Clare is asked if changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax could help with affordability. He says Labor is not considering any changes, and that the party will keep Coalition changes to save people paying mortgage insurance. He says:
The policy we announced today is helping Australians on a lower income, $90,000 or less, $120,000 if they are a couple, who otherwise would not buy a home because they cannot get the mortgage to buy a home.
And he says it’s “good to have the captain back on the field”, referring to leader Anthony Albanese’s release from iso and today’s launch.
Labor’s Jason Clare confirms the housing policy for shared equity would start on 1 January if Labor wins the election. Grattan Institute research shows the plan will not contribute to the overheating of the market, he says.
There would be policies in place to deal with cases where owners could no longer make repayments, he says, and an independent evaluation if a property had to be sold.
“I think we can win Boothby,” Malinauskas says of the marginal Liberal seat in SA, but concedes it will be tough. Asked if the SA result will translate federally, he says there are state issues around health service delivery (such as ambulance ramping) but that health is still a national focus.
And he says that he will fight the Coalition’s deal to deliver more GST revenue to Western Australia and argue SA’s case.
SA premier Peter Malinauskas is talking to the ABC now, off the back of his big win in the state.
Malinauskas says Labor leader Anthony Albanese’s speech was a speech from a future prime minister. “You’ve gotta have a vision for the future,” he says:
There were significant policy announcements … [and] we are in a unique time. The nation wants to know what is the legacy of Covid going to be and I think Anthony and the team have a vision for that.
It’s a different election to 2019, he says.
Wong’s asked about the security agreement between Solomon Islands and China, and Manasseh Sogavare’s speech last week. She says there were aspects she didn’t agree with, and accuses the Coalition of being “dismissive of climate change” when Pacific leaders say it’s their number one national security issue:
I do not agree with the way in which Mr Morrison has taken his eye off the ball, and I do not agree that he has been a prime minister who has consistently looked to national interest, I think he has played to domestic politics over and over again.
Labor senator Penny Wong is asked if there’s a conflict between the idea of Labor as a party of reform and the idea that it offers “safe change”.
Unsurprisingly, she disagrees:
I do not think that is correct… We have said very clearly that powering Australia matters, tackling climate change, cheap energy, making sure we got the capacity to generate new advanced manufacturing, doing more manufacturing here in Australia, and of course childcare reform and aged care. So there are plenty of reforming policies in the announcements today.
People have had a tough couple of years, Butler says, and they’re looking for “safe change”. “It’s a particularly difficult mountain to climb … but we’re up for this challenge.”
There’s a “real mood for change” in South Australia, Butler says, when asked about Labor’s chances of winning the marginal, Liberal held seat of Boothby.
On blowouts in the NDIS and Labor’s proposed overhaul of the system, Butler says:
What we will do is make sure that this reflects the hope and ambition our government has, and people with a disability have, to make sure the plans put in place with a properly staffed agency give them the hope and the opportunity to participate in Australian life.
Labor leader Anthony Albanese pitch today was that he will step up and take responsibility, he says.
Labor’s health spokesman Mark Butler is talking about that reduction in prescription medication payments. He agrees with the ABC’s Andrew Probyn that people weren’t getting the medicine they needed because of the cost. He says it’s a core issue of equity:
It would take effect on the first of January. The costings will be released… but this is a fully costed policy.
They “can’t do everything”, Butler says when asked about why they’re not changing the Medicare safety net.
Albanese has a strong finish – with nary a croak nor quaver, which is pretty good considering he only just got out of iso. He finishes saying:
Vote for an Australia that recognises the privilege of sharing our vast continent with the oldest continuous culture on earth.
Vote for a country that celebrates our success as a multicultural nation.
Vote for an Australia that believes the doors of opportunity should be open to every Australian, no matter where you live, who you pray to or who you love.
Vote for hope and optimism over fear and division.
“They don’t think, they know,” Labor leader Anthony Albanese says of prime minister Scott Morrison. His appropriation of French president Emmanuel Macron’s phrase gets a very warm welcome from the crowd. He says:
I think people know all about Scott Morrison, they have worked him out. Australians … understand that we cannot bet our future on the three more years of a prime minister who looks at every challenge facing our country and says ‘that is not my job’.
Labor will legislate an integrity commission, he says:
And – as your prime minister – I won’t run from responsibility.
I won’t treat every crisis as a chance to blame someone else.
I will show up, I will step up, I will bring people together.
I will lead with integrity and treat you with respect.
Labor will also create a national housing supply and affordability council which will, among other things, cut red tape. (Cutting red tape is always on the election campaign bingo card).
Now Albanese is talking about the home equity scheme, called “Help to Buy”:
A national shared equity scheme that will provide an equity contribution from the commonwealth government for 10,000 aspiring homeowners on low and middle incomes, every year.
If you have saved 2% of your deposit, we will contribute up to 40% of the purchase price of a new home or 30% for an existing home.
Help to Buy will assist Australians to buy a home with a smaller deposit, a smaller mortgage and smaller mortgage repayments.
Albanese says:
We can do better than this. So much better than this.
We will look after the young, we will look after the sick, we will look after our older Australians.
No one held back. No one left behind.
Albanese’s aged care pledge: ‘Older Australians deserve dignity and respect’
Albanese is getting a lot of whoops and hollers as he talks about aged care.
It is economic reform not welfare that grows the economy. Older Australians built this great nation. You deserve dignity and respect in your later years, not neglect. More carers, more time to care. A pay rise for aged care workers. Tastier, more nutritious meals for residents. New accountability and reporting measures, so that every dollar we invest gets better care, not bigger profits. And critically, Labor will put the nurses back into nursing homes 24/7.
He gets a good laugh for saying prime minister Scott Morrison only offers “smirk and mirrors”.
“Labor will always protect Medicare,” Albanese says, hitting one of the hot button points for Labor.
[And] we will bring the principles of universal, affordable and quality service to childcare and to aged care.
Childcare is unaffordable, and “the neglect in aged care is just unconscionable”, he says.
