Jason Wood
La Trobe · Liberal Party · Australia
“'My word is my bond' is a phrase never to be used again in Australia, and we can thank the Prime Minister for that, as, when he was asked 50 times prior to the election, 'Will there be changes to capital gains tax or negative gearing?' he kept on saying no. He even belittled the media when he was asked that question.”
“Then Labor got in, and they cancelled all the funding, which is really upsetting for those local residents. The other one I was very passionate about was Wellington Road. Going from Clematis down to Lysterfield Road, Wellington Road is very important.”
“Also, under the former Liberal government, we upgraded dangerous intersections across Latrobe—this was brought to me in particular by Cardinia Shire Council, and I give them their credit—between McGregor Road, and going further down, Cardinia Road. As I mentioned, those were very important upgrades along there.”
“One of the things I'm hearing from small business and people who put trust in the Prime Minister when he made comments like 'my word is my bond' is that they took him at face value when it came to not changing capital gains tax or unit trusts. This actually really hurts a lot of people. A lot of tradies have established a trust.”
“They were advised to set up a trust through their small business. It could be a landscaping business, it could be a post office—whatever it is. They've already gone once to get advice on what's occurring with the government's changes. Now we're seeing all these changes the government's made again. Obviously, they're copping a backlash.”
“Again, it's those smaller, dangerous intersections we've upgraded. The Officer South ramps have now been completed. But one of the projects, very disappointingly, was stopped by the Albanese government when it came into power.”
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“So it's a really tough time for people trying to get ahead in life, especially when it comes to cost-of-living pressures. The government are not making life easier; they're making it more difficult, especially for small businesses.”
“They were advised to set up a trust through their small business. It could be a landscaping business, it could be a post office—whatever it is. They've already gone once to get advice on what's occurring with the government's changes. Now we're seeing all these changes the government's made again. Obviously, they're copping a backlash. I warn the Labor members. You know what? If you don't stand up and speak out about this, it'll cost you your seats, because people are really hurting on the ground, especially when it comes to people who put their faith in the government, especially multicultural communities, when they've set up trusts, and they've also planned for the future when it comes to capital gains discounts. It was 50 per cent under the Howard government. Now that's all going to be changed, with indexation.”
“One of the things I'm hearing from small business and people who put trust in the Prime Minister when he made comments like 'my word is my bond' is that they took him at face value when it came to not changing capital gains tax or unit trusts. This actually really hurts a lot of people. A lot of tradies have established a trust. They've gone to an accountant, and the accountant said, 'Hey, a good way of minimising tax is to put money in a trust,' and then, if one of the partners—it could be a husband or a wife—isn't working, they can get a discount on that. Now they're going to be hit, as money goes into that trust, by a 30 per cent tax. That's a huge whack. When I talk to my friends in the multicultural communities, a lot of my Indian friends, to use them as an example, are going to their accountants at the moment.”
“There are two big issues in the electorate of La Trobe. One is the cost of living. People are really hurting. Recently I'm hearing on the ground that, when it comes to insurance premiums, amazingly they're going up 20 or 30 per cent again. I know sometimes there are factors when it comes to where people live. Up in the Dandenong Ranges, because of bushfires and other issues, they are going up by 20 or 30 per cent. That's really hurting people. Again, when it comes to energy bills, they're going up and up again in Melbourne. Obviously, we're here in parliament in Canberra, but it's a lot colder down there. So power bills are going up. People were promised by the Prime Minister, prior to the previous election, a discount of $275. That hasn't happened.”
“So the Suburban Rail Loop ended up getting the funding from Wellington Road that we committed under the Liberal government, and for sealing the roads in the Dandenong Ranges. The south-east and, in particular, La Trobe have really missed out when it comes to road funding. I know the Labor Party have their hearts set on the Suburban Rail Loop, but you're really hurting local residents when you divert funding from smaller projects to the SRL, which has been impacted by major corruption in the CFMEU.”
“So we recommitted the funding again for Wellington Road back in 2019, and the commitment was working with local councils. City of Casey, Cardinia Shire Council, Yarra Ranges Council and Knox City Council all gave me submissions of the costing. The highest amount was $220 million for probably 20 or 30 kilometres of road duplication, and we decided to go with what was fair. We got the state Labor government to pay half, so we committed $110 million. We were hoping state Labor would commit to the remainder instead. That didn't occur at all. What happened is that the Albanese government got in power, along with state Labor, and said, 'This project is now blown out to $900 million,' and they diverted the funding to the Suburban Rail Loop.”
“Then Labor got in, and they cancelled all the funding, which is really upsetting for those local residents. The other one I was very passionate about was Wellington Road. Going from Clematis down to Lysterfield Road, Wellington Road is very important. It's a single-lane road in both directions, and sadly, over the years, there have been fatalities and serious accidents. I've twice committed funding to this project, first in 2007. That's when we announced the funding prior to the election. I must blame Yarra Ranges Council, who mucked about trying to work out where they were going to put overtaking lanes. My last letter was to the then transport minister, who's now Prime Minister, Albanese. I said, 'Don't allow this funding to be diverted.' So what did he do? He added the funding to be diverted on the council's request—a bad move.”
“Again, it's those smaller, dangerous intersections we've upgraded. The Officer South ramps have now been completed. But one of the projects, very disappointingly, was stopped by the Albanese government when it came into power. Can I say, when Bill Shorten was the former Labor candidate, when we announced this program, they actually matched that sealing of the Hills program. I again commend CRAG21. Like a local group up in Cockatoo who said, it's unfair that all these residents have been living up in the hills for years, and the roads are unsealed. They've got potholes. In summer there's dust; in winter water goes into the potholes. They damage their cars. We secured $150 million to seal 110 kilometres of road for 164 local roads, and the program just started. It actually had already committed and sealed 38 roads.”
“Also, under the former Liberal government, we upgraded dangerous intersections across Latrobe—this was brought to me in particular by Cardinia Shire Council, and I give them their credit—between McGregor Road, and going further down, Cardinia Road. As I mentioned, those were very important upgrades along there. Then I come to eight dangerous intersections which were funded. O'Neil Road, Glismann Road, Bayview Avenue and Tivendale Road are being completed. This was the old Princes Highway. It was very dangerous. I remember once speaking to a lady who was trying to cross this with two children in the car, and, sadly, the lady behind her was beeping the horn and ended up forcing this lady to go forward, making a very bad decision. They ended up having a T-bone, but, luckily, the children ended up being okay after that accident.”
“The project includes adding an extra lane between Peet Street and Henry Street, removing the roundabout and replacing it with traffic lights and installing new signals at Railway Avenue and Campbell Street intersection. Pedestrians' and cyclists' safety will also be improved through the construction of new walking and shared-use paths, completing the missing link between the Healesville-Koo Wee Rup Road and New Pakenham Station. Can I say also that the Healesville-Koo Wee Rup upgrades were a very, very important joint project. In fact, I drove down there on the weekend to take my daughter to a swimming competition, and that road is a great road. It was a very dangerous road. What was one lane is now dual lane. It's good to see residents using that road, which is a hell of a lot safer now.”
“When it comes to road projects locally now in La Trobe—again, one of the fastest growing growth corridors in the state—there are no major projects going on except the ones which were previously announced by the Liberal government. Under the former Liberal government, we upgraded the Monash Freeway. That was an extra lane from Warrigal Road right down to Cardinia Road for 36 kilometres. I note the state government in Victoria did actually match half the funding. That was a good project with state and federal working together. We also delivered the Beaconsfield interchange, a very important project. There was also the extension of O'Shea Road, linking up Clyde Road to the Beaconsfield interchange. When I talk about Racecourse Road upgrades, they're now in the final stages, with major work completed in 2026.”
“I understand that going over the Monash Freeway is a lot of engineering work, but the rest of it is just widening the road. Then we come to others, like the Berwick train station car park. I compare this to when council—I think it was Maroondah council—upgraded the Mitcham train station car parks. That was done for under $15 million. The Berwick train station car park—I do note it actually has bus turn lanes et cetera—has gone to $64 million. Again, that's state Labor putting their extra costs and burden on the taxpayer when it comes to the CFMEU. Driving along around Berwick and Pakenham, you see the CFMEU proudly displaying their flag, letting all the residents know that, in actual fact, it's their project and they're getting the most benefit from it, which is very, very sad.”
“At the time the local Casey council and their engineers—obviously Casey council is not a little council; it's got a lot of engineers—came to me with the road package project, which was going to be $70 million. We committed to doing that. Then, under state Labor—obviously this comes down to the CFMEU and their input of corruption and everything else—it blew out to $250 million. This was actually announced with the former prime minister and myself: we had the Racecourse Road and McGregor Road upgrades in Pakenham at $82 million. That's a lot of money, $82 million. Again, state Labor blew this out to $398 million. To go back to Clyde Road, it's only 900 metres of road. I basically worked out that every metre is costing $250,000.”
“Today I wish to raise the issue of infrastructure projects in La Trobe. For those who don't know, La Trobe is in the south-eastern suburbs of Melbourne and is one of the fastest growing growth corridors in Australia. Thank you very much. Yes, it is, Member for Aston. The only issue when it comes to infrastructure out there is you always have to keep pace with the area's growth because it obviously becomes very tough for residents moving around. There were a number of road projects under the former Liberal government that I announced, working with local residents. One was actually the Clyde Road and Kangan Drive extension. This is actually an extra lane from the train line going over the Monash Freeway.”
“They've now been hit today. The way small business has been hit in this country is an absolute travesty. Also, when it comes to capital gains tax, those who've put their future into having a 50 per cent write-off won't be able to do that in the future. When it comes to first home owners, we see the mortgage clearance rates getting worse and worse each weekend. The Labor Party members may have celebrated on budget night, giving themselves high fives, but they have really hurt the Australian people and, in particular, business.”
“'My word is my bond' is a phrase never to be used again in Australia, and we can thank the Prime Minister for that, as, when he was asked 50 times prior to the election, 'Will there be changes to capital gains tax or negative gearing?' he kept on saying no. He even belittled the media when he was asked that question. It's an absolute shame, because it is a slur on all members of parliament when such a broken promise to the Australian people actually occurs. But what it hurts the most is small business. Small business people who have had trust set up have had to go to their accountants and say, 'What do I need to do now?' They've already gone once, and now that we've seen this dirty deal with the Greens today, they're going to have to go and see their accountants again. There's no escape now that there are self-managed super funds.”
“The most crazy situation we now have is that, even after the state Labor government committed funding to the emergency department there—and La Trobe has been one of the fastest-growing growth corridors in the entire country—work has just finally commenced. It is an absolutely disgraceful shame that state Labor in Victoria has taken several years to start this project. I've been calling on them year after year to start the project. They had the federal funding there, and finally they've started. Shame on state Labor. They need to go.”
“Back in 2019, I caught up with members of the Animal Justice Party because we'd worked together to ban cosmetic testing on animals, and there was a little bit of a celebration in Berwick. They're all vegans, as you can imagine, and they had a cashew dip. My little daughter, Jasmine, was there, and she's allergic to cashew nuts and had a reaction to it. We had to urgently go down to the Casey Hospital. The great news for Jasmine was she was fine, but the awful situation we saw was the emergency department was overflowing outside, basically to the front doors, and this was in the afternoon. I spoke to the Minister for Health at the time, Greg Hunt, and by working with the state we committed funding to have a dedicated children's emergency department there.”
“An amount of times, the Prime Minister, prior to last election, said, 'My word is my bond.' But, again, on 9 April, when asked about changes to negative gearing and CGT—'How hard is it?' Condescendingly, that's what he says for the 50th time. Again, on 22 April, he said, 'I rule it out. There are no plans.' It was live TV. 'We won't cut the CGT.' In August 2025 he said, 'The only tax policy we implement is the one that we took to the election.' Well, obviously that hasn't happened. I just finish off by saying, no-one will ever use 'my word is my bond' ever again in Australia, whether in politics or business. I challenge all the Labor members—I see the member for Bruce—to put that on your next brochure: 'My word is my bond.'”
“That's 800,000 people in Australia who, at the very worst, on advice from the accountant, will be changing plans which they've put into effect possibly 10 years ago, and they're leading up to retirement, and all these things are going to change. And this budget is bad for young people. Young people don't feel helped by the budget. Many think they'll be worse off. Labor's changes close the pathway to buying a home and building wealth. Gen X and millennials feel forgotten too. New taxes and housing rules make buying and renting harder and more expensive. More homes won't appear as quickly as the government estimates. In actual fact—I'll go back to the budget papers—that reduction of 35,000 is promised by the government in its own budget papers. Small landlords will exit the system, and it's going to be a devastating time for investment.”
“But now, as that money goes into the trust, they're going to be hit by a 30 per cent tax. What I'm hearing at the moment is that everyone who's got these trusts is going to the accountant and asking what they need to do. And the accountants are at the moment saying, 'Hey, hopefully they will make some changes.' Obviously, it doesn't sound like they're going to. So they're paying the accountant a fee at the moment to get some advice to basically do nothing. Then, after this week, they're going to be paying the accountant for advice on: 'What do I need to do next? Do I need to set up a company? Do I need to get out of the trust?' Like 800,000 people's tax arrangements must change because of this measure.”
“But what if that young person in five years time wants to move out and start a family et cetera? The Labor government is hoping that everything lines up for that young person. And if it goes wrong—and I think it's going to go terribly wrong—it's going to put a great burden on them financially. The other thing which I and so many people are really annoyed about is the trust situation. I mentioned this before. When people go and see their accountant, they're advised, 'You know what, it could be a good idea, for younger people too, for one of the family members—it could be the husband, wife, partner or whoever—if you're not working, to set up a trust where you can distribute any gains.' And yes, of course, it's a way of—how should I say—not paying the tax you normally would.”
“If they've got an existing dwelling which is doing well, why would you sell it to go invest elsewhere? So a lot of the investors are going to hold onto those properties. This is what's been told to me by people in the property industry. Again, when it comes to the capital gains tax, I make the point that for young people in particular it's going to be tough on them when they've been putting money into shares and planning for their future. As I said, Labor is hitting those with deposits when it comes to home deposits and when it comes to shares. I know my electorate has taken up, like many around Australia, the five per cent deposit scheme. What I'm hearing now is that the house value has actually dropped. You can have a bank loan larger than the value of your property. Obviously, in ten years, property prices will increase.”
“But at the same time too, when it comes to rentals, you need the investors to be there. Most investors in this space are actually mum and dad investors. We're going to talk about the multicultural communities. A lot of these guys have negatively geared properties, and in the future they're not going to be going and buying another one. At the same time, think about this. If I owned—which I don't—three or four negatively geared properties, even two negatively geared properties, do you think I'll be selling those at the moment? They're like gold dust now because they're going to get the benefit. So people will hold onto those existing ones, and they're not going to go and sell one to go and take the risk of buying an off-the-plan where potentially things can go wrong with builders.”
“The new rule is that those 50 per cent discounts will be replaced by inflation indexation plus 30 per cent minimum tax on gains applied from 2027. Again, for everyone who has been seeing their accountants for years and taken all this into account, it's going to change. This policy will raise taxes on ordinary Australians and reduce rental supply. Sellers will pay more tax under the new rules than under the old 50 per cent discount, obviously. Not just big investors but small landlords, retirees and long-term owners face higher tax bills. Some investors may sell or drop off buying established homes. I know this is what the government's tactic is. We want the investors to get out of the market, so in actual fact it actually allows the first home buyers to get in.”
“Again, what does that mean? It means that for the younger generation their premiums go up. It's as simple as that. More seniors relying on public care means longer waits and more pressure on hospitals, as we know. Again, this hasn't been thought out. 'My word is my bond'—I'll challenge any Labor MP to put that on their next brochure going out to their electorate. I just can't see it happening. That is a slogan that is never going to be used again in Australian history by any member of parliament or by any businessperson. There won't be anyone standing up and going, 'You know what? I promise you—my word is my bond,' because the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, has completely destroyed that slogan. The old rule was a 50 per cent discount on capital gains assets held for 12 months or more.”
“You get the warning—'If you don't get health insurance, you'll be paying extra for your Medicare, and you'll be paying more for it.' So people have chosen to do the right thing. Labor has betrayed Australians that are 65-plus, who after a lifetime of paying health insurance premiums are being hit with major changes in Labor's budget. Labor is removing the private health rebate for people over 65, cutting support purely based on age and not their income. So you get to retirement, and you've been planning this for many years, and they just hit you in the guts. Scrapping the private health rebate means up to $807 extra a year for singles and $1,600 for couples. That's a lot of money if you're a pensioner or retired. Seniors already struggling with rising bills now face another financial hit. Thousands may drop their insurance entirely.”
“Again, this is putting huge pressure on inflation, with everything going up. I know the Labor treasurer. I like the Treasurer, but he's got this wrong. He and the Prime Minister talk about it being because of the war in Iran and the fuel going up. Well, hang on. We had the highest inflation rates out of any Western economy even before that. The reason is that the government has spent so much money. This has put so much pressure on interest rates, and the Reserve Bank governor has had no discretion but to raise the rates. Also, in the government's own budget papers, it says there will be 35,000 fewer homes built. And then I come to another one. This has really betrayed our seniors, who over the years have paid for their health insurance.”
“We have green wedge zones, so the land's not there. All those young kids leaving school et cetera and who want to stay close to the parents—there are going to be no places to rent. They have to go down like 30 or 40 minutes away. That will be the closest we're going to actually see. When we look at this budget, the projected decade of deficits is about $150 billion and gross debt $1.25 trillion. I was first elected under John Howard, and we actually had a final budget with Peter Costello. I think the surplus was like $97 billion. That's completely gone. Annual interest is over $42 billion each year, roughly $80,000 per minute. Higher taxes announced are about $50 billion in total, including $15 billion personal income tax. Government spending is the highest level in 40 years outside the pandemic.”
“You're actually giving them a huge burden, and it's going to really hurt them. The people who benefit the most from Labor's changes when it comes to the negative gearing—it's not going to be mum and dad who's going to say, 'Why don't we actually subdivide our little block and put a couple of townhouses on it?' In my electorate of La Trobe, it's the big land developers who may own 30 or 40 hectares. When they develop those, they're going to be selling those to two groups. It's going to be the investors in there fighting with the first home owners. The other issue is areas—I've mentioned this before in the Dandenong Ranges—such as Cockatoo, Gembrook and Emerald, there are not many places for rent up there, and there's not much land for redevelopment. There's hardly a block up there that you can actually redevelop.”
“Labor, as we know, has changed that, and it's been absolutely rushed through this week. They're going to be hit with a 30 per cent tax, and that is absolutely devastating. When it comes to the capital gains taxes too, no longer are you going to get the 50 per cent discount. I'm speaking to young—I listened to the Labor member before me saying how amazing it is and how it's going to help young people. Can I tell you now the young people I speak to who are trying to get in front have been investing in shares and using that as their home deposit. They're going to be hit in the future, and they're not going to get the same benefit as obviously the Prime Minister and people like myself have received. I've done negative gearing in the past. They're not actually giving the young people a break.”
“If you're just going to blindly follow your leader and not listen to your business community and especially all those people who have set up trusts—in every single phone call, I speak to a business person. I ask, 'Have you got to trust?', and they say, 'Yes, I set up the trust was advised by my accountant.' I go back to my time as the minister when it came to multicultural affairs and the shadow minister. Every Indian accountant and every multicultural accountant I know always tells their clients, who, obviously normally due to language barriers, go to their person can also speak the mother tongue, especially if you've got connections overseas—they've advised them to set up trusts. If one of the family members is not working, you can divert the income to them.”
“What happens to the humans in the time machine is that they end up being taken prisoner and held as slaves by these underground creatures. Worse still, they end up getting eaten and destroyed. Can I just make the point to the Labor MPs that this is what you are doing now when you're following your prime minister into supporting all these changes, in particular when it comes to trusts and capital gains tax. You are just blindly following the leader, and your seats will be at risk because the devastation is so much so. I've been here before in my own government side with a budget the community didn't like. Can I just say we spoke up at the time, and the budget was changed. The Labor members will not do that.”
“One of the all-time classic novels is by HG Wells. It's The Time Machine . He wrote it back in 1895. And I must say, too, that I love the movie, with Rod Taylor, of 1960, and I encourage all government members to watch it. It's got this classic scene. Obviously he's gone forward in time and the world is a different place, with all these humans dressed in white dresses—and the guys all looking great too!—and they're picking up fruit, and it looks like the most amazing utopian place ever. Then all of a sudden he hears sirens coming from two large doors. The doors open up into a cave underground, and he's trying to stop all the humans from going in there, because obviously he's travelled in time and doesn't know what they're doing. This actually reminds me of Labor's caucus, when they're all just going in there aimlessly.”
“I just say to the Labor members, you're going to have to change this in particular for the trust, because you're hurting so many small businesses right across the country.”
“They are really concerned about the changes they need to make for their future when they've planned ahead maybe 10 years. It's of great concern. I know that the Labor members—and I've heard the Treasurer and the Prime Minister speak about how all this is going to benefit young people and make it fairer. I ask them to listen to the interview with their own treasurer. The Daily Aus editor in chief, Billy FitzSimons was asking questions to the Treasurer. He obviously didn't have a clue about the impacts on young people. Concerns were raised by her in questions about facing higher rents, mortgages and financial uncertainty. The data suggests thriving they're but live lives of telling stories—it's going to make their lives so much tougher in the future.”
“If you've planned ahead in a small business, whether it be a person who may be in a hairdresser or a butcher or a tradie or whatever it is—in particular, tradies in La Trobe have been hit really hard. You've arranged income splitting on the accountant's advice, and now you've got the situation where—I spoke to people yesterday. People, especially from my multicultural communities, are all going and seeing their accountants at the moment. With booking and seeing the accountant once, you have to pay a fee to see the accountant, but the accountant is saying, 'We're expecting some changes,' and is saying to come back. If the Labor members don't think this is going to hurt them when it comes to small business, in particular the multicultural community, I can tell you now the feedback I'm getting is absolutely red hot.”
“The great thing about the internet is the humour, and I have been seeing all these jokes and memes. I am not a big fan of the AI generated images of the PM, but businesses are so frustrated that they are putting up these images. They're putting up these images where you've got the Prime Minister—in the one I saw this morning, there's a guy on the building site digging a hole, and he's got the PM holding his arms around him. This theme goes on and on. The message now is that PM Albanese and the Labor government basically own 50 per cent of their business simply due to the high taxes and also, in particular, the capital gains tax changes, the trust changes and the negative gearing changes. It makes it really tough.”
“When it comes to the IT sector, we've heard they want special dispensation for capital gains and investors. But you know what? It should be for any Aussie who's prepared to have a go at business and employ Australians. They must get the same advantages.”
“I just say to government members: you're going to lose seats over this because people on the ground are furious, especially small businesses and hairdressers who have their business connected to a trust—the tradies et cetera. They're all talking at the moment and they're letting their customers know, especially young people, that they'll be paying a lot more in the future when it comes to building, and they're not going to get the benefits, as the older generation have, when it comes to negative gearing and capital gains. I come back to trusts and what Labor has done there. There are 800,000 trusts in Australia and people are now seeing their accountants—it's just a diabolical mess and it's going to make investment in Australia a lot tougher.”
“We heard Premier Allan come out today and say there are no links to bikies et cetera. What a lot of rubbish. You've got the CFMEU and bikies—it's come out in the royal commission how they worked hand in glove, with paybacks, kickbacks and preferred building providers or suppliers and materials. It's corruption at its worst. When you're getting these huge wages for CFMEU members, when it comes to someone who wants a developer they're competing against builders and traders working on these major projects, and the CFMEU wages are forcing project costs—not only the rip-offs on these huge tunnels and the North East Link but also the local guy or family who have been trying to subdivide. They now have to compete with these massive wages.”
“People who already own property keep the old tax rules, so the younger buyers will face competition. Small landlords will sell or stop buying because, as I said before, they won't want the stress of subdividing land, going through council and getting building permits et cetera. Changes to capital gains tax make future profits harder to predict, which can scare off buyers. One thing, too, which we've seen in Victoria in particular, when it comes to the corruption of the CFMEU in the suburban rail project, money was diverted from the electorate of La Trobe, my electorate, which was for road sealing on Wellington Road and in the Dandenong Ranges. It was all put towards this Suburban Rail Loop, and the corruption there—I believe it's an amazing amount of billions of dollars.”
“Labor's pitch to youth under the budget has not worked. Many believe they will be worse off under Labor. Youth are denied the pathways to buy a house and create wealth. As has been mentioned in parliament, the Prime Minister has benefited from negative gearing and from capital gains tax reductions. They're taking that away from generation X and millennials, and they're going to be the forgotten ones. A lot of them are hearing, too, that when they're investing in things like crypto they're going to get hit. The budget's tax and housing changes risk making it harder and more expensive for young Australians to buy or rent homes. Homes won't appear overnight; building enough new homes takes years, so most young people won't see quick improvements.”
“Small landlords who buy existing homes are the ones most affected. Some landlords may sell up. It could mean fewer rentals and higher rents. New houses take years to build. I've actually been out there in the past. I'm not negative gearing any properties at the moment, and I haven't for many years, but I have bought land, developed it and put three properties on it. I must admit it was during a bit of a crisis and I didn't make too much money out of it, but the builders actually went into liquidation. It wasn't an easy ride and it caused a lot of stress. That's probably why I never did it again. We're now expecting others to go and do the same thing, and when you're subdividing, you need town planners and everything else like that. So it's going to be really tough when it comes to this. The budget is bad for young Australians.”
“People that are on capital gains for retirement may get less income and less security. The new rules add complexity and require more accounting, valuations and of course paperwork. Replacing the 50 per cent discount with indexation plus a 30 per cent minimum means many sellers—especially lower-rate taxpayers and owners of long held assets—will pay more tax, get less after tax and face harder retirement and succession planning. Remember: Paul Keating tried all this. It didn't work, and they had to bring it back after two years. That was when it comes to negative gearing. From July 2027, negative gearing will only apply to newly built homes. For properties bought after the cut-off, the rental losses can reduce your wages. They can only be used against further rental income or capital gains.”
“Sellers will often pay more tax under the new rule than under the old 50 per cent discount, which is obvious. Not just big investors but small landlords, retirees and long-term owners will face higher tax. These could be people who planned for their retirement 20 years ago, and now they're going to be hit. The higher tax reduces the take-home profit when the property is sold. Some investors may sell or stop buying established homes, which will, as I said, shrink the rental market. If you're a property investor, are you really going to go and buy an existing home when you can go and buy a new home with negative gearing and the capital gains benefit? That's where they're going to be going. At the same time, they're going to be competing against the first home owner. Fewer rentals and fewer listings will push up rents.”
“The new rule is that the 50 per cent discount will be replaced by inflation indexation plus a 30 per cent minimum tax on gains, applying from July 2027. Again, the accountants are going to be trying to work out how much a property has grown in value after 2027 if it was purchased before that. You're going to have the ones doing well. Obviously the land value is coming out. Again, that's more money being paid from people who've gone into business and have gone into investments. Again, it's them who are paying the price. This policy raises taxes for ordinary Australians. As I said before, rental supply will be less and will obviously be much less in established areas because investors won't go there, and the new home buyer is going to be competing with an investor.”
“They're saying that the advice they've been giving their members for years is to set up trusts. I wonder how many tradies out there have set up trusts. So this is going to have a major impact. At the moment, if you look at Australia, you see we've got a situation where people are really struggling to make ends meet, and now small-business people have to fork out money to change their trust arrangements or, at the very least, get advice. This wasn't even mentioned prior to the election, so Labor can say, 'We didn't actually break our promise.' But I'll tell you what: no-one expected them to go after this. When it comes to the capital gains tax, the old rule was a 50 per cent discount on capital gains for assets held for 12-plus months.”
“In my previous role working with the multicultural community, I had a lot to do with our Indian community. I can say that there are a lot of Indian accountants out there. The main people they are serving are obviously from their own community because of language barriers et cetera, and they've advised them to use trusts. Tonight I messaged 10 or so multicultural people I know and business people, and all of them have trusts. We're not necessarily talking about people owning big companies. We're talking about the little guy or the family out there with a business. If the wife or the husband is not working for illness or whatever else, they just want to have the ability to put the money in the trust and actually disburse that money. The other night I was at an event and was talking to electrical contractors.”
“Under Labor, the trust itself would pay 30 per cent tax on its income first. As it goes in before distribution, less money would be available to distribute to family members and heirs. Trustees and families may need to restructure ownership, incurring legal, accounting and stamp duty costs. The ones who are really winning on this at the moment are the accountants. But, even when I talk to the accountants, they're saying they're hating it because they've got all their businesses in trusts too, so it's going to impact them. People have gone and put trust in Labor—in particular, when it comes to discretionary trusts. They now have to go to an accountant and pay money to actually get legal advice and potentially change their trust arrangements. We're not talking about 100 or 200 people. We're talking about hundreds of thousands of people.”