Budget 2024 - Delivering for Hotham
Labor’s Budget has been handed down – and it’s one designed to tackle cost-of-living pressures with real and meaningful support, while also taking a look to the future.
Many across Australia are doing it tough and Hotham is no different. It’s my – as well as the Albanese Labor Government’s – priority to help ease these financial challenges we all face.
This Federal Budget has some big announcements and I want to ensure you’re accessing everything available to you. So please take a look in this Hotham Budget snapshot below.
Bigger, fairer tax cuts
From 1 July, we’ll deliver a bigger tax cut for all taxpayers. Every taxpayer in Hotham (that’s around 86,000 people) will receive a tax cut with the average person getting $1411 back.
Estimate your tax cut here: Tax cuts for every Taxpayer
Cheaper energy bills
We’re giving every household a $300 energy rebate to help with the cost of your power bill. While this won’t fix everything, I know that this will make a real difference to people in Hotham.
Eligible small businesses will also receive $325 rebate on their electricity bills. To be eligible for a $325 rebate, small businesses must meet their state and territory definition of electricity ‘small customer', as determined by their annual electricity consumption threshold. The annual electricity consumption threshold in Victoria is 40 MWh. Small businesses whose annual electricity consumption is above the threshold set by their state and territory government will not be eligible for bill relief. Eligible small businesses will receive their energy bill rebate automatically and won’t be required to take any further action.
You can check your eligibility here: | energy.gov.au
Education
The Budget invests in building a better and fairer education system for all Australians, in early education and care, schools and universities.
The Budget provides cost-of-living relief by making the HECS-HELP system fairer. The Government will cut $3 billion in student debt for more than 3 million Australians. The Albanese Government is capping the HELP indexation rate to be lower of either the Consumer Price Index (CPI) or the Wage Price Index). This will be backdated to 1 June 2023, meaning those with a HELP debt will receive a credit. This means HELP debts will never grow faster than wages and will ensure last year’s high indexation rate doesn’t happen again.
This change will support 23,081 people with a HELP debt in Hotham.
Health and aged care
The 2024–25 Budget builds on the strong foundations and major investments in the Albanese Government’s first two Budgets, by extending the generational reforms to strengthen Medicare and easing cost-of-living pressures with cheaper medicines.
Strengthening Medicare: The Albanese Government is investing $2.8 billion to strengthen Medicare by providing additional Medicare Urgent Care Clinics, more free mental health services, higher Medicare rebates for many common medical tests, and a women’s health package over $160 million.
In the last year 64,592 residents in Hotham accessed 199,016 pathology services. We’re making sure these pathology tests stay bulk billed by indexing the Medicare rebates for common medical tests – reducing waiting times and catching health problems sooner.
We're expanding Medicare coverage to 5 MRI machines in Hotham, expanding affordable access to imaging services in Hotham.
Cheaper medicines: The Albanese Government is investing almost $4 billion to deliver cheaper medicines to ease pressure on household budgets, by freezing the PBS co-payment, and adding more medicines to the PBS.
Residents in Hotham have already saved $2,426,021 thanks to the Albanese Government’s commitment to delivering cheaper medicines. Everyone in Hotham who access PBS medicines are set to save even more thanks to our freeze on the maximum cost of a PBS medicine.
The pensioners and concession card holders in Hotham won’t pay more than $7.70 for their PBS medications for the next 5 years, thanks to the Albanese Government’s commitment to delivering cheaper medicines.
Fit and Healthy Australia: The Albanese Government is investing in a fit and healthy Australia, through expanded access to free bowel cancer screening, continued expansion of newborn bloodspot screening, and a boost to sports participation from the grassroots to high performance.
12,055 people aged 45-50 in Hotham will now be eligible for the National Bowel Cancer Screening program.
Last year, we supported 22 young people aged 12 to 18 in Hotham to compete in sporting championships. We’re extending the Local Sporting Champions program so more young champs from Hotham can compete on the state, national and global stage.
Aged care: We’re making an extra 24,100 home care packages available for older Australians to receive aged care supports in the comfort of their own homes.
Veteran's Affairs
The Albanese Government is committed to delivering a better future for Defence personnel, veterans and families, to ensure they can access the services and supports they both need and deserve.
The Albanese Government is investing an additional $477 million in the 2024-25 Budget to increase our support to the more than 340,000 veterans and dependents accessing services through the Department of Veterans’ Affairs.
Thanks to investments from the Albanese Labor Government, this means funding for the Department of Veterans’ Affairs remains at a record high, now better funded than it has been in three decades. This will benefit the 1,491 veterans in Hotham.
Skills and training
The Albanese Labor Government is building on its ambitious reform agenda to strengthen TAFE and Vocational Education and Training, train the skilled workers needed across the economy, ease skills shortages in construction and develop the workforce capability needed for the transition to a Net Zero economy and a Future Made in Australia.
With 1,855 apprentices working towards a nationally recognised qualification in Hotham, the Government is looking to encourage more apprentices to take up training in areas our economy needs them most:
- Apprentices in priority occupations will be eligible for an incentive of $5,000 to assist with cost-of-living pressures and support them to finish their training.
- Employers taking on apprentices in priority occupations will also be eligible for an incentive of $5,000, on par with their apprentices.
Social Services
The Albanese Labor Government is committed to responsible cost-of-living relief for Australians, delivering targeted support for pensioners and income support recipients.
The Albanese Government is providing a 10 per cent increase to maximum rates of Commonwealth Rent Assistance, benefitting close to 1 million households across Australia. This will benefit 5,715 households in Hotham. This builds on the Government’s 15 per cent increase which commenced in September 2023, and (combined with indexation) will take maximum rates over 40 per cent higher than in May 2022.
We are also continuing the freeze to social security deeming rates for a further 12 months – to 30 June 2025, to provide continued relief for around 876,000 income support recipients across Australia with deemed income. In Hotham, this will support 5860 income support recipients including Pensioners, Jobseekers, parenting payment, student payments and carer payment recipients.
The Government has committed an additional $227.6 million, bringing the total funding to more than $5.4 billion over the next four years, to help more people with disability to prepare for and find suitable employment through a new specialised disability employment program. This will provide individualised support to meet the unique needs of 1,271 DES participants in Hotham.
NDIS
The Government is committed to improving outcomes for NDIS participants and ensuring every dollar of NDIS funding goes to those who need it most.
This builds on $732.9 million provided in the 2023–24 Budget.
Don't forget to register for our Hotham NDIS Forum with The Hon Bill Shorten MP.
Small business
The Albanese Labor Government’s Budget will deliver a better deal for Australia’s small businesses, including more than 19,000 in Hotham, helping to lay the foundation for future growth in our economy.
This is by committing $3.1 million to extending support available through the Small Business Debt Helpline. In 2023, the Small Business Debt Helpline supported 765 small businesses in Victoria. The Albanese Labor Government is also investing $7.7 million to continue providing support through the NewAccess for Small Business Owners mental health program, so small businesses can access free and specialised help when they need it most. In 2023, 496 small business operators were supported in Victoria.
Communications
The Albanese Government’s $2.4 billion investment in the NBN in our first budget continues to see more Australians access higher internet speeds.
In Hotham over 17,000 businesses and households have received a major connectivity boost and are now able to order a full-fibre upgrade. Across Victoria this represents over 900,000 premises that can upgrade to a world-class service.
