Page 1227 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 6 April 2016
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Meanwhile we have every respected economic commentator in this country and political leaders across the political divide, including the Liberal Prime Minister, acknowledging the importance of state tax reform. If a bunch of leading economists and organisations and their own federal leader will not sway those opposite, nothing will, Madam Deputy Speaker. Nothing will.
This is the most conservative branch of the Liberal Party in this country—the Tea Party advocates, the people out on the crazy fringe of the Liberal Party with Zed Seselja, Cory Bernardi and all of the flat earthers who occupy the right-wing fringe of the Liberal Party in this country. They have amongst their closest confidantes and friends Jeremy Hanson and Brendan Smyth.
Madam Deputy Speaker, I have spoken many, many times in this place about the details of the territory government’s taxation reforms, but Mr Smyth has given me another opportunity. For the benefit of those opposite, let me remind the Assembly that the government is reforming the territory’s tax system to ensure that it is fairer, it is simpler, and it is more efficient.
We are now nearly a quarter of the way through this tax reform program, and some very significant gains have already been made. We have reduced stamp duty in every budget, and these rates will continue to be reduced in every budget that I deliver. Lower stamp duty means improved housing affordability for Canberrans for those on low incomes, for those entering into the housing market for the first time, for those wanting to downsize to a smaller property, and for those who may have had a new addition to their family who are looking for a larger property.
Compared to before tax reform started in 2011-12, someone purchasing an average property in the ACT is saving in the order of $6,000 to $7,000 in stamp duty. For those purchasing a lower value property of around $300,000, the saving is nearly $3,000. For those purchasing a $750,000 property, the saving is approaching $8,000. And that is just in the first few years of tax reform.
By reducing the up-front cost of home purchases, mortgage costs for home owners are also reduced. The preference of those opposite is for people to have to take out a mortgage for their stamp duty payments and then pay 30 years of interest on that as well.
Not only do they want to gouge them at the start of the process, but they are happy to gouge them even more. That is their policy position: how much can you rip out of homebuyers at the point of purchase? That is their preference—that people will be hit with a large up-front tax. These guys want to put that tax back up again, so they want to add thousands of dollars to the cost of the purchase of a home in this city. That is their stated position. They oppose the government’s tax reform and they have done so in every budget and every year since the reform process began. They will immediately revert to putting all of those stamp duties back up, putting a tax back—
Mr Hanson: No, we won’t. Who said that?
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