Thursday 24 July 2025

Transcript - Interview with Sally Sara, ABC RN Breakfast

Topics: US beef, penalty rates, super tax, net zero. 

E&OE.........................................................

 

SALLY SARA:

Before we get to IR breaking news this morning that Australia will lift restrictions on beef imports from the United States to Australia. What's the Coalition's view on this development?

TIM WILSON:

Obviously, this is a question for the Shadow Minister responsible, but we're obviously cautious about lifting any biosecurity measures. Biosecurity shouldn't be compromised and I really hope the Government knows what it's doing. We know that the United States is obviously doing a number of things on the trade front right now. It's not always in Australia's national interest or the decisions the United States is making. We need to be making decisions in Australia's national interest and backing our exporters. And so we need to make sure that the biosecurity framework is strong, robust and in Australia's national interest.

SALLY SARA:

Well let's return to your shadow portfolio we've heard the argument for penalty rate protection from the Employment Minister Amanda Rishworth. What's the Coalition's view?

TIM WILSON:

We've only seen the legislation as of last night and we're going to go through our processes. But one of the most disturbing and distressing things was when we put to the Minister, what's the impact going to be on small business? And she couldn't tell us how many small businesses would be impacted. We asked simple questions like, will it have a regulatory impact statement? The short answer is no. They want to rush it through the Senate and not have full consultation with small businesses around this country. When the government can't tell us what impact this legislation is going to have on small businesses in Australia, there's a wake-up call Minister. Ignorances in policy. Penalty rates won't be paid on jobs that don't exist.

SALLY SARA:

At the heart of this issue is whether overtime and penalty rates should be allowed to be bargained away for other things. Why do you think it's fair game?

TIM WILSON:

Well, the Government is doing its legislative victory lap after the election. The key thing that we're focused on is making sure that Australians have jobs and economic opportunity, and that's by making sure that small businesses can employ Australians, and we have arrangements where we have improvements of standard of living. Standard of living is about dollars and cents, but it's also about making sure Australians can afford the petrol that they need to go and pick up their kids from school, with the workplace flexibility that works for them. And so making sure that businesses can back workers and workers can back themselves, is an important part of this framework, and that isn't what the government is interested in. Instead it's trying to ram its agenda through to pay off its political patrons.

SALLY SARA:

Is the Coalition open to discussing a four-day working week, particularly with the lead-up to the Productivity Roundtable?

TIM WILSON:

Well, the government's the one who's going to have the discussion. We don't know any of the principles that the government is outlining for its productivity tax and everything else summit right now. This is a proposal that's been thrown out there by the Prime Minister. First, it was a productivity summit. Then it became a tax summit. The Treasurer said then it's going be about the GST. Then the Prime Minster slapped down the Treasurer and said the GST's off the table. We have no idea really where this summit is going. And now they've got their unions and their political patrons now saying that they're gonna make about tenfold other issues. I just think the government should lay out some principles, make it clear what this actual summit is going to be about. Because at the moment we've got record small businesses falling, we've got unemployment rising. Australians need hope and they need hope for a better future because that's the basis they're going to go on and do things like, save for a home, be able to secure their retirement and have better opportunity for the future.

SALLY SARA:

We had our first question time yesterday for the new Parliament. You asked the Treasurer, Jim Chalmers, about the government's proposed changes to tax on super accounts with balances more than three million dollars. The Treasurer insisted that this is only projected to impact half a percent of the workforce. Given the government has already been advised that the budget can't be fixed without raising taxes, why shouldn't the government look at super changes or would you prefer higher taxes, for more Australians?

TIM WILSON:

But this is exactly the challenge with this government right now. They've thrown out this productivity tax and everything else summit. And they're now floating taxes that Australians didn't vote for, at the last election...

SALLY SARA:

But this superannuation change has been put forward for some time, hasn't it?

TIM WILSON:

Well, it was put in previous budgets, wasn't able to pass the Senate, and what we know now is that when Australians went to the ballot box, researchers established people went to the ballot boxes not knowing this tax proposal was on the table. And we now have them flooding new taxes. The government is trying to sneak things through the Parliament. The Prime Minister has gone off to Beijing, he's come back after six days and thinks he can treat the Parliament of Australia like it's a National People's Congress and just ran things through. The reality is things need to be consulted with, processes need to followed, and we've got in the newspapers, even today, Labor MPs say we're not sure about this proposal, we're not sure of the principles that sit behind it. And justifiably so, because it's not just about how the system works, it's about the tax administration, it's where it's going to go next.

SALLY SARA:

Just finally, how do you reflect on the latest push from the nationals, from Michael McCormack and Barnaby Joyce to scrap Australia's net zero target? Is it helpful?

TIM WILSON:

Well, as I've said consistently, the social license of net zero is dependent on having net zero price increases and net zero outages. But the reality is we're seeing rises in electricity prices. We're seeing rises in emissions as well. And of course, we're not seeing the problems of reliability, which is the promise the government sold since they legislated net zero. We need a policy framework which is going to increase the volume of supply of energy to make sure that electricity prices go down. So we've got reliable power and so we've got the social license to reduce emissions as well.

SALLY SARA: 

So you support this intervention by Barnaby Joyce and support from Michael McCormack?

TIM WILSON:

Well, I look at the full spectrum. During the last term of Parliament, under the Labor government, they legislated net zero, then opened new coal mines. They extended the life of gas projects. We had the Independent member for Kooyong go and vote for $2 billion of new coal gas subsidies. We have the Independent for Curtin go and vote for $2 billion on new coal subsidies. We have the Independent member for Wentworth go and vote for new coal subsidies. So, people are saying one thing and doing another. They're having an honest conversation about a policy difference and the realities of the policy framework.

SALLY SARA:

Are you confident the Coalition will hold for the time being?

TIM WILSON:

I'm absolutely confident the Coalition will hold for the term because this government is already overreaching on the license they've been given from the Australian public. They're introducing or proposing taxes that the Australian people didn't vote for and they're abusing the trust that they would give it.

SALLY SARA:

We need to leave it there. Tim Wilson, thank you. Tim Wilson is the Member for Goldstein in Victoria.

ENDS