Anthony Albanese rejects Peter Dutton’s budget barb
Anthony Albanese has rejected Peter Dutton’s criticism that Labor’s second budget imposed an economic penalty on middle Australia.
Anthony Albanese has rejected Peter Dutton’s criticism that Labor’s second budget imposed an economic penalty on middle Australia, with Jim Chalmers using analysis from the Commonwealth Bank to counter arguments that interest rates would be higher for longer.
The Opposition Leader used his budget reply on Thursday to say Labor was turning the middle class into the “working poor”, that mortgages and power bills had gone up and Labor would break its promise for 24/7 registered nurses in aged-care homes by July 1.
On Friday, the Prime Minister said the government had helped middle Australia by lifting aged-care wages by 15 per cent at a cost of $11.3bn, committing $3.5bn to support bulk billing and introducing measures to reduce the costs of medicine.
“We have halved, through our medicines policy, the cost by extending out from one month to two months where prescriptions can be available for people who have diabetes, heart disease, who have to have regular medications,” he said.
“That will literally cut in half the cost, following our decrease in prescription payments from $42.50 down to $30 that occurred on January 1.
“This is a budget aimed squarely at assisting vulnerable people through cost-of-living relief, but also at assisting people in middle Australia across the board.
“More than five million Australians will benefit from our energy price relief plan, put in place in a way that will reduce inflation by 0.75 per cent as a result of Treasury modelling.”
The Treasurer also sought to dismiss commentary from economists that the extra $21bn of spending in his second budget would contribute to interest rates staying higher for longer.
He cited a Commonwealth Bank note declaring the “government’s Energy Price Relief Plan is expected to subtract 0.75ppts from headline inflation in 2023-24. Medicare bulk billing incentives along with childcare subsidies will also put downward pressure on measured inflation.”
CBA also said that the economy was anticipated to continue to slow and the budget was “simply providing some targeted relief to low income households to assist with the cost of living.”
“It’s not enough to shift the overall picture of a slowing economy,” it said.
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