Simon Kennedy (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

I'm not interjecting. I have the call, so I'm not interjecting. If she wants to interject, I'll take the interjection. But Andrew will not love these changes. This is what Labor's capital gains tax changes look like, and this is what it looks like when you call them out in parliament—defensiveness, no listening and telling people like Andrew that they'll love them. I've had enough of it, and you can tell I'm hot under the collar, and I am, because I think this could destroy Australians. They're getting double the CGT tax that I have ever paid. Not only are you getting double the CGT tax that I ever paid; you'll be paying more in income tax than I have ever paid because of Labor's bracket creep tax. Every single year, your income tax will go up, and, as I read out here today, you will lose the negative gearing benefits that all boomers have had and that I have had. You will never have those same opportunities.

Instead of actually showing some self-reflection and wondering why people like Andrew and Lyn are writing in to me, asking me to come to parliament and fight for them, which I will do—I will not be deterred from fighting for you. Instead of listening, being curious and asking questions, we hear interjections, interrupting my speech, that you will love them. I've had enough of that. This isn't just a debate for economists, accountants and politicians. This is about Andrew and his wife, a teacher and a nurse. These are two people serving their community, working hard, saving and investing, taking risks, trying to do the most basic Australian thing imaginable—buy a home and build a future. But their deposit is now being taxed double than what my deposit was when I invested in shares and ETFs, just like them. What message are they getting from this government?

What they're hearing is, if you work hard, save carefully and invest responsibly, Labor will come after you. Andrew and his wife are not asking for special treatment. They're just asking for the same settings that applied to every other Australian until two weeks ago. Andrew and his wife are not asking for a handout. They're not asking for free money from the government. They're not asking for someone else to pay their way. They're doing exactly what every government says young Australians should do. They're working. They're saving, they're investing, and they're trying to get ahead—a teacher and a nurse. But Labor's answer is to punish them at a time when inflation has already made it harder to save for a deposit. You're struggling, and I know many in my electorate are. I'm here fighting for you. At a time when inflation has pushed your rents higher, when mortgages are out of reach because interest rates are higher, while there's a war in Iran with inflation going up and while petrol prices are going up, Labor is now making the ladder even harder for you to climb because you are going to pay higher tax than any generation before you—far more than me. I think that's incredibly unfair.

This is intergenerational unfairness at the very heart of these changes. Older Australians have had the chance to build their wealth under a completely different set of rules with lower taxation. Younger Australians are now being told the rules will change just as you start trying to get ahead. They're now being locked out of homeownership, so they're asking you to invest in other assets to build a future, but then they come up with a tax on that too—doubling CGT. CGT now being at the top rate taxed at 47 per cent. In New Zealand, it's zero per cent. In Singapore, it's zero per cent. In communist China, it's more than half what ours is at 20 per cent. We have a communist country with less than half the CGT that we have. I'm almost speechless. I don't understand it.

I would love to fight an election on this issue. It's a shame we didn't, and they weren't upfront about it 12 months ago. I think we would have had a very different result. I'd love to, but they're trying to jam it in between elections. I think we could win an election on this, but I hope they backflip on it. I really do hope this is backflipped on because I think it will destroy Australia. We're hearing about carve-outs, and now we're hearing in the press carve-outs aren't going to fix it. It's not going to go far enough. We need these taxes axed for Andrew and his wife, a teacher and a nurse. That is the face of what is happening here. This budget's not just a fiscal document; it's a statement of values. And Labor's values are clear. If you work hard, they're going to tax you more. If you save, they will tax you more. If you invest, they will tax you more. If you run a small business, they will tax you more. If you try to build a future for your family, they will make that harder. It's not reform; it's an assault on everyday Australians. And the great contradiction is this: Labor says it wants more housing and more housing supply, but its policies will drive investment away from housing. Labor says it wants to help renters, but fewer investors means fewer rental homes, and we know how many: 35,000. It's in black and white in the budget papers for that policy.

Now, they try and trickily say it will lead to a 35,000 increase, because they came up with another plan, spending the money they're taxing from you to build more homes, which they've been unable to do in the first four years in government. But this time they're saying, 'Trust us.' Well, they said that at the election 12 months ago, and you've seen just 12 months later how much you can trust.

This is a government that can't manage its spending. Spending is at a 40-year high outside the pandemic. That is why this is the highest taxing budget of all time—it's one of the highest spending governments of all time. And Australians are just starting to wake up to where they get the money from. It's from you. But, because those tax settings haven't changed aggressively, this increased government spending is catching up with them, and this is the only way they can pay for it. It is increasing the taxes on people like Andrew and his wife, who's a nurse. It's everyday Australians.

So this Treasurer can dress this up however he likes, but Australians can see what's happening. This is a government addicted to spending and looking for new ways to fund it, pushing tax hikes onto millions of Australians. Under Labor, families have been hit across the board. Gas is up, electricity is up, food's up, health costs are up, education's up, child care is up, insurance is up, rents keep going up. And then, after all of that, Australians are being asked to pay even more tax—none more so than the next generation. That's why people are angry. That's why our social media feeds are littered with memes. They're not angry because they've refused to contribute. Australians are happy to contribute. They just want a fair go. They pay income tax. They pay GST. They pay rents. They pay strata fees, levies and charges. Small businesses pay company tax, payroll tax, workers comp, insurance and compliance costs. Investors already pay CGT tax. Retirees pay tax. Families pay tax every day in one form or another. What they object to is a government that wastes money, drives up inflation, breaks promises and then lectures Australians about fairness and tells them they should love it. That's what I heard here today. 'You should love it.' There's nothing fair about telling a young nurse and teacher that they should love a path that they don't. There's nothing fair about telling a retiree who built a modest property portfolio through sacrifice that their plan is now under threat. There's nothing fair about treating aspiration and hard work as a loophole. Hard work is not a loophole. Saving is not a loophole. Australia should be a place where aspiration is rewarded, where a teacher and nurse can believe that, if they work hard and save carefully, homeownership is still possible, where retirees who plan for their future are not punished for staying off the pension, where small businesses can invest with certainty and where young Australians are encouraged to build wealth, not told that Canberra will take more money away from them for the wealth and homes and assets they're trying to buy.

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