Page 94 - Week 01 - Tuesday, 15 February 2011
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MR SESELJA: Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. No big deal: 77 per cent! Wages have gone up, Mr Corbell says. But most people’s wages have not gone up 77 per cent in that time.
The level of services delivered to people since 2001 has certainly not gone up 77 per cent, and to claim that that does not hurt and that the government are not responsible is simply dishonest. I think again it goes to just how little regard this government sometimes have, this ACT Labor Party have, for how their policies affect the hip pocket of Canberra families. They simply do not seem to get it, nor do they seem to care.
We can look at parking and how much that has gone up—57 per cent since 2000. The cost of buying a home or renting a home in the ACT has become prohibitive for many young families. We see it regularly through the HIA Commonwealth Bank report. It looks at the income of the average first homebuyer in Canberra, which is higher than the national average, and then it looks at the mortgage that they need to take out to buy their first home, and it consistently places the ACT amongst the most unaffordable jurisdictions for first homebuyers. I heard again on radio yesterday the Chief Minister claiming that it was some sort of urban myth that Canberra is unaffordable. Has he actually spoken to some of these families who are renting in Canberra, who are looking for rentals or who are trying to buy a home?
What can the government do in relation to this? They control land release, and of course it was Minister Corbell who was the man who turned the tap off when it came to land release. It was Mr Corbell, when he was planning minister, who really started to cause problems that are still being felt. We see significant planning problems which
hold back the ability to build homes quickly and efficiently. The Hawke review has identified them. That is a failure of Andrew Barr and it is a failure of Jon Stanhope; they have control of land release and the planning system, and those things coming together, along with the failure to plan for infrastructure, make it more expensive. So when these young families have to pay more and more to get into their first home, when they have to pay more for their rents, they can thank this government for their policies. The ACT Labor government cannot run away from their policies, including the massive amount of stamp duty that people have to pay to purchase their first home.
You can either put downward pressure, through efficient land release, through an efficient planning system and through lower taxes and charges, or you can put upward pressure. And what do the government do? They have got massive amounts of stamp duty. Their whole budget strategy is designed on the back of homebuyers, particularly first homebuyers. They ride on the back of first homebuyers. But what do they now want to do? They now want to actually put a tax on units—not a little tax; a really, really big tax on units, a massive tax on units.
What do we think putting an extra $30,000, $40,000 or $50,000 in tax per unit will do to the cost of a unit in Canberra and the cost of renting in Canberra? Those Canberra families who are already struggling to pay the rent are likely to see their rents increase again in coming years as a direct result of this government’s policies. They will be paying for the government’s reckless spending through higher rents. They will be paying for the government’s reckless spending through higher unit prices.
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