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Friday, March 29, 2024

To the editor: ACT government’s grab for money

The Real Estate pages of the 24 February 2022 Canberra Daily reveal that the median price of properties sold that week was $900,000. The ACT government makes a fortune from its stamp duty tax on the sale of properties so must delight in the high prices being paid by families desperate to own their own home.

Further, some 12,300 registrations were received for just 71 blocks of land, which will not even be available for at least a year. Further land sales will not occur until the middle of this year.

The ACT Labor/Greens government makes a fortune from ‘selling ‘ land to developers (how is this even possible when all ACT land is leasehold?), who also take a huge profit from the same piece of land.

By my rough calculations, over the past 45 years the cost of land has risen from about half of the average wage to about eight times the average wage. No wonder we have a housing affordability crisis here.

Meanwhile schools are under-resourced and over-crowded, hospitals are underfunded, and ‘Community Transport’ services cut back (“Changes worsen isolation”, letter to the editor 24 Feb). Yet we continue to pursue an ideologically-driven extension to the light rail project and all the disruption that entails instead of other more affordable options.

Our debt per capita is already the highest of all the state/territory governments. 

What will it actually take to make voters open their eyes and really look at just what this current government is costing us and future generations?  

  • Disgruntled Greenie (name and address supplied)

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