Interview on News24, News Day 2

Wednesday, 2 September 2026

Topics: National Accounts; interest rates; inflation; housing.

E&OE……………………..

Kieran Gilbert: Let's return to the economy now. Joining me to discuss the GDP number today and the government's reaction to it is the Shadow Treasurer, Tim Wilson. Thanks for your time, Mr Wilson. Let's start with the government's response. Jim Chalmers says it shows the economy is robust and resilient and has exceeded expectations, albeit by a very small margin. What did you make of the number?

Tim Wilson: Well, the reality is Australians having conversations around the kitchen tables of the nation tonight are worried about increases in interest rates. They're worried about inflation. The small businesses that are going to the wall in record numbers don't share Jim Chalmers' enthusiasm. The brutal truth is that the government's active inflation agenda is catching up with it. Their budget and the dodgy numbers that underpin it are catching up with the government, and that's why Jim Chalmers had such a tetchy and cranky press conference, because the numbers simply don't stack up with what Australians are living.

Kieran Gilbert: Public demand as a percentage of GDP at 27.7%, is that at the core of the problem here in your view? Is that what you're saying, that that needs to be slashed?

Tim Wilson: The challenge we've got is that the government keeps stoking inflation and they're doing it by expanding the size of the government since they were first elected. It's increased by essentially a third and as a consequence, we're seeing more demand in the economy. That's putting upward pressure on inflation, upward pressure on interest rates. That's why small businesses are going to the wall. That's why households are wondering whether the Reserve Bank is going to have its hand forced again and we're going to have another interest rate rise. That's why we've seen an increase of around 213% in the cost of servicing debt by Australian households. They're buckling under the pressure and the answer from the Treasurer has been to fist-bump the air and tell everyone what a great job he's doing while Australians are living a very different reality and they're wondering how they're going to get through.

Kieran Gilbert: Does this number being stronger than expected make a rate rise almost inevitable later this month, another one?

Tim Wilson: Well, that's the serious concern. We've gone into these national accounts where the banks were already starting to price out the risk of an interest rate rise off the back of inflation data, off the back of demand data and of course, particularly the underlying inflation problem that Australia has that existed before we ran, has continued since Iran, and even if the Iran crisis ended tomorrow, the Iran crisis might evaporate, but Australia would still experience an inflation problem. That's why everyone's pricing in a potential interest rate hike and, of course, off the back of today's data, that's the conversation that's going to be happening around the kitchen tables of the nation, and of course the small businesses that are already buckling under the pressure of higher costs caused by the Albanese active inflation agenda.

Kieran Gilbert: Huge implications for the property market if there is another rate hike, already cooling, a correction as the Commonwealth Bank has now called it. If there were to be another rate hike, do you fear that we will see a crash in the property market?

Tim Wilson: I'm very concerned about what's happening with the property market where Australians on average are having up to $100,000 wiped off their wealth because they're having real wages going backwards, now their wealth wiped out. But we should never lose sight that this was by design of the federal budget. This was Anthony Albanese and Jim Chalmers' intention: to wipe out the wealth of the nation, to reduce and undermine real wages and that's what they're delivering to the Australian community. The question is when confidence gets smashed, where does it end? We have rents increasing, we have the price of first homes increasing while we see established homes seeing price drops and confidence being smashed at the same time. This is the economy Labor has designed and that's the reality of what Australians are now living.

Kieran Gilbert: Even though we're talking about the largest year-on-year drop on house prices, the median house prices, for decades, the Treasurer, he's standing by the treasury forecast at the budget. He says that the forecast of house prices growing, albeit at a 2% lower rate, that's what Treasury suggested, he says that needs to be judged not on the last few months, but over the next few years upon which that forecast was made. Is that fair?

Tim Wilson: The Treasurer likes to spin numbers however it suits him. The other day he was saying how Australians are getting richer and their wages are going up. The reality shows that inflation is overtaking wages. So, when Australians go to the supermarket, they're paying more and they're getting less. It isn't the numbers that Jim Chalmers repeats, it's the reality of what Australians are living that is how Australians are experiencing this economy. This is the economy Labor designed, it's the economy Labor built and it's one where rents are going up, the price of first homes is increasing while the wealth of Australians is decreasing, as well as their wages. Until we get an adjustment, a change in the economic model, Australians sadly will continue to go backward. That's the problem with the government's economic model.

Kieran Gilbert: Tim Wilson, Shadow Treasurer, thanks for your time. I appreciate it.

[ENDS]