Shorten to thank for Clive’s tilt
CLIVE Palmer has revealed Bill Shorten jolted him back into politics because of Labor’s “cruel”, high-taxing agenda, which he warned would financially punish Australians in their 80s.
In an exclusive interview with the Bulletin, the former Fairfax MP said he could not stand by and watch “Bill Shorten’s tax grab ... destroy our country, our children’s future and demolish elderly Australians”.
Speaking from a yacht in an undisclosed location, the billionaire said he had learnt lessons from his first time in Federal Parliament and would take more of a businesslike approach if he won on Saturday.
Revealing he had spent $53 million on election campaigning and had written all of the United Australia Party’s advertising, Mr Palmer predicted he could win up to seven seats and hold the balance of power.
Mr Palmer said he would pursue policies in Parliament that supported mining and agriculture, including allowing interest on home loans to be tax deductible.
“My real worry is that Labor and the Greens are joined at the hip and given half a chance, will bring back death taxes,” Mr Palmer said.
“That will see husbands and wives not able to leave the results of their hard-earned life together to each other and it would mean children would lose their inheritance.”
He reaffirmed that Labor was desperate to do a preference deal with him because it could see in its polling he was getting traction with voters.
“I could not stand back and see Australia destroyed by a lack of vision,” Mr Palmer said.
“I had to do something to stand up for the Australian people, putting Australians first.”
He said he did not support Labor’s negative gearing or franking credits overhaul, which would even hurt “those 80 and 85 years old”.
“We have a very positive agenda for Australia,” he said.
“We want to make home loans tax deductible.
“We want to introduce zonal taxation so we encourage people to move from congested cities into regional areas.
“We believe Australia should process its mineral wealth and energy here in Australia.
“We need those jobs here.” He said his party members were concerned about the “negative impact on Australians everywhere if Labor gets to implement its high-taxing agenda punishing aspiration and hard work”.
“Bill Shorten doesn’t want Australians who work hard to get ahead to be able to claim the interest on their investment property, but he is quite happy for foreign corporations to be able to deduct their interest expenses,” he said
Dismissing controversy about unpaid workers at Queensland Nickel, Mr Palmer said, as a shareholder, he was not responsible for the entitlements fallout.
But he said he had put $7 million aside for workers and paid 40 former staff members already.
A Labor campaign spokeswoman said Mr Palmer should explain to Queenslanders why, instead of paying Queensland Nickel workers, he was “wasting millions on billboards and baseless TV ads”.
“We won’t be lectured to by a millionaire who ripped off workers and has done a dodgy deal with the Liberals on the basis of waving through hundreds of billions of dollars in corporate handouts and tax cuts to the top end of town.”