Treasurer Jim Chalmers has appointed Chris Barrett, a seasoned economist and former chief of staff to another Labor treasurer, to head the Productivity Commission for the next five years.
Barrett’s appointment for a term of five years starting in September followed “a rigorous process involving interviews with two departmental secretaries and the Australian Public Service commissioner”, Chalmers said on Monday.
Barrett, a deputy secretary of Victoria’s treasury and finance department since January 2021, has held a range of senior appointments at home and abroad.
These included being Wayne Swan’s chief of staff from 2007-10, a role then taken up by Chalmers. Barrett was Australia’s ambassador to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris from 2011-14, after which he became executive director of Berlin-based European Climate Foundation from 2015-19.
“Mr Barrett’s experience – from key senior roles in important international institutions to practical experience delivering reforms in both state and federal governments – will further cement the commission’s role as a world-class economic institution,” Chalmers said.
“I’m certainly looking to revitalise and renew and refocus the Productivity Commission,” he said. “We’ve made it clear we think the productivity opportunity for Australia is not to make people work longer for less but to invest in human capital and the energy transformation, and get much better at adapting and adopting technology as it evolves.”
The commission has often criticised Australia’s poor track productivity record in the past decade, including in its most recent five-year report. Outgoing Reserve Bank governor Philip Lowe, too, has warned rising wages without workers becoming more efficient would mean higher interest rates for longer if inflation was to be reined in.
The commission has also tended to criticise subsidies to support renewable energy while backing “a single, explicit carbon price”, a policy the Abbott government scrapped in 2014. Last week, it warned against “old-fashioned protectionism” by governments trying to support industries such as a national battery strategy.
“As a small open economy, our future prosperity depends on global economic integration and low-trade barriers,” deputy chair Alex Robson said. “It is unlikely to be in Australia’s interests to try and compete in a protectionist contest via large-scale industry assistance.”
Chalmers said he supported the independence of the commission and that the choice of Barrett was not “a kind of a performance review” on outgoing chair Michael Brennan.
“I want to make sure the Productivity Commission is providing the kind of insights and perspectives about a more modern economy that a government can pick up and run with,” he said.
Brennan said the choice of Barrett as his replacement was “an outstanding appointment”.
“Chris will bring great intellect, strategic insight and a breadth of experience to the role,” Barrett said, according to comments provided by the treasurer’s office. “We should all be very positive about the future of the PC under Chris’s leadership.”
Innes Willox, chair of the AiGroup, also welcomed Barrett’s appointment and said he “looks forward to continuing to work with the Productivity Commission to inform debate and policy making in the years ahead”.
Chris Barrett, born in 1969, holds a bachelor of commerce and a bachelor of arts with honours, and a masters in public policy from the Princeton school of Public and International Affairs.
Brennan too had hailed from the Victorian government, also serving as a deputy secretary, in the treasury department. He also worked as an associate director in the economics and policy practice at PricewaterhouseCoopers, among other roles.
Separately, Chalmers said the government wouldn’t dip into the improving fiscal position to support additional funding for struggling households. The budget for the year, which ended last month, is expected to post a cash surplus “likely north of about $20bn,” according to Chalmers.
“[T]he government’s main focus is on providing cost of living relief by rolling out the commitments that we’ve made over our first two budgets,” he said, adding the surplus was “banked” for the year just ended. “[W]e’re not looking for ways to spend out of last year’s budget - even if we wanted to, that wouldn’t be a goal.”
Asked about whether he would be open to having more than two RBA votes on the new monetary policy board planned for the central bank, Chalmers said it would have the “same arrangements” as the existing board.
The new board is part of the recommendations of the RBA review. The current board has nine members, including the two from the central bank and the treasury secretary.
