TV interview with Minister Butler, ABC News Breakfast – 19 August 2026

Media event date: 19 August 2026 Date published: 19 August 2026 Media type: General public JAMES GLENDAY, CO-HOST: It sure has been a busy week, so let’s talk federal politics. Of course, there’s been deal-making happening in Canberra with agreements on cuts to the NDIS, and changes to gambling advertising. There’s also this new push by unions to try to overhaul conditions for renters as well.

For all this and, wait, there’s more, the Federal Health Minister Mark Butler joins us now from Canberra. Minister, thank you for making time for us. MARK BUTLER, MINISTER FOR HEALTH AND AGEING, MINISTER FOR DISABILITY AND THE NDIS: Thanks James.

So much more. : Now, you are a union guy, what’s your personal view about this idea from the ACTU for all renters to have access to a two-year minimum lease? : Look, our government’s been talking to state and territory governments about renters’ rights. It’s been a really important part of our program, really, to make sure that renters get a fair deal. It’s a really important part of the housing market.

We hope it’s mainly a part of the housing market as people work out how they become homeowners. But we’re open to all good ideas about how renters get a fair deal. I haven’t looked through the detail of this latest one, so I don’t have any particular comment.

But it has been a big part of the discussions our Prime Minister has led with state and territory governments. : Is there a chance that Treasury got its forecasts for increasing rents due to changes to housing taxes wrong? Could rents be about to jump quite substantially do you think? : We're very confident in our forecast, and as Jim Chalmers has said it's important to give these sorts of changes some time to settle down, look over a couple of years rather than a couple of months.

But just think about it logically, James. Remember that the two and a half million or more private rental properties in the market that are owned by investors, if they're owned already at budget night and we're being negatively geared, that can continue. There should be no impact on the rents being charged in those properties.

We're seeing investors move to new builds, which is something we really wanted to see happen, to add to the productive capacity of the country. Again, they will be entitled to negative gearing arrangements as well. There should be no impact on rents there.

I've seen some sort of pretty startling headlines, but it doesn't reflect logic. And it certainly doesn't reflect the modelling that we're very confident about. : Well, to quote a journalism cliche, only time will tell. Now, One Nation's been making a lot of bold claims lately.

I saw Barnaby Joyce claiming it was the gayest party in the country. It's got some ideas about what to do with superannuation. It’s also talking about slashing the tax on cigarettes to try to reduce illegal tobacco in this country.

This is adjacent to your portfolio, of course. Is it something that you've had discussions about as a government? : The first thing to say is that the most important objective about smoking policy is to get smoking rates down, and the latest data that was released relatively recently showed that we're still making terrific progress there. About half a million Australians quit daily smoking over the last three or four years.

We now have one of the lowest smoking rates in the world and we should be very pleased with that, while recognising still that about 20,000 Australians die every year because of smoking-related complications. What we do have though is a really serious law and order issue and I think all of your viewers understand that in their big cities, particularly the two big cities where law enforcement has taken a little while to catch up with some of the leading efforts of states like Queensland and South Australia.

Yes, we're thinking very carefully about how to crack down on these criminals and put them out of business. But from a health perspective, I'm pleased that smoking rates are continuing to come down. We're not going to be particularly interested in sort of thought bubbles like One Nation's this week.

There is a Senate inquiry looking at this right now. I think it's due to report in the relatively near future. We'll look at that report very, very closely. : So would you be open then?

Would you be open to cutting the excise? Because the argument- I mean, it’s not just One Nation that’s saying this. The argument is that cigarettes are so expensive there's this real incentive to buy much cheaper illegal cigarettes.

And as you allude to, you can find them in our major cities relatively easily. : Governments aren't usually in the habit of engaging in price competition with organised crimes. That's a hard line for us to cross. Equally, no one's really said to me or to the government where the price point is that actually starts to move them out of the market.

You could get rid of excise altogether, completely abolish it, and still legal cigarettes would be significantly more expensive than the illegal product. That's why I think this requires more deep thought than frankly cheap headlines of the type we've seen this week. We're not particularly interested in thought bubbles in an area that is this important, both in terms of public health, but also in terms of serious organised crime. : It seems as though a cut to the excess is not likely.

The NDIS of course, has been a huge thing for you. The changes are going to go through Parliament with a lot of amendments. For people waking up this morning and thinking, goodness me, what is being traded here, can you just take us through?

I think there's 60 odd amendments. What are the biggest changes that you have made to get this through Parliament? : Yeah, many of the amendments, frankly, James, are relatively technical. They clarify the policy intent that I outlined several months ago at the Press Club.

Some of them are more significant, particularly we talked to the Coalition about some amendments that would tighten even further the safeguards on fraud, the integrity controls, which frankly have been too loose for too long in this scheme. Also quite significantly we outlined protections that again I announced in principle some months ago for people with high support needs to ensure that those people who need 24/7 care would continue to get it.

It's not a change in direction. In many ways, it's simply providing more detail, more clarification around the policy intent that I announced months ago. But I'm really proud of the delivery in the Parliament of this significant plan to get the NDIS back on track, alongside the huge protections against gambling harms that we'll deliver today, and the protection for Australian journalism from being exploited, frankly, by the global tech giants.

This is a huge week of delivery for the government. : Yeah, a lot of deals being done. We covered your speech extensively at the time. You're trying to save a huge amount of money on the NDIS.

As part of that, a lot of children with autism are going to be diverted off the NDIS and into this Thriving Kids program. What’s going to happen if the states don’t play ball here? What’s going to happen if this is not ready?

Because there is still a lot of disagreement. : I’m really pleased that every state and territory, with the exception of Queensland, which I'll come to, have already got agreed implementation plans in place and they are ready to start ramping their Thriving Kids services up from October. It's important to recall that the switch won't happen until 2028, so young children with these level of support needs are able to continue to be enrolled on the NDIS but I’m very confident - : Are you confident it'll be ready by 2028?

I guess that’s the big question families are going to have this morning. : Yeah, I'm very confident. States recognise the importance of this. They've got their implementation plans ready from 1 October.

Those services will start to roll out. They're not new concepts. These are the sorts of services that we had in place for many decades before the NDIS was created.

I'm very confident about that. I’ve made clear, of course, to parents that there is no way that any government will let their children, their precious children slip between two stools or go without supports. But I’m really confident that that target date of 1 January 2028 will be achieved, particularly for Thriving Kids.

Now, for kids over nine and for other adults who might be impacted by these changes to the NDIS, we do have a tonne of work to do with states and territories. I made that clear yesterday that there’s still much work to do to get the NDIS back on track. And really now that work has to commence for those other population groups from today. : Minister, we promised more.

We've really gone around the grounds. Thank you for joining us in a busy week. : Thanks, James. The Hon Mark Butler MP Smoking, vaping and tobacco Disability and carers Accessibility We acknowledge the Traditional Owners and Custodians of Country throughout Australia, and their continuing connection to land, sea and community.

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