The $8 billion-a-year saving from redesigning the compensation for bracket creep can neutralise the fiscal and inflationary impact of a meaningful rise in the dole.
would be about, the Reserve Bank’s surprise move on interest rates last Tuesday sealed the deal. This is a budget about the cost of living.
The already announced change to pharmacy dispensing rules will similarly reduce costs to households. Allowing people to receive two months of medicine on a single script will reduce trips to the GP and pharmacies, saving patients both money and time. The change provoked the Pharmacy Guild to kick off one of its famous scare campaigns, but it looks like unambiguously good policy.Likewise, the “decision” not to continue the Low and Middle Income Tax Offset in this budget is the right one.
Greater support for single parents – by maintaining the Parenting Payment until the youngest child turns 13 or 14, instead of 8 – and a JobSeeker rise are rumoured to be on the table. But on the latter, the government has flagged concerns about the inflationary and fiscal impact of going as far as the $132-a-week increase its Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee recommends.
But budgets should also go beyond solving short-term problems. If the government is serious about long-term cost-of-living relief, this budget is the time to put some teeth into its Housing Accord.Boosting supply in the areas people want to live in – generally in suburbs within a reasonable distance of major urban centres – is the single biggest thing governments could do to improve long-term housing affordability and kick-start economic growth.
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