The Liberal Party has clearly listened to the concerns and challenges of the business and employer community in South Australia. Now they have four years to turn our state around, stimulate the economy, increase jobs and give working families and small businesses a chance to grow.
Along with most of the pundits, we didn’t pick the Liberal Party to win with such a majority. However, we are pleased they have formed government in their own right. That is important as we have strongly advocated for a government which can provide the kind of certainty and continuity of policy-making that is essential for building confidence in the business and employer community, and across the entire state.
We have already recognised the new Liberal Government’s support for key policy platforms such as payroll tax reform, shop trading hours deregulation and the need for significantly greater efficiencies in the public sector. For small and medium-sized businesses in South Australia to grow and thrive, they badly need these and other reforms to key policies.
Steven Marshall has said he will deregulate shop trading hours within 100 days. For us, that doesn’t mean forcing retailers to open around the clock, it means giving them choice to open when it suits, whether that means staying open longer on weekends or opening on public holidays.
In his “new dawn”, we hope the new Premier will review the public sector and trim some of the fat which has seen our state’s figures blow out to 16 per cent of all employees compared to the mainland average of 12.7 per cent.
The new Liberal Government has also promised to cut payroll tax for businesses with a payroll of up to $1.5 million, which will benefit thousands of employers, their families and their staff.
We will work with the new government to help boost South Australia’s economy, create further employment, increase exports and attract more investment to this state.
As the voice of business in South Australia, we will continue to advocate without fear or favour to all political parties, in our efforts to ensure we build an environment in which all business and employers of any size can thrive and create the positive future which all South Australians deserve. It’s well and truly time to fire up this economy.
We look forward to true bipartisanship in the common cause of growing South Australia’s economic future, where the Liberal Government can work constructively with the Labor Opposition and the elected Independents. We particularly urge members of the Legislative Council to take a common sense approach in working with the new government, recognising its mandate for economic reform. We would be disappointed, as would the South Australian community, if we saw obstruction for the sake of petty politics.
We urge the new cabinet to continue to review our 2018 Charter for a More Prosperous South Australia as they settle in to government. We hope this well-researched blueprint for our economic future will be referred to regularly by our new leaders.
This article was originally published in the South Australian Business Journal on Tuesday 20 March.
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