New COSBOA chief executive Peter Strong is disappointed new Prime Minster Julia Gillard has not spoken directly about small business and will be seeking a meeting to clarify her position.
Strong, who has acted as COSBOA chief since the shock resignation of Jaye Radisich in May, has now formally taken up the role.
Strong, who was previously the chief executive of that National Independent Retailers Association, runs a bookshop in Canberra and has previously worked at the United Nations and the World Bank.
He says his first priorities are COSBOA’s national conference, which will be held in Brisbane on July 8, and the upcoming federal election, in which COSBOA hopes to play a major role.
In conjunction with NIRA, COSBOA will write to thousands of small business owners in marginal seats to outline the major parties views on a range of issues such as red tape, taxation, industrial relations and competition policy.
“There are a lot of small businesses in every seat in Australia and in the marginal seats you might have small business owners making up 15% of voters in a seat where there is a margin of 2% or 3%,” Strong says.
“What we are looking at is getting the message out there and saying, these are the questions you need to be asking your candidate.”
“We are telling the major parties they need to consider small business as people and consider them in their plans.”
Strong says he is disappointed Gillard has not mentioned the SME community since becoming Prime Minster just over a week ago.
“We haven’t heard her really talk about small business much and that’s something we need to hear about.”
Strong says he would specifically like to talk to Gillard about the complexities of the Fair Work IR system, where a small employer is “expected to have the same knowledge as the pay master at a big corporate”.
Cutting red tape – through measures such as giving responsibility for collecting superannuation back to the Australian Taxation Office – is another focus.
“In the last 20 years everybody has been fighting hard to get rid of red tape and we’ve failed dismally.”
In addition to Strong’s appointment, COSBOA has also announced a number of new board appointments following the resignation of five directors in the last five months, including Radisich and chairman Richard Brooks.
Former directors Judith van Unen and Geoff Fader from the Tasmanian Small Business Council have rejoined the board, while Ken Phillips, executive director of the Independent Contractors of Australia, is a new appointment.
Strong says he will be working with a newly established COSBOA secretariat on ways to grow the organisation’s membership.
James was the editor and publisher of SmartCompany and LeadingCompany for five years. He is now the Australian Financial Review‘s companies & markets editor, and a former BRW editor.
Comments