I’ll be a voice for the regions: new Treasurer’s pledge to Australians

Cost-of-living pressures will be front of mind for Queensland’s Jim Chalmers as he assumes the role of federal treasurer.

Queensland’s most powerful federal politician and Treasurer-to-be Jim Chalmers says he

feels the weight of responsibility of “dire economic challenges” as he fights to keep a lid on cost-of-living pressures.

Aware of Labor’s lack of seats outside the state’s southeast, Mr Chalmers gave a commitment that he would be a “prominent and powerful voice” for the regions in an Albanese Government while being a “Treasurer for all Australians”.

Jim Chalmers with his mother Carol Chalmers, at his post election party at Logan Rec Club, Logan Central. Picture: Mark Cranitch

Treasury secretary Steven Kennedy flew from Canberra to give an incoming government brief to Mr Chalmers in his Logan home on Sunday. 

Describing himself as “a Logan kid who happens to be Treasurer”, Mr Chalmers said he felt a sense of responsibility with the nation facing “dire economic challenges”.

“This will be the trickiest conditions an incoming treasury has inherited since World War II,” Mr Chalmers said ahead of being sworn in as Treasurer on Monday. 

“Inflation is skyrocketing, real wages are falling and there’s substantial pressure on the budget with $1 trillion in debt.

“We intend to implement our commitments, we intend to start with these challenges straight away, but we’re realistic about how long it will take to turn these challenges around.”

Mr Chalmers will deliver an economic statement to Parliament when it next sits, in late June or July, before handing down a new Budget in October.

His priorities will be providing cost-of-living relief without adding to inflation, as well as getting wages up and tackling Australia’s growing debt.

Rising inflation is seen as one of the biggest economic challenges facing the nation, as well as much of the rest of the world, while the Reserve Bank of Australia has warned that more interest rate rises are inevitable, which will put significant pressure on the Treasurer.

Some of the relief for taxpayers, including the 22.1c/litre petrol excise reduction, are about to come to an end, but Labor is hoping a reduction in childcare fees and power prices under its policies could help families in the short-to-medium term.

Treasurer-in-waiting Jim Chalmers on election night. Picture: Mark Cranitch

“Our cost of living measures are carefully calibrated for this cost-of-living

Mr Chalmers, Labor’s most senior federal MP in Queensland, said he would bring a perspective to the Cabinet table and Treasury from outside the Sydney-Melbourne-Canberra triangle.

“I’m a Queenslander born and bred, but I want to be a Treasurer for the whole country,” he said.

“Being from the suburbs in general and being from Logan particularly means that I have an understanding of the realities of life in communities like ours.

“For me personally, there’s a real sense of responsibility for the hard task ahead.”

Mr Chalmers will be the first federal treasurer from Queensland since Wayne Swan and only the second since Bill Hayden in 1975.

Dr Kennedy is expected to be retained as Treasury secretary.

Labor’s controversial tax agenda from the 2019 election, which included scrapping negative gearing and franking credits, was scrapped well ahead of the 2022 poll.

Tax reforms aimed at multinational companies were the only taxation changes Labor took to this election.

Labor endorsed the stage 3 tax plans, which kick in from July 2024 and ensure people earning $45,000 to $200,000 will all be paying 30c in the dollar.