Page 2826 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 13 August 2019
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there seems to be no rationality in how directorates and ministries are allocated. We know that Chief Minister, Treasury and Economic Development has numerous responsible ministers. Anybody who has had a glance at the Hawke review of the ACT government from all those years ago, on which the directorates are meant to be based, would know that what we see today bears almost no resemblance whatsoever to the recommendations that Dr Hawke made all those years ago.
As a result, after 18 years of Labor, Canberrans are being monumentally ripped off. Despite record revenue, the ACT will soon be in debt to the tune of $3 billion: interest-bearing liabilities of $3 billion. For the amount that this government is spending and borrowing each year, it would be reasonable for Canberrans to expect a premium service from the ACT government. For the number of fees, rates, taxes and charges that Canberrans pay, we should get world-class services in every single portfolio.
But, as we know, Canberrans are being ripped off. Canberrans are being ripped off through all means possible by this ACT Labor government. Despite the monumental increases in revenue that the ACT government are getting from the commonwealth and from ACT taxpayers, they are still incapable of balancing a budget. Canberrans are paying more but getting less. It is a rip-off.
The tax that was supposedly abolished all those years ago, stamp duty, continues to rake in hundreds of millions of dollars for the ACT government. Some $265 million will come in in 2019-20, because house prices—or, rather, the underlying land prices—are increasing faster than the government is decreasing stamp duty. They are having a bob each way. This financial year, 2019-20, will see $265 million raised through stamp duty. In contrast, when it was abolished in 2011-12 the figure was $239 million. That is an increase of some $25 million, not to mention the $1½ billion collected along the way.
And there is rates revenue, the biggest rip-off of all. We will go from $209 million in 2011-12 to $698 million in 2021-22. Commercial rates in particular are going up by six per cent, yet again, to $211 million. The government are not just increasing the rating factor with regard to commercial rates; they have got the hit squad doing the rounds of Canberra and changing the valuations of properties. I know of some properties that have had their valuation tripled—tripled—by the ACT revenue office, by the ACT Labor government, with no lease variation. There has been no lease variation, yet the valuation has tripled. Do members know what excuse the valuation office gave the owner of this block? “Consider yourself lucky, because we should have done it years ago.” That is the level of respect, or lack thereof, that this government has for small businesses in Canberra.
Unit title rates are also on the move. This year they are up 11 per cent, to $82 million. Whilst the government claims to bring about relief for those in apartment complexes and unit complexes across the ACT, the revenue is still going up 11 per cent.
Land tax has gone up seven per cent, to $150 million this year. Let us not forget that land tax is pretty much a renter tax. It gets passed on one way or the other. For a typical house that might pay $2,500 in rates and then a further $3,000 or so in land tax,
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