Federal budget open thread

A thread for discussion of the federal budget, along with the federal anything-else.

As I type, Treasurer Scott Morrison is lifting the lid on the 2016/17 budget. Discuss and argue the toss here (or indeed, discuss anything else related to national affairs).

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

284 comments on “Federal budget open thread”

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  1. I hope that Labor will now really hoe into super concessions for the wealthy. Now the Govt has set the precedent, why not up the ante? None of them would vote labor anyway

  3. Alan Kohler: “The Reserve Bank is much more worried about the Economy than Scott Morrison is.”

    Might have something to do with the fact the Reserve Bank is much more likely to have a clue about the Economy than Scott Morrison is.

  4. Imacca – I wondered if it were the study of where electoral demographics and man’s dominion over the geological gift of fossil fuels converged to greatest effect, but your summary covers all very concisely.

  5. From PvO –
    Treasurer says he will cut “unnecessary waste” in his budget speech. What’s the necessary waste?

  6. Well this is a buddget for the True Deceivers! Or is it the Tax Evaders? Both!

    The cap on super contributions is good, but after that it is all downhill for both fairness and efficiency. No incintives for investment or saving, just a tax hand out for “small” business. Meanwhile in the things that really do generate jobs in the long term, education and training is punished, and infrastructure investment is being returned to a level still well below what it was four years ago (in real terms). And this is claimed as a triumph?

    Yet the real fiction here is in the growth assumptions (fantasies) and claimed future lower deficits. Did Treasury really support these? The growth assumptions, in a post mining boom world, are very optimistic, when investment in training and infrastructure will still be low in real terms, with many strings attached. With low growth, which has become the norm, tax revenue will not grow. That means the deficits will not shrink.

    The final farce was in the timing of the surplus falling. It does not drop below $30 billion till beyond 2019 :). So you have to re-elect this lot TWICE before they have promised to get deficits below GFC levels, only without the stimulus! Genius.

    There has never been a more exciting time to run a “small” business turning over $990 million per year or less. Finally some relief for the battlers 😀

  8. From Lenor Taylor …. almost identical to Ross Gittens ” it’s just a check list”

    “So in the end Morrison’s budget is unusual for trying to tick every box, for trying to do so many different things at the same time that it risks not making much of an impact.

    Just a cotton pickin’ minute there!

    I quote myself from this morning…

    The Budget tonight will do not much more than count coup on the various issues that need serious attention. Check boxes will be ticked-off and initialed. There’ll be a little something for everyone, but not enough for anyone.

    The pundits will dutifully write this up as “broad-based” and “holistic”, a Budget for all seasons. But it won’t stick. The paper they’re using to cover the cracks is too thin.

    I was right about the ticks in the check boxes, and I am pleased to say I may have been wrong about the pundits.

    Haven’t seen the commercial TV channels yet, but the reactions from our betters in the CPG I’ve seen so far have been: “Pfft”.

    Not quite the wave of public acclaim you’d want to be surfing at the start of a 60-day election campaign, methinks.

  10. Henry 8:58,
    I’m not paying too much attention but the SMH front page looks pretty bad for the budget right now. It took a while for the CPG to catch on to how crap the 2014 budget was… At this stage it’s not looking good for them.

  11. ratsak

    Might have something to do with the fact the Reserve Bank is much more likely to have a clue about the Economy than Scott Morrison is.

    That and in Scrott’s church Dog rewards financially the pious. Muy faithful muy money. Srsly.

  12. NB: “Battler” (noun) a lawyer or banker with only one S Class Mercedes. Source: New Liberal Party Dictionary.

  13. henry @ #127 Tuesday, May 3, 2016 at 8:51 pm

    Bowen is really on top of his game these days – becoming very secure in his grasp of the detail. Nailing it with Speers on Sky at the minute.

    I agree.

    Every time I see him he seems improved.

    But lose the beard, mate, it is not a good look.

    Tony Burke goes from strength to strength. I am very, very impressed. Eventually I can see him approaching Paul Keating’s ability, but that may take a while….

  15. BK: What’s the necessary waste?
    It’s like the line from the old song, Moreton Bay: “Excessive tyranny each day prevails.” As opposed to perfectly reasonable tyranny which anyone could be expected to endure until morale improves.

  16. bk @ #154 Tuesday, May 3, 2016 at 9:12 pm

    From PvO –
    Treasurer says he will cut “unnecessary waste” in his budget speech. What’s the necessary waste?

    Now, see, BK, your big problem is that:

    a) you are logical

    and

    b) you understand English.

    A term in the LNP gulag for reeducation for you, my boy!

  17. I rest my case…Ross Gittins tonight:

    You get the feeling this budget was pulled together with the use of a checklist. “We’ve got to have something on super, bracket creep, women, company tax, cities, multinationals, infrastructure . . .”

    It involves a lot of imminent-election tidying up of loose ends from projects the government has supposedly been working on for three years, plus much squaring away of key interest groups.

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/business/federal-budget/budget-2016-forget-jobs-and-growth-this-was-political-20160502-gojr0h.html#ixzz47ahFUBLm

  19. The key nessage of the Budget:”It’s taken us 3 years, but you’ll be pleased to know we’ve sorted it out in the final 6 weeks.”

    That’s a relief! I thought we were n trouble for a while, there.

  20. I wonder if the budget gives more to Border Force since they are obviously under resourced, given that an asylum seeker boat sailed into Cocos yesterday under their noses.

    (Of course a conspiracy theorist might suggest they let the boat reach Cocos to demonstrate how under resourced they are.)

  21. Since the cartoonists seem to be on the ball than the rest of the media, the cartoons tomorrow should be worth seeing.

  22. At the end of the last post we has a new poster

    Ian (Sorry cannot quite recall your name but i know it was Scottish) – welcome aboard!

    It was a boring budget. Will not scare too many horses but will not win friends either.

    Don – Chris Bowen needs to keep the beard. Refering to a discussion of a few months ago his chin is not his best feture and my sartorial advice is to keep it. If you have a nice strong chin aka roger Ramjet then get rid of the beard.

  24. From the SMH:

    The federal government has skewed cuts in personal income tax rates to higher income earners, with about 75 per cent of taxpayers missing out entirely on relief announced in the budget after the government judged they had already benefited enough from recent tax cuts and compensation for the carbon tax.

    ************
    http://www.smh.com.au/business/federal-budget/budget-2016-government-skews-prudent-tax-cuts-to-higher-income-earners-20160502-gojs2b.html
    ************

    Sounds like the SMH is not impressed at this point.

  27. A question for the spiv Morrison. How do we manage to put a 40% tax on multinational PROFITS when, by Australian Tax laws, they don’t make any profits. Profit shifting offshore is a well know ruse, but in actual terms of the law, they are paying “licensing” fees to be able to sell the product of the parent company, which is usually in a nice low or no tax paying constituency. A play on words by the waffle king and his monkey.

    Tom.

  28. You would have to assume the Government has some big ticket announcements held back, especially relating to those in the under $80K tax bracket who didn’t benefit tonight, for later in the campaign. This is too far out from election day, surely, to use all ammo.

  29. Lol!

    Maureen
    6m6 minutes ago
    Maureen ‏@Moby011
    Poor Speers Has yet to have a guest who likes the #budget2016 Has tried to defend it but is losing badly Guests all to smart for him #sky

  30. I am assuming that we have moderation turned on. A post in which I referred to our esteemed Treasurer with what one-time PB’er Fran might have called a “vituperative portmanteau” (not the usual one) disappeared into the ether.

  31. When will these idiots learn …

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-05-03/budget-2016-abc-facing-budget-cuts/7380570

    I expect their online presence (which competes so effectively with Rupert’s commercial sites) will be reduced to a rump – probably only the IPA-infested Drum will remain.
    Lets just hope they get rid of some of their highly paid and useless “celebrity journalists”. Crabbe would be top of my list, but I’ll bet she somehow manages to remain.

  32. Treasurer says he will cut “unnecessary waste” in his budget speech. What’s the necessary waste?

    Oh you know, stuff like public education, public health, welfare. Useless stuff that rich people don’t use.

  33. This is too far out from election day, surely, to use all ammo.

    You’d think people would by now stop falling into the trap of thinking Turnbull has a clue…

  34. If the Libs win the election it’s the emergency Mini Budget soon after that worries me.
    Slash spending on education, health And all the other things IPA wish list.

  35. daretotread @ #171 Tuesday, May 3, 2016 at 9:26 pm

    Don – Chris Bowen needs to keep the beard. Refering to a discussion of a few months ago his chin is not his best feture and my sartorial advice is to keep it. If you have a nice strong chin aka roger Ramjet then get rid of the beard.

    OK, but the beard is pathetic. Looks like an 18 year old kid who is trying to look like George Clooney.

    Sorry Chris, you don’t rate.

  37. Well my appraisal of the Australian media outlets, from afar – is they are generally unimpressed with what is the Budget.

  38. Listening to The Cormannator being interviewed by Emma Alberici.

    Whatever the question, the answer is “Labor bad”.

  39. Re BK @154: but the “necessary waste” like Direct Inaction, the Marriage Equality plebiscite, handouts to elite private schools, the chaplaincy orogram, the private health insurance rebate and the excess of the cost to building submarines in Adelaide over the cost of saving the auto industry, will remain in place.

  40. A status from the Daily Telegraph’s Facebook page.

    “The hardest hit in the Federal Budget are lower-income parents with teen children. But childless people on above-average incomes will come out on top”.

  41. I don’t know why anyone bothers to interview Cormann. Whatever the question, he’ll simply reply with the LNP talking point of the day.

  42. I guess they’ll start the crackdown on disabled pensioners after Centrelink finishes processing this year’s Austudy applications backlog.

    That should give any pensioners who think they might be borderline when it comes to eligibility a two or three years before they need to start worrying.

  43. Socrates @ 9.13pm,

    Meanwhile in the things that really do generate jobs in the long term, education and training is punished, and infrastructure investment is being returned to a level still well below what it was four years ago (in real terms). And this is claimed as a triumph?

    In other words, we are supposed to see as a triumph by Turnbull and Morrison the fact that they have restored some of the money cut from the Horror 2014 Budget. I mean, they were threatening to cut more but in the end didn’t!?! So, huzzah!?!

    Anyway, the whole thing proves one thing with crystal clear clarity to me about Scott Morrison. His schtick is saying something, which tends to suggest to the rational mind one thing…and then turning around and using that concept which we all generally agree upon in a completely refashioned way.

    For example, ‘Jobs and Growth’. Everyone thinks about the normal sort of job and the normal sort of Economic Growth. However, what Morrison means is ‘Jobs’ which are insecure and insufficiently-remunerated. Or ‘Jobs’ for our Young Unemployed where newly-defined ‘Small Business’ Owners will get a free unemployed young person to do the shit can work for them, ‘in their chosen industry’, but it will be the ‘Small Business’ Owner who will reap the rewards from the government. With a Tax Cut.

    I bet those Young Unemployed people taken in by this new ‘PATH to work’ will be taken off the Unemployment statistics too.

    And all this is supposed to win them an election?

  47. citizen @ #185 Tuesday, May 3, 2016 at 9:38 pm

    It’s hard to tell if Malcolm Farr is being serious or sarcastic:
    Analysis: Why this is a clever Federal Budget
    http://www.news.com.au/finance/economy/federal-budget/analysis-why-this-is-a-clever-federal-budget/news-story/e3a860571962e84cefbd398d22456579

    I agree. I think he’s not impressed, but working for Limited News he has to be careful what he says. As such, this is a very clever budget summary. Basically he acknowledges that ScoMo stole all the good ideas from Labor, and that the tax cuts are a bribe to the better off that they expect to be rewarded for at the election. Which tells me they realize they have irretrievably lost a substantial part of the electorate, so much so that it is not worth them even trying to get it back – they are just desperate to hold onto their base and maybe scrape across the line.

  48. citizen @ 9.38
    I think there are some good points in Farr’s analysis. I agree that the voters will not accept a budget that tries to sell too many goodies when it stretches incredulity. And it was a non-dumb move not to try it.

    But the whole government is a joke and it will make stupid mistakes inevitably during the election campaign. And with the headlines figures presented by the budget on the night being the nicest or most politically saleable bits, there is an intense period for both Labor and sectoral interests to rip bits out of it that have been cleverly hidden.

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