Last night, Australia’s treasurer for the Property Council of Australia, Scott Morrison, was interviewed on ABC’s The Business, where he continued spouting lies that Labor’s changes to negative gearing would cause property crises to crash, force-up rents, and threaten the economy:
Morrison: “Changing negative gearing is not an ambitious reform, it’s a bad idea. It’s going to undermine the value of people’s homes and it’s going to crash house prices”.
Ticky Fullerton: “It’s something Ken Henry recommended looking at”.
Morrison: “Well Ken Henry wasn’t right. I mean, on this issue. If you change negative gearing in the way that Labor propose you undermine the value of people’s homes, you will push-up rents at a time when no one can really afford for that to be happening. But importantly Ticky, when we look at the national accounts…, household consumption is central to what is driving the economy. Now if you go and undermine the value of someone’s home, that will obviously have an impact on consumer confidence and household consumption. And that’s the last thing our economy needs as we are going through this transition period.
So, changes to negative gearing isn’t reform, it’s just a tax grab from the Labor Party, who want to put up taxes, they have already said that they will increase the deficit, and they will increase the debt if they are elected to government. Now that is not a plan that can support stability for our AAA-rating”
Where’s the Scott Morrison who in February admitted “there are excesses” in negative gearing and that it has gone too far:
And why does the Coalition persist with the lie that Labor’s plan to direct negative gearing towards new builds would smash the economy and force-up rents, when it is exactly the same as the Coalition’s policy on foreign investment, where it has argued the complete opposite?
Here’s the chair of the foreign investment inquiry, Liberal MP Kelly O’Dwyer, explaining the benefits of this ‘new homes only’ policy:
“Currently the framework seeks to channel foreign investment in residential real estate into new dwellings in order to increase the housing stock for Australians to build, buy or rent. Foreign investment is encouraged in new dwellings whether they be apartments, units or homes because in addition to creating more supply, it also creates more jobs for the building and construction sector – all of which helps to grow our economy”.
Swap the words “foreign investment” for “negative gearing” and the arguments are identical.
In other words, stop lying Scott.
