Jim Chalmers’ three-day roundtable builds consensus on road user charge, clearing housing approvals backlog

Progressing road user charging and clearing a backlog on homes awaiting environmental approvals are among the 10 immediate reform directions to result from a three-day roundtable aimed to boost Australia’s ailing productivity levels. Speaking after talks ended on Thursday, Jim Chalmers said there was “a lot of conceptual support for road user charging”, however no final model had been settled. The next steps will involve presenting an options paper to state treasurers at a meeting in two weeks on September 5, which would be drafted by NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookhey, Infrastructure Minister Catherine King and other relevant ministers. “The model is not determined, but the key considerations are what’s in and out and whether that’s sequenced or not and over how long a time period,” he said. “Treasurer Mookhey was very informed and very constructive on this question and really right around the table people had a view that this is an idea whose time has come and so we will do that work.” The charge, which would likely capture EV drivers currently exempt from the fuel excise, would reform how the government collects revenue to fund road maintenance and infrastructure upgrades. Other short-term reform initiatives involve fast-tracking deadlocked reforms on the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act to speed up approvals for projects while protecting the environment, and further work to remove nuisance tariffs and regulation reductions. Speeding up housing approvals was another “quick win” which achieved consensus following 29 hours of discussions, with Environmental Minister Murray Watt set to work with Housing Minister Clare O’Neil to speed through the “backlog of environmental approvals for new homes, most likely in the tens of thousands”. Longer-term reform areas included investigating prefabricated and modular housing, plus more modern methods of construction to increasing housing supply. Mr Chalmers also highlighted three priority areas of tax reform, which dominated the last day of talks, and appeared to achieve little consensus beyond agreement on the need for reform. This included improving intergenerational equality, “affordable, responsible” offsets to “incentivise business investment”, and a simpler and more sustainable system to fund services such as aged care and the NDIS. “There are hundreds of different changes you can make to the tax system. Some of them obviously unpalatable to our government or to governments broadly,” he said. “But what they wanted to do was to give us the guidance that they will help us in those three areas to do the work that we need to do to inform future budgets.” Speaking more broadly about the roundtable, which had been criticised as a “talkfest” and a “stitch up” by the opposition, Mr Chalmers said he “finished the three days more optimistic than I was at the start”. He also praised participants for working through the issues in a “methodical, considered, consultative way”. “I’m genuine when I say at the end of that three days I looked around the table and I saw people of, you know, big achievers in their own areas representing workers, business CEOs, academics, economists, public servants and others,” he said. “I drew great strength and confidence from their contributions because not because they had some kind of faux camaraderie, but because they take the challenge so seriously.”