The Coalition’s full company tax cut plan and many of its long-stalled “zombie” savings have little chance of becoming law after the election, a Guardian Australia survey has revealed, despite Malcolm Turnbull’s claim only Labor would face the “chaos” of negotiations with minor parties and independents.
And if Bill Shorten was to form government after Saturday, he would be forced to negotiate to get his plans to limit negative gearing and capital gains tax concessions through the Senate.
A Guardian Australia survey of the positions of the minor parties and independents with a reasonable chance of winning seats in either the House of Representatives or the Senate reveals a high likelihood the Coalition will lose significant spending and saving measures.
These include the family tax benefit changes, the increase in the pension age, the four-week wait for the dole, tax cuts for companies with more than $10m in turnover and the cuts to Gonski school funding for the final two years.
The Coalition could also lose elements of its superannuation package and the marriage equality plebiscite, as Labor’s and the Greens’ positions on both remain unclear and other potential senators remain opposed.
If Labor wins government, its negative gearing policy also remains in doubt. Nick Xenophon, for example, says he would want changes to ensure continued negative gearing concessions to encourage more affordable rental accommodation.
The prime minister’s central message in the election campaign’s final week is that only a majority Coalition government can offer “stability” in contrast to the Labor party, which would be forced to form a “chaotic” alliance with the Greens and independents.
But a Coalition government would also need votes from Labor, the Greens and minor parties to get its policies through the Senate, with polls suggesting it is likely to need support from Nick Xenophon’s senators, as well as number of minor-party senators likely to include Jacqui Lambie, and possibly Derryn Hinch, Pauline Hanson, Bob Day, David Leyonhjelm and Glenn Lazarus. It is also possible that the government could be reliant on minor-party votes in the lower house.
Both Turnbull and his treasurer, Scott Morrison, suggest Labor, the Greens and the minor parties would change their position and support government policy in deference to an election “mandate”.
“The fact that we’d taken the budget to an election and, if we were successful, we received the support of the Australian people, I think that is a pretty powerful argument,” Morrison said on Monday.
But the minor parties and independents themselves insist that is not the case. The so-called “zombie” tax cuts from 2014 – including changes to the family tax benefit, the increase in the pension age to 70 and the four-week wait for the dole – would still have little prospect of passing the Senate.
The government’s changes to the family tax benefit would see a cut to the annual supplements, including FTB-A, which is worth $720 a child each year, and FTB-B, which is worth $350 a family each year. Labor has agreed to reduce the FTB-A supplement by 50 per cent for families earning more than $100 000 a year and will maintain the freeze on thresholds until 2020. The Greens, Xenophon, Day, Lambie, Leyonhjelm and Lazarus say they won’t vote for the Coalition’s changes. All but Lazarus also say they would not support the increase in the pension age.
With Xenophon sticking to his insistence that company tax cuts should not go to firms with a turnover of more than $10m, Lambie also nominating a threshold of $5m to $10m, and Labor and the Greens opposing cuts for firms with a turnover of more than $2m, Turnbull is likely to have to negotiate changes to his centrepiece $48bn tax cut plan.
Lambie, for example, is considering a policy with special economic zones, where companies in regional Australia with higher turnovers could get the Turnbull tax cuts but city companies would not get the same treatment.
The Coalition’s superannuation changes will only pass with Labor or Greens support, though neither party will fully commit. The changes would cap the tax-free super contributions at $1.6m, after which contributions would be taxed at 15%. It would also cap after-tax contributions at $500,000, backdated to 2007. Labor has banked the $6bn in savings but is not committing to pass the whole policy and the Greens are leaving the door open while not committing to support the changes. Xenophon says the government needs to “go back to the drawing board”, and Day and Leyonhjelm are against any cuts to generous superannuation concessions.
To implement cuts to the final two years of the Gonski schools plan, the Coalition would have to amend legislation. Labor, the Greens, Xenophon, Day, Lambie and independent lower-house candidate Tony Windsor all say they would vote against this.
And legislation to implement the Coalition’s promised marriage equality plebiscite could also face problems in the Senate. Labor has left open the option of not supporting it, as have the Greens, Xenophon, Lambie and Leyonhjelm, who has put up his own same-sex marriage private member’s bill.
Xenophon said his party had yet to take a formal position, though all his candidates support marriage equality and believe the plebiscite is a waste of money.
Labor’s negative gearing plan faces similar uncertainty, with the Greens, Xenophon and Lambie all saying they would want to see changes.
