Andrew Leigh

THE CASE TO DOUBLE PHILANTHROPIC GIVING

Philanthropy Australia: Philanthropy Meets Parliament
Parliament House, Canberra

Tuesday, 24 October 2023

I acknowledge the Ngunnawal people the Traditional Custodians of the land we are meeting on, and pay my respects to all First Nations people present.

As a Canberra, I'd like to welcome you here to the nation's capital, to the bush capital and to the social capital of Australia. Canberra does strikingly well on a range of social capital metrics. And I hope while you're in town, you'll have a chance to get out and about and enjoy some of that Canberra community spirit.

I’ve been asked today to talk about the case for double giving. One way to start is to think about what Australia would look like without charities and not-for-profits.

What if there were no charities or not-for-profits in Australia? Immediately many people who are disadvantaged, who are homeless or struggling with family violence would have nowhere to turn to. Aged care centres and childcare centres would close down. We'd see an immediate collapse of the arts: music, dance and theatre.

Suddenly, on a Saturday morning, a whole lot of parents would be wondering what to do with their kids, because there wouldn't be those sporting activities that are being run by Australia's charities. Our local environment would be worse off without the community groups that support local bush regeneration projects. Medical research would be slowed. In the case that disaster struck, Australia would be less resilient without charities and not-for-profits.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
RADIO INTERVIEW
6PR MONEYNEWS WITH KARALEE KATSAMBANIS
MONDAY, 23 OCTOBER 2023

SUBJECTS: ATO’s Multinational Tax Avoidance taskforce; benefits of competition policy in assisting small businesses and the Royal Australian Mint's recent win at the Mint Directors Conference in Canada.  

KARALEE KATSAMBANIS (HOST): I'm always delighted to catch up with this gentleman, the Honourable Dr Andrew Leigh, who is Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury and Employment. Good evening, Dr Leigh. 

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

​KATSAMBANIS: Well it's lovely to be with you too, and I thought we'd do a bit of a round-up this evening because there's a lot of things happening, you're in charge of a lot of portfolios and you're always very accessible here for our West Australian listeners and to tell us what's going on. 

So I thought we'd sort of kick off with one of the things that is one of your babies I should say, but what's been happening with the multinational tax amendments and the things that are going on there and the various measures that are being progressed by the Government? 

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RADIO INTERVIEW
ABC CANBERRA MORNINGS WITH ADAM SHIRLEY
TUESDAY, 24 OCTOBER 2023

SUBJECTS: ATO’s Multinational Tax Avoidance taskforce; Australian companies using foreign tax havens; future of the Australian Institute of Sport.

ADAM SHIRLEY (HOST): You do your work, you pay your taxes. Although if you're not a multinational conglomerate who can afford some pretty skilled accountants, you might be paying, in percentage terms, a lot more. Multinational tax avoidance is an issue that the then opposition, now Federal Government pledged to crack down on, so that you weren't paying an unfair amount compared to those big companies. Andrew Leigh is the Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities, Treasury and Employment. He's the Federal Member for Fenner in the ACT. Dr Leigh, good morning to you.

ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR CHARITIES, COMPETITION, TREASURY AND EMPLOYMENT ANDREW LEIGH: Morning, Adam. Great to be with you.

SHIRLEY: How is that work progressing? And is it fair to say still that some regular Australian workers are being dudded compared to multinationals?

LEIGH: When multinationals pay less, Australians pay more. So, the fact is, we need to make sure they're paying their fair share. After a decade when the coalition was on the go-slow on multinational tax dodging, we're on the case. The Tax Avoidance Taskforce has now reported that it managed to claw back some $6.4 billion last year. These are taxes that should have been paid but weren't, and were followed up by the Tax Avoidance Taskforce. We're also looking at ways of tightening the laws. Multinationals right now have too many ways of dodging tax that just aren't available to your regular Canberra small business.

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RADIO INTERVIEW
ABC NEWS RADIO WITH GLEN BARTHOLOMEW
MONDAY, 23 OCTOBER 2023

SUBJECTS: ATO’s Multinational Tax Avoidance taskforce; Australian companies using foreign tax havens.

GLEN BARTHOLOMEW (HOST): A new report suggests multinational profit shifting deprived Australia of $11 billion in tax in 2020. The global report from the EU Tax Observatory of the Paris School of Economics suggests Australians hold more than $370 billion in known foreign tax havens, and that multinational companies are shifting profits to lower tax in countries.

Assistant Minister for Treasury, Andrew Leigh, says his government's determined to prevent companies unfairly shifting profits to tax havens, and that the Tax Office has managed to claw back billions in lost revenue. Andrew Leigh, good afternoon.

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

BARTHOLOMEW: Is it concerning it see that more than $370 billion is held by Australians in these so‑called tax haven countries?

LEIGH: Look, I take this report very seriously. Gabriel Zucman who's the co‑lead is one of the best known tax economists working globally, and his work has uncovered a whole range of concerning patterns, which have been one of the reasons that we took multinational tax integrity to the last election.

We've now had the Tax Avoidance Taskforce report that it brought in more than $6 billion over the last year, significantly more than in previous years, and we're moving to close multinational tax loopholes. There's an awful lot to be done, but the bottom line is when multinationals pay less, Australians pay more.

OPINION PIECE

START UPS, UPSTARTS AND COMPETITION

Melanie Perkins and Cliff Obrecht started Canva in their early twenties. Ruslan Kogan started Kogan at age 23. At the same age, Scott Farquhar and Mike Cannon-Brookes started Atlassian.

Yet the data shows that such stories are increasingly rare. In 1976, 17 percent of business owners were aged under 30. In 2021, the figure was just 8 percent. Conversely, the share of business owners who are aged over 50 has risen from 30 percent to 47 percent. True, the age profile of the whole population has shifted in that period, but not so dramatically as the age profile of business owners.

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RADIO INTERVIEW
2CC DRIVE WITH LEON DELANEY
FRIDAY, 20 OCTOBER 2023

SUBJECTS: ACT unemployment rate; ACCC monitoring prices of airline flights; Progress on multinational tax laws; Release of Australian Charities and Not-For-Profits Commission’s Annual Report.

LEON DELANEY (HOST): The unemployment rate in the ACT has gone up against the national trend, despite the Canberra job market still apparently going strong with the highest participation rate in the country. But the unemployment rate is up from 3.2 to 3.9 per cent. Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury, and Assistant Minister for Employment, not to mention, our local member for Fenner, Andrew Leigh joins us now. Good afternoon.

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

DELANEY: What should we read into these unemployment figures in the ACT?

HELPING HOUSEHOLDS

Matter of Public Importance
House of Representatives, 18 October 2023

Today's matter of public importance is on the cost of living, and I could take the House through some of the statistics that reflect what the Albanese government is doing to tackle the effect in Australia of the global cost-of-living crisis. But instead I want to start by talking about some of the stories of ordinary Australians whose lives have benefited from cost-of-living measures that the Albanese government has put into place.

Our cheaper childcare measures were welcomed by Blanca Ramirez, a woman in Canberra whose daughter, Paloma, is at daycare. As a result of the increase to the childcare subsidy, Blanca has moved to working four days a week. That ensures that her productivity is up, that their household budget is improved and that Paloma has a little bit more support. As Blanca puts it, 'I can run around and I'm not like dead tired after work.' There are 1.2 million families across Australia benefiting from Labor's cheaper childcare measures.

Statement on Israel and Hamas
Federation Chamber, 17th October 2023

On the weekend, Hamas terrorists committed mass murder on a shocking scale. People at a music festival were gunned down. Babies were killed in their beds. Defenceless elderly people were murdered. Over 100 hostages were taken into Gaza. The scale of the attack was so large that it was the greatest loss of life among Jewish people since the Holocaust. This is a murderous, barbarous terrorist group whose objective was not just to kill Jewish people but to kill the peace process itself. Hamas has as its goal the destruction of the Israeli state. It wants to ensure that the peace process is derailed.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
RADIO INTERVIEW
ABC DRIVE WITH ANNA VIDOT
MONDAY, 16 OCTOBER 2023

SUBJECTS: Barton Highway duplication, Voice referendum, Australian Institute of Sport independent review

ANNA VIDOT (HOST): Lots to talk about, not only with regard to the referendum but there are a couple of other interesting political things bubbling along. To discuss this afternoon I'm joined by the Federal Member for Fenner Andrew Leigh, who's on the line with us.

Andrew Leigh, thanks very much for your time. How are you feeling on the Monday after the referendum before?

ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR CHARITIES, COMPETITION, TREASURY AND EMPLOYMENT ANDREW LEIGH: Look, very sad, Anna. I think this was a referendum which would have made a big positive difference for First Nations people and for Australia as a whole. I’m feeling especially for the First Nations leaders here in the ACT and across the country who'd worked for years, in some cases even more than that, in order to get this constitutional recognition happening.

I think the challenge now is to take the energy and the passion, the mobilisation of volunteers that's occurred around First Nations issues and point that towards closing the gaps, towards reconciliation.

We know that there is a lot of goodwill, particularly here in Canberra where more than 60 per cent of Canberrans voted yes. That certainly shows how strongly committed we are here in the ACT to reconciliation and to closing the gaps.

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RADIO INTERVIEW
2CC CANBERRA DRIVE WITH LEON DELANEY
WEDNESDAY, 11 OCTOBER 2023

SUBJECTS: Australian Centre for Evaluation and the commencement of online employment service trials, Productivity Commission report on slowing productivity, allegations of bullying and sexism at the Productivity Commission, Rural Fire Service Association’s use of donations.

LEON DELANEY: Federal Member for Fenner, the seat in which this radio station is located also happens to be the Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury, and Assistant Minister for Employment. He's also coincidentally on the telephone right now. Good afternoon Andrew.

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

DELANEY: Always good to have you on the program. Thanks for joining us today. You're on about your favourite pet project at the moment, aren't you, the Australian Centre for Evaluation, apparently it has passed a milestone? 

LEIGH: It has. Today the Australian Centre for Evaluation has entered into a partnership with the Department of Employment to do a series of randomised trials on employment services programs.

These are programs which use the online services system to assist people to find jobs. We need to make sure, Leon, that at a time with historically low unemployment that everybody is getting the work that they feel that they're ready to do. So this is about ensuring that government works better, it will save people money, and it will help some of the most vulnerable in the community.