Lindsay Tanner (Melbourne, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Hansard source

That was the Governor of the Reserve Bank, who attracts mirth and general derision from the opposition benches. The second response is from the Property Council:

The Property Council urges bi-partisan support for this legislation to inject stability and confidence into the economy.

ABIP is an essential mechanism to inject stability and confidence into commercial property lending.

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This will protect the lending collateral for Australian small businesses, whose jobs and productivity will help lead us out of this economic slump.

Next is Master Builders Australia. Sneer at them as well, why don’t you, while you are on the way through. They said:

Master Builders Australia ... has called for bipartisan support for the early passing of the Australian Business Investment Partnership Limited Bill.

Ian Harper from Access Economics said:

In normal times, the Government ought have no business lending to property or to anything else, but these are extraordinary times.

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If there is a major collapse in asset prices in the commercial property market, that could feed through into domestic housing.

Given the exposure of domestic banks to housing ... that is what we’re trying to avoid at all costs.

Predictably enough, there is one voice in the community reaction that does not go along with the Governor of the Reserve Bank, the Property Council, the Master Builders or indeed Access Economics. Once again, it is the Liberal and National opposition who have indicated their opposition to this very important measure to sustain employment and growth in the Australian economy. The Leader of the Opposition said in response to this:

The market should take its course.

In other words: ‘Let’s just take the risk that we will see widespread collapses in commercial property prices, that we’ll see thousands of jobs lost, that we’ll see a serious withdrawal of foreign funding from this sector and major negative ripple-on ramifications for the Australian economy.’ Yet again, that is the position of the opposition. The government does not believe that is the right approach. The right approach is to act. When the Australian economy is threatened, when jobs are threatened and when businesses are threatened, the Rudd government will take decisive action to protect those businesses and to protect those jobs.

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