Regulations are choking the state of Victoria

Victoria has become one of the toughest places in Australia to run a business, build homes or invest your money. The problem isn't that people have stopped working hard or taking risks, there are plenty of good business people out there who want to expand, employ more staff and have a crack, the problem is that governments have made it harder and harder to get anything done.

Every year we're told housing will become more affordable, businesses will get more support and the economy will improve. Then the exact opposite happens. More rules, more paperwork, more taxes, more fees and longer delays. It feels like every time government runs out of money because it has overspent, it simply looks for another way to charge businesses and ordinary people more.

Every new tax or fee seems to come with another form to fill out, another permit to apply for or another regulation to comply with. None of it helps businesses grow, it just keeps public servants busy while the people actually creating jobs spend more time behind a desk than serving customers.

The result is exactly what you would expect. If you make it harder to build houses, fewer houses get built. If it takes years to get planning approvals, people either walk away from projects or invest somewhere else. Money doesn't sit around waiting for governments to make up their minds, it goes where people are welcomed, decisions are made quickly and the rules are clear.

Housing is probably the best example of how badly we've got things wrong. Politicians keep talking about affordability while making it harder to build new homes. They announce reviews, inquiries and new policies, but very little actually changes. Every new planning restriction, zoning rule or bureaucratic delay means fewer houses are built and when supply falls behind demand, prices and rents keep climbing. It really is that simple.

Business owners aren't asking governments to hand them money or protect them from competition, all they want is a fair go. They want to be able to build, invest and employ people without getting buried under endless red tape or penalised for doing well. Every month a project is delayed costs money. Every unnecessary report or approval adds another expense that eventually gets passed on to the customer. That's why everything keeps getting more expensive.

If Jess Wilson becomes Premier after the election, I hope she understands that Victorians don't just want a different face at the top, they want a completely fresh approach with a different way of governing. They want a government that backs businesses instead of treating them like a problem and continually trying to extract more out of them. They want planning approvals that happen in months instead of years and they want governments that know prosperity comes from people taking risks and investing their own money, not from creating another department or another layer of bureaucracy.

The same applies if Labor stays in government under a new leader. Changing the person at the top means very little unless the policies change as well. Victoria has accumulated years of bad policy that now needs to be undone. Whether Labor has the courage or even the desire to do that remains to be seen. They have crippled Victoria and brought it to its knees causing so much damage that it is difficult to see how they can fix such a mess.

The biggest thing we've lost is confidence. Businesses invest when they know where they stand and feel like they have a real chance of making a go of things. Builders and developers build when they know approvals won't become cost prohibitive or drag on forever. Families buy homes when they believe the future is stable and the housing market is going up. Once confidence disappears, people stop spending, stop investing and start waiting and that's exactly what we're seeing now.

Planning is one area where Victoria has really lost its way. Planning laws should protect what's important while making it possible for sensible development to happen. Instead, they've become a roadblock. It has become easier for governments and bureaucrats to say no than to say yes. Until that changes, we won't solve the housing shortage or get the economy moving properly again.

I also think we expect too much from governments too quickly. Problems that have taken twenty years to create aren't going to be fixed in six months and Labor has created a lot of problems. Whoever wins the next election deserves the chance to make meaningful changes before people write them off. Of course they should be held accountable, but they also need enough time to get things moving.

Victoria is still a fantastic state and we've got hardworking people, great businesses, outstanding universities and plenty of talented entrepreneurs. None of that has disappeared but what has changed is that governments have slowly become an obstacle instead of helping people succeed. Businesses spend more time dealing with paperwork than building their companies, developers spend more time waiting than building homes and investors are increasingly looking interstate because it's simply easier to get things done.

The next government has a real opportunity to turn things around, but only if it's prepared to cut red tape, reform planning, back businesses and remember where jobs actually come from. Governments don't create wealth, businesses do. The people who risk their own money, employ staff and build companies are the ones who keep the economy moving and they need to be supported not taxed and penalised to oblivion.

Victoria doesn't need another review, another strategy or another announcement, it needs a government with the will and policies to engage, support and trust businesses, get out of the way where appropriate and start saying yes to sensible ideas and initiatives instead of saying no or putting up more obstacles.

If we keep going down the path we're on, Victoria will simply become more expensive, less competitive and a place people choose not to invest in. But if the next government is prepared to make some tough decisions, remove unnecessary barriers and restore confidence, there's no reason Victoria can't become one of the strongest states in the country again. It's not too late, but we do need to stop talking about reform and actually get on with it.