Page 3448 - Week 08 - Thursday, 23 August 2012
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this year. Many Canberra families are facing significant increases that they did not expect. But we know that, in coming years, if Labor is re-elected, under the plan that they have set out, all Canberra families will face significant increases in their rates.
All Canberra families will see their rates bills go through the roof as an effective land tax on their home as the family home loses its tax-free status, as Mr Barr foreshadowed in his maiden speech. The family home is no longer going to be the tax haven, as Mr Barr described it, and we will see in coming years, if Labor is returned, a massive burden placed on Canberra families. This is not to be underestimated in terms of the significance of how this will affect people.
Let us think of the self-funded retirees, many of whom are not going to receive concessions on their rates. Some will receive concessions; some will not. But many self-funded retirees will not be getting concessions. Their incomes are relatively fixed—they are not going to go up much if at all, and they are going to see their rates bills every quarter going up significantly. Where are they going to find the money? Where will the Canberra couple in their 70s who may have been retired for 10 years or so and who are trying to make ends meet find those extra hundreds and even thousands of dollars every year that ACT Labor wants them to pay for their rates?
This is a significant problem, and what we saw today in the failure of Mr Barr to answer the information, or the misinformation, that has been put out there by this government on these rates is worth reflecting on. The very first piece of information that people are getting in their mailboxes on tax reform is misleading. It is not telling them what is actually going to happen. In one case it is a flat-out lie; it is simply not true that every buyer of a home under $1.2 million is going to pay less. No, that is not true because, in fact, many, if not most, first homebuyers will actually pay more. Most first homebuyers buy established homes, and they are no longer going to be eligible for the concessions. So the very first piece of taxpayer-funded propaganda from this government about a fairer, simpler tax system does not tell the truth. It does not tell the truth about first homebuyer stamp duty and how first homebuyers of all people are going to be slugged under this scheme. The very people you would think may benefit from a change like this will actually be paying more.
In addition, if you look at the brochure, it does not really tell you that your rates are going up. They neglected that bit. In the first panel as you open up the brochure is an explanation of what this reform is, and the first panel tells you a bunch of things. It tells you some of the taxes that are going down, and then it says that rates will be reformed with the aim of making them fairer. There is a euphemism if we have ever heard one. No, rates will be going up significantly. Families will see their rates bills go through the roof in coming years under this reform.
Let us be clear about this. Buried at the very back of the brochure in small print is a mention that rates will go up. So the first piece of information given is absolutely misleading information to first homebuyers. It is incorrect information, and the government hide the real reform, the real change, for most people, which is that they will see their rates bills go up significantly. This is, of course, coming on top of rates increases over the last decade under this government of about 80 or 90 per cent on average. They have already seen an increase of 80 or 90 per cent, and now they are going to face an even more marked increase in coming years if Labor are re-elected.
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