The Government's GAIC Bill was voted down by the Legislative Council last Tuesday. It was designed to impose a new tax of $95,000 per hectare on land to be brought within the Urban Growth Boundary, payable on sale. It represented a potentially huge burden on many hard working families who have invested in land. Those landholders had repeatedly argued that the GAIC should be payable only on development, not on sale.
I have been asked many times why I abstained on the second reading vote.
Before the second reading vote, I proposed amendments to the Bill which would have made the GAIC payable only on an application to develop land. I informed the House that I would vote for the Bill on the third reading only if my amendments were passed. Before my amendments were debated however, there was a second reading vote. I feel that it is not normally honourable to vote against a Bill while simultaneously proposing to amendment it. On that basis, I abstained from the second reading vote. The Bill was defeated at that point.
If the second reading vote had passed, I would have then argued for my amendments and voted for the third reading of the Bill only if they had been accepted.
