Andrew Willcox (Dawson, Liberal National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Manufacturing and Sovereign Capability) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Regional Australia has done the heavy lifting to line the pockets of this Treasury. Yet where has that record revenue gone? It has vanished, into the insatiable appetite of the Labor government's coffers. It has been spent on absolutely nothing that helps the ordinary family survive this crisis. Instead of using this windfall to structurally repair our economy, pay down our massive national debt or build wealth-generating infrastructure in the regions, the Treasurer has locked in an aggregate deficit of a staggering $150.5 billion over the forward estimates for the period 2029 to 2030. The underlying cash deficit for this immediate period starts at a staggering $28.3 billion and climbs even higher over the forward estimates. This government has pulled off a disastrous double. It is spending record amounts of public money, while leaving our economy weaker than ever.

Does this government simply not understand that people are hurting? People are facing genuine, raw desperation. They are angry. They are frustrated. And they feel completely abandoned by the Prime Minister, who promised them a $275 reduction in their electricity bills, a promise repeated 97 times, which—surprise, surprise!—was an untruth.

Broken promises have been the theme of this budget, because, in the Labor playbook, every single time a promise is broken, the taxpayer is the one who picks up the tab. Labor's only solution to the widespread desperation of the people of this great nation is to tax them even more and introduce sweeping changes to capital gains tax, negative gearing and the taxation of trusts that will penalise investment and drive a knife through the heart of domestic productivity.

Don't take my word for it. Some of the most respected independent economic minds in the country are looking at this budget with absolute contempt. They see a Labor government who's completely abandoned fiscal discipline. In a sobering post-budget analysis, the economic team at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia said that this budget represents a massive missed opportunity in the fight against inflation. At the exact moment inflation is peaking, Labor is still printing and spending more money, throwing debt fuel on a fire that is already burning through family budgets. The Reserve Bank of Australia itself has dropped diplomatic subtlety in an assessment of this fiscal recklessness. The Reserve Bank's own board minutes show that they are deeply worried that the government's spending is sabotaging the fight against inflation. The writing is on the wall, and the RBA have warned that, if this reckless spending doesn't stop, high inflation will be locked into the economy.

Financial models are now forecasting a further cash rate increase in the upcoming September quarter of 2026, a move that will automatically push repayments even higher for families who are already at their absolute breaking point. Across the country, business leaders have reacted with equal fury to this tax-heavy agenda. They have blown the whistle, warning that this budget drops an absolute tax bomb on small business. They are pointing out that the changing tax rules overnight will completely destroy local confidence, especially when our small-business operators are already battling a brutal surge in their everyday running costs.

You cannot tax a nation into prosperity, and you cannot stabilise an economy by dropping a tax bomb on the very people who take the risks and create local jobs. The most cynical, damaging aspect of the budget is the way it systematically snuffs the light out on aspirational young Australians. Think about a young worker in Dawson today. They aren't doing it tough; they are trapped on an economic treadmill they cannot outrun. They face skyrocketing utility bills and they face the constant looming threat of endless rent rises thanks to soaring inflation. They are taking on second jobs only to watch their hard earned cash get cannibalised by bracket creep. The game is completely rigged against them.

No-one is safe from the Albanese agenda to increase taxes on the people of this country. When a worker puts in overtime, this government treats them like a target to be plundered. When will this government learn? When you penalise effort, you simply get less of it. This budget completely crushes the ambition of youth, trapping them in a permanent rental cycle and telling them having a go is no longer worth the struggle. The Albanese Labor government is taking the tools that make wealth away from our youth. If you want to see where our national wealth is being completely wasted, look no further than the multibillion-dollar black hole of Labor's net zero obsession. Billions of taxpayers funds are being funnelled to green corporate welfare, while giant wind and solar projects destroy our regional forests, lock up our farmland and fracture our communities.

Let us examine the complete economic failure of this energy transition. The government has spent billions of dollars on transmission lines, foreign engineered wind turbines and overseas made solar panels and batteries, yet power bills for ordinary families have jumped by around 40 per cent. It is an extraordinary display of financial incompetence. This Labor government has managed to spend record amounts of public money to make electricity more expensive and less reliable. Without cheap, reliable, continuous baseload energy an industrial economy simply cannot function. Labor's green energy spending is a multibillion-dollar monument to waste, a policy that locks regional Australia into structural disadvantage, while everyday Australians pay the price through sky-high electricity prices.

This brings me straight to the total hypocrisy of this government's big slogan: Future Made in Australia. The hard reality on the ground is that, in heavy industrial hubs like Paget, this policy is an absolute sham. You cannot build, maintain or expand a sovereign manufacturing sector if you do not have access to cheap, reliable, continuous power. It is a physical and economical impossibility. Heavy engineering, advanced steel fabrication, automated assembly and mineral processing require massive amounts of energy. When a government deliberately drives up the cost of that energy through ideological inventions, it makes Australian manufacturing completely unproductive. We are seeing iconic regional smelters, processing plants and chemical facilities across this nation pushed to the absolute edge of operational survival, requiring emergency government interventions and bailouts just to survive.

The fundamental failure of these appropriations is the complete and total lack of basic human empathy. This government simply does not understand the depth of the pain its policies are causing. People are facing genuine, terrifying desperation. The people of regional Australia are angry, and they have every right to be angry. They are deeply frustrated because they feel completely invisible to the Prime Minister, who promised them a better future and delivered nothing but broken words and shattered trust. They were promised a better life. Instead, they've been hit by consecutive interest rate rises that have stripped hundreds of dollars out of their disposable income every single month.

And what is this government's response to the widespread regional suffering? The answer is always the same from Labor: tax them even more. The Albanese Labor government is increasing the tax burden via bracket creep. They're hitting our small business with an investor tax bomb, they're targeting our primary producers with unfair biosecurity levies and they're swinging a green hammer down on our heavy industries. Labor hold some sort of misguided belief that every single economic problem can be solved by seizing more money from the pockets of working Australians and spending it on vanity pet projects. It's an absolute insult to the intelligence of our people. This government has spent billions of dollars on consultants, billions on international climate frameworks, billions on expanding the Public Service, while the hardworking people who keep the wheels of the nation turning are left to drown in their bills.

This cannot continue. A nation that systematically penalises effort, crushes the aspirations of its youth and abandons all semblance of physical discipline is a nation that is actively engineered to its own economic decline. We need an immediate, unconditional return to economic common sense. Labor must stop the reckless public spending that is actively fuelling this inflationary firestorm. We must dismantle the green bureaucracy that is strangling manufacturing, and we must start backing the aspirational Australians who are trying to build a secure life for their children.

Jerome Laxale (Bennelong, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The world we live in today is not the same as it was 30 years ago. It's not the same as it was a couple of years ago. Once-in-a-generation events are now more and more commonplace and no longer do we have the global stability previous generations grew accustomed to. In much of the commentary out there and in most of the correspondence in my inbox there's been a pretty clear message. It's what I get in my inbox and what I get out on the streets when I engage with locals in my home of Bennelong. It's clear to me and to them that things need to change and change for the better.

People who approach me, identify an injustice that working people are bearing the load of our nation's tax take, which is why people are demanding action. The bare necessities are now a struggle for so many people, and many hardworking Australians are scraping by. In no sector is this more profound and debilitating than housing. If you want to own your own home, housing prices are now eight times higher than the average salary. Rents have gone up across the country. My message is that the government hears you. While we have thrown record amounts of funding at housing supply—$47 billion to date—we have the understanding to acknowledge that there's more to do. That's why at this budget we have done more. Instead of just talking about reform, we're trying to deliver it.

It's not okay for a government that hears from people directly just to kick the can down the road. It's not fair on young people who have been locked out of the housing market for a generation or who are trying to get their start buying their first home. I want to talk about what we've done, what we are doing and what we will do in this and future budgets. From Medicare to housing, tax cuts and support for small business, we want to attack this cost-of-living crisis head on from every angle possible. This budget is another way we're helping Australians in these challenging and tumultuous times.

It'd be no surprise to you, Deputy Speaker, that Labor is committed to strengthening Medicare, and that's exactly what's happened in Bennelong and across the country. In Bennelong, we've recently officially opened the Top Ryde Medicare mental health centre, which provides an important walk-in service for our community, with no appointments needed. We've locked in the local Ryde and Chatswood Medicare urgent care clinics, now making them a permanent feature of our primary healthcare system with $1.8 billion worth of funding in this budget over the forward estimates. They are part of a national network of 135 clinics that are open, with two more to come. By the time those two more open, four out of five Australians will live within a 20-minute drive of an urgent care clinic, providing bulk-billing, urgent care and taking pressure off our hospital emergency departments.

Our record investment in GP practices and increasing bulk-billing is working. From 1 November, Bennelong has increased from nine bulk-billing practices to 23 as at March. In New South Wales, bulk-billing is up, as it is across the board. This is on top of making medicines cheaper, ensuring you pay $25 per script. Had we not made those changes for cheaper medicines, we'd probably be hitting $50 out of pocket per script now. But, when we came to government, we reduced it and we reduced it again down to $25 whilst also capping those who have concession cards to $7.70 until 2029-30.

We've also delivered tax cuts. We recognise that the tax burden on working Australians in particular is too high. So in four years in government we've delivered five tax cuts in four different ways. Firstly, we made the stage 3 tax cuts fairer, diverting more relief to low- and middle-income earners who would have missed out under Scott Morrison's plan. We've got more tax cuts coming in from 1 July this year and another round of tax cuts coming in from 1 July 2027. A huge reform being introduced in the parliament this Thursday is the $1,000 instant tax deduction for those with simple tax affairs. They'll be able to lodge their tax return in six clicks, I think, and they'll be able to claim that $1,000 tax deduction, which will save people between $200 and $300 on their tax bill every year. And we're introducing a new and targeted way to deliver tax relief to working Australians. That's through the working Australian tax offset—$250 coming off your tax bill, which will be fantastic. All up, that's around $2,800 for the average worker, delivered by Labor and specifically designed to ease the burden on income earned through labour, to help people keep more of what they earn.

But what we're seeing here in Australia is pretty common around the world. In the US, the UK, Canada, Europe, people are calling for change, calling for reform. They say here in Australia and across the world that the status quo isn't working. That's why we've taken the really tough decisions to put through these progressive reforms in this budget. Predictably, there have been scare campaigns about this. I mean, some of the stuff we're addressing has been talked about for 40 years. The Asprey review in 1975 recommended some of the tax changes we're seeking to address at this budget. The same people that have always opposed this reform are continuing to oppose this reform, and I'm not surprised. But, as a government, we need to take on those scare campaigns because we can't defend the status quo any more. We can't.

It would have been very easy to look at everything that's going on in the world and say: 'You know what? We're just going to leave things as they are.' That's essentially what the opposition are arguing for here. They don't have any other options to address the housing crisis, to help first home owners get into their home or to deliver costed, funded tax relief for working Australians. They're just there trying to tear this reform down and defend the status quo. What we're seeking to do is bring in a fairer system that allows more Australians to have the same opportunities that I did, that my parents did and that those before them did.

Intergenerational equity was at the heart of this budget and something that was identified by leaders of business, by unions and by experts at the productivity roundtable late last year. Firstly, we're going to reform negative gearing for residential property investments and target this reform to new builds only. This could have been done long ago and probably should have been done long ago, because it will still encourage investment in housing—and that's a good thing—but it will target that investment into the construction of new homes, not just bid up the prices of existing ones. New homes have a substantial benefit to our country through more jobs on the tools and more homes to go into the market to help with rental affordability and housing affordability. Naturally, the changes we're bringing in are grandfathered so that, if you currently own a negatively geared home as an investor, you can continue to do so.

We're fixing the errors of the Liberal government when they introduce the capital gains tax discount with their blunt measure in 1999, which only ended up completely distorting the housing market and locking people out for a whole generation. This policy was a mistake. It was originally designed to encourage investment into the share market. Well, that failed. Investment in shares did not grow as intended. Instead people invested in housing, and that's what has led to the complete distortion of the housing market that young people face today.

But it's not just in tax reform that we're addressing housing. On top of our $47 billion we've now got an additional $2 billion in funding for critical infrastructure like roads and sewerage through another round of the Housing Support Program. All these things are meaningful and ongoing action to help with the housing crisis.

On small business there's $3½ billion worth of new measures alone. There's been a lot of noise around the impact of this budget on small business but not much acknowledgement that this budget goes a long way to helping small businesses invest and maintain growth. The instant asset write-off will be made permanent from 1 July 2026. This is a great Labor reform, first brought in by the Rudd government. That instant asset write-off gives small businesses the incentive to purchase equipment valued at up to $20,000, and have that instant asset write-off. What has happened since it was introduced is that every year it has needed to be reconfirmed. This didn't give small businesses certainty. Even in the last parliament, the legislation would only pass right at the last minute. Cautious small businesses wouldn't go out and invest throughout the year, probably on sound advice from their accountant, until that legislation went through. 'Wait until the law goes through before you spend this money.' It being made permanent means that small businesses can go and invest up to $20,000 and get that instant asset tax deduction.

We're delivering a permanent two-year loss carry-back for all companies with up to $1 billion worth of turnover, which can offset future profits. We are introducing loss refundability to support startup businesses invest and grow in their first two years of operation. This is a huge reform for small startups. It means they can get cash flow relief if they have loss refundability in their first two years of operation. We're expanding tax incentives for venture capital to help unlock capital for young and expanding businesses. And we're reforming the R&D tax incentive, targeting that a lot more to allow young businesses greater access to the refundable tax offset as they grow.

And don't forget that our reforms and tax cuts in the PAYG system, in the marginal tax rates, also benefit sole traders. The working Australians tax offset will go to 1½ million sole traders. A lot of them are tradies, a lot of them are hairdressers—they will have access to that $250 tax offset as well.

Predictably, those opposite oppose these changes. That's despite both the current shadow Treasurer and former Treasurer Joe Hockey who, we heard today, during his last speech to this parliament, said: 'Do you know what? We really should target negative gearing towards new supply.' Never mind that he could have done that for—how long was he in parliament for? Ten years or something? He could have advocated for it when he was actually the Treasurer. He could have done that, but no. Instead of doing it on the way out, we're going to do it while we're in government. It's a good reform. These reforms are necessary because the status quo isn't working. We can't continue to ignore the facts out there, and the facts are that the status quo isn't working.

Those opposite have voted against every cost-of-living measure we've brought to this place, and they went to the last election promising to increase taxes for working Australians. We'll see what they do on Thursday, whether or not they will once again vote against tax cuts brought forward by this government.

And then, of course, there was the opposition leader's budget reply. It was one long dog whistle, seeking to blame migrants and permanent residents—building on his policy announcements from before—and calling them a drain on Australia. That's not the Australia I grew up in, and it's certainly not an Australia that I want to continue. The Liberal Party's budget response is just trying to emulate One Nation. It's more about what's happening on the Right of politics than what's the best for our country.

We need to build a better Australia for young people, to give them the opportunity to own their first home, to give them a foothold. Already these policies are working. Every weekend, we're seeing news reports of first home buyers getting into their first home. They're shocked, surprised that they are no longer competing against investors for existing stock. This is a good thing. We need people to have the aspiration to own their first home, just like I was able to and just like many people in previous generations were able to. These are tough reforms, but we are doing them for the right reasons and at the right time. I commend these bills to the House.

Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Centre Alliance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

At no time in the last 10 years have I received so many emails and handwritten mail about a budget. And I have to tell you, very little of that was positive—very, very little. Whether it be private health insurance changes for older Australians, around limiting veterans' access to support, changes to trusts or capital gains tax or, indeed, negative gearing, overwhelmingly, people in my community have said to me that they feel betrayed by the government. In fact, the government went to the election just a year ago promising that they weren't going to change negative gearing and capital gains tax in particular. They didn't even mention trusts, discretionary trusts and testamentary discretionary trusts. A year in, they have completely changed their position.

My community overwhelmingly feels that, if the government are confident in their decision-making, they should take those proposals to an election, just as John Howard did when he was Prime Minister, with respect to the GST. He had the courage of his convictions to do that. We've seen the Prime Minister himself saying that he had said over 50 times he wasn't going to make the changes. A year in, the changes are made. Having been a member for 10 years now, I know that the wheels of government move very slowly. I wonder when the government actually went to the Treasury and asked for modelling with respect to capital gains tax and negative gearing, because I can't believe that it was just a recent aberration that happened in the last couple of months.

I'd like to read comments from my community to you on these issues. With respect to private health insurance changes, Geoff from Strathalbyn said:

I am disgusted with Labor's treatment of aged pensioners who have sacrificed much to pay private health insurance. At the age of 80, when health insurance is critical, I'm having to think about scrapping it to be able to afford power, water and food.

Andy from Craigburn Farm said:

This harsh and unfair policy will probably result in more senior Australians dropping their private health cover. Australians at the most vulnerable period of their lives, don't deserve this.

Jonathon said:

As someone who has had private health cover since my mid 20s, I now need to decide what else I can cut back should I wish to keep it. I urge you to press the Government on the unfairness of this cruel and short-sighted decision.

With respect to veterans health, my inbox is overflowing with correspondence from veterans, veterans' family members and, indeed, some of our RSLs about the changes. Macclesfield RSL wrote to me and said:

Immediate concern for many veterans in your electorate is the capping of Allied Health Care. This will result in many veterans' foregoing treatment with regards to Physio, Psychology, Occupational Therapy, and Exercise Physiology as examples. The new $5000 cap will mean that some veterans will have to decide between mental health and physical health, unless they go through another administration process to seek approval to get the treatment they need and deserve. As the Government spin doctors are hard at work trying to dress up the budget as a win for veterans.

What I think really went to the nub of Macclesfield RSL's communication with me is this:

If the same impediments were placed before other demographics of our community, there would be an uprising, but for those who wrote a blank cheque for their country for and up to the sacrificing of their life, we look away.

With respect to trust in the budget, I've received a huge amount of correspondence. Ryan said to me:

With respect to the proposed changes on trusts, I see this as an attempt to further tax a sector of people who are productive, hardworking and financially responsible. This Government appears to want to punish those who work hard, are economically productive and plan for their future under the guise of some kind of "Robin Hood" ethics.

Alan said:

I left school at 16. I am now 77 and a fully self-funded retiree. No handouts. Full health insurance. Now I'm the target to fund Labor's massive debt. Please voice our concern as to the mess this … Treasurer and Prime Minister are leaving us in.

Andrew said:

I am a 28-year-old. Rather than encouraging aspiration economic opportunity and personal freedom, I believe this budget further entrenches Government control while weakening intergenerational equity and the ability of younger Australians to build prosperous futures for themselves.

Ben, an estate lawyer, wrote to me and said:

My concern is that testamentary trusts are being caught up in a broader policy conversation about discretionary trusts, without sufficient recognition of their unique role in estate planning. The primary purpose of a testamentary discretionary trust is to protect an inheritance for children, widows, widowers, disabled beneficiaries and vulnerable adults after a person's death.

Jacqui said: 'It seems obvious to me that the government is making tax changes that favour younger voters at the expense of older voters. It's a blatant attempt to garner stronger support from a younger voter base.'

Let's go to capital gains tax, which we remember that the Prime Minister said he had no plans and he wasn't going to do it 'for the 50th time'. Andrew wrote to me and said:

I've never written to my local MP before—

I've got to say I've received so many emails starting with that—

I feel like this budget is a direct attack on me and my family. We made decisions and voted based on the promises made by Labor at the last election. These promises have been completely flipped and so has my family's ability to succeed. To make matters worse I have always hoped to be able to leave my kids with some kind of wealth once my wife and I pass. Now the Labor Government wants to get their hands on that as well.

Sally wrote:

I never write emails to politicians, but I'm scared. I'm trying so hard to save enough for retirement and pay off my mortgage, and it all seems impossible now. I'm a 57-year-old woman living in a single income household, doing my best to accumulate enough money to self-fund my retirement by the age of 65. The proposed CGT changes mean I won't be able to gradually sell down shares to fund my own retirement and will likely end up on the pension.

Scott said:

The package is presented as addressing the housing-investor tax bias and intergenerational unfairness. On the actual mechanics, it does close to the opposite—it tightens tax treatment for productive equity investment, while preserving, and in places concentrating, the structural advantages of leveraged residential property.

Paul said:

I'm saving for a house. Your budget just added years to my timeline.

Ari said:

I'm a 24-year-old middle-income earner and I don't own a home. I'm exactly the kind of person this policy is supposedly designed to help. I'm trying to build wealth through shares and Exchange Traded Funds because I can't access the housing ladder. The CGT reform hits people like me hardest. It raises the cost of the one wealth building option still available to me.

Hans said:

My son has been saving diligently with bitcoin for five years and has just recently accumulated enough for a deposit to buy a house. This is no longer the case with this CGT increase which now sets back the time for a deposit by at least another two years.

Honestly, they're maybe just two per cent of the emails I've received on this. This is the first time as a member of parliament I just cannot support a budget that's been handed down by the government, and that's because it's not built on promises and trust. It's the complete opposite.

Let's look at housing. I have three adult children. I want to see them get a house, just like I was able to get a house in my 20s. If we genuinely want to reduce the demand on housing, here are some policies that the government may decide to consider that would reduce demand without taxing Australians. Canada has actively reduced their immigration. They've paused short-term population growth, and they have alleviated pressure on housing and their public services. Their federal government has significantly slashed both permanent and temporary resident targets. Canada is a nation of 41 million people. They slashed their permanent resident targets by 20 per cent. It's capped non-permanent residents to five per cent of their total population—1.5 million. They've targeted in that international students, with strict caps on international student enrolments, and they've tightened the eligibility rules for foreign workers. This has seen a significant decline in their house prices. That's why they did the shift. They did that because they wanted to put their people first. And Justin Trudeau, he's hardly a right winger, is he? I mean, he was a left-wing Prime Minister who said, 'We didn't get the balance quite right,' and that's why they pivoted towards reducing migration. Why are we not doing this here? We're a population of 28 million. We had a net permanent migration in 2024-25 of over 300,000 people. Canada has 1.5 million temporary migrants. We have three million temporary migrants on our soil in Australia. Student visa holders make up around two 720,000 of those. Each of those need to live in a home. Now, if we go back to our student visa numbers, in 2016-17, the year I started, we had 343,000 temporary student visa holders. We now offer 720,000 and we wonder why we have a housing crisis.

When we look at permanent migration, if we go back to the numbers again—let's look at the year 2016—we had 206,000 people who came here as permanent migrants in 2016. If we go back to 2004, before Kevin Rudd was Prime Minister, when we saw the mass increase in house prices along with a mass increase in population, we had under 100,000 people coming to Australia.

I understand the Canadian government has reduced the capacity for people who are either temporary migrants or are overseas investors to purchase established dwellings—we have a temporary ban on that—but they can still purchase vacant land or new dwellings. If we want to reduce demand, why don't we do that? Why don't we say: in order to buy land or a new home or indeed an established home in Australia, you need to be a permanent resident or an Australian citizen. Why is it that, when the government introduced their five per cent deposit scheme, they didn't cap that just to Australian citizens? That's madness. We do that with HECS. We say you need to be an Australian citizen to access HECS—or a refugee. You can't be a permanent migrant to do that. So now the Australian taxpayer is actually on the hook for people who are not Australian citizens to get into the housing market with just a five per cent deposit. If they default, Australian taxpayers are landed with the mess; it's just insane. And by the way, 50,000 people who are not Australian citizens have entered that scheme.

If we genuinely want to make sure that our next generation is able to own a home, we need to be looking after ourselves first and we're not doing that. This budget doesn't do that. In fact, this budget punishes Australians for the benefit of everyone else. I would urge the government, if you genuinely believe that the capital gains tax and the changes to negative gearing—which you're applying to shares but you're somehow saying that it relates to housing affordability—then take it to an election. Just take it to an election. Do the honourable thing. Do what John Howard did. He had the courage of his conviction and he did it.

I can't tell you how many emails I've received but I think that the government needs to do better on this. For the first time in a decade, I just cannot support this budget bill.

Rowan Holzberger (Forde, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

After a year in this place and after my first budget, it's time to reflect on the philosophy of this government, which, after four years, has become clear. The Prime Minister sums it up when he says his core philosophy is no-one left behind and no-one held back. He really summed up his approach the other day, acknowledging that this is a tough decision. He knows that this is well and truly contested in the community. But he said that if you see something wrong—he said it a bit more eloquently than I'm quoting him—do you just throw your hands in the air and say, 'I can't do anything about it? I'm only the Prime Minister'?

Fundamentally, what has become clear to me—and this is something which I have been keenly urging the government on, and the Labor Party, frankly, for many years—is that this is a government which is challenging the status quo. There was an interjection today—forgive me for not remembering the member's electorate. The Prime Minister said, 'It's hard to buy a house,' and the coalition member yelled out, 'And it's getting harder!' The Prime Minister seized on that and said, yes, it is getting harder. This is a government which doesn't shy away from the fact that the status quo is not delivering for the Australian people and the Australian community. He doesn't shy away from the fact that people are doing it tough and that in many ways people feel like it's getting even harder, and not just in housing. There are two ways to tackle that. You can throw your hands up in the air and say, 'I'm only the Prime Minister. I'm not going to do anything about,' or you can tackle it head on—be courageous, have the courage of your convictions and make the changes which you believe are going to have an impact.

So let's have a look at what that status quo is. The reason why I'm so energised by what the government is doing in this budget is that we have now had decades of an agenda of privatisation, economic rationalism and unfettered free trade, which has seen the working class communities that I represent decimated in many ways. Whole industries have been decimated. The textile and clothing industry is gone, after decades of unfettered free trade. The manufacturing industry is on the ropes. Having taken an approach—and just remember that the coalition were in government for 20 of the last 30 years—where you leave housing to the private sector and don't invest in public housing, having taken an approach where you leave energy creation to the private sector and don't invested in public energy, it is unsurprising that you end up, 30 years later, with a housing crisis and an energy crisis.

I like the way the members opposite are having a little bit of a smirk at me. Is Labor really the enemy at the moment? I think that's what the opposition members need to ask themselves. As they pander to the supporters of One Nation, are they really getting any benefit by attacking us? It's not us coming for you in your seats at the moment. It's not us that are focused on ourselves, like the three parties of the right are. I don't know that they really should be smirking at the moment, but they are. I guess that's the sort of attitude that's landed them in the position they're in. It's sad, in a way, to be here in the parliament to watch the demise of the once great Liberal Party, but there it is. Ultimately, it is this status quo that they have implemented over the years, with their ideology of privatisation, economic rationalism and unfettered free trade.

This government is tackling the areas of housing, health, mental health, child care, skills, industry, energy, aged care, NDIS and tax. Over four years, this government's agenda has become clear. It is an agenda of sticking up for working class people again, ensuring the services that we all pay for. We dig the stuff out of the ground. We farm the fields. We work in the factories. We work in the aged-care centres. We work as teachers. Working class people build this nation and working class people should have a share in the wealth that's created by this nation. When John Howard became Prime Minister, Australia was one of the most egalitarian countries in the world, yet, 30 years later, we have become one of the most unequal countries in the world. That's why they shouldn't be smirking, because the backlash is going to be severe in their electorates.

I think the government acknowledges that tax is the most contested area in this budget, despite the fact that we're about to see the opposition yet again vote against another tax cut. The changes around CGT and negative gearing have created a lot of conversation in the community. I've only sat here through the member for Mayo's speech, but I'm sure there's been the same half-truths and misinformation supported and trotted out as in question time.

I had a conversation with somebody called Mark last night. He said to me, 'I can't support this budget because I've had a strategy to retire'—he's probably a little bit younger than me, in his 40s—'and that's all gone out the window now.' I said: 'I like to listen; I don't really like to argue and persuade, but can I just try this one out on you? You know the capital gains tax exemption discounts are still going to be there. They're going to be indexed.' He went: 'No. What does that mean?' I said it means that you're going to be able to deduct inflation off the actual capital growth. I explained it to him because he didn't know it was going to be there—because it is in the interest of those on the other side to maintain these mistruths.

As the Treasurer said, when you actually look at the impact that this change to indexation will have on shares, if you extrapolate that over the last 20 years, there will be either no change or, in some cases, people will be better off. They would have been better off had there been a system of indexation over the previous 20 years. When I sit down and crunch the numbers with the people that are sending me emails, as I do, there are many scenarios where people who have bought a house or an apartment are going to be better off under indexation.

Ultimately, when you do crunch those numbers, what you're trying to see is government moderating capital growth in housing. To put it in investment terms, this is about trying to get that wild capital growth that we saw of sometimes eight, nine or 10 per cent a year. That's when house prices doubled almost every seven years over the last couple of decades. What we're trying to do is moderate that capital growth and actually bring it back more in line with inflation. Isn't that the whole point? Shouldn't wages and house prices be coupled together? Isn't there something broken in the system when those two things break apart?

Let's take the example of five per cent capital growth and three per cent inflation—we wish! Take that example and apply that to marginal rates of tax. In that example, it's pretty easy to see that some people will actually be substantially better off. But I'm sure those opposite aren't spending any time talking through the facts with the people that email them.

Again, I don't want to single out the member for Mayo, because I know that this is the line that's being trotted out by the opposition—and it is a line. In some of the emails I've got, there has been this concern that they have been using shares to save up their deposit because they, frankly, are not able to get themselves into a leveraged property. The only way to take $10,000 and make it grow is to invest in shares, with a dream, perhaps, of one day buying a house. I totally get that. But there is an extraordinary irony in the statement that you can't get your foot on the first rung of the housing ladder and so therefore you need to invest in shares. Shouldn't the solution be about bringing that ladder back down so that people can get their foot on the first rung? Really, it is an injustice, and it is an injustice to working class people, particularly. In 2000, when these capital gains tax arrangements were introduced, for somebody on a median income the price of a house was something like four to five times their median income; now, the multiple is eight to 10 times. How is it that house prices have become so completely decoupled from wages? It is people in the electorates that we, especially, in the Labor Party, represent—working-class electorates—that are doing it the toughest.

When there was investment in public housing, and when there was a tax system that was designed not to reward housing investment as an investment, you saw, at the high point, that homeownership was had by something like 72 or 73 per cent of the population. That has now fallen to about 66 per cent. And, when you look at that 25 to 45 age group, homeownership has completely fallen off a cliff.

So, yes, this is contested. Yes, this is a tough decision. But do you just throw your hands up and say, 'We're only the government'? Do you just throw your hands up, or just sit there and nod, when you're talking to a 65-year-old woman whose lease is about to run out in three months' time and who is not going to be able to afford to find somewhere for her and her 13-year-old dog to live? Do you just throw your hands up when you come across a 55-year-old woman with a severe disability whose home is going to be sold by the owner, and she's not going to be able to find somewhere to rent, because how do you rent on a disability support pension? Do you just throw your hands up when you talk to working-class trades men and women who are living in two-income households, earning good money, who can't afford to buy a house? Do you just throw your hands up and say: 'We can't do anything about it, I'm sorry; you're just going to have to put up with it as it is'?

I tell you what: out there in the electorate—this is something everybody in this room has in common—they are not going to put up with the status quo. The electorate has had enough—that is a message to all of us. But it is only the Labor Party that has taken that message on. It is only the Labor Party that recognises the problem that exists and is determined to do something about it, whether that be in housing, whether that be in health care, whether that be in mental health, whether that be in child care, whether that be in skills, or whether it be in industry policy.

For the first time in so many years, we've got an industry policy. Do you know what free trade meant for working-class people in the communities we represented? I'm reminded of an example—of, I think, the Mitsubishi plant in Lonsdale, in South Australia. When that car plant closed down, they actually did a study of the workers and tracked them over the next few years. Thirty per cent of those workers went and got a good job; 30 per cent of those workers went and found precarious employment—casual employment, on reduced hours; and 30 per cent of those employees never worked again.

So this government's not going to accept the status quo. We're going to do something about it.

Unbelievably, we are already seeing results. We are seeing first home buyers, over just two weekends in, who are able to compete against investors, as they aren't using the money that they were getting from taxpayers to prop up their bids. Already we're seeing results. It might have taken us 40 years to get into this mess, but we don't have 40 years to fix it. And so I commend the bill to this House, as part of the government's strategy to fix things up for— (Time expired)

Aaron Violi (Casey, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for the Digital Economy) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I must say, I look forward to the member for Forde speaking out against the EU free trade agreement that his government just signed, given that he is such an advocate against free trade! It's also interesting that the member for Forde talked about the challenges that have been there for 40 years for the Australian people. It is staggering. Where was this passion from those opposite, 12 months ago, when they went to the election, committing to not changing negative gearing or capital gains tax? Their commitment wasn't there, the passion wasn't there, 12 months ago.

And then there's this other confusion. On the one hand, you get the Minister for Housing standing up in question time today and this week telling everyone how great this government is and how they're fixing housing for the Australian people, and then, in exactly the same question time, you've got the government saying: 'Housing is a disaster. We failed. That's why we've had to break our word to the Australian people.' They can't have it each way. Either the minister is doing a good job and they're fixing housing or the minister is failing and they cannot deliver.

I understand that the member for Forde wants to be out of order and interject on the way out, because I, too, would be embarrassed to sit there and be a nodding head as their own leaders contradict each other in question time. But I'll look forward to him speaking out against the EU free trade agreement. I'll also look forward to him talking to the minister for energy and telling the minister for energy that he's wrong in supporting the energy system as it is and that he wants to nationalise it. I thought that was an interesting contribution from the member for Forde.

But this is really about this budget. There are lots of failures in this budget. It is important that we talk about it because the Australian people are struggling on so many fronts. They're worried about their future, their children's future and the state of the country. Disappointingly, Labor's budget only makes those worries worse. It does not help Australians today. This budget provides zero cost-of-living relief for the Australian people today. When I'm out listening to locals in my community, many express that they don't feel this government has their backs and that this government doesn't understand the challenges they have.

The reality is that it's getting harder and harder to get ahead. It's getting harder to pay the mortgage, to pay the rent, to keep the lights on and to put food on the table. For example, Australians with an average mortgage are $32,000 a year worse off under Labor. When interest rates go up, mortgage holders and renters will be worse off. Rent goes up as the cost to the landlord goes up. Australians have seen their living standards erode under this government.

Inflation in Australia is at 4.6 per cent. It's forecast to hit five per cent—and that's greater than France, Japan, Italy, Canada, Germany, the United States and the United Kingdom. The Treasurer and the Prime Minister will try to spin the inflation crisis by blaming the Middle East. And the Middle East has absolutely had an impact on inflation, but let's be clear—and every Australian knows this—interest rates increased before the conflict in the Middle East and before the Strait of Hormuz was closed. As the Governor of the Reserve Bank herself said, 'This government is spending.' So they made an already tough situation with issues in the Middle East even worse for the Australian people, with no economic buffer for the government, for the RBA governor or for the Australian people at home.

This budget centres around three key themes for this government: broken promises and lies, higher taxes and rising debt. It's a budget that does what Labor promised they wouldn't do. It shows the true colours of this government, which is comfortable breaking promises to the Australian people who put them in this place. The Prime Minister said this would be a budget about Labor values. Well, I guess it's a budget about Labor values in tribute to Julia Gillard and 'No carbon tax under my government.' It is in their DNA to lie to the Australian people.

The papers also show that we are dealing with the highest taxing government in our nation's history. We all know—and you feel it at home—that this government can't manage the budget and can't manage money. We're facing a decade of deficits, and the Australian taxpayers will foot the bill for Labor's decisions to increase taxes. The budget sees our economy burdened with $50 billion in higher taxes, and that includes $15 billion in higher personal income taxes. Put simply, Labor is taking more of what you earn, and every time you get a pay rise and every time you work that overtime shift and earn more, Labor takes more—through their little secret called bracket creep. Labor talk about being for workers, but they don't talk to the Australian worker about bracket creep and how, when you work that extra overtime, you pay more tax.

If they really wanted to support the Australian people, they would support the Liberal Party's tax-back guarantee, because the coalition's tax-back guarantee will index tax thresholds to inflation. By indexing the bottom two income tax thresholds to inflation, we will fully protect 85 per cent of income earners, year on year. It will start with relief of around $250 in year 1, and it will grow to more than $1,000 a year in year 4 and continue to grow, year on year. By 2031-32, we will index the top two tax thresholds as well, and this will fully protect all income earners from inflation. This is generational tax reform that will put more money back into the pockets of the hardworking Australians who earn it.

Labor will try—and we already saw it with the member for Forde—and run class warfare about working people and those that own businesses. The reality is that this supports every Australian that earns a wage and every Australian that risks it all to start a small business. What this government doesn't understand is that it is not a competition. It is not a competition between those that own businesses and those that work in those businesses and earn a salary. It's about business owners and workers working together to help those businesses grow and share more of what they earn, growing the pie. That's what the coalition is doing—supporting workers and supporting business owners. When business owners are doing well and business is strong, the workers are strong as well and our community is strong.

Labor promised that this budget was about intergenerational reform. Instead, they've handed down a budget of intergenerational fraud. The government is pulling up the ladder on every young Australian who is trying to get ahead. Labor's toxic new taxes make it even harder to get ahead in this country—to save, to invest and to buy a home. Not one Labor member, from the Prime Minister down, has been able to explain to the Australian people how taxing shares, stock options and ETFs will help reduce housing prices for the Australian people. The reality is that it's actually not about helping people with housing. That's a cover for increased taxes from this Prime Minister and this Treasurer.

We do know that getting in the housing market is one of the biggest challenges that's raised with all of us by young people. They expect their government to make it easier. But, as I said, these changes will not. They're going to make it harder. These tax changes will reduce supply in housing. Twelve months ago, this Treasurer was defending the current negative gearing and capital gains tax system because he said it wouldn't help supply. Suddenly, today, he won't talk about his own budget papers that show supply will be reduced by 35,000 houses because of their changes. He won't talk about how rents will go up for the Australian people because of his changes. The reality is that, despite the spin from this government, it's not about housing; it's about taxing you more. If you're trying to save for a deposit and build your future by investing in shares, ETFs, crypto and other assets, as so many young people and so many other Australians are, Labor want to take a bigger share of your gain.

To make it worse, older Australians have had the benefit of a capital gains discount while they build their wealth, including the Prime Minister and 20 of 23 cabinet ministers. But younger Australians are now being whacked from every angle and not given the same opportunities by this government. This isn't reform; it's an assault on aspiration. It's shutting the door on young Australians, who have already been locked out of too much opportunity.

This is why the Liberals have said we will repeal these taxes and put in our tax-back guarantee. We will support all Australians. We will support you to build a future for you and your family. We will support wage earners. We will support business owners because we know that they are stronger together.

But not only does this budget destroy hope and aspiration for young Australians; it's an attack on every older Australian that is over 65. This government have ripped out private health insurance support for three million older Australians, costing singles up to $800 a year and couples over $1,600 a year. This will not only impact those Australians that will have this cut on them; it will put more pressure on public housing. I've been inundated with older Australians on fixed incomes who cannot absorb this cost and who will have to remove their private health insurance at a time that they need it more than ever. They will go to the public health system, putting more pressure on the public health system and impacting every Australian.

But we know in Victoria and the seat of Casey that these governments, whether it's the Albanese Labor government or the Allan Labor government, don't care about the Australian people and that they are all about spin and announcements. That is epitomised locally by the Maroondah Hospital. Twice the Allan Labor government have promised to upgrade Maroondah Hospital but failed to include the money in the budget. This is the closest hospital for many in my community. Reefton, Warburton, Healesville, Lilydale, Chirnside Park—so many rely on this hospital, and this Labor government federally and this Labor government in Victoria led by Jacinta Allan continue to mislead my community by talking about announcements and failing to deliver.

When we're talking about failure to deliver and broken promises, my community remembers the broken promise from this prime minister when it comes to dirt roads. The coalition committed in 2019 to seal 150 kilometres of dirt roads in my community, because we are a periurban community and we have natural disasters. It keeps residents safe. It allows emergency services to get in. Prime Minister Albanese, when he was the shadow infrastructure minister, committed to that 10-year program. He gave his word to my community that he would fund it. Like so many things that he does, he broke his word and ripped that funding from my community. But I'll keep fighting because my community deserves safe roads. They deserve promises being met.

When we're talking about roads, we need to talk about Maroondah Highway and Killara Road, another example of failure by Labor governments. In 2019 the coalition committed $20 million to upgrade the Maroondah Highway-Killara Road intersection. The money was given to the Labor state government in 2019. In 2024 I wrote to the minister, and they committed to starting the works and having it delivered in 2025. Here we are in 2026, and nothing has started. I genuinely struggle to find one thing that this prime minister has done to keep his word. The real thing is, as my mum used to say to me, watch out because, if they lie about the little things, they'll lie about the big things.

In looking back at the Prime Minister who didn't fall off the stage, despite the video footage, and then denied it, that was an insight into this prime minister. The Prime Minister had the gall to look at the Australian people and say, 'My word is my bond.' He made that commitment to the Australian people and then, time and time again, this prime minister has broken his word. He's forced every member of this government to break their word with the Australian community. I feel a little bit sorry for the first termers. It is fewer than 12 months into their careers, and they have broken faith and broken their word with their community. Now, they don't really have a choice, because you're not allowed to speak out in the Labor Party ,or you get kicked out. But that broken promise will haunt them. Every time they speak to a community member, they'll have to know that they've broken faith with their community. (Time expired)

Ali France (Dickson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2026-2027 and other appropriation bills for 2026-2027. Our Treasurer delivered the 2026 budget two weeks ago, and it is a budget for every Australian. It is a budget for workers, for first home buyers, for families struggling with cost-of-living pressures and for future generations. It is an ambitious budget in a challenging global environment. It is a budget full of tough decisions to build resilience and bolster our economy, while also finally addressing intergenerational inequality. It is a budget that delivers more cost-of-living relief, more funding for Medicare, housing, aged care and much-needed tax reform. It also delivers for my home state of Queensland. This is a budget about resilience and security, getting Australians through the global oil shock while building a fair economy that works for more people. I am incredibly proud of it.

Global conflict has meant rising inflation and cost-of-living pressures. My electorate of Dickson is not immune. People are under stress. We recognise that and we are doing something about it. Helping with the cost of living has defined the Albanese Labor government over the past four years, and it is at the very heart of this budget. We are delivering a new round of tax cuts for working Australians. Our new permanent working Australians tax offset, worth $6.4 billion, will deliver a $250 tax credit every single year to 13.3 million working Australians from 2028. This is on top of our $1,000 instant tax deduction, which workers can claim without sorting through a shoebox full of receipts at tax time. Together with the tax cuts we have already legislated, landing again on 1 July this year and again next year, workers will save about $2,800 a year. That's $54 back into the pockets of average workers every single week. These are tax cuts that the coalition opposed. In fact, they went to the last election promising higher taxes. The coalition will kick and scream about changes to make our tax system fairer, but, when it came down to delivering tax cuts for the lowest earners, they said a big fat no.

This budget continues to strengthen Medicare. Medicare is Labor's heart, and it is mine too. I started my journey to this place to specifically reduce the cost of health care. In the year since I arrived, we have delivered 135 Medicare urgent care clinics right across the country. We have delivered cheaper medicines at just $25 a script, more fully bulk-billed GP clinics, 55 free walk-in Medicare mental health centres, an awesome women's health package and 33 endometriosis and pelvic pain clinics across the country. By July, these clinics will also deliver perimenopause and menopause services.

I got an email this week from Susan, who lives in Dickson, who told me that, since we moved menopause medications onto the PBS, she will save $1,200 a year. This is real, responsible cost-of-living relief, and it is targeted at the people who need it most. By July, four in five Australians will live within a 20-minute drive of an urgent care clinic, reducing pressure on our hospitals and delivering fully bulk-billed care. This budget includes permanent funding for each and every one of them, with $1.8 billion to ensure our UCCs are a permanent part of our healthcare system and our communities.

In Dickson, our much loved Murrumba Downs urgent care clinic has now treated over 33,000 locals, saving many, many hours waiting in A&E, and all they needed was their Medicare card. Our walk-in Medicare mental health centre at Strathpine is helping people get the mental health support they need with no waiting and no fees. This budget continues to make medicines cheaper with $5.9 billion to list new and amended treatments on the PBS for cystic fibrosis, chronic kidney disease and a range of cancers. Importantly, this budget delivers an additional $25 billion over five years to strengthen our public hospitals, which includes over $11 billion specifically for Queensland hospitals.

Queensland is a real winner in this budget. Queensland was allocated more infrastructure funding than any other state or territory, even when Olympics infrastructure funding is excluded. We won the infrastructure State of Origin with $24 billion for major road and rail projects and $2.5 billion for local roads and Black Spot programs. This includes an extra $812.5 million for stage 2 of the Dohles Rocks Road to Anzac Avenue, Bruce Highway upgrade—building on our $758 million investment in stage 1, which will connect everybody in my electorate in Moreton Bay to the Sunshine Coast; $2.5 billion for local road project upgrades and Black Spot programs; over $11 billion for our hospitals over five years. Queensland will get $8.2 billion in education and skills funding, increasing to $8.9 billion by 2029-30. That includes a new TAFE centre of excellence at the University of the Sunshine Coast Moreton Bay campus in my electorate of Dickson.

And we've done a new deal with the state government to build 51,000 new homes for Queenslanders, including 20,000 exclusively for first homebuyers. Everyone in this place knows that buying a home is out of reach for most first homebuyers. We know a shortage of housing and tax incentives for investors has created a housing market that has been appreciating faster than salaries, ambitions or our will to live. We also know that the coalition sat on its hands for nearly a decade without a housing minister, building a measly 373 social and affordable homes over nine years, while sitting on a 40-year housing supply crisis with no plans to fix it.

The median house price in Brisbane is now over $900,000. Since 1999, house prices have risen over 400 per cent, more than twice as fast as average incomes. We are the first federal government since the postwar period to focus on actually building homes. We have a $45 billion plan to build 1.2 million homes, including homes specifically for first homebuyers, and 55,000 social and affordable homes. We've already built more than 5,000 social and affordable homes. In this budget we invest another $2 billion in the power, roads and drains that we need for new housing developments, which will help add another 65,000 homes over the next decade.

Dickson is one of the fastest-growing areas in the country. Young families priced out of Brisbane and Moreton Bay tell me they just want a fair shot at a home of their own. This budget gives them that shot. We are making changes to negative gearing, to even the playing field for young people trying to get into the market. For too long, homebuyers have been losing out to investors at auctions. For too long, incentives for investors have driven up house prices beyond what an average wage earner can afford. For too long, we have treated a roof over our head as an investment portfolio. Housing has become a wealth strategy, excluding people who actually need a permanent home. We have forgotten that a home should be a place to belong, not a place to profit and build more wealth. And despite some of the misinformation online, we are not getting rid of negative gearing. We are limiting it to new residential properties from July next year. This will incentivise new house building, which is exactly what this country needs.

These changes are prospective. If you currently negatively gear an investment property, nothing changes for you. Your arrangements are grandfathered, meaning you can keep doing exactly what you are doing now and, going forward, you can still negatively gear a brand new property. In a fast-growing region like Moreton Bay, there's going to be a lot more new homes where this is going to be possible. Before these changes, young people wanting to buy a home in the area they grew up in would be lining up against 10 or 15 investors for the very same home. Under these changes, they will be competing with people who actually want to live there. That is the difference. That is fairness.

That's not the only thing we are doing to make our tax system fairer. Let's talk about changes to capital gains tax. I've seen the misleading AI generated memes of the Prime Minister laying concrete slabs and cutting hair. I've even seen him doing some stretches on a Pilates reformer. But let me be clear: the only thing being stretched here is the truth. Nobody is suddenly paying 47 per cent tax, nor is the government taking a 47 per cent stake in your business.

Unlike the stuff doing the rounds on social media, let's talk about facts. We're replacing the 50 per cent capital gains tax discount with inflation adjusted indexation to restore the taxation of real gains. We are doing this to even the playing field so that those who earn income from assets like shares and trusts are paying tax like those who work a 40-hour week. Why should our nurses, teachers, cleaners and aged-care workers pay more tax than those who earn income from shares and trusts?

These changes will also be prospective. So, if you are talking about CGT on a property, the gains you made prior to the budget will still get a 50 per cent discount. If you buy a new build, you can also claim the 50 per cent. Plus, for any small businesses turning over less than $2 million per year, you can still claim the 50 per cent if you've owned that business for 15 years and you're selling on retirement. This budget also makes the $20,000 instant asset write-off permanent, and it's delivering $3.5 billion in new tax relief measures for businesses.

This is a responsible budget that builds resilience and responds to the global oil shock, including investment to strengthen supply chains and for a permanent fuel security reserve. In this budget, we are delivering a $14.8 billion package to strengthen Australia's fuel resilience, securing more fuel and fertiliser now and building reserves and supply chains so that we are better prepared for global economic uncertainty. Ten billion dollars will go to immediate fuel and fertiliser security and a permanent government owned Australian fuel security reserve, extending our reserves to at least 50 days.

We are also reserving 20 per cent of gas exports for Aussie users so there's more supply at lower rates. Our landmark domestic gas reservation policy will require east coast LNG exporters to reserve 20 per cent of production for the domestic market from July 2027. This will shield Aussies from global price volatility and supply shortfalls. Strengthening our fuel resilience is a literal no-brainer, yet, for some reason, the coalition opposes our domestic gas reservation policy. I'll say this to the coalition: if we wanted to hear the gas lobby's opinion, we'd just talked to the gas lobby ourselves.

This budget is for everyday Aussies. It is for the worker, enabling them to keep more of what they earn. It is for the young couple in Dickson who can finally see a path to a home of their own. It is for people who work a 40-hour week. It is for the family filling up at the tank. It's for the local who can walk into an urgent care clinic with nothing more than their Medicare card.

There are tough decisions in this budget. We know there's an easier road. We could pretend that homes are affordable for first home buyers. We could ignore the fact that the average nurse pays more in tax on every dollar she earns than many investors do. We could pretend that there's no inequality in our tax system: 'Nothing to see here; just move on.' But then we would be the Liberal Party; we would be the coalition and we would be robbing future generations. That's not what I came to this place to do. This budget lays a strong foundation for the future of Australia.

Julian Leeser (Berowra, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Indigenous Australians) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is a bad Labor budget built on broken promises funded by a tax assault on aspiration, designed to punish the very Australians who invest, build businesses and plan for the future. Last week, I launched a survey of my electorate. So far, nearly 2,000 people responded, from every suburb and town across the electorate. Their verdict was unambiguous, and I want this parliament to hear it: 68 per cent of respondents believe Labor's budget tax changes will worsen Australia's economy; 75 per cent of small business owner respondents said the budget would worsen the economy; 70 per cent said the CGT and negative gearing changes will make it harder for Australians to invest, save and build for the future; 75 per cent of small business owners oppose the trust tax; and 64 per cent of respondents agreed that trust changes amount to a death tax by stealth. Unprompted, more than 100 respondents mentioned broken promises or dishonesty, and that tells you something.

From 1 July 2028, discretionary trusts will face a minimum 30 per cent tax on distributions with no grandfathering. Businesses structured legally over decades on professional advice will find the rules change beneath them. There's been no transition period, no compensation and no acknowledgement from this government that the people affected by these changes did nothing wrong. They followed the law, planned carefully and took risks, and now the rules have been rewritten around them. Throughout both the 2022 and 2025 election campaigns, the Prime Minister made specific, repeated promises not to change taxes on small businesses, on farmers, on negative gearing or on capital gains, and he's broken every one of those promises. More than 100 survey respondents used words like 'broken promise', 'lied' or 'betrayed' in their written comments, unprompted, in response to a question about tax policy.

Kath from Berowra Waters put it plainly: Labor didn't run on these changes, and they've not been adequately explained. When you change taxes, taxpayers have a right to know what is happening first, and Labor hasn't done that. Alan from Galston started his business with his wife 36 years ago. He always planned to sell it and retire on the proceeds. That was the deal. It was the unspoken contract between the government and the people who take the risk of building businesses. This budget has torn up that contract. Nathan from North Epping has effectively paid himself next to nothing for the past 10 years to build his business, with a sale as the prospect of growing wealth for the future. Now that prospect comes with a tax liability he never planned for. Jeff from Epping has invested a seven-figure sum in a dairy manufacturing business in regional Victoria, currently employing 32 people and expecting to employ over 100 within 12 months. He told me that the proposed changes will make him substantially worse off on any exit.

Estimates suggest that there are around 642,000 discretionary trusts in Australia, and well over 300,000 will be affected. This isn't a tax on the wealthy; it's a tax on the people of Berowra. It's a tax on the tradesman who incorporated, the pharmacist who structured her practice and the couple who built something together over 30 years and hoped to pass it on.

The trust tax is also a tax on families, on what parents spend a lifetime building to pass onto their children. Sixty-four per cent of survey respondents agreed it mounts to a death tax by stealth. Hannah from Berowra has a testamentary trust in her will, not to minimise tax but to ensure that if both parents die her children's inheritance cannot be spent by a guardian before those children reach adulthood. Under this budget, the government takes 30 per cent before those children see a dollar. Helen from Waitara, raising a child with a significant disability, spent nearly $4,000 in legal fees this year to establish a testamentary trust to protect that child's future. These aren't tax avoiders; they're parents, and this government proposes to tax what they leave behind. The cruelty of this measure is not abstract. These are people who sat down with their solicitor, thought about what would happen to their children if they were gone and took legal steps to protect them. This budget penalises that foresight. It punishes responsible planning, and it does so without warning, without mandate and without compensation.

From 1 July 2027, negative gearing on established residential properties purchased after budget night will be abolished. The 50 per cent capital gains tax discount is replaced with a minimum 30 per cent rate. The government's own Treasury modelling concedes that these changes will result in around 35,000 fewer new homes over the next decade. Independent economists forecast upward pressure on rents. That doesn't help renters. It punishes them. Michael from Arcadia withdrew superannuation and bought an investment property that houses two people. Following this budget, he says that the CGT changes will make that investment unviable. He plans to terminate the lease and sell. Two people will be evicted and need to find somewhere to live. Multiply that decision across hundreds of thousands of small landlords running the same numbers, and you understand why housing economists are forecasting rental pressure and why the government's claim to be helping renters is so dishonest. Toni from Pennant Hills made decisions based on this government's guarantees. Those guarantees have been broken. Andrew from Mount Colah spent his entire working life planning carefully for self-funded retirement through superannuation and shares. He retired last month at 65. The month he got there, the goalposts moved. His careful planning to provide a cash pension for himself has been scuttled at the finish line by this federal budget.

The rentvesting pathway—renting near work while investing elsewhere to build equity—has also been destroyed. Nathan from North Epping named this explicitly. The CGT changes have made rentvesting virtually impossible. Young people who couldn't afford to buy near where they work now have lost that stepping stone too. This wasn't a loophole. It was a legitimate and widely used strategy that allowed ordinary Australians to enter the property market on their own terms. The government has slammed that door without offering any alternative.

The reduction in the private health insurance rebate for Australians over 65 has not received the attention it deserves. Peter from Westleigh and his wife are on full age pensions and are desperately trying to maintain health cover that costs them $5,000 a year. Helen from Hornsby, a self-funded retiree, faces an additional $3,000 a year and told me she'll be forced onto the age pension sooner as a result. Pamela from Berowra has been a private health member since she was 17. She's now 84 years old and wonders whether she can continue to afford $600 a month. Rowena, a retiree from Normanhurst, wrote something that should trouble every single member of this parliament. Labor says we can earn more and keep more of what we earn, but she can't earn more and now she has to spend more of what she's already earned. She has to choose between her health cover and being able to afford to hire someone to help her take a shower. Norm from Westleigh called it a slap in the face for the people who've paid their taxes all their working lives, and he's right.

The consequences are entirely foreseeable. People will drop private health cover and enter the public hospital system at the moment their healthcare needs are the greatest. The cost of that shift won't disappear. It'll simply be transferred from private insurers to the public purse and to every Australian who waits longer in a public hospital queue because the system is absorbing many more patients than it planned for.

No account of this budget's impact on small business is complete without addressing energy costs, because the budget does nothing in a structural way to address them. Angus Taylor has made this case consistently. Labor's ideological commitment to an all-renewables grid, the closure of baseload power and the failure to develop more gas supply have driven electricity prices higher for every small business in Australia. The cafe, the gym, the print shop and the medical practice in Berowra are all paying more for power than they should. Every dollar spent on electricity is a dollar not spent on wages or investment. John from Normanhurst works in the building industry and he was blunt: nothing in this budget will improve the housing supply or stimulate development, and the energy policy settings embedded in construction requirements add significant cost to every new build. The coalition will pursue a technology-neutral energy policy that prioritises affordability and reliability, not a $150 quarterly rebate that runs out in December. That rebate is a bandaid on a wound that requires surgery. It doesn't lower wholesale prices, it doesn't improve grid reliability and it disappears before the summer is over.

When a government changes fundamental rules without warning, without mandate and without grandfathering, it creates sovereign risk. It causes investment to stop and it causes planning to become impossible. Ross, a Hornsby resident, drew the sharpest historical comparison. When John Howard changed his position on the GST, he took it to the election and won a mandate. This government campaigned for these exact changes in 2019 and were defeated. They promised not to implement them in 2025, won the election and then implemented them. His conclusion was absolutely right. This is a government that cannot tell the truth.

Philip, a Dural resident, said the most fundamental concern, even beyond the toxic nature of these changes, was the utter dishonesty of a government that refuses even to acknowledge that it has broken promises. Craig from Westleigh is approaching retirement, having structured his finances around a discretionary trust in good faith. He told me simply: I trusted this was something that wouldn't change.

Sovereign risk isn't just an abstract concept for economists; it's what happens when a small-business owner in Galston realises that planning for his future is futile because the government can change the rules after the fact, with no consequences. It erodes confidence and it erodes trust, and once that trust is gone it takes years to rebuild.

This government has made young Australians the stated justification for this budget, and I want to test that claim against what the young people of Berowra have told me. Of the 2,000 responses, more than 10 per cent were under 45. Fifty-nine per cent of those under 45 said the budget would worsen the economy and 52 per cent opposed the trust tax. Mark from Berowra is a young Australian who invests in shares and property and works hard. He told me this budget has struck a hard nerve with him and his fellow young Australians. He asked: 'What's the point of getting an education? What's the point of working hard and innovating if 47 per cent just goes to the government?'

Shane from Cherrybrook identified a critical design failure—for younger Australians who can't afford property, non-property investment—shares, ETFs and managed funds—has been one of the few remaining ways to build the wealth needed to eventually buy a home. The CGT changes don't distinguish between a landlord with five investment properties and a 28-year-old putting aside $200 a month into an index fund. They are hit the same.

Nicholas from Beecroft made the point with precision that the minimum 30 per cent tax on capital gains literally punishes the lowest of low-income earners, including young people who need to sell shares to produce a home deposit. The government tells young Australians it's opening the door to homeownership, and yet it's blocked that door with a tax collector.

Anton from West Pennant Hills invested in small ASX listed biotech companies that do research and development, exactly the kind of productive investment that creates jobs of the future. Under the new CGT rules, the after-tax return no longer justifies the risk. He may as well invest in stable dividend companies. That's not good for Australian innovation.

Jonathan from Hornsby made the supply point plainly, saying that young people invest in shares to build capital for a deposit and now they'll be taxed too heavily on those gains. Labor's measures won't result in more first home buyers getting into a house when the real issue is supply. The government's own modelling indicates that there will be 35,000 fewer homes built as a result of this. That's not a housing solution; that's a housing problem. The answer is to build more through planning reform, reduced red tape and energy policies that don't inflate the cost of every new home. This budget offers none of that.

The contrast with our approach in the coalition is clear. We will fight these trust tax changes and, if they pass, we will repeal them. We will not destroy the negative gearing and CGT settings that mum-and-dad investors and first-time rentvesters depend on. We will work on supply, planning reform, construction capacity and energy affordability because that is what will actually help young people buy a home.

Let me discuss the tax that this budget ignores entirely, and that is bracket creep. When wages rise just to keep up with inflation, workers are no longer better off in real terms. If that rise pushes them into the next bracket, the government takes more. It's a stealth raid, and it happens every year. This budget does nothing about it. Think about what this means for the workers of Berowra—a teacher at Normanhurst Boys or Pennant Hills High, a nurse at Hornsby hospital, a police officer at Castle Hill or Hornsby or a paramedic or a firefighter stationed across the electorate. All of them work hard. They earn their pay rises through years of service. Every time inflation pushes their salary up, the government quietly takes a larger share. They're not richer. The government is just extracting more from the wages they've worked for. Darren from Mount Colah named it directly, saying that Labor kept the 37 per cent bracket when it was meant to be abolished. That's another broken promise making it harder for ordinary Australians to get ahead. It's not a dramatic headline. It doesn't appear in the Treasurer's budget speech as a line item. But it compounds, year after year, quietly eroding the purchasing power of working families who thought they were getting ahead.

The coalition's tax-back guarantee is our answer. From 2028-29, we will index the bottom two income tax thresholds to inflation, protecting 85 per cent of income earners, including every teacher, nurse, paramedic and police officer in Berowra, with relief of $250 in year 1, growing to more than $1,000 a year by year 4. From 2031-32, all thresholds will be indexed. When a nurse gets a pay rise at Hornsby hospital, she, not the taxman, will actually keep it. That's what fairness really looks like.

We oppose this budget and its tax increases. I can't support a budget that taxes and disadvantages my community as much as this budget does. This is a bad Labor budget. It deserves to be opposed. We will fight these toxic taxes every step of the way. If they get through, we will repeal them.

Debate adjourned.

Federation Chamber adjourned at 19:30