Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Vice-President of the Executive Council) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you very much, Senator Hanson. You would be aware that the government released an economic and fiscal update in July which provided our assessment of the fiscal impact of the various measures that we've adopted as a result of COVID, as well as the fiscal impact of the economic parameter changes and our assessment of the cost over the two financial years 2019-20 and 2020-21. Treasury also conducted a review of the JobKeeper arrangements over the initial three months, halfway through the initial six-month operation of the program, and Treasury provided advice based on the review and based on their assessment of the economic outlook moving forward.

In the context of what's been happening in Victoria, in particular, in more recent times, we've made the judgements that we've made. The judgement is that, yes, we do need to transition out of this historically unprecedented level of transitional support. We're phasing down the payment from the end of September to the end of December and then again from January to the end of March, and we're also reapplying the turnover test to ensure that the businesses that receive this support still genuinely require that support on an ongoing basis. We believe that the steps we're taking are part of a pathway to transition the economy out of what is historically unprecedented fiscal support for businesses and workers.