Wednesday, 30 September 2026

Topics:

E&OE……………………..

Michael McLaren: The Shadow Treasurer Tim Wilson is on the line. Good to speak again, Tim.

Tim Wilson: Good to speak to you too, Michael.

Michael McLaren: Now, we know the problem. So, we don't need to reiterate the problem. What the people listening now and those with mortgages where they're now paying probably, you know, six point something, maybe some of them paying seven percent now on their home loans and their business loans. What they want to know is, I mean, let's say Angus Taylor and Tim Wilson win the next election, what's going to be done differently to get this inflation under control?

Tim Wilson: Well, there's two parts. One is around how we need to address government spending, and we've already outlined a series of measures from housing bureaucracies that don't build houses to the net zero bureaucracy that doesn't reduce emissions or deliver cheaper electricity. We've already said that, you know, welfare shouldn't be provided for non-citizens into the future, which all these measures individually compound significant savings and offset what was seen as a massive expansion of government spending. I heard the Prime Minister say before that they've basically the equivalent of cut two dollars of spending, what he is ignoring is that they've spent an additional three dollars in the process. But the other thing we need to do is we've got to get the economy moving, Michael. What we have is too much money chasing too few goods, and we haven't got the investment in the future growth of the economy, whether it's cheap energy to back industry and back business, whether it's giving certainty to business, particularly around taxes. The last federal budget was a direct assault on the small businesses and the startups of the country. If we don't get growth, we're not going to get a change in the direction, and that's only going to come from a change in government.

Michael McLaren: It will, and you're only going to get a change in government though if there's a change in the perception of the Australian voter. At the end of the day, you guys have voted in, it is a democracy. I think Paul Kelly, the veteran journalist, nailed it today, where he said the irresistible collision is coming. He said the Australian public has repeatedly shown its preference for more government spending to boost services and benefits, but the consequences are increasingly apparent in the form of higher inflation, higher interest rates and weaker growth. How do you convince, I know you don't want to talk down to voters, but I mean some people just don't get it. So how do you convince the average Australian that really, if they keep voting for more spending, more programs, more welfare, I mean a lot of these things in and of themselves, I'm sure have great merit, but cumulatively, it's going to sink the ship. I mean, how do we turn that mindset around?

Tim Wilson: Well, I think the mindset is actually turning around. For a long time, the government could borrow from the future and spend today, and the bond markets didn't move, and now they're starting to send tremors and that means now debt servicing is the highest part of the federal budget, the fast-growing part of the federal budget, and the same is true with a lot of these programs. It seemed like the government could spend forever and it wasn't going to be inflationary. People are now living the consequences of it, and we're just being very frank with people. There's a consequence to the Albanese economic model. The consequence is higher inflation, higher interest rates, and you go to the supermarket, and you might buy the same thing, but you're paying more and you're getting less.

Michael McLaren: Tell me about it.

Tim Wilson: Well, exactly. I mean, you know, there are plenty of people yesterday after the interest rate rise who'll be sitting around the kitchen table and saying how do I cut more out of a budget, household budget, that has nothing left to give, and, you know, people are looking at baked beans on toast as meals and, you know, really big changes. They're living the consequences, and it needs to be made clear, obviously, to the public that there's a consequence, but we need to outline what the pathway forward is. We've started that process, but we’ve got to keep going because Australians need hope that there is going to be a change at the end of this process.

Michael McLaren: I made the comment earlier, Tim, and I'm sure you would agree, that in the Parliament, perhaps the best economically credentialed individual is actually your boss, Angus Taylor. I mean, when you think about Rhodes Scholarships, Sydney University Economics Medals, medals from Oxford, the bloke does know what he's talking about. But whether people are listening when he talks anymore is the concern. I remember when Julia Gillard was actually in The Lodge, but after the whole no carbon tax thing, the average person just switched off. I mean Julia Gillard could have announced tomorrow's lotto numbers, no one would have heard them because no one was listening anymore. Do you get a sense, I mean you look at the One Nation polling, I'm not going to go into all of that stuff again, but you sort of get the sense that irrespective of how robust the economic message, how sensible it may be from yourself and Angus, it's falling on many, many pairs of deaf ears. Do you sort of get that feeling yourself?

Tim Wilson: No, I don't think so. People know something's not right with the country. They know we're heading in the wrong direction. That is resolutely clear. There's two parts to a message we need to deliver. One is obviously to critique and outline and define the problem of what our opponents are doing, and I don't think people want blame-shifting or buck-passing. Then we've got to actually drive forward a very clear message about where we need to go and what it is we're trying to build. We've started that process. I'm not the first to say it, we've got a way to go on that, but the more people can have a sense of hope about the future and that we drive a debate which is about empowering Australians and backing particularly small business and households, the more I think we'll see a shift and a change in sentiment. Because, you know, One Nation is offering nostalgia, they're not offering a pathway of hope for the future, and that's where we've got to be because we've got to be the agent of change so Australians can live better, more prosperous, and secure lives, because the world is moving, it's changing fast, not all of it's great, we all acknowledge that. So, they need confidence in a government that's on their back, behind them, backing them every step of the way.

Michael McLaren: You're saying the voters will come home to daddy eventually, it’s just they’re dancing with Pauline for now, but come next election they'll see the light as it were. Is that what you're suggesting?

Tim Wilson: No, no, that's not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying we need to earn people's trust that we have a pathway forward that is going to build a better future for them. I don't think we're at the end of that process. I do think it's a journey. You know, people are jacked off, and I understand why, that we lost the last election when we've got such a terrible government. The brutal truth is I agree with them. I think we let the country down, we're paying a price for it, but we're the only pathway to then go on and defeat the Albanese government. But we've got to earn that trust if we want to make sure that we go on and win the next election.

Michael McLaren: Yeah, fair enough. Okay, industrial relations, it's sort of a naughty thing these days, no one wants to go there, we remember Work Choices, okay, Liberals aren't too keen. But I want to get your sense of the impact on everything we're seeing now with cost and inflation of the influence of the union movement. Because, I mean, I've been almost a lone voice here anyway, constantly trying to remind people and all the business lobbyists that come on and chat about all sorts of things, that they've danced with the Labor Party and the ACTU, and they might have their name on the dance card somewhere, but they're not being taken home at the end of the night by them. I mean they have been, they've been done something terrible. Now, IR changes have been thick and fast. As I said, the Liberals aren't too keen to go hard on it, I know why, but my goodness, that is showing up, is it not, in some of these metrics and these numbers?

Tim Wilson: Resolutely, it is. I mean we've got small businesses who are screaming they can't afford to keep their doors open. A lot of small businesses in this country, like in hospitality, one to two percent margins, nothing. And every time the government, whether it's multi-employer bargaining or additional obligations they're putting on employers, it's making it harder for them just to keep the doors open, and I think we need to have a conversation about industrial relations, particularly in backing in small business. But the unions always want to have this as an employer versus employee fight. That is not the focus we should be having. We should be focused on how we're going to empower young Australians to back themselves, to go up and set up their own small businesses, and make it easier to employ people through simplicity and harmony in the workplace. The problem we've got at the moment is Labor just wants conflict because they want to reward their union mates. The problem is it's eating into the very foundations of our economy, and that's, you know, one of the myriad of reasons that they can boast how many times people have got wages, inflation is overtaking them, and so people are actually going backwards while the government is boasting and saying people are going forwards.

Michael McLaren: So just finally, this is I think why Paul Kelly wrote today in The Australian, and I quote again, he says much of the public, however, doesn't get it. And you know, you see the unionised workforce around their leaders and the Fair Work Commission giving these pay rises and the government ministers are all over it like a rash. Isn't it wonderful, we're paying with taxpayer's dollars to prop up the wages of privately employed daycare workers and all this sort of stuff going on. And there's this idea that people are getting wealthier or somehow the government's helping their cost of living or what. But I mean, you know, Angus knows, I know, a lot of people know, all of this money pouring in is driving inflation. It's only making the problem for everybody, actually including those people worse in the long run. But I'm not sure that the average person, well not the average, but enough people can put it together. I mean as Kelly says, too many politicians are frightened to speak the truth in an age where populism is rampant. I think that's right.

Tim Wilson: Well, I don't think politicians are afraid to speak the truth. I don't think I've been dancing around any of these topics today. I think what we need is clarity of a way forward because there's a problem that we're living and, and you're right, all of this is stoking inflation and making the problem worse for Australian households, but particularly for the small business owners or the self-starters of the country, they're just being brought to their knees by, you know, drowning in regulation and the costs of doing business, and I don't want a corporatist Australia. Labor wants a nation where people, you know, big business, big government, big unions, and the big industry union super funds get in the room, agree on the terms and conditions and impose everything on the public, and they want conformity. What we should want is a completely different vision for our country, anchored in giving people power, control over their lives, and building a sustainable economy from the ground up. That's the only way we're going to address the problems of inflation, of productivity, of economic growth, and frankly, it's a type of country we should want to be.

Michael McLaren: Yeah, a dynamic country is where we're going to have to go. Thank you for your time. We'll stay in touch. Thanks Tim, appreciate it.

[ENDS]