Mr BURKE - 2005-05-04
You said that my budget reply comments were unbelievable. Do I take it that you are making a statement today that you do not believe the Northern Territory can achieve a payroll tax regime better than Queensland? If not, why not?
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I thank the Leader of the Opposition for his question. Payroll tax, like all of the taxes and charges inside the Northern Territory budget, come under constant review and there is no closer scrutiny than when you are sitting down and formulating a budget because you have to look at what revenue you are going to accrue over a financial year and at your outgoings.
As a government, we have made great inroads into payroll tax. We have cut the rate twice, we have lifted the threshold; we will have lifted the threshold three times. I am not saying it is not possible to change our payroll tax rate because we have already done it. We have done it in every budget that the Chief Minister, as Treasurer, and I have brought into this House. You blokes had it up there at a $600 000 threshold and 6.5%. I am not saying what level you might eventually get to. The interesting thing is, as we have taken companies out of the payroll tax as a result of our reforms, we have continued to have increased receipts. That is growth in the economy. So if you continue to grow the economy, of course, in terms of getting revenue in, there is the opportunity to further tweak those margins.
Why the Leader of the Opposition is unbelievable is that he wants to do everything tomorrow. The day he is elected he is going to make all of these reforms in one hit – all of the IGA taxes: ‘I am not going to take four or five years to roll these out; I am going to do it overnight. I am not going stagger the payroll tax down; I am going to take it straight to 4.5%’.
Well, start adding up the cost of these promises: probably around $25m to $30m for the payroll tax cut alone; if you want to go further, $41m per year for the IGA taxes. If he wants to bring all those initiatives in, good luck to him, but he should have a look at the bottom line because there would be hundreds of jobs and service delivery cuts to the public sector on the other side to balance the ledger unless you are to drive the budget into unsustainable deficit, and why wouldn’t he? This is the bloke who left us with an unsustainable deficit position about which he misled Territorians and this parliament at budget time 2001-02, yet another reason why he is unbelievable.
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I thank the Leader of the Opposition for his question. Payroll tax, like all of the taxes and charges inside the Northern Territory budget, come under constant review and there is no closer scrutiny than when you are sitting down and formulating a budget because you have to look at what revenue you are going to accrue over a financial year and at your outgoings.
As a government, we have made great inroads into payroll tax. We have cut the rate twice, we have lifted the threshold; we will have lifted the threshold three times. I am not saying it is not possible to change our payroll tax rate because we have already done it. We have done it in every budget that the Chief Minister, as Treasurer, and I have brought into this House. You blokes had it up there at a $600 000 threshold and 6.5%. I am not saying what level you might eventually get to. The interesting thing is, as we have taken companies out of the payroll tax as a result of our reforms, we have continued to have increased receipts. That is growth in the economy. So if you continue to grow the economy, of course, in terms of getting revenue in, there is the opportunity to further tweak those margins.
Why the Leader of the Opposition is unbelievable is that he wants to do everything tomorrow. The day he is elected he is going to make all of these reforms in one hit – all of the IGA taxes: ‘I am not going to take four or five years to roll these out; I am going to do it overnight. I am not going stagger the payroll tax down; I am going to take it straight to 4.5%’.
Well, start adding up the cost of these promises: probably around $25m to $30m for the payroll tax cut alone; if you want to go further, $41m per year for the IGA taxes. If he wants to bring all those initiatives in, good luck to him, but he should have a look at the bottom line because there would be hundreds of jobs and service delivery cuts to the public sector on the other side to balance the ledger unless you are to drive the budget into unsustainable deficit, and why wouldn’t he? This is the bloke who left us with an unsustainable deficit position about which he misled Territorians and this parliament at budget time 2001-02, yet another reason why he is unbelievable.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016