Latham woos industry with strategy of nurturing education and
talent  By John Garnaut August 10, 2004  Mark Latham would
reduce taxes for lower-income earners and fund new research and
development programs as part of a strategy to reinstate Labor as
a party of economic reform.  The Opposition Leader called for a
"second wave" of productivity improvements to meet challenges in
housing, tax, export competitiveness and household savings
rates, to complement Labor's reforms of the 1980s and 1990s
which, he said, had built the modern economy.  "Globalisation
makes economic reform an assignment without a completion date,"
Mr Latham told an Australian Industry Group forum at Parliament
House yesterday.  "The cost of abandoning reform is lower living
standards over time, something that the Labor Party won't
tolerate."  Mr Latham promised he would soon unveil policies to
improve work incentives and reform the tax system.  "People who
want to work harder on $30,000, $40,000 and $50,000 a year -
they deserve tax relief.