Warren Truss (Wide Bay, National Party, Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Hansard source

We have the honourable member opposite defending that situation. Let him go home and talk to the doctors in the remote towns in his electorate and tell them that it is fair for them to pay 43 per cent tax while the people parked at Double Bay can have their cars tax free.

The reality is that this government has not thought through its legislation. It is has bungled the process. The original legislation was fatally flawed. This new legislation, a great embarrassment to the government, has had to be brought in to fix just a few of the problems. We welcome the fact that those problems will be fixed and that a few of the bungles are being unravelled. For that reason, the opposition will support the bill. But if the government is serious about having a luxury car tax regime that is fair and equitable, it will recast the entire legislation and withdraw the whole of the luxury car tax and devise a scheme that is fair and equitable.

As others have said in this debate, we have had a luxury car tax now for quite some time, set at 25 per cent. Labor, as a part of its tax grab, decided to put an eight per cent surcharge on the luxury car tax. Now it has allowed a set of exemptions. Those exemptions are in areas where it is appropriate to make exemptions, but in addition to that it has actually taken off the existing 25 per cent luxury car tax that has been applying to the Mercedes, the Jaguars and the BMWs. It has taken that away. The inconsistency in what the government has done is absolutely mind-blowing. It needs to fix the legislation. It needs to fix the tax—lock, stock and barrel. The opposition will be supporting these amendments, but they do not go anywhere near far enough to resolve the problems, the injustices, that this legislation has created.

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