Bill Shorten has called for “tailored, light-touch rules” for sharing-economy services such as Airbnb and Uber so that emerging operators pay their fair share of tax and customers’ safety is protected.
On Thursday, the federal Labor leader released six principles that would guide his approach to regulating the sharing economy, although the details would be subject to talks with state and territory governments.
The principles recognise that people’s primary property is theirs to share; new services should support good wages and working conditions; everyone must pay a fair share of tax; there should be proper protection for public safety; services should provide access for people with disabilities; and companies should play by the rules.
“A lot of Australians are exploring the sharing economy,” Shorten said at an event in Canberra.
“There are lots of Australians now when they look at their holiday who may go on Airbnb to see what’s possible. A lot of Australians are looking at the possibilities of Uber to be able to get transport at times when you need it in a most cost-effective manner.
“But it’s important as we develop these new ideas that regulation keeps up. Labor’s sharing-economy principles can be summarised as light-touch regulation.”
Regulators around the world have been wrestling with the arrival of new companies that allow consumers to connect with their peers to share rooms in their homes and seats in their cars, and make use of technology to disrupt existing operators.
In various Australian states, authorities have taken a hard line against the increasingly popular Uber ride-sharing service amid complaints from the taxi industry, which says it is an uneven playing field because cabs are subject to an expensive licensing regime and safety measures.
Uber said last month it was “shocked” and was seeking legal advice after 40 of its New South Wales drivers had their vehicle registration suspended for three months. The Australian Capital Territory’s Labor government has taken the most accommodating stance on Uber, vowing to allow its regulated use from 30 October.
Shorten said the sharing economy was here to stay and the ACT regulations would “be a good test to see where we go on this”.
The Labor leader said he understood the concerns of the taxi industry, given that people had invested significant sums of money in licence plates and leases, but it was important to get the balance right.
“I do not think it is an insurmountable problem to ensure that Uber pays their fair share of taxation. What I’m not going to do with the new economy is drown it in red tape,” he said.
“The new economy’s here, the sharing economy’s here. Governments can either help guide and navigate the future using the principles that we’ve enunciated or they can throw up their hands in the air and say, ‘It’s all too hard and we can’t cope with change’.”
In May, the tax office offered guidance to people providing such services, in a ruling Uber vowed to challenge.
In its general advice about the sharing economy, the tax office said people needed to register to charge the 10% GST if their annual turnover from that enterprise was $75,000 or more.
But it said ride-sourcing services such as Uber were considered taxi travel under the GST law regardless of turnover, and drivers must be registered to charge the tax from the time they first took a passenger.
The shadow assistant treasurer, Andrew Leigh, said he was yet to find a sharing-economy provider that operated under the idea its main comparative advantage was tax dodging.
“We just want to get the rules right, so innovative companies can prosper and help to deal with big Australian challenges such as traffic congestion and housing affordability,” Leigh said.
“We’ve got 10m spare bedrooms unused in Australia today. Making better use of those can help deal with the big challenge of housing affordability.”
The Labor policy document said if Shorten was elected in 2016, he would work with state and territory governments to deliver legislative and regulatory reforms that would turn the six principles into “concrete laws”.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and the Productivity Commission would be asked to monitor how the new regulatory approach was working and the impact on existing markets.
