2025-10-23
Labor’s “quiet summer” comes at a resounding cost
By Larissa Waters, Leader of the Australian Greens
Labor is racing to wrap up major reforms with as little noise as possible. But quiet politics hides bad choices that keep big corporations and billionaires comfortable while people, nature and climate pay the price.
Next week, we’re heading back to parliament for the final stretch of sittings for the year.
And I’ve got to say, the government’s priority is clear: tie up loose ends, avoid controversy, and have themselves a nice, quiet summer.
But quiet politics hides bad choices, and delivers for big corporations and billionaires, not ordinary people.
Since 2022, we’ve watched the government bend over backwards for powerful industries, fossil fuel corporations, property developers, and big banks, while dragging their feet on reforms that would make life fairer for everyone else.
Labor is now looking to draw a line under two major pieces of work before the end of the year: a long-promised rewrite of Australia’s environment laws, and its reworked superannuation tax proposal.
On paper, both sound like major reforms. But dig a little deeper and it’s the same old story, where fossil fuel companies, property developers and billionaires get what they want, and everyone else is told to wait.
Take the environment laws. The government is focused on negotiating with the Liberals and Nationals, the same Coalition that gutted the system in the first place.
The government wants the optics of progress, but the deal on the table risks locking in faster project approvals, weaker oversight, and no obligation to consider the climate impact of new coal and gas or end native forest logging.
That’s not reform, it’s a free pass for big corporations to continue wrecking our climate and ecosystems.
Labor is running a campaign targeting the Greens and other independent and progressive members of the crossbench, urging them to support the legislation when it comes to parliament.
But let’s be clear, what they’re really asking for is a rubber-stamp for whatever deal they strike with the Liberals. That’s not collaboration, and it’s not the path to meaningful reform.
And we know from their weak 2035 climate targets that this isn’t an accident, it’s a deliberate choice, and it’s a pattern: Labor promising ambition while protecting the profits of the corporations driving the crisis.
Their climate target falls far short of what science demands, and people can see through it.
That’s why we’ve had such a strong response in donations and volunteers through our climate targets campaign in recent months. People genuinely understand that tinkering at the edges won’t protect the places we love or the people already living with the impacts.
And this support matters, because the parliament has a once-in-a-generation opportunity to actually do better: to put strong protections in place for people, nature, and the climate.
Real progress means working across the parliament to create laws that actually protect people, nature and climate, not cutting deals that leave oversight weak and industry in charge.
Labor can, and should, be talking with those of us who have been fighting for it all along, not with the parties that gutted the system in the first place.
The Greens have the balance of power in the Senate, and as you’ve heard me clearly say before: we’re ready to work constructively to make it happen.
And then there’s superannuation.
The government’s decision to expand the low-income super tax offset is a welcome and overdue step that will boost the retirement savings of millions of lower-income workers, many of them women in insecure or part-time work. It’s a reform the Greens have long called for.
But at the same time, Labor has watered down its proposed tax on ultra-wealthy super balances, scrapping the proposed tax on unrealised gains, and indexing the $3 million threshold. That’s a gift to the wealthiest 0.5% of Australians.
We’re talking about people with multimillion-dollar super balances, investment properties, and portfolios that often don’t get taxed until they’re sold, if ever.
A fairer super system shouldn’t be built on half-measures. It should make life fairer for working people, and should ensure that the mega wealthy pay their fair share.
The Greens will use every tool we’ve got in parliament to push these reforms in the right direction.
Our focus is simple: ensure environment laws actually protect the environment, and that the tax system serves everyone, not just the corporations and billionaires who already run the show.
These aren’t just parliamentary debates, and they’re not just about bills and policies. They’re about courage.
It doesn’t take guts to play it safe, to avoid conflict, to settle for small changes while the climate crisis deepens and inequality widens.
Because while real courage means taking on fossil fuel giants, the property moguls, and the billionaires, Labor’s wish for a quiet summer is about keeping them comfortable.
From corporations that pay no tax to the ultra-wealthy with multimillion-dollar super funds, the government is keeping the profits of the powerful intact while the costs fall on everyone else.
Labor may crave a quiet summer, but quiet politics only protects the powerful.
We’re not here for that. We’ll keep pushing until this parliament delivers bold action for the people it’s meant to serve.