Cost-of-living report finds Australian households poorer, calls for national cabinet into government spending

Aussies are worse off compared to when the Albanese government came into power two-and-a-half years ago, amid a per capita recession, a parliamentary report into the cost of living crisis says. The Coalition-led probe said it had been widely established that the cost of essential goods including rent, housing, food and utilities had increased, while household incomes had not kept pace, putting pressure on households. Compared to more than 100 countries in the OECD, Australian households also reported the largest fall in disposable incomes, it said. The final report released on Friday contained nine recommendations, including a call for national cabinet to be urgently convened to tackle “excessive public expenditure” with the committee taking aim at government spending for exacerbating inflation. The report called for Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and state and territory leaders to “develop productivity-enhancing reforms for the economy” and pushed for a “deregulation agenda” to boost business competition. It also spruiked the Coalition and Greens backed policy for the consumer watchdog to be given supermarket divestiture powers as a “last resort” to fight price-gouging and poor behaviour. It also has urged the government to reinstate the building watchdog, the Australian Building and Construction Commission, to mitigate fall out from the CFMEU scandal. Both policies have been rejected by the government. NED-6058-Australias-Inflation-Rate Chaired by Liberal Victorian senator Jane Hume, the committee has conducted 21 public hearings, considering evidence from the Reserve Bank, the Treasury, unions, small business, housing and industry associations, as well as everyday Australians. While the latest inflation data has revealed headline inflation has dipped into the Reserve Bank’s target band between 2 to 3 per cent for the first time in three years, Senator Hume said many households and businesses were still in “crisis”. “Standards of living have collapsed and Australians are facing their third Christmas with less in their pocket. Many will struggle through this holiday season,” she said. “As the Cost of Living committee has confirmed, inflation is the number one enemy of every Australian. “Unfortunately, the Labor government has left Australians to fight it on their own.” A spokesperson for federal Treasurer Jim Chalmers rejected claims made in the report, noting Labor’s $900m productivity fund to incentivise states and territories to slash red tape to boost productivity announced this week. “If the Liberals really cared about the cost of living, they would have voted for our cost-of-living relief in the parliament but they didn’t,” they said. “The Coalition left us much higher inflation, huge deficits, and in the third year of a three-year term they still have no costed or credible economic policies.” The government has said it had restrained real spending growth to 1.4 per cent, less than half its 30-year average while the previous Coalition government had had average real spending growth of 4.1 per cent and found no savings in their final budget.