Page 4614 - Week 15 - Wednesday, 15 December 1993
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Madam Speaker, the amendment made by this Assembly during the last sittings did provide certainty in respect of commercial contracts. It must be remembered that the parties to a contract for sale have 30 days in which to lodge the document, and a further 30 days after assessment in which to rescind and still obtain a refund. I think Mr Kaine, in his remarks, has skated over that a bit. He would have us believe that it is all a sudden death matter. It is not. It must also be remembered that when parties sign a contract for sale the purchaser has a legal interest which can be sold and that the primary reason for the amendment was to stop avoidance practices. Like the first amendment, it was an anti-avoidance measure. Avoidance practices have been detected by the Revenue Office. Parties have been on-selling their interest, rescinding the original contract and, of course, obtaining a refund.
In proposing the change made during the last sittings, and when speaking against the amendments proposed then by Mr Kaine, which are identical to those being moved by him today, I outlined the reasons why the Government believed that conditional contracts should not be encouraged; why parties to such contracts should not expect ACT taxpayers to bear the cost, through refunds of duty paid, when speculative projects failed. Madam Speaker, the Government does not intend to alter our position on this issue, and we oppose Mr Kaine's second attempt to make the changes to section 28 unworkable.
We have received representations from the business community arguing that the changes made to section 28 will have adverse effects on certain development projects. I am prepared to look at these concerns, and to look at them very closely. Indeed, Treasury officers have been holding discussions with members of the Business Council to ascertain whether the concerns that are now being pressed by the business community raise issues which were not taken into consideration by the Government. In the event that this is shown to be so, and there are specified circumstances which, if they occur beyond the 30 days limitation period for unconditional refund, justify an extension of the refund period, then the Government will be prepared to amend the legislation to specify all those reasons.
Madam Speaker, I repeat that I remain committed to the anti-avoidance measures that we have put in place, but if it appears that there is some specific circumstance where this anti-avoidance imperative is overridden by some other consideration we will take that on board and make the appropriate changes. Consultations on that matter are continuing; but I repeat, Madam Speaker, that clause 5 of Mr Kaine's Bill, I believe, produces an unworkable piece of legislation, and it is therefore opposed by the Government.
To sum up on the first point that Mr Kaine has made, the Government has taken action on that matter. It has been undertaken administratively on a retrospective basis, as Mr Kaine has said, quite correctly, and it has been implemented for some time now. I think that to change the period from 25 to 30 years is only going to confuse the issue further, without, in my opinion, any appreciable benefit to the business community. I think they are satisfied with the 25 years. All that I have seen from them indicates that they are satisfied with that 25-year period.
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