Politics With Michelle Grattan: Jim Chalmers Wants Roundtable To 'Crack Open' The Challenge Of Slow Housing Approvals

The Reserve Bank's rate cut this week will help relieve many mortgage holders, but it wasn't all positive news from the bank. It also underscored the serious productivity and economic growth challenges facing the Australian economy.

The Economic Reform Roundtable next week will be a deep dive into those issues. In its lead up, however, the government is trying to manage expectations, resulting in mixed signals about ambition, outcomes, and timetables for implementing measures.

Meanwhile the union movement has thrown a curveball at the meeting, with the ACTU calling for a four day working week, when industrial relations was supposed to be off the table.

Chair of the roundtable Treasurer Jim Chalmers joins us today to talk about his focus ahead of next week.

On whether there will be more rate cuts this year, Chalmers points to market expectations,

Looking ahead to the roundtable, Chalmers says of the ACTU proposal,

He highlights the work his ministerial colleagues have done to help prepare for the meeting,

A focus of the roundtable is set to be housing and Chalmers says:

On fears that the growing use of AI may lead to a weakening of copyright law to allow AI data harvesting, Chalmers insists the government will not be weakening existing laws,

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