What is changing from 1st January 2023?

As the new year rang in, so too did a raft of new financial measures brought in by the Australian Government.

Here’s a recap of the major changes:

Larger ATO fines & penalties

Those who are late lodging their tax returns to the ATO will see increased fines and penalties from 1^st January 2023, with the Commonwealth Penalty Unit increasing from $222 to $275.  

For each late tax return (or BAS, IAS, TPAR etc) the ATO can impose one penalty unit for each 28-day period that the return is overdue, with a maximum of 5 penalty units.

Commonwealth Penalty Units dictate the value of fines not just relating to tax but also communication, financial & fraud offences.  

Super top-ups for downsizers

More Australians will now be eligible to make downsizer contributions to their super, with the eligibility age reduced from 60 to 55.

The downsizer contribution allows Australians to use the proceeds from the sale of their home to make a one-off post-tax payment of up to $300,000 ($600,00 for couples) to their super.

This will allow more older Australians to boost their super accounts and will potentially have the flow-on effect of freeing up housing stock for young families and individuals looking to buy a home.

Welfare payment increases

Around one million Australians will see an approximate $20 a week or 6% increase to their Centrelink payments. The boost applies to recipients of Youth Allowance, Austudy, the Disability Support Pension (DSP), isolated children assistance, mobility allowance, double orphan pension, carer allowance and pharmaceutical allowance.

This cash boost is in line with regular indexation, which increases with inflation.  

Cheaper medicines

The maximum cost of prescriptions on the Pharmaceutical Benefit Scheme (PBS) has dropped from $42.50 to $30. This is a significant decrease of 29% which marks the first time in 75 years that the general PBS co-payment has been reduced.

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