Peter Strong: Labor has made a good start, but it must never forget small business people

Back in the mid-1990s, Labor’s Kim Beazley, as leader of the opposition, addressed a small business conference and made the comment to that audience “small business is not Labor’s constituent”. I was appalled. Since then, there has been much better engagement with small business by Labor; the Gillard government in particular gave the sector more attention and more positive outcomes.

We now have a newish Labor government. Will it do a Kim Beazley or a Julia Gillard?

At the Council of Small Business Organisations of Australia’s (COSBOA) annual summit in April this year, which I attended as immediate past CEO, Richard Marles, then-shadow small business minister, delivered a range of policies that were rightfully well received by that meeting.

So far so good. Since Labor won the election what has happened?

The ongoing focus on small business from the government has been mainly behind closed doors it seems. The COSBOA newsletter for July shows many meetings held with many government ministers, at the Minister’s request, and there is much preparation on small business needs for the Jobs Summit in September. It is good that there is still this strong focus. COSBOA is really the only peak body on small business and must continue to be engaged with, which they are.

Otherwise, there hasn’t been much mention of the small business community by the government — in public or in parliament. Even peak bodies such as the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) and the Australian Industry Group (AIGroup) haven’t been talking much about small business — they should.

The fear I have is that we may go back to the old ways of talking about small business to look good but in reality looking after either big business or the unions or both. 

The new Small Business Minister Julie Collins has been mainly focused on her other portfolios of housing and homelessness and that is to be expected given the ministers background and Labor’s traditional focus on those areas.

For small business there have been announcements of changes for unfair contract terms legislation, which is very welcome indeed, as well as announcements around small business access to government contracts.

It does seem that the main small business policy activity will rest with other ministers, which means Collins’ role in cabinet is to do a ‘Bruce Billson’ and be a loud and persistent champion for the small business people, of whom there are some 2.3 million who between them employ more than 4.5 million other people.

Billson, the current federal small business Ombudsman, is the gold standard for how to be a small business minister: he was determined, unrelenting, patient, loud and successful when minister in the Abbot government. 

Still, there must be more mention of the small business community. We are hearing a lot about workers, again to be fully expected from a Labor government, but the lack of public acknowledgement of small business people and their needs is a bit concerning. There is an issue with low growth of wages yet there is never any mention of the impact on the employer of those workers, on the person or family that provides a job and income for others. 

Delivering on promises

Let’s acknowledge it is very early days in the time of this government, and they have certainly hit the road running. We see in foreign affairs the extraordinary Penny Wong showing her capacity and rare ability in international relations. We finally have climate action progressing and hopefully unstoppable. Then there is a renewed focus on indigenous issues, as controversial as that appears to be. The development of a federal corruption commission is way overdue and will provide some transparency around process or at least create fear of being caught out. Transparency is essential for the confidence of the small and family business people

However, many in the small business community will be closely watching where this government moves on the economy and on removing the cumbersome complexity that bedevils workplace relations. 

Before the election Labor promised to remove complexity for small business but so far it appears that an extra, quite complicated, process will be imposed through the domestic violence leave (DVL) provisions. DVL needs to be provided for people in that awful situation, but it should not be complicated for the victim or the businesses.

The leave should be managed through the experts in the community — the social workers and others — not by the employer. It should be funded by the government — the same as paid parental leave. DVL has been shown to be poorly used in the larger workplaces that already provide that leave provision. DV victims, it has been shown, are very reluctant to have their private lives become the business of their workplace.

The government can meet an election promise and not impose new complexity on employers — it can do both. Labor might just fail the first test by introducing this new complexity in workplace relations when it promised to remove complexity. Let’s hope wiser counsel prevails.

Industry Minister Ed Husic is showing his calibre and understanding of the issues he and his department faces. In question time in Parliament he has been one of the few ministers to acknowledge the work and sacrifices made by businesses, in this case in manufacturing, during the recent and ongoing crisis. The fact that the needs of industry is important enough to be mentioned is a good sign of Husic’s understanding of the needs of employers as well as workers. 

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has hit the road running and is popular as a result. But when he talks about workers and their pay needing to increase, he uses the example of ‘an extra $1 an hour’ being miniscule. He should also highlight, as an example, that a small business with a wages bill of, say, $500,000 will have to find an extra $25,000 each year to cover that pay rise. How will they do that?

It is Collins job to remind the Prime Minister, constantly, to never ever forget small business people. 

Will Albanese be a Beazley or a Gillard?