I’ve served as Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Small Business and Fair Competition for over a year now. For small businesses, 2011 has been a year where the dark clouds have continued to gather.

Indicators do not point to a bright future for this critical sector, yet the Labor Government has done little to help Australia’s 2.7 million small businesses.

This year, the small business indicators published by the National Australia Bank showed business confidence hit a low of -9 in August. They have since climbed a little, but confidence levels are still negative.

I have been out and about speaking to small business owners all year, and no one is forecasting a bumper 2012. Research by MYOB has shown that over time, an increasing number of small business owners are anticipating a disappointing year ahead.

The Gillard Government certainly did Australian small businesses no favours in 2011.

It continued to introduce new taxes, regulations and laws that will simply make running a small business harder. This also directly impacts the more than 4.5 million Australians working in small businesses.

The most damaging of Julia Gillard’s 2011 initiatives was the carbon tax. Forget what the Government is saying about its $40 million small business fund – it will likely flow through to desk-bound consultants, rather than small manufacturers, retailers, IT workers or tradesmen. It is not about helping you with the cost of the new tax – it is merely a slush fund for the the Labor Government to seek to convince you it won’t hurt too much

In October, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry commissioned independent research into the impact of the carbon tax on small businesses. The numbers were stark.

It found that for some small businesses, particularly those that are trade exposed, the Labor-Greens carbon tax could wipe up to 20 per cent of their profits. As Tony Abbott has repeatedly said, a Coalition Government would scrap this tax, which is likely to export both jobs and emissions, as well as hurt this most vibrant and entrepreneurial sector of our economy.

The carbon tax is not the only blow delivered by the Labor-Greens Government against small business. The regulatory burden on businesses of all sizes has continued to mount.

Since coming to office, Labor has delivered more than 12,000 new regulatory measures and this year, the Office of Best Practice Review has received more than 4000 pages detailing the Commonwealth’s new regulations.

Together with a small group of my Liberal Party colleagues, I am working to cut $1 billion worth of regulation compliance costs and develop a long-term policy to restrain the relentless growth of regulation and red tape that serves no purpose other than employ paper-shufflers. A new approach is needed, one that lasts beyond a single minister, government or parliament.

The Coalition has set up a Deregulation Taskforce to identify ways to save employers time and money and let them get on with business, rather than filling in forms.

As always, if you have any suggestions, questions or comments, please drop me a line.

Wishing you a merry Christmas and a safe and prosperous 2011.