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The central bank's high-stakes fight against inflation will come under the microscope at the outgoing governor's last parliamentary hearing.

In what will be one of Philip Lowe's last public appearances as head of the Reserve Bank of Australia, he will likley be quizzed on his performance in the top job over the past seven years.

Flanked by his deputy and incoming governor, Michele Bullock, along with other senior officials, Dr Lowe and his colleagues will be asked to spell out the likely trajectory for returning inflation to target without tanking the economy.

The RBA, which has been chasing down high inflation with a series of interest rate hikes, revealed a fresh set of economic forecasts last week.

The predictions were largely unchanged from three months ago aside from a more pronounced slowdown in growth in the next few years, and a slightly lengthened timeline to return inflation to the two to three per cent target range.

The central bank has previously made it clear it's been willing to tolerate a slower return to target, now late 2025, than many of its global peers.

This should help most people stay in their jobs.

Whether or not four percentage points in interest rate hikes to date will be enough remains up in the air, although a second consecutive month on hold sparked hope the tightening cycle was over.

In both July and August, the RBA board opted to keep interest rates at 4.1 per cent.

Parliamentarians will also likely try and gauge the RBA's tolerance for lingering inflation risks, such as the exceptionally strong jobs market and lacklustre productivity growth.

Committee chair Daniel Mulino said inflation was starting to grow more slowly but remained a key challenge.

"'The committee takes its scrutiny of the RBA seriously and will continue to examine how the challenges of tackling high inflation are evolving - especially in light of the RBA's mandate of returning inflation to the two to three per cent range over time," he said.

The independent review into the Reserve Bank will probably also get some airtime.

A three-person review panel recommended a suite of reforms to bolster the central bank's leadership and decision-making prowess, including a dual-board structure.

The RBA has already committed to several other recommendations, such as fewer meetings a year and press conferences after interest rate meetings.

© AAP 2023

Spending habits and persistent services price inflation remain two major sources of uncertainty for the Reserve Bank in its fight against inflation.

In opening remarks to his last parliamentary economics hearing, RBA governor Philip Lowe said further tightening of interest rates was still possible to ensure inflation returns to target in a reasonable timeframe.

The central bank has hiked interest rates 12 times since May last year but has kept the cash rate on hold for two months in a row, fuelling speculation the peak has been reached.

Dr Lowe noted interest rates had been jacked up a lot in a short period and cash rate movements take time to work through the economy.

He said data flows were encouraging and lined up with Australia travelling down the "narrow path" he had been speaking about for some time.

"That path is one that leads to inflation coming down within a reasonable timeframe and the unemployment rate remaining below the levels of the past 40 years," Dr Lowe said.

But he said there were two main risks complicating this scenario.

The first was household consumption, which on one hand, has been supported by the strong labour market, and on the other, was under pressure from declining real incomes and higher borrowing costs.

"And, while around one million borrowers have already transitioned from low fixed-rate loans to loans with higher interest rates, a similar number will make that transition over the next 18 months," he said.

There was also a risk of services inflation staying high due to "strong demand for services in the wake of the pandemic, stronger growth in nominal wages and incomes and weak productivity growth".

A related concern is the threat of inflation expectations adjusting upwards, although Dr Lowe noted they were well-anchored.

"But the longer inflation stays high, the greater the likelihood that businesses and workers will come to doubt that inflation will return to target and, in response, they will adjust their behaviour,'' he said.

The hearing will be among Dr Lowe's last public appearances as head of the RBA.

Deputy and incoming governor Michele Bullock and other senior officials, also attended the hearing.

© AAP 2023

The NRL and Rugby League Players Association have settled on an in-principle collective bargaining agreement (CBA), ending a months-long dispute between the warring parties.

It will be a matter of days before the league's first billion-dollar CBA, which lasts until 2027 and covers men's and women's players, is ready to be implemented.

But the players' union confirmed to AAP that negotiations had been finalised after a series of crisis talks over the last 48 hours that ended in a handshake agreement late on Thursday.

All industrial action taken by the players, including the game-day media boycott announced last month, has been lifted immediately.

The possibility had also been floated of a boycott of the prestigious Dally M Awards, but any further action is off the table.

After more than a month refusing to speak to the media on game days, players resumed their usual commitments starting from Thursday night's clash between Manly and Penrith at Brookvale Oval.

"This has taken a long time to get done and the players have stood their ground," said RLPA general president and Manly skipper Daly Cherry-Evans.

"As always, we've used the RLPA to help us and it's prevailed with what we believe is a great deal for the game, for the players, past, present and future.

"It's exciting times."

The deal comes after 20 months of tension between the RLPA and NRL, which intensified in November when the new CBA became due.

The parties had resolved their financial differences last year, with the NRL proposing an increase in player payments of 37 per cent, with $1.35 billion to be designated to players between 2023 and 2027.

But in the nine months since the November deadline, the parties had remained at loggerheads over issues including access to and ownership of player data, allocation of funds to the RLPA's programs and the length of the season.

The previous CBA could only roll over until October 31 this year, leading to fears the dispute could stretch into the upcoming finals series and potentially leave the league without an agreement for the first time since 2003.

Aside from their media boycott, players taped over the NRL logo on their jerseys in round 22, and released a video titled Stand With Us hoping to garner support from fans as the stoush reached boiling point.

This week's crisis talks were attended by NRL chief executive Andrew Abdo, his RLPA counterpart Clint Newton, several players, Australian Rugby League Commission chairman Peter V'landys, and players' union representatives Tim Lythe and Deirdre Anderson.

© AAP 2023