THIS week’s federal leadership spill and appointment of a new prime minister has put a dent in business confidence, Western NSW Business Chamber regional manager Vicki Seccombe says.
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Following the leadership spill Malcolm Turnbull resigned from the top job on Friday and was replaced by former treasurer Scott Morrison who will now be Australia’s 30th prime minister.
Josh Frydenberg was elected as the deputy leader of the Liberal Party.
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The change followed weeks of speculation in federal parliament and Ms Seccombe said it had led to uncertainty right across the region.
“All this uncertainty in a leadership spill will definitely erode a business confidence, business needs to understand where they’re going,” she said.
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“I don’t think it’s been a great week in a lot of respects in politics, with the NEG [National Energy Guarantee] being shelved on Monday, on Wednesday was the company tax cuts … businesses just don’t know who to turn to so that’s probably a big issue.
“We’ve got enough going on at the moment, our businesses, without having to deal with the change in leadership and not sure where we’re headed.”
When asked if Scott Morrison was the best person for the job following the three-way race between him, Julie Bishop and Peter Dutton for the top job, Ms Seccombe said stability was more important than who was prime minister.
“I think we’d just like stability from whatever party is in power, we just want stability knowing what’s coming, what’s happening,” she said.
“For us it’s not about a particular person, we’re looking for just stability from the government.”
Western Research Institute chief executive officer Kathy Woolley said it was too early to determine what impacts a change in leadership would mean for the region at this early stage.
“We really need to wait and see if there are policy changes and in particular if those might affect consumer confidence or trading positions of businesses in a time where there’s fairly significant pressure arising from the weather conditions and the drought impacting regionally,” she said.
“I don’t think it’s really clear what policy change might occur as a result of the change [in leadership].”
Ms Woolley said she was hopeful that the government would get on with governing now that a new leader had been appointed.
I think we’d just like stability from whatever party is in power, we just want stability knowing what’s coming, what’s happening. For us it’s not about a particular person, we’re looking for just stability from the government.
- Western NSW Business Chamber regional manager Vicki Seccombe says
“Everybody’s a bit over change like this and we just want to get on with it,” she said.
Meanwhile Central NSW Councils Joint Organisation (formally CENTROC) chair John Medcalf said the spill and appointment of a new prime minister would not have an impact on the region.
“I don’t think it will have a lot of impact, but it’s just a bit disruptive in the normal running of government,” he said.