continued to fall. April 8^th 2018 was the hottest April day ever recorded in Australia. That record lasted for exactly a day, until it was broken on April 9^th.[2] In August, 100% of NSW was declared to be in drought. September 2018 was the driest Australian September on record.[3] In ten of the state’s local government areas, day one of the summer fire season was declared in winter, for the first time ever.[4] December 2018 was our hottest recorded December.[5]