Stamp duty for off-the-plan homes slashed in stimulus bid for Victorians
Every Victorian who buys off-the-plan apartments, units and townhouses will have their stamp duty slashed, AAP reports, but only for a limited time.
The premier, Jacinta Allan, announced Victorian stamp duty concessions would be expanded to all buyers and uncapped. Thresholds for stamp duty concessions had previously been set at $750,000 and $550,000 for first home buyers and owner-occupiers respectively.
But eligibility has been expanded to investors and the value cap removed for one year from today, providing a 100% discount for outstanding construction and refurbishment costs when calculating stamp duty.
Allan said the 12-month stimulus plan was in response to under-pressure builders crying out for help after successive interest rate rises. She told Sunrise earlier:
It’s certainly having an impact on the housing industry. That’s why we’re providing this support. It’s good for builders, it’s certainly good for buyers who will save money, it’s good for building more homes.
The premier foreshadowed she would release more housing policies and initiatives across the rest of the week.
Key events
Sharlotte Thou
Trainee doctors rate training experience ‘pass’ at best in survey
A survey from the doctor’s peak body has revealed trainees rate their training experience a “pass” at best in 2023.
Only 4 in 10 trainees reported receiving useful feedback from their college, which the Council of Doctors in Training’s chair, Dr Sanjay Hettige, said had a “huge impact on trainee health and wellbeing”.
Just over one in five respondents did not feel comfortable raising bullying, harassment and discrimination with their college and only over half felt safe raising training and wellbeing concerns. Hittite described these figures as “far too low”, warranting greater attention from medical colleges.
Almost eight in 10 rural based trainees wanted to stay in rural practice, but only a third of metropolitan based trainees said they would consider moving to rural practice. Hettige said that greater exposure to rural training could help solve the rural doctor shortage, but graduates often have “no choice but to go to the big cities”.
Unless greater focus is given to creating more rural training opportunities, this trend will continue at the detriment of patients in rural and regional Australia.
Josh Butler
People already lining up at Parliament House ahead of royal visit
It’s still hours before the King and Queen arrive at Parliament House, but eager royal watchers have already been lining up for some time on the building’s forecourt.
Before Parliament House staff closed up the front of the building for security reasons, we spotted around 50 people already lined up to get close to the royals; some prepared for the long haul with camp chairs and sandwiches, others bearing flowers and gifts.
One family arrived wearing gold plastic crowns.
There’s people of all ages, young and old, including a few kids that look like they’ve gotten the day off school to catch a glimpse of Charles and Camilla.
We’ll bring you more from Parliament House later this afternoon.
Brittany Higgins speaks on risks to baby during ‘acutely stressful pregnancy’
Brittany Higgins, who is currently pregnant, says that her baby is “perfectly fine and healthy” after a blood test raised red flags in the second trimester.
In a post to Instagram, Higgins said it is an “understatement to say that we’ve had an acutely stressful pregnancy”, with her and her husband, David Sharaz, having the “scare of [their] lives” with a recent blood test:
Our baby had a high probability of a genetic disorder – which wouldn’t have mattered to us – but scarily could mean he may be incompatible with life outside of the womb.
After an amniocentesis and a seemingly never-ending wait our prayers were answered. Our little guy is perfectly fine and healthy.
Higgins said she wanted to talk about this as it “takes the stigma out of these very real circumstances that people are faced with when trying to start families”.
Meanwhile, Higgins and Sharaz have still not sold their French home. Higgins said in July that she was being forced to sell the home to defend the defamation action brought by the Liberal senator Linda Reynolds.
Sarah Basford Canales
Alpaca joins crowd awaiting royal couple
At Canberra’s Australian War Memorial, territorians are lining up to catch a glimpse of the king and queen’s first pitstop in the nation’s capital.
One of those in line is Robert Fletcher and his alpaca, Hephner. Hephner sported a sparkly gold crown and bow tie, with a blue velvet suit (see our previous post for some photos).
And he was on his best behaviour, Fletcher said.
We just thought, what an opportunity to dress him up as royalty and bring him today.
Hephner is a monarchist, Fletcher said, and would love to meet King Charles III and Queen Camilla.
I think this is probably the last opportunity that you’ll ever get to see them, certainly in my lifetime and probably my daughter’s lifetime as well.
The gates opened at 10.30am, but whether Hephner with his human family will be allowed to pass through remains to be seen.
People lining up to see King and Queen at War Memorial
King Charles and Queen Camilla are continuing their tour of Australia, with their first stop today at the War Memorial in Canberra.
Mike Bowers is there to capture all the action, and people are already lining up to catch a glimpse of the royals, including Robert Fletcher and his alpaca, Hephner:
You can have a read of the full royal itinerary below:
Extreme fire danger for west coast of South Australia
There is an extreme fire danger rating for the west coast of South Australia today.
The Bureau of Meteorology says hot and dry conditions, with gusty north-westerly winds forecast ahead of a cooler, south-westerly change this afternoon and evening.
Here’s a look at today’s weather forecasts across Australia’s capital cities, from the Bureau of Meteorology:
Entertainment Quarter at Sydney’s Moore Park set for redevelopment
Sydney’s Entertainment Quarter at Moore Park is set for redevelopment, with the state government opening a tender process for its long-term lease.
Proposals are being sought to deliver more visitors, live performances and events, a statement from the NSW government said. It is also seeking proposals for additional creative spaces that could host up to 20,000 people.
The state government said the EQ is one of Sydney’s key entertainment and sports precincts but is “currently underutilised”, considering its location between Centennial Park, the SCG and Allianz Stadium, and proximity to the CBD via the light rail.
The current lease has a maximum term expiring in 2046 and the open-tender will allow all parties to put forward proposals. The open tender will commence in the “near-term” and run through next year.
The NSW premier, Chris Minns, said in a statement that the EQ was “falling far short of meeting its full potential”:
We want to turn the EQ into a thriving world-class precinct, full of dining and entertainment options, complete with a brand new venue that can host between 15,000 to 20,000 for live music and public events …
From cutting through red tape that has decimated Sydney’s nightlife to getting visitors and entertainment back into the city with projects this like this, we’re focused on turning Sydney into the best entertainment destination in the world.
Stamp duty for off-the-plan homes slashed in stimulus bid for Victorians
Every Victorian who buys off-the-plan apartments, units and townhouses will have their stamp duty slashed, AAP reports, but only for a limited time.
The premier, Jacinta Allan, announced Victorian stamp duty concessions would be expanded to all buyers and uncapped. Thresholds for stamp duty concessions had previously been set at $750,000 and $550,000 for first home buyers and owner-occupiers respectively.
But eligibility has been expanded to investors and the value cap removed for one year from today, providing a 100% discount for outstanding construction and refurbishment costs when calculating stamp duty.
Allan said the 12-month stimulus plan was in response to under-pressure builders crying out for help after successive interest rate rises. She told Sunrise earlier:
It’s certainly having an impact on the housing industry. That’s why we’re providing this support. It’s good for builders, it’s certainly good for buyers who will save money, it’s good for building more homes.
The premier foreshadowed she would release more housing policies and initiatives across the rest of the week.
Peter Hannam
Bowen underscores gas won’t be included in any capacity scheme
The energy minister, Chris Bowen, has been taking questions after his speech, confirming he wouldn’t include gas into the capacity investment scheme (that was set up speed up the renewables’ rollout).
Bowen noted NSW had included gas in its long-term auction system, and noted that no gas operator had bothered to bid “because it is so expensive”. Hence, putting gas into the federal scheme “achieves nothing” because such project would never get support. “It’s just a distraction,” he said.
(His federal counterpart, Ted O’Brien, had argued last week: “The inclusion of gas in the CIS is crucial to addressing the immediate challenges in Australia’s gas market, ensuring reliable electricity supply, and stabilising energy prices.”)
Bowen, meanwhile, downplayed reports in the past week or so in the Murdoch tabloids and the AFR about Norway’s Equinor pulling out of the running for a proposed offshore windfarm zone near Illawarra. He noted that Equinor had announced its exit from the race back in June (and hence, wondered why it was being repeated).
The company was still in the running for a zone planned for the offshore Hunter River, up the NSW coast, and the much larger zone off the Gippsland coast was going “gangbusters”.
As we anticipated, that second round of the CIS is only an acceleration (albeit a significant one). The overall size of the scheme will not be expanded, Bowen’s office has confirmed.
Meanwhile, Bowen hinted the government won’t be releasing its 2035 emissions targets this side of the election. He would be taking advice from the Climate Change Authority (now chaired by Matt Kean, the former NSW treasurer and energy minister in a Liberal-led coalition).
No nation had yet lodged 2035 carbon cuts to the UN body (the UNFCCC), Bowen noted. Perhaps Australia won’t be in a hurry to sign up.
Andrew Barr speaks following election win in ACT
The ACT chief minister, Andrew Barr, spoke with ABC News Breakfast earlier after his election win over the weekend.
Barr, already the longest-serving political leader in the country, fended off a negative swing and an independent surge to win his third election as chief minister.
He noted swings against some incumbent parties, including Labor, and said “there are always lessons to learn from each election campaign”:
It is looking increasingly certain of 10 Labor and three Green [seats], with a possibility of an additional seat either going to Labor or Green in the southern electorate of Brindabella. But there’s postal votes and interstate votes that will need to be added to that count. We would hope this would be resolved by the end of the week.
Responding to accusations that Labor is dominating the jurisdiction, Barr argued that “power is always shared in the ACT” with crossbenchers:
In this instance, we will expect a crossbench of at least five and possibly six members out of our 25-member assembly. But they have generally represented progressive views.
The Canberra Liberals are the most right-wing branch of the Liberal party in this country, and that’s been ably demonstrated election after election … We don’t make any apologies for running successful campaigns.
Barr argued that “votes were quite sharply weaker for the Liberal party” after its leader, Elizabeth Lee, was caught giving the middle finger to a journalist.
Government to accelerate clean energy auction scheme, Bowen says
Peter Hannam
The federal energy minister, Chris Bowen, says the government will accelerate the pace of its capacity investment scheme, an auction system that helps underwrite the rollout of renewables.
Bowen has told an AFR energy conference in Sydney that its second round of investments has been lifted to 6GW of new renewable generation from 4GW. Storage (mostly big batteries) will be lifted to 4GW from an original 2GW. He said:
I expected it to work well, and it’s working better than I thought.
The scheme guarantees a minimum payment for the power supply – but if wholesale prices are higher than a certain level, the government would take a share of the cut.
It’s not clear if the acceleration of the plans means the overall scheme will be larger than anticipated. Perhaps there’s also an insurance element. Auction results can’t be overturned if the government were to change at the next election.
The Coalition has said it wants to introduce gas in the scheme (something that states such as Victoria had opposed in the past). Plans for seven nuclear power plants are unlikely to gain market interest to include them in any action, given most reports estimate such generation to be far more expensive than wind or solar (even with storage added).
Bowen said uncertainty in the industry was something the Coalition was “deliberately” creating by introducing nuclear proposals to Australia’s mix. Bowen said he remains confident that the government can meet its 2030 goal of supplying 82% of electricity from clean energy sources.
Bowen noted too that some parts of the grid had record minimum demand on the grid over the weekend, something we touched a week or so ago here:
Byelection results reflect shift away from major parties: Ryan
Monique Ryan was also asked about Jacqui Scruby’s election results in Pittwater at the weekend, and if they makes her feel more comfortable ahead of the next federal election regarding retaining her own seat. She said:
[Almost] a third of Australians did not vote for the major parties [in 2022], I don’t think we have seen anything since that time that’s changed their minds.
I think people are seeing that independents can hold the governments to account at all levels of government. We play an important role, we’re pragmatic and centrist and we contribute. The results from the elections over the weekend reflected that.
Ryan says Allan ‘playing politics’ with Nimby-ism suggestion
Monique Ryan was also asked about suggestions from the Victorian premier, Jacinta Allan, that part of the opposition to the rezoning plan is “Nimby-ism”.
Ryan accused the premier of “playing politics with this” and said she is “trying to create a point of difference:”
I’m not interested in that. I’m interested in ensuring … these developments will be [designed] in a way that’s sensible and sustainable, they’ll be delivered on time … and we’ll retain the character of the suburbs in which we’ve chosen to live, while welcoming hopefully hundreds of thousands of new people into the area.
