Page 2788 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 21 November 1989
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clearly has a different perception of its financial responsibilities to the ACT from that which we have. Quite clearly, when they are the ones who pay out the funds, their view is the one most likely to prevail. We need this sort of tax.
But Dr Kinloch said that, if we were to tax the industry based on a mail-order business, in some way this breaches the spirit, if not the letter, of the State laws of those States which do not permit X-rated videos. Now, that is a funny sort of argument. I am surprised at its coming from an academic of Dr Kinloch's standing, because I do not think it stands up to very close examination.
Where, for example, does that leave the poker machines that proliferate along the northern banks of the Murray River? Every weekend hundreds and thousands of Victorians swarm to New South Wales in order to play the poker machines, which are banned by law in the State of Victoria. Are they breaking the spirit? Is New South Wales breaking the spirit and the letter of the State law in that situation?
What about casinos, Dr Kinloch? Are the States of Tasmania and South Australia - and shortly the ACT - breaching the spirit of the State laws and the letter of the State laws in Victoria which ban casinos because we supply casinos and because people who want to gamble at casinos flock to Tasmania, flock to Adelaide and will flock to the ACT in order to indulge their desire to play poker machines? Quite clearly we do not, and it is an absolute nonsense to suggest that we are in some way violating the laws of those States.
I would like to refer you to the tobacco tax argument and the gambling tax argument. There are people who would put forward very strong cases. I am surprised, Dr Kinloch, that, in view of your stand on gambling, you do not find yourself obliged to object to the very substantial revenues which are collected from gambling here in the ACT.
In conclusion, Mr Speaker, I take you to a very authoritative editorial in the Canberra Times of Tuesday, 14 November. I have been very impressed recently with some of the writing that I have seen in the Canberra Times. It says:
Basically, the Government's Bill should be seen as what it is: a simple revenue-raising exercise. And it should be allowed to succeed or fail in the Assembly on its financial merits, not on its power to perform as a moral prescription.
That is what the risk is. Every speaker from whom we have heard - every sanctimonious speaker who has spoken about pornography - has turned it into a debate on that issue, not about the taxation issue. It appears that the majority of Canberrans are in favour of non-violent erotic videos being available to adults to watch in their own homes. Those opposing them are running against community opinion.
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