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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 6 Hansard (19 June) . . Page.. 2112 ..

MR SMYTH (continuing):

Initially, we in the opposition undertook a detailed analysis of the proposed system, to highlight he inequalities and lack of fairness that would result. I suspect the economic team in my office did more work than was done by the Treasurer. We took several suburbs-one in each of the significant town centre areas of the ACT-and looked at a medium house in a medium street, to determine what the impact would be on two houses side by side. We came up with some disturbing trends which clearly illustrate the inequities of this bill.

We have now seen the Treasurer's attempt to provide a more detailed analysis to support his position. To complement his one-page graph, we got a two-and-a-half page chart. So we have three-and-a-half pages of total economic modelling and analysis to support a major change to the rating system of the ACT.

This time the chart comprised a number of columns of figures. In my view, the Canberra Times did a pretty good job of manoeuvring, to make this more understandable by the general public. Unfortunately, what this more detailed analysis demonstrated was how to manipulate, with the use of percentage changes. Much of this more recent analysis is based around the percentage of changes in rates bills that will be imposed on ACT residents.

A change of rates of, say, 20 per cent, which the Treasurer estimates will take place in Macgregor, if the new system is not passed, sounds large-and 20 per cent is a large number. I'm told that that amounts to $3 a week, totalling $150 a year. For some, that is a significant amount of money, but the portrayal and spin-doctoring that was going on seemed to describe it as more than it really was. I submit that that is a far more reasonable and honest approach to the consideration of the impact of rating policies-and the outcome is not as awful as the Treasurer would have us believe.

The critical issue the Treasurer has in his sights is the higher rates bills faced by people whose underlying property values have increased significantly. It is not possible for either this government or this Treasurer to be a King Canute and prevent change from occurring. People will continue to move within our city; they will move in and out of the city and seek to redevelop parts of the city where they live. This very process will lead to disparate changes in property values in some areas of the city. Only the most draconian legislation would avoid these outcomes. That approach would be totally unacceptable in our jurisdiction.

The solution, Mr Treasurer, is not to try and hold back these changes, as you are proposing in your bill, by penalising people who move within the city, through imposing exorbitant rates bills upon them-or, indeed, on the people who happen to purchase a house after 1 July of this year.

If a problem exists, the approach should have been to implement a sound and robust rating policy, such as the one we have currently, and to then-more importantly-address the needs identified as the downside of such a system. We need an effective safety net, based around policies such as deferments and exemptions, for residents for whom rates bills are a problem-particularly for people who might have become asset rich and yet have limited cash flows, such as pensioners and self-funded retirees, who live in the inner parts of the city.

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