Page 4165 - Week 13 - Thursday, 14 December 2006
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Telecommunications Act that prevent discrimination against telecommunication providers. Of course, it is conceivable that the tax rate could be higher for utility owners other than telecommunications, but this would add its own layer of distortion for the end company. In regard to encouraging better use of water and electricity, the charges for those services are set at a level to discourage waste and the water restrictions enforced are far more effective than a redistribution of this tax would be.
Finally, the tax is intended to raise revenue so that the government can continue to deliver the important service that the community expects and demands. Key public services can only be maintained if we have the financial resources to do so. As the Assembly is aware, the government has embarked on a comprehensive program to cut costs across the public sector but we also need to raise sufficient revenues. The revenue raised by this tax can be used far more effectively to redistribute social and environmental benefits than could be achieved directly through varying the application of the tax.
In that regard it is intriguing that the Liberal Party has announced another revenue measure that it will not collect in government. Today the shadow minister issued a press release entitled “New utilities tax completely unjustified”—a tax that the Liberal Party in government will not collect. It is interesting to reflect on that issue. That is $16 million in revenue on top of the $20 million fire levy that the Liberal Party in government will forgo. Add to the $36 million in revenue that the Liberal Party will forgo those other initiatives that this government has announced or pursued and that the Liberal Party will reverse.
We need to reflect on these issues and it is time for the Leader of the Opposition to answer these questions. That is $36 million a year in revenue measures that the Liberal Party in government will not collect. It will reopen the schools and establish a $10 million re-establishment fund, which will get it nowhere. It will reopen all those schools and not collect parking fees from our hospitals. It will re-establish the tourism bureau and a whole range of sports grants funds that have been discontinued. It will increase funding for Business ACT, reopen the Griffith library and somehow pay for all these things. Of course, the list is much longer but we get to the point where we know that the Liberal Party is not serious.
These are promises that the Liberal Party has made now, two years out, and that cannot be kept. It cannot keep promises that it is making now to the people of Canberra for pure political effect; and it knows that it cannot keep those promises. The Liberal Party cannot reopen schools, reopen libraries, abolish paid parking in hospitals, reinstitute funding at the level it has declared for tourism, reintroduce into Business ACT a different starting regime at significant cost, provide the additional support and services to the ACT Police and the Emergency Services Authority that have been promised and, at the same time, reduce revenue by at least $36 million, not counting the equivocal position expressed by the Liberal Party in relation to the water abstraction charge.
Essentially, we are talking about $50 million in revenue that will be forgone and at least $50 million in initiatives that will be pursued. In the last six minutes the bill for the Liberal Party’s promises totals at least $100 million. These are promises that cannot be kept. The ABC asked the shadow treasurer about his now essentially
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