Page 2500 - Week 06 - Thursday, 23 June 2011
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MR SESELJA (Molonglo—Leader of the Opposition) (9.33): I want to touch on a few of the things that have been touched on in the debate. The first is the new Barr doctrine of sectional interests. The Barr doctrine of sectional interests is: if you are a renter or if you are looking to buy, you are part of a narrow sectional group who should not be given assistance and towards whom policy should not be directed. This is the new Barr doctrine, the new Labor Party doctrine, in the ACT, that somehow looking after homebuyers, somehow looking after housing affordability, is dealing with narrow interest.
We take a different view. We actually believe that looking after homebuyers, looking after people who are looking to buy homes, who are renting a home, is core business for a government, particularly in the ACT, which has so many of the levers at its disposal. And this government has shown itself to be completely incapable of exercising those levers.
When we look at why this is a recipe for corruption, we do not have to look very far. If we look at its simplest form, when you set a tax far too high and then give yourself lots of power to exempt, you are setting up the potential for corruption and dodgy dealings. You are setting up a situation where those who scream the loudest will not pay the tax or will not pay as much tax and everyone else will have to cop it. Those who get access to the government are the ones who do not have to pay as much tax.
So if we are serious about reform, we should be setting a tax at a rate which is reasonable so that we do not have to constantly be remitting it. And that is at the heart of the problem that the government faces. It has been so desperate to set it at such a high rate, not reflected in any of the valuations that are coming back at the moment, not reflected under rectification, they have been so keen to set it so high that they have to give themselves lots of outs. They have to make a virtue of the fact that there is going to be a remission for part of it. They have to make a virtue of the fact that there are going to be all sorts of ways for the Treasurer to remit this tax for all sorts of reasons.
It will be very difficult, no matter what you put on a website, for the community to know what has gone into that decision-making process. It will be nigh on impossible. And that is the fundamental structural problem you have got with this legislation. It is that if you set the tax at an unreasonably high level you will have to remit it and then it becomes a question of when you remit it. As sure as night follows day under this government, that will happen as a result of those who make the loudest noise, those who have access, not paying the tax like everyone else. But everyone else will cop this tax.
I come back now to why I think the government and the Greens did not want to debate these clauses individually. The reason they did not want to debate the clauses individually is—and we heard the answer just before lunch—if they did, they actually undermine their case. We saw two very clear examples of that from both Ms Hunter and Ms Gallagher.
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