Tony Abbott hits the phones to rally G20 support

TONY Abbott is urging other G20 leaders to raise their ambitions for a summit in Brisbane next month to tackle the slowdown in world growth.

TONY Abbott is urging other G20 leaders to raise their ambitions for a summit in Brisbane next month to tackle the slowdown in world economic growth, using a series of phone calls with US President Barack Obama and others to set out an ambitious meeting agenda.

The Prime Minister spoke to Mr Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper yesterday and is due to speak to other G20 leaders in coming days to smooth the way for a reform pact that might one day add $2 trillion to the world economy.

His office said he spoke to Mr Obama for “around half an hour” yesterday on the terrorist threat in Iraq, the spread of Ebola and the G20 meeting. “The President thanked Australia for its efforts in Iraq and continued commitment to disrupting and degrading ISIL,” the Prime Minister’s office said in a statement.

“They agreed that the inter­national community needed to act swiftly to arrest the Ebola epidemic and the President thanked the Prime Minister for Australia’s contribution to date.”

Mr Abbott also spoke to Mr Harper yesterday to express Australia’s solidarity with Canada after a soldier was killed by a suspected jihadist in Quebec.

The conversations are part of a series of phone calls Mr Abbott is holding with his G20 counterparts to ensure a big economic agenda at the Brisbane summit, focused on a “Brisbane Action Plan” that commits to hundreds of reforms across the world’s 20 biggest economies.

Joe Hockey and his fellow G20 finance ministers have cleared the way for the agreement by proposing reforms that range from infrastructure investment to labour-market reform.

Italy has begun legislating new workplace laws that would make it easier for employers to hire and fire workers, for instance, while Germany is said to be preparing an infrastructure plan that could lift growth.

The International Monetary Fund and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development have examined the proposals and said they would add 1.8 per cent to world economic growth over the next five years if they were all implemented.

Mr Abbott is seeking further commitments to lift that figure to 2 per cent, the goal agreed by Mr Hockey and his counterparts at a meeting in Sydney in February.

Some doubts hang over the Brisbane summit on November 15 and 16, with the new Indonesian President Joko Widodo unsure about whether he will attend as he has yet to name his new ministry.