Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has released details of the Government’s new National Innovation and Science Agenda. Here’s the key extracts from the Media Release:
The Government’s National Innovation and Science Agenda will help to create a modern, dynamic, 21st century economy for Australia…
Australia is falling behind on measures of commercialisation and collaboration, consistently ranking last or second last among OECD countries for business-research collaboration.Our appetite for risk is lower than in comparable countries, which means Australian startups and early stage businesses often fail to attract capital to grow.
And participation in science, maths and computing at high school is declining.
Through the National Innovation and Science Agenda, the Government will invest $1.1 billion to incentivise innovation and entrepreneurship, reward risk taking, and promote science, maths and computing in schools by focusing on four priority areas:
• Culture and capital, to help businesses embrace risk and incentivise early stage investment in startups;
• Collaboration, to increase the level of engagement between businesses, universities and the research sector to commercialise ideas and solve problems;
• Talent and skills, to train Australian students for the jobs of the future and attract the world’s most innovative talent to Australia; and
• Government as an exemplar, to lead by example in the way Government invests in and uses technology and data to deliver better quality services.
The Agenda is part of the Government’s commitment to establishing Australia as a leading innovation system.
More information on the NISA is available at www.innovation.gov.au
And here’s the important specifics, via The AFR:
Stable science investment: [The sector] will receive $459 million in total over four years, with most funding kicking in from 2017… The government will hand back $200 million to the CSIRO, placed into an innovation fund aimed at co-investing in new companies and existing start-ups…
Tax: Investors will be able to get a 20 per cent tax offset [up to $40,000], rather than a deduction and a capital gains tax exemption…
Start-ups: For established start-ups this will bring forward the point at which they get their tax break, offering a 10 per cent tax rebate for venture capital investments to expand existing start-ups…
Bankruptcy: Laws will be changed to reduce the default bankruptcy period from three years to one year, and a new ‘predominantly similar business test’ will replace the ‘same business test’, allowing businesses to access past losses…
University funding incentives: The government will allocate $127 million over four years of research block grant funding towards collaboration between industry and universities…
Visas: There will be a new entrepreneurs visa created to bring in international talent, and post-grad students with STEM or ICT talent will be fast-tracked for permanent residency…
Government body: The government will create a new board in the Industry Department called Innovation and Science Australia, as well as a new innovation and science committee of cabinet.
I view anything that shifts investment away from unproductive housing towards genuine productive enterprise as a positive step.
Let’s hope that the policy is followed-up with the removal of Australia’s draconian metadata laws, which are likely to stifle the development of Australia’s internet-based industry, including start-ups, as well as reform of negative gearing and/or the capital gains tax discount, which have jointly diverted the nation’s capital away from productive investment (including start-ups) into non-productive housing.
In short, these are good steps by the Turnbull Government, but much more needs to be done to facilitate genuine productive investment and business development in Australia.
