Page 3073 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 16 September 2015

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arrangements. The $27 million outlined in the things that I have just spoken about excludes the construction cost, which would have been about $80 million. The rule of thumb for construction used to be 30 jobs per $1 million, so 80 times 30, that is, 240 construction jobs.

There is then the knock-on effect to local businesses, whether it is the removalists that cart people there and back, the furniture sales, the curtain packages, the carpets, and the additional things that people buy when they move into a new home. That is the problem—it is well and good to say, “We deserve 75 per cent of the windfall gain.” If there is no windfall gain, 75 per cent of zero is zero, and that is what you are getting in the main—in the town centres and in Civic where there are whole years where you get nothing from the lease variation charge. Under your own policy, which sees 50 per cent development in these places, these town centres should be thriving centres—but they are not.

Look at Northbourne Avenue. The government says that they are going to get a windfall from the light rail, all that development is coming to Northbourne Avenue. The lease variation charge, the lease variation tax, makes just about all of them unviable. Pick a block up Northbourne Avenue around 5,000 or 6,000 square metres. If you wanted to redevelop that and build some units, one example I have seen is that you forgo a $5 million or $6 million windfall.

If the properties are worth $9 million to $10 million as office buildings and you have to secure payments of $5.8 million, that means the total site cost is $15 million to $16 million. If the residential value is only $10 million it is not viable and it does not occur. This is a distortive tax. Standard pat lines from the Chief Minister are not going to change it. The amendment should go down. (Time expired.)

Question put:

That Mr Barr’s amendment to Mr Smyth’s motion be agreed to.

The Assembly voted—

Question so resolved in the affirmative.

Amendment agreed to.

Motion, as amended, agreed to.

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