Alicia Payne (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Last night the Albanese Labor government handed down its most ambitious budget yet—a budget of resilience and reform, one that helps Australians through a global oil shock, with real cost-of-living relief right now, while building a stronger, fairer economy for the longer term. I want to talk about what this budget means for Canberrans. Since coming to office, our government has committed more than $4 billion to the ACT, and this budget builds on that record. There will be 260,000 working Canberrans receiving a new tax cut of up to $250 through the working Australians tax offset. On top of that, 140,000 Canberrans will benefit from a new $1,000 instant tax deduction.

The budget also makes housing fairer. We're reforming negative gearing and capital gains tax arrangements to ensure that more young Australians will have the opportunity to buy their first home—this is something that many Canberrans have raised with me—and we're putting in $50 million for the ACT's share of the local infrastructure fund to unlock more housing supply, building the power, roads and drains needed for new housing developments.

We're also investing $30 million for a new RSPCA animal welfare campus at Pialligo. The RSPCA is a much-loved and very important organisation in our community. We're investing $50 million, matched by the ACT and New South Wales governments, to upgrade the Canberra to Sydney rail link—something that has been a long time coming. Our national institutions are receiving an additional $20.2 million so they can continue to do their vital work of telling our nation's story. In that, it includes $9.9 million for the National Film and Sound Archive and $3 million for the Museum of Australian Democracy as it prepares for its centenary. We're ensuring that the CSIRO's groundbreaking research continues with an additional $387.4 million of funding on top of the extra $278 million announced last year. And for small business, we've made the $20,000 instant asset write-off permanent.

For people considering switching to an electric vehicle, we've locked in the FTB discounts until 2029 and beyond. We know that the stronger the uptake of EVs, the less exposed we are to shocks when oil prices spike. On that front, we're also building long-term fuel resilience by increasing our fuel reserves to 50 days and we're requiring gas companies to reserve 20 per cent of their supply to the Australian market.

The 2026 budget is a strong Labor budget, one that makes Australians more resilient and builds an economy that works for everyone. I'm also really proud of a measure in the budget that is helping more young Australians avoid homelessness. We know that too many young Australians are facing homelessness and that young people have no chance of building their futures if they don't have a stable home, and so I'm really proud that we are investing in helping social housing to make that fairer.

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