NAB Group CEO Andrew Irvine spoke at the Australian Financial Review Banking Summit about NAB’s leading business bank, as well as productivity and growth in Australia.

Australia has all the ingredients for success 

Mr Irvine said Australia is the lucky country, but lucky is not going to be enough forever.

“We have all the ingredients we could need. We just struggle to find a recipe.”

Mr Irvine said productivity in housing, resources and energy are all key challenges.

“We’re suffocating the development of dwellings. It’s too hard to get planning permission and it takes too long,” Mr Irvine said.

“We’ve also got an issue with skills and labour. There are not enough skilled workers to go on job sites to get dwellings done. There are work practices and housing modalities where we’re not leading the way.”

Despite being blessed with the greatest resources per capita of any country in the world, Mr Irvine said mining was also an issue for Australia.

“It takes more than 20 years to get a mining project from inception to production,” Mr Irvine said.

“Capital goes where it gets the best returns. We have no innate right to capture that capital unless we’re a great place for that capital to want to come.”

Mr Irvine said Australia also must do better when it comes to energy.

“We’re a big country. We’ve got lots of wind, we’ve got lots of hydro, the sun shines a lot in Australia, we’ve got gas everywhere – and we have an energy crisis. We’ve got to do better.”

Making Australia the easiest place to start a business

Mr Irvine also said Australia needs to be one of the best places to start and grow a business.

“We’ve got a country that’s wonderful to live in and raise a family. But no one in this room would say that this is one of the easiest places to start and grow a business and that’s important.”

“We need to be better for business owners to want to deploy capital here, grow businesses and thrive.”

“Business banking is in our DNA”

When asked about NAB’s leading business bank franchise, Mr. Irvine said the bank cannot rest on its laurels.

“This is an area NAB is exceptional in. Business banking is in our heritage, and in our DNA,” Mr Irvine said.

“We bank more than one in four businesses and more than one in three farmers. Australia needs us and we’re out and about.”

This month, Andrew visited customers in Newcastle and the Hunter Region.

“We have 6,000 bankers up and down the country who look after their customers with distinction and that model is hard to replicate.”

Commenting on recent leadership changes, Mr Irvine said incoming Business Banking Executive Andrew Auerbach is going to be a great fit for NAB’s business and that the bank wouldn’t be distracted.

“We’re continuing to invest in our leadership position in business banking because we know it’s competitive out there.”

“We are not here to defend it, we are here to extend it. We want to drive this business hard, and we’re going to do that.”

“I believe to my core that if you look after customers that they look after you.”