MELINDA CILENTO, CEDA: You took us through your productivity agenda, It's obviously the word on everyone's lips at the moment. Two pronged question, if I could. In the room we've got plenty of people who have come across from WA, from the Western Australian government, some great Victorian department representation here. I'm interested in how much of this agenda is going to be dependent on working with the states and how you're going to prosecute that, if I could put it this way. And the second part goes in a different direction which is, a lot of businesses now raising concerns about the impact of some of the workplace relations changes on productivity and how you're responding to that?
ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Two quick questions, okay, just sort of what are you doing in workplaces, and the balance between employers and workers, and what are we doing on the productivity, the general economy and federation reform? Okay, what’s the time?
CILENTO: You've got a couple of minutes.
PRIME MINISTER: A couple of minutes. Firstly, on working with the states, we need to do that. And the way that the National Cabinet is working, which is essentially a gathering that unlike a cabinet of a government, has to operate by consensus. It’s bringing states and territories with us on that agenda of reform. Now different states, you mentioned WA and Victoria, they're very different economies but they all have an interest in cooperative reform going forward. And I've been very pleased with the work across the board from Premiers and Chief Ministers, including former Premier Dominic Perrottet and the Tasmanian Premier Jeremy Rockliff, in us being able to work together. One of the things that I think the National Cabinet can do is, part of the problem we have in this country is the gap that's there between the rhetoric, if you like, of some of the media. But consistent with CEDA’s position of we need productivity reform, we need change, we need to drive that dynamic through. And anytime it suggested, any reform you get shock, horror, these are the impacts, don't do anything, you get that contradiction there. So, reform is hard, we know that that's the case. I think the National Cabinet can provide a ballast, if you like, for state and territory governments working with the Commonwealth to drive that common agenda through and to get things done that would be more difficult if it was just a single unit of government. So, it can work together against the pushback that occurs in any reform. On the IR changes, I’m somewhat bemused by some of the campaign against things that no one's suggesting, no one's supporting and aren't going to happen. We are negotiating in good faith and consulting with business, with unions about a level of reform to make sure that some of the abuse that has occurred, that has driven down wages in the economy is not permissible. We know we have an increasingly casualised workforce and that can be a very good thing for business and for people who are engaged in that, but where someone gets a roster for twelve months in advance saying exactly when they'll be working, they're not a casual employee. And if it's used to pay them less than the person who they're working next to, who they have the same experience and skills as, then that's a problem that needs to be addressed. And we don't apologise for attempting to address that. And they're the issues that we're trying to address. Not to say that two people who have different skills, different experience, or all have to be paid the same, no one's arguing that at all. No one's arguing that you don't need a flexible workforce, no one's arguing that there's not a role for labour hire or for casual employees. What they're arguing, what the argument is over is where there is a manipulation in order to produce an outcome, then that is not a positive thing. Because what that does is lead to competitive pressures as well where employers that are doing the right thing by their workforce are competing against companies that aren't and therefore are at a competitive disadvantage and that's where you get a spiral down. And the fact that real wages have not grown at all, and indeed low wage growth was a priority, was part of the economic architecture of the former government, it's not a part of that for us. So, we are looking at practical ways in which that can be changed and we're consulting about that and it's possible to get these changes. And the real impacts of it, just to go back a little bit, the issues of the gig economy and abuses whereby if someone is paid, essentially, 10 minutes of pay to take a food delivery to someone that's half an hour away, then what we know is not only is that a bad economic outcome, we know that people have lost their lives because they're rushing around on bikes in the middle of traffic, desperate to try and feed their family and their kids, and that has a real world consequence, and you can change it. Menulog have a deal with the union that is producing better outcomes - and these things have to occur. If we don't do it, if you look at the consequences of the growth of inequality in places like the United States for the cohesiveness of society. We all have an interest in a society that doesn't see increasingly a gap between people, with due respect, like us, who are very comfortable, and most of the people in this room I suspect are pretty comfortable, and people who just feel like they don't have a stake in society. So, we make no apologies for having a debate about this. A debate about this is in the interests of the sort of society that we want, which summarised best from my view is an economy has to work for people, not people working for the economy. It's an important distinction, one that I make, one that my government makes as well, and that's our objective here. To produce reforms that are pro-business and pro worker. I think with a bit of goodwill, it is certainly possible to do just that.