SUPER TAX
Dear editor,
Many agree that the current tax system requires an overhaul to make it more equitable. All Australians are affected by the tax breaks and the benefits given to individuals and companies. The proposed modifications to superannuation tax are one example of the reforms that need to happen.
For example, the cost of adding dental care to Medicare would cost an estimated $13.63bn in the first year, according to the Parliamentary Budget Office. While the tax breaks given to the richest 10% on their superannuation balances (much of that will be the inheritance they leave) will cost the budget $22bn in 2025-2026, according to Treasury estimates.
Superannuation should not be about leaving an inheritance. Superannuation is designed to ensure that people can live comfortably in retirement. Inheritances are not a reason for tax concessions.
We need a debate on whether to include dental coverage in Medicare or offer tax breaks that allow some individuals to leave tax-free money to their children and other selective tax concessions.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers is convening an Economic Reform Roundtable in August to begin a national debate, and tax reform will undoubtedly be on the agenda.
The Labor government has turned the economy around, slowly but surely, in a measured and sensible manner. Governing is about managing the economy responsibly in the national interest while building economic resilience in the face of global uncertainty.
Robyn Deane,
Nambour.
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NEW ERA FOR POKIES
Dear editor,
I’ve been a member of licensed clubs for many years and enjoyed their services as community hubs. However, I’ve had qualms that my enjoyment has been subsidised by people who can least afford problem gambling losses on the pokies.
We know the resulting financial stress can lead to family breakdown, with kids doing without the essentials when addicted parents can’t hold down jobs, become depressed, frustrated, and violent, or convicted of fraud to feed their habit.
No amount of signage saying ‘gamble responsibly’ really makes a significant inroad into this major problem in our community.
There must be better pathways for our clubs to foster community connection, employ local staff, provide good value food, beverages, and entertainment, as well as make charitable contributions to local worthy causes by transitioning from a pokie-dependent business model.
Interstate, some clubs have moved to using their well-located land assets to build tourist accommodation, kindergartens, retirement and aged care facilities, plus desperately needed affordable housing through using these alternative revenue streams while doing public good.
To hasten the transition, the ACT Government has successfully trialled a voluntary scheme for clubs and pubs where they are paid $15,000 for each machine they withdraw and $20,000 per machine for eliminating them at their venue. Already, 300 gaming machines have been surrendered from across 28 venues, and two venues have gone completely pokie-free.
Looking to avoid pokie problems in newly developing areas, the ACT Government is cooperating with the clubs, encouraging them to set up in new estates on the understanding that machines will never be installed.
While the Queensland Government is raking in gambling taxes, there is an avenue for it to be courageous enough to reinvest in partnering with clubs and pubs willing to transition to alternative revenue streams.
Can we as a community go beyond moralistic tut-tutting and hypocritical handwringing to support politicians willing to create voluntary pathways to sustainable alternative business models, avoiding the tragic family fallout from pokie machine addiction?
Surely this is a better investment of our taxes than funding programs to try and pick up the pieces after the damage continues to be done, and spending millions on ineffective TV ads and token signage.
Garry Reynolds,
Peregian Springs.
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BULLYING
Dear editor,
Everyone knows how bullies work, having been bullied sometime in their lives. Bullies are cowards, with a sense of entitlement, to make other people pay for their insecurities, their inability to achieve personal status by legitimate means, and in competition with or envious of their targets. Bullies act with impunity, to impress peer groups, especially when victims are vulnerable, disempowered in positions of inferiority and isolated.
Bullies function covertly or overtly as domestic terrorists, found in corporations, government institutions, families, marriage and personal relationships, nations against nations, and religions manipulating their congregations with coercive control, with personal agendas of domination and absolute destruction of their victims. In Australia, with a multi-cultural population, opposing cultures can clash, physically and verbally. We have witnessed this publicly in the media without political intervention. No one is exempt.
Bullies negatively affect individual lives, undermining our society, requiring urgent investment in legal aid, drug and alcohol addictions, family counselling for mental illness, exacerbated by government inaction and political focus on broader issues.
Bullies prosper as bullies through political negligence, lack of interest, and an investment in victims. Cyberbullying can be secretive with devastating effects.
Victim blaming is common – “Look what you made me do!” Victims find leaving such personal unsafe warzones untenable, due to very limited societal support. Left unaddressed, bullying is undermining the stability of families, and children are growing up witnessing bullying as empowering.
Withdrawal of societal support by our various political institutions and a lack of will to deal with the enormous threat of bullying and ignorance come at a high price to our population. Generations of future victims can often repeat this undermining scenario to our detriment.
E. Rowe,
Marcoola.
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CHANGE?
Dear editor,
Whereas once the fear in childhood was the Boogieman used to control kids, nowadays the adult’s Boogieman is ‘Change’. Just asking which brave adults faced the Boogieman and changed the country, building aeroplanes, electricity grids, sewerage systems, the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge, etc?
Margaret Wilkie,
Peregian Beach.
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