CAMERON MILNER: It’s about time Prime Minister Anthony Albanese showed some courage

Prime Minister Albanese admitted that just 12 months in he’s already delivered all of his 2025 election promises, so underwhelming was his very short list of promises.

Now that it’s “mission accomplished”, Albanese can turn his idle hands towards leading an “ambitious” Government.

Finally, Labor is ready to implement Bill Shorten’s unrealised reform agenda across capital gains, negative gearing and family trusts.

Not one of the ideas being pushed by Albanese are new. All were taken to previous elections by Labor under Shorten.

It’s plain old political plagiarism from the small target Albanistas who managed to jag 94 seats promising a lot of nothing at the last election.

This shift will require him to eschew his predictable brand of policy timidity and stop desperate moves to chop the Treasurer off at the knees or leak against his other reformist Cabinet ministers.

However, Cabinet has been far more watertight since one-time minister, now full time Canberra resident, Ed Husic is just chirping from the cheap seats.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers is also rediscovering his “go big or go home” attitude.

It’s refreshing to see Chalmers being given the opportunity to roll out the triple whammy tax attack on the privileged upper middle class of landlords and small business owners.

This Budget strategy was not taken to voters in either of the two elections.

Its was actively denigrated after 2019 and delivered the Albo small target era of government.

The courage has finally been found thanks to the combination of a barely present Opposition, a hopelessly divided centre right vote, and a thumping parliamentary majority.

Albanese should reprise the words he used about his Voice to Parliament ‘if not now, when?’ to a full program of Labor policy ambitions.

The strategy will be waved trough the Senate by the tax-and-waste Greens.

Still, Labor should be commended for finally grabbing the reformist nettle.

But more needs to be done to pay down intergenerational debt to really tackle intergenerational inequality.

We need to surge our national productivity. That starts with lower taxes for working people, allowing more reward for effort.

Shorten has recently called for his tax changes to pay for income tax cuts. The new taxes shouldn’t just go into the Albanese slush bucket for more pen pushers and box tickers.

Former US president Ronald Reagan famously attacked the Left as running a government agenda of: “If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidise it.”

The same criticism can be laid at the feet of the Albanese Government if it doesn’t now show some further ambition to reform its reckless spending.

If Mark Butler can do it so successfully with a political sensitive area like the NDIS, then surely others can follow his lead and also offer up more hard dollar savings.

Re-introducing means testing Labor could fight the glut of middle class welfare on offer from the Albanese Government.

A millionaire’s kid gets the same access on a multi-million dollar first home than someone buying a basic flat.

Under Albo, millionaires get free TAFE, free home batteries and free child care.

This is Labor looking after its mates and voter base. It’s lazy policy and fiscally wasteful.

Labor should always be about progressive taxation as well as progressive means testing to save scarce taxpayer dollars from being wasted on the already very well off.

Implementing Shorten’s tax reforms are a great place to start, but Labor, with two more years to this term of government, should have so much more ambition to deliver.

Let’s mean test middle class welfare and subsidies for millionaires and pay down some debt, all while giving a tax cut for hard working Australians.

Next week’s Budget should be just the start of a new age of ambition.

Albanese should reprise the words he used about his Voice to Parliament “if not now, when?” to a full program of Labor policy ambitions.

After all it’s time for a Labor government once again in Canberra, even one only there because Albanese has idle hands and an empty to-do list.

Cameron Milner is a former Queensland Labor State secretary