ADDENDUM TO THE REPORT
from Senator Andrew Murray Australian Democrats
SENATE ECONOMICS LEGISLATION COMMITTEE INQUIRY INTO PRODUCTIVITY
COMMISSION BILL 1996,
PRODUCTIVITY COMMISSION (REPEALS, TRANSITIONAL AND CONSEQUENTIAL
AMENDMENTS) BILL 1996
MARCH 1997
The Australian Democrats wish to strongly dissent from the
majority report. We do not believe that the takeover of the Economic
Planning Advisory Commission and the Bureau of Industry Economics by
a renamed Industry Commission is in the public interest.
The clear lessons of economic policy making of the last
decade - particularly the causes and effects of the 1991 - 93 recession
- are that there is a need for Governments to have a diversity of opinion
in the advice provided to them. An excessive belief in the benefits
of deregulation and market forces, pioneered by the Industry Commission
and pursued by Treasury, was a major contributing factor to the extent
of that recession. We also believe that particular world view is also
responsible for many structural, fiscal, social and economic problems
of Australia. Governments need more different, less uniform and more
varied sources of economic advice, not less.
EPAC and the BIE have fulfilled and can fulfil important
roles in economic policy debate. It remains our concern that the establishment
of the Productivity Commission will see these roles completely subsumed
by the dominant culture and monolithic philosophy of the Industry Commission,
renamed the Productivity Commission. Such an outcome would clearly not
be in the public interest. Given the longevity and prevalence of the
economic rationalist philosophy of the Industry Commission, it is clear
that the Productivity Commission will in turn fail to provide and objectively
test the variety of views represented by the current three organisations,
as it is proposed are re-structured.
The Democrats will be pursuing these issues in more detail
when the bill is debated in the Senate.
Senator Andrew Murray
Australian Democrats