Australian Budget

With the New Zealand Budget released on 22 May 2025, it is worth looking over the ditch and seeing whether the grass in Australia is greener as a result of their Budget that was released on 25 March 2025.

A tax cut was introduced for individuals. The rate applying to income between AU$18,201 to AU$45,000 will reduce from 16% to 15% from 1 July 2026 and to 14% from 1 July 2027. As a comparison to NZ, it is worth remembering that Australians enjoy a tax-free threshold up to AU$18,200. This equates to an extra AU$268 and then AU$536 extra ‘in the hand’ across the two years.

A change that will be of interest to New Zealand students is the plan to complete a one-off 20 percent cut in existing student loan balances.

For an embattled hospitality sector and beer drinkers, a pause in the indexation of draught beer excise will occur for two years at an estimated cost of $200m.

With a roading and infrastructure spend of AU$17.1B we can only be jealous of the investment that Australia is able to make, throw in a beer and a tax cut and the grass keeps looking greener.

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