Australia’s economic focus will shift to improving productivity from reducing inflation over the next three years, Treasurer Jim Chalmers said on Sunday.
Speaking in the wake of the ruling Australian Labor Party’s comprehensive election victory on Saturday, Chalmers said the government’s immediate focus would be the impact of global economic uncertainty.
He said Labor had a “big agenda” for its second term, including building more homes to ease a housing shortage crisis, managing the transformation to renewable energy and embracing technology, particularly artificial intelligence.
“And so we've got a big agenda there, and I'm really looking forward to rolling it out,” Chalmers said on the Insiders television program on the Australian Broadcasting Commission.
Although the trade war between the United States and China “cast a dark shadow over the global economy” Australia was well positioned and the direct impact of tariffs was manageable and relatively modest.
“And the best way to think about the difference between our first term and the second term that we won last night, the first term was primarily inflation without forgetting productivity, the second term will be primarily productivity without forgetting inflation,” Chalmers said.
“So the priority does shift now to productivity, and a much broader sense of it, human capital, competition policy, technology, energy, the care economy, these are where we're going to find the productivity gains, and not quickly, but over the medium term.”
On the same day Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said: “We will be a disciplined and orderly governmnent in our second term, just like we were in our first.”
Chalmers said the Labor Government was looking forward to rolling out changes to occupational licensing and non-compete clauses, and reviving national competition policy.
Chalmer said financial markets expected more cuts in official cash interest rates this year but “I'm not going to count my chickens on that front”.
“And so if we do see more interest rate cuts over the course of the rest of the year, I think that will be a very helpful way to boost confidence in the economy, particularly consumer sentiment, and also provide some cost of living relief for people,” Chalmers said.
He also declined to comment on his leadership ambitions, instead paying tribute to Albanese in leading Labor to victory for a second time.
