Page 3522 - Week 12 - Thursday, 20 September 1990
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
quote have been converted to a percentage of turnover for ease of comparison. To make the comparisons fair, the revenue percentages include all sources of revenue, and that includes, for example, licence fees. In other words, separate licence fees have been grossed with taxes. In 1982-83 New South Wales collected 2.33 per cent of poker machine turnover as tax. The ACT figure at that time was 1.3 per cent. ACT rates have, of course, risen since then, but until now have historically been well below New South Wales levels.
With the new measures included in this Bill, ACT gaming machine revenue, expressed as a percentage of turnover, has now risen to 2.5 per cent. This is almost identical to the figure for New South Wales. It is anyone's guess as to what the next New South Wales budget holds in store. The New South Wales budget has recently been brought down. But, by comparison with Queensland, the ACT rates are positively benign. According to an item in the Canberra Times on 10 September, entitled "Watchdog to Keep Control of Queensland Pokies", Queensland intends to tax poker machines at 4 per cent of turnover. This is 1.6 times the ACT rate. Queensland clubs are certainly being thrown into the deep end. In comparison, ACT clubs have had a long easy walk across the beach before getting their feet wet.
Mr Speaker, while I have compared ACT rates with those in New South Wales, I should add that this is for the purposes only of responding to criticisms that have been made about tax rates. The ACT is different from New South Wales and the Government has no policy of meekly following what is done in that State.
New South Wales has many more large clubs than we do. It calculates its tax in a different way. It permits draw poker machines in hotels but not clubs, while in the ACT the clubs have most, but not all, of the draw poker machines. And spending rates differ. New South Wales residents spend $340 per head each year on gaming - gaming consisting essentially of poker machines and lotteries - while ACT residents spend only $305. The Licensed Clubs Association has complained that, unlike New South Wales, the ACT is not dropping the gaming machine licence fees that apply in addition to the gaming machine levy or tax.
Licence fees were introduced to cover the administrative costs of gaming machine regulation. Those administrative costs have not gone away. While New South Wales is abolishing licence fees, they are adjusting tax rates upwards to compensate. The figures I have already quoted include the costs of ACT licences. In other words, even when licence fees in the ACT are taken into account, overall ACT and New South Wales gaming machine tax rates are almost exactly the same. The Government's response, therefore, to the Licensed Clubs Association is that total ACT gaming machine taxation has only now, after nearly 15 years of poker machines being in the Territory, caught up with New South Wales.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .