The federal Labor government has broken or abandoned several high-profile promises since 2022 — most notably its pledge to deliver the Stage 3 tax cuts unchanged, its "$275" household power-bill cut, and its repeated assurance that it would not touch negative gearing. But an independent tally tells a more balanced story: most of the commitments it was elected on have been kept. Here is what the record actually shows.
How many promises has Labor broken?
More were kept than broken. The RMIT Promise Tracker, which followed 66 of Labor's 2022 election commitments, found the government delivered roughly 70% of them — at least 46 — while about 14 (around 20%) were broken, with a handful stalled. RMIT's analysts concluded the Albanese government performed "on a fairly level footing" with comparable governments. Among the clearly unmet pledges: lifting real wages above pre-election levels, delivering 450 gigalitres of Murray-Darling environmental water (only 27.5GL was achieved), and establishing a Makarrata Commission, which the government walked away from after the 2023 Voice referendum was defeated. So the "broken promises" charge is real — but it sits within a record where the majority of pledges were delivered.
What happened with the Stage 3 tax cuts?
This is the most-cited broken promise. Before the 2022 election and after taking office, Anthony Albanese repeatedly committed to implementing the legislated Stage 3 tax cuts unchanged. In January 2024 the government redesigned them instead: it cut the bottom rate from 19% to 16%, lifted thresholds, and halved the cut for people earning over $200,000 (from about $9,000 to roughly $4,500), while giving middle-income earners around $804 more than they would have received. Shadow treasurer Angus Taylor called it "the mother of all broken promises"; the changes passed the House on 15 February and the Senate on 27 February 2024. The government's defence was that cost-of-living pressures justified redirecting relief — and most taxpayers ended up better off, which polling suggested voters accepted.
Did Labor break its "$275" power-bill promise?
It has not been met. Announcing the "Powering Australia" plan on 3 December 2021, Albanese said modelling by the firm RepuTex showed electricity prices would "fall from the current level by $275 for households by 2025." Instead, household power bills rose over the following years rather than falling against the 2021 baseline (a median annual bill of about $1,209). Treasurer Jim Chalmers has attributed the failure largely to Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine and the global energy-price spike that followed — an external shock the original modelling pre-dated. The promise was specific and time-bound, and on its own terms it was not delivered.
And negative gearing?
Labor spent the 2025 campaign ruling out any change. Asked in Cairns on 8 April 2025 whether he ruled out changes to negative gearing and the capital gains tax discount, Albanese replied, "Yes. How hard is it? For the 50th time," The Nightly reported. Yet in 2026 the government moved to curb negative gearing and scrap the 50% CGT discount, with the measures passing the House on 4 June 2026. Deputy opposition leader Jane Hume said the earlier denials had "been a lie"; Albanese argued the election result was "the foundation for Labor's agenda, not the limit."
The record at a glance
| Promise | What Labor pledged | What happened |
|---|---|---|
| Stage 3 tax cuts | Deliver them "unchanged" | Redesigned (Jan 2024); >$200k cut halved, most taxpayers got more |
| Household power bills | Cut by $275 by 2025 | Bills rose; government cites the global energy shock |
| Negative gearing / CGT | Ruled out any change (2025) | Curbed; 50% CGT discount scrapped, passed House Jun 2026 |
| Real wages | Above pre-election levels | Not delivered (RMIT) |
| Murray-Darling water | 450 GL | 27.5 GL delivered (RMIT) |
| Makarrata Commission | Establish it | Abandoned after the Voice referendum defeat |
How does the government justify it?
Its consistent line is that circumstances changed. On Stage 3 and power bills it points to the post-Ukraine inflation shock and the cost-of-living squeeze; on negative gearing it casts the changes as using "every lever" on housing within a mandate it treats as a floor, not a ceiling; and on the Makarrata Commission, RMIT notes the retreat followed the "changed political circumstances" of the referendum loss. Critics counter that several of these were explicit, repeated commitments — and that a reason for breaking a promise is not the same as keeping it. Both things are true: the government has a defensible delivery rate overall, and it has clearly broken some of its most prominent and specific pledges.