Although the central bank voted in favour of a hike, the 5-4 split was the narrowest decision since the RBA started publishing votes in July 2025.
The readout of the meeting, published on Tuesday, showed the four doves who voted for a hold were worried about several uncertainties they believed merited waiting until May before hiking rates.
"Members noted that while private demand growth had picked up as expected in the December quarter 2025, the outcome for consumption had been weaker than expected," the minutes read.
"Taken together with the signal from indicators of household spending in the March quarter, the dampening effect of higher petrol prices on real household disposable income and subdued consumer confidence, there was a risk that consumption growth would be weaker than forecast in February.
"Given the possibility that this could lead to weaker GDP growth, there was a case to wait for a little more data to assess the degree of inflationary pressure coming from excess demand."
Treasurer Jim Chalmers said it was not inevitable that the economy would shrink due to the war, but forecasts were still evolving given the volatile situation.
"We've got a few weeks still before we finalise the forecast for the budget," he told reporters.
"We're not currently anticipating our economy to go back, but obviously, there's more than the usual amount of global economic uncertainty."
Consumer confidence has plummeted since the start of the war, causing economists to slash their predictions for household spending in 2026.
The ANZ-Roy Morgan consumer confidence index reached a new low in the week to March 29, down 4.3 points to 58.8.
"All subindices deteriorated last week, with household confidence in their current and future finances at their lowest level since the subindices were first available in 1985," ANZ economist Sophia Angala said.
Inflation expectations were also the worst on record, rising from 6.9 per cent to 7.3 per cent.
"We expect household spending to weaken in response to the impact of inflation and higher interest rates on disposable incomes," Ms Angala said.
The RBA doves were also concerned about the strength of the jobs market, citing falling unit labour costs as a sign it might not be as strong as their colleagues believed.
"A final source of uncertainty related to how the current conflict in the Middle East would evolve," the minutes said.Â
"There was considerable uncertainty about almost every aspect of the conflict at this early stage and therefore its impact on global and domestic economic conditions."
However, the majority still believed an interest rate rise was warranted to "demonstrate a clear commitment to returning inflation to target" and avoid the need for much more restrictive measures in the long-term.
