AUSTRALIAN STATES ARE HARMONISING
It is quite a rare event when Australian states are in harmony!
This does not mean a reduction in the traditional rivalry and strong competition between the states – these will always be evident!
This is about the states harmonising in legislative and regulative areas to avoid unnecessary cost burdens to those businesses and industries that operate in different states and territories of Australia and to those that are located on state borders.
The Business Council of Australia estimates that there are 32,000 businesses presently operating across state borders and they are constantly confronted with different rules for each state and territory which are sometimes duplicated by national legislation.
Most agree that present business regulation in Australia remains an outdated, state-based system with differing legislation and rules that is cumbersome, difficult and costly to interpret and implement.
It is a lot like the states choosing different rail gauges across Australia when they set up their separate railway systems in the 1800’s and the resulting gross inconvenience and extra operating costs that this caused everyone using them later.
True harmonisation between states is a great opportunity to produce a national system that incorporates the “best of the best” from all states and territories rather than have the present cumbersome model of individual regulations with each state and territory claiming to have the best system.
The Business Council launched its ambitious plan last year to attack the growing tangle of business “red tape” and to put, in its place, a single system of business regulation by 2010. It claims that the present individual systems are difficult to keep track of and estimates that the cost burden to Australian businesses from this is as high as $16 billion annually!
The push is for all state and territory laws in Australia to be the same and not to have eight different sets of rules and interpretations which add huge costs and confusion for Australian business.
A prime example is the area of occupational health and safety. Many businesses ask why does Australia have different rules and regulations for OH&S in each state and territory for an area as universal and important as this?
Having different codes and regulations causes nightmares for operators that work in different states and adds considerably to their operating costs!
Now the states are getting closer to adopting universal OH& S laws Australia-wide by their target date of 2011 but there is still huge argument between the unions and the regulators about duty of care and who should carry the burden of proof and the Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, is closely monitoring this.
Progress has also been made in the area of payroll tax. Victoria and New South Wales harmonised their legislation in mid-2007 and Tasmania followed suit in mid-2008. While each state continues to have different payroll rates and deduction thresholds, their rulings are consistent.
These are a welcome start to the full state harmonisation program, but a lot more still needs to be done. The federal Minister for Finance and Deregulation, Lindsay Tanner, said recently that the OECD has found Australia to be the worst performer when it comes to regulatory harmonisation.
The Chamber has been asking governments to adopt universal sets of rules controlling business operations, where possible, to minimise cost and confusion and it looks forward to more moves towards achieving harmony among them.