New chief pushes case for trust

BUSINESSES must act with integrity and ask what they “should do” rather than “could do” if they’re to earn the community’s trust, the new Business Council of Australia president says.

And they needed to ensure their products and services were fit for purpose, and represented them “honestly and clearly”.

Tim Reed said one of his priorities would be to ensure the influential lobby group helped the private sector earn the trust of the community.

Speaking at the group’s annual dinner last night before an audience that included Prime Minister Scott Morrison, Mr Reed said he wanted to ensure that mindset was “reflected in all the work we do”.

The former chief executive of Melbourne-based accounting software company MYOB was last month named successor to Grant King as BCA president. He formally stepped into the role at the lobby group’s annual meeting late yesterday.

“If we’ve taken anything from the past couple of years it is that business needs to first make sure the basics work — having products and services that are fit for purpose, representing them honestly and clearly, and acting with integrity,” Mr Reed said.

Business should be “asking first what we should do, rather than what we could do”, he said.

Mr Reed said his push to help the BCA earn the trust of the community was fourth on his list of priorities.

At the top of the agenda was the need to “prepare Australians with the skills and capabilities they need as technology continues to reshape the way we live and work”, he said. He also wanted to “anchor the pursuit of tax and regulatory policies to a long-term focus of Australia’s prosperity”.

“There are competitive alternatives to investing in Australia so we must be as competitive as we can and remain an attractive destination to do business,” Mr Reed said.

His other priority was “ensuring that we don’t just promote the role of big business but of all businesses, and in doing so we end the conversation of big versus small”.

“The fact is big and small businesses are an ecosystem and their ability to thrive depends on the success of one another,” Mr Reed said.