Budget will ‘kneecap’ younger Australians, says Tim Wilson
Tim Wilson has doubled down on his stance that the Coalition would look to repeal the changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax “if necessary”. It’s a little different to what Angus Taylor is saying this morning.
Wilson tells Sky News:
double quotation markWe [will] take every measure to make sure that we stop and fight them and defeat them. But of course, if necessary, we’ll look at repeal as well.
The shadow treasurer says the budget is “built on bad faith, [and] built on broken trust”, after the government promised it would not touch those tax incentives.
He says the changes will lead to fewer homes being built and increase rents.
A reminder – the budget says that rent will increase about $2 a week for the average renter household.
double quotation markWe’ve said we’ll support measures around hospital funding. We said we’ll support income tax offsets on earned income. But when it comes down to the measures of broken trust built on bad faith that this government is putting forward, which is going to kneecap young Australians, then let’s be very clear about just how bad it is.
Shadow treasurer Tim Wilson. Photograph: Lukas Coch/AAPShare
Updated at 19.57 EDT
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Negative gearing and CGT gains should be returned in income tax cuts
Allegra Spender says the government should give the money raised from tax changes back as an income tax cut down the road.
The independent MP last night said the changes were sensible – though had concerns over the impact of CGT changes on startups.
Independent member for Wentworth, Allegra Spender. Photograph: Lukas Coch/AAP
She tells Sky News the government’s $250 permanent tax offset is good, and should go further.
double quotation markI think it’s not a bad mechanism, but I do think it needs to be broader. And with any of these tax changes there, there’s some transitional arrangements, which means that most of the tax raises is in five to 10 years. I think that’s where the government should commit now. It’s $77bn they should commit now to giving that back as lower tax cut, particularly reducing bracket creep.
Jim Chalmers suggested this morning that the tax offset was a mechanism that could be used in the future to return some bracket creep.
Updated at 20.09 EDT
Cait Kelly
Anglicare says government’s tax reforms will help tackle inequality
Anglicare Australia has welcomed the federal government’s reforms to the capital gains tax discount and negative gearing in the budget, describing them as some of the most significant steps to tackle inequality in decades.
Anglicare Australia Executive Director Kasy Chambers:
double quotation markFor years, governments have avoided touching unfair tax concessions that deepen inequality and drive up housing costs. Tonight’s Budget changes that. Reforming the Capital Gains Tax discount is a significant and overdue step toward a fairer tax system.
These reforms recognise that Australia cannot keep subsidising wealth accumulation while millions of people struggle to afford the basics. This principle matters: governments should not be using the tax system to fuel speculative investment at the expense of everyone else.
Chambers said the reforms would help slow the growth in housing inequality over time, but warned they were not enough on their own to solve the housing crisis.
double quotation markThe biggest gap in tonight’s Budget is the lack of new investment in public and community housing. Australia’s housing crisis will not be solved without building many more homes people on low incomes can actually afford. We still need to see a major expansion of public and community housing if we want to tackle this crisis.
Updated at 19.54 EDT
Plans for Trump Tower on the Gold Coast scrapped
Joe Hinchliffe
The much-hyped vision of a Trump Tower on the Gold Coast has evaporated, less than three months after a deal was announced – and without a development application ever lodged.
The tower was promised to become Australia’s tallest and “best resort” when it was unveiled on social media in February, with the image of a twice bankrupt Australian property developer shaking hands with the US president’s son, Eric Trump, in Mar-a-Lago.
An image of the Trump International Hotel & Tower Gold Coast. Illustration: Altus Property Group
Billed at A$1.5bn, Altus Property Group’s David Young claimed the project would break ground by the end of the year and be realised by 2030.
At the time of the deal, Young was effusive about the Trump brand, declaring it synonymous with quality.
But in a LinkedIn post on Wednesday night, Young said the US war on Iran had made that brand “toxic to Australians”.
double quotation markThere is no acrimony between the Trump family and myself, why would there be after knowing them for 19 years when no one here then even knew who Donald Trump was.
It is pure business. My team and I look forward to completing the project and as an old expression goes, “never let the truth get in the way of a good story”.
Updated at 19.57 EDT
Benita Kolovos
Victorian minister for Suburban Rail Loop defends Indigenous artwork on tunnel boring machines
The Victorian minister responsible for the Suburban Rail Loop, Nick Staikos, says critics of the commissioning of Indigenous artwork on the project’s tunnel boring machines were engaging in “petty politics”.
The Herald Sun reported on Wednesday that artist Hayden Roberts was commissioned to paint the cutter heads of two tunnel machines before their launch later this year, in a move the opposition’s transport spokesperson, Matthew Guy, labelled “stupid” during a cost-of-living crisis and “not value for money”.
But Staikos told reporters at parliament the artwork didn’t cost the project any additional money – though he would not provide a figure. He said:
double quotation markI’m not going to engage in any petty politics on what is the largest transport project in our nation’s history – one that is going to change this great global city of Melbourne.
Asked if he’d been asked to approve it the artwork, he said: “I wasn’t asked to approve this piece of artwork, and it is a hypothetical to ask me if it was put in front of me if I’d approve it.”
Last night’s federal budget included another $3.8bn for the first stage of the project – known as SRL East – a 26km stretch of tunnels between Cheltenham and Box Hill. The project is billed as a 90km line between Cheltenham in the south-east and Werribee in the south-west, stopping at Melbourne airport.
Minister Nick Staikos. Photograph: Con Chronis/AAPShare
Updated at 19.47 EDT
‘As the facts change, you’re allowed to change your mind’: Shorten backs tax changes
Bill Shorten, who this morning said he felt vindicated over last night’s budget proposing significant changes to negative gearing, capital gains tax and discretionary trusts, says that times change, and the housing crisis doesn’t wait three years for an election, in response to questions on why Anthony Albanese didn’t take this policy to the polls.
He says he regrets that the policy took 10 years to do, but that 40% of people in Sydney and Melbourne are now renters, which means that how the population feels about the issue has changed.
He tells Sky News it will give younger people a “fighting chance”.
double quotation markI think the population’s changing. And as the facts change, you’re allowed to change your mind … things have got tougher.
It was a good idea 10 years ago and it’s an even better idea now.
Shorten says he currently uses negative gearing – having moved states from Melbourne to Canberra to take on the vice-chancellor position at the University of Canberra. He criticises the Coalition’s argument that the changes will now “kneecap” young people and aspirational Australians.
double quotation markI think the Libs are sort of clutching at straws a little bit here, as they’re sort of looking for their identity when I get their logic. And good people can disagree with what happened last night. I respect that, but I think grandfathering is the sensible way. If you retrospectively change tax laws, that would be a bad law.
Updated at 19.48 EDT
High court considers its first case on climate grounds
Lisa Cox
Australia’s highest court will consider climate change for the first time today as it hears a mining company’s challenge to a NSW court of appeal decision to overturn a coalmine expansion in the state’s Hunter region.
The outcome could have ramifications for the consideration of new fossil fuel projects if the court decides that the burning of exported coal from an individual mine is legally connected to climate harm in local Australian communities.
The case has been brought by coal company Mach Energy, which is appealing a decision by the NSW court of appeal last year. That decision overturned a massive expansion of the company’s Mount Pleasant mine in Muswellbrook.
The Mount Pleasant open-cut mine, near the town of Muswellbrook, NSW. Photograph: Jessica Hromas/The Guardian
The court of appeal found in favour of the Denman Aberdeen Muswellbrook Scone Healthy Environment Group which challenged the project, ruling the NSW Independent Planning Commission was required and failed to consider the impacts of all emissions associated with the project on the local environment, including from the exported emissions – known as scope 3 emissions – when the coal is sold and burnt overseas.
The proposed expansion would double the mine’s coal output to 21m tonnes per annum until 2048 and 98% of the projected emissions are scope 3 emissions.
In the initial proceedings brought by the community group in the land and environment court, that court ruled in favour of Mach Energy.
Wendy Wales from the Healthy Environment Group said the outcome of the case could “determine whether the law catches up with the reality that the rest of us are already living”:
double quotation markThe court case has never been about us. It’s about whether the true costs, in this case, climate costs have been factored into the planning approvals.
Tony Lonergan and Wendy Wales on their property in Muswellbrook, NSW. The pair have been challenging the approval of an expansion of the Mount Pleasant open-cut coalmine.Share
Updated at 19.43 EDT
‘No wonder people don’t trust politicians’, Hume says
Jane Hume says it’s no surprise that people don’t trust pollies when the government can do a U-turn on their commitments and break election promises.
The opposition is going hard on this “broken promises” line against last night’s budget, accusing the government of a lack of honesty and integrity.
Speaking to Sky News, the deputy opposition leader accuses the government of “lies”.
double quotation markNo wonder people don’t trust politicians when they can look you in the eye and tell lies, whether it’s about $275 off your energy bill, whether it’s about fiscal responsibility, whether it’s about no changes to superannuation, no changes to taxation, this government lies.
Deputy Liberal leader Jane Hume. Photograph: Hilary Wardhaugh/Getty ImagesShare
Updated at 19.34 EDT
Labor has built 660,000 homes in government, Albanese says
The government is past halfway on its target to build 1.2m homes, according to the PM – although it’s quickly running out of time with the deadline of 2029 fast approaching.
Anthony Albanese tells Nova Perth radio that Labor has built 660,000 homes since coming into office in 2022.
But it’s still far behind its target, agreed in late 2023, to build 1.2m homes by 2029.
Albanese is on the budget hard sell, and has been forced to justify breaking his promise to not touch negative gearing or capital gains tax, while also trying to increase supply. The PM has said (many many times this morning) that the government’s thinking has changed, and so have the times.
double quotation markThe number of homes that have been built since we’ve been elected is 660,000 now, the 5% deposit that we said at the last election was a big measure, more than 240,00 Australians have invested in that as a result …
So many stories you would have heard it, and you know people you’ve gone to options, they get outbid by investors. That takes away that and provides an opportunity for people, if it’s existing homes, whilst at the same time allowing investors to invest in that new supply as well. They’re helping not just themselves, but helping the nation as well, and helping boost that supply
Anthony Albanese is interviewed on morning television at Parliament House in Canberra on Wednesday morning. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAPShare
Updated at 19.33 EDT
Luca Ittimani
CBA profits slip as it sets aside $200m for recession risk
The Commonwealth Bank has seen its profits slip slightly to $2.7bn for the first three months of 2026, down 1% from the previous six months’ average, on an unaudited cash basis.
Australia’s biggest bank said it had attracted more deposits and issued more loans but faced growing operating expenses as cloud computing, software licensing and AI investment grew.
A Commonwealth Bank branch in Melbourne. Photograph: James Ross/AAP
Like other banks, CBA has begun preparing for the economy to slow as the Iran war hits, today lifting its provisioning for potential borrower collapses by $200m.
The share of CBA personal loan customers who are 90 days behind on repayments picked up markedly in the March quarter, to 1.71%, its highest since 2019, which the bank said was in part due to deliberate business settings.
Home loans and credit card arrears have also picked up but only slightly, to 0.69% and 0.68%, returning to where they were a year ago.
CBA’s chief executive officer, Matt Comyn, said:
double quotation markThe Australian economy continues to demonstrate resilience, but supply chain disruptions, higher prices and interest rates are expected to weigh on household spending and business activity.
Updated at 19.27 EDT
NDIS not ‘the only lifeboat in the ocean’, Shorten
Bill Shorten, who was most recently the minister for the national disability insurance scheme, says that the NDIS was growing too quickly and did need to be made more sustainable.
When the government came into power in 2022 the growth rate was about 22% per year, which Shorten brought down to 9%, but he told RN Breakfast earlier “that was never going to be the destination.
.Shorten says that someone doesn’t have to be on the NDIS to receive support for their disability, as long as they are receiving the support that they need.
double quotation markAt the core of the NDIS, it’s changing lives for the better, but it wasn’t ever meant to be the only lifeboat in the ocean. And so, the government’s saying that they want to create more limited services outside the NDIS for people who don’t need the full NDIS orchestra of services.
Updated at 19.14 EDT
Budget will ‘kneecap’ younger Australians, says Tim Wilson
Tim Wilson has doubled down on his stance that the Coalition would look to repeal the changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax “if necessary”. It’s a little different to what Angus Taylor is saying this morning.
Wilson tells Sky News:
double quotation markWe [will] take every measure to make sure that we stop and fight them and defeat them. But of course, if necessary, we’ll look at repeal as well.
The shadow treasurer says the budget is “built on bad faith, [and] built on broken trust”, after the government promised it would not touch those tax incentives.
He says the changes will lead to fewer homes being built and increase rents.
A reminder – the budget says that rent will increase about $2 a week for the average renter household.
double quotation markWe’ve said we’ll support measures around hospital funding. We said we’ll support income tax offsets on earned income. But when it comes down to the measures of broken trust built on bad faith that this government is putting forward, which is going to kneecap young Australians, then let’s be very clear about just how bad it is.
Shadow treasurer Tim Wilson. Photograph: Lukas Coch/AAPShare
Updated at 19.57 EDT
In pictures: the budget sell
Anthony Albanese fronts the cameras following the handing down of the 2026 federal budget. Photograph: Hilary Wardhaugh/Getty ImagesJim Chalmers and Anthony Albanese speak to the media. Photograph: Hilary Wardhaugh/Getty ImagesAlbanese and Chalmers defend the decision to make changes to negative gearing, capital gains tax and discretionary trusts, saying it’s the ‘right thing to do’. Photograph: Hilary Wardhaugh/Getty ImagesShare
Updated at 18.41 EDT
Taylor and Wilson differ on negative gearing approach
Angus Taylor and Tim Wilson appear to have slightly different views on whether the opposition will repeal changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax, announced in last night’s budget.
Last night, the shadow treasurer said that the opposition would “repeal if necessary” the changes.
But this morning Taylor wasn’t so clear cut, and would not commit to yanking back those reforms if elected.
Speaking to AM earlier, Taylor said “let’s see”.
double quotation markLet’s see, because if you take their small business taxation, for instance, they’re saying they’re going to do a review because they realise there’s a whole lot of criticism they’ve had. They’re going to do a review of their own capital gains tax measures … So we don’t even know what final form this is going to come in. What I do know is we are dead opposed to those increases and we’ll fight them.
Updated at 18.38 EDT
Housing tax changes will make ‘no meaningful difference’ to young Australians, opposition argues
Changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax, which the opposition will fight, won’t shift the dial on young people getting into the property market, and will only increase home ownership by 0.1%, Angus Taylor says.
A little earlier, Taylor also spoke to the ABC’s AM program and continued to blame low housing supply and high migration for the housing crisis.
For a little fact check on whether slashing migration would help the housing crisis, read here. (Spoiler alert, it could well make the problem worse).
Taylor says that the tax changes will mean fewer homes are built and allow just a fraction of extra young people into the market.
double quotation markThe first is they admit that this is going to drive up rents. That’s in their own budget papers. There’s going to be less supply, higher rents. The numbers of owner-occupation are – if you believe them, 7,500 a year, that’s 0.1% increase, Mel. It will make no material difference to young Australians.
Just on that point about rents – the Treasury estimates the impact to be minimal: an extra $2 a week for a household paying the median rent.
Updated at 18.37 EDT
Budget an ‘assault on aspiration’, Angus Taylor says
Angus Taylor says the opposition does not support *most* of the budget, and will fight until the election to stop the government from changing negative gearing, CGT and discretionary trust tax incentives.
The opposition leader is also out and about this morning in the Canberra cold, and spoke to the ABC’s News Breakfast.
He says the budget is an “assault on aspiration” and won’t build more houses.
double quotation markWe absolutely don’t support the assault on aspiration in this budget through hiking taxes on small businesses, on savings, on houses, on the government’s own admission.
We’re going to get less houses as a result of these taxes.
He does, however, say the opposition will support the $250 income tax offset for workers, but like his shadow treasurer, Tim Wilson, did last night, argues that the offset will be eaten up within six months by inflation and calls it a “fraud”. And a reminder, that offset only comes into your wallet at tax time in 2028.
So what would the opposition do? Taylor says the opposition wants to clamp down on overseas migration to reduce demand and make it easier to build houses.
double quotation markI’ve already said that central to this has to be getting immigration into balance with our housing supply. It’s out of balance.
Updated at 18.22 EDT
Why would anyone believe you now? Albanese faces grilling over integrity
Anthony Albanese says it’s not the first time the government’s position has changed – just look at the U-turn on halving the fuel excise.
Speaking to Sky News, the prime minister says the thinking has changed, to address both supply and demand in the housing market.
You might also remember the PM doing a 180 after promising not to touch the Coalition’s stage-three tax cuts. He fronted up at the National Press Club in early 2024 to give the lowest-paid workers more money, and those in the higher tax bracket less.
Host Pete Stefanovic asks why the government didn’t take these changes to an election, rather than putting them in the budget. Albanese replies “our position has changed” (if I had a dollar for every time I heard that phrase this morning).
He’s now also facing questions on whether there will be death taxes or inheritance taxes now. No, Albanese says, but Stefanovic asks “why would anyone believe you now?”
Albanese replies:
double quotation markWe are putting in place changes for the future. We are quarantining, grandfathering, whatever way you want to call it, the existing arrangements, which are there for investors, because that’s the right thing to do. We are doing the right thing here.
Anthony Albanese takes questions about the budget during a TV interview at Parliament House this morning. Photograph: Hilary Wardhaugh/Getty ImagesShare
Updated at 18.52 EDT
Bill Shorten says he’s vindicated by negative gearing changes
The man who tried to introduce these reforms 10 years ago says he does feel vindicated after last night’s budget.
Speaking to the ABC’s RN Breakfast, Bill Shorten the former Labor leader – now vice-chancellor of the University of Canberra – says there has been a demographic shift over the last decade that has allowed this to happen.
He says the policies are “modest not massive” but very similar to what he would have introduced if he had been elected prime minister.
He adds that the benefit of incumbency is real too – it’s easier to make the changes when you already hold the cards than from opposition.
double quotation markIn 2016 and 2019, we took tax reforms to the electorate, and I think that we were probably ahead of our time, and I do think this is important for the nation.
I do believe that the principles of the changes are fair. This is very like our 2016 and 2019 policies in terms of capital gains tax, in terms of negative gearing, in terms of trusts. And I think the proposition is it’s a long-term reform. It’s not a quick sort of change.
Chickens are still laying eggs and property will still be a good bet in Australia.
Former Labor leader Bill Shorten. Photograph: Lukas Coch/AAPShare
Updated at 18.09 EDT
The Coalition is ‘a rabble’, Albanese says
The prime minister says the opposition are a “rabble” but won’t say whether the chaotic state of the Coalition gave the government an opportunity to take on these broad tax reforms.
Anthony Albanese has moved over to ABC News and is asked whether the Coalition being a rabble has made it easier to put this budget together.
The Coalition is facing terrible polling and just lost the seat of Farrer, which it had held since its inception, to One Nation in last weekend’s byelection (and doesn’t that already feel like an eternity ago).
So the PM knows that the Coalition is badly bruised and might not have as much muscle as they would otherwise have to get the public angry about the changes. (The PM has probably also realised that a lot of households have been calling for the changes for some time.)
He says:
double quotation markWell, they are a rabble, and they have – not surprisingly – just said no to everything, because they say no to everything and that’s what they’ve been doing for four years.
This was about doing the right thing by the country, so that, when you look back and you go, is this the right thing to do? People will say, ‘Yes’. We firmly believe that.
Updated at 17.49 EDT
Albanese defends grandfathering tax incentives
The budget finally deals with both supply (boosting housing) and demand (reducing incentives for investors to give first home buyers less competition) and says that it will lead to an additional 75,000 people getting into the market over 10 years.
That’s just 7,500 additional people each year. Is that enough, the ABC AM program’s Melissa Clark asks the prime minister?
Anthony Albanese says it will make a “substantial difference”. He also tries to justify the decision to grandfather the policy, by allowing current investment owners to continue to use negative gearing incentives.
double quotation markWhat it will do is to make a substantial difference by giving people that opportunity to aspire to their own home. It will also, of course, boost supply over time as well.
We do have to have a transition and that’s because we wanted to look after people who had made decisions based upon a system that had been there for a while, but a system that increasingly simply wasn’t working.
Anthony Albanese and Jim Chalmers at Parliament House this morning. Photograph: Hilary Wardhaugh/Getty ImagesShare
Updated at 17.43 EDT