Jim Chalmers (Rankin, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Dunkley. Because of her efforts, every one of the 73,000 taxpayers in Dunkley will be getting a tax cut and every single one of the 65,000 households will get energy bill relief. Since parliament rose at the end of budget week, we have been visiting communities and talking to people about the budget and what it means for them and why it matters for them as well—from Western Sydney to Western Australia, from Logan to Launceston, from the Gold Coast to Gladstone and in Melbourne, Ipswich, regional South Australia and Brisbane.

We know that inflation has moderated a lot since we came to office, but we know that people are still under the pump. This is why the primary purpose of the budget two weeks ago was to ease cost-of-living pressures. Most of that cost-of-living relief is for everyone. Some of it is targeted, but all of it will help to take some of the edge off these inflationary pressures that people are feeling. In the first instance, there is a tax cut for every taxpayer, all 13.6 million of them. As the Prime Minister said, those tax cuts are now less than five weeks away. There is energy bill relief for every household and for small business, and there's the first back-to-back increase in Commonwealth rent assistance in more than 30 years. We're freezing the cost of prescriptions; we're wiping $3 billion in student debt; we're helping students on prac and we're creating more fee-free TAFE places; and we're paying the super guarantee on paid parental leave for the very first time. By helping with bills, we'll put downward pressure on inflation at the same time. We know this works because when we did it in the last budget, we were able to take some of the edge off the inflationary pressures in the economy. A combination of our cost-of-living help and our responsible economic management is a key reason why inflation is almost half what we inherited from those opposite two years ago.

A key reason why Treasury is now forecasting an earlier return to inflation in the target band is because of our cost-of-living help. So we have made welcome and encouraging progress when it comes to the fight against inflation, but it doesn't moderate in a straight line; we've seen it zig and zag in other countries already. We'll get some new monthly figures tomorrow and, as I've said a number of times from this dispatch box, these monthly figures bounce around a bit. They don't compare the same items month to month and they're less reliable than the quarterly figures, but the overall direction of travel when it comes to inflation is clear: when we came to office, the monthly and quarterly measures of annual inflation were both 6.1 per cent and they're now substantially lower. But they're still too high and that's why our inflation-fighting budget provides cost-of-living relief in the most responsible way, at the same time as we invest in Medicare, housing, skills and the industries which will power our future.

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