Andrew Leigh

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TV INTERVIEW
SKY NEWS AFTERNOON AGENDA WITH TOM CONNELL
WEDNESDAY, 26 JULY 2023

SUBJECTS: Inflation figures, Energy bill relief, Transition to renewables, Increasing housing supply.

TOM CONNELL (HOST): Joining me now for more on this is Andrew Leigh, Assistant Minister for the Treasury. Thank you very much for your time here in the studio, of course.

ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT, COMPETITION, CHARITIES, AND TREASURY ANDREW LEIGH: Pleasure, Tom.

CONNELL: Inflation, 0.8 per cent for the quarter is a big figure here, it's barely above the target band, if it's annualised. Is the case for another rate hike greatly diminished after that figure?

LEIGH: Well, that'll be entirely up to the Reserve Bank and its board, Tom, but it’s certainly welcome news for households. Remember the peak of inflation was in the Coalition's last quarter in office. We had that quarterly figure of 2.1 per cent inflation. This figure of 0.8 per cent is less than half of that figure. So, warmly welcomed. Still annualised over the year, we're at 6 per cent, a little down from the 7.8 per cent we were at, but yet to come within the target band. As a government, we're focused on what we can do. Cheaper energy, cheaper childcare, ensuring we're providing that rental relief to households and cheaper medicines. Not only the reforms from January but also the reforms that will come into effect in September that will allow people to get two months supply in one go.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
RADIO INTERVIEW
ABC RADIO NATIONAL BREAKFAST WITH HAMISH MACDONALD
TUESDAY, 25 JULY 2023

SUBJECTS: Cost of living, Appointment of Chris Barrett to the Productivity Commission, Randomised trials and employment services system, Review into offshore processing.

HAMISH MACDONALD (HOST): The economic storm facing Australia might be gathering pace, but right now, the budget bottom line is looking better than ever. Yesterday, the Treasurer, Jim Chalmers, revealed the surplus has gone down since the May budget - sorry, gone up to $20 billion. But despite housing being a major problem in the community and government support payments below that of the poverty line, it's unlikely that any of that money will be used to ease the cost of living pressures. Andrew Leigh is the Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury and Employment and joins the program now. Good morning to you.

ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT, COMPETITION, CHARITIES, AND TREASURY ANDREW LEIGH: Good morning, Hamish.

Monopoly makes life harder for central banks

The Australian, 18 July 2023

The job of the Reserve Bank is never easy, but it is especially challenging at times when inflation is outside the target band. Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine and major problems with vital supply chains are undoubtably key drivers of Australia's inflation problem.

Nonetheless, two new pieces of research suggest that a lack of competition may impede the transmission of monetary policy - effectively making life harder for central bankers. Both were published in May in the American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings.

The first study, by Romain Duval, Davide Furceri, Raphael Lee and Marina M. Tavares, considers the effect of mark-ups. Mark-ups are the gap between cost and price. In a highly competitive market, mark-ups tend to be small. When monopolies rule, mark-ups are massive. Across many advanced countries, mark-ups have risen over recent decades.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
RADIO INTERVIEW
ABC BRISBANE BREAKFAST WITH CRAIG ZONCA AND LORETTA RYAN
WEDNESDAY, 12 JULY 2023

SUBJECTS: Charity town halls, Government’s goal to double philanthropy, Speech to Australian Economists Conference, Bank branch closures.

CRAIG ZONCA (HOST): The Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury, Andrew Leigh is joining us. Guess what, he has literally just run into the studio this morning. In your running gear, Andrew Leigh, good morning to you.

ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT, COMPETITION, CHARITIES, AND TREASURY ANDREW LEIGH: Good morning, great to be with you.

LORETTA RYAN (HOST): Where have you run to and from?

LEIGH: Just along the beautiful South Bank. I’ve been going for a run with a bloke called Wayne Spies. Wayne just broke the masters world record for a race called Comrades, which is an 87‑kilometre race in South Africa, and he's currently training to take a shot at the over 50 marathon world record.

RYAN: Gosh.

LEIGH: Amazingly quick runner. We were running at Andrew pace, not Wayne pace.

ZONCA: And is that what you do, if you're visiting a particular city, will you go for a run to experience early mornings, say like you have in Brisbane today?

CHARITY SECTOR TOWN HALL MEETINGS

This week, I will hold a series of town hall meetings across Australia to meet with charity sector representatives.

The Australian Government values the expertise and the contributions of the charity and non-profit sector, which constitutes almost one-tenth of the economy, and over one-tenth of employment. We know how vital Australian charities are in building stronger, fairer communities.

IMPROVING INTEGRITY AND TRANSPARENCY IN THE CHARITY SECTOR

The Albanese Government takes the integrity of the charity sector seriously and is acting to provide the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission (ACNC) with additional powers and resources.

Presently, secrecy provisions prevent the ACNC from disclosing whether it is investigating alleged misconduct by a charity, the outcomes of investigations, and/or the reasons for revoking the registration of a charity. This limits the ability of the public and charities to learn from ACNC regulatory activities.

Cut non-compete clauses and clear a creative path

The Daily Telegraph, 10 July 2023

In 1956, William Shockley shared the Nobel prize for silicon semiconductors. A brilliant scientist, he was also a bad boss. At his US company, he spied on employees and was both racist and paranoid.

So eight of his top engineers left, founding Fairchild Semiconductor. Shockley called them “the traitorous eight”, but couldn't stop them.

A decade later, two of them left to create Intel. Then another departed to create AMD. One reason why Silicon Valley came to dominate technology was that workers could walk out to create new firms.

Yet millions of Australian workers today don't have that freedom. New research from economist Dan Andrews at the thinktank e61 finds that 22 per cent of employees are bound by non-compete clauses.

Their contracts mean they can't take a better job if the company competes too closely with their current employer.

STREAMLINING THE DEDUCTIBLE GIFT RECIPIENT REGISTERS

Deductible Gift Recipient (DGR) status has been streamlined for organisations applying under four unique DGR registers. This is part of the Government’s commitment to boosting philanthropy and supporting a vibrant charitable sector.

The Australian Taxation Office (ATO) currently administers 48 of the 52 categories under which an organisation may be eligible for endorsement as a deductible gift recipient. The four deductible gift recipient categories presently administered by Ministers through departmental registers - environmental organisations, harm prevention charities, cultural organisations, and overseas aid organisations - will now benefit from the reforms to transfer administration of these DGR registers to the ATO.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
RADIO INTERVIEW
ABC SYDNEY DRIVE WITH JAMES VALENTINE
MONDAY, 26 JUNE 2023

SUBJECTS: Simon Crean; Unfair trading practices

JAMES VALENTINE (HOST): We were talking on Friday about the problems of unsubscribing. And so it's one thing where you might voluntarily subscribe to a streaming service or some kind of delivery service or whatever it might be, and it's going to charge you $10 a month and you decide to unsubscribe. And it's messy, it's awkward, it's all over the place. It's hard to do. It's a whole other thing, and this is what's happening in the US, where Amazon is being sued by the Federal Trade Commission, who are saying, you're signing up people to Prime who haven't even said that they want it. You go and buy something on Amazon and you suddenly find you're subscribed to Prime - subscribed to Prime, their television streaming service. We found people here who'd had this situation, they were subscribed to the US service, which is like $24 a month, and they can't even access it, let alone they didn't want it to start with. So, what can be done about this? And one of the things we discovered was that our laws are not particularly helpful here. Dr Andrew Leigh is Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury and joins us this morning to explore this. Andrew Leigh, good morning.

ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT, CHARITIES, COMPETITION AND TREASURY ANDREW LEIGH: Good morning, James. Great to be with you.

TREASURY LAWS AMENDMENT (MAKING MULTINATIONALS PAY THEIR FAIR SHARE—INTEGRITY AND TRANSPARENCY) BILL 2023

The Albanese Government is progressing work on its Multinational Tax Integrity package to improve the integrity, transparency, and fairness of the tax system.

The Treasury Laws Amendment (Making Multinationals Pay Their Fair Share—Integrity and Transparency) Bill 2023 was introduced this week.

The Bill amends Australia’s thin capitalisation rules to limit the amount of interest expenses that entities can deduct for tax purposes from 1 July 2023. This tax integrity measure is estimated to result in a gain to receipts of $720 million over the 4 years from 2022-23.