Labor Shadow Treasurer Dr Shane Broad and Launceston Chamber of Commerce Executive Officer Will Cassidy voice their concerns regarding retail sales and capital investment. Video Rod Thompson
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NewsTranscript
00:00 The Australian Bureau of Statistics puts out reports quite regularly and unfortunately
00:09 what we're seeing is a pattern now of the report showing that Tasmania is performing
00:14 way worse than the other states.
00:16 This is a big concern.
00:17 What we've seen in the latest report is that capital investment from businesses around
00:22 Tasmania has actually gone down about 21%.
00:26 We know that Queensland was flat but the other states are galloping ahead.
00:29 What we see continually, we see the state final demands of the size of the Tasmanian
00:33 economy has shrunk three quarters in a row.
00:36 Unfortunately we're also seeing now Tasmanians move to the mainland.
00:40 This economic data is pushing in the wrong direction.
00:43 So what we really need is a government that instead of just simply blindly talking up
00:47 an economy that's actually going backwards, they need to step up to the plate and they
00:51 need to make changes like we've been calling for.
00:55 Changes like capping power prices, making it easier to invest in the state in these
01:00 big capital projects like wind farms, but also importantly not changing the goalposts.
01:05 So what we're seeing lately is the government suddenly making decisions that surprise businesses
01:11 and that's resulted in a decrease in business confidence and now the ABS is reporting as
01:16 well that there's a decrease in capital expenditure.
01:20 What we know is when the state's economy is shrinking, that's an economy that's also
01:25 shedding jobs and unfortunately Tasmania now has the highest unemployment rate out of any
01:30 state in the country.
01:33 Electricity prices are a real concern for local small and medium businesses.
01:39 Anything that affects the cost of living and increases the cost of living also increases
01:44 the cost of doing business, but it's a double whammy because our discretionary spending
01:48 drops and many of our small and medium businesses in Launceston rely on that discretionary spend
01:56 from customers.
01:57 [BLANK_AUDIO]