Legislative Assembly Hansard 1982
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Queensland Parliamentary Debates [Hansard] Legislative Assembly TUESDAY, 21 SEPTEMBER 1982 Electronic reproduction of original hardcopy Ministerial Statements 21 September 1982 965 TUESDAY, 21 SEPTEMBER 1982 Mr SPEAKER (Hon. S. J. Muller, Fassifern) read prayers and took the chair at 11 a.m. ASSENT TO BILLS Assent to the following Bills reported by Mr Speaker:— Commercial Bank of Australia Limited Merger BiU; Commercial Banking Company of Sydney Limited Merger BiU; Exotic Diseases in Animals Act Amendment BiU; City of Brisbane Act Amendment BiU; Acts Repeal BUl; Dividing Fences Act and Another Act Amendment BiU. PAPERS The following papers were laid on the table:— Orders in CouncU under— Electricity Act 1976-1980 Electricity Act 1976-1982 and the Statutory Bodies Financial Arrangements Act 1982 Agricultural Bank (Loans) Act 1959-1981 Agricultural Bank (Loans) Act 1959-1981 and the Local Bodies' Loans Guarantee Act 1923-1979 Milk Supply Act 1977-1981 Primary Producers' Co-operative Associations Act 1923-1981 SoU Conservation Act 1965-1980 and the Co-ordination of Rural Advances and Agricultural Bank Act 1938-1980 Regulations under— Fruit Marketing Organisation Act 1923-1980 Veterinary Surgeons Act 1936-1973 Wheat Pool Act 1920-1979 and the Primary Producers' Organisation and Marketing Act 1926-1981 Report of the Queensland MiUc Board for the year ended 30 June 1982. MINISTERIAL STATEMENTS Supreme and District Court Sittings During Commonwealth Games Hon. S. S. DOUMANY (Kurilpa—Minister for Justice and Attomey-General) (11.4 a.m.): Mr Speaker, I rise on this occasion to correct any misapprehensions which may have been brought about by a week-end newspaper article conceming the position of Supreme and District criminal trials in Brisbane during the Commonwealth Games. Quotations in the article implied that the judiciary had suspended Supreme and District Court criminal trials in order to "have a holiday during the Games". I desire to inform the House that such implications could not be further from the tmth. What in fact has occurred is that because of the necessity for police to be avaUable for other duties during the period of the Games most criminal sittings for that period have been set aside. What the article did not emphasise was that, far from having the "holiday" suggested, judges in both the Supreme and District Courts wiU be hearing rescheduled civil cases. People who were moved to comment would have been better advised to consult the Government Gazette which came out at the week-end and which in fact did detail the rescheduling to which I have referred. The Gazette is readily available. I would be only too hapypy to make copies of those rescheduling notices available to any member. 966 21 September 1982 Ministerial Statements Indeed, Mr Speaker, far from "suspending" the criminal sittings as the article suggested additional criminal sittings in both the Supreme and District CJourts have been scheduled for the period immediately following the Commonwealth Games. Propyosed New Queensland Housing Commission Rental Assessment Scheme Hon. C. A. WHARTON (Burnett—Minister for Works and Housing) (11.8 a.m.): Over the week-end there have been some wald and wondrous utterances issued in the name of the ALP on the new Housing Commission rental assessment scheme. One of the statements was even made by a part-time South AustraUan cook book writer, and I would like to take this opportunity to clear up some of the misunderstanding spread by this odd assortment of Labor members—^past, present and hopefuls. They have been making wild and exaggerated claims about the new scheme, a scheme which was fully debated right here in this House last week. Either they did not bother to listen to what was said or they have deliberately chosen to ignore what took place in this House. Their statements are causing unnecessary anxiety to many tenants of the commission. The persons concerned are using scare tactics for political purpyoses and they stand condemned for their actions. Last week I gave an undertaking in this House that the new policy would be further assessed once data, now being collected by the commission on tenants' income, was completed and the results analysed. This vrill be done so that any significant difficulties with the scheme can be ironed out before it is pyut into effect. The fuU effects of the new scheme will not be known untU the commission has complete details to hand on the incomes of such tenants—the 7 000 tenants who are not now on income-geared rents. When this is to hand, the matter will be carefully considered before the scheme is implemented. There was not one word of this mentioned by Labor spokesmen on the week-end. Mr MACKENROTH: I rise to a point of order. The Minister stated that over the week-end no Opypyosition spokesman said that the scheme would be reassessed in December. I point out that at every meeting that I addressed over the week-end I made that point. Mr SPEAKER: Order! The honourable member will resume his seat. Opposition Members interjected. Mr SPEAKER: Order! Mr WHARTON: Labor spokesmen were pyrepared to make uneducated guesses, for their own political purposes, at the effect of the scheme. The Government wUl be taking the responsible approach; it wiU consider the matter when it has the full facts, not half-facts as the Opposhion has. Let me say once again so that the Oppyosition spokesmen get it clear: this new scheme is one which is aimed at giving the top priority to those pyeople who are most in need. It aims at giving the poor and stmggUng family waiting for welfare housing help a better opportunity to get housing. The ALP has lost sight of such pyeople in its rush to predict astronomical rents for a wide range of people. Let us just look at some of its claims. It says that some people could face rents as high as $300 a week. So far, to my knowledge, no such case has been unearthed by the information commg into the Housing Commission. However, let us say there is such a case. That family wUl have a gross family annual income of 5^^" 1 ask: Are we talking about welfare housing where such a family is concerned? That family, earning $60,000 a year, is living in housing needed by the genuinely poor families. Let the ALP spokesmen explain that to pyoor families. Let me point out another thing: If the rent for a family is raised to $300 »^^ it would be about six years before the full rent could be phased in under the guide-lines of the new scheme. I make no secret of the fact that this new scheme is discriminatory. It discrimmat^ heavily in favour of the poor, the needy. That is what welfare housing is aU about, in ALP seems to have forgotten that. Ministerial Statements 21 September 1982 967 There are going to be famiUes on higher incomes who wiU face significant rent rises. But, in aU cases, these people will be those famiUes on incomes well above the national average weekly wage level. The scheme is, in fact, generous of its treatment of low and moderate income famUies. In fact, with the tax aUowances that have been built into the new scheme, a family has to be eaming an annual income of some $44,000 before it has to pay 25 pyer cent of its income as rent. To say that this is a harsh or hard scheme for the genuinely needy, as the ALP asserts, is just so much political mbbish. Although we are stiU awaiting the fuU information on tenants' incomes, we know already that there will be tenants in the group being s^urveyed who wiU be better off, not worse off as the ALP suggested, because their rents will be reduced. The ALP suggests that pyeople wiU be forced out of their present homes. That is not correct. We wiU be seeking to encourage those whose incomes are high enough, and who want to, to opyerate on the private-rental or home-purchase market. Long-term tenants of the commission, those who have lived in their homes for five years or more, wiU generally have the option to buy the house. And, under the State Government's new housing package, we have a home purchase assistance scheme to help them do just that. The Labor Party suggests that children will have to move out of homes because of the new policy. Until a child turns 25 years, and is in fact a full adult member of the community—and this is not out of line with the thinking of the Opposition spokesman on housing, Mr Mackenroth—the full income of that "child" is not taken into account in calculating family rent. Up to that time the maximum the chUd wiU pay is $15.20. It is $7.60 if the chUd is under 19 years. The Opposition says that this will cause strains on the family. This is difficult to understand when it is considered that the same situation has been appUed for many years now to famiUes on income-geared rents, It is not new and it is not something which, to my knowledge, has caused family breakups in those 11000 poorer families. AU that is being done now is to extend that situation to better-off famUies. FinaUy, let me point out that the ALP has been misleading people on the real effect of the new scheme on rent levels. There have been many instances of people coming to the Housing Commission scared about high rents only to find out that, because of facts such as the taxation aUowance, they wiU not be facing the type of rent they have been led to believe.