Home run: Liberals bet on property to win over voters

Scott Morrison has hitched his re-election to an economic plan to drive aspiration and turbocharge home ownership.

Scott Morrison with his daughters Abbey and Lily, and wife Jenny after speaking at the Coalition’s campaign launch in Melbourne yesterday. Picture: AFP

Scott Morrison has hitched his re-election to an economic plan to drive aspiration and turbocharge home ownership, recasting his sweeping income tax cuts as an ­attempt to deliver on the “promise of Australia”.

Launching the Coalition campaign in Melbourne — a key battleground where a swag of under-threat government seats could determine the election — the Prime Minister outlined a ­vision of a new positive compact aimed at handing a better future to coming generations.

“I believe that Australia is a promise to everyone who has the great privilege to call themselves an Australian,” Mr Morrison said.

“It’s the promise that allows Australians, quietly going about their lives, to realise their simple, honest and decent aspirations — quiet, hardworking Australians.”

The set-piece event at the Melbourne­ Convention and Exhib­ition Centre — attended by about 300 supporters — avoided the fanfare of Labor’s campaign launch, with no former Liberal prime ministers attending, in a bid to divert attention from the divisio­n and leadership instability that saw three different men lead the government in five years.

Mr Morrison’s major pledge at yesterday’s launch — a top-up of home loan deposits to 20 per cent for first-home buyers — was matched within hours by Labor, which attacked the measure as a “desperate” attempt by the ­Coal­ition to woo young Aus­tralians leading into the final week of the campaign.

Mr Morrison framed the announcem­ent as part of his plan to encourage aspiration without resorting to irresponsible spending. Under the initiative — which would start on January 1 — first-home buyers would be able to purchase their first property with a deposit of 5 per cent after receiving a special government loan.

“We want to help make the dreams of first-home buyers a ­reality,” he said. “It’s hard to save for a deposit. With the banks pulling­ back and larger deposits of 20 per cent being standard, it’s not getting any easier.”

Mr Morrison’s $500 million First Home Loan Deposit Scheme would support home buyers earning up to $125,000 annually or $200,000 for couples in the “form of equity through the National Housing Finance and Investment Corporation”.

With Bill Shorten holding a rival event in his Melbourne elect­orate of Maribyrnong, where he sought to position climate change at the centre of an ­11th-hour pitch to undecided voters, Mr Morrison used his campaign launch to pitch himself as a modest family man, introduced by his mother, Marion, wife Jenny and daughters Abbey and Lily.

The Opposition Leader, who is relying on a strong result in Victoria­ to help deliver a majority government, surrounded himself on stage with female Labor MPs and their children, and called on voters to consider the “damaging partnerships” between the ­Coal­ition, Pauline Hanson and Clive Palmer ahead of the “final sprint to the finish line”.

With the Coalition launch falling on Mother’s Day, and coinciding with a $36m Coalition pledge to provide further support to tackle perinatal depression, Mr Morris­on sketched out his persona­l story of growing up, sharin­g a room with his brother Alan and attending public school.

Following an introduction by Liberal MP Sarah Henderson — who is fighting to hold on to the key marginal Victorian seat of Corangamite — a video presentation touched on Mr Morrison’s married life and his struggle to have children.

In a bid to make his economic plan more tangible for voters in the final days of the campaign, the Prime Minister enshrined people at the heart of his political narrative and warned that Labor’s big-taxing agenda would hamper the delivery of essential services and stop Australians from getting ahead.

“Because people matter, a stronger economy matters,” he said. “Because the economy is what people live in. It’s real.

“Countries with weak economies do not have good public hospitals, a reliable pension, affordable medicines, Medicare, Headspace, a National Disability Insurance Scheme and increasing investments in public schools and aged care.”

He reiterated that the Coalition planned to flatten the tax system over the next several years in a move that would deliver a 30 per cent tax rate to 94 per cent of taxpayers — a move opposed by Labor.

“Australians earning between $45,000 a year and $200,000 a year in the future will never face bracket creep again,” Mr Morrison said. “You can take on that extra shift. You can have a go for that promotion and take on that extra training. You can study at night and you will not be penalised under our government. We don’t buy Labor’s politics of envy.”

Moving to combat traditional areas of Labor strength, Mr Morrison talked up the government’s investment in health and education as well as his push to make suicide prevention a “national priority”.

He said more than 500,000 people would be supported by the NDIS over the next five years and touted his move to set up a royal commission into the abuse of people with disabilities.

In a challenge to Labor, Mr Morrison offered a key promise to 13.5 million Australians with private health insurance. “There will be no private health insurance cuts under our government,” he said.

Seeking to defuse any repeat of Labor’s 2016 Mediscare campaign, Mr Morrison said there had been a 60 per cent increase in hospital funding since the Coalition took office while bulk billing rates had reached a record of nearly 90 per cent.

“More than 2000 medicines (have been) subsidised to provide affordable access through our Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. When Labor ran out of money, they stopped listing medicines,” he said.

The PM also cited a doubling in the number of older Australians receiving in-home aged-care packages, noting that aged-care funding had been growing by $1 billion every year.

Strengthening his key attacks on Labor over the economy, Mr Morrison suggested that aspiration would suffer if Mr Shorten became prime minister in a betrayal of the “promise of Australia” — the idea that people can achieve their aspirations through hard work and economic advancement.

“The election, friends, is about a choice. The choice of who you can trust to keep the promise of Australia to all Australians as prime minister. Myself or Bill Shorten,” he said.

Citing “storm clouds and tensions ahead”, Mr Morrison said Labor’s high taxing and spending agenda would put economic growth at risk “at the worst possible time”.

Additional Reporting: Rosie Lewis