00:00What these changes are designed to do is to get homes built more quickly and to also reduce the
00:07costs associated with building homes. So the first big change, and this is something that came out of
00:12the Economic Roundtable last week, is to pause changes to the National Construction Code. Now
00:18this is what's become, we're told, an unwieldy 2,000 page document, which is both complicated
00:25and also something that changes every few years. So it's hard for builders and tradies to keep up
00:32with. So the government's seeking to address that by pausing any further changes for the next
00:36four years. And it should be noted that that excludes anything relating to essential safety
00:42and quality. But while the changes are paused, the government will look to simplify that code and make
00:48it easier to read and interpret for the people who actually need to be reading that document.
00:53And the second change announced today, the housing minister in conjunction with the
00:58environment minister will fast track the assessment of more than 26,000 homes that are currently stuck
01:04in the federal environmental approvals process. So by fast tracking the assessment, it doesn't mean
01:09that these homes will necessarily be approved, just that the government will actually get to a yes or a
01:14no more quickly than is currently happening. But on the changes to the National Construction Code,
01:20Labor has copped a bit of criticism from the coalition and fairly so, because in the May
01:26election, the opposition took to that election a policy to freeze changes for 10 years. And at the
01:32time, Labor criticised those changes and said it could lead to a catastrophic outcome. Well, the
01:37housing minister today has defended Labor's four-year pause, noting that while most changes will be
01:44paused, they are excluding anything relating to essential safety and quality changes. Here's Claire O'Neill.
01:50What Labor's proposing here is a really balanced approach. What the Liberals took to the last
01:54election really threw the baby out with the bathwater and said that we're going to put quality
01:59and safety to the side. And that's not the right answer for Australians. We want Australians to live
02:04in high-quality homes. And that's why we've got the balance right here. A four-year pause, but most
02:09importantly, the opportunity for us to streamline and make this code usable. At the end of the day,
02:15what we want here is builders doing what they do best, and that is building high-quality homes for
02:20Australians. We don't want them stuck in the back office as they are today, filling in forms and
02:24dealing with bureaucracy. And Jane, this was the government's first concrete action following
02:30the economic roundtable. But the Treasurer is indicating that tax could be the next area of
02:35reform? Yeah, there's been an interesting shift in language here, because after the May election,
02:39the Prime Minister made it really clear that Labor wouldn't get ahead of itself and that the party
02:44would be focused on delivering the commitments that it took to the election. And when pressed on
02:49tax specifically, the Prime Minister said the only tax policy Labor would implement in this term of
02:53government was the one that it took to the May election. So that includes income tax cuts,
03:00plans to increase taxes on super balances worth more than $3 million. But after last week's economic
03:06roundtable, there seems to be general consensus that, in Jim Chalmers' words, the tax system is
03:12imperfect, that there are issues to do with intergenerational inequity that need to be
03:17addressed. And so there seems to be more of an appetite for reform. And Jim Chalmers is now saying
03:22that that might take place in this term of government. And, you know, obviously there could be larger
03:28changes taken to an election. So in terms of what is on the table, that is still a little bit unclear.
03:34But what we are starting to see is a bit of shift in language from the government, really softening
03:38up the public to the prospect of more tax changes to come sooner, perhaps, than had previously been
03:45indicated. And here's how he responded on Insiders this morning when asked if there might be tax
03:50changes in next year's budget. Well, it remains to be seen. I mean, there is a lot of policy ambition
03:56around the roundtable last week. And there's a lot of policy ambition in the government from the
04:00Prime Minister down. And our primary focus is on delivering tax reform in all of those ways we
04:07took to the election. As I keep mentioning income tax cuts, considering road reuser charging,
04:11the standard deduction. These are important features of our existing tax agenda.
04:17Now, as I said, I think in the immediate aftermath of the roundtable, I think there are more steps to
04:24be taken on tax reform. And that was the Treasurer Jim Chalmers there. And we await the government to put
04:29some meat on the bones of just what those steps are.
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