‘He thought he could lie and get away with it’: Labor blasted over 2026 budget

The Prime Minister thought he could get away with a great big lie.It's not working.

Negative gearing is off the table.

Yeah, it's off the table.Will you guarantee that you won't touch negative gearing in capital gains tax concessions?

Well, we have no plans to touch or change negative gearing.

If we go to the current issue of negative gearing capital gains tax, might you change...Well, it's not a current issue.Even though it certainly is on the front pages of every paper at the moment.

Well, if you ask the same question, Peter, you get the same answer.Well, I'm not getting a response to it, so can I ask again, could those plans change?Yes, you are.Yes, you are.You're not listening, Peter.You've already asked it and I've already answered it.

Yeah, but I'm asking, you said no plans, but could plans change?And I mean, well, Peter, if you want to keep interrupting me, then this won't be, we won't get anywhere.

Can you rule out any changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax?Yes.How hard is it for the 50th time?

Do you notice the tetchier he gets, the thinner his lips get as well.But he also thought, in addition to that lie, he also thought ordinary people would be slow to comprehend just how much Tuesday night's budget would hurt them.But he was wrong on both counts.Real people watch every dollar, unlike the Prime Minister and his front bench, who don't pay for their cars, their petrol, their flights, their hotel rooms, their staff.or even their phone bills, meaning that as soon as changes are made to anything that hits your back pocket, you do the calculations and you know it right down to the last dollar, what it'll cost you and what it will cost your family.So what's your verdict on the fifth Albanese budget?

Well, it stinks.If news polls anything to go on, the majority of Australians telling pollsters they are worse off and that they will pay more tax overall.The majority also recognise that Labor's budget will only make inflation worse because they've heard the warnings from the Reserve Bank that government spending must come down and it hasn't.On housing and all of Labor's talk about changes to negative gearing, they know it'll hurt young people.They don't buy this lie that it'll increase supply.22 % say it won't make a difference.

38 % say it's a step in the wrong direction.So in aggregate terms, that's 60 % of voters that are less than impressed with the Prime Minister's decision to lie, to break his word and change the rules regarding property taxes.To lie and then let that lie not just hurt you in trust terms, but not even give you a win in policy terms, Well, that's really dumb politics, but it gets worse.Already, Australians are rejecting the class war that's explicit in the budget, with fully half of those polled agreeing that it's driving a wedge between younger and older generations.And when compared to other controversial budgets in the past, well, this one, it's a shocker.You have to go back to the Keating era when Labor lied back then, too.

It lied about the L .A .W.law tax cuts.They put them in the legislation before the election.They took them out after the 93 election.

Well, that's the last time that Labor had a budget like this.Today out on the hustings for the big budget PR sell, Labor was clearly rattled, particularly by revelations that they have bought in by stealth death taxes.

If people want to avoid paying the minimum tax in the future, they can still set up a fixed testamentary trust for that purpose.

that testamentary trust will not be included.

Now, when Bill Shorten had this same package of tax changes, he exempted trusts related to someone's will and estate, but not this time under this leader.He says, yes, fixed are in, but not discretionary testimony trusts.And when journalists wanted to know why this time it was different, why the exemption then and not now, well, the Treasurer was at his tricky best.

Look, I'm not revisiting the decisions that we took some parliaments ago.Our job is to make the right decisions on policy in 2026, not to redo the policy decisions taken in 2018 or 19 or whenever it was.

Worst deal was a response to the Prime Minister who honestly just waffled his way through.I don't even think he understands what a testamentary trust is for or why they are used by everyday people.I mean, farmers, small business.Someone with a disabled child, for example.They're all examples of people who use these sorts of arrangements in their will.Now, the opposition leader, Angus Taylor, on the other hand, well, he's found his mojo.

He's a Rhodes Scholar, we know that, with an economic and business background, but he is running rings around his financially incompetent Labor counterparts.

that are squeezed.Small businesses that are going out backwards.Small businesses where the people working, the family members working in that business are working harder than they ever have for less.Talk about working harder for less.Nowhere do I see that more than amongst small businesses around the country right now.Every accountant in this country who has clients who are small business people got calls over the weekend.

They all got calls, what are we going to do?This government is going after us.But this is not a government that cares about small business.Never has, never will.

Already Taylor has eclipsed any memory of Susan Lee.There's not a Liberal out there saying they got it wrong when they removed her back in February.And his fighting speech on Thursday in response to Labor's class war budget was everything that coalition supporters have been desperate to see to date, but they haven't.Not under Lee, and to be honest, they didn't see it under Peter Dutton either.Finally, as I wrote in my column yesterday in the Sunday papers, Taylor's put some policy backbone back into the Liberals and a bit of political mongrel as well.The problem to date, as I said to a colleague today, is that in opposition, the Liberals have been appalling in taking the fight up to Labor.

And you need to have fights in opposition so that voters can understand why and how you are different from your opponents.Yes, it's early days.Let's not get ahead of ourselves.But finally, there's a policy, a clear policy difference between the government and the opposition on a whole range of big ticket items.Income tax, immigration, the whole net zero madness so loved by the green left.On income tax, Taylor wants to increase or incentivise those, deal with bracket creep, sorry, by indexing income tax thresholds.

And that'll really assist those on low to middle incomes.They won't be punished for getting ahead.On migration, he's gone the jugular and landed a bullseye, so much so that the Prime Minister himself was basically hysterical, declaring it was un -Australian to divide people between those who are migrant and those who are not.

We want, as the Labor Government, to fight for our nation as a whole, not to divide people through the division which he put up.speaking about Australians and migrants as if they were completely separate things, as if there is no one in this country who is a migrant, who isn't loyal to Australia.What I see is hardworking Australians who've come here making a difference to their nation.

Another Albanese lie.Taylor did not divide people by those who are migrant and those who are not.Another lie, as I said.Taylor's split was between Australian citizen and non -citizen.And he said that under the coalition, only citizens would get access to the pension, the dole, the NDIS and other welfare.Now, what's unfair about that?

Why should your taxes carry people who've made no formal commitment to this country.Because right now, people could live here for decades, take the money, and never pledge loyalty to Australia and its people.Now Taylor says, not anymore.

If people commit to this country, if immigrants commit to this country, we will commit to them.We are a great immigrant nation.We are one of the greatest immigrant nations on earth.And it has worked because of a very simple principle.that if people coming to our country commit to this country, we will commit to them.And that is in a principle we believe in firmly.

Given Labor's got us on track to hit 30 million people by 2030, so four years time, despite nowhere near enough housing for those who are here now, you can bet this commitment from the coalition is politically potent.Last week, El Menizi declared his budget was full of Labor values.And yes, it is. the socialist values that attack the fair go, that break trust and hit middle Australia even harder.For the Liberals, there's no better ground than this to fight Labor.If the Coalition holds its nerve and campaigns like every day of its life depends on it, and frankly it does, then this budget could well be the beginning of the end for the Albanese government.But only if they work night and day to take the fight up to Labor.

Labor's a target here, not each other, and not one nation.