Page 164 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 6 March 2007
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I will vote against this bill unless the Treasurer or the planning minister puts on the record how this scheme will be managed, how the community will be assured that the levy will be directed to deliver the outcomes that are planned and how the levy payers and businesses of Canberra City can shape the fund’s endeavours. As a responsible Assembly, we simply do not have enough before us to pass this right now. However, I have laid out the challenge. Tell us how it will work, let us see a good idea fleshed out and we will get behind it.
MR STEFANIAK (Ginninderra—Leader of the Opposition) (11.05): Mr Speaker, we have had in recent times a history of increased taxes from this heavily taxing government, and they are a real impost on the people of Canberra, the ratepayers, and businesses. I am hearing from quite a few people in Civic, quite a few businesses, that they have to pay anything up to 60 per cent or 65 per cent more in charges and taxes as a result of the 2006-07 budget, that they are doing it tough and that they are causing them considerable concern. Clearly, this tax is a real problem.
I think that this government has a habit now or is getting into the habit of taxing anything that stands still for more than 10 minutes. As my colleague Mr Mulcahy said—indeed, Dr Foskey made some good comments too—this levy is an inappropriate tax. It imposes a taxation burden for providing supposedly “a cleaner, safer and more attractive location for Canberrans and visitors to Canberra to enjoy”. That came from the Chief Minister on 14 December 2006. It places that on the shoulders of private individuals.
Public spaces are very much a government responsibility. I am scratching my mind to think of anything similar to this levy that the previous Liberal government implemented. In relation to suburban shopping centres, it implemented a very good renewal program.
Mrs Dunne: Which was well and truly within the purview of the government, not of the leaseholders.
MR STEFANIAK: Absolutely. I recall one that the Chief Minister opened after we finished being in government: $800,000 for rejuvenating the Higgins shops. There were a number of other shops in the pipeline there but this government, which has got itself into all sorts of trouble through its own economic incompetence, scrapped them. We now have this amazing levy which is meant to raise $1.2 million in the next financial year.
Public spaces are a government responsibility and I do not think private individuals should have to assume responsibility for maintenance of the city area. Indeed, as my colleague Mr Mulcahy has said, in private spaces—that is, commercial buildings—it is the responsibility of private landowners. They do have responsibilities, too, in terms of their leases. Private individuals are being taxed to pay for services that should be provided either by government or by other private individuals, and that simply is not fair.
Why should good taxpayers, property owners who ensure their premises are presentable and well maintained, have to share the burden for other owners who do
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