Allegra Spender (Wentworth, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is for the Treasurer. Tuesday's budget showed our fiscal position in structural deficit for the next decade. That concerns many of the people of Wentworth. What is the government's plan, apart from bracket creep, to address the structural deficit?

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

I thank the honourable member for her question. I also acknowledge the 104,000 taxpayers in her electorate who will get two more tax cuts because of Tuesday night's budget. I also want to acknowledge that the member for Wentworth is a frequent and considered contributor to the national debate about tax reform, and I assure her that the government's focus is on implementing the broad and ambitious tax reform agenda that we have laid out over the course of four budgets now.

Obviously—and the member referred to this in her question—the tax cuts for every taxpayer are about returning bracket creep and increasing participation. We're also ensuring multinationals pay their fair share of tax here in Australia. We're encouraging investment in important areas like housing and clean energy with our tax breaks.

Milton Dick (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The Treasurer will just pause for a moment so I can hear the member.

Allegra Spender (Wentworth, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On relevance: the question was about structural deficit, not tax cuts.

Milton Dick (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will just bring the Treasurer back to the question.

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

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The reason I'm running through these tax reforms is that a number of them improve the structural position of the budget, which I think the honourable member understands, including the changes to the PRRT, which will see the offshore LNG industry pay more tax sooner, as well as the efforts on tax compliance.

One of the defining features of the government's four budgets has been responsible economic management, and that has made a difference in the near term to the position of the budget but also to the structural position of the budget, which the honourable member asked me about. As to the fact that we have engineered the biggest ever nominal turnaround in the budget in a parliamentary term—a $207 billion improvement—the fact that we delivered those two budget surpluses and the fact that we got the deficit down this year and delivered an improvement every year, what that means for the structural position is that we save a lot in interest costs. The fact that interest costs are down is making a major, meaningful difference to the structural budget position.

In addition to that, we have also taken steps—and here I pay tribute to the former member for Maribyrnong and Minister Rishworth for their efforts. The steps we have taken on the NDIS are about structural improvements to the budget. The steps that the aged-care minister and the health minister have taken in the aged-care budget are about making the budget more sustainable as well. As to that interest cost difference, the fact that we've got that debt down by $177 billion this year is going to save about $60 billion over the life of the medium term in the budget, and that's making a structural difference too. So if the honourable member's question is, 'Is there more work to do in terms of the structural position of the budget?' of course there is, but we shouldn't dismiss or diminish the very, very substantial progress that this government has made cleaning up the mess that we inherited from those opposite.

Cassandra Fernando (Holt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Treasurer. How is the budget helping Australians with the cost of living? Are there any threats to this cost-of-living support?

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

Thank you to the outstanding member for Holt for her great question. I wanted to acknowledge more broadly that, as the government puts together its cost-of-living agenda, it is wonderful local members like member for Holt helped us put together, because on this side of the House we understand the cost-of-living pressures that people are under, even as we make really encouraging progress in the fight against inflation. We saw more progress yesterday in the inflation figures, which came down in a headline sense but also an underlying sense, and what that means is as a government we were getting inflation down. Real wages are up. Unemployment is low. We are getting the debt down. Interest rates are coming down and growth is rebounding solidly in our economy as well, so we have made a lot of progress together as Australians, but we know people are still under pressure and that is why there is more work to do.

The cost-of-living pressures that Australians feel despite the progress we have made together on inflation is the primary motivation for the cost-of-living package which was in Tuesday night's budget. We know that the cost of living is front of mind for a lot of Australians and that is why it was front and centre in Tuesday night's budget as well. That budget contained a coherent and comprehensive package of cost-of-living assistance—energy bill relief, cheaper medicines. We are cutting student debt. We are strengthening Medicare because we know that more bulk-billing means less pressure on families around Australia, and we have those two new tax cuts to top up the tax relief that is already flowing despite the opposition of those opposite.

Now, the shadow Treasurer's brain snap today makes it really clear that they would legislate higher taxes for every single Australian taxpayer. Under those opposite, as we have said, Australians would earn less and keep less of what they earn, and that is because they want to cut everything except taxes for workers. So whatever the opposition leader says tonight, it is already very, very clear that they are about three things: higher taxes for workers, secret cuts to pay for nuclear reactors and no ongoing help with the cost of living. So this does set up a very simple choice at the election: this Labor Prime Minister and his Labor government cutting taxes and helping people with the cost of living or that opposition leader and that coalition jacking up income taxes and making people worse off.