The Jobs and Skills Summit on September 1 and 2 provides business participants with a historic opportunity to influence economic policy decisions by the Albanese Labor government. There are important lessons to learn from the National Economic Summit nearly 40 years ago to avoid previous mistakes.

Bob Hawke’s Labor government won a mandate at the March 1983 election to hold a National Economic Summit and pursue a raft of economic reform initiatives that would fundamentally change the way the country was run. Many business leaders felt compelled to attend and support the reform process.