New productivity tsar Danielle Wood is ready to deliver frank and fearless advice

New Productivity Commission chairwoman Danielle Wood says she will not automatically carry her politically controversial views into her new role.

New Productivity Commission chair Danielle Wood. Picture: NCA NewsWire / David Geraghty

New Productivity Commission chair Danielle Wood says she will not automatically carry her politically controversial views on issues such as raising the GST or rolling back super concessions into her new role.

Ms Wood said she would have an “open mind” to issues as they arrive on her desk and committed to “fiercely” defend the institution’s independence.

Before starting her new job as the country’s productivity tsar on Monday, Ms Wood was the head of the Grattan Institute, an independent and influential think tank that pushed for a raft of policy measures from which governments of both persuasions have shied away.

With the nation on track for 25 years of rolling deficits, for example, Ms Wood in her former role urged Labor to cut spending and raise taxes to repair the budget, and described the sweetheart GST distribution deal the former government struck with Western Australia as “untenable” given the state of the nation’s finances.

That deal expires in 2026, and the PC will be tasked with assessing the deal and advising the government before a new agreement is struck.

Despite her previous strong opinions on this and other topics, Ms Wood told The Australian “when we’re scheduled to look at that (GST deal) as a commission, we will go through the normal processes, and we will come up with a set of recommendations”.

Improving efficiency and quality in the services sector, including the care economy, is the greatest challenge and opportunity to improve the country’s lacklustre productivity performance.

“I will begin topics with an open mind and go through that process,” she said.

The decision by Jim Chalmers to create for the first time a “statement of expectations” between the government and the PC has raised concerns that the Treasurer’s plan to renovate and refocus the institution towards Labor’s priorities could undermine its ability to provide unbiased independent advice.

But Ms Wood said she would be “fiercely protective” of the independence of the commission.

“The statement of expectations makes it clear they really want the recommendations and advice coming out of the PC to be as practical as possible. We will be focusing on the types of policies that governments can pick up if they have got the political will, and we will still be saying things that are politically hard in some cases,” she said.

Ms Wood is the first woman to head the PC, and she takes over the role at a time when productivity growth has collapsed to zero over the Covid years, and in the context of a worrying structural slowdown in the decade leading up to the pandemic that threatens to undermine the nation’s future prosperity.

Ms Wood said she is particularly concerned with improving the longer-term vibrancy of the economy. “When you think of the rate of the development of things like AI and with every wave of technological change, it just takes a while to work out how to use it to transform the way we produce goods and services,” she said.

“The really important thing about this technological wave is that when we look at the components of the economy where it’s been hardest to get productivity gains, such as health and education … some really lend themselves to the benefits of AI.”