Andrew Leigh

HELPING MELBOURNIANS NAVIGATE THE TAX SYSTEM

THE UNIVERSITY OF MELBOURNE

MONDAY, 15 APRIL 2019

I acknowledge the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation and pay respect to their elders.

Thank you to Provost Mark Considine and Melbourne University Law School Dean Pip Nicholson for your hospitality. I’d particularly like to acknowledge my colleagues. Labor’s Melbourne candidate Luke Creasey is an educator and somebody who is passionate about social justice and is enthusiastic about today's announcement. Peter Khalil, a Melbourne University alumnus, an internationalist and somebody with whom I've had many conversations about the importance of providing better supports to disadvantaged members of our community. Ged Kearney, who has spent her life standing up for working people and who is one of our most thoughtful voices in the Labor team about how to ensure that we have public services that work for all.

I’d especially like to thank Sunita Jogarajan and Kate Fischer Doherty, whose thought leadership is bringing the tax clinic project together at the moment. This is an enormously exciting announcement for us, an announcement that a Shorten Labor Government would provide $150,000 in ongoing funding for a tax clinic here at Melbourne University. Not a one off trial, but ongoing support.

LABOR TO HELP MELBOURNIANS NAVIGATE TAX SYSTEM WITH TAX CLINIC

A Shorten Labor Government will ensure that all Melbournians have help navigating the tax system  by helping fund the University of Melbourne Tax Clinic.

Labor will commit $150,000 annually to the University of Melbourne Tax Clinic as part of Labor’s proposed expansion of 10 tax clinics around Australia.

While multinationals and millionaires can afford an armada of experts to navigate the tax system, low and middle-income Australians are often intimidated by the tax system, and unsure where to turn to get help.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

DOORSTOP INTERVIEW

CANBERRA

SATURDAY, 13 APRIL 2019

SUBJECTS: Labor’s $1 million in funding for the Holt District Playing Fields in Kippax.

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: Thanks very much for being here today. My name's Andrew Leigh, the Federal Member for Fenner. I’m enormously proud to announce that a Shorten Labor Government would contribute $1 million towards the upgrade of the facilities here at the Holt Kippax District Playing Fields. Playing fields are places where memories are made and friendships are forged. I was talking to my son Theodore on the way over and he was chatting about his favourite sporting grounds. I think we can all remember as kids the importance of those local sporting facilities. 

We've got to keep on upgrading our sporting facilities, making sure that they're prepared for developments like the influx of women and girls playing AFL. The upgrade will help to serve AFL, cricket and rugby league. It will be a vital resource for the community and is part of federal Labor's commitment to improving the quality of sporting facilities. I'll hand over now to Yvette Berry and Gordon Ramsay to say a few words. 

LABOR KICKING GOALS FOR ATHLETES IN KIPPAX

A Shorten Labor Government will  contribute $1 million to the redevelopment of the  Holt District Playing Fields at Kippax.

This funding will go towards upgrades and improvements to the changing rooms to make them inclusive for female players.

This commitment will help boost sporting facilities in the Kippax area and cater for growing demand, especially in West Belconnen.

AUSTRALIA’S COST OF LIVING SEESAW

Fiji Times Australia, 11 April 2019

Do you feel like the cost of living is higher than it used to be? You’re not imagining it.

For many Australians, life can feel like a lop-sided seesaw. On the high part of the seesaw, we have electricity bills, childcare costs, and health insurance costs. Almost two million Australians are unemployed or underemployed, meaning they can’t find work or enough hours at work.

The other part of the seesaw is stuck on the ground: wages, incomes and savings. Wages growth has been lower every quarter under this government than any quarter under its predecessor. Wages growth has been as low as 1.9 per cent since the 2013 election. Even during the global financial crisis, wages didn’t drop below 2.9 per cent.

TAX PIRATES AND TAX FAIRNESS

DEVPOLICY CENTRE, CRAWFORD SCHOOL OF PUBLIC POLICY

AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY

12 APRIL 2019

I acknowledge the Ngunnawal people, on whose lands we’re meeting today, and pay my respects to their elders past and present.

It is common for forms of serial fiction such as comic books, or film or television franchises, to have a new start of that universe – often called a ‘reboot’.

On occasion, when discarding the previous continuity or plotlines, the rebooting producers will change the tone of the text, perhaps favouring a gritty, realistic tone.

LABOR WILL HELP DEVELOPING COUNTRIES WARD OFF TAX PIRATES

A Shorten Labor Government will help developing countries claw back cash from tax avoiders, by supporting a tax compliance program that returns $100 in revenue for every $1 invested.

Tax Inspectors Without Borders, launched in 2015 by the OECD and the United Nations, helps countries collect tax, including from multinational companies squirrelling funds away in tax havens such as Bermuda and the Bahamas.

Tax havens hurt equality, especially in developing countries. Globally, two out of every five dollars of multinational profits are estimated to be channelled through tax havens. For regional neighbours such as the Philippines and the Solomon Islands, the amount shifted into tax havens is over 2 percent of GDP.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT 

RADIO INTERVIEW 

ABC MELBOURNE DRIVE 

WEDNESDAY, 10 APRIL 2019 

SUBJECTS:  Electric vehicles, Labor’s cancer plan, Adani. 

RAF EPSTEIN: Tim Wilson is the Liberal MP for the seat of Goldstein. He's also the head of the House Economics Committee. He's been running an Inquiry into Labor's changes to dividend imputation. Tim Wilson, thanks for coming in.  

TIM WILSON: Thanks, Raf. It’s wonderful to be here. It's even better to represent a community that is going to have its first Medicare licensed MRI. I see a copy of my letter in front of you. 

EPSTEIN: Yes, well one of your constituents has a bone to pick with you but we'll get to that, we'll get to that. Andrew Leigh also joins us in our Canberra studio. He's the Shadow Assistant Treasurer. He's the Labor MP for the seat of Fenner in Canberra. Andrew Leigh. 

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: G’day Raf. Great to be back with you.  

MELBOURNE’S MECHANICS SHIFT INTO TOP GEAR WITH LABOR’S REFORMS 

Labor is fixing a broken system for car owners and independent mechanics in Melbourne with a plan to make timely access to technical information a reality.

Whether you drive a Nissan Leaf or a Toyota Hilux, everyone should be able to choose where they get their car serviced. But independent repairers are being driven to despair by their inability to get fair access to the data and software upgrades they need.

LABOR’S CENTRIST ECONOMIC AGENDA

PER CAPITA REFORM AGENDA SERIES

MAURICE BLACKBURN LAWYERS, MELBOURNE

11 APRIL 2019

I acknowledge the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation and pay respect to their elders. My thanks to Per Capita, particularly Executive Director Emma Dawson, for the chance to speak with you today.

Last month, journalist David Speers asked senior Liberal Party frontbencher Linda Reynolds a reasonable question: ‘Do you agree that flexibility in wages and keeping wages at modest levels is a deliberate feature of our economic architecture?’.

‘No, absolutely not’, replied Reynolds. ‘For Bill Shorten to even suggest that…’

‘I’m quoting Mathias Cormann’, Speers pointed out.