If, as widely expected, the federal budget winds back the tax benefits attached to property investment and family trusts, it will amount to a breakthrough that has eluded every federal government since the Howard era. The achievement will be symbolic as well as material.

Even Scott Morrison, as treasurer, flirted with some winding back of the excesses of negative gearing concessions to property investors. Labor’s modest proposals for reform at the 2019 election were part of the mix that cost Bill Shorten victory at that election.

While Howard was not responsible for negative gearing, his government introduced the 50% capital gains tax concession which had added large incentives to property investment. Meanwhile, even while wages grew during the boom of the early 2000s, the price of houses grew faster.

Howard publicly celebrated the increased value of housing. Who wanted their home to be worth less, he asked? Howard knew he was on to a winner so long as those who owned their homes – and perhaps an investment property or five on the side – would continue supporting him.

If you had run up a huge debt in the process of buying a home or a suite of investment properties, you were even less likely to look favourably on risk-taking at election time, as Mark Latham found to his cost in 2004. Property owners were most likely to be middle-aged and older Australians. They........

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