Crispin Hull

Every Budget, ACT and Federal, journalists attend a lock-up in which they get the Budget papers several hours in advance. Half way through, the Treasurer gives a media conference.

For the past half dozen year, I have asked an almost ritual question: when is something going to be done about the outrageous stamp duty rates to take account of ever rising house prices?

Not this year. Something was done about them. They actually went up! And I don’t use exclamation marks lightly.

There was a minor change in 1987, but for more than 20 years stamp duty rates have not been changed to take account of rising house prices. It would be like applying the 1980 income tax rates to present income – top marginal rate of 66 per cent on incomes above $50,000.
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After the election in November last year, few gave the Senate much thought. The change in the numbers following the half-Senate election looked of no consequence. NSW Democrat Vicki Bourne lost her seat to the Greens’ Kerry Nettle, otherwise the numbers stayed the same. The Coalition retained the 20 seats it had up for re-election; Labor retained its 13 seats; the Greens Bob Brown was re-elected. Independent Brian Harradine and One Nation Len Harris were not up for re-election this time.

One Green for a Democrat, so what. But events in the past week or so, show that there is a critical difference – especially with the numbers the way they are.

The Greens Bob Brown asserted that the environment was more important than keeping Telstra in private ownership. If the price was right, he would allow Telstra to be privatised – provided the money went to environmental projects that otherwise would not get done.

Senators have a fixed term beginning on July 1 after the election. So the new senators elected on November 10 take their seats on July 1. June 27 is the last sitting of this Senate and the new Senate assembles in August.
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The compensation agreements for sexual abuse signed by members of the Catholic Church have given rise to the questions: Why weren’t these matters reported to the police? and Surely those who did not report them are themselves guilty of a crime?

They are serious legal questions. Australian law – having its roots in the common law of England – is robustly individualistic. It is fairly slow to apply civic duties. The law imposes no obligation to help people in distress, unlike European countries. One can walk past a drowning infant or watch a blind person walk towards a cliff edge and the law says there is no requirement to do anything, even if only the slightest effort would avoid catastrophe. It is immoral, of course, but we are not talking about morality here.

There are some requirements with respect to crime, but not very onerous ones.
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Excising off-shore islands in the north of Australia from the “”migration zone” does not make sense. When you pose the question why enough times, the logical move by the Government should be to excise the whole of Australia from the migration zone.

Why does the Government want to excise these islands?

Because once they are excised people who land on those islands have different migration rights from people who land on the mainland. The Migration Act gives rights to people who are in the “”migration zone” and no rights to those who are not in it
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Retrospective legislation is almost always undesirable. It was undesirable when the previous ACT Government sought to remove rights under victims’ compensation laws in 1999. The law changed the rights of people who had already put claims in or who had sustained injuries before the legislation was passed. It was unfair and the Government should not have put such legislation to the Assembly. Instead it should have curtailed only claims arising out of injuries sustained from the date of the legislation.

Some of the victims appealed to the courts arguing that the law was invalid. The Supreme Court accepted their argument and the Full Federal Court upheld an appeal last week. The main grounds of the appeal were that the law offended the Constitution’s requirement that property not be acquired by government except with just compensation and that the law also offended the ACT provision that mirrored the constitutional provision.
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The ACT Chief Minister, Jon Stanhope, is to seek to increase the size of the ACT Legislative Assembly. There is a very good case to be made for increasing the size of the Assembly. The only real question is by how many and how should those members represent the ACT.

Mr Stanhope has favoured the minority report of the Assembly’s Standing Committee on Legal Affairs – that of Labor Member John Hargreaves – which says the Assembly should be increased from its present 17 Members to 23. The majority – Liberal Bill Stefaniak and Green Kerrie Tucker — has recommended an increase to 21.

Mr Hargreaves recommended four electorates of six, six, six and five members. The majority recommended three electorates of seven members.
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Treasurer Ted Quinlan’s first Budget yesterday was a slow-and-steady affair. That was probably just as well. Now is not the time for grand fiscal adventures. Interest rates are on the rise. Tourism is having a tough time following September 11 and the collapse of Ansett and the Federal Government is not in an expansive mood. Rather there has been a contraction in Federal spending in Canberra because of the electoral period last year.

Mr Quinlan scrapped into surplus. He bemoaned the legacy of the Liberal Government, but for every negative he mentioned – the Totalcare quarry venture, the V8 race and Stadium loses – there was the overall positive of the Liberal years of turning the fiscal direction of the ACT around for deficit and debt to surplus and debt reduction.

There are some welcome things about this Budget. There is no new debt. There has been a marked concentration on health and education – particularly the main public hospital, the medical school and public education — and police. These are core matters of government.
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The statement by Democrat MLA Roslyn Dundas about the funding the Rental Bonds Board makes alarming reading. Before the board was established bonds were kept by real-estate agents in trust accounts or by landlords themselves. It was an unsatisfactory arrangement. After all, it was tenants’ money and the interest on it should be used in the tenants’ interests. Moreover, there were instances of abuse by landlords. The idea behind the board is a good one. Landlords are required to lodge all bonds with it. The board pays bonds back to either tenant or landlord applicants after giving the other party notice and ensuring there is no dispute. Disputes are sorted out between the parties or failing that by the Residential Tenancy Tribunal. The board provides information and help top landlords and tenants. The board is funded by the interest on bond money.

Ms Dundas says that $16.6 million in bonds was in the fund at June 30, 2001. Bonds had earned $1.3 million in 2000-01. Of that only $144,000 went to the Tenants’ Advice Service. $600,000 went to the board’s administrative costs and $370,000 went to the Residential Tenancy Tribunal. A further $176,000 was collected by the tribunal in user-pays fees. This left about $380,000 unaccounted for – presumably the money has gone into government coffers. It warrants an investigation.
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The proposition by some university vice-chancellors for universities to be allowed to charge extra fees could easily back-fire on them. The Minister for Education, Brendan Nelson, rejects the idea of a funds crisis. The vice-chancellors disagree. Dr Nelson can point to increases in funding over the years of the Howard Government, but those increases might not be enough in an increasingly competitive world.

Much is spoken about the knowledge nation. It is widely recognised that manufacturing jobs are disappearing to cheaper labor markets overseas and that for Australia to maintain its relative standard of living we will have to use our brains, not our brawn. The trouble is, there is less recognition of the need to pay for the knowledge nation – in funding schools, universities and on-the-job training. Governments seem reluctant to pour more money into education because – unfortunately — it is not what the voters seem to want. At the last election Labor promises more spending on higher education, whereas the Coalition spent the surpluses on ad-hoc bribes to voters on whatever hip-pocket nerve issue arose at the time, like petrol prices and border protection. The Coalition got re-elected. The message was as clear as it was sad for the long-term interests of Australia – let’s talk about education and the knowledge nation, but let’s not spend any money on it. Until the lead-up to the last election, the Howard Government had a good record of economic management. Up to a point it still does. But it is not showing the necessary commitment to education, research and training that will lead to greater wealth generation in the future.

The trends are worrying. In 1981, 90 per cent of university funding came from government. A decade later it was below 70 per cent and a decade after that it was less than 50 per cent. Now universities get more than a third of their income from fees – including the Higher Education Contribution Scheme and 17 per cent from their own commercial and other activity.
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