Page 1329 - Week 05 - Thursday, 31 May 2007
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totally disillusioned with this government’s capacity to manage the finances of this territory. I think Ms Porter’s motion will alert many community groups and send a very mixed message to them about their ongoing viability under the Stanhope government. You can see it—rationalisation all the way through.
Finally, not one speaker from the government has been able to bring himself or herself to talk about GST revenue to the territory. Perhaps they think that if we do not talk about it, people will not question how they have squandered it.
MR SESELJA (Molonglo) (4.39): I had to laugh when Mr Corbell started his speech with the usual refrain from the Labor Party that a drover’s dog could have delivered the kind of economic benefits that we have seen over the past 11 years under the federal government. What is he basing that on? Over the last 11 years we have seen the Asian financial crisis, a major recession in the US and most major European nations go through a recession at some stage—yet the Australian economy has continued to grow and has continued to perform well.
In that time we have seen $96 billion of Labor Party debt paid off. We have seen taxes cut year after year. We have seen not just an income tax cut for the last four years but a cut in the top marginal rate. The Labor Party thought in 1996 that people on $50,000 a year were rich—so presumably they now think that people who are on about $65,000 or $70,000 are rich, because that would be the inflationary rate—and they were slugged with the top marginal tax rate at $50,000. We have seen that go up. We have seen the middle rate cut. We have seen low rates cut. We have seen family tax benefit flow to those families who most need it. Low and middle income families with children are seeing the benefits of this economic management.
Mr Corbell says, “Well, a drover’s dog could have done it.” Despite all the evidence to the contrary, despite the federal government having had to deal with national security challenges and despite the increase in funding for Medicare, for roads and for education, he says, “A drover’s dog could have done that. They could have paid off $96 billion of debt. They could have established a future fund, an endowment fund, cut taxes, increased funding to Medicare, increased funding to national security and increased funding to roads.” The analysis that Mr Corbell has engaged in is laughable.
What we are seeing now is a result of sound economic management, most of which has been rejected or opposed by the Labor Party. Who would forget that they voted—was it the year before last?—against the tax cuts? Mr Beazley voted against the tax cuts. They voted against the GST. The Chief Minister, of course, is anti-GST. I think if he had his way he would be giving it back. He would be giving back all of the extra revenue that we are now seeing, because we know that he came in this place at the time and said what a terrible, unfair tax it was. But of course he is happy to accept that money. In fact the states and territories have never had it so good in terms of revenue they are receiving from the commonwealth as a result of the GST.
Ms Porter invites us to compare legacies in her proposal as a matter of public importance: “the importance of responsible financial management in providing the basis for the delivery of sustainable, high class services to the ACT community it.” It is clear that there has not been good financial management at this end, in the ACT government, under the Labor Party over the past five years. If anyone was in doubt
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