Thursday, 22 June 2023

Small business support

Renee HEATH (Eastern Victoria) (17:54): (322) My adjournment is for the Minister for Small Business, and the action that I seek is assurance that small and medium businesses will be supported and protected from rising energy costs. Energy prices are set to rise by 25 per cent when businesses are already struggling to keep the lights on.

Last week I visited a local farm in Gippsland that employs 50 people. The business owner spoke to me about his stresses and about there being no long-term support to keep power prices low. He fears that with his business they may have to resort to downsizing, changing staffing arrangements or worse. Victorians continue to learn of industries and businesses shutting down because of the overreach of this government. It goes without saying, but a good example of this is changes to the native timber industry, which are just trashing communities in my area and killing off many, many jobs. The Herald Sun today reported that one of Australia’s oldest chocolate brands has fallen into administration. This week Ford announced that it is cutting hundreds of local jobs in Victoria. Main streets are full of empty stores that used to be home to vibrant businesses that have now had to close their doors, some due to COVID, from which they never recovered.

We are losing so much manufacturing and so many jobs because of the red tape from this Labor government. We have already had 50 new or increased taxes since the Labor Party came into power: payroll taxes, land taxes, higher WorkCover premiums – the list goes on. Every time things get too hard for businesses and industries to operate in this state, people simply move and take their profits to other states or other countries. Therefore I ask that the minister commits to supporting small and medium businesses so they can survive the upcoming energy price hikes.