"Dreaming of politicians who do the right thing…." Article by Steve Marsten

Well its Federal Budget week. This is when the Government of the day shares its plans to grow Australia’s economy with various tinkering of a very complicated tax system. The only time in the year when the National Treasurer takes the lime light away from the leaders of both sides of the political divide and becomes the centre of attention.

It got me thinking (or is it dreaming?) wouldn’t it be great if all our premiers actually met over a coffee and asked themselves…. What is the one big thing that we could do to improve the tax system within Australia? Something that would make things simpler, less invasive and fairer for all. Why not increase the GST to 12%? This would still be considerably lower then most of the OECD. Make it across everything bar Health Services and banking services. Now I may not make many friends with this suggestion and clearly not many politicians have the stomach to even consider it however we did vote to get it in once and we do need to talk about it.

The GST is considered the best tax reform ever made in this country. It spreads the tax burden fairly across the nation and provides states with an assured income. Further, we as consumers hold one very important key – it’s the right to spend or to save! We can actually choose whether we want to pay GST and how much we want to pay. Everyone in the country holds this right so to some extent, taxpayers can determine how much tax they want to pay.

The other advantage is that it would make the Governments of the day less likely to attack the hard earned savings of the Taxpayers who have worked hard to stow as much as they can into their superannuation without fear that the Government will take a second dip into these reserves.

…..and the premiers all agreed setting aside their political differences and the NSW premier rang Mr Abbott on his mobile and made the suggestion. Tony agreed and prepared the legislation immediately; and everyone with saved superannuation had a better nights sleep knowing that we have politicians that actually care about our Nations future! We can dream….. can’t we?

Contact Sothertons for your Budget Wrap email on sothertons@sothertonsgld.com.au or ring 4972 1300 to provide your email address to get the wrap.