Opposition leader Anthony Albanese was involved in an intense standoff on live morning television between Karl Stefanovic and Allison Langdon.
Both Today Show co-hosts asked Mr Albanese five times whether Aussies would be paying more tax under his election.
The Labor opposition leader however refused to give a straight answer and repeatedly resorted back to his budget response.
‘You won’t be increasing taxes to pay back debt?’ Karl asked.
“We’ve said that the tax we’re looking at is multinational tax evasion. We’ll have more detail about that during the election campaign.
Mr Albanese went on to speak about the Liberal government who have “more rorts, more waste” and how they were spending taxpayer’s money.
Karl then asked the same question again to which he responded: “Look, what we’re doing is two things, Karl,”
“One is that we’ll stop the waste and rorts, the other thing is we have a plan for growth through our national reconstruction fund.
“Our climate change reconstruction fund. Our climate change policy will create 604,000 new jobs by 2030.”
Allison interrupted asking Mr Albanese: “But you won’t increase taxes?”
“Yeah we have made it very clear, we have all our policies out there for all to see, for all to see.
“And we have a plan for growth,” Mr Albanese continued before being interrupted by Karl.
“Albo, Albo, I don’t know that you’re answering the question,” he pointed out.
‘Yes, I am,’ Mr Albanese replied.
Karl said it was a simple “yes or no” question before asking him for the fifth time whether he would be increasing taxes.
“We will be announcing our measure on multinational tax evasion. That is the announcement we have made.
“We’re not doing anything on the other measures that we’ve put forward during the last election campaign. All of our policies are fully costed and released.”
The Labor Party delivered their budget response on Thursday night.
Mr Albanese pledged to spend an extra $2.5 billion for aged care which would see an increase in wages for workers and ensuring all residential aged care facilities to have a registered nurse on site at all hours.
Other areas of strong focus for the opposition is to take pressure off the cost of living by making child care and power bills cheaper, along with an economy with stronger wages and more secure work.
‘After all the challenges and the sacrifices made during the pandemic, floods, and bushfires, Australians need and deserve a better Budget for a better future,’ Mr Albanese said.
‘A future where no one is held back, and no one is left behind.’
‘Labor has a real plan for growth and prosperity – a plan to get incomes rising and costs under control.’
Other plans include cheaper energy, more manufacturing and training, fee-free TAFE places and renewed focus on Medicare.
Image: Today Show
