Page 2615 - Week 09 - Tuesday, 11 August 2015
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It is important that these recommendations are about developing a vision for Canberra as a whole; it is not about a vision for a train. It is about a vision for the sort of city that we could be, that plays to our strengths and that allows us to unlock the potential of the people of the ACT. We need more businesses which, hopefully, we tax less, instead of fewer businesses which Andrew Barr, Treasurer and Chief Minister, simply wants to tax more. We get it every day. We hear it with compliance costs. Mr Wall as shadow minister for small business will have a number of stories, I am sure, to tell us of the businesses he speaks to, as do I.
All we have is a one-trick pony, and it is called land. They are obsessed with land. They think that unleashing capital metro on the people of the ACT will somehow mysteriously unlock the land values on Northbourne Avenue and the surrounds, but the problem with that is that they put a tax on it. “Yes, this is our tax policy. We want to unlock something, but before we unlock it we’re going to tax it.” You only have to look at the number of cranes in the CBD—I think there is one. You only have to look at projects like the Manhattan, which is finished. The old development used to give the government about $65,000 a year in rates. The redevelopment, the Manhattan, I think now gives them something like $750,000 a year in rates. This is what we should be looking at. Under the new lease variation charge regime, something like the Manhattan would not have gone ahead. Why? Because under this government’s high taxing regime, it is just not viable. That is the problem.
The government do not get business, and they do not understand. Up until now the lease variation charge was meant to be taking about $28 million a year, but in this year’s budget it is down to $16 million. That is slowing the growth of Civic, because the government are greedy. They are greedy because they are lazy because they cannot unlock the value, as I have just pointed out, for instance, of the arts community.
When you talk about the arts community and how it adds to the economic overview and the economic wellbeing of the territory, at the outer limits it is things like advertising, architecture, design, jewellery, craft, computer systems. As you move in closer to the heart it is things like music, literature, performing arts, the visual arts, sound recording, video games—we have the AIE; will they support the AIE in their bid?—radio, television, publishing, parks and zoos. Then you go to the inner circle, which is things like film, photography, museums, galleries, archives and libraries, all of which we have in spades. In many cases we have the best of those sorts of facilities in this country. But the government are so busy taxing people because they do not know how to diversify the economy. They have the glib lines and all the talk. Let’s face it, the launch of their new business policy was simply the rebadging, renaming or relaunching of old policies. There is not a great deal that is new.
It is time for a long-term vision for Canberra. It is about a long-term vision that plays to the things we are good at. It is about a vision that builds on things we either have here or could have easily here if we get the tax settings right. It is not about taxing people more; it is about spreading the burden. Many have already paid for a long time either through their service or through transactions years ago, and they are now being hit with a double whammy of getting no benefit from the government’s supposed reduction in stamp duty. It is the taxes on small businesses. It is the increased fees and
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