Mr AH KIT - 1999-04-29
The Country Liberal Party’s handling of the taxi and private hire car industry has led to a flooding of taxis. The industry is facing unsustainably low returns, with many operators working incredibly long hours for poverty wages. What action will the minister take to alleviate this bleak scenario?
ANSWER
Mr Speaker, answering on behalf of the minister for transport, we’ve saved the owners of taxi licences from financial doom. Had we not allocated something in the order of $27m to buy back licences, in a year or two’s time the value of those licences - naturally with a flow-on impact on drivers, as the member for Arnhem interjects - the value of licences would have been very nearly nothing, and in accordance with …
Mr Toyne: What about the drivers?
Mr REED: I just mentioned drivers, but it didn’t get through the bone. Get a screwdriver to clean your ears out or something like that. See if you can get a bit of knowledge through there. Go and sit under the Tree of Knowledge over in the council yard. Go and sit over there, you might absorb something, get something through the bone. You ain’t doing too much good at the moment on behalf of your constituents.
The member should stop being so deceitful and telling students at Alice Springs High School that it’s going to close, stop being so deceitful by misrepresenting what’s actually in the budget. He should talk about what’s in the budget, and give some credit to the quarantine officers who work hard to look after the primary industry sector of the Northern Territory. Then he might do something positive for Territorians. He might also tell them what he’s studying at university, instead of taking on his doctorate before he actually gets it. But I digress.
Getting back to the reform of the taxi industry, we acknowledge as a government that it’s been difficult for the industry. We have put an enormous amount of money forward for the purchase of taxi licences so that the people who bought them over the years would recover a reasonable value and be able to continue in a business, albeit in a different way from in the past. I think there’s a bright future, not only for the taxi industry ...
Mr Ah Kit interjecting.
Mr REED: The member for Arnhem may laugh, but he hasn’t got a bright future. When he was first elected member for Arnhem he had 76% of the vote. When he was last elected he had 51% of the vote. If he’s worried about the downward trend for anybody, he better look at his own downward trend. He’s about to slip off the edge, and when he hits the ground it’s going to make a big splat.
Mr TOYNE: A point of order, Mr Speaker! The question related to taxi driver incomes. We still haven’t heard anything about it.
Mr SPEAKER: Yes, and in fact it is the interjections that lead ministers into commenting on other matters during Question Time. I would appreciate hearing the minister in reasonable silence. I’m sure he will get to the nub of the answer if you let him.
Mr REED: Thank you. Taxi drivers and the taxi industry can rest assured that the budget that was delivered this week will maintain a strong economy in the Northern Territory. It will maintain unemployment growth of 5% per annum. It will maintain …
Mr AH KIT: A point of order, Mr Speaker! Maybe I should table my question and have an attendant take it across to the acting minister. Obviously he hasn’t understood, and doesn’t have the intelligence to understand, the question with regard to taxis, minibuses and private hire cars. He’s digressing across the whole spectrum of the budget rather than being specific in answering the question.
Mr SPEAKER: I thought we covered that just a short time ago. The minister has some leeway in answering the question. I would appreciate it, though, if he would get to the completion of the answer as quickly as possible.
Mr REED: Any industry in the Northern Territory, including the taxi industry, would be pleased that they are working in an environment where the economy is growing by 5% a year, where unemployment is the lowest in the country, where the growth of employment opportunities is 5% per annum, where they have prospects of their industry growing, where the government is providing this year an additional $3m for promotion and advertising for the Territory as a tourist destination, nationally and internationally. As the tourists get off the aeroplanes out there at Darwin Airport and fill the taxis and keep the taxis employing drivers and the industry takes advantage of the restructuring that’s been put in place, we will see the whole economy of the Territory benefit, and everyone will realise it except the 7-pack over the other side.
ANSWER
Mr Speaker, answering on behalf of the minister for transport, we’ve saved the owners of taxi licences from financial doom. Had we not allocated something in the order of $27m to buy back licences, in a year or two’s time the value of those licences - naturally with a flow-on impact on drivers, as the member for Arnhem interjects - the value of licences would have been very nearly nothing, and in accordance with …
Mr Toyne: What about the drivers?
Mr REED: I just mentioned drivers, but it didn’t get through the bone. Get a screwdriver to clean your ears out or something like that. See if you can get a bit of knowledge through there. Go and sit under the Tree of Knowledge over in the council yard. Go and sit over there, you might absorb something, get something through the bone. You ain’t doing too much good at the moment on behalf of your constituents.
The member should stop being so deceitful and telling students at Alice Springs High School that it’s going to close, stop being so deceitful by misrepresenting what’s actually in the budget. He should talk about what’s in the budget, and give some credit to the quarantine officers who work hard to look after the primary industry sector of the Northern Territory. Then he might do something positive for Territorians. He might also tell them what he’s studying at university, instead of taking on his doctorate before he actually gets it. But I digress.
Getting back to the reform of the taxi industry, we acknowledge as a government that it’s been difficult for the industry. We have put an enormous amount of money forward for the purchase of taxi licences so that the people who bought them over the years would recover a reasonable value and be able to continue in a business, albeit in a different way from in the past. I think there’s a bright future, not only for the taxi industry ...
Mr Ah Kit interjecting.
Mr REED: The member for Arnhem may laugh, but he hasn’t got a bright future. When he was first elected member for Arnhem he had 76% of the vote. When he was last elected he had 51% of the vote. If he’s worried about the downward trend for anybody, he better look at his own downward trend. He’s about to slip off the edge, and when he hits the ground it’s going to make a big splat.
Mr TOYNE: A point of order, Mr Speaker! The question related to taxi driver incomes. We still haven’t heard anything about it.
Mr SPEAKER: Yes, and in fact it is the interjections that lead ministers into commenting on other matters during Question Time. I would appreciate hearing the minister in reasonable silence. I’m sure he will get to the nub of the answer if you let him.
Mr REED: Thank you. Taxi drivers and the taxi industry can rest assured that the budget that was delivered this week will maintain a strong economy in the Northern Territory. It will maintain unemployment growth of 5% per annum. It will maintain …
Mr AH KIT: A point of order, Mr Speaker! Maybe I should table my question and have an attendant take it across to the acting minister. Obviously he hasn’t understood, and doesn’t have the intelligence to understand, the question with regard to taxis, minibuses and private hire cars. He’s digressing across the whole spectrum of the budget rather than being specific in answering the question.
Mr SPEAKER: I thought we covered that just a short time ago. The minister has some leeway in answering the question. I would appreciate it, though, if he would get to the completion of the answer as quickly as possible.
Mr REED: Any industry in the Northern Territory, including the taxi industry, would be pleased that they are working in an environment where the economy is growing by 5% a year, where unemployment is the lowest in the country, where the growth of employment opportunities is 5% per annum, where they have prospects of their industry growing, where the government is providing this year an additional $3m for promotion and advertising for the Territory as a tourist destination, nationally and internationally. As the tourists get off the aeroplanes out there at Darwin Airport and fill the taxis and keep the taxis employing drivers and the industry takes advantage of the restructuring that’s been put in place, we will see the whole economy of the Territory benefit, and everyone will realise it except the 7-pack over the other side.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016