The Australian Labor government is facing a mounting political storm over its flagship housing tax reforms, with resistance building both inside and outside Parliament. The Greens have threatened to withhold their crucial Senate support unless the reforms go further, while new polling suggests the very generation the policy is designed to help remains unconvinced.
Housing Minister Claire O'Neill has defended the budget measures, which aim to limit negative gearing and reduce the capital gains tax discount from fifty per cent. She argued the reforms would see seventy-five thousand rental households transition into home ownership while creating a fairer housing market, with only a mild affordability impact on overall prices.
However, one US investment bank has predicted the reforms could see house prices drop by up to ten per cent, a forecast the opposition has seized upon. The Coalition has blamed the government's changes for the dip in consumer sentiment, claiming Labor's measures have acted as a sledgehammer on market confidence as auction clearance rates weaken.
The Greens have demanded that any grandfathering provisions be capped at a maximum of one investment property, a stance that could prove difficult for the government to accept. Without Greens support in the Senate, the reforms face an uncertain path through Parliament.
Perhaps most alarming for both major parties, a Redbridge opinion poll released tonight shows Pauline Hanson's One Nation has surged to a primary vote of thirty-one per cent among Gen X voters, higher than either major party. Hanson has left open the prospect of running for the lower house at the next election and, when asked whether she wants to be Prime Minister, declined to rule it out.