QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE: TAKE NOTE OF ANSWERS

Senator GHOSH (Western Australia) (15:09): There is no greater illustration that the Liberal Party of Australia is not fit to govern than the attack on the budget here today. This is one of those things that illustrates the lack of capacity on that side, and I'm going to deal with three points. The first is you have no credibility on taxes.

The second is you ignore the details in the budget, and you ignore them in order to mislead. The third is that the values that this budget embodies on this side of the house are the values of Australia. They are the values of the Australian people.

Senator Henderson: Come on, Varun! This is one of the most tragic betrayals. What's an innovative business?

You know the law applies certainty. We demand tax reform, not tax— Senator GHOSH: Senator Henderson, you can interject all you want on me; the facts speak for themselves. Let's go to those facts, and let's go to the circumstances, because the one thing that's been a theme on that side is that the government shouldn't have changed its position on a number of topics and taxation issues.

But, when the facts change, when the circumstances change, when working Australians are desperate for changes and some assistance to their cost of living, when working Australians are desperate to get into housing, then we change our policies because that is the right thing to do. That's what we're explaining and we're taking to the Australian people. There's no better illustration of the values that differ on this side of the house to that side than the fact that my colleague was quoting from the finance minister to King Louis XIV of France, the Sun King himself, yet we are engaged in a piece of tax reform that helps working people.

We're engaged in tax reforms that will help get people into housing. In terms of working people, what have we done? We've delivered a Working Australians Tax Offset to reduce the tax that working people in this country pay by 250 bucks a year.

Since 2023 and 2024, that brings the total reduction in the average tax that working people pay in this country down by $2,816 a year, on average. That's significant, that's money in people's pockets, that's a lower tax burden and that contrasts to those opposite, who took to the last election a tax increase. The second point I want to make is around housing.

Let's deal with negative gearing and these tax changes to CGT in relation to housing, because it's important to understand where the values lie and on whose side of the debate each of the parties in here lie. In spite of their nocturnal flirtation with One Nation, when you go back to it, the coalition are for the top end of town. That's why they oppose these capital gains changes.

This is from the Australian Financial Review: About a third of all capital gains were realised by the people who earned incomes in the highest 1 per cent during their working lives, while more than half of all gains went to the top 10 per cent. So, if you want to know whose side they're on, it's the top one per cent and it's the top 10 per cent; it's not working Australians.

It's not young Australians trying to get into a house. In terms of negative gearing changes, which they oppose, again from the AFR, in the same article, 'For almost one-in-three negatively geared investment properties sold in 2022-23, investors ultimately paid less tax than they would have if they had never bought the property at all. However, they still made a profit on the property.' That's effectively a government subsidy in the tax system through negative gearing.

We're fine for people to invest. We're fine for people to make money, but they shouldn't be able to put it through a loophole, and they shouldn't be able to do it in circumstances where we have a housing crisis and where investors are taking stock off the market and keeping young Australians out of their first homes. What it comes down to in the end, what this budget comes down to and where this debate lies is values.

Where you will find the Australian Labor Party, where you will find the Albanese government, is on the side of working Australians and on the side of young Australians.