Wednesday, 4 August 2026

Interview – NEWS24, Sharri 

Tuesday, 4 August 2026

Topics: widow tax; negative gearing; testamentary discretionary trusts; capital gains tax rate; housing market; first home buyers; inflation; One Nation; David Ossip; Royal Commission.

E&OE……………………..

Sharri Markson: Well, in breaking news, the Albanese government has backflipped on its plan to scrap negative gearing for widows. The Australian is reporting that Labor has caved into demands to preserve grandfathering of negative gearing on residential homes in case of death or divorce, unwinding its widow's tax and exempting testamentary discretionary trusts from the new minimum capital gains tax rate. And Shadow Treasurer Tim Wilson joins me now live from Maroochydore, Queensland. Tim, great to see you. Thanks for your time. Well, let's start with this breaking news. Are you satisfied with these changes as they're being reported by The Australian?

Tim Wilson: Well, of course we're not satisfied because the government has introduced a series of taxes Australians didn't vote for. They're pearing it back after laying a series of financial landmines across the country. As people are slowly discovering them, they're financially maiming households, families, and of course, widows. The government is now trying to diffuse the landmines they've laid across the economy, but it's not enough. They haven't found them all and they're certainly not prepared to diffuse all of them. Australians deserve to go to an election, vote for a government, and then for that government to honour its commitments. Not to wake up one day when the Prime Minister has, after 50 times promising to the Australian community, changed his mind and then turn around and break his word.

Sharri Markson: So even with these changes, you would still unwind the tax reform if you got into government?

Tim Wilson: Well, we shouldn't use the word tax reform, it's a tax grab, and it's just a budget that's focused on how it increases the revenue of the government. So, we've said consistently we will repeal the measures in the budget that increase capital gains tax because it's hitting startups and small businesses, and those who are backing themselves to get ahead. We'll change the rules back on negative gearing and of course on trusts, because what the government is doing is not just tightening a sort of economic noose around the small business of the country, they're undermining the very basis in which small businesses are the foundation of the Australian economy.

Sharri Markson: Look, we're hearing a lot about first home buyers. Figures show that about 34,000 first home buyers are at risk of a $2.2 billion wipeout with property prices dropping. This is mainly the first home buyers who entered the market with the 5% loan scheme. So I mean Tim, what do you think the government should do now to address this situation where you've got thousands, tens of thousands of first home buyers who could be at a major financial loss?

Tim Wilson: Well, it's difficult to know what the government should do. It’s a problem that they have created for themselves. They actively stoked young Australians to take more debt perhaps than they could afford or certainly that they'd saved for themselves. Now they're finding themselves in negative equity and essentially hostage to their properties. And of course, it's not just them, there's been about $230 billion that's been wiped off the value of homes across the country, and that means that there'll be plenty of Australians out there who will be living in negative equity where they owe more than their house is worth, and they're now living to service a bank rather than themselves and to advance their own wealth and opportunity. The government has to go back in time effectively and undo the damage they've done. Instead, Australians are just left with the wreckage.

Sharri Markson: I mean, the Treasurer Jim Chalmers over the past couple of days has been celebrating news about the economy. He says more businesses were created in July and that headline inflation is coming down. What's your response to this?

Tim Wilson: Well, I want to be very careful about what I say, but I would say that he probably needs a breathalyser frankly. The idea that you'll be high-fiving yourself after seeing a huge number of small businesses being opened because people are trying to restructure their finances and declaring this is some new era of growth is frankly just delusional and a lot of people have called that out. Yes, there was a spike, but it was a spike because people are restructuring their finances. At every point this government has overseen record small business confidence collapsing, record consumer confidence collapsing, and this government simply does not understand the impact its budget has had on the Australian economy.

Sharri Markson: That was a joke, right? When you said he must need a breathalyser, you're not making actual accusations against the Treasurer? I'm just checking.

Tim Wilson: Well, all I'm saying is that somebody who makes such ridiculous claims really needs a sanity check, and this is the problem. The Treasurer and the Prime Minister think that they can spin and lie to the Australian community and get away with it. We need to call out their BS. We need people to understand and the Australian people to understand that they are being lied to by this government. And even worse than that, they lie so easily, as we've seen in the case of Victoria, we had a government that consistently lied to the public who saw government as simply a pathway to take from taxpayers to feed themselves and their mates. We're now the most corrupt government in, you’d have to argue Australia's history in Victoria, and Anthony Albanese has taken that model and exported it to Canberra.

Sharri Markson: Just a quick couple of questions, just really quickly before we go. You know, there's a lot of discussion about how the Liberal Party should handle One Nation. You're one of the only politicians who managed to win a seat back from the Teals. Do you think there does need to be a preference deal at the very least done with Pauline Hanson?

Tim Wilson: Well, we always look at preferences on a case-by-case basis. Pauline Hanson has previously got Fraser Anning elected to the Senate. You know, I'm not a big fan of preferencing people like Fraser Anning who then go on and consort with very undesirable sections of the community. We should look at this in a measured way at the time, factoring in all the information. We know that the Greens, you know, put up antisemitic candidates. We certainly want to put them last.

Sharri Markson: Sure. Just very quickly, Tim, just your reaction to my editorial where I spoke about Jewish leader David Ossip facing a grilling from lawyers acting for Palestinian advocacy groups today at the Royal Commission in what I saw as a case of victim-blaming.

Tim Wilson: Well, this is what we should be very concerned about. The point of the Royal Commission is to get evidence and truth on the record about the scale of the antisemitic attacks that have occurred across the country. The Prime Minister and the government has tolerated an escalation of antisemitism where we basically have the biggest outbreak of racism in Australia's history and we should be supporting the Jewish community to tell their truth and to make sure that they are able to stand up and speak out because it's important for the record.

Sharri Markson: All right, Tim Wilson, thank you very much.

[ENDS]