LABOR WILL NOT DO ANYTHING TO HELP WITH ENERGY PRICES DESTROYING SMALL BUSINESSES

Today, the Labor Government indicated they would make a big announcement on energy relief in the upcoming Budget, but revealed instead they had nothing of substance in support small businesses doing it tough with skyrocketing energy bills.

In his address to the Council of Small Business Organisations Australia (COSBOA), Prime Minister Anthony Albanese admitted that “energy bills remain a source of financial pressure.” You would have to be living under a rock to not know this, but what is the Prime Minister doing about it?

Not much, according to the Prime Minister’s words to small business. He chose to focus not on affordable energy, but rooftop solar and a Small Business Energy Incentive that effectively creates energy inequality for Australian small businesses.

A manufacturer who operates out of a large shed-like structure in Western Sydney whose roof does not structurally support solar, is not thanking the Labor Government for their renewables only incentive. Nor is a small business that is clinging to life due their energy bills increasing 100 per cent, and customers not coming through the doors because they can’t afford their own bills in this cost of living crisis.

The Prime Minister’s words today fail to depict the reality of an increasingly dire situation across the country. In the real world, sky-high energy bills and the Albanese Labor Government’s inability to bring inflation under control are making the cost of doing business so extreme that insolvencies are occurring at rapid rates, across many industries from hospitality to manufacturing.

It is not only small businesses that are bearing the brunt of the energy affordability crisis. Families in Western Sydney are now paying up to 37% more for energy under this Labor Government.

The recent draft Default Market Offer figures clearly shows Australians are suffering. In Western Sydney, to recoup the $275 reduction in energy costs promised by Labor, the Government would need to write a cheque to households for over $1,000.

Singing the praises of rooftop solar while the lights are going out is a song of heartbreak to all Australians doing it tough under this Government, and whatever renewable incentives are in the upcoming Budget, they aren’t going to be able to mend the damage that is being done.