Page 1513 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 7 May 2008
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Mr Smyth: Talk to Mr Corbell; he’s the expert.
Mr Corbell: It still hurts, doesn’t it?
Mr Smyth interjecting—
MR SPEAKER: Order, Mr Smyth!
MR STANHOPE: Here we are: “We dismiss the possibility of aged care or housing for the aged and in the same breath we show no concern for the possibility of at least exploring the possibility of affordable housing on these sites.” We do not adopt that shallow, short-sighted, populist approach to significant issues of policy and of community.
Mr Smyth: Mr Corbell carried it; you are right.
MR SPEAKER: I warn you, Mr Smyth.
Housing—affordability
MRS BURKE: My question is also to the Chief Minister and Treasurer. I refer to your comments on radio on 23 April that you were happy for first home buyers, representing one per cent of the population, to pay four per cent of the ACT government’s taxation revenue and stamp duty. Chief Minister, given that housing affordability is at record lows, why are you so happy for first home buyers to bear this burden of stamp duty?
MR STANHOPE: At no stage did I say—it is simply not true—that I was happy for one per cent—
Mr Seselja: You’re not going to do anything about it.
MR STANHOPE: I did not say it. It is not true; it is simply false. I said no such thing.
Mr Seselja: You’re not unhappy because you’re not doing anything about it.
MR STANHOPE: I said absolutely no such thing. It is a false assertion. In the context of stamp duty, one does need to consider the first policy position put by the Liberal Party in 3½ years. The policy involves providing to first home buyers, un-means tested, a complete exemption from stamp duty. I do not think it is good policy. I do not think it is good policy at all to provide, in an un-means tested way, an exemption from stamp duty to a person who is not in financial stress, who is not in housing stress, who is suffering no economic, financial, housing or other stress at all. It is a policy that on the face of it says, “We, the Liberal Party, will provide this to you, even if you are a millionaire.”
The Liberal Party policy is as simple as this: it proposes that, even if you are a millionaire, the Liberal Party believes that you deserve to be freed from a community
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