Coalition touts tax-free lunch proposal as Federal Parliament returns

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Both the Prime Minister and Opposition Leader have been testing out their election lines, as the first question time of the new year in federal parliament. With an election just over the horizon, both the government and coalition are sharpening their messaging.

Transcript

00:00Yeah, good afternoon, Lorna. It is a little bit unusual. Usually, question time would

00:05be dominated by what the government is doing, or is planning to do, at least. But it was

00:09an opposition policy around tax-free lunches for small businesses that dominated much of

00:14at least the first half, I suppose, of question time. This first question time on the first

00:19sitting day of 2020-25, and possibly one of the last before we see a looming federal election.

00:26This policy was released by Peter Dutton only a few weeks ago. It would allow small businesses

00:31to deduct up to $20,000 for meals provided to either their staff or to clients. The government

00:38has really seized on this one. They see this as an opportunity to score some political

00:43points arguing this is essentially a tax break being provided to bosses to take their clients

00:49out to lunch, something they don't think will resonate with the public. But the opposition

00:53is keen to talk this policy up, raising it in question time earlier today. Now, importantly,

00:59this policy hasn't necessarily been costed, or at least the costings for it have not yet

01:03been released publicly by the opposition. Now, the government seized on that and asked

01:08Treasury to run their own costings of this policy, coming back with a cost of somewhere

01:13between $1.6 billion and $10 billion. Now, the opposition disputes those numbers heavily,

01:19but raise this issue in question time regardless, putting to a policy that allows big corporates,

01:25big businesses, to essentially write off the cost of a boardroom lunch, for example, in

01:29a company like Qantas. Here's how the Treasurer, Jim Chalmers, responded to that in question

01:34time earlier today.

01:37They couldn't hand in their homework. They either didn't know or wouldn't say how much

01:40their policy costs. We've done their homework for them. The policy that they're trying to

01:45inflict on the Australian people would have workers shout lunches for their bosses and

01:50would smash a $10 billion hole up to in the budget as a consequence.

01:56Now Lorna, it's important to note the opposition absolutely decries that number, says it's

02:02completely ridiculous and says they have costed this policy through the Parliamentary Budget

02:07Office, which is normal procedure, but they haven't made those costings public as yet.

02:11They say they will do so, but the Shadow Treasurer, Angus Taylor, says the cost of

02:15this policy is a fraction of what Jim Chalmers is saying, somewhere around underneath $250

02:21million. He's also criticised what he says is the politicisation of the public service

02:26by asking Treasury to cost the opposition policy. Here's a bit of what he had to say

02:30on this earlier today.

02:33We have a longstanding custom in this country of not politicising the public service, but

02:38it is very clear today the Treasurer is intent on doing exactly that. He has worked with

02:45Treasury to come up with figures that we think and know are absolute nonsense.

02:49OK, so Tom, what did Peter Dutton have to say to his own MPs about the election ahead?

02:55Yeah, we heard from Peter Dutton speaking to the Coalition party room. The leaders often

03:00make the first meetings of their party rooms for the year open to the media to hear the

03:05leaders addressing the troops, addressing their own MPs. We heard from the Prime Minister

03:10doing that with the Labor caucus yesterday. He painted a very optimistic picture in his

03:15own words. He pointed to economic indicators like the inflation rate going down, the unemployment

03:20rate staying low and wages going up as a reason to be optimistic, he says, about the year

03:25ahead. Peter Dutton really picked up on that sentiment from the Prime Minister in his own

03:30speech to the Coalition party room, saying there really isn't room for that optimism

03:34under the Albanese government, he argues, pointing to his own figures around the closure

03:40of small businesses, for example, and the rising costs that Australians have seen over

03:45the past three years. Here's a bit of Peter Dutton's speech to his party room earlier

03:49today.

03:50I think we've all heard a message right across the country, and it's not the Prime Minister's

03:54message that this is a year of optimism and that people are sort of, you know, very happy

04:00with where the government's at. It's not that situation at all. There are families

04:04who thought two and a half years ago that this was going to be a government for them

04:08and this was going to be a Prime Minister who understood their concerns. It's been anything

04:13but that.

04:15Peter Dutton says there is momentum for change in his own words. That's the sentiment he's

04:20seeing. He says the Coalition will be talking freely and frankly to the public over the

04:25next few months. If there is that momentum for change, Peter Dutton will get the chance

04:29to test it, at least, at an election in a few months' time.

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