Andrew Leigh

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
DOORSTOP
GOLD COAST
TUESDAY, 4 SEPTEMBER 2018

SUBJECT: Labor’s plans to level the playing field between multinational manufacturers and Australian car retailers.

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: Good morning everyone. My name's Andrew Leigh, the Shadow Minister for Competition. Thank you for coming along today. Today at the Australian Automotive Dealer’s Association conference, Labor made an important announcement. We announced that under a Shorten Labor Government, we would implement an industry-specific code governing the relationship between automotive dealers and car manufacturers. We haven’t taken this step lightly. But when the competition watchdog brought down a report on new car retailing, it outlined significant areas of concern. The power imbalance between multinational manufacturers and Aussie car dealers, many of whom are small businesses and family owned firms, has gotten out of control. We've seen instances in which manufacturers have enforced dealership terms as short as a year, in which they haven't dealt appropriately with issues of recalls and haven't ensured that the Australian Consumer Law is adequately complied with. We need to make sure that our automotive dealers get a fair deal. That we ensure that they can operate as family businesses, as small businesses. Automotive dealing is one of the most competitive areas of the Australian economy. Many parts the Australian economy are heavily concentrated, but auto dealers aren't that. They are a diverse set of businesses, employing nearly 70,000 people across Australia. Australians bought around 1.2 million cars last year and we want to make sure that Australian motorists get a fair go, that their consumer rights are respected and that auto dealers are looked after. This policy is based on the evidence from the ACCC report and based on our engagement with the Australian Automotive Dealers Association. I’ll now ask David Blackhall from the AADA to say a few words.

DRIVING A BETTER DEAL FOR AUTO DEALERS

A Shorten Labor Government will drive a better deal for auto dealers by levelling the playing field between the overseas multinationals that manufacture cars and the small businesses that operate car dealerships.
 
Labor will implement an industry-specific code through regulations under the Competition and Consumer Act to deliver clear rules for manufacturers and dealerships.

DRIVING A BETTER DEAL FOR AUTO DEALERS

AUSTRALIA AUTOMOTIVE DEALER ASSOCIATION CONFERENCE

GOLD COAST CONVENTION CENTRE

TUESDAY, 4 SEPTEMBER 2018

I acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands on which we meet, the Yugambeh people, and pay my respects to their elders past, present, and emerging.

I want to thank the Australian Automotive Dealer Association for having me here today and in particular your chief executive officer David Blackhall, with whom I maintain regular contact on a number of matters, ranging from industry specific issues to whether the Westfield Australian Marathon in Sydney was a tougher race than the Gold Coast Marathon.

Today, I’m going to resist addressing you about running. Instead, I’m going to start off by talking about sandwiches. Or to be more accurate, farmers and sandwiches.

CHARITIES SUFFER AGAIN UNDER CHAOTIC COALITION

Australian charities are once again collateral damage of the crisis and division within the Coalition.

For the past five years, the Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison government has waged a war on charities, prompting two open letters to the Prime Minister of the day, and wasting endless hours of time as charities push back against the Coalition’s retrograde agenda.

Zed Seselja is the government’s sixth minister with responsibility for the Australian Charities and Not-for-Profits Commission, following Kevin Andrews, Scott Morrison, Christian Porter, Michael McCormack and Michael Sukkar.

INDIGENOUS READING PROJECT GRANT GIVING CEREMONY
 
CANBERRA
 
MONDAY, 3 SEPTEMBER 2018

Like Auntie Violet, I acknowledge the Ngunnawal people, the traditional owners of the land on which we meet, and pay my respects to elders past, present, and emerging. 

It's great to be here with Dan Billing, Professor Marcia Langton, ACT Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith and so many other strong supporters of this great program.

Five fresh facts you might not know about inequality

The Canberra Times, 1 September 2018

Superyachts are getting longer. Recently, we learned that one of Australia’s richest men has progressed from a 21-metre long sports cruiser to a 27-metre flybridge cruiser. His latest is a 73-metre Hasna superyacht, worth $75 million. But it’s not the biggest privately-owned yacht in Australia. Another rich-lister owns a 74-metre Italian-made yacht.

In the world of luxury boats, one expert observes that ‘the client who 15 years ago would have been satisfied with a 40-metre yacht, which would then have been one of the largest yachts in the bay, is now surrounded by dozens of yachts of 60-70 metres, and this plants the seed that he really ought to upgrade.’ The world’s largest yachts now include multiple swimming pools, submersibles, jet skis, concert halls and dance floors. Running costs alone can be millions of dollars per year. Yet as investment banker Mark Carnegie notes, no matter how large megaboats get, ‘someone’s always got a bigger one’.

At the other end of the income spectrum, recreation looks a little different. As one low-income person put it, leisure spending ‘depends on the situation with bills and gas and electric and so forth’.  Another said that their only leisure is to smoke cigarettes. Recreational activities tend to involve walks and bicycle rides, with one study estimating that for poor Australians, spending $20 a week on recreation was a ‘generous amount’. When his friends go out for a meal to celebrate, one young unemployed man said ‘it’s quite embarrassing - I’ll just sit there and not eat’.

CHRIS BOWEN MP
SHADOW TREASURER
SHADOW MINISTER FOR SMALL BUSINESS
MEMBER FOR MCMAHON
 
ANDREW LEIGH MP
SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER
SHADOW MINISTER FOR COMPETITION AND PRODUCTIVITY
SHADOW MINISTER FOR TRADE IN SERVICES
SHADOW MINISTER FOR CHARITIES AND NOT-FOR-PROFITS
MEMBER FOR FENNER
 
MADELEINE KING MP
SHADOW MINISTER FOR CONSUMER AFFAIRS
SHADOW MINISTER ASSISTING FOR SMALL BUSINESS
 
LABOR ENSURES SMALL BUSINESS GETS A SEAT AT TAX OFFICE TABLE

Labor is committed to giving all taxpayers – particularly small businesses – a fair appeals process when dealing with the Tax office.
 
Genuine concerns have been raised about engagement with small businesses about tax disputes, including the lack of a perceived and real structural separation within the Tax Office of officials who make tax assessments from those who handle disputes and appeals.

CHRIS BOWEN MP
SHADOW TREASURER
MEMBER FOR MCMAHON
 
ANDREW LEIGH MP
SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER
SHADOW MINISTER FOR COMPETITION AND PRODUCTIVITY
SHADOW MINISTER FOR TRADE IN SERVICES
SHADOW MINISTER FOR CHARITIES AND NOT-FOR-PROFITS
MEMBER FOR FENNER
 
DID ATO WASTE TAXPAYER DOUGH DIGGING DIRT FOR SLOMO?

The full extent of Scott Morrison’s politicisation of independent institutions remains unknown with the Australian Tax Office refusing to provide details of work done for the now Prime Minister, months after being asked.
 
In May, The Australian newspaper reported on costings of Labor tax policies as part of a heavily biased drop seemingly from the former Treasurer.
 
The Tax Office was asked later that month whether it had done the costings at the behest of Mr Morrison’s office, but remains unwilling to answer even three months on, saying it would be a “an unreasonable diversion of resources” to provide a response. That could suggest that Scott Morrison has laboured the ATO with a lot of costings requests of Labor policies.

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

TV INTERVIEW

SKY NEWS AGENDA

WEDNESDAY, 29 AUGUST 2018
 
SUBJECTS: Tony Abbott, Closing the Gap, Wentworth polling, ASIC investigation into Stuart Robert.

KIERAN GILBERT: With me now is Shadow Assistant Treasurer, Andrew Leigh. Given think it's fair to say in the past we haven't utilized the capacity of Australian prime ministers as well as we should, like the Americans have done for years with their presidents, why is this not a good move to put the prime minister – young former prime minister's energy into something constructive?

ANDREW LEIGH, SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER: I don't think anyone doubts Tony Abbott's energy. The question is whether that’ll be followed up with measures that actually help close the gaps. As you remember from earlier this year, the latest Closing the Gap report now sees Australia not on track to meet most of those Closing the Gap indicators. And as Richard Marles has pointed out, significant cuts to funding of Indigenous programs are one of the reasons why we're not closer to closing those gaps. I would like to see Tony Abbott energy's more productively utilized. I've been as disappointed, as have many Australians, at the way in which he's comported himself since stepping down as prime minister. But just visiting is going to be enough. We actually need the Morrison Government to step up and act.

GILBERT: He's already got a number of ideas, including in education - he wants to focus on greater attendance rates and even talking about possible penalties for Indigenous parents who children aren't showing up at school. Do we have to think outside of the box here in order to get some progress? Because he's quite right that the best start is to ensure a good education.

LEIGH: Attendance matters. As Woody Allen says, 90 per cent of life is just showing up. But I'm not sure a big stick is appropriate in this instance. I don't think the history of Indigenous affairs would lead you to think that we need more big sticks in Indigenous affairs. We need to be working in partnership with local communities, listening to them, and many Indigenous Australians are still reeling from the Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison Government's rejection of the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

ANDREW LEIGH MP
SHADOW ASSISTANT TREASURER
SHADOW MINISTER FOR COMPETITION AND PRODUCTIVITY
SHADOW MINISTER CHARITIES AND NOT-FOR-PROFITS
SHADOW MINISTER FOR TRADE IN SERVICES
MEMBER FOR FENNER
 
PATRICK GORMAN
MEMBER FOR PERTH
 
HANNAH BEAZLEY
LABOR CANDIDATE FOR SWAN
 
PERTH RECONNECTED FORUM A SUCCESS

 
Today, we held a successful ‘Reconnected’ forum with Perth charities and not-for-profits, exchanging ideas to boost social capital and community engagement.