Page 4630 - Week 15 - Tuesday, 6 December 1994
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
MS SZUTY (10.24): I thank the Chief Minister for providing me with extra briefing notes on this particular Bill which is before the Assembly today. I would like to quote a few paragraphs from the briefing from the Chief Minister's Treasury liaison officer dated 30 November this year. It says:
The Bill gives effect to the Government's decision to discontinue the practice of removing a taxpayer's right to pay their rates or land tax by instalment if an instalment is not paid by the due date. This action was a recommendation of the recent rates review, and the Government is anxious to introduce measures flowing from the review as quickly as practicable.
Given administrative constraints, many of the recommendations of the rates review cannot be introduced until the 1995-96 financial year. However, this measure is one which can be introduced quickly and easily. Experience has shown that a large number of taxpayers that have lost their instalment rights are low income earners facing financial difficulty, and the Government believes that any means of reducing hardship should be dealt with promptly.
The Bill proposes that the legislation be made retrospective to 15 November 1994, the date on which the Government announced its intention to discontinue the practice of removing the right to pay rates and land tax by instalment. This is also the day on which taxpayers that had not paid their second rates instalment for 1994-95 lost their right to continue to pay in instalments.
I commend the Chief Minister for this particular measure. I note that her rates review was concluded some little time ago and that another raft of recommendations is to come before this Assembly at some point. She is to be commended for the swiftness with which she has responded with this particular measure, which I understand from the briefing provided by her Treasury liaison officer is very much a social justice measure.
MS FOLLETT (Chief Minister and Treasurer) (10.26), in reply: Madam Speaker, I thank members for their support of the Bill. If this Bill was ever Liberal Party policy, it was one of the best kept secrets in Canberra. Madam Speaker, not even Ms Lucinda Spier, the Liberal Party's member of the ratepayers association, has ever mentioned it. In fact, all she has ever come up with has been a one-year - just the one year - capping of rates. Madam Speaker, I appreciate members' support for my initiative here. If they want to pretend that it was theirs, I guess that I feel a little bit sorry for them.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .