Senator Jane Hume tells government to ‘move on’ from RBA reforms
Shadow finance minister Jane Hume has killed off any bipartisan move to reform the Reserve Bank’s governance arrangements by creating separate boards to oversee monetary policy and how it runs.
The Opposition frontbencher says that if the Coalition wins government, it would keep the existing single board arrangement despite an independent review of the central bank last year recommending the restructure.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers and his Opposition counterpart Angus Taylor had been in negotiations over the new arrangements for the RBA since April 2023, but the shadow treasurer walked away from that last Tuesday.
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By continuing you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy.Dr Chalmers insisted he had offered compromises for every concern the Opposition raised.
The main sticking point was Mr Taylor’s insistence that every member of the existing board be shifted to the new monetary policy board.
The Government offered that every member would move unless they did not want to, with Dr Chalmers indicating there were some who would prefer to be on the governance board under the new arrangement.
Mr Taylor cited this along with Labor attacks earlier in the month on the RBA for “smashing” the economy by keeping interest rates high for abandoning the talks.
He raised fears the Government intended to use the overhaul to “sack and stack” the RBA.
Senator Hume said on Sunday the Coalition would not seek to revive the recommendations of the RBA review if the Government could not get them passed this term.
“Quite frankly, I think that it’s time that the government moved on,” she told ABC’s Insiders.
“We feel that this is no longer something that needs to be talked about. It’s no longer on the table.”
The Coalition was comfortable with the existing board dealing with monetary policy in the way it was.
“You stick with the current arrangements because you need that continuity and stability of the current board,” she said.
“That’s the job that these people were hired to do. They were hired to do monetary policy, and they should continue to do monetary policy.”
Dr Chalmers said he would consider his options, including potentially turning to the Greens to pass the RBA reforms.
