National Reform Summit: PM and summiteers leave everything on the table

It was by all accounts a bright and positive meeting between Malcolm Turnbull and the National Reform Summiteers from the business groups, the welfare lobby, the union movement and seniors organisations. Yet what was actually achieved was not easy to discern from the talking heads that emerged from the three-hour meeting behind closed doors in Parliament House.

The Prime Minister should benefit from lending his political authority to a summit process that the two national newspapers – The Australian Financial Review and The Australian – began out of frustration with politicians. Tony Abbott and the ACTU did not exchange words once while the former prime minister was in office. Mr Turnbull by contrast now has the union movement, the welfare lobby, and business groups agreeing that things cannot stay the same.

The government has offered to look at tax concessions on superannuation and capital gains tax that largely favour the better-off, to check whether they achieve their proper purpose. The Reserve Bank has questioned housing-related tax concessions for capital gains. The Business Council has conceded that super tax breaks should be directed at the purpose of promoting reasonable retirement incomes for ordinary Australians.

But both the ACTU and ACOSS are reluctant to see that as a quid pro quo for a more profound, underlying change in incentives in our economy, by lifting GST on consumption and reducing income taxes on wages and profits.

By agreeing to look at tax concessions, however, Mr Turnbull has done two things. He now has political cover to end the "rule-out" politics by which Mr Abbott shut down debate on superannuation. And he can also claim to have at least begun consulting the community on lifting the GST as part of a tax reform package that the government will likely take to a 2016 election. "We have to be prepared to stay the course on tax reform," agreed Cassandra Goldie of ACOSS. Everything remains on the table.

Having the big interest groups in one room is the first step in combating complacency over our national circumstance. As the International Monetary Fund said on Thursday, Australia's economy has grown twice as fast as its peers over the past quarter of a century, lifting per capital income to among the world's highest.

But, as the IMF also notes, per capita income has actually fallen over the past few years and is unlikely to rise above its 2012 peak until the 2020s. By keeping them in the tent, ACOSS and the ACTU eventually will have to answer how they would propose lifting productivity, repairing the budget and reviving the nation's economic growth prospects.