Nick Sherry (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Minister Assisting on Deregulation) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you for the question. In addition to the decisive actions that were outlined by my colleague the Minister for Finance and Deregulation, Senator Wong, in terms of protecting the Australian economy and indeed highlighting the comparative strength of the Australian economy, a recent World Bank report has rated Australia in the area of start-up for business and ease of doing business as a top 10 country out of 183 economies surveyed. Notwithstanding what is a good assessment, the Gillard Labor government is determined to ensure that doing business in Australia becomes easier. We are assisting small business by reducing red tape. Part of that is the government’s COAG Commonwealth-state agreement on deregulation. It is a central economic reform.

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has noted that Australia is one of the front-running countries in the OECD in terms of its regulatory reform practices. Through the ministers on the Council of Australian Governments, the government is working closely with the states and territories to deliver reforms in 27 important areas of economic regulatory activity through what is known as the seamless national economy. Establishing a seamless national economy, overcoming the differing rules and regulations that exist from state to state and territory to territory and addressing unnecessary and poorly designed regulation reduce business compliance costs.

Several of the reforms are already operational. For example, the standard business reporting simplifies preparation and lodgement of business activity statements, making it easier for business but particularly small business. In many cases the actual benefits of these reforms have been quantified. We are looking at an approximate annual benefit in the range of $2 billion to $3 billion. (Time expired)