From the Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm christinamiot. It's Monday, April fourteen, twenty twenty five. Taxpayers could be on the hook for an extra one billion dollars per year if private berths aren't propped up. Modeling shows private births could be extinct by twenty thirty if a sustainable funding model isn't put in place and fast. That exclusive story from the Australian's Health editor Natasha Robinson is live
right now at the Australian dot com dot au. Anthony Albanezi would be returned with a hung Parliament if an election were held today. That's according to new data from Newspoll and it comes as both the major parties fire the starting gun on their official election campaigns. Today. The Australian's National editor Dennis Shanahan pulls back the curtain on a big day of political theater.
This is a time to keep building and to keep building with labor.
This election outcome will define the decades to come.
I trust Peter Dutton with every fiver of my being.
Albo is about the next generation, not the next news cycle.
These challenges provide clarity about what we must do as a nation.
And at this election, our ambitions, our agendas, our plans for the future are a world apart.
And I will always stand up for our national interest.
The Liberals shed friends faster than Elon Musk. Peter Dutton is too reckless and too risky to be the prime minister of our great country Australia.
We have a liar in the lodge.
These ideals are being crushed by a bad Labor government.
At this election. Choose your Liberal or National candidate so that we can get this great country that we love back on track.
That is the Australian way, that is the Labor way, and that is the choice. I'm asking the Australian paintball, so mate on the third of May.
On Sunday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanezi and Opposition leader Peter Dutton launched the official election campaigns of the Labor and Liberal parties ahead of the vote on May three. But hang on a minute, weren't they already campaigning.
We've been campaigning for months. Really.
Dennis Shanahan is The Australian's national editor.
The reason that they have a campaign launch is to gain some momentum. There is also a small technical detail in that the taxpayer funds the campaign up until the campaign launch, and what has happened of late is that the campaign launch has occurred in the last week of the campaign and this term, because of the Easter and Antik Day holidays, they're both having it early. They've both had it on the same day. It's very rare to
have both campaign launchers on the same day. But the Easter holidays is really putting pressure on both sides to come out a bit earlier, and so the Coalition, realizing Labor was coming out this weekend, had a little choice but to come out on the same day.
There you go. Do you think that makes our job easier or harder?
It makes it shorter anyway, because we can deal with them both in one day.
The day started with some big policy announcements around taxation.
One off cost of living tax off said, this will reduce the amount of tax paid by millions of Australians and it will be up to twelve hundred dollars.
Today I announced that a re elected Labor government will create a new one thousand dollars instant tax deduction. No paperwork, no box of reriscins, eat, no scrolling through your online banking and housing.
A new policy for first home buyers who purchase a newly built property to live in a coalition government will allow you to deduct interest payments on the first six hundred and fifty thousand dollars of a mortgage against your taxable income. We will allow these deductions for five years provided you continue to live in that home for that period.
You'll be able to buy your first home with just a five percent deposit and you won't have to pay a single dollar in mortgage insurance.
Our government will cover it.
And ten billion dollars to build one hundred thousand new homes reserved for first home buyers only, no competition from property investors, just a fair crack for young Australians.
And it was those competing housing policies that really got people riled up.
Probably better politics than they are policy. There is no doubt that the housing crisis is a crisis and that younger people particularly feel like they are shut out. Australians historically have high rates of home ownership. It is an Australian dream and there has been a breakdown in the generations of late where people because of the high cost of real estate the high prices, the actual pressure from
the lending institutions. It has been much more difficult for young people to buy a house, mainly because of the supply of houses, which drives up the price. So what we saw today from both sides was aimed at younger buyers. Now the government approach actually pushes up demand. So in a simple real estate world, that's not such a good idea. Now. Coupled with that was the labor proposal to build more homes which would be specifically targeted at first home buyers. Now,
again this sounds good. The problem is that the government's promises on how building have failed. They have not been able to build anywhere near the number of houses they said they would. And yet Anthony Albernes's launch is talking about what we have done, what we have achieved. It seems that the promises on housing are essentially more of the same, targeted at young people with probably even less
chance of success. So I think that politically, yes, it's appealing to young people, but economically and in a market sense, it's probably not going to help. Peter Dutton's alternative is to also offer ten billion help and provide help to first home buyers. Also though he takes a slightly different view and saying that we are going to provide five billion to help count's cut regulation. Now this actually is sensible policy because it actually says we're not going to
finance land. What Peter Dutton is talking about is saying we're going to try and make it easier for developers and for counsels to make more land available address supply. And now that is better, but still the promises with all the billions and so forth, probably is only going to push up demand as well. The other aspect of all of this, both of them are talking about the
bank of Mum and Dad. Now the bank of Mum and Dad is the baby boomers and Gen X, So the question is here, what are they offering in housing for Gen X and the baby Boomers.
Yeah, you wrote for The Australian that this narrative that we've all brought into about young voters being millennials and Gen Z out numbering older vote is from the baby boomer generation for the first time is actually inaccurate because it's written gen X out of the equation entirely. The housing policies pitched by both Labor and the Coalition are presumably pitched at that younger cohort. So are they vote
winners do you think? And if so, are they election winners if gen X hasn't been factored in.
My wife made this point, and we're baby boomers and we have children and grandchildren in every generation right through to alpha or most mini alphas. And the point is that just to appeal to one group is a bit blind, because baby boomers an ex generation who will say I want to help the young people and I will vote for what I think will help them, particularly the bank of Mum and Dad, as Peter Dutton puts it. So
there are cross generational appeals. But at this stage, as far as the housing is concerned, most of the emphasis from both parties has been on the younger voters because of the housing crisis. It's part of a general emphasis on younger voters. But I think overall the Labor Party and the Liberal Party have started to push the housing crisis too much towards the young Australians.
Labour knows this dance around housing all too well. The Prime Minister's predecessor, Bill Shorten lost what was widely considered an unlosable election thanks to a fumble on franking credits and an attempt to limit negative gearing.
The problem for Anthony Albernasi is that he wants to appeal to the younger voters, those who have maybe attracted the Greens particularly. At the same time, he is absolutely denying that he's going to adopt any of the Green policy on inheritance, on capital gains tax and negative gearing because he knows who's all of those older voters are going to be turned off by that and it did
shift the election that Bill Shorten lost in. Anthony Albenese knows that he's got to balance it, and so he's got to try and a get Green preferences to win seats and say I'm not going to adopt Green's policies. And at the same time, Peter Dutton is saying the Greens are against everything that we stand for, but they also stand for inheritance tax, changes, the superannuation capital gains
tax and changes the negative gearing. So he is locking Anthony Alberenes in with the Greens, handcuffing them together on unpopular policies for older Australians.
Coming up. The political calculus of both major parties was on display on Sunday the coalition's election campaign officially kicked off in the seat of Werrower, where Liberal and National MPs pumped up the party's credentials in Western Sydney.
Welcome to Western Sydney, the heartland of the Liberal Party.
A fitting place to launch our vision for Australia because the history of our country has been written here.
Werrower is currently held by Labours and Stanley, and the party has deep roots there. It's been held by the ALP since nineteen thirty four, including by former pm GoF Whitlam. But Labour's pitch was made on the other side of the country in Perth, making it the thirteenth visit by Prime Minister Anthony Albanesi to Western Australia in this term.
Premier Roger Cook, still basking in the glory of an historic state election victory, he didn't miss his opportunity to have a friendly dig at the PM for his near constant presence.
Now Around three years ago, Anthony Albanezi and the Federal Labor team convened here in Perth to launch their campaign, and to be honest, he's barely been away ever since.
But this is no mistake. WA was instrumental in delivering Labor to government in twenty twenty two, a record it's hoping to repeat on May three.
Every one of us felling a strange feature together.
This is a defensive move. He has to hold on to those seats. He may be in trouble in New South Wales and certainly in Victoria, so he cannot afford to lose seats in Western Australia. There was some view to begin with that the Labor Party was in trouble in Western Australia, that there'd be a big difference between federal and state. I think that the polling is suggesting that's not so much the case.
And what about Peter Dutton and the coalition in the Western Sydney seat of Werrowa. There was a lot of retoric from Liberal MPs around that region being a liberal heartland, despite history suggesting otherwise. Was that a good choice?
Oh, it really was the only choice. Brisbane is Dutton's home state. It is very strong for the LNP and so it would have been a bit of a wasted launch to have it in Queensland and suburban Sydney has always been the heart of Dutton's campaign, so it made absolute sense for them to launch in Western Sydney, the fact that it was a very aggressive move in the seat of Werrower, the old seat of Gough Whitlam. It is one that the Coalition has hopes of picking up.
And what Peter Dutton is trying to get back to was that it was the home of the Howard Sattlers. And of course in nineteen ninety six John Howard was swept to power by the strength of the vote in Western Sydney. And when the Liberal Party can do well in Western Sydney, it does well nationally. And that's why they've got such high hopes in Western Sydney.
That's why we called you in to be there.
Yes, exactly all the way from Camber.
Dennis Shanahan is The Australian's National editor. You can read all our experts, reporting and analysis from the campaign trail anytime at the Australian dot com dot au