Page 180 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 6 March 2007
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MR SPEAKER: Order!
MR STANHOPE: It is rates legislation. It is raising money to be expended for the public good. Let us add it to the list. In the context of the debate today this is not an expenditure for governments to facilitate. Just as the fire levy will be abolished, this issue needs to be put on the record. At some stage the Liberal Party must begin to answer the question. Here is another $1.4 million of annual expenditure mooted for the city that the Liberal Party will not collect or spend.
This comes on top of the fire levy which the Liberal Party has promised to abolish, the utilities levy which the Liberal Party has promised to abolish, the wage price index calculation as a means of calculating a certain range of charges, and the water abstraction charge which the Liberal Party has promised to abolish. The Liberal Party cannot escape the necessity to respond to this $100 million of annual expenditure or revenue which, on election to government, it will abolish. We are now up to $100 million with the water abstraction charge, the utilities levy and the wage price index.
Mrs Dunne: Point of order. Mr Stanhope continues to misrepresent the position of the opposition on the water abstraction charge. It has never said that it would take that away.
MR SPEAKER: Order! There is no point of order.
MR STANHOPE: The most significant part of the debate that we have had today, over and above the extent to which this opposition turns its back on legitimate representations from the property council and from the City Heart Association, is this acknowledgment once again, this addition to the list, of charges which the Liberal Party will not collect in government. Opposition members have stated unequivocally that they will not collect the fire levy.
Mrs Dunne: You said it was not a tax. You just contradicted yourself.
MR SPEAKER: Order, Mrs Dunne!
MR STANHOPE: They will not collect the utilities charge, they will not collect the water abstraction charge and they will not apply the wage price index to their calculations of charges. Today we heard that they will not collect the city heart levy. These are almost $100 million worth of recurrent charges which the Liberal Party in government will not collect. When will the leader of the opposition tell us which $100 million of recurrent expenditure his government will abolish?
What $100 million of recurrent expenditure will the leader of the opposition cut on coming to government? You have promised in this place to cut the fire levy, to cut the utilities levy, to cut the water abstraction charge and not to use the wage price index. You will now not collect this $1.4 million worth.
Mr Mulcahy: You have got that one right.
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