Treasurer knows his real contest is against the Greens

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg. Picture: Gary Ramage

Josh Frydenberg’s seat of Kooyong is now a Liberal v Greens seat, and at the 2019 federal election the Liberal Party spent like a drunken sailor to hold it. The growing pressure on the Treasurer is clearly starting to show.

Frydenberg is on the nose after doling out $14bn in JobKeeper to big corporations with rising profits, including to at least one billionaire who bought a private jet, while also pushing more new coal and gas mines against the wishes of his inner-city constituents, and the fear campaign has begun.

It is true the Greens are the real opposition to Frydenberg’s illiberal Liberals. While Labor sides with the Liberals to pass stage three tax cuts that give 75 per cent of the benefit to the richest 20 per cent, and votes with Barnaby Joyce to spend public money to open up the Beetaloo gas basin in the NT that will lift Australia’s emissions by up to 13 per cent, the Greens stand opposed.

There are plenty of points of difference for Frydenberg to find without making them up. So let’s clear things up. The Greens have a strong policy platform, determined by our members, that sets our direction. Each election we take a set of costed initiatives to the electorate, which is our plan for the coming term.

This term, despite Frydenberg’s frantic claims, the Greens are not proposing new taxes on superannuation, death duties or lifting income tax rates for everyday people. Instead, our costed policy platform is based on taking on those that Liberals such as the Treasurer really care about: the billionaires and big corporations.

The Greens will push a new billionaires tax. That’s the only wealth tax we’ll be pushing. A big, new 6 per cent tax on billionaires’ wealth. While everyone else did it hard during the pandemic, Australia’s billionaires increased their wealth faster than billionaires anywhere else and it’s time they paid their fair share.

One in three big corporations in Australia pays no tax. When a nurse pays more tax than a multinational, something is seriously wrong. The Greens will fix that not by going after small family businesses but instead by getting big corporations (with turnovers above $100m) making super-profits to pay a 40 per cent tax on those super-profits.

We won’t be going after everyday people like the Liberals do, but instead make big corporations and billionaires pay their fair share and rein in their unfair handouts.

The Liberals have delivered flatlined wages growth, a health system in crisis, and higher out-of-pocket fees for healthcare and schools. They know the public is about to turf them out, so rather than campaign on their terrible record the Treasurer goes post-truth.

What the Treasurer refuses to say is that the Greens want the big corporations and billionaires to pay their fair share so everyday people can have a better life. We know cost of living will always be an election issue. That’s why our plan is aimed at making people’s lives better by cutting the costs of healthcare and education while lifting wages.

We want to kick the Liberals out. We want to kick them out because of the climate debt they are leaving to future generations. It used to be a core value not to leave an enormous debt to your kids, but the Liberals are threatening our children’s survival.

If the Liberals do lose, what will be their legacy? Record climate pollution. Record inequality. Underfunded health, education and aged care. No corruption watchdog. Record wealth growth for billionaires and record misinformation. Records set in the unaffordability of housing, the amount of insecure work, and the lack of wage growth.

The next parliament will have to fix a lot and the Greens don’t exist just to block legislation, unlike the Treasurer’s political bedfellows the Nationals. The Greens will work constructively to improve climate, environmental and economic laws, make sure they keep people safe, so everyone can have a better life.

And let’s knock one final thing on the head. The Greens want to change the government but not to be in a Liberal-National style coalition with Labor. Being forced to vote with Labor for more coal and gas mines or to give tax cuts to billionaires doesn’t interest us in the least. We’ll maintain our independence as we push the next government to act on the climate and inequality crises.

So what might a minority parliament deliver? The Greens’ agenda is clear. We’d kick the Liberals out and push to make billionaires and big corporations pay their fair share of tax so we get dental and mental health into Medicare, build affordable housing, make childcare free, get a federal ICAC and take real climate action. No wonder Frydenberg is terrified.

Adam Bandt is the leader of the Greens and the federal member for the seat of Melbourne.