Small Business

Dr ALY (Cowan—Minister for Small Business, Minister for International Development and Minister for Multicultural Affairs) (14:42): I thank the member opposite for his question, because it gives me an opportunity to really talk about small business—something that I'm passionate about and something that the members on this side of the House are all passionate about as well.

As I said yesterday, small businesses operate right across the country. They are everyone from your local Indian grocer to your hairdresser and the place that you go to get your lunch. I'm pleased to report that, since we took office, since this Albanese Labor government took office in 2022, there are 800,000 more new small businesses operating right across Australia. They comprise female led businesses—around 35 per cent are female led—and 40 per cent on average are led by migrants, people who are aspirational, who come to this country and who see starting up a small business as a way of making a life for themselves and for their families. Small businesses employ more than five million Australians, and they contribute more than $590 billion to our nation's economy every single year.

I'll remind the member opposite that this is the government that, last term, introduced the very first National Small Business Strategy, which guides the ways in which we will work with state and local governments to address those issues for small business.

The SPEAKER: Member for Cowper, on a point of order?

Mr Conaghan: It's on relevance. The question was very tight. It was in relation to this government's economic mismanagement, insolvencies and job losses.

The SPEAKER: The minister was asked about the government's agenda and, in particular, details of that. She is providing relevant information. I'm going to make sure that her remarks are directly relevant to the question she was asked.

Dr ALY: Though I repeated it three times, I'll repeat it again. There are 800,000 more small businesses since this government took office in 2022. In our first term, we set our priorities for small business, and they were to help them grow and to give them a level playing field. I'll remind the House again, as I mentioned yesterday, that last week I convened our very first small-business roundtable to feed into our reform agenda. I will continue listening to small businesses right across Australia, across the width and breadth of the diverse sectors they represent.

The Albanese Labor government backs small business. Have a look at the members behind me. Small businesses operate in every single city and every single town across Australia, including in the outer suburbs, represented here on this side of the House. We will continue with our agenda to back small business, because small business backs Australia.