Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

The honourable member, as he knows very well, has misrepresented what I said. I made it quite clear that the federal government does not have the means to impose taxes on land of the kind that he describes. His reference to existing property is quite unclear, because all property—all of the real estate in Australia—is in existence. Some of it, plainly, is in greater stages of development than others. Perhaps, when he asks his next question, he can explain what he means by existing property.

All of the property, all of the real estate and all of the acreage in Australia is in existence. Some of its value can be dramatically improved by the construction of infrastructure, and some of that value—it may be value occasioned by the increase in land taxes; it may be the value created, as I said, in the Gold Coast Light Rail from council rates—can be brought to bear to support infrastructure. The honourable member understands this very well.

This rather pathetic gotcher effort, or would-be-gotcher effort, is simply a demonstration of his determination to avoid scrutiny of that which nobody can avoid—the $20 billion black hole on the tobacco tax. I know that the honourable member and his colleagues regard it as a rounding error. We have been very unkind—or not unkind; we have been critical of them calling it a rounding error. But of course, when you think of the scale of Labor's spending, and when you consider—

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