This Month
Budget surplus to be 50pc bigger than forecast: Chalmers
The May budget forecast a $9.3 billion surplus last financial year, but Treasurer Jim Chalmers now says people should expect something in the ‘mid-teens’.
- Ronald Mizen
- Exclusive
- Infrastructure
Victoria’s secrecy stalls cash for Suburban Rail Loop
Victoria has failed to hand over critical information about its controversial rail loop for almost two years despite seeking $11.5 billion from taxpayers.
- Ronald Mizen
Dutton moves to election footing after budget shift, NATO snub
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has told his party room to “be ready” for an election as early as September.
- Phillip Coorey
- Exclusive
- Anthony Albanese
Albanese quietly frees up funds for election fight
The prime minister has implemented a shift in budget strategy that allows him to free up funds for election priorities, causing some dismay among senior officials.
- Phillip Coorey
- Exclusive
- Pension
Deeming rate freeze costing up to $1.8 billion a year
If the freeze is maintained over the forward estimates, the overall unrealised savings could be more than $7bn, according to government figures, though this is not reflected in the budget.
- Ronald Mizen
June
The final push on inflation will be the toughest: Chalmers
The final push to lower inflation to within the RBA’s target band will be the toughest, Jim Chalmers has warned.
- Phillip Coorey
- Exclusive
- Disability
NDIS to cost $100b, exceeding the pension: budget watchdog
The NDIS is on track to overtake the age pension as the most expensive area of spending within three years if it remains stuck on its current trajectory.
- Michael Read
Palmer confident on $40b coal damages claim
Billionaire Clive Palmer says his Singapore business could take the Commonwealth to the cleaners over a stalled coal project in Queensland’s Galilee Basin.
- Brad Thompson
NDIS delay to cost $1.1b as senators jet off to Brazil
Disability Minister Bill Shorten warns that a Coalition proposal to delay the government’s NDIS overhaul by two months will cost taxpayers $137 million per week.
- Michael Read
- Exclusive
- Interest rates
Chalmers’ budget is expansionary: RBA analysis
Labor’s third budget adds more money into the economy this year than it takes out, making it ‘slightly expansionary’, according to RBA research.
- Michael Read and Ronald Mizen
- Opinion
- Inflation
Reserve Bank must restore credibility and not buy into energy rebate trickery
A year out from an election and amid Labor’s overhaul of the institution, a temporary mechanical reduction in the CPI has the potential to interfere with the RBA’s independent conduct of monetary policy.
- Steven Hamilton
May
Treasury boss warns PM: ‘Enormous benefits’ from Chinese solar panels
Commenting on the government’s Future Made in Australia green industrial subsidies, Steven Kennedy says Australia ‘must not be distracted by ideas, frankly, over many decades, have been shown won’t work’.
- John Kehoe
- Opinion
- Company tax
Husic, inadvertently perhaps, has rained on the budget centrepiece
Industry Minister Ed Husic articulated a long-held view that the government needed to consider lowering the company tax burden to spur investment.
- Phillip Coorey
AI minister: Cut company tax to boost robotics, automation
A call by Ed Husic to cut taxes on corporate profits to encourage investment in advanced manufacturing has been applauded by business but exposed a split in the cabinet.
- Phillip Coorey
Health spending outstrips tax cuts in budget beauty contest
Defence spending and paying superannuation on public paid parental leave, were the two least popular measures in the federal budget, a new survey reveals.
- Phillip Coorey
- Opinion
- Opinion
Someone will have to bite the bullet and raise taxes
It’s delusional to think that we can find large new areas to spend money on without the overall cost of government going up. But whoever raises taxes first will have an advantage.
- Laura Tingle
- Opinion
- Opinion
There’s a super-sized hole in the budget. Here’s why
The forecast bounce in the tax take on superannuation will not happen because we’ve massively overdone the concessions that take from poorer and give to richer Australians.
- Chris Richardson
- Opinion
- Canberra Observed
Both sides are pushing buttons on migration, one is being more subtle
Migration long ago became a lazy method, adopted by both sides of politics, to generate growth in the absence of any reform or productivity agenda,
- Phillip Coorey
‘Super-sized hole’ in budget as Treasury revises tax take
Treasury has cut $11 billion from its four-year estimates of revenue from superannuation taxes, as “overly large tax concessions” keep benefiting the richest retirees.
- Hannah Wootton
Universities brace for foreign student cuts of up to 95pc
Both sides of politics say the reductions are needed to relieve housing pressure and both plans would deliver a huge shock to the $48b industry.
- Julie Hare
