Anthony Albanese and Opposition Leader Peter Dutton have very different visions for – at least when it comes to cars, tax cuts and nuclear energy.
Both sides of politics have vowed to leave negative gearing tax breaks for investors untouched, give handouts to first-home buyers and address the cost-of-living crisis.
Labor and the Coalition also agreed on the target of net zero carbon dioxide emissions by 2050.
The Opposition has also supported the government’s extension of $75 quarterly electricity rebates to the end of 2025, announced in the pre-election March Budget.
But they radically vary when it comes to reducing car emissions, taxing motorists, allowing nuclear power, providing income tax relief, letting first-home buyers access their superannuation, cutting student debt and reducing immigration.
Cars
Mr Dutton has campaigned to scrap Labor’s New Vehicle Efficiency Standard designed to reduce carbon emissions from cars by 59 per cent over four years, starting in 2025.
Emissions for utes would be required to fall by a more moderate 47 per cent, from 200 grams of carbon per kilometre now.
Under this policy, car companies will be penalised from July 1 if they sell too many petrol and diesel cars that exceed those limits – as a proportion of overall sales – with the emissions rules getting stricter each year.
Car companies that sold more EV or hybrid vehicles would be given credits, based on them having an average new fleet that emitted less pollution.
Mr Dutton said this policy would see buyers of petrol and diesel cars pay a lot more at the dealership.
‘This is a tax on families who need a reliable car and small businesses trying to grow,’ he said.
‘Instead of making life easier, Labor is making it harder and more expensive.’
The Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries estimated ‘s top selling car for 2024, a Ford Ranger with a diesel engine, would cost $6,150 more compared with $2,720 for a petrol Toyota RAV4.
The Coalition argued that within four years, this would see the price of a Ford Ranger go up by $14,400 compared with $9,700 for a Toyota RAV4.
The Opposition is also vowing to scrap a salary sacrificing program that enables a professional buying a fully-electric car to claim all the running costs and novated lease repayments as a tax deduction.
Mr Albanese’s Labor government removed the requirement for employers to pay a fringe benefits tax if they provide an EV to a staff member under the $91,387 luxury car tax threshold for fuel efficient vehicles.
This policy has proven popular, with 100,000 people taking it up since the policy was introduced in July 2022, with the benefits flowing mainly to richer motorists.
Mr Dutton announced during the campaign he would scrap Labor’s policy – only two days after promising to keep it – arguing it would save taxpayers $3billion over four financial years.
Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen had estimated Labor’s fringe benefit tax exemption on EVs would save an employer $9,000 on a $50,000 Chinese-made Tesla Model 3, while an employee would save $4,700 through a salary sacrificing arrangement.
Petrol excise
The major parties also differ about fuel taxes, with the Opposition vowing to halve petrol and diesel excise for a year, from July 2025, should it win Saturday’s election.
This would see excise fall to 25.4 cents a litre – down from 50.8 cents a litre now, at a cost of $6billion.
A driver of a popular SUV like a RAV4 or Mitsubishi Outlander would save $14 a week, with Mr Dutton citing 55-litre cars in his Budget-reply speech last month.
‘For a household with one car filling-up once a week, that’s a saving of $14 a week on average – or around $700 over 12 months,’ he told Parliament.
‘For a household with two cars filling-up once a week, that is a saving of $28 a week on average – or around $1,500 over 12 months.’
Mr Dutton told Seven’s leaders’ debate on Sunday the petrol excise halving would ease the squeeze on household costs.
‘That immediate support, that 25 cent a litre cut in petrol – that can be provided to help people with the bills they’re facing now,’ he said.
Mr Albanese said the policy was a rehash of what his Liberal predecessor Scott Morrison did in early 2022, when it halved fuel excise for six months from March that year.
‘The measures that Peter is putting forward are all temporary, they disappear in a year’s time,’ he said.
‘Let’s be very clear: that is something that Scott Morrison did before the 2022 election and then it disappeared. It’s the same policy being put forward here.’
Tax cuts
The Liberals backed Labor’s rejigged stage three tax cuts, originally legislated in 2019 under the previous Coalition government, despite arguing their policy to redirect relief to lower-income earners amounted to a broken election promise.
But the Coalition is not supporting Labor’s modest new tax cuts, announced in the March Budget. These cuts would give most people $268 a year back in tax from July 2026 – that’s about $5 a week.
Dutton mocked the tax cuts, calling it just 70 cents a day and said it’s not worth the wait.
Instead, he’s promised to fix bracket creep – that’s when people get small pay rises just to keep up with rising prices, but end up moving into a higher tax bracket as a result so end up worse off. So far though, he has not said exactly how that will be done.
First-home buyers
Both sides of politics have policies aimed at getting first-home buyers into the real estate market, which economists fear will only add to demand and drive up already massive prices.
Labor has promised that all first-home buyers would be able to get a loan with a smaller five per cent deposit, instead of the usual 20 per cent.
Labor’s policy would be available for all property newcomers, and not just those who fit a certain low-income criteria.
While both sides support the idea of letting first-home buyers get in with a small deposit, only the Coalition wants to allow them to access up to $50,000 or 40 per cent of their superannuation to buy their first home.
Existing rules prevent ns accessing super to buy a home from compulsory employer contributions, now at 11.5 per cent, but they can withdraw from their voluntary contributions to buy a first home.
The Coalition also wants to allow first-home buyers to claim mortgage interest repayments, on the first $650,000 of a loan, as a tax deduction if it’s a newly-built home.
These owner-occupiers would be getting a tax break on a home, even though they would be exempt from paying capital gains tax when they sold.
The US and Switzerland allow home owners to claim mortgage repayments on tax but owner-occupiers there do pay a capital gains tax when they sell.
In , only property investors pay a capital gains tax but with a 50 per cent discount.
The UK tried a similar policy from 1983 to 2000, of allowing mortgage repayments to be claimed on tax in a nation where owner-occupiers don’t pay a capital gains tax when they sell.
Nuclear energy
Both sides of politics support a net zero by 2050 target for climate emissions but only the Coalition sees a role for nuclear energy.
Labor wants renewable energy to make up almost all of ‘s energy needs in 25 years from now – a more realistic goal than the Greens’ push for a 2030 target.
But the Coalition sees renewable energy only making up 62 per cent of ‘s energy mix by 2050, with nuclear energy making up the remaining 38 per cent.
The Coalition says its plan will cost $331billion but Labor argues it would cost close to $600billion.
The Liberal and National parties want to convert seven existing coal-fired power stations into government-owned nuclear reactors planned at Liddell and Mount Piper in NSW, Callide and Tarong in Queensland, Loy Yang in Victoria, the Port Augusta region in South and Collie in Western .
‘We’ll utilise seven existing coal-fired power stations. Why? Because when they come to an end of life – when the coal-fired power station closes – that community doesn’t have jobs,’ Mr Dutton told Seven’s leaders’ debate.
The Coalition argues they could use existing wires from coal-fired power stations – negating the need for new powerlines – and have vowed to axe Labor’s $20billion Rewiring the Nation fund to connect new renewable energy to the grid.
Student debt
The Coalition has also vowed to oppose Labor’s $16billion plan to cut student debt by 20 per cent for three million ns.
The government estimates their policy will save university students and graduates an average of $5,520.
But the Opposition argued it was unfair that university students would get subsidised by blue-collar workers, and by those students who have already paid their own debt.
‘It’s not fair that they should get thousands of dollars from taxpayers, but the young tradies who had to borrow to pay for their ute or their tools, or the uni students who diligently paid off their student debt, get nothing,’ Mr Dutton said in a media release.
Mr Dutton has also vowed to axe fee-free TAFE, a Labor policy that debuted in January 2023, because only 100,000 people had completed the courses.
The Coalition is instead promising to revive a network of 12 n Technical Colleges, that existed when John Howard was prime minister, at a cost of $260million.
Immigration
Both sides have vowed to cut immigration levels after they reached record-high levels approaching 550,000 in late 2023.
Mr Dutton wants to reduce net overseas migration by 100,000 a year, with this pledge also including a vow to slash the permanent intake by 24 per cent to 140,000.
The Treasury Budget forecasts had net overseas migration falling to 260,000 in 2025-26 under a Labor government.
Under the Coalition, this would fall to 160,000 – the lowest level in two decades.