Page 559 - Week 02 - Thursday, 9 March 2006
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The strategies in the white paper are enduring. They have provided the government with framework and flexibility to address new issues such as the skill shortages facing many ACT businesses. In July 2005, following a strategic and operational review conducted earlier that year—and, I might add, a bit of a clean-up—the government restarted the skills and business migration program. In six months 155 skilled migration applications have been approved under the program to help address local skill shortages. In addition, 30 business sponsorships have been processed under the business migration stream of the program, representing $14.2 million since 2003 and a further potential $30.6 million over the next two years.
In April of this year the government will be launching a new pilot media campaign aimed at attracting skilled workers and their families to Canberra. The initiative has been developed with the close involvement and financial support of the ACT business sector. They have joined in.
While the government can be rightly proud of the policy leadership it has displayed in getting the white paper initiatives up, what really counts is our how our business and key institutions are responding. Let me take you through a few of the indicators. In 2003-04 the ACT had the highest rate of small business formation in the ACT. We have debated in this chamber before the veracity of ABS enterprise count figures and the swings and roundabouts they produce. But the fact is that for some time small business formation in the ACT has been leading, or is at the high end of, national surveys.
Small business formation figures are also supported by other metrics. The Sensis Business Index has shown confidence levels in ACT SMEs to be consistently higher than the national average. The Sensis data also shows a strong export culture amongst ACT small business. Official trade statistics show around four per cent per annum growth in the ACT’s exports over a five-year period, bucking the national trend of stagnating non-commodity exports.
The Hudson employment intentions survey consistently shows the ACT at the top end of employer optimism for employing permanent staff. Print and on-line job advertisements in the ACT are still tracking at near record highs. The 2004 KPMG CEO’s Guide to International Business Costs ranked Canberra as the number one city in the ACT across a range of competitive indices.
In 2005 Australian Business Ltd ranked the ACT as the easiest place to do business of the eight states and territories. In 2004-05 the State of the Regions Report rated the ACT as the best-positioned region to participate in the new economy. The same report ranked the ACT fourth out of 64 Australian regions in new wealth building potential.
These references and statistics give the government considerable comfort that we are on the right track with our policies and programs. However, they also remind us of the hard work ahead and the opportunities we need to convert. While I have enjoyed immensely the issues and policy challenges of the business portfolio, nothing has given me more satisfaction than the interaction I have had with ACT businesses, and also knowing that a little of their success can be attributed to some of the things that we have done in government.
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