THE ALBANESE LABOR GOVERNMENT

So far in office we have delivered

Cost of Living Relief:

• Tax cuts for all Australians
• Two years of energy bill relief for every household and small business
• We’ve increased Commonwealth Rent Assistance by 45%
• We’ve introduced 60 day scripts and delivered cheaper medicines – saving Australians $1 billion and Sydney residents nearly $9 million
• We’ve funded a 15% pay rise for early childhood educators and aged care workers while requiring childcare centres to cap fees to support affordability and fairness
• We’ve wiped $3 billion from student debt for more than 3 million Australians, and we’ll wipe another $20 billion if re-elected

The Economy:

• Delivered the largest back-to-back surpluses in history, halved inflation from 6.1% to 2.8%, and returned 82% of revenue upgrades ($285 billion) to reduce debt, saving $80 billion in interest
• Created more than 1 million jobs, the most of any first term government!
• Unemployment is at 4.1%, the lowest average unemployment rate in over 50 years
• Our 2024-25 budget invests $22.7 billion over the next decade to build a Future Made in Australia. This includes a new front door to make it easier to invest in Australia, production tax incentives and programs to support solar and battery manufacturing

Labor Priorities:

• Real wages are up 3.8% (almost double the 2.2% under the Coalition) – we’ve achieved the fastest turnaround in real wage growth on record
• Same Job Same Pay is now law, minimum wage earners are up $7000, the gender pay gap is the lowest it’s ever been with women $1900 per year better off
• We’ve building 1.2 million new homes across Australia, plus the biggest investment in social and affordable housing in a decade
• Making home ownership possible through Help to Buy schemes so that you can buy a home with a deposit as little as 2%
• We’ve strengthened Medicare by tripling bulk billing incentives and opened 84 Urgent Care Clinics, delivering 1 million free GP consultations so far, with 3 more clinics set to launch this financial year
• More than 30 of the 61 planned Medicare Mental Health Centres have been rolled out, providing free mental health care to everyone who walks through the door, in every state and territory
• We’ve passed landmark legislation to lift Federal Government funding to public schools above the 20% cap introduced by Malcolm Turnbull
• We’ve also made $16 billion of additional investment for public schools available to help fill the gap
• Families will be able to access three days a week of subsidised early childhood education for children who need it from January 2026.
• We’ve funded 500,000+ Fee-Free TAFE and training places across key areas of national priority and legislated 100,000 free TAFE training places annually from 2027
• 99% of nursing homes are now staffed with a registered nurse on-site 24/7, legislated bipartisanship reforms for certainty within the sector and an additional 3.9 million minutes of direct care every day, including 1.7 million minutes of care from registered nurses in residential aged care
• Passed legislation to ensure that multinationals pay their share of tax in Australia
• Implemented the biggest reform to mergers laws in almost 50 years to make the economy to stop damaging anti-competitive corporate acquisitions and to make economically beneficial mergers quicker and simpler
• Introduced laws to protect Australians from debt spirals associated with using Buy Now Pay Later services

Employment and Workplace Relations:

The Albanese Government has legislated:

• A right to disconnect for eligible workers when they are not working or being paid, allowing Australians to unplug guilt-free, and cutting the expectation of unpaid overtime
• New ‘regulated worker’ functions for the Fair Work Commission, including setting minimum standards for workers in the gig economy, and minimum standards for the road transport industry to deliver better protections against unfair dismissal at work
• A fairer definition of casual employees allowing more casuals to access job security.

These reforms are at risk under Peter Dutton and the Coalition who have already confirmed that they will repeal the right to disconnect and the changes to the casual definition, while flagging further attacks to workers’ wages and conditions.

Integrity:

The Albanese Government’s commitment to restore trust and integrity to federal politics has been recognised with Australia back in the top 10 nations in Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index for the first time in almost a decade.

The Albanese Labor Government has:

• Legislated a powerful, independent, and transparent National Anti-Corruption Commission. After just 12 months of operation it has 31 corruption investigations underway and five matters before the court
• Made the most significant reform to Australia’s system of administrative review in decades by creating an efficient, accessible, independent and fair Administrative Review Tribunal which was opposed by the Liberals
• Introduced a new Fraud and Corruption Control Framework which imposes stronger anti-corruption obligations on all Commonwealth agencies
• Legislated the Combatting Foreign Bribery Act which introduced a new corporate offence for failing to prevent foreign bribery
• Established a Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme
• Strengthened protections for public sector whistleblowers
• Strengthened the Code of Conduct for Ministers
• Delivered a new National Action Plan under the Open Government Partnership

Renewable Energy and Towards Net Zero:

• In just two years, I’ve ticked off 65 renewable projects – enough to power more than seven million homes; by the end of 2024 our grid will be powered by 42% renewables and we’re on track to achieve our 82% target by 2030
• We’re electrifying everything that can be electrified, powering it with renewables, and building large-scale storage through batteries, pumped hydro, and hydrogen—creating thousands of jobs across our regions
• Through the $15 billion National Reconstruction Fund and the Buy Australian Plan, we’re modernising and diversifying our industrial base, unlocking the capability to manufacture these cutting-edge technologies right here in Australia

Top Environment Portfolio Wins:

• Investing $550 million to protect our threatened species
• We’re increasing recycling by more than 1.3 million tonnes a year and stopping paper, soft and difficult to recycle plastics from going to landfill
• I’m the first Environment Minister to block a coal mine
• I saved Toondah Harbour from destruction. The Labor Government is protecting internationally important wetlands
• We now protect 52% of our oceans, more than any other country on earth!
• We’ve protected 70 million hectares of land and sea – an area bigger than Germany and Italy combined!
• I’ve set up new Indigenous protected areas and expanded the Indigenous ranger program
• We’ve doubled funding to national parks
• We’ve stopped Jabiluka from being mined for uranium – and will add it to the Kakadu National Park World Heritage instead
• We hosted the world’s first Global Nature Positive Summit (which got a shout out from The King on his recent visit) to drive collective action and private investment in nature protection and repair

More achievements in my portfolio are here.

Locally we are supporting a bid to include the original 1978 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Parade Route on the National Heritage List.

We’ve also introduced world-leading legislation to enforce a minimum age of 16 years for social media.

And we're just getting started.

We promised to build a better future for all Australians, and that's exactly what we're doing. 

as at February 2025