The Greens will support the first tranche of Labor’s controversial tax reforms, including an overhaul of negative gearing and capital gains tax rebates, all but ensuring the Bill will become law when it is debated in the Senate. The Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Reform No.1) Bill 2026, which passed the lower house earlier this month, includes an instant $1000 asset tax deduction and a $250 Working Australians Tax Offset.However, to pass into law, the Bill required support in the Senate from the opposition or crossbench, including the Greens. On Tuesday, the Greens announced they had resolved to support the changes in the Senate this fortnight having secured an amendment to “prevent wealthy property investors from exploiting a loophole to use self-managed super funds to buy up tax-advantaged investment properties and remove ministerial discretions that would have allowed a minister to wind back these reforms”.“This was a once-in-a-generation moment to help young Australianns, but by grandfathering in wealthy property investor tax perks Labor has once again chosen to put the 1 per cent over the millions of people trying to buy their first home,” Australian Greens leader Larissa Waters said.“Backing this Bill puts an end date on these tax breaks, but Labor’s low ambition means that that inequality and the housing crisis will be worse for longer. This enduring housing crisis will now be squarely of Labor’s design.“We are glad that the government has listened to some of the concerns raised through the inquiry process by the Greens and experts, but Labor has again ignored young people and renters.”Later, Senator Waters said it was an “open question” about whether the reforms would work, saying “renters and people who would like to have a house in this country will be right to hold the government accountable when homes are still unaffordable”.She said the party would also withhold judgment on the second and third tax Bills the government was set to introduce.“We haven’t seen what the government is proposing, so we will scrutinise those Bills in the normal fashion once the government proposes,” Senator Waters said.Greens senator Nick McKim accused Labor of having met a “once-in-a-political generation opportunity with an abject lack of ambition”. “Labor’s lack of ambition means that Australia’s housing crisis is now going to be worse than it needs to be for longer than it needs to be,” he said.“After so many opportunities to fix the housing crisis and so many failures to address the housing crisis, Australia’s housing crisis is now Labor’s housing crisis. “Labor owns this housing crisis lock, stock and barrel because it has consistently failed to do the things that need to be done to fix it.”The Greens had lashed Labor’s tax reform package for “locking in over $30bn in tax handouts” by grandfathering the proposed changes. Last week, Treasurer Jim Chalmers announced the government would wind back some of its reforms, announced during the 2026-27 federal budget.The changes includes a rolling back of the ministerial discretion powers that would have enabled the minister to determine what asset classes will be hit by the new capital gains tax rules, as well as the the definition of new builds central to the negative gearing changes.Angus Taylor has heavily criticised Labor’s proposed reforms, calling them a “assault on aspiration”.On Monday, the Opposition Leader slammed Labor’s “toxic taxes”.“Now, we don’t need a carve-out, we need an axe. This budget has been a flop and the flop should be dropped,” he said.“We’ll also reduce income taxes and reduce taxes on investment from businesses … with our instant asset write-off. “But we’ll have lower income taxes as well and this is crucially important. This government is funding its Budget not just with these new toxic taxes, but with their sneaky rising income taxes each year. “The higher inflation goes, the more those income taxes go up. We will bring that to an end.”Mr Taylor, in his budget reply, vowed to legislate an end to so-called tax bracket creep.Labor’s reforms have been subject to a truncated parliamentary probe, which heard mixed evidence.While the reforms were widely supported by housing advocates as improving access for younger Australians into established homes, they were rebuffed by members of the business community who have raised alarm bells about the potential impact on businesses, and other assets such as stocks. NDIS inquiry extendedThe Greens said on Tuesday they had also secured an eight-week extension to a parliamentary inquiry into the government proposed changes to the NDIS that would lead to more than 160,000 people being booted from the scheme. The inquiry will now run until August 14.Greens disability spokesman Jordon Steele-John, who has been heavily involved in the inquiry, said the proposed cuts to the NDIS were “one of the cruellest acts perpetrated on a community by an Australian government”.“Thankfully, the momentum behind these cuts is crumbling, and with growing public opposition, disabled people across the country will recognise this as a reflection of their strength and unity in defying this attack on their independence and dignity,” he said.“The Greens will continue to work alongside the disability community to build pressure on Labor and the Liberals to walk away from these appalling cuts.”Senator Steele-John said the extension would enable the disability community to keep organising and campaigning.“I call on every Labor and Liberal senator who has heard the disability community’s testimony that these cuts will up-end their community and kill people: go back to your party room and tell them what you’ve heard,” he said.“Tell them that supporting this Bill means hundreds of thousands of disabled people across Australia and their families will lose access to carers, equipment and supports they rely on everyday.“While we’ve secured some improvements and won more time for scrutiny, our objective remains the same: this Bill should be shelved.”Read related topics:Adam Bandt