Page 4157 - Week 13 - Thursday, 14 December 2006
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outweigh the expected revenue benefit of approximately $3 million, are expected to be derived from the portion of the tax extracted from the telecommunications sector.”
Soon it will not be just the telecommunications companies who feel this way. The utilities and telecommunications companies that will be affected by this new tax will inevitably pass the increased costs from this new impost straight through to the end consumers, therefore increasing the prices paid by those consumers. Yet the GST from which this government is already enjoying a steady stream of growing revenue already applies to these same services.
In effect, this new tax is something of a rip-off of ACT utility consumers because it allows the ACT government to effectively double-dip in its take of taxes on the consumption of utility and telecommunications services. This flies in the fact of the agreement this government made with the federal government in the intergovernmental agreement on GST and, more significantly, forces the people of Canberra to pay double tax on services they simply cannot live without.
Where else in Australia would we encounter a government that has the nerve to knowingly and deliberately double-tax its citizens just so its budget bottom line looks more attractive? I simply cannot fathom how the people of this territory, once they are fully informed about the implications of this tax, will willingly subject themselves to paying two lots of tax on such essential items as utilities and telecommunications services.
When you look at this issue from the standpoint of the territory’s general business climate, the news does not get any better. The unfortunate reality of the situation is that the application of this tax on telecommunications will discourage new investment by them in the ACT, primarily because no other Australian state or territory government jurisdiction has ever imposed such a tax.
This deterrent to new investment will only further disadvantage ACT businesses and households who are keen to adopt better IT and telecommunications technology. In addition, it will damage irrevocably the attractiveness of the ACT to new businesses dependent upon the use of advanced IT infrastructure, including, quite conceivably, new or expanded federal government departments.
I am not naive enough to say we will not have telephone services in Canberra but I am quite sure that, when Telstra are looking at where they will roll out new technology, we have suddenly made Canberra the most expensive option for them in Australia. It is beyond belief that this government would jeopardise the prospect of future investment by the private sector, and even the federal government, which would considerably assist in the long-term growth of the ACT economy just so it can make its budget bottom line look marginally rosier than it is at present.
In truth, this is what the Chief Minister proposes to do by attempting to pass this desperate and poorly thought through piece of legislation. To see the extent to which this bill is a hurriedly prepared and confused revenue-raising measure, we need only look to the fact that this government decided to dramatically change the mechanism of this new charge from a utility land use permit in the 2006-07 June budget to a network facilities tax.
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