Page 2778 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 21 November 1989
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revenue for the citizens of this Territory. X-rated videos are legal here. This Bill will not alter the fact, and I have no problem at all in supporting the taxing of what is presently sleeping revenue potential.
The financial implications of passing this Act are enormous. The Government geared its first budget to take into account the receipt of some $2m this financial year and an estimated $5m to $7m each full financial year afterwards. These are only conservative estimates. The reality could prove that we will have an even greater source of funds coming into the ACT from this tax for the benefit of its citizens. The budget has been balanced to account for the expenditure of moneys raised through the tax and therefore if this Bill is going to be defeated these funds will have to be drawn from elsewhere. That is another fact that cannot be denied.
I ask this Bill's critics to name the budget program from which $2m will be extracted this financial year. Will it be health? Will it be education? Will it be tourism? Perhaps we will have broad support from the opponents of this X-rated Bill for an increase in payroll tax. All these are distasteful alternatives, but that is the economic reality. The budget relies on $2m raised from this tax up to July next year, and I ask all members who oppose this Bill to get off their moral high horses, to reconsider stubborn party policy and face the hard financial facts of this issue. This is a tax that is being raised basically throughout the rest of Australia. The citizens of the ACT are going to pay a very, very little amount of the total revenue raised from this tax. It will be coming from Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide.
Mr Kaine: That is a value judgment. You do not really know, do you?
MR DUBY: Well, I have been reliably informed, because I have investigated this issue, that 99 per cent of the revenue - - -
Mr Humphries: Yes, by the adult video industry?
MR DUBY: No, I am told that by the postmaster at Fyshwick, Mr Humphries. Opponents of the tax who are first and foremost moral crusaders and not economic realists are firm in the belief that the Liberal Party and National Party coalition will form the next Federal Government and that, true to espoused policy, that government will proscribe X-rated videos. I believe that is going to be the case, is not it, Mr Humphries? Can you not wait six months for the realisation of that? The loss of revenue sustained from the application of such a policy could then be fully or partly recompensed through the Grants Commission. When we have this tax raised and your Liberal Government bans it, we will then have a genuine claim for getting $5m from them.
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