'We want to adjust the levers': Liberals plan incentives for community housing providers

Rubbish. Land taxes are progressively proportional to capital value. Poorer people tend not to rent higher value properties which are taxed at higher rates. This is unlike GST which is flat rate.

@byline, except you’re forgetting about Land Tax which applies to each and every rental property in the ACT, and is more than rates for the same property. This means even the cheapest properties rented out attract more tax than most larger homes that are owner occupied. With every rental property in the ACT charged Land Tax, it gets passed on to the tenant, creating a situation where lower income working people are paying more in tax than the average higher income family in a nicer home. Thus the creation of a large class of “working poor” as Incidental Tourist talked about.

If the Labor-Greens government was truly interested in looking out for lower income workers, Land Tax would be gone or at least greatly reduced. They have however lost control of the budget, racking up massive debts and deficits that will make it a long and difficult path for future governments to cut back unfair taxes. The Libs have however at least committed to looking at Land Tax to see if it can be reduced.

Garfield – I can only add that two neighbours living next door to each other in two similar homes will pay different tax to ACT government. Tenants will always pay more than double that of owner occupier neighbour because they rent. This would be similar if a renter always pays more than double GST on their electricity or internet bill, or they will pay more than double parking fees in the same location, or more than double registration fee for the same car because they rent.

Garfield, I forgot nothing, and I am quite familiar with property rental thank you.

Removing land tax would benefit the better off more than the less well off. It is a progressive tax, and Incidental Tourist is rent-seeking, as they often do here.

Then you talk about budget deficits while wanting revenue removed. If the Liberals reduce land tax, contrary to policy directions around the country and where the ACT is praised by taxation experts and economists for its lead, it will demonstrate fiscal irresponsibility. I do not defend the current government’s budget at all, but I will defend good tax policy against the self-interested.

byline, you’re tying yourself in knots there. I’ll add that ACT residents are the most highly taxed in the country according to ABS statistics. Before Labor’s “revenue neutral” tax reform, we were taxed less than the average Australian and had better health and education outcomes and a stronger budget. There is no revenue shortage for the ACT government, but a problem with profligate spending on a bloated bureaucracy, inefficient procurement and ideologically driven infrastructure spending that’s not what Canberra most needed. The debt that Barr relentlessly increased in good years as well as bad as a result of a lack of fiscal discipline and poor prioritisation, is driving up the cost of living and hurting Labor’s traditional base of lower income workers more than anyone else.

Any particular knot, Garfield? Because you mention none but divert to suggested profligacy of this government; which is not my wicket. Tell it to Jack D.

Citing “average” taxation, without context, is an obvious ploy to avoid practically every issue in the taxation field. For a couple of obvious starters, taxation rates are neither flat nor a Bell curve and dollars depend on socio-economic mix of the population of interest.

I accept that you have no argument to raise against my land tax comments.

byline – The problem with ACT “land tax” is that it has little to do with what was recommended before the tax reform 2011. Labor and Greens skewed and twisted reform recommendations turning it to rent tax. Their tax reform was neither universal nor revenue neutral, and not evenly distributed and of course unfair. I suggest you to read more what former ACT Labor chief minister Jon Stanhope and Khalid Ahmed wrote on the history of it if you want to learn more about the context from first hands.

QLD Labor proposed to introduce land tax changes a couple of years ago but they backed off citing rent increase concerns. So QLD labor argued higher “land tax” similar to ACT would increase rents and ACT greens and labor said it did not. So this land tax narrative became dog’s breakfast even without your comments in the mix.

Quick rental search will show that there are many 3br detached houses in metropolitan Brisbane rented around $400 p.w. mark. In Canberra this rent will only buy some basic entry level apartment. As Brisbane house prices catch up to Canberra the main difference is ACT rent tax and of course more red tape which result in higher rents.

Ironically doubling tax grab did not deliver any golden era utopia. The budget is deep in red, the debt is out of control, we have failing services and less public housing per ca-pita than before this reform. As Elisabeth Lee said in debates we don’t have revenue problem. We have the waste problem.

Still with the sophistry, Incidental Tourist?

I looked at Domain:
https://www.domain.com.au/rent/brisbane-city-qld-4000/
Stated median price for a 2 Br house, $820, for a 3 Br unit, $1100

so I looked at Realestate for 3Br houses:
https://www.realestate.com.au/rent/property-house-with-3-bedrooms-in-brisbane+city,+qld+4000/list-1?maxBeds=3&source=refinement
Median of the first 11 listings is $825.

Nope, you are not using comparable basis of income and property type but pretending in hope of maintaining your rent-seeking position.

At no point have I either asserted or argued there is a revenue problem. There is a rent-seeking problem, and you are an example of it.

Still, if you are prepared to argue in favour of broad, progressive, Federal land taxes in line with Henry Review recommendations 51 and 52 then I shall happily support that, and would also see the possibility of reducing ACT tax on property not occupied by the owner as a home (which is what it is, not a “rental” tax) accordingly. I have already said the same in relation to exterminating negative gearing and CGT concessions above inflation. I take it these now have your support.

Get a load of this guy, attempting to compare rent prices in the center of a major cities CBD with suburban Canberra rents, to back up his mid witted argument that land tax is just worn by the landlord and not passed on to tenants by way of higher rents. 🤣

Ken M, to quote Incidental Tourist, “… many 3br detached houses in metropolitan Brisbane…”.

I looked up 3br detached houses in metropolitan Brisbane to demonstrate that Incidental Tourist was making a selective comparison. You now replace “metropolitan” in both cases with “CBD” vs “suburban”, a selective comparison where you do not even cite any data. You finish with a silly, false claim, one you cannot back up anywhere.

Your frenzied obsession with my posts is getting the better of you, and you were not doing well in the first place. Have a nice cup of tea while appreciating some aboriginal art.

Yes Ken M, I was going to say the same. We all know that comparison of rents of similar types of houses in similar locations in Brisbane and Canberra will statistically show ACT rents higher.

There are still people out there who will argue that Earth is flat even if you show them photo of it from space. They will say as the photo is a flat sheet of paper so is Earth.

Incidental Tourist,
we know you struggle with data analysis, but you made a specific claim around rents at a specific figure that has been shown to be misleading and false.

Now you change the claim to be about ACT rents just being statistically higher than Brisbane for similar dwellings, which is not the same as your first statement.

Yes, you are right that some people will argue the Earth is flat, even when presented direct evidence showing they are wrong.

Sounds ironically apt for your comments.

And you would be wrong again. Land rents are fair and efficient. Canberra’s current rate could be traded against federal reform of
negative gearing and capital gains tax. By then the cows should be home too.

I agree with you about the mickey mouse subsidy promise. It’s a gesture, not a policy.

Hello byline,

With respect, I think that you and I see the world very differently.

I see Land Tax, as an additional ownership cost that ultimatley forms part of the of rent paid by tenants, you would appear to see it as a “Robin Hood” tax; or a means of wealth redistribution.

Apart from the Greens, there is no push to reform NG & CGT. Messrs Shorten and Bowen lost the
unloseable election in 2019 election when they proposed reforming NG &CGT and the ALP promptly abandoned the policy.

Maybe my views aren’t so wrong? It might just be that your ideology is somewhat more to the left of centre?

Land tax in the ACT is not fair and efficient – if so, as you claim, it would be a set standardised charge on every rental property. Clearly land tax costs filter through to the renters – “the housing poor” who are struggling with high rents, and an inability to save a buyers deposit.

Please explain the efficiency of a land tax charge on an old three bedder renting in Yarralumla of $15-18,000 per year LT (the cost filters to any renter silly enough to rent in Y.).
Contrast with a newly built house in Denman or WC where land tax is approx $6000 for a house.

This is why Rattenbury and his green fairies are a complete hypocrite crying poor for the oppressed renters whilst imposing the highest land tax rates in Australia.

I am not discussing politics or ideology but economics. That is where our views differ. You are offering political opinion where it is not the subject. Any tax is a cost. Obviously. How could it not be? That is why both of fairness and efficiency matter.

Referring to any tax as ‘Robin Hood’ betrays a serious lack of understanding of governance and of revenue.

Your views are wrong, except as defined by your preferred politics.

johnm4873, why would it be “a set standardised charge on every rental property” rather than progressive by land value?
A flat tax would be hopelessly unfair. It is, after all, a tax on land rents, the capital value of the land. It has nothing at all to do with the worth of the property plonked on that land or for what sum a person is able to rent it out.

That is why they call it “land tax”, not “property tax”, or “I’d rather somebody else pays tax”.

No byline, my views are NOT wrong. They are my views and I am entitled to express them; you simply have different views!

In addition, my views are not based on my preferred politics. It wouldn’t matter who was in power in the ACT, I would still oppose Land Tax.

Yes, of course you do GrumpyGrandpa. It is just that you haven’t an economic argument to show why. Therefore your view is political, or perhaps some random flat-earther prejudice, I don’t know, but as you say, it is your view and at no point did I deny you the right to be wrong and say so; often.

@ D. Jack I agree, sounds great value for the teachers and nurses.

Im in construction, so I shouldn’t get it , sounds fair

The definition of a key workers is open for interpretation.
Teachers & Nurses; sure. What about:
Bus drivers?
Ambo drivers?
Garbo drivers?

Personally, I think Cleaners (who are at the lower end of the payscale) are Key Workers. Anyone who cleans toilets and picks up lazy people’s rubbish gets my vote!

Way to infantalise them. Ask them what policy changes they actually need. This wouldn’t even occur to them