Sussan Ley says leaked advice shows economic reform roundtable a stitch-up

Sussan Ley has lashed Labor’s highly anticipated economic reform roundtable as a “stitch-up”, forcing the government to defend the three-day forum after leaked Treasury advice revealed a draft list of pre-written outcomes prepared for cabinet. First reported by the ABC, the recommendations include pausing the National Construction Code, which sets safety and environmental standards for buildings and has been criticised for driving up the cost of construction by imposing overly strict regulations. The leaked document also recommends a national AI plan to speed through environmental regulations and other reforms to slash through 30,000 housing approvals currently in limbo. The Opposition Leader immediately seized on the report, accusing the government of wasting the time of participants, which will include shadow treasurer Ted O’Brien. “When I read information that says it’s all been choreographed, it’s all been lined up, even to the level of announcements being made from outcomes, I wonder whether people who are attending this roundtable are indeed wasting their time,” she said. However, Ms Ley declined to say whether the Coalition would support a pause to the National Construction Code despite it being a policy her predecessor Peter Dutton took to the 2025 federal election. “Further leaked Treasury advice indicated that the government can’t possibly build 1.2 million homes it’s promised to do. Closely associated with that is the fact that it has no idea how to actually execute this promise,” she said. “Now, we know today that maybe 50 per cent of the cost of building a home is actually not the building of the home itself but other factors. “What that tells us is that there’s so much more work that this government needs to do when it comes to delivering a promise that matters greatly to young Australians.” The Coalition’s assistant spokesman for competition and treasury Dave Sharma questioned whether the discussions would be a “serious exercise in reform” if the government was “already determining the outcome”. “It means they’re not open to new ideas or what might emerge or consensus or discussions that might happen in the room,” he said. Senator Sharma also said the predetermined outcomes were “not sufficient” and “don’t reflect the scale of the challenge we’re facing”, citing the Reserve Bank’s downgrading of productivity growth from 1 per cent to 0.7 per cent. “Our challenge here is massive,” he said. Jim Chalmers moved quickly to water down the leaked advice. The Treasurer said he was not “pre-empting any outcomes or directions” ahead of next week’s meetings, and it was not “a big surprise” that Treasury was helping government. “The Treasury’s job is to analyse that and to advise me on that. The document you’re referring to is not a government announcement,” he said. “Nothing that has been reported today has been adopted as government policy.” Although the ABC reported that negative gearing or changes to capital gains tax concessions were not mentioned in the leaked advice, Mr Chalmers reiterated that the government had not “changed our policy” and would keep the tax settings as is. “People have put all kinds of proposals to us, including changes in that area (and) I have tried to be respectful to people,” he said. Anthony Albanese said Labor was “an inclusive government” and welcomed the roundtable’s opportunity to allow “people to advance their ideas, to advance policies”. “You’d expect Treasury to be giving advice about a forum that’s about the economy, and there’s been 41 different round-tables. Ideas are popping up all the time,” the Prime Minister said. “Those ideas are getting assessed as they’re being made … (but) to be very clear, governments make decisions.”