{"id":541817,"date":"2026-03-15T11:12:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-15T11:12:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/541817\/"},"modified":"2026-03-15T11:12:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-15T11:12:16","slug":"jim-chalmers-flags-ambitious-budget-amid-5-inflation-forecast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/541817\/","title":{"rendered":"Jim Chalmers flags \u2018ambitious\u2019 budget amid 5% inflation forecast"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jim Chalmers says he sees the war in the Middle East and the economic shocks as \u201ca reason to go further on reform\u201d, declaring the May budget<\/a> will be \u201cambitious\u201d, focused on savings, and that there are a \u201cwhole bunch of options\u201d on tax reform on the table.<\/p>\n

The Treasurer said his department forecasted year-on-year inflation could hit almost 5 per cent<\/a> at the next quarter because of the oil price spike and the cascading impacts across the economy. <\/p>\n

But Australia will not go into a recession or soon see quarters of negative growth due to the war, Dr Chalmers said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis will be a difficult budget,\u201d he told Sky News.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt will be an ambitious budget too, because this is an ambitious government.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Treasurer said that he saw \u201call of this uncertainty and all of this volatility not as a reason to go slower, but as a reason to go further on reform\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"Escalating<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll be working up a number of reform packages for this budget, and they\u2019ll be focused on savings, they\u2019ll be focused on productivity, I\u2019ll give the colleagues a whole bunch of options when it comes to tax reform, and we\u2019ll work through those issues in the usual considered and methodical way, recognising that we\u2019re in the midst of another period of very substantial international economic uncertainty, and that will weigh heavily not just on our economy, not just on our budget, but also on the deliberations that we undertake in the next couple of months,\u201d he told Sky News. <\/p>\n

Dr Chalmers did not rule out changing the capital gains tax discount on investment properties<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe haven\u2019t taken any decisions on it,\u201d he said, when asked about the prospect he could choose to reduce the 50 per cent rate down to 30 or 33 per cent, as had been speculated. <\/p>\n

\u201cBut as I said a moment ago, we\u2019re working up a number of tax reform options for the colleagues.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said there was \u201cwillingness\u201d to consider further reforms. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf there are additional steps we can take in tax reform beyond those income tax cuts, beyond the changes to the super tax concessions and the other tax reforms that we\u2019ve already made, there is a willingness on my part to consider some of those options,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He similarly did not deny there would be changes to negative gearing or family trusts settings at the next budget. <\/p>\n

Dr Chalmers was asked whether it was \u201cfair\u201d to voters for the government to make such sweeping changes without having flagged those changes at the previous election, less than a year ago. <\/p>\n

He said Labor\u2019s policy platform at the last election made up the \u201cfoundation of our reform efforts, not necessarily a destination\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe take seriously our responsibilities to deliver what we committed to, strengthening Medicare, urgent care clinics,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe tax cuts are an important part of that as well. <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd we consider delivery of what we took to the election to be a foundation of our reform efforts, not necessarily a destination. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere is always more to do when you\u2019re a government like ours, an ambitious government, a reforming government.\u201d<\/p>\n

This comes as inflation forecasts rise and a handful of banks are now expecting the Reserve Bank to raise the target cash rate in coming days. Year-on-year inflation is currently at 3.8 per cent.<\/p>\n

Dr Chalmers said his department expected inflation to hit almost 5 per cent at the next quarter. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf we were putting pencils down on those forecasts today, we\u2019d have inflation peaking somewhere between the mid to high 4s,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

But it depended on how long the war would be, he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve run a number of scenarios as well, just like the private banks do. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got a couple of months to finalise the Treasury forecasts for the budget in May, and so obviously we are working through scenarios and contingencies like this pretty much every day as we try and land these forecasts for the budget.\u201d<\/p>\n

But he said changes to the petrol excise was \u201cnot something that we have been considering\u201d ahead of the budget. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not something that\u2019s on the list of things that we are working up for the budget.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Noah<\/a><\/p>\n

Noah Yim is a reporter at The Australian’s Canberra press gallery bureau. He previously worked out of the newspaper’s Sydney newsroom. He joined The Australian following News Corp’s 2022 cadetship program.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jim Chalmers says he sees the war in the Middle East and the economic shocks as \u201ca reason…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":541818,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[64,63,99,164],"class_list":["post-541817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-economy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/541817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=541817"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/541817\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/541818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=541817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=541817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=541817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}