Michael Sukkar MP

Interview with Pete Stefanovic – Sky News Australia

THE HON MICHAEL SUKKAR MP – SHADOW MINISTER FOR SOCIAL SERVICES, NDIS, HOUSING AND HOMELESSNESS

TRANSCRIPT

INTERVIEW WITH PETE STEFANOVIC – SKY NEWS AUSTRALIA

Thursday 26 September, 2024

TOPICS: Housing, Negative Gearing

E&OE

Pete Stefanovic: Let’s go to the Opposition now. Joining us is the Shadow Housing Minister, Michael Sukkar. Michael, so the Prime Minister says no plans, two words there to change capital gains tax or negative gearing. You buying it?

Michael Sukkar: Oh, look, he’s very slippery Pete. And we’ve seen this before where the Prime Minister plays these verbal gymnastics in preparation of breaking an election commitment. I mean, the truth is, I think most Australians know that the Labor Party would love to abolish negative gearing. We saw them take it to elections. We’ve seen virtually every one of their cabinet argue in favour of abolishing negative gearing. If I thought they could get away with taxing Australians more, they would. But the evidence here is very clear. If you want less housing, less investment in housing, if you want to increase rents, then you abolish negative gearing. The evidence has been clear for many decades, ever since Paul Keating tried to abolish negative gearing and we saw rents massively spike. So, the consequent sins for the Australian economy and for millions of people who own homes would be terrible. But nonetheless, the Labor Party would love to get their hands on a big pot of money by taxing Australians more so they can fuel their spending.

Pete Stefanovic: So, former Liberal treasurer Joe Hockey, he said that negative gearing should be looked at. He said that in the past. Bridget Archer said changes should be in the discussion. So for the record, do you think there is any room to move on negative gearing at all?

Michael Sukkar: Absolutely not. The tax arrangements around negative gearing have sort of taken on mythical status. But the truth here is if you’re someone who owns an investment property and let’s remember about a third of people rent, Pete, and I don’t think anyone thinks that’s going to drastically change. So around 33 per cent of Australians rent, someone’s got to own those homes. Now if you tax the people who own those homes more, there’s only one place they can go to make up the difference and that is the people renting those homes. Secondly, we know that every study shows that if you want less of something, you tax it more. So if you want people to smoke less, you tax cigarettes more. If you want people to invest less in housing, if you want people to build less homes, you tax housing even more. I mean, in Sydney – independent analysis shows that an apartment in Sydney now, Pete, about 50 per cent of the cost of that apartment is taxes and regulatory charges. So this idea that we don’t tax housing enough in Australia is nuts and the idea that we’re going to tax Australian mum and dads even more, I think is a terrible idea.

Pete Stefanovic: What about and I have to leave it here, but what about, what about caps on the amount of properties an investor can own? I mean, there’s a lot of folks who turn the nose up to, you know, not so much people who have one or two or three, but those who own ten or 20. Would you be open to caps on the amount of properties investors can own?

Michael Sukkar: Well, it’s a bit of a fatuous discussion because 95 per cent of people who invest in a property will have one or two homes. I think it’s about high 70 per cent would own one investment property. So four out of five people essentially hold one investment property and then there’s about another 15 per cent who have two. So, for nearly the entire housing stock of this country, people hold one or two. But let’s just go back to my earlier point, Pete. If about a third of people are going to rent, someone’s got to own those homes. Now, what the Labor Party’s trying to do is reduce taxes for large corporate landlords, in many cases foreign corporate landlords, because they want to replace Australian mum and dad investors with large foreign corporate landlords who will end up owning tens of thousands of property. We think that’s a terrible outcome. We want Australians to own Australian properties. We don’t want these big foreign funds with tax advantages…

Pete Stefanovic: So you don’t support any caps, just to be clear?

Michael Sukkar: Absolutely not. We support the current arrangements that Australian mums and dads rely on as a normal feature of the tax system. If someone’s able to negatively gear their share portfolio, a mum or dad should not be denied the same opportunity with owning an investment property.

Pete Stefanovic: All right. That’s the Shadow Housing Minister, Michael Sukkar. Thanks for your time, Michael.

ENDS