Page 2090 - Week 07 - Thursday, 16 June 1994
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ACT taxes are amongst the highest charged in Australia. Mr Westende will compare them with other States when he has his turn to speak. We are talking about financial institutions duty, stamp duty, land rates and taxes. There is no doubt that high rates for land taxes, stamp duty, et cetera, are causing big property investors to leave the ACT market. Examples of that are the AMP Society, National Mutual, Colonial Mutual and Lend Lease. It is true that people are leaving residential property development in the ACT as well, in large numbers, and moving to developments such as Jerrabomberra Park in New South Wales. One asks why that is so. Is it because the Follett Government is doing so much for business? Of course, the opposite is true, because we are doing nothing. There is a possible loss to the ACT of businesses using diesel fuel - for example, earthmoving contractors. Who can forget the increase in the cost of diesel fuel? Businesses in the ACT are moving across the border due to the Government's removal of diesel fuel exemptions in the ACT.
This Government puts hurdles in front of businesses instead of creating the atmosphere for businesses to grow. That is what it does. What does it say that it does, though? It says that it supports the development of the business community. What utter nonsense! The ACT is the third highest taxed Territory or State for payroll tax, behind only Victoria and South Australia. Mr Westende, once again, will talk about payroll tax. He is living, breathing proof. He knows exactly what business is performing like because he runs a multimillion dollar business. He runs it very efficiently, and has national recognition for the way he does it. When he stands up he can talk about it from the coalface, not out of textbooks.
Canberra, as the national capital, should represent the whole of the nation, and it does, and we are very proud of that; but utopia, Mr Deputy Speaker, always comes at a cost. The ACT should remember that much of what is good here - the roads, the parks, the infrastructure - is a legacy from the spending binge by the Commonwealth prior to self-government. The ACT housing standards are very high. The average income is also very high. We Canberrans are, to a large extent perhaps, annual subsidy addicts. We are used to maintaining much of our economy and living standards on annual subsidies of one kind or another. But there is a high risk element to our company town economy. It is a very high risk because we have a bureaucracy and a government system more attuned to a sizeable nation state. Where in the budget have we seen any restructuring of that sort of situation? Nowhere. Where have we seen the three-year plan? Nowhere. It is steady as she goes; nip and tuck; do nothing; try to please everybody, especially six or seven months before an election.
For the overall good of the ACT economy, Mr Deputy Speaker, we must rid ourselves of the often held attitude that business as a group is possessed of some wonderful, never failing money pit. The ACT, to operate under the strong, growing and creative economy it should have, needs effective, timid and stable government. But what are we getting here from across the road? We are getting a government that panders to the pressure groups. It wants to satisfy them all the time. Mrs Carnell, on the other hand, has come forward today with an alternative way of restructuring the whole of the ACT economy and at the same time delivering services - no fewer services; the same or better services -
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