Federal Budget 2026-27 — Gazing into the crystal ball

A version of this article was published in the June/July 2026 edition of The DCN.

The Commonwealth Government traditionally releases its Federal Budget for the forthcoming financial year in May each year. It is a ‘whole-of-government’ document that includes a ‘report card’ on some past activities, commentary on the state of the global and Australian economies, and anticipated future revenues, expenditures, and activities for the next financial year.

Aspects of economic and political policy contained in a budget are regularly and widely released before the ‘budget session’ of Parliament to ‘soften the political and electoral ground’ for those measures. Even so, there are often elements that can be considered part of a wider ‘crystal ball’, as many aspects of our national economy are affected by developments beyond our control.

The 2026/2027 Federal Budget

The Federal Budget for the period 1 July 2026 to 30 June 2027 was presented to Parliament on 12 May 2026. This does not mean that the budget has been passed or enacted — it was merely released following development that considered economic, electoral, and political factors. There will now be extensive public debate and negotiation to secure legislative approval.

Trade highlights from the Budget

While it is a ‘whole-of-government’ document and the focus was on issues such as general economic management, raising productivity and reducing the cost of living, there were some measures touching on various aspects of trade. Those highlights are set out below and are drawn from a media release by Treasurer Jim Chalmers dated 12 May.

Reducing red tape

• Reducing regulatory burdens in the financial sector by $780 million a year by progressing 14 legislative reforms, including by increasing the monetary thresholds for large proprietary companies, improving the efficiency of climate‑related financial disclosures, further modernising business communications by making electronic recordkeeping and communication with ASIC easier and increasing the cap on banks’ covered bond issuance.
• Reducing annual costs by $181 million a year with the reduction of duplicative, inconsistent or opaque data requests through 13 actions by financial regulators, while delivering more than 50 commitments in the Better Regulation Roadmap.
• Saving small businesses 376,000 hours on their tax returns by making the $20,000 instant asset write‑off permanent and moving towards dynamic monthly tax instalments.
• Working with the states and territories to harmonise payroll tax administrative arrangements.

Removing barriers to trade

• Abolishing another 497 nuisance tariffs, bringing the total tariffs removed to around 1,000 and saving businesses $157 million per year in compliance costs. The government is also consulting on abolishing another set of tariffs to further cut costs for Australian businesses, strengthen competitiveness and enhance productivity.
• Reducing red tape for export and import businesses with faster access to markets through a $7.6 million investment in expanding Australian Trusted Trader.
• Streamlining biosecurity border processes to help get fertiliser to farmers faster.

Building a single national market

• Making it easier to run a business across states and territories by harmonising state retail tenancy frameworks.
• Making more standards consistent across states and territories, with key agricultural and veterinary chemical products added alongside existing work on household electrical consumer products, waste and recycling, building and construction, and food standards.
• Accelerating and expanding heavy vehicle reforms to reduce fuel costs, increase transport productivity and support the uptake of heavy zero emissions vehicles.

Making it easier to engage with government

• Providing a further $654 million to expand the availability of Digital ID as a simple and secure way for Australians to verify their identity and reduce the sharing and storage of personal data by businesses, government and individuals.
• Improving the Consumer Data Right to make the storage and sharing of personal information easier and safer.
• Adopting a ‘tell us once’ approach so Australians spend less time providing the same information across different areas of government.
• Making it easier for businesses to engage with regulators through further investments in ASIC’s business registries, including linking Director IDs held by 3 million directors to ASIC’s Companies Register.

The Government is said to be looking at how these proposals affect the trade sector once they are translated into legislation. There is limited direct impact on our industry; however, the measures broadly support the facilitation of international trade across the supply chain and at the border.

Proposed amendments to dumping and countervailing legislation

Beyond the prominence of the budget, amendments to the dumping and countervailing regime are proposed through the Regulatory Reform Omnibus Bill 2026, which has now been introduced into Parliament. These amendments are viewed as an outcome of discussions between government agencies (including the Department of Industry, Science and Research and the Australian Border Force) and private sector representatives, including the International and Customs Brokers Association of Australia (IFCBAA) and food and beverage importers, through the International Trade Remedies Forum (ITRF).

As outlined in an email from the Anti-Dumping Commission (ADC) released shortly after the budget:

The Omnibus Bill includes several small but important trade remedies reforms, some of which were ‘early harvest’ suggestions from the ITRF Subcommittee on Strengthening the Anti-Dumping System. These measures mark some early legislative progress for trade remedies reform and will reduce compliance costs for business, simplify processes and focus on removing unnecessary administrative burden for system users and improve legal clarity.

The measures include:

• Streamlining duty assessment refunds to allow importers who do not wish to appeal a preliminary decision on refunds to receive that refund sooner, relieving cashflow pressures for SMEs.
• Automated exemptions for goods covered by tariff concession orders (TCOs) so that importers will not need to apply to be exempt from duties when a TCO is in place, removing an unnecessary administrative process and ensuring businesses do not have to pay duties longer than they need to.
• Aligning the definition of a subsidy to ensure our domestic legislation is consistent and aligns with the WTO Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures. This reduces the risk that decisions made by the ADC could be appealed at the WTO and overturned.
• Clarifying weighted average methodology which makes it clear how the weighted average of a price, value, cost or amount applies even where there is only a single transaction over an investigation period to reduce the risk of legal disputes.

Some developments may not make the final ‘cut’ in their current form and some may be further amended following negotiations at the ITRF reflecting the position of its member organisations.

Additional amendments have been endorsed in principle but require administrative rather than legislative change. A prime example would be the perennial request that government agencies provide a system by which a party can secure a ‘dumping advice’ or similar confirming whether dumping or countervailing duty will apply to goods to be imported.

Contact us

If you would like to discuss the customs and trade measures announced in the Federal Budget 2026-27 in greater detail, please contact Andrew Hudson, Partner — Customs & Trade, on +61 3 9321 7851.