Page 1934 - Week 06 - Thursday, 9 June 2016
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MADAM SPEAKER: I have called members of the opposition to order, and they know how they should behave. Mr Barr, on the question of the impact on rents.
MR BARR: Thank you, Madam Speaker. As I was saying, the change in methodology, on average, would mean around $150 a year, so that would equate to a little less than $3 a week. If you were to assume that would be fully passed on to rents, the maximum impact would be a little less than $3 per week. However, we do know that rental prices are, of course, the interaction of supply and demand in the rental market. With a significant addition of supply in the pipeline, there is no doubt that there will be downward pressure on rents in this city.
MADAM SPEAKER: Supplementary question, Mr Wall.
MR WALL: Chief Minister, will all unit owners now be offered kerbside rubbish collection as a part of their rate increases?
MR BARR: Where that service is practical, that service is provided to households in multi-unit developments. In some circumstances, clearly, that is not practical to have hundreds of individual garbage bins or recycling bins on very narrow streets. So there is a collective response across a body corporate for the delivery of those particular services.
MADAM SPEAKER: Supplementary question, Mr Wall.
MR WALL: Chief Minister, at what point will you acknowledge that your punitive rates increases are imposing a significant cost impost on so many Canberra families’ budgets?
MR BARR: The government recognises that in making a change away from inefficient taxes like stamp duties and insurance taxes we are saving many Canberra households thousands of dollars each year, and we also acknowledge that in making that transition we are asking the entire community to pay a little more. But they are the policy choices. You can tax seven per cent of the population and hit them for tens of thousands of dollars every time they move house. For example, if you have a baby and you need to move into a bigger house because your family is growing, Mr Hanson wants his hand in your pocket then for $25,000 or $30,000. That is the policy approach of those opposite. It is a choice; it is a choice between efficient or inefficient taxes.
It being 3 pm, questions were interrupted pursuant to the order of the Assembly.
Appropriation Bill 2016-2017
[Cognate bill:
Appropriation (Office of the Legislative Assembly) Bill 2016-2017]
Debate resumed from 7 June 2016, on motion by Mr Barr:
That this bill be agreed to in principle.
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