Peak retail industry body the Australian Retailers Association (ARA) urges the Federal Government to give retailers the opportunity to grow the Australian economy and create employment opportunities by quickly removing unnecessary red tape costs.

Australian Retailers Association (ARA) executive director, Russell Zimmerman, will present at the Regulatory Reform conference in Canberra today.

Zimmerman will outline key cost blowouts the ARA says are stifling jobs and growth in the Australian retail sector, as well as highlight potential employment growth opportunities if these issues are addressed in a timely manner.

“The key message we will be delivering is that retail has a real opportunity for jobs and economic growth over the next five years, however, regulatory costs have stifled that growth in the last five years. The only way we will achieve our potential is to remove costs and restrictions,” says Zimmerman.

“The retail sector shows real promise as the jobs driver for the economy over the next five years, but in order to achieve this, we must reduce costs and burden on retailers.

“I see retailers every day of the week, from single store businesses to the boardrooms of some of Australia’s largest companies, and I can confirm that all of them have done a fantastic job in surviving – they have all had to cut costs and cut jobs. They are running on the smell of an oily rag.

“The ARA congratulates the government on their first steps to reducing burden but the bulk of the work is still in front of them.”

Key points to will be raised include:

• Over the last five years retail has grown by around two per cent a year while jobs have only grown by 0.2 per cent a year
• Average full time wage is now more than $55,000 with regulation killing flexibility
• Ernst & Young report confirms 93,000 jobs have been lost due to non-collection of overseas GST and the sector could grow by 87,000 jobs in the next four years with this red tape non-compliance measure being removed
• ARA/ACCI report shows 70 per cent of businesses had their red tape burden increased in the last 12 months
• More than 55 per cent of all businesses indicated they had no capacity to pass the cost of regulation on to consumers
• The carbon tax has significantly increased costs for retailers (e.g. for bakery retailers by $20,000 p.a.)
• Almost one quarter of businesses (23 per cent) spent between $10,001 to $50,000 on compliance management
• Safety and workers compensation is the most complex area of compliance (55.8 per cent). This is followed by employee wages, conditions, and superannuation (51.4 per cent), and tax compliance obligations (47.5 per cent)