Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

He says, 'No, they don't.' They do. Only one per cent, I think, they said—barely a ripple, they are proposing. What the Labor Party is proposing in its ban on negative gearing is the most ill-thought-out tax grab you can imagine.

For our part, we have no doubt that it would hit the housing market with a sledgehammer, with very, very negative consequences. But let's leave opinions on the value of real estate to one side. Let's look at how Labor discriminate against the very people they claim to represent. More than two-thirds of the people who file negative gearing claims are middle-income Australians: nurses, teachers and policemen.

Opposition members interjecting—

You can hear the Labor Party sneering about it—scoffing and scorning. That is where most of the negative gearing claims are made. And who, under Labor's plan, will be able to continue to offset net business losses? Who will be able to continue negative gearing? Not the wage earner, not the salary earner, not the professional person—no policemen, no teachers. Who will be doing it? Wealthy people with large investment incomes. So, the very people Labor claims to champion they are abandoning, and the people they claim to be taking on are the ones who will benefit from the market, from the greater opportunities afforded by yet another ill-thought Labor policy. They're such hopeless generals they can't even manage a class war. (Time expired)

Mr Rob Mitchell interjecting—

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