Lucy Wicks (Robertson, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today I rise to express my concern about the potential impact of a draft ruling issued by the Australian Taxation Office with respect to moveable home estates on people living in my electorate of Robertson. If this ruling is adopted it will require operators of moveable home estates to pay GST when a land site is leased to a resident. I do not agree with the draft ruling and I am extremely worried about the considerable impact it will have on the vast majority of people who live in moveable home estates in Robertson, many of whom are senior Australians on the age pension or disability support pension. I have personally visited hundreds of these residents over the past 18 months and I know that the rising cost of living is having a significant impact on their lives. They do not need additional stress and expense because of an ill-considered draft ruling by the ATO.

In chatting to them over a cup of tea or coffee earlier this year, many residents shared with me their concerns about the impact of the carbon tax on their electricity bills and their grocery bills. The carbon tax, which the coalition government is committed to abolishing, is costing the average family in my electorate around $550 a year, and we are determined to put that money back in their pockets. It is why the people in Robertson voted for us, and we will deliver on our commitment to them.

Many residents in these parks own their moveable home and lease the site on which their home lies. I am advised by local estate owners I have spoken with that the current average weekly leasing cost for these sites is about $120 to $150 per week. The recent CPI pension increase in September this year was $18.70 per fortnight for a single age pension recipient. If this draft ruling is implemented, it will more than swallow this latest increase as park owners I have spoken with locally have advised me they would reluctantly need to pass on to residents any GST costs associated with leasing of such sites. I am fighting for a better future for all people on the Central Coast and the last thing we need is another unfair financial roadblock imposed by the ATO.

There are more than 2,000 people living in moveable home estates in Robertson and I have received a petition with hundreds of signatures calling for the draft ruling to be repealed and the current GST ruling to continue to apply. Numerous others have personally written to me or spoken directly with me. I advise the chamber that I have raised my concerns, and those of local residents, directly with the Assistant Treasurer. I will also be making representations directly to the Commissioner of the Australian Taxation Office. I am determined to get this draft ruling overturned. The ATO must see sense.

Unlike Labor, under which this draft ruling originated, as the Liberal member for Robertson I will fight the ATO on this issue and lend my voice in support of those in the community that this draft ruling will hurt. I recognise the ATO is an independent statutory body that makes its decisions independent of government. However, I am urging my senior colleagues to join their voices to the thousands of residents living in these estates, not only in my electorate of Robertson but across the country, and express their concern about the draft interpretation of a law that will have such a major impact on the everyday lives of those who most need our assistance.