Treasurer announces slashing of ‘nuisance’ tariffs on shoes, toasters and tampons
Josh Butler
Jim Chalmers has announced the slashing of some 500 “nuisance tariffs” worth nearly $30m on a range of goods including washing machines, shoes and fridges, as the government cleans up old regulations.
It includes the slashing of $3m in tariffs on menstrual sanitary products.
The treasurer says Australian businesses aren’t protected by these tariffs, which apply to a range of goods which are now imported duty-free thanks to various trade agreements, but local businesses still have to go through various regulatory processes and paperwork anyway.
Such compliance takes time and costs money. The government claims that slashing the tariffs – which they’re calling the biggest tariff reform in 20 years – will cut costs for businesses and consumers, as well as boosting productivity.
Although the costs of the tariffs bring in relatively little money, so the benefits to consumers may be relatively small. Examples given include cutting tariffs on toothbrushes ($22,000 in revenue annually), fridge-freezers ($28,000), X-ray film ($200) and toasters ($1,000).
At the upper end, the government is cutting $3m in tariffs on menstrual products, $140,000 on fishing reels, $95,000 on pens and $140,000 on washing machines.
“The tariffs identified have been selected because their abolition will deliver benefits for businesses without adversely impacting Australian industries or constraining Australia in sensitive FTA negotiations,” a release from Chalmers’ office said.
Chalmers acknowledged the small tariffs on some goods, but said the changes would give “small amount of extra help with the cost-of-living challenge by making everyday items such as toothbrushes, tools, fridges, dishwashers and clothing just a little bit cheaper”.
Key events
Search continues for missing 12-year-old boy in Sydney
AAP is reporting that dozens of emergency service crews have spent the night searching for a young boy who went missing in western Sydney.
Hussein Al Mansoory, 12, was last seen running from Auburn Memorial Park towards the intersection of Station Road and Rawson Street, Auburn, about 10.30am on Saturday.
There are serious concerns for Hussein’s welfare as he lives with Down syndrome and autism and is non-verbal.
State Emergency Service crews and police, including PolAir and the riot squad, have been searching for him and are particularly focusing on construction sites.
They believe Hussein could have taken shelter in a construction site in the area to escape the hot weather Sydney faced over the weekend.
Locals in the Auburn area have been asked to check sheds, garages, back yards and properties for any signs of Hussein, who was last seen wearing a white T-shirt.
He is described as being of Middle Eastern appearance, of slim build, about 140cm tall and with short black hair.
Josh Butler
Australia expected to resume funding to UNRWA
The federal government is working with allies on “ensuring aid flows to Gazans in desperate need”, with expectations Australia might soon resume funding to the UNRWA.
Australia and other donors to the United Nations Refugee Works Agency, the UN body providing aid in Gaza, paused funding after Israel alleged some staff had been involved in the 7 October Hamas terrorist attack. The foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, has said Australia wants to resume funding once it receives guarantees around stronger processes for UNRWA spending such contributions, and with Sweden and Canada announcing plans to restart their funding, the federal government is facing calls to follow suit.
On Sunday, a spokesperson for Wong said: “The Australian government has been working with a group of donor countries, who also paused funding, on the shared objective of rebuilding confidence and ensuring aid flows to Gazans in desperate need.”
UNRWA’s commissioner general, Philippe Lazzarini, told the UN’s general assembly last week the agency was at “breaking point” from a “financial crisis”, noting medical staff in Gaza were forced to amputate limbs without anaesthetic and babies were dying of malnutrition.
Australia’s representative to the UN last week called on Israel to cooperate fully with investigations into their claims about UNRWA staff, and “provide all available evidence so that these serious allegations can be properly assessed and appropriate safeguards put in place”.
Bowen promises vehicle efficiency standards plan will provide savings
Federal energy minister Chris Bowen is insisting this morning that the government’s vehicle efficiency standards will provide “some pretty good savings”.
Speaking on the Today Show earlier, Bowen said the plan would get more options for buyers, adding that some drivers could save as much as $1,800 a year in fuel costs under the plan:
This is about really getting better quality cars into Australia that use less fuel, and the more you drive the more you’d save.
So some pretty good savings to be had if people choose to take the more efficient model, and we want to give them more choices.
These are options that would be available right from January 2025. Obviously, that’s when the policy would start, but we’d ramp it up over time, because we do need to give car companies some time to respond.
We will take on board good faith suggestions that help us implement it, not people who are trying to get around it or slow it down or water it down, but good faith suggestions from people who know the industry to say, listen, you’ve got a good idea here, but here’s how we think it could be done better. Sensible ideas will be sensibly listened to.
Elias Visontay
Sydney drivers will spend $123bn on toll roads over next 37 years
Sydney drivers will spend $123bn on tolls over next 37 years, a review into the city’s patchwork toll road network has found, as the Minns government lays the groundwork for an overhaul of how drivers are charged.
On Monday, the review’s interim report was released, finding that by 2060, drivers will spend $123bn on toll roads measured in 2023 dollars, and in nominal dollars, the figure will be $195bn in nominal terms.
Driving the mammoth spend on tolls is the privately owned Westconnex project, the final stage of which included the Rozelle interchange which caused traffic chaos when it opened late last year. Of the $123bn toll spend by 2060, 52% of this amount will be spent on Westconnex. Over the next 37 years, Sydneysiders will have paid for the construction cost of the entire Westconnex project three times over.
The interim report “lays bare the reality of privatisation, all at the expense of the people of Sydney”, the New South Wales premier, Chris Minns, said. Minns, in an indication the government plans to overhaul how tolls are charged, said:
Sydney is the most tolled city in the world. And now we know trying to fix it requires a significant reset of the tolling network … We were elected with a mandate to undertake work on toll reform, to make tolls simpler and fairer.
Analysis in the review also found that while toll roads were meant to alleviate pressure on existing free-to-access arterial roads, many drivers avoid the paid roads. “Rather than use the toll roads, motorists are continuing to utilise the more congested untolled roads,” the report said.
The review also conducted a review of 1,500 drivers across Sydney which found that 87% felt tolls were too high and 70% felt toll prices were unfair. Earlier on in the review process, the report’s chief author, former competition watchdog chair Allan Fels, flagged splitting the toll network into geographic zones to spread the burden more fairly from the west of Sydney to the east.
Doxxing ban consultation starts
Josh Butler
The federal government is seeking feedback from the public on its plans to outlaw “doxxing”, spurred after the sharing of details of a large group chat of Jewish Australians.
Attorney general Mark Dreyfus called for public submissions on the proposed new laws, saying “the targeted and malicious release of personal information without permission is unacceptable and cannot be tolerated”.
The doxxing legislation will come separately to other planned reforms to the Privacy Act and laws against hate speech.
“The increasing use of online platforms to harm people through practices like doxxing, the malicious release of their personal information without their permission, is a deeply disturbing development,” Dreyfus said.
“Australians should have trust and confidence that their personal information is kept safe and secure in the digital age.”
The government swiftly promised doxxing laws after the publication online of the log of a group chat of over 600 Jewish writers and artists. Some parts of the WhatsApp chat had reportedly included discussions about coordinating complaints against public figures over their comments about Israel’s actions in the Gaza war.
Dreyfus said the government’s process around the proposed doxxing laws would include roundtable discussion with key stakeholders, individuals with lived experience of doxxing, and media organisations to discuss “how to appropriately balance competing rights”.
The consultation period is open until 28 March on the Attorney-General’s Department website.
Jacqui Lambie says slashing of tariffs won’t do enough to support businesses
Sticking with tariffs for the moment, independent senator Jacqui Lambie says the government’s plan isn’t enough.
Appearing on the Today Show, Lambie said the plan wasn’t going to do enough to support businesses through the cost-of-living crisis.
If this is their way of slashing red tape for businesses out there, it’s not even going to be close enough.
So I don’t I don’t believe … you’re going to get much less off for tyres or anything else. And you can see they’re actually not sucking in a lot of savings from all of this.
They [the government] want to get bigger and better than this … Those small businesses and businesses out there are on the back foot right now, and they need some help.
Treasurer announces slashing of ‘nuisance’ tariffs on shoes, toasters and tampons
Josh Butler
Jim Chalmers has announced the slashing of some 500 “nuisance tariffs” worth nearly $30m on a range of goods including washing machines, shoes and fridges, as the government cleans up old regulations.
It includes the slashing of $3m in tariffs on menstrual sanitary products.
The treasurer says Australian businesses aren’t protected by these tariffs, which apply to a range of goods which are now imported duty-free thanks to various trade agreements, but local businesses still have to go through various regulatory processes and paperwork anyway.
Such compliance takes time and costs money. The government claims that slashing the tariffs – which they’re calling the biggest tariff reform in 20 years – will cut costs for businesses and consumers, as well as boosting productivity.
Although the costs of the tariffs bring in relatively little money, so the benefits to consumers may be relatively small. Examples given include cutting tariffs on toothbrushes ($22,000 in revenue annually), fridge-freezers ($28,000), X-ray film ($200) and toasters ($1,000).
At the upper end, the government is cutting $3m in tariffs on menstrual products, $140,000 on fishing reels, $95,000 on pens and $140,000 on washing machines.
“The tariffs identified have been selected because their abolition will deliver benefits for businesses without adversely impacting Australian industries or constraining Australia in sensitive FTA negotiations,” a release from Chalmers’ office said.
Chalmers acknowledged the small tariffs on some goods, but said the changes would give “small amount of extra help with the cost-of-living challenge by making everyday items such as toothbrushes, tools, fridges, dishwashers and clothing just a little bit cheaper”.
Good morning
Good morning everyone, Mostafa Rachwani with you today, to take you through the day’s news.
We begin with the federal government, which will today begin a public consultation on new laws to combat doxxing. The community is being urged to provide feedback on the laws, which intend to crackdown on the practice of doxxing, something the attorney general called “malicious”.
Elsewhere, almost 500 nuisance tariffs will be scrapped in the new financial year in the hopes of saving businesses $30m in compliance costs. The Albanese government intends to eliminate 14% of Australia’s tariffs on imported goods from 1 July. This will include hand tools, fridges, clothing and menstrual and sanitary products, and the government hopes the changes will boost productivity and reduce red tape.
Finally, a record-breaking heatwave is continuing to bake south-east Australia, with temperatures set to soar again today. Melbourne is expected to peak at 37C today, while Adelaide will peak at 38C. We’ll keep you updated on conditions and everything else happening around the country.