Small Business

Small business is Western Australia's largest employer and is vital to the economic future due to its contribution to job creation, innovation, training, and participation.

Small businesses allow people to be creative and to pioneer new economic activities. They are essential to the building and maintenance of sustainable communities.

Aims

The Greens (WA) want:

  • to assist small businesses to contribute to improved, long-term social, environmental and economic outcomes for Western Australia
  • to increase the proportion of small businesses in the economy as a whole (see also The Greens (WA) Economics policy)
  • to increase the number of cooperatives and worker-owned businesses
  • to make the economy more inclusive by making participation easier
  • more support for businesses with strong connections and contributions to their local communities
  • to encourage value-adding businesses  
  • to encourage innovation, diversification and local manufacturing

Measures

The Greens (WA) will encourage and support legislation and actions that:

  • encourage regular Government consultation with small business, including the convening of a Small Business Summit to identify ways to improve business-related legislation  
  • remove payroll tax, replacing it through a carefully phased-in expansion of alternative, progressive taxes
  • monitor the effects of deregulated trading hours on small shop-front retail businesses
  • reform trading hours regulations to improve economic and social viability for small traders
  • provide more accessible, mixed-use, higher density activity centres to distribute services and employment throughout large urban areas (see also The Greens (WA) Planning policy)
  • encourage community ownership of local initiatives and infrastructure such as small energy projects, waste management and training facilities
  • encourage cooperative schemes that allow small retailers access to shop space which might otherwise be monopolised by large firms
  • properly fund and maintain the Small Business Development Corporation and innovation centres
  • provide and maintain affordable small business management skills courses and advisory services, including start-up accelerators
  • properly fund State training organisations to provide affordable skills training
  • increase research and development incentives to business, particularly in areas that serve broader objectives such as renewable energy, social services, education and sustainability
  • provide resources and incentives to support social enterprises including cooperatives, producers’ markets, schemes to share vehicles and equipment, and enterprises providing supported employment for those disadvantaged in the labour market
  • modify The Associations Incorporation Act 2015 to create a new class of organisation - cooperative and community-based businesses - with appropriate model rules and guidance notes which incorporate consensus decision making
  • discourage monopolistic vertical integration, where single market players own substantial parts of supply and distribution chains
  • ensure retail tenancies, especially in major shopping centres, do not set unfair or unworkable conditions for small shops in favour of major chain stores
  • reform tenancy laws to provide transparency to all parties and ensure that small businesses are not locked out by large business collaboration
  • develop and drive initiatives to activate dormant commercial and retail spaces
  • provide appropriate legal protections for franchisees to prevent them from being treated as de facto employees without industrial protections
  • promote the use of digital technologies and platforms to reduce red tape for small businesses, making it easier and more affordable for them to navigate regulatory processes such as licensing and approvals
  • promote and adhere to a policy of open-by-default government data released under an open licence, as a means to allow entrepreneurs and small businesses to develop new platforms to engage with government data and add value to government services (see also The Greens (WA) Open & Honest Government policy
  • increase grant schemes and other financial supports for small businesses, especially start-ups and cooperatives
  • discourage and regulate anti-competitive measures taken by monopolies, including price gouging and buying up competition
  • promote local business as a means of supporting local communities and economies

Small Business policy ratified by The Greens (WA) in 2020