Melissa McIntosh
Lindsay · Liberal Party · Australia
“The working homeless are one of our country's most worrying trends. When a working mother escapes violence only to trade fear inside her home for fear inside a parked car with her children, we should all be asking how Australia has come to this.”
“They told me they have women living in cars while waiting for transitional accommodation, women that are working jobs, women trying to keep their children safe and women doing everything right yet unable to secure a rental property because the market is simply too tight.”
“In my own electorate of Lindsay, the number of people sleeping rough in the Penrith local government area has increased by over 30 per cent in just one year. For every person counted sleeping rough, there are many more living in cars, couch surfing or remaining in unsafe situations because they simply have nowhere else to go.”
“More than four million Australians live in poverty, rents have soared, childcare costs continue to rise, and homeownership is slipping further out of reach. Mortgage arrears have risen by 6.8 per cent over the past year, while credit card arrears among Gen Z have surged by almost 29 per cent.”
“OzHarvest's latest frontline report reveals more than 350,000 people are seeking food relief every month, while more than 74,000 are being turned away because services cannot keep up with demand.”
“It cuts me to the core to hear the Penrith Women's Health Centre say that around 10 per cent of their clients are now working homeless. These are women fleeing violence, often with little more than the clothes on their back. Last year alone, the centre supported 750 women escaping violence in their homes.”
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“In Australia, a job should be a pathway out of hardship, not a front row seat to it. Hard work should deliver security, dignity and opportunity. That is the Australian promise. Everyone should afford a safe place to call home, and we cannot say that promise is being kept.”
“More than four million Australians live in poverty, rents have soared, childcare costs continue to rise, and homeownership is slipping further out of reach. Mortgage arrears have risen by 6.8 per cent over the past year, while credit card arrears among Gen Z have surged by almost 29 per cent. Hard work should lead to security, yet more than one in every 100 Australians sought homelessness assistance last year. Compassion begins with seeing this reality clearly and choosing to act. More than 20 years of work has gone into Christ Mission Possible's efforts for the local community. They've provided more than 60,000 nights of shelter across Greater Sydney, including in my community, and those beds represent more than accommodation; they represent safety, dignity and hope.”
“OzHarvest's latest frontline report reveals more than 350,000 people are seeking food relief every month, while more than 74,000 are being turned away because services cannot keep up with demand. As OzHarvest founder Ronni Kahn so powerfully said, 'The cost-of-living crisis has become a cost of surviving crisis.' Despite seeing Australians pushed to the brink, this government's budget does nothing. It delivers nothing for food relief organisations that are struggling under unprecedented pressure. Families in Lindsay told me they're hanging on by their fingertips. They worry about high rents, high bills and whether they can absorb one more unexpected expense. The warning lights are flashing across the economy.”
“In my own electorate of Lindsay, the number of people sleeping rough in the Penrith local government area has increased by over 30 per cent in just one year. For every person counted sleeping rough, there are many more living in cars, couch surfing or remaining in unsafe situations because they simply have nowhere else to go. At the same time, cost-of-living pressures continue to crush household budgets. The latest Foodbank h unger r eport found that 3.5 million Australian households either ran out of food or were forced to reduce the quality of their meals over the past year, and, most disturbing of all, 64 per cent of those experiencing food insecurity are actually employed. Let that sink in. The majority of Australians struggling to put food on the table are working.”
“They told me they have women living in cars while waiting for transitional accommodation, women that are working jobs, women trying to keep their children safe and women doing everything right yet unable to secure a rental property because the market is simply too tight. Seven in 10 women escaping violence leave behind their home and assets, often stepping directly into homelessness. Escaping a violent relationship typically costs $18,000 and takes 141 hours, an impossible barrier for many women. The housing crisis is making an already desperate situation worse. National rental vacancy rates remain at just 1.2 per cent. In New South Wales, the number of people sleeping rough has climbed to 2,308 people, a 75 per cent increase since 2020. That should shame this government.”
“It cuts me to the core to hear the Penrith Women's Health Centre say that around 10 per cent of their clients are now working homeless. These are women fleeing violence, often with little more than the clothes on their back. Last year alone, the centre supported 750 women escaping violence in their homes. They told me homelessness is increasingly a direct consequence of domestic and family violence. There are also seeing more older women seeking help—women with little superannuation, women experiencing elder abuse and women who are still working. The centre put it plainly: when and where are you going to find an extra $1,000 for a bond?”
“The working homeless are one of our country's most worrying trends. When a working mother escapes violence only to trade fear inside her home for fear inside a parked car with her children, we should all be asking how Australia has come to this. Every woman sleeping in a car after finishing a day's work is a stain on our national conscience. The new face of homelessness is increasingly not someone disconnected from the workplace. It is someone who gets up every morning, goes to work, pays tax, contributes to their community and does everything we tell Australians they should do to get ahead. The new face of homelessness is the working homeless, and nowhere is this crisis more visible than among women escaping violence both across the country and within my own electorate of Lindsay.”
“The online safety of our children is not a press release, nor is it a photo opportunity; it is a solemn responsibility. On this government's watch, that responsibility has been dropped. Australian parents deserve better, and Australian children deserve better. Until this government does the hard work it has so far avoided, the coalition will hold it to account every single day.”
“We want to keep children safe, but supporting the goal was never the same as endorsing Labor's execution, and on execution the Albanese Labor government has failed. Labor inherited a world-leading framework and a world-first regulator, and it still managed to deliver a ban that 85 per cent of under-16s simply ignore. They had every tool the coalition built at their disposal. They have now squandered the goodwill of this parliament through incompetence, haste and a minister out of her depth. So let this be said plainly: much more must be done for our children. Parents must be given proper mobile device safety tools. We must confront the addictive algorithms that fuel doomscrolling and prey on young minds, and we must block the live streaming that enables the very horrors of child sexual abuse.”
“And the coalition put in place the basic online safety expectations, putting the onus squarely on the tech giants to make their platforms safe by design, not as an afterthought. It was the coalition that gave the eSafety Commissioner the power to order the removal of the very worst content—and I think everyone would agree: child sexual abuse material, pro-terror content, abhorrent violent material—no matter where in the world it is hosted. That's a record. That's leadership. That is the hard, methodical work of governing by designing laws that actually function, which stands in stark contrast to what we have seen from the Albanese Labor government. The coalition supported a minimum age for social media.”
“It was the coalition, through the Enhancing Online Safety for Children Act, that first gave Australia a Children's eSafety Commissioner, with powers to have cyberbullying material taken down, protecting young Australians from the torment of online abuse. It was the coalition that expanded that office in 2017 to protect all Australians, not just children, recognising that online harm does not stop at the age of 18. It was the coalition that delivered the landmark Online Safety Act 2021, the most comprehensive online safety regime in the country's history. We halved the time platforms have to remove harmful content, from 48 hours to 24, and built an adult cyberabuse scheme, strengthening protections against intimate images being shared without consent.”
“The coalition will not be lectured by this government when it comes to protecting children online, because, when it comes to online safety, it is this side of the House that built the frameworks that Labor now leans on. It was the coalition that established the eSafety Commissioner, the first dedicated online safety regulator of its kind anywhere in the world—although I have questioned the overuse of the eSafety Commissioner's powers. We did not follow other nations. We led them. Australia became the global benchmark, and governments around the world looked to what we had built and sought to replicate it.”
“The eSafety Commissioner's own compliance update in March this year found that 70 per cent of children remain on these platforms. That is a verdict on the Albanese Labor government's signature child-safety policy. And, while children slip through the cracks, the minister flies around the world taking credit for a policy that this side of the House made possible. Minister, the work that needed to be done was here at home—the hard work of design, of enforcement, of getting it right. That work was never done. Worse, the government continues to mislead Australians, boasting that more than five million accounts have been removed. But we know a large proportion of those are Google accounts used for Gmail and other purposes that have nothing to do with social media accounts. Australians deserve honesty, not spin dressed up as success.”
“The eSafety Commissioner herself described this ban as a 'very blunt force approach', developed very quickly. She now says she was 'not keen on it' when it was first discussed. She said it did not give her the 'potent powers' that she needed. When your own regulator tells you the tools don't work, there's a real problem, and that problem has a name: incompetence. The evidence is damning. A landmark Australian study published just last week in the British Medical Journal found that 85 per cent of under-16s are still accessing social media—we know this; we see this out and about in our communities—and that ban was unlikely to improve adolescent mental health in the short term. The study concluded there had been limited implementation, incomplete compliance and substantial circumvention.”
“I do so with a simple observation. The Albanese Labor government has been forced back to the parliament to fix a law it told Australians it had already fixed. Let us be clear about what this announcement really is: doubling the maximum penalty to $99 million and legislating new information-gathering powers. These are not the actions of a government that has got it right. They are the admissions of a government that got it wrong. The Albanese Labor government's social media ban is half baked, poorly designed, rushed and badly implemented, and every Australian parent who was promised that their children would be safer is today learning the truth—that this ban was built on very thin scaffolding indeed. You don't just have to take my word for it.”
“I rise to speak on the Online Safety Amendment (Strengthening Enforcement for the Social Media Minimum Age) Bill 2026, and I move the second reading amendment circulated in my name: That all words after "That" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words: "whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House: (1) recognises that the former Coalition Government delivered world-leading online safety reforms, including the enactment of the Online Safety Act 2021, which set an international benchmark for protecting Australians, and children in particular, online; (2) notes the Government's social media age restrictions were poorly designed, and badly implemented which has compromised the online safety of Australian children and failed parents, and this bill is an embarrassing admission the Government is failing; (3) expresses concern the Government's proposed digital duty of care remains ill-defined and uncertain in its scope and operation, and that the Government has failed to explain how it would work, what obligations it would impose, or how it would be enforced without creating unintended consequences; and (4) expresses further concern that much more needs to be done to protect children online, including by giving parents access to effective mobile device safety tools, and combating the addictive algorithms which fuel harmful 'doom scrolling' on social media feeds".”
“They celebrate the wins, but they also carry the heartbreak. This week, one of my staff was left in tears after learning that an NDIS participant she'd been helping had attempted to take his own life while waiting for the support he desperately needs. It was a sombre reminder that behind every policy decision is a person, a life, depending on us to get it right. As we head into Kind July, it's worth remembering compassion is not softness; it is the strength to care, to listen and to step forward when others need help. To everyone in Lindsay who is helping out—and there are so many of you—thank you so much for everything you do.”
“Our boardroom is piled high with food and winter essentials, because in Lindsay we do look after each other. You can see that same spirit in City Park Penrith each morning. Volunteers serve breakfast to those in need, among them familiar blue hoodies from my office, and my office enjoys so much that interaction with our local community. They're part of nearly 15,000 volunteers in Penrith City. This generous spirit was on show at our recent Our Community Cares high tea, as locals dug deep to support programs for the area's most vulnerable. Before entering parliament, I worked in community housing in Penrith, and it taught me that real compassion is local, practical and personal. My staff spend hours helping constituents navigate systems that can feel overwhelming, fighting to ensure their voices are heard.”
“As we head into Kind July, there's no better time to reflect on the quiet acts of kindness that strengthen our communities every day. I recently caught up with Christ Mission Possible in my electorate, and, as always, I left feeling inspired. Each week, Christ Mission Possible feeds around 25,000 people, including preparing thousands of school lunches. Few things are more heartbreaking than imagining parents in our community staring at empty fridges, yet it's becoming more common as families are squeezed by rising housing, childcare, grocery and school costs. The Salvos latest Red Shield Report found that 72 per cent of people seeking assistance worried about where their child's next meal would come from. To support locals doing it tough, my office has been collecting donations for community care kits.”
“The government and the Prime Minister have too many faces: one for the election campaign, one for question time and one behind closed doors doing deals with the Greens while layers of stone form around Australian family budgets. While the bills arrive, the Prime Minister refuses to look Australians in the eyes, instead leaving them in the coils of Labor's tax serpents. A father from Glenmore Park said, 'They're treating Australians like top-tier earners, penalising a lifetime of hard work and self-reliance.' No matter which face this government presents, the Medusa effect, is the same—another piece of the Australian dream slowly turning to stone.”
“In Greek mythology, Medusa didn't defeat her victims with strength, but by stopping them seeing the danger until it was too late. Today, the Medusa effect in Labor's poisonous policies is real. It's measured in mortgage repayments, in rent hikes and in supermarket receipts. After 15 interest rate rises under Labor, a family with a mortgage is around $29,000 a year worse off. The cost-of-living pain is not from Medusa's cold stare; it is from the Albanese government's heartless taxes, homegrown inflation, and increases in electricity and in food. While trying to distract Australians with a $250 sweetener, Labor locked in an extra $70 billion in taxes over the next four years in their budget.”
“on indulgence—I'd like to associate the coalition with the Prime Minister's words. Sadly, it's our electorate offices that are often the front line of domestic violence—a number of women have sat in tears in my office trying to seek a safe place—and it shouldn't be like that. It doesn't matter how much money we are throwing at this issue, it is not going away. It is the role of every single member in this place to do more and to listen to those families that are doing it so tough. Although we don't agree on everything, the coalition will stand with the government to try to do our best, in our generation, to end violence against women and children.”
“My question is to the Prime Minister. To ram through Labor's toxic taxes, the Prime Minister has changed his position yet again and done a dangerous deal with the Greens. Will the Prime Minister rule out agreeing—”
“Hayley's journey from the local football fields in Cranebrook to representing Australia on the world stage shows exactly what can be achieved when young women are encouraged to dream big and are given the support to pursue those dreams. On behalf of the people of Lindsay, I want to celebrate Hayley on this extraordinary milestone. We are incredibly proud of your achievements, Hayley, and look forward to watching you continue to represent Australia in the future. We wish you every success as you continue your journey. Go Aussie!”
“Across Australia more girls and young women are stepping into sporting fields with confidence knowing there are pathways to elite competitions and opportunities to represent our country. Role models like Hayley demonstrate what is possible when talent is matched with dedication and supported by a strong community. Hayley's achievement is also a reminder of the incredible sporting opportunities available throughout my electorate of Lindsay. We are fortunate to have outstanding local sporting organisations, dedicated volunteers, passionate coaches and high-quality facilities, including Olympic facilities and Olympians , who help young athletes develop their skills and realise their potential. These clubs and organisations are about much more than sport. They build confidence, resilience, leadership and a sense of community.”
“When I spoke with Hayley after she received her reward, I asked her what her next goal was. Her answer was simple and ambitious: to qualify for the U-17 Women's World Cup. I'm extremely delighted to inform the House that Hayley has now achieved her goal. This is an extraordinary accomplishment, and one that reflects not only Hayley's talent but years of hard work, sacrifice and determination. It is also a credit to her family, her coaches and the local sporting community who have supported Hayley throughout her journey. Hayley's success highlights the immense value of investing in women's and girls sport, and supporting young people to pursue their dreams.”
“I rise to recognise an outstanding young woman from Cranebrook in my electorate of Lindsay, Hayley Muir, whose remarkable achievements are inspiring the next generation of female athletes across Western Sydney, and she is only young herself. Last year Hayley was awarded the Melissa McIntosh Lindsay Award for sportsperson of the year at my annual community awards event. Her nomination recognised not only her exceptional talent but her dedication, perseverance and commitment to representing Australia through the Junior Matildas pathway. At the time Hayley had already achieved what many young athletes only dream of. After developing her skills through local football, she earned selection in Australia's under 16 team and was part of the site that won the championship in Indonesia, defeating reigning champion Thailand.”
“'Yes. How hard is it? For the 50th time.' You remember—that's what the Prime Minister told Australians when asked if he would rule out changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax. He also said: The only tax policy we're implementing is the one we took to the election. Now, he's saying: Our changes are pro-aspiration and pro-supply … There's a Jim Carrey movie about a smooth-talking lawyer who builds his career bending the truth until his son makes a birthday wish: for one day, he can only tell the truth. What's that movie called?”
“A nation cannot grow when its workers are punished for keeping up and when its dreamers are punished for daring to get ahead. Australians deserve a government that backs them, not one that punishes them for just doing their best and for having a dream and aspiration. I'm happy to promise that 50 times because, unlike the Prime Minister, I intend to keep my promise.”
“Never again will a government be able to bring in more people than a housing market can support. In the early years, migration will need to be significantly below the cap to allow the housing market to catch up after Labor's record migration wave. We will also establish a $5 billion housing infrastructure fund to unlock up to 400,000 homes by funding essential last-mile infrastructure like water, sewerage, power and access roads, and we will simplify the National Construction Code to cut up to $70,000 off the cost of a new home. This is how you fix a housing crisis. You build more homes, you match migration to capacity and you stop punishing the people who invest in supply. A country cannot thrive when its government treats aspiration like a taxable offence.”
“The housing crisis cannot be separated from migration, because supply and demand cannot be separated from reality. Under Labor, Australia has taken 1.4 million people, the population of Adelaide, far more than the homes we have built. With 90,000 more people than planned arriving over the next two years, the government is stoking demand while choking supply. This is not sustainable. This is not responsible. This is certainly not fair on young Australians already struggling to find a place to live. Labor's approach is simple: bring in more people than we can house and then tax away the investment that builds homes. The coalition will restore common sense. A coalition government will cap net overseas migration each year based on the number of new homes completed.”
“The targets are the families who saved and sacrificed to have something to pass on, not as a luxury but as an expression of what it means to love your kids. The Prime Minister is fuelling fights over Sunday roasts all over Australia between generations about what will be left and what the taxman has taken. That is not the Australia we want to build. That is the politics of resentment applied to the family dinner table. Young Australians are already being kneecapped on their rent, on their deposit and on their investment returns, and they now face the prospect of getting nothing at the end of the family line either because the government will take its cut from trusts and estates. A government that taxes aspiration in life and taxes aspiration in death is not a government for the future.”
“When the Prime Minister was asked in question time to rule out a death tax, he just wouldn't. We know why he couldn't rule it out—because he had already introduced one buried in the fine print he hoped Australians wouldn't read This is a government that lied more than 50 times before the election about not introducing new taxes on homes, rentals, investments and family savings, and now it's been caught trying to sneak a death tax through on top of it all. The deception is breathtaking. The government calls this intergenerational fairness, but taxing what families pass on to the next generation is not fairness. This is a government inserting itself between grandparents and grandchildren and claiming a cut of a lifetime's worth of sacrifice and saving. The targets are not the wealthy with complex structures and expensive accountants.”
“From 2028 to 2029, we will index the bottom two income tax thresholds to inflation, protecting 85 per cent of income earners and delivering around $250 in the first year, growing to more than $1,000 by year four. From 2031 to 2032, we will index the top two thresholds as well, delivering immediate relief of $1,250 to $1,600. This is not a temporary fix. This is structural reform—true generational reform—that restores honesty to the tax system and fairness to the Australian worker. It is because Australians should not be punished for keeping up; they should be rewarded for getting ahead. As if taxing aspiration in life weren't enough, Labor is now taxing aspiration in death too. The Albanese government hid a 30 per cent death tax in their budget papers like an Easter egg, deliberately buried, hoping no-one would find it.”
“Australians are being punished for inflation they did not create. Every time prices rise, the government takes a little more. Every time wages merely keep pace with inflation, the taxman reaches in as if Australians are suddenly richer, and they're not. Under Labor, bracket creep has become a stealth tax on aspiration—a quiet, relentless stealing of household budgets year after year without a single vote being cast. The coalition will end it. We will introduce a tax-back guarantee, a safeguard to ensure Australians are never taxed more simply because prices have gone up. Under our plan, when inflation rises, tax thresholds will rise with it. Your pay packet will no longer be raided just because of the cost of living.”
“According to PricewaterhouseCoopers, one-third of family businesses will pass to the next generation in the next five years, but Labor's CGT changes threaten to turn that handover into a financial ambush. The government insists small business is protected, but business groups warn 200,000 growing businesses could lose access to key concessions. The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry has urged the government to rethink its approach, arguing investment in business should never be penalised. At a recent small-business roundtable in Lindsay I heard the frustration and the anger firsthand. There was a real sense of deflation in the room, a feeling that, no matter how hard people work, the goalposts just keep being moved. A theme emerged: what's the point? CGT was the proverbial bull in the China shop.”
“They're everyday Australians trying to build a nest egg, so they don't end up on welfare in retirement, because not everyone understands crypto, not everyone plays the stock market. Many put their faith in something they do understand—bricks and mortar. A small unit in St Marys, an old townhouse in Emu Plains, a modest investment property in Werrington Downs is something solid, something they can touch. In Lindsay the latest available ATO data showed 5,511 people made a net rent profit, which is just 13.1 per cent of taxpayers in Lindsay, and almost 60 per cent made a net rent loss. In other words, 7.8 per cent of all taxpayers in Lindsay negatively geared a property. They are Australians who saved, sacrificed and planned for their future, and right now they feel like the one thing they built is being taken away from them.”
“Labor's five per cent deposit scheme is supposed to help young people into homes sooner, yet families now fear that a single rate rise or even a modest downturn could push them into negative equity. With analysts warning of property dips of up to 10 per cent under this budget, that fear isn't hypothetical; it is a red flag waving furiously. According to the first home buyers dashboard, 2,912 homes have been purchased under the scheme. In my electorate, that's hundreds of families—many of them young, many of them first generation homeowners—now lying awake at night wondering whether the home they fought so hard to buy could be worth less than the debt attached to it. For many Australians, property is their single biggest financial asset, and most investors are not wealthy—71 per cent own just one investment property; 19 per cent own two.”
“These aren't just numbers; they're people—the single mum working two jobs and watching half her pay disappear on her rent, the young couple delaying having a baby because they can't afford a bigger place, the pensioner skipping heat in winter to keep a roof overhead. Mortgage stress is rising too. If the Reserve Bank were to lift the cash rate next week, 1.57 million mortgage holders would be pushed into the danger zone, an increase of 104,000. The share of mortgage holders at risk of mortgage stress would rise to 30.7 per cent, edging close to the GFC peak of 35.6 per cent. Casula in Western Sydney has the highest arrears. One in 40 mortgaged homeowners is falling behind. Cambridge Gardens in my electorate is not far behind that. For young Australians trying to save a deposit, the picture is even bleaker.”
“The Real Estate Institute of Australia has warned that Labor's CGT changes will worsen housing shortages and push rents even higher. New modelling from the REIA, Master Builders Australia and the Property Council shows the budget's housing measures would push rents up by $9 a week, a 350 per cent increase on the budget's own forecasts; reduce new housing supply by 8,700 homes; cut GDP by $864 million; and cost more than 3,800 construction jobs. When you tax something, you get less of it. That's Economics 101. In Penrith city, 30.2 per cent of rental households were already paying $450 or more per week at the last census. The average rent is now $600. Regentville had 45 per cent of households paying more than a third of their income on rent.”
“This budget practically taunts them— work harder, risk more, build something extraordinary then pay for daring to dream. What does that do to confidence? What does that do to the apprentice told to dream big only to learn the system punishes dreamers. What does that do to the tradie who's put in a lifetime of work, ready to pass the tools on, only to find the finish line has been pushed further away? Australians aren't asking for special treatment; they're asking for a fair go. Nowhere is Labor's assault on aspiration more obvious than in housing. The government's own budget papers show 35,000 fewer homes will be built. The Real Estate Institute of Australia's modelling lands in the same place: 33,000 fewer new builds. These two different sources tell one story—fewer homes, higher rents, deeper pain.”
“The Prime Minister and the Treasurer say that times have changed and they need to respond to a changing environment. That's wrong, Prime Minister. You were elected on a promise of no changes to CGT and no changes to negative gearing. Australians will not forget and they will take this as a stark reminder that your word and your bond mean absolutely nothing. Australians instinctively understand something this government still refuses to learn. If you punish aspiration, people stop aspiring. And when you punish the people who build things—the people who wire our homes, pour our slabs, fix our pipes and train the next generation—you don't hurt the rich. You hollow out the backbone of communities like mine in Lindsay. As of 30 June 2025 there were more than 2.7 million actively trading businesses in Australia.”
“It's as if Labor thinks that we just forget. In 2019, Labor went to the Australian people with sweeping tax changes, slashing the capital gains tax discount and abolishing negative gearing. They expected applause. But Australians overwhelmingly rejected that and they were not elected. At the 2022 election they stayed quiet. The Prime Minister preached to all Australians that he was a man of his word, that his word was 'his bond' and that there were 'no taxes to see here'. At the 2025 election the Prime Minister repeated this promise more than 50 times and said that an Albanese Labor government would not impose changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax. Fast forward to 2026 and the Prime Minister has done the unthinkable: he has gone back on his word.”
“The budget locks in $50 billion in higher taxes, and the Prime Minister has now confirmed $273 billion in taxes Australians never voted for. Debt is heading towards $1.25 trillion. The interest bill is running at around $80,000 a minute, and today's debt is tomorrow's tax bill, a bill handed to the next generation. The Albanese Labor government is selling this as 'intergenerational fairness', as if it is something to be proud of. It's not intergenerational fairness; it is intergenerational fraud. There is nothing fair about making young Australians pay for the consequences of government failure. Every element of this package targets aspiration It targets Australians trying to get ahead—the self-starters, the risk-takers and the people building businesses, saving deposits and investing for the future.”
“No-one voted for these taxes. Before the election, the Prime Minister promised more than 50 times he would not introduce them, yet here we are. The Albanese Labor government's budget changes to the capital gains tax and negative gearing demonstrate their inclination to tax ambition first and justify later. This is a budget of broken promises that takes a wrecking ball to the Australian dream and pulls the ladder of opportunity up on the next generation. Labor is reaching deeper into the pockets of millions of hardworking Australians because it cannot manage the nation's finances. The Albanese Labor government has won an award for something, though. It is now the highest taxing government in Australian history. Well done!”
“To every person on the NDIS and people with disabilities across our country: I just want to let you know that the two ministers for the NDIS are not here to listen to this speech and answer questions. They've sent in their assistant minister. Right now, people with disability who rely on the NDIS are terrified about what their future holds. Just last week I heard from a man who's been in a wheelchair for 27 years—”
“The principle is simple: when your wages rise just to keep up with inflation, you are not better off. But under the current tax system, you are taxed as if you are. That's unfair and dishonest. Under a coalition government, that will end. Under Labor, Australians work harder, pay more and fall behind. Under the coalition, Australians will be rewarded to keep more and to get ahead. If the Albanese government keeps treating aspiration like a taxable offence, eventually fewer Australians will bother trying to build anything at all. I seek leave to table the Daily Mail article 'Why politicians are banned from calling Anthony Albanese a "liar" in parliament'. Leave not granted.”
“Not everyone plays the stock market. Most don't have a financial adviser on speed dial. These are the people who put their faith in something they do understand—bricks and mortar. A small unit in North Penrith. An old townhouse in St Marys. A modest investment property in Werrington Downs. Something solid. Something they can touch. They're not trying to get rich. They're just trying to take responsibility for their future. These are Australians who have saved, sacrificed and planned. But, right now, they feel the one thing they built so they could live comfortably in their retirement is being taken away from them. This is why the coalition will introduce a tax-back guarantee—to end the inflation tax and to stop Australians being taxed more simply because prices have gone up.”
“About one in 40 mortgage homeowners are falling behind on repayments. Other higher arrear areas include Cambridge Gardens, in my own electorate of Lindsay. The 2021 census showed Regentville had the highest proportion of households paying more than 30 per cent of their income on rent. In the City of Penrith, over 30 per cent of renting households were paying $450 or more a week back in 2021. The average rent is now $600. Behind those numbers is a very real person. I know this. This is my community. These are young people wanting to get ahead in life and pensioners who skip heating in winter so they can keep roofs over their heads. And there's another side of the story. There are the people who own one modest investment property. They're not moguls. They're not tycoons. They're just everyday Australians. Not everyone understands crypto.”
“Australians understand something the Albanese Labor government refuses to learn. If you punish aspiration, people stop aspiring. And when you punish the people who build things—wire our homes, pour our slabs, fix our pipes and train the next generation—you don't hurt the rich; you hollow out the backbone of communities like mine in Lindsay. If the Reserve Bank lifts the cash rate next week, Roy Morgan reports that 1.57 million mortgage holders would be pushed into the danger zone of mortgage stress—an increase of 104,000. The share of mortgage holders at risk of mortgage stress would increase to 30.7 per cent in July. For context, the record high was 35.6 per cent during the GFC—the global financial crisis. As of 14 September 2025, Casula in Western Sydney had the highest proportion of arrears.”