10 October 2024

The brown stuff's going to hit the whirly thing, the only question is when?

| David Murtagh
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Andrew Barr with the 2024 Budget. It’s smiles now, but cutesy time is coming to an end. Photo: Ian Bushnell.

Let’s take a walk down history’s page for a second.

If you’re old enough to remember the 1996 Federal election, one of the issues was the deficit.

Opposition Leader John Howard said there was one; he just didn’t know how big it was.

Prime Minister Paul Keating said there wasn’t one. And even better, there was a surplus.

It turns out, there was a deficit that year. A bloody big one. About $9 billion. That’s in 1996 money, remember, which was enough to buy a house in Sydney with a backyard.

Had Keating won that election, it would have been a sight to behold his gymnastics explaining, “Oh! That deficit!”

Which brings us to 2024 in the ACT.

It is very clear that not one of the three major parties in this election – Labor, the Greens and the Canberra Liberals – have grasped the dire state of ACT finances. They’re a pack of Keatings, without the nice suits and the clock fetish.

It is clear that all three leaders are whistling past the graveyard, pretending that all is well. All is not well.

We’re in a pickle. A very brown pickle. Reality is going to bite us very hard.

READ ALSO Why is our public service allowed to keep so many private secrets?

This is first going to be obvious to every ratepayer not long after the winner gives their tedious “governing for all Canberrans” victory speech, but there have been clues.

In case you missed it, on 16 July there was a fascinating article about rates, titled Tax reform doubts: Rates rises not enough to cover stamp duty losses, says Budget review.

That’s not true.

The article was about rates (that bit is true) but because it was about rates it was dull as batpoop (sorry, Bushy), and because it was dull, you may not have read it. But a few points need to be brought to the surface again. Such as, the government’s experiment to replace stamp duty with rates has hit a bump in the road.

This matters.

As the article notes: “The increase in rates [3.75 per cent this year] will not be enough to cover the loss in revenue … It is not known how much rates will rise in Stage 4, which kicks in in 2026-27.”

In other words, despite going up 3.75 per cent, that wasn’t enough. Ask yourself: will the government pull back spending or find other ways to trouser your money? (Hold that thought for a moment.)

Then: “The Budget is becoming increasingly vulnerable, with net debt expected to increase by 70 per cent over the forward years to $12 billion in 2027-28, and interest payments forecast to reach $514 million in 2024-25 and $832 million in 2027-28.”

If you’re playing at home, that’s an increase in interest payments from about $1.4 million a day to about $2.28 million a day.

“This is $127.2 million higher than the estimated 2023-24 outcome and is forecast to increase by a further $318.3 million over the Budget and forward years.”

In other words, not only is there a revenue shortfall, but the money we’re paying out is getting larger at the same time as spending is going up. Translation: this is going to get worse.

Then comes the worse bad news. The kicker: “The review says general rates are not rising quickly enough to replace the amount of revenue lost from changes in commercial and residential conveyance thresholds and rates”.

The question for ratepayers is, when the election is done and dusted, who do you think the government is going to clock in the pocket to recoup the missing moolah from rates?

The review says either the government is backpedalling on its tax reform program by not increasing rates sufficiently to make up for the reduction in stamp duty or it is not being transparent about its plans for Stage 4 which commence in 2026-27.

Of the two options, what’s more likely? Backpedalling on a flagship 20-year project or hiding tax increases until after the 19 October election?

That’s not a toughie, is it?

And remember, the Canberra Liberals say they’ll cap rate increases at 2.2 per cent.

The fact is, no matter the party or coalition of MLAs that claims power on 19 October, we can’t afford their promises because we are living beyond our means now, before their splurge. And things aren’t that great.

READ MORE Time to stop digging: The ACT can’t afford to ignore the first rule of holes

It is almost mathematically impossible for the Canberra Liberals to win on 19 October.

It would be hilarious for the Greens to be the major party in coalition with Labor; for a start, the mass resignations from Labor would throw the Assembly into disarray and that’s always fun, but don’t count on a Greens’ plurality.

Whatever the outcome, the fiscal reality is becoming clearer and the warnings are getting louder.

Who will win this debate? The fiscal conservatives. The Cassandras. The only issue is when.

Who will win the election? Andrew Barr will almost certainly remain as Chief Minister. But that doesn’t mean he’s right.

In 1996, we didn’t get to see Keating explain the deficit he denied existed.

Will Andrew Barr be here long enough to explain why the brown stuff’s hitting the whirly thing?

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How can one even contemplate Barr remaining chief minister? Apart from his financial and fiscal failings, he is too old by his own previous admissions.

HiddenDragon8:35 pm 11 Oct 24

It’s always worth remembering that self-government for the ACT wasn’t primarily about representative democracy, it was about the federal government off-loading responsibility for funding the entitled infrastructure and service delivery expectations of the Canberra component of its workforce.

It’s likewise worth bearing in mind that the option of a city council style government for the ACT, rather than full self-government, was fiercely opposed by local interests across the political spectrum because, among other things, the former would not have provided a sufficiently large and free-wheeling trough for all the snouts to go into and feed heartily at the public expense.

The reality is that long term fiscal sustainability for a fully self-governing ACT was always an elusive prospect – particularly in what is still, and will be for the foreseeable future, a public service town dominated by people who believe that an ever growing public sector is a good and necessary thing, and that the funds to pay for that will keep magically flowing (whether from a “Magic Pudding”, or elsewhere) regardless of what is happening in the national and international economies.

Sooner or later, a federal government will have to deal with this mess, with a likely option being the end of the current model of self-government and of a relatively large, stand-alone ACT public service – which clearly suffers from major diseconomies of scale and struggles to provide decent, consistent, state-level services.

Before we get to that crunch point, there will, as this article correctly suggests, be some very painful revenue gouging to be endured by ACT households and businesses.

Let’s spend money on a tram! We can afford it. Andrew told me so.

Mr Barr continually Claiming it’s only one percent of budget is easy when you only count the construction component and ignore the associated costs and push payments outside the budget process.

BJ,
It’s also absolutely meaningless when it only refers to the first stage, with the proposed future stages significantly more expensive but excluded from his numbers.

I live in Palmerston. Prior to the construction of this white elephant it took me 25 minutes to travel on a bus to the City for work.
When the rail was completed, the govt cancelled all the buses that wound through the Gungahlin suburbs and forced us all to catch a bus BACKWARDS to the Marketplace. We then wait there for a while before we board the tram. Commute time is now 40 minutes. Hopeless.
Also.
They cancelled the red rapid that travelled to the City and then onwards to Russell Offices, Barton and Kingston. My wife now has to wait several
minutes for an second additianal bus to complete her journey. Her commute time is now 18 minutes longer and requires 3 services instead of 2. Hopeless.
It only cost $1 billion for most of Gungahlin to be inconvenienced. Bargain.
The next stage to Woden will see the cancellation of their rapid service which currently only 11 minutes in a dedicated bus lane. This will be replaced by a tram that is expected to take 26 minutes.
Also.
All the suburban services from Woden through Deakin, Garren, Yarrulumla etc will be cancelled. Also.
It will see several sets of new traffic lights along Adelaide Ave so that the passengers can cross 3 lanes of traffic (although how many people actually live along Adelaide Ave?).
Another bargain at only $2.5 billion.

Incidental Tourist10:53 pm 10 Oct 24

Today’s ACT is far from 1996 Australia which by the way was in recession, had large unemployment, much higher inflation and interest rates. Since then the entire generation has grown up not knowing what recession is. Today balanced budget looks too “regressive”, too “conservative” and too “right wing” policy. Howard’s balanced budget policy back in 1996 can never win votes today of “buy now pay later” generation.

GrumpyGrandpa10:33 pm 10 Oct 24

What I don’t understand is that we knew about S&P’s downgrading of our credit rating some time ago and yet the ALP & Canberra Libs are all trying to over promising / outspending each other. And as for the Greens, well, they have absolutely spending limit.

Logically, the ALP weren’t going to cut back their programs and in doing so, admit they created the financial mess we are in, but I thought the Canberra Libs might have gone into the election using the downgrading as political mileage, promising less and therefore demonstrating their financial responsibility.

It seems that when it comes to elections, the financial responsibility only rests with the tax payer, who ultimately will be paying for the extravagances of whoever is elected.

It would be impossible for the Libs to win an election in this town based on fiscal responsibility. The local, loyal doyens of progressiveness are only drinking from the public teat. They believe the public teat is a never ending source of funds and that spending on programs they believe in is viable – regardless of the outcome to the local budget. And most are transient, here for a short term so never have to consider the long term repercussions of the outrageous spending.

I for 1 have had a gut full of the rates increases, the poor delivery of services et al, and so after having spent most of my life here, there is nothing left to keep me here in retirement – I shall be selling up and exiting stage left before the proverbial hits the fan. (And we poor taxpayers get slugged even more heavily to pay for it.)

Of course rates aren’t meant to replace stamp duty revenue – GST was supposed to do that back when it was introduced. The States/Territories get the GST revenue, which was a deal in exchange for getting rid of stamp duty. Years later, we’re still being hit with stamp duty. Then rates went up massively (just as we were warned, but no one believed the government would increase them THAT MUCH), supposedly also to replace stamp duty, which still remains despite the massive rates increases that were supposed to replace it.

Stamp duty on private property sales was never part of the GST implementation deal, they had only proposed to remove it on commercial sales early on in the piece.

And even then, due to the negotiations to get it across the line, that too was left in place as part of the reduction in revenue by excluding fresh food and other components of the watered down GST.

The myth that the GST was replacing stamp duties for property sales is simply not true.

When the ACT government invests in projects like Light Rail stage 2a that their own cost benefit analysis shows that it’s worth less than half what it costs, it’s no wonder Canberra is starting to face debt and deficit issues and lost our AAA credit rating.

Throw in hundreds of millions of Chris Steel stuff ups and it’s no wonder John Stanhope has had so many ongoing concerns about Mr Barr’s financial management.

Pity the Canberra media cheer squad find financial reporting too boring.

Just a week out from election day, and voters are still waiting for Barr-Rattenbury to explain why they broke the budget, especially when they promised to do exactly the opposite. The Labor-Greens alliance agreements from 2008, 2012, and 2016, all included this phrase “The parties confirm their commitment to fiscal responsibility and the maintenance of a balanced budget through the economic cycle.” Labor-Greens have now delivered a record 12 budget deficits in a row, forward estimates show no end to this, and annual interest costs are rising unsustainably.

Whilst it’s good to finally see an article about the reality of the territories finances, the previous article around the taxation mix didn’t show that the increased revenue from rates wasn’t keeping up revenue lost from the tax reform package.

It simply showed that our reliance on rates wasn’t increasing as a percentage of the total own source taxation as it should have (all things being equal) if the taxation mix was being shifted as proposed under the 20 year program.

The problem with that being, it’s based on the overall revenue being received by government, which has been increasing at enormous amounts over the last decade, more than doubling. The cause of the changing taxation mix is thus actually significant increases in taxation in areas other than rates at the same time that government promises and spending have been going through the roof.

So yes, we have a problem with our budgetary position but it isn’t caused through a lack of revenue, it’s caused by massively increased spending.

Which is only proposed to get significantly worse with all parties throwing out election promises like cars at an Oprah show.

Incidental Tourist9:32 am 11 Oct 24

What “revenue lost”?? Do you mean “lost revenue” from stamp duty which is in fact increasing every single year? Or maybe some other “lost revenues” like from car registration, licenses, parking fees, fines, lease variation charges or anything else? Don’t be naive suggesting that 2011 tax reform was ever meant to be revenue neutral. Revenue neutrality was its sale pitch. It was a carrot put in front of donkey. Since ACT Greens and Labor never reduce taxes it means rates can go up endlessly at ever increasing speed never reaching that nirvana “tax mix” like a donkey never catches up with a carrot.

Incidental Tourist,
You typically fail at understanding the intent of the tax reform which is to remove inefficient taxes and replace them with a far more stable base.

Governments do need revenue, they just need to control their promises and spending to productive and necessary areas.

The reform is a perfectly sensible economic reform to institute broad based land taxes with numerous benefits, the increasing taxation amount is not.

Your anger is, as usual, directed at the wrong place.

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