Page 1924 - Week 06 - Thursday, 8 June 2006
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the household budget and who has taken away their discretionary spending. When they want to go down to the video shop, or they want to go out to a restaurant or go down to their local club, they say, “Jeepers creepers, we have lost this much money because Jon Stanhope wrecked the budget, wrecked the management of the economy, and has had to tax us out of our existence. Sorry kids, we’re staying at home tonight; we can’t accommodate you.”
This is what this government is all about. This new Rates Amendment Bill of course is simply another grab for cash out of the already heavily taxed people of Canberra, who have no idea how much this budget is about to cost them. At the end of the day, Canberra households pay too much in taxes. They now face hundreds of dollars more in rates, levies and charges because the territory government could not manage its finances.
What about the Daily Telegraph today? Didn’t that tell the whole picture? That front page headline, which I am sure the Chief Minister was keen to see, will live in memory. Here we are, even the biggest selling paper in Australia has passed economic judgment on this Chief Minister. I think the term was “economic vandal”, wasn’t it? I will have to refresh my memory because I was so stunned when I read it that we could manage to capture national headlines over the poor budget management. I think the people of Australia are passing judgment about the economic incompetence. The credit rating agencies have forced change. The opposition’s suggestion for the presentation of accounts has begrudgingly now been accepted but, of course, we are now left with paying a price for all this which every man, woman and child in Canberra will in fact experience. This fire and emergency services levy is a disguised way of ripping another $20 million out of the pockets of Canberrans.
Of course, it brings us back to the question why this levy is being considered by the government to be immune from scrutiny in estimates. It is an extraordinary decision. Whenever you bring in a levy like this in the context of a budget period, it ought to be subject to appropriate assessment. It is a sign of the desperation of this government, a desperate grab for cash, and their unwillingness to be accountable. The fact that manifests itself is that ministers refused to take questions from the media on budget day and that for the opposition the courtesies of Treasury briefings were withdrawn. I think there was the vain hope that we might sit there and struggle through the books and not be able to read them in time for the television news.
Mr Stanhope: How many briefings did I get in four years of opposition, Mr Mulcahy?
MR MULCAHY: How disappointing it must have been for the Chief Minister to see the headlines already in the media: wise up to this work of incompetence in terms of the budget. I could talk for hours on this—
MR SPEAKER: For 22 seconds.
MR MULCAHY: —because there is so much material that this government has provided me. We will have an opportunity later today. I recognise my time is limited on this bill. It certainly ought to be referred to the estimates committee. It is an indefensible grab for cash from the people of Canberra, along with all the other measures that we will look at later. This one will hurt ordinary people. There is no apparent defence for this levy; it is an excuse to simply tax the community again.
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