Rarer than a campaign without slogans, or a streetwalk without selfies, is a real estate agent opposed to negative gearing. But such a specimen was spotted on Wednesday evening at Guardian Live’s special election event in Sydney.
“If most people realised the benefits people are getting from negative gearing, it would stop tomorrow,” the agent, John Knott, told the panel, who included Labor’s deputy leader, Tanya Plibersek, and the newly elected Liberal Trent Zimmerman.
Fairness was the theme and, six weeks into this marathon 2016 campaign, it was negative gearing that most animated the crowd.
What a stellar @guardianaus election special panel - @tanya_plibersek Trent Zimmerman @cassandragoldie #guardianlive pic.twitter.com/gdNvZ0vJKr
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Zimmerman made the Liberal case for leaving the deductibility scheme untouched. “Ownership of real estate is an important investment tool that many people utilise,” he said.
He pointed instead to his party’s plan to help state governments increase housing supply, and to promote affordable housing as part of new developments.
Plibersek, in reply, touted Labor’s plan to limit negative gearing to new houses from July 2017. “There’ll be more investment in building new housing, so there’ll be more housing stock, and 26,000 new jobs building new housing stock,” she said.
Her three children provided the motivation, she said. If they couldn’t afford to one day buy a home, “There won’t just be something wrong with our economy, there’ll be something wrong with our society.”
No party would describe its policies as unfair and, sure enough, the panellists’ definition of the word differed starkly.
“For some people fairness is, regardless of who you are, we’ll treat you the same, and in public policy terms, that can get pretty ugly,” said Cassandra Goldie, the chief executive of the Australian Council of Social Services. Her view was that “government policy should be grounded in a debate about need”.
Plibersek talked up the economic potential of more equally distributed wealth. “Sustainability and inclusive growth gives you longer and stronger growth,” she said, pointing to a growing consensus that inequality was “a drag on growth”.
Zimmerman said the concept was nebulous and invariably required “a personal value judgment”. His was simple: “It’s about equality of opportunity.”
There was consensus among the progressives on the panel – which was hosted by Guardian Australia’s Lenore Taylor, and featured Katharine Murphy – that inequality was deepening in Australia. “We’re fooling ourselves if we think we’re still a completely fair society,” Plibersek said.
She pointed to the country’s growing GDP but halting living standards. “People on high incomes are being paid more and [those] on middle and low incomes are stuck,” she said.
But determining fairness demanded a longer view, Zimmerman said. “We do not think it is fair to burden future generations with a fiscal position that is unsustainable. So, fairness applies across a broad range of policy areas.”
Meanwhile, those who think the election campaign is stretching on a bit were reminded: they aren’t alone. “It’s too long,” Plibersek said. “I just don’t think people are listening yet.”
• Join Lenore Taylor and Katharine Murphy in Melbourne on Tuesday as they host a Guardian Live election special event featuring a panel of prominent political guests
