Topics: Stage three tax cuts, Negative gearing

E&OE

CHRIS KENNY:

Well, as I've been saying the Coalition has agreed to roll over and support Labor's tax cut plan, which means they're also voting for a tax increase for many Australians. I took up that issue with Shadow Treasurer Angus Taylor late today asking him, if that sticks in his craw.

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well, I wouldn't characterise the Opposition that way at all, Chris. What we've said is that given Labor's mismanagement, egregious mismanagement of the economy, Australians are hurting - an average Australian is $8,000 worse off in terms of their standard of living than they were 18 months ago. And we're seeing that pain right across the country. So we're not going to stand between those Australians and tax relief, but we disagree with the way Labor has funded this tax relief. They're doing it by obviously raising taxes. And that's why we've said, we'll take a strong tax reform policy to the next election.

CHRIS KENNY:

Yeah look I understand...

ANGUS TAYLOR:

So we've got to do our money, our work.

CHRIS KENNY:

Yeah, but I understand the rationale. And that's why you're going to not stand in the way of Labor's package, but it means you're effectively voting, apart from a tax cut for a lot of Australians, you are voting then for a tax increase on many Australians too - anyone over $150,000 a year.

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well, as I said, we're going to take tax relief to the next - tax reform, I should say, to the next election, Chris, but you've got to look at how we got to where we are. What we've seen here is egregious mismanagement of the economy by Labor. And this is the number one issue Australians are facing right now. We have never seen Chris, a collapse in real disposable incomes in our lifetimes, like we're seeing right now. 8.6% in 18 months, so we're seeing people at Food Banks we've never seen before. Now, we disagree with the way they're funding this, of course, we want to see lower taxes. And this was legislated. But the other reason why we are where we are is Labor has decided to pursue this way to fund this tax relief. And that means they've broken a promise, which was in legislation which they voted for, a promise made by the Treasurer and the Prime Minister over 100 times, Chris. And where does this end? Of course, we know they're coming after negative gearing, they've absolutely refused to rule that out. We know they're looking at family trusts, we know they would love to get to the family home to capital gains tax. And this is a Prime Minister whose word means nothing. We've seen that with electricity bills where he promised $275. And we haven't seen any of that. And I don't think it ends anywhere near here. It ends up a long way down the track with a lot more broken promises.

CHRIS KENNY:

I'll come back to negative gearing in a moment. And I agree with your critique on Labor. I've got no qualms about your critique there. I agree with you. But my point is that in voting for this package, because you're in a political world, and in a practical world, you have to, it must really stick in the craw of Coalition MPs that are actually voting for a tax increase on anybody over 150 grand and that is largely the Liberal Party or National Party base, in many cases. When you talk about trying to redress that with a tax policy at the next election, can you guarantee that you'll get rid of that 37 cents in the dollar tax bracket that you were eradicating under your plan?

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Well, we'll take to the next election, as I said tax reforms that are in keeping with the stage three tax cuts. Labor's spent the money, Labor always spends the money, Chris, this is the point about Labor, they'll always spend every bit of money they can and wie'll have to go and find it. I mean, they have spent an extra $209 billion since they came to power. They've trashed the economy. Australians are hurting like, as I said, I've never seen in my lifetime, but we're doing the work and we'll do the work. But Labor plays this tricky politics all the time now, Chris, where they staple two things together where they know we'll like one thing and we'll hate the other. That's what they do. There were we know other options that the Prime Minister looked at for how they fund these tax cuts. But Labor being Labor, the way they like to fund things is to rob Peter to pay Paul. That's how Labor does it. I mean, it's divisive politics. We had racial division all last year, and we're going to have no doubt economic division this year. But that's that's the way the Prime Minister likes to play the game. That's the Australia he wants to see. It's certainly not the Australia we believe.

CHRIS KENNY:

Yeah, that's the politics they want to play. Here's a bit of Jim Chalmers the Treasurer in question time today.

[AUDIO]

Pretty sickening to watch, really when you think about what they've done to the economy, what they've done to electricity prices and the like, but also, because of their broken promise, how can we believe them on tax in the future? We know the greens are out there pushing hard today for changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax. Is that going to be next year do you think? Because the Greens, of course, are a party that Labor absolutely relies on.

ANGUS TAYLOR:

It will be next. There's no question about that. They are coming after negative gearing. I asked a question of the Prime Minister again today, I did the same earlier in the week as to whether they'll rule out changes to negative gearing, he refused to do that. And we know this Prime Minister, if he's refusing to rule it out, then he's definitely planning to do it. Even if he's planning to do it, he'll rule it out. So if he's not ruling it out, it's gonna happen. And you know, the question I asked him was an important one, which is whether they're prepared to grandfather existing arrangements, which would mean, you know, people would have to unwind all of, any of their investment properties that are negatively geared. Now again, absolutely refusing to roll out so we know where they're going. We know. This is the politics of envy. It's not the politics of aspiration. This is the exact opposite of it Chris, we have Labor going back to its socialist roots right now. And we pretty much have all the way through the next election and we will take policies to the next election, which are aspirational as we did to the last election, and they were legislated. Labor pretends to be all sorts of things. They're not. They are the politics of envy.

CHRIS KENNY:

Yeah, we're getting all the policies that were rejected when Bill Shorten ran at the previous election. Thanks so much for joining us, Angus Taylor.

ANGUS TAYLOR:

Good on you, Chris. Good to be with you.

ENDS.