Former Rba Governor Calls For Property Tax Exemption To Be Scrapped | The Business | Abc News

A former Reserve Bank governor has told a parliamentary hearing the capital gains tax discount should be scrapped altogether to help improve housing affordability. Bernie Fraser told a Senate committee hearing on capital gains tax (CGT) that, if it were up to him, he would abolish the discount. He conceded that a "cartel" of vested interests in the economy would like to keep the status quo. "I believe that that would be a useful step, one of many steps that are required to moving back to an affordable housing market for all Australians," he said.

CGT is paid on the profits made from selling an asset. The current 50 per cent CGT discount allows Australians to only pay tax on half the profit if they have held the asset for 12 months. The Albanese government has left the door open to changing the CGT discount for property investors, as it looks to develop a new housing affordability policy. Mr Fraser said the increase in house prices had seen the dream of owning a home "fade away", particularly for Australians on modest incomes. "There are all those other generations of people — young home buyers — that are watching what's going on in the marketplace, but they must be watching with awful dismay," he said.

However, Treasury has told the committee its research showed any changes to the CGT discount would have a minimal impact on the supply and pricing of housing. ABC business correspondent David Taylor was following the hearing and spoke Kirsten Aiken for The Business.
#ABCBusiness

Subscribe: http://ab.co/1svxLVE
Read more here: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-02-24/former-rba-governor-bernie-fraser-calls-out-toxic-tax-debate-cgt/106381176

ABC NEWS provides around the clock coverage of news events as they break in Australia and abroad. It's news when you want it, from Australia's most trusted news organisation.

For more from ABC NEWS, click here: https://ab.co/2kxYCZY
Watch more ABC NEWS content ad-free on ABC iview: https://ab.co/2OB7Mk1

Go deeper on our ABC NEWS In-depth channel: https://ab.co/2lNeBn2
Like ABC NEWS on Facebook: http://facebook.com/abcnews.au
Follow ABC NEWS on Instagram: http://instagram.com/abcnews_au

Note: In most cases, our captions are auto-generated.

#ABCNEWS #ABCNEWSAustralia