Paul Murray Live | 2 June

not working hard enough. You've got a too e who cares, right, But the reality is that there are hundreds of thousands of people who desperately would love to get a joint sometime soon. But it's just ever every week, month, year, clicking away from them. And tonight I can tell you that the average median house price in the capital cities of Australia is now one million dollars. Now, median is not average, of course, you take the most expensive house

and then there's the least expensive property unit. Whatever the number right in the middle, that's the median. But today we learned just how wild some of these prices actually are. If you actually have a look at the median price across all of the capital cities right now, including Canberra,

you're going to get eight hundred and seventy seven thousand dollars. Now, that is the median okay, from the smallest, crappiest little one bedroom something somewhere on the absolute fringe next to the train station, to the pink house that's filled with ghosts. In terms of Sydney, it's one point one million dollars. That is a new record for the median house price in Sydney. In Melbourne much more affordable, seven hundred and eighty two thousand dollars. The market that is somewhere between

Sydney and Melbourne is Brisbane. Now right now, according to the data, the Brisbane housing market is at absolute peak. It just keeps going up. The median house price in the CBD or the metro area I should say, of Brisbane eight hundred and eighty nine thousand dollars. Now, normally, if I just mentioned Sidney, Melbourne and Brisbane, someone will send me an email from somewhere else, and rightly so, Paul, it's a national show. What are the numbers where I live? Well,

we've got those too. Today the median house price was revealed in Camber. It'll be eight hundred and fifty six thousand dollars, so a little bit under Brusban, but still way in front of Melbourne Adelaide eight hundred and five thousand, again higher than Melbourne Perth eight hundred, seven hundred and eighty seven, higher than the median price or just under

I should say in Melbourne. Then if you call this affordable, Hobart six hundred and eighty five thousand dollars median price Darwin five hundred and thirty five thousand, and as I mentioned before about Canberra at eight hundred and fifty six, that was put out today by the prop Track people. Now, as you know, we love regional Australia. We get to visit it at least once a month where we do our towns and I love every little bit of where

we go. And it doesn't matter that it could be the fog of Tawombird to the side of the road in Western Australia, playing a little bit of two up in Calgooley. You know, I love seeing as much of this country and despite the fact we've been doing it for years, we've still got a mega and massive list of places to see in regional Australia. But the assumption a ways is oh well, the house prices are cheaper there and yes, if you're comparing Sydney at one point

one million dollars, regional areas are cheaper. But again, if people say, well, yeah, this is the better house, just go further out now, all that's true, But even if further out is the option, it's still pretty expensive. Again, these numbers are for the month of April, so this is about as up to date as you could possibly

be when it comes to these numbers. Outside of Sydney seven hundred and fifty one thousand dollars, outside of Brisbane, seven hundred and thirty three one thousand dollars outside of Melbourne and Perth, bang on the same number five hundred and seventy eight thousand dollars outside of Hobart five hundred

and twenty six thousand dollars. If you really want some value and pretty good lifestyle, you got a place like Renmark in South Australia four hundred and eighty six one thousand dollars and the Northern Territory outside of Darwin four hundred and sixteen thousand. Now, of course, one of the reasons why the prices keep going up is because there's only X number of houses, but due to population growth, both natural and immigration, not to mention intergenerationally, kids growing up,

moving partners, coming together and splitting up. There are more people than ever before that are looking for homes, but there are not the number of homes available for the number of people who are trying to look for them. Put simply, if demand is bigger than supply, well then the cost goes up, meaning those with the most amount of money you're able to get a joint. Those who

don't just have to sit on the sidelines. And then we get ourselves into the issues in and around the rental market, where of course more people chasing fewer properties because few are being built, but also because many properties that previously may well have been rented out for six or twelve months, well if they're in a reasonable enough spot. People like to airbnb and can almost get a year's worth of money out of doing it weekend to weekend. So cities have to look for new places to build.

And yes, it always seems like it's further and further out, further and further up and down in terms of the north and south, and also up in the suburb that you were born in, in the suburb that you live in, in the suburb where you may well have had your first house if you went back to that street. There's probably a pretty good chance that what used to be quarter acre blocks are now starting to become high rise.

And we know that there was a suggestion of about twenty five thousand new homes, and by that we mean units that we're going to go in on the Rosehill race Course site not too far from Paramatta in western Sydney. The people who are the members of the Australian Turf Club they said no to that, so that idea is off the table, but a new idea is being suggested as to where there could well be tens of thousands

of new places for homes in and around Sydney. Now I get a national story, and there's lots of versions of this story playing, but I'm just going to focus in specifically on one area in Sydney. The Inner West of Sydney is a place which is filled with absolutely stunning homes, but they're normally smaller homes. They end up being sort of either not quite Federation, but they're basically sort of little two story terraces. And that's the way

it is. Suburb after suburb after suburb, and there's only one place that is open fields and that is what used to be a passenger terminal which then became a cargo terminal, which is on a place called Glebe Island. That's the Anzac Bridge which is next to it that connects the Inner West or should I say Balmain Leichhart over across to Piermont and the inner city of Sydney. Well, that big patch of concrete that you can see is where for years when cars have come off ships they

all get unloaded there. That's a major place where cars will be dropped off. But the nusowa's government is talking about turning that entire patch into tens of thousands of homes. In fact, either side of the bridge there are plans in the Inner West Bays precinct. The areas which you were in red here are all areas that where high

density housing could end up going in. So all the people who are currently living in sort of the one two story lovely little places and they are gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous, but they are now going to have to feel what every other suburban Sydney in particular has had to feel, which is get ready for a heck of a lot more units. So you may well be able to if you lean this way and lean that way and stand up, you might be able to see just a flicker of water. Well,

of course all of that will be gone. Why should up through the roof now? The chances of any of this happening anytime soon rather remote unless the Nusouals government just basically plays a heavy hand and says, whether you like it or not, we're getting it now. These areas. Maybe Labour will go hard at because these are areas which now have Greens members in the state parliament. So why would the Mustweld's Labour party care. But it's a

perfect example. There are sites in Brisbane, there are sites in Melbourne that are very close to the city that are currently being used for a whole collection of other things. Will there be a day when those things are shut down, leveled off and what replaces them are not one or two bedrooms, not quardu acre houses, but instead shun sum

sum sum. Because hundreds of thousands of people come into the country, let alone the hundreds of thousands who have enough money to go looking for a place of their own, and this particular area, I'll be fascinated to see the battle that takes place there. Because the very same part of Sydney is one that I mentioned last night that is playing a very big not in my backyard, a nimby game. You see within viewing distance of this big patch of concrete is the suburb of Boomin, formerly working class.

My grandfather grew up there, told me the different stories that literally what are now multimillion dollar units was an old factory where he and others used to line up for work each and every day. And whether you've got it or not during the depression will of course meant whether the family was going to eat well or not. Right. But as you can see, the bell tower of a

church is in the middle of the photo. To the right of it is where you can see what might be the place where all of these new houses go. Will the residents be fine with very high rise buildings in those areas, methinks not because that church, As I told you last night, that church is an outrage to some people in the local area because it's planning to buy some new bells and whack some new bells into

the bell tower. Now, despite the fact the church has been there since nineteen oh seven, people that have moved in near the church in the years since nineteen oh seven, and our complaining to the local council. They're not allowed to have the bells because, among other things, it will disturb babies crying or babies trying to sleep, I say. And some people are complaining because they're twenty meters away from the bell tower that's been there since nineteen oh seven.

You see, it's all well and good for the people who live in the absolute inner urban areas that assume because the rest of the street is terrace houses and at the end of the street there's a lovely little dog park that those areas will never change. So they're often the ones that are really cool with big Australia, with high numbers of immigration, people who believe that, of course we should have a renewable energy system. But God forbid if anyone wanted to put a wind farm in

the middle of those dog parks. You see, this will be the challenge of housing in the next few years. Who will be able to afford these properties. Now, obviously, if they're high rise units and one side's looking back towards some concrete pillars, probably not going to be as valuable as the one that's looking out onto the edges

of Sydney Harbor. Fascinated to see in the next few years if the people who want your area to change, particularly in regional Australia where bugger what you think about solo farms and wind farms, whether they are going to be fine for their areas to look vastly different than the way they used to because in part they've cheered on the problem. More people, not enough houses do as you know, the Australian Defense Minister met with the US

Defense Secretary. Nice little touch of the pocket square. Not generally a pocket square man, but I like the red, white and blue of the American flag there on Pete hegsitff nice little look. And you may all have heard what the news has been out of this, and I know that several of my mates say here tonight, have been talking about it. Well.

we're run. But I wanted to mention something different here. And this doesn't mean that we shouldn't spend more money, but also it is to temper down the idea that we're not spending any money when it comes to defense. In fact, over the past twenty years, we have dramatically

increased the amount of money that we spend on defense. Now, I had to look at the budget papers for two thousand and five and fifteen point six billion, which in today's dollars is twenty six and a half billion dollars, compares to fifty one billion dollars, so basically double over twenty years now. On the side, there's a whole bunch of money of course for Orcus and the three hundred billion dollars when it comes to subs, but that number

is double where we were twenty years ago. But that number is still basically about half or under half of what the Americans would like us to be able to do. And I think, sure, there's billions of dollars, and I would probably be spending more money on missisles rather than the ships that take forever to get from the South to the top round into the Pacific button. I'm not going to pretend to be a defense military analyst. I'm

just a bloke on TV. But perhaps one of the reasons why Australia is not going to be spending any more money on defense is because before I show you, what do you think the number one thing is that we spend the most amount of money on in our federal budget. Now, Greens and lefties will turn around and say, oh, it's definitely defense, right, like, surely we're pulling it up at the wall with the new submarines and that they're

doubling on twenty years. No. You see, if you have a look at the federal budget that was released earlier this year, the number one thing we spend our money on is that little section in blue, social Security and welfare. Social Security and welfare now is thirty seven percent of the federal budget. Health is fifteen percent, Defense is almost seven, sorry, is almost six and a half, and education is at seven.

So for all the conversation about defense spending and should we double it, well, even if we did double it and maybe it became, say twelve percent, maybe it became one hundred billion dollars, you'd still be way behind what the actual money they spend on, which is social security and welfare. To put this in dollar terms, about how over the past twenty years, the country's population has grown, but the amount of money being spent in the federal

budget has grown way more than that. When it comes to social security and welfare, and of course you can't touch it, you can't talk about it, because why we're getting close to half the country that's got its hand out for something. In two thousand and five, eighty seven billion dollars or one hundred and fifty billion dollars in today's money, is how much we spent on social security and welfare. Just before I show, you have a guess, just have a wild guess. How much do you think

that's gone up in twenty years? One hundred and forty nine billion, maybe two hundred billion, maybe two hundred and fifty billion, No, two hundred and ninety one billion dollars. The welfare bill in Australia has gone up by ninety four percent. Australia's population has not gone up by ninety four percent. In fact, in two thousand and five it was about twenty million, it's now twenty seven million. The

increase in population is thirty seven percent. The increase in the welfare bill is ninety four percent, from one hundred and fifty billion back then to two hundred and ninety billion now. So yes, the welfare bill is going to go up because the number of people that we have here is more than it was twenty years ago. But every single year, every single government for the past twenty years, produces a federal budget. And the expectation of the federal budget is what's in it for you, or from the

voter perspective, what's in it for me? And every single year labor liberal left, far left, center right government has to produce something that the newspapers can put on the front page, that we can talk about on television, that is the good is in the budget. Well, guess what eventually happens when you have a culture that is addicted

to that. It means that the total spending on welfare again goes from one hundred and fifty billion dollars to almost three hundred billion dollars, an increase of ninety four percent, when the population has only increased by thirty seven percent. It didn't go up by fifty, it didn't go up by sixty, it didn't go up by seventy five or wine or by ninety four percent. And those are billions of dollars that we could spend on education or defense, we could spend on health, we could increase in every

other area. But because the size of government, via welfare is thirty seven percent of the entire chunk of change. That is why we are in part in a world of trouble. That is why we are in one trillion dollars of debt. That is why we will move to one point two trillion dollars of debt before the next election. That is why there will be budget deficits not for the next five or ten, but for the next forty years.

But there's a solution to all of this, and it was freely being offered in the pages of the City Morning Herald and the Age today. We should just increase taxes, with a whole bunch of quotes from people saying we're not over taxed. Nothing to see here everyone. Of course, of course everyone should just pay more. Okay you first, And speaking of when it comes to finances, let's have a little chat about smoking taxes. Now, this is not a hobby horse, because of course, you know, I make

a stupid life, the choice to be a smoker. I get it. I know, my kids tell me each and every day. One day I will learn. But there is something that has been happening as a direct result of the government being addicted to a massive welfare bill. That in part is being paid for a massive amount of money that is raised via cigarette taxes.

go back, say to two thousand and nine. Team. Now, it depends on where your source is, but I'll be open about where the sauces are. Yes, there are way more tobacconists, way more places selling tobacco in Australia than ever before. In fact, twenty nineteen the number was, according to the ABC, fifteen thousand different places that were tobacco retailers. Now this number can go a little higher if it is a business which you know, might be a bar that's got a cigarette machine in it, might be a

corner shop. But we're talking about not fifteen thousand tobacconists as such, but fifteen thousand places where you can buy tobacco. Well, now there are sixty tobacconists for every McDonald's that exists in some parts of Australia. Again, back to Sydney, they now say that there are twenty thousand different places which are selling tobacco products. Now, of course, smoking is never socially acceptable, and in twenty twenty five it is as

socially unacceptable as it's ever been. The extreme majority of Australian stone light up, don't think about lighting up, and thankfully because of that change over many years, there's generations of people who have never smoked. Good on you. I apologize for letting the team down, But what of course has happening here is that there is more tobacconists around, and there are more tobacconists which are selling illegal tobacco. It's called chop chop. It's garbage that comes in via China.

It is a total criminal operation. Think of it as any other form of drug, but this one. For some reason, they can put a sign out in front of their building as to what they are actually selling. Now, this is not me saying that every single tobacconist in Australia is selling illegal tobacco before anyone with more money than I could possibly dream of is thinking about launching a legal action. But you get my point here. Supposedly the number of people smoking has gone down, how has the

number of places selling it gone up? Because of the crap that he is being sold in these places. And Chris Mins, the New soth Wales premiere, has seen the light that the taxation that the federal government puts on legal cigarettes is now too big and it means that a legal packet of cigarettes is twice, almost close to at times three times higher than what you could buy over the counter. In a tobacconist that is willing to sell crap from China. This is what he said today, I'm.

making zero dollars out of tobacco. But the reality is that when budgets are the way they are, where we're spending double on welfare than we were twenty years ago, it's a chance to get an easy few billion dollars here and a few billion dollars there. And Jim Charmers is the latest of the treasurers who has gone for this supposed pot of gold. He of course has increased tobacco taxes on his brief watch as the country's treasurer. And the logic behind all of this again is the

higher we make the prices, the fewer people will start smoking. Well, I'm going to show you the reality here. What you were going to see is the blue line on this graph that we have for you tonight, and that is the percentage of Australians who are smokers. Now it has definitely gone down from about fourteen percent towards twenty fifteen twenty sixteen and now it's down to just about, let's say,

roughly ten percent. But the different policies of different governments have seen a reduction in the amount of smokers when there's been an increase in tax But then you can see upon the election of the Labor government in twenty twenty two, massive ramp up in taxes, but basically the number of smokers in Australia has stayed the same. So literally, in terms of the legal product, it doesn't matter what

the cost of the legal product is. There's something about ten percent of people in Australia who have not changed their habits for whatever reasons. But then when you start to get into the detail that yes, the rate has gone up, but then it started to flatten that red number about the amount of taxation which is being charged, the actual amount of revenue the government is getting is starting to go down. So the taxes are high, which means the price is higher, but the number of people

smoking is the same. So why is the federal government going down when it comes to tobacco taxes? They've previously taken in eight, ten, fifteen billion dollars, Well now it is sub ten billion dollars. Why because of people who are buying the cheap Chinese crap in one of thousands of more tobacconists which are appearing all over Australia, to a point where we can get to a ratio that for every one McDonald's there are sixty places that are

going to be selling tobacco. That tobacco industry an illegal tobacco industry. The illegal tobacco industry is a criminal operation. If there is about ten percent of Australia that is going to keep smoking, as the numbers show us, the government is forcing those people, or at least pushing them towards it's the cheaper product because the legal product is

now too expensive. It's time for cigarette taxes to start to move down, not to go right back where we were twenty years ago, but maybe just maybe start to meet the population where it is because if nothing else, and while I would love to be one of the people who would give up in the next little while.

When it comes to smoking, the reality is that there are many of us who continue to make this stupid health decision, and regardless of the cost, there's many of us that have stayed at the same number for the best part of five years. Now. If the government is serious about helping their states or councils deal with illegal tobacco, they must bring down the cost of legal tobacco. But if the idea is to just keep increasing the price of the legal staff right up and off the scale,

whether then the criminal stuff will just replace it. And for the more tobacconists there are the more fire bombings. Want that what do you personally find for more offensive? Somebody smoking on a balcony at home or somebody blowing up a shop that might be next to the cafe where you get your coffee each and every day. Quick

break back with me here on Paul Murray Life. Thanks for watching wherever you happen to be and maybe you can always send me an email Paulitzkuynews dot com dot A. One of my wife's dreams is to go and see the northern lights. We may not get there anytime soon. But if you were looking up last night, what about the Aurora Estrallas most further north that it has been in a very long period of time, FETO has taken

all around the coastal areas of New South Wels. I think you've got it as far up as the mid North coast. But what an absolutely beautiful natural attraction for people to be able to look up and see. And the quality of people's photography now, not just for Instagram, but good old fashioned photos. They look absolutely beautiful, don't they.

All right, speaking of let's be joined right now by the Lord Mayor of Melbour, none other than the wonderful Nicholas Reese, and a man who agrees with him on almost every single issue is none other than send in about Canavan is joining us from Queensland, a truly national show from the light show above New South Wales to Melbourne and beautiful central Queensland. All right, lads, let's get to this first here.

challenged into the future. You know, there's no opposition intellectual or otherwise to the constant march of the Labor Party is that despite the fact that orange Man Bad is putting tariffs on steel and that's bad because it makes things more expensive for the American consumer, Chris Bowen is openly talking about US introducing tariffs on imports coming from anywhere in the world that may well be carbon intensive, so say a car, or a fridge, littlone, thousands and

thousands of other products that come into the country. So I don't understand orange Man Bad when it comes to tariff's. Bowen just mad when it comes to tariff's here. This is in part what he had to say yesterday on the ABC.

power prices. Things would be better, well if they if they were going to be better and cheaper and easier, why do they need these tariffs to protect our industries that are competing against countries that are not pursuing net zero or not decarbonizing in the language that Chris Bowen has used. That inconsistency blows the government's argument completely out out of the water. And it is about time that we have a proper costing of how much is net

zero is this goal costing the Australian people. That's never been done. We've never had a full proper costing in this country of how much pursuing that zero would cost. We've usually had a bunch of handwaving about how I know it's not going to cost any money? Because renewable andy's cheaper and it's going to be going to be even better for everybody. Well, the government's policy here on tariffs totally shows that to be a lie, and I think the Australian people deserve to know the truth.

percent put on them. Because that's what the Europeans are talking about. How would that not be exactly the same thing?

new renewables are cheaper the new coal. But for the time that we've got a situation where new renewables are cheaper, new renewables at the moment are more expensive than old coal.

our domestic steel when they're not meeting trade agreements? Nick now I have argued for the latter, the former though the environmental one. The problem with those is you're adding an additional cost. It's an additional cost for strength consumers, it's an additional cost for steel production in this country, for a building costs in this country. For what benefit? Like,

you're not we're not changing the environment there. But the subsidized steel comes in from China is clearly breaching trade agreements. It's clearly distorting world markets. Why don't we get back to being self sufficient and still we only produce enough study? Yeah, really quickly, Why don't we get serious about the abuse that China is doing to world trade marks? That's exactly what Trump's doing really in essence, why don't.

Of course, Now in Melbourne it was perfect, amazing as always, Nicholas. But still some beautiful photos there from Sydney. If you see nice things you'd like just to show on the Telly can see in them, Paul, it's goynews dot com dot are you so divid? Good at night and then pretty fog around in the morning in Sydney. Here with Nicholas Reese and with Matt Canavan. So Nick, as the Lord Mayor of Melbourne, I have read a lot about these Recee Police more security guards ones working on behalf

of Melbourne City. What are they going to be doing? Will they have sirens on their head? Will will you be the one recording the E or E or E or like? What is the rece police?

because they're pushing back against a massive battery development. I also noticed that in New South Wales in some of the built up sort of industrial areas, but also residential around a place called Quarry Park. The state government there said no no, no, no, no to battery and a data center request there thoughts.

should not just be industrialized. People deserve to have just bought a house on Someone's just spent over a million dollars for a house that I was speaking to or about today, and now they're going to have a massive, big battery for one hundred Megwa battery one hundred and twenty meters from their homes that shouldn't be on.

w well, they decided to have a protest. Why because there was a quote unquote Zionist event which was rubbish but still being held inside. Now, obviously you can rent a space in any pub anywhere, but apparently there was a protest because the wrong type of people were having an unapproved gathering. According to their logic. Some of the staff even walked off. He's part of the protest. So Nick,

let's talk about this here. If you're not breaking the law, if you're not some hate group all the rest of it, right, sure that you're able to walk into anywhere and rent a room. Because if we want a scenario where people turn around, say I disagree with why you're renting the room, so therefore you're not allowed to. Isn't that the reverse of the old baker and the gay couple.

a state of Israel. But unfortunately we got a situation in Australian politics at the moment where people, you know, equate Zionism with the Yahoo government and also sort of confuse Austrange Jews with the state, the political state of Israel. So people are getting all these things sort of mixed up. So Zionism is a completely acceptable, you know, political philosophy, and you know, many people, including myself, believe in it.

And so the fact that these people are protesting about that and trying to say if you believe in Zionism, you sport everything that the net you know, who government is doing is completely misguided actually, and the people who are going to that event feeling quite threatened and that's that's terrible.

other bloke over? If you do, you get the points? Is this a sport? Is it okay? And would you turn up to it if it rolled into rocking? No?

sixty today. Legends of Australian cricket. Of course, from Wogger all the way through New South Wales and then representing Australia. They define an absolute hera of Australian cricket that sadly we are not about to repeat anytime soon. But absolute hardcore Blokes and Steve Whore have had the chance to meet a few times. Absolutely ripping bloke. Now, before we go, remember when Fatima Payman decided to quit the Labor Party

to become an independent. What was the reaction of the Prime Minister and Labor figures at the time.