Page 2574 - Week 08 - Thursday, 14 August 2014
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That gives me encouragement to continue to boost the supply of housing in the territory, that being the most effective way to put downward pressure on house prices. The next most effective way is to abolish stamp duty. That is what this government is doing, and in this budget we are delighted to be able to get rid of stamp duty for those over 60 who are looking to downsize into a property worth less than $600,000. Stamp duty is cut by up to $20,000. It is a tax the Liberal Party wants to levy on people over 60 that Labor has got rid of. Jeremy Hanson, Brendan Smyth, those politicians, want to get $20,000 out of the pockets of Canberrans over 60 looking to downsize. This government, through that initiative, has cut stamp duty by that amount. That is a significant disincentive. If you are looking to move, a $20,000 stamp duty bill is a significant hit. That is a tax we are getting rid of that those opposite want to keep and increase in the future. That is the clear policy difference between this side and those opposite when it comes to housing affordability.
MR HANSON (Molonglo—Leader of the Opposition) (12.00): Madam Speaker, I was not going to speak to this line, but the Treasurer has provoked me into responding to his comments. He is only looking at one small section of the over-60 community. Many Canberrans—in fact most, the vast majority of Canberrans—would like to stay in their home. What you find, if you go out and speak to people in the community, is that with older Canberrans many of them are asset rich and income poor. Through many of the more established suburbs—not fancy suburbs, but more established suburbs throughout Weston Creek, Woden, Tuggeranong, Belconnen, the inner north and the inner south—you will find people who are living on reasonably large blocks in houses where they raised their families or where they have done renovations but that are not necessarily fancy by any stretch of the imagination. These people may find that their pensions are going up at very moderate rates, two or three per cent a year. Or they may be superannuants; many of them have lost a lot of money in the GFC and are not getting a lot of money as self-funded retirees. But their rates are going up well in excess of 10 per cent. As we know, this reform from the government is “progressive:; that means that if you are on a bigger block, if you own a more expensive property, your rates will go up at a greater rate than the average 10 per cent across the territory.
Although Andrew Barr is absolutely right in what he has said about relief for those over 60 and stamp duty, for the vast majority of Canberrans this is a punitive tax that is unfair. As I recall, Madam Speaker, and I stand to be corrected, when the Australian Council on the Ageing appeared before estimates, I think a couple of years ago, they made this point. If you talk to people who are in the aged sector who represent people who are older, they will tell you that the rate increase, going up 10 per cent a year, year after year, is punitive. The people most directly affected by that, the people hurt by that, the people who are struggling to pay their bills, are older Canberrans.
The world’s greediest Treasurer comes in here and says that this is good news, that his tax reform is good news for older Canberrans. It is simply not true. It is good news for that small section who have made the decision that they want to downsize. For everybody else, what you have is Andrew Barr taking more and more out of their pockets every day and probably forcing them into a position where their only option is to downsize, because they can simply no longer afford to live in their homes, where
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