For a comprehensive account of how this year’s budget tackles the education sector, see our continued coverage here.

On Tuesday 25 March, Treasurer Jim Chalmers handed down Labor’s early pre-election budget for 2025-2026, promising Australians some ambitious and occasionally poorly-defined payment measures (provided they vote Labor, of course).

Woroni trawled through Chalmer’s budget so that you don’t have to, and in fact, we highly recommend that you don’t. Categorically, the 2025 Budget is not a good read for students. Not only is it kind of long and a bit boring, but also includes only minimal new provisions for improving higher education outcomes and cost of living pressures, outside of some tax cuts and notable funding for healthcare initiatives. 

Students reading the new budget may feel a resounding sense of déja vu (given the government seems to have already boasted about the more substantial measures in this year’s plan). With the Federal Election looming overhead, the 2025 Budget feels hesitant and thoroughly contingent. It clearly hails from a caretaker government attempting to appeal to voters for a further term in power, whilst not ruffling too many feathers.

Read on for our crash course of what did or did not rake in some extra (provisional) funds.

COST OF LIVING MEASURES:

With costs constantly on the rise, many students are feeling the weight of the cost-of-living crisis. 

–   Winners: Domestic home buyers, the ATO, bill payers

–   Losers: Foreign home buyers, US pharmaceutical giants, under-the-counter cigarettes

Tax Cuts

In the words of Chalmers, “modest but meaningful” tax cuts have been planned for the $18,201-45,000 tax bracket, reducing the bracket’s tax rate by one per cent in this budget and the next. For those students who make more than $18,201 a year, their payable tax will be somewhat reduced.

Bill Relief

Energy bill relief will continue to the end of 2025 for all bill-payers. Households will receive $150 energy rebates off their electricity bills across two quarterly payments. Unfortunately, none of the 7,500+ ANU students who live as occupants in on-campus accommodation will be eligible. However, this is a measure which has been endorsed by the Coalition, so is guaranteed relief to households regardless of the election result.

Housing

Home buyers will be getting some love in this budget, including an expansion to the Help to Buy program, enabling Australians with smaller deposits to buy a home. The Government will provide an equity contribution of up to 40 per cent in assisting an estimated 40,000 eligible home buyers into ownership, helping first home buyers significantly. 

A further $54 billion investment into the construction of 55,000 social and affordable homes alongside crucial infrastructure is planned within the budget.

Renters do not receive as much airtime. With passing mention to increased regulations to provide a ‘better deal’ for renters and goals to limit rental increases to once per year, there is otherwise very little discussion as to how this budget serves people not in a position to buy a home anytime soon.

“Restricting Foreign Ownership of Housing”

Largely self-explanatory — foreign buyers will be banned from purchasing established dwellings for a two-year period starting 1 April this year. This measure is somewhat surprising, and temporary residents and foreign-owned companies will be included in the restrictions. The target of this policy is to increase Australia’s housing supply enough to place downwards pressure on the cost of housing. Following the government’s previous blame on international students for worsening the housing crisis (an accusation debunked recently in a study by researchers from the University of South Australia), some may view such a policy bitterly.

PBS Medication

The Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) is a cornerstone of Australia’s public healthcare system, covering two-thirds of all medication in Australia. Under this budget, the maximum cost of medication will decrease from $31.60 to $25.

More medications have also been added onto the PBS list, including prescriptions for menopausal hormone therapy, oral contraceptives and treatment for different cancers. Some of the medications to be added from 1 May 2025 include Yaz, Yasmin, Slinda, Estrogel Pro, and Prometrium.

The combination of decreasing the maximum payable rate and increasing eligible medications should ultimately help vulnerable Australians, including students.

Childcare

Those with little ones will be happy to hear that subsidised childcare will double to 36 hours a week. This provides a guaranteed 3 days of childcare a week. This is estimated to save parents more than $11,000 per year.

Alcohol and Tobacco

Garnering $156.7 million over two years from a range of departmental budget lines including Health and Aged Care, the government is set to crack down on the illicit tobacco trade. This could be a win or a loss for students, depending on how bad your ‘Manchester’ habit is.

Alterations to alcohol taxes designed to support the hospitality sector have paused indexation on draught beer excises for two years, and increased remission caps for brewers, distillers and wine producers. Impacts of this on the price of a pint are TBC.

WELLBEING AND WELFARE:

If last year’s budget was a self-proclaimed “wellbeing” budget, what does this year’s budget propose to do for the wellbeing of the average student?

–   Winners: Bulk-billing appointment-seekers (hopefully), patients with “an urgent but not life-threatening need for care”, women’s reproductive health

–   Losers: Welfare recipients, NDIS fraudsters

Medicare

For the many students who might have found themselves scrolling hopelessly through HotDoc for a bulk billing doctor’s appointment, Chalmers has placed heavy emphasis on strengthening Medicare. $8.5 billion has been directed to lifting bulk billing rates and building the health workforce, with the ALP aiming for 9/10 GP visits to be bulk billed by the end of the decade.

The strategy sees the government promise to pour over $660 million into incentivising and training new General Practitioners, nurses, and midwives, including through an expansion of medical Commonwealth Supported Places, paid study leave and scholarship programs.

The ACT has received an additional $7.6 million in a national sum of $657.9 million to fund 137 Medicare ‘Urgent Care Clinics’ to remove the burden on hospitals, providing care for non-life threatening but urgent medical concerns. 

The ACT has also copped an extra $2.1 million to fund public dental services, $7.2 million for mental health and suicide prevention, and a share of additional public hospital funding.

Women’s health maintained an additional boost (on top of the aforementioned PBS additions), with $240.4 million promised over five years to long-acting reversible contraception provision, endometriosis and pelvic pain clinics, and public awareness.

Mental Health

$46 million has been designated for general digital mental health services. It is currently unclear whether this infrastructure is designed to account for previous reductions in the number of subsidised psychology sessions available under a Mental Health Care Plan.

$1.6 million has specifically been provided for mental health supports for “Australians impacted by the conflict in the Middle East”.

Welfare

Although boasting previous increases, the budget does not provide for any additional help for those receiving Youth Allowance, Austudy, or ABSTUDY. Rent Assistance Payments receive a 5% increase which is significantly reduced from previous years, and are confusingly advertised only by reference to the total increase across the Albanese Government (which is a total of 45%).

$8.9 million was however pledged over three years for additional housing support services for vulnerable Australians, including homelessness research.

NDIS

Rather than providing any additional funding for disability supports themselves, every budget line item regarding the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) is aimed towards fulfilling Labor’s promise to get the NDIS “back on track”, and by that, they mean providing an initial $175.4 million to “safeguard the integrity” of the NDIS, by detecting and cutting down “fraud and non-compliant payments”.

$423.8 million has, however, been earmarked over the next five years for investment in capacity building and accessibility improvements for people with disabilities, as well as to improve “general understanding of disability”. 

“GLOBAL UNCERTAINTY”

Social Cohesion

Alongside a repeated rhetorical emphasis on “global uncertainty”, Chalmers has designated $178.4 million to supporting “social cohesion” in Australia. If you didn’t immediately know what this means, we didn’t either. It includes $60.4 million funding for security uplifts at Jewish community sites, including synagogues and schools, and to “support the Muslim community to uplift the security of places of significance”.

Specifically, $31.4 million over four years is assigned for security upgrades and restoration of the Adass Israel Synagogue in Victoria, after it was firebombed in December 2024. $4 million has also been provided to the Project Rozana Foundation in 2024-2025 to address rehabilitation gaps in the health sector in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

Funding is also provided for other multicultural projects, local museums and refugee integration (including the resettlement in Nauru of non-citizens released from detention after the High Court decision in NZYQ v Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs). 

Defence

To the likely distaste of many student activists across campus, the 2025 budget buckles down with “whole of government support” for the AUKUS “conventionally-armed, nuclear-powered” submarine program. This includes the continuing provision of CSPs to support “AUKUS initiatives and broader sovereign capabilities” by “building education pipelines and delivering targeted measures to support the nuclear workforce and supporting sectors.” Sheesh.

Looking abroad, Australia has also committed a further $17 million to providing communication systems, artillery components, firearms and other equipment to the Government of Ukraine, topping off a $1.5 billion total since February 2022.