Page 5683 - Week 17 - Thursday, 5 December 1991
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circumstances. Profit out of speculation on the land, though, is anathema to the leasehold system, and I think it is appropriate that we have 100 per cent betterment tax. Therefore, Mr Speaker, I move:
Page 87, lines 19 to 21, paragraph 183(b), omit all the words after "amount", substitute "equal to the increase in the value of the lease that would result from the variation".
MR KAINE (Leader of the Opposition) (4.02): I believe that Mr Moore would expect that I would oppose this amendment. Quite clearly, this amendment would simply kill off redevelopment of some areas of land in the ACT. There would simply be no likelihood that some of the run-down areas of Canberra would ever be redeveloped under such a regime.
I think that the Forrest bowling club is a classic example. There would be no redevelopment of the Forrest bowling club if the bowling club could not get sufficient return from redeveloping that block to allow it to redevelop its facilities. I think that that is denying a club that has been in existence since 1927 the right to continue in existence. I do not believe that that is reasonable. I do not believe that it is rational and I think that - - -
Dr Kinloch: Using public land for private profit.
MR KAINE: It is not public land, Dr Kinloch. It is leased land, just like the block that your house is sitting on. If you want to remove lessees' right to have some interest in their land, we will apply the same rules to the bit of land that your house is sitting on and see how you like it.
Dr Kinloch: I would agree to that.
MR KAINE: It is a very interesting argument. Dr Kinloch is prepared to declare a leased piece of land public land when it belongs to somebody else. This is the real NIMBY syndrome. If it is somebody else's lease, it is all right to declare it public land; but you do not believe that your own is.
I believe that the regime of betterment tax put in place by the Alliance Government last year - and I remind Dr Kinloch that he was a member of that joint party room and that he agreed to the regime of betterment tax that we put in place - provides sufficient return to the community for the community's interest in the piece of land, depending on the nature of the redevelopment, how long the lease has been held and whether it is a concessional lease or not. I think it is a very sensible regime. It does not kill off the likelihood of redevelopment of land that sometimes can run down beyond the control of the lessee, and this proposal would simply do that. I think, frankly, there is no rationality or anything else behind it, and I oppose it.
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