Page 1024 - Week 03 - Thursday, 21 March 2019
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
MR BARR (Kurrajong—Chief Minister, Treasurer, Minister for Social Inclusion and Equality, Minister for Tourism and Special Events and Minister for Trade, Industry and Investment) (5.48): What an extraordinary statement from the Leader of the Opposition: “Why don’t we get rid of duty across the board?” Yes, exactly. That is what we have been doing every year, and you have opposed it every step of the way.
Mr Coe: Then why are you doing this?
MR BARR: We are doing this is because it addresses a prior omission in 2015 when the provision for the exemption was inadvertently excluded. This change will provide certainty to transacting parties that a duty exemption will apply to the University of Canberra declared subleases with respect to the grant of a new lease on the surrender of a development lease where there is no change in beneficial ownership, that is, the grant of the new lease is to a person who was the lessee under the development lease. This amendment is in line with the intended policy in 2015. I repeat what I said in the in-principle stage: it ensures that the University of Canberra subleases are treated consistently with other crown leases in the ACT.
It is strange that the Liberal opposition has, continuing an approach of several years now, consistently opposed any measure that will improve the sustainability and standing of our city’s own university. What have you got against the University of Canberra? It is a university that is rapidly climbing up the rankings of the world’s best universities. The vice-chancellor and the board are taking the next step to enhance the campus, which will assist in putting the university on a solid financial footing for coming decades. With all of these benefits for our city’s university, our city’s publicly owned university, governed by an act of this Assembly, I am baffled as to why the Liberals continue to oppose the university’s growth and development.
Its one asset, its one major endowment as one of the youngest universities in the nation, is the land it was granted. That is why it is fundamentally important to that institution’s long-term success. Higher education is our city’s single largest export earner. It is an area of economic diversification that is a very significant priority for this city, for its residents and for the students and people who work at that university. Its viability in the long term is fundamental to the diversity of our higher education sector and to the diversity of our economy. That is why we have been so active in supporting our city’s university to grow.
On the more substantive point of why we do not get rid of duties in order to support economic development, that is exactly what we are doing for all properties. Under $1.5 million we have abolished duty altogether. We have cut commercial stamp duty at every level over a number of budgets now, and it is our intent to phase out that duty over time. Why? Because it is a distortive tax. It is one of the worst taxes levied by this level of government.
In his passion at that moment he just forgot for a second where he was and what he has consistently argued in every other debate on duty reform, and the position that his party took in 2012 and 2016 and clearly looks like taking again in 2020, which has been to support the maintenance of or increase in duties. If you are concerned that we are collecting more duty now, imagine what the total amount of duty collected would be if we had not been cutting rates and removing 70 per cent of commercial property
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video