Page 970 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 21 March 2012
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Family Business Australia used KPMG in 2011 to do a report called Stewards: moving forward, moving onward. There are a number of areas in the report that discuss the special needs of family business. Part (2)(c) calls on the government to ensure that services to business include appropriate advice and assistance to family business where appropriate.
Part (3), in particular, addresses the need for further knowledge. Family business is a big chunk of the Australian business scene, yet we still do not know enough about it. So part (3) calls on the Minister for Economic Development to write to his federal counterparts, primarily being the ministers responsible for small business and any associated policy areas, which would include the Assistant Treasurer, who is responsible for the Bureau of Statistics, and ask that the Bureau of Statistics collect appropriate data about family businesses in Australia so that we as governments can be better informed about family business, their impacts and their needs.
Family Business Australia itself and the family businesses of Australia will also then have a fuller picture of what it is they do in the economy and what the issues are that affect family businesses. It is only with strong, longitudinal data of good quality that we can actually get the policy settings right and do what Family Business Australia is asking—that is, get out of their way and let them get on with business.
MR BARR (Molonglo—Deputy Chief Minister, Treasurer, Minister for Economic Development and Minister for Tourism, Sport and Recreation) (10.16): I thank Mr Smyth for raising this matter today. I have circulated a fairly minor amendment that notes the ACT government’s support for a range of programs and acknowledges, in fact, that I have already taken the opportunity to write to the new federal small business minister on some of the matters that are raised in Mr Smyth’s motion.
From the outset can I say that the government recognises the importance of business to the ACT economy and, indeed, within that, the many family-owned and operated businesses. According to the ABS, there were 25,632 businesses operating in the territory at the end of the 2010-11 fiscal year. Since the new business count data series was introduced by the ABS in 2003-04 our business population has grown on average by one per cent per annum.
Pleasingly though, in the two most recent post-GFC years, the ACT business population has grown by 5.4 per cent. About two-thirds of these businesses make their home their base—the self-employed electrician, the plumber, the IT consultant, right through to the emerging internet-based businesses.
Of course, there are many family-based businesses in the territory that operate on a much larger scale. There are many reasons for people choosing to operate a family-owned business. With restructuring in public and private organisations and the increasing trend for organisations to outsource some of their operations, there are more and more opportunities for people to build a business around unique skill sets.
There are others who opt to run a family-owned business because it gives them the opportunity to be their own boss as well as providing a shared sense of
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