Page 2304 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 3 August 2022
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If this is all going to be by MOU, what’s to say that one day you won’t just
cease funding?”
The government just laughed. They said: “Oh Brendan!” They said, “What are you talking about, Smythy? As if we would do that! We will never do that.” They made it very, very clear. They made a steadfast promise that racing was an important industry and that it would continue to be funded by government. They guaranteed long-term funding. Many big money decisions were made on the basis of that very clear agreement. There are those in this government who wish to renege on that.
As the years progressed, more and more betting shifted to online sources. Racing began to miss out on a lot of revenue. The online betting agencies only paid tax based on their geographic location and, as such, the percentage of that turnover that would normally be funnelled back to the various codes could not be, because it was stuck in the Northern Territory or wherever they were. That all changed in recent years, as the various jurisdictions put in place a point of consumption online gaming tax so that tax was paid at the geographic location of the punter rather than the betting agency.
That tax raised $17 million last year, and then there was the sudden increase to 20 per cent as the rate in the ACT. I saw the one-line email that went to the betting agencies—I think it was on 12 or 14 July—and it said, “Just letting you know that the rate of point of consumption tax rose to 20 per cent as of two weeks ago. Thank you.” That was great consultation there. That tax raised $17 million last year and, with the sudden increase to 20 per cent, it is forecast to increase to $26 million in the current financial year. So we are talking about well over $100 million across the forward estimates.
In every other part of Australia, each of the somewhat-more-sensible governments has rightly chosen to redirect a portion of the point of consumption tax back to whence it came, back to the racing codes. They have done so because historically this would have been the case and because the racing industry is a massive economic driver and a huge employer. They have done so because—even in strong Labor jurisdictions, probably even more so in strong Labor states—there is an acceptance that horseracing is a part of the fabric of Australia. That is the acceptance that they have arrived at.
I am not expecting any support from the Greens on, this because the Greens are off in fairyland. I would expect the Labor Party to consider it very, very carefully. Can you imagine if Mary Porter were here or people like Ian De Landelles the discussions that they would have with you on this? You have trodden lightly in the MOU space in the hope that if you spent a piddlingly small amount on racing the Greens would just nod and let it go through. But they have not, have they? They have not done that at all, have they? We are about to see the extraordinary scenario whereby, if the press statements are correct, a minister of the government is set to vote against a line of spending in his own government’s own budget! What is that about? I cannot see a scenario where that has ever happened before.
What I guess I am saying to Labor is this: you have nothing to lose. At the moment, you are sitting in no-man’s-land; nobody is your friend. The Greens hate you because you are going to spend more than a dollar on racing; the racing industry hates you because you are strangling it. So you have no friends here. I do not know how many
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